You surely know by now about it. Prof. Paul Mirecki of KU was slated to teach a class in comparative religion called “Special Topics in Religion: Intelligent Design, Creationism and Other Religious Mythologies”. He later fired off a posting to a message board, which said:
“The fundies want it all taught in a science class,” Mirecki wrote, “but this will be a nice slap in their big fat face by teaching it as a religious studies class under the category ‘mythology.’
On Monday, Prof. Mirecki apologized for these remarks:
KU on Monday released a written statement by Mirecki, chairman of KU’s religious studies department. In the statement, Mirecki said his e-mail was ill-advised.
“My words were offensive, and I apologize to all for that,” he said.
In my perfect world (which I would rule with an iron fist, thank you very much), this would be a non-story starting now.
Prof. Mirecki clearly titled his course that way out of spite, and whatever his views of his critics, perhaps a public message board was not the best place to air them. Prof. Mirecki has a public role to play as educator, researcher, and presenter of information to his students. He should have known that the Kay O’Connors and Susan Wagles of the world — busybodies who are perpetually looking to be aggrieved — would be looking for an excuse to hammer him, as well as being needlessly offensive to those who might be otherwise indifferent or even sympathetic to him.
And we’ll stop to point out the hypocrisy of Rep. Brenda Landwehr:
“The integrity of university is in question right now,” said Rep. Brenda Landwehr, R-Wichita, and vice-chairwoman of the House appropriations committee. “He’s only apologizing for getting caught. He’s not apologizing for his behavior.”
Landwehr said she wants Mirecki and KU Chancellor Robert Hemenway to appear before the appropriations committee to answer questions about the course.
“I don’t want to make a judgment without giving an opportunity for these individuals to respond to us,” she said.
Amazing. To do something in the first sentence that you say you won’t do in your last. Maybe Kansas schools have failed.
It’s an election year now, so I expect these sorts of things to keep happening as it gets closer to next November. They’ll all, left and right, OD on money and exposure until then, and then we’ll have a brief moment of relative peace before we do it all again.
Anyway, congratulations, Prof. Mirecki. You’re a tone-deaf dope. As punishment, I shall snicker in your general direction.
NOTE: For entertainment purposes, read through the open comments on the J-World piece I’ve linked. The thoughts of the paranoid and odiferous Massachusetts Street-pounders will make you laugh out loud. The level of paranoia — both by tin-foilers barking about “fundies” and “Talibaptists” and by the religious types about “libruls” and atheists — is astounding. One commenter in the whole lot makes the most sense of how I feel about this story:
What really gets me about our country is, there are scores of people, more growing up every day, who would love to make a name for themselves by blowing up major U.S. cities.
They could settle this entire debate for us in a radioactive instant, and yet our politicians are focusing on interviewing some college professor with bad email manners.
At least all of this is well preserved on tape backup for future generations -
And God help us for that.
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