The culture wars are proceeding as expected, and Ben Stein’s reputation is following a predictable trajectory.
Popular character actor and mendacious old fool Ben Stein has a little movie coming out about how “BIG SCIENCE” doesn’t want you to know the truth about evolution. Stein salutes the scientists who are bad enough to question Darwinism in his upcoming documentary Expelled, about an unscrupulous Nixonite hack who parlays his unlikely pop cultural fame into an inexplicable career as an entertainer/propaganist. Rex Sorgatz asks, “do you remember when Ben Stein wasn’t bat shit crazy?” Actually, uh, not really.
Couldn’t happen to a nicer guy.
I think this movie may have the opposite effect to the one they were intending…
helping the cause of science.
It’ll get nothing but bad reviews.
Is there explosions? I chuffing LOVE explosions, me.
Although, when the explosions simply tear a straw man to shreds, it sort of loses it’s awe.
Poor, persecuted theists can’t get away with calling mythology science. Sniff, sniff…
As someone just cresting onto 40, I have to say that the only thing Ben Stein is actually ‘known’ for to my generation is Ferris Bueller and Visine commercials.
Yes, some of us do vaguely realize he was connected to Watergate, but I’d place good money that if you poll 45 and younger on the street you’d be lucky if 1 out of 20 good give you even a hint about Ben Stein and Watergate. I have a feeling even history will forget about this joker within the next 50 years.
Expelled? More like never entered the arena.
That was lovely.
go to Google Blogs, and search for: expelled…of the top five sites listed, one thought the movie sounded dumb, two thought it’s a great expose of academic intolerance, one was unclear to me, and the fifth was about some students being expelled from school.
It’ll get great reviews from its intended audience, and Stein will be a star to them.
@ #4,
Yep, this 38 year old pretty much has only known him for “Ferris” and now this crazy talk he’s been doing. He’ll be forgotten in a few.
If Stein is unable to get another job after Expelled, do you think he’ll blame a huge scientific conspiracy to shut him up?
Nevermind.
Can we start calling Ben Stein what he really is? A conspiracy theorist. He’s no different from moon landing deniers and Holocaust deniers.
** Check out **
Check out Tim Lambert’s blog and his Oreske’s video on global warming & cigarette smoking. The parrallels between what she discusses and the Discovery Institue are amazing. Very interesting stuff.
Here is a link:
http://scienceblogs.com/deltoid/2008/02/oreskes_on_the_american_denial.php?utm_source=mostactive&utm_medium=link
Sorry for typo’s above…
this just in the news today:
http://www.att.net/s/editorial.dll?pnum=1&bfromind=7401&eeid=5685832&_sitecat=1505&dcatid=0&eetype=article&render=y&ac=-2&ck=&ch=ne&rg=blsadstrgt
People may end up going to this movie expecting to see a comedy pseudo-documentary. And they wouldn’t be wrong.
Well his initials are BS.
Foolish people joke about GOD creating the world, even if that`s and obvious fact. On the judgement day, all will accept that, but then it will be too late. Read the Bible, the only book worth reading! The Bible is not JUST a history book, a roman, a poetry book. It`s not something that you read and throw away. It`s the Book. A book to apply to your life and practice daily. But no wonder the people today don`t know how to live and ruin they lives: they were never interested in what God says about life. And who could write better about life that it`s Creator? What’s really hilarious is an atheist trying to prove there is no God. :)
“What’s really hilarious is an atheist trying to prove there is no God. :)”
The burden of proof is on you.
“A book to apply to your life and practice daily.”
Really? I’ve been wondering how I should treat my slaves and sell my daughter, does this book have advice on that?
Le,
Perhaps if you pray hard enough, the LORD will cure you of your atrocious grammatical skills.
Foolish people come here to preach. Ar you earning your license? Is this the equivalent of preaching on college campuses?
What does your post have to do with BS, wait, wait don’t tell me.
le:
I’d like to “get to know you” in the biblical way.
It`s not something that you read and throw away.
Very true. There are many better books you should spend your time reading.
Expelled is bound to get at least one good review – after all, Michael Medved is now a DI Fellow.
le: Having your conclusion as one of the premises of your argument might be ok where you come from, where I come from however, it is not.
le: do you advocate killing kids who talk back to their parents? If not, you’re not doing a very good job of using the Bible as a guide for your daily life.
*sniff *sniff
I smell a troll.
I really can’t get over how sad it looks when Stein pretends that he’s going to get silenced somehow for making this movie.. like his life is in danger. Give me a break. oooh “BIG SCIENCE” is going to rub you out, Ben!!! Watch it!
Spurge @ 15 covered it.
Le,
I’ll see your fictional god and raise you by some reason. Show your cards.
Hmmmm… Where to start with le? Perhaps a joke about His Noodly Appendage? A comment about the quality of writing in the bible being on par with that of le’s comments?
I’ll settle for this: Le, have you read every single book? What were the last 10 that you read? Or is there not enough light where your head is currently to read anything?
Next stop for Ben Stein: regular columnist for WorldNut Daily.
This isn’t the only commentary on EXPELLED out there: Apparently it was screened at the Nuremberg Rally (excuse, me “CPAC” conference), and our intrepid undercover reporter Leonard Pierce from Sadly, No! has some thoughts on it (though I’d question his characterization of Dawkins a bit…):
Oh…he said BIG Science….
The delicious irony here is that BS has built his “reputation”, such as it is, among those who are unaware of his Watergate connections, on the notion that he is an extremely intelligent man (this was the entire premise behind “Win Ben Stein’s Money”). While Expelled will do little to convince anyone of the rightness of ID, it will do quite a lot to disabuse many of the rightness of BS’s reputation.
le said ” … people today don`t know how to live and ruin [their] lives …”
People today don’t know how to live and ruin their lives?
That’s silly. A lot of us know perfectly well how to live and ruin our lives.
For instance, I have friends who smoke.
Jusssst kidding.
Ben Stein is a multi-disaster idiot. He also writes a financial advice column seen on yahoo. He missed the subprime meltdown, the coming recession, and the ongoing stock market crash.
Anyone who took his financial column seriously is now out a lot of money.
He is just a bottom feeding troll, an energetic one working the fringes of politics, science, and business. Like Dembski, Coulter, and Behe.
I thought “Win Ben Stein’s Money” was an anti-Semitic jibe that Ben never understood. Win the arrogant, big nosed Jew’s money was the theme.
#4
Ben Stein actually did ads for Clear Eyes, not Visine, which shows how effective he is as a pitchman.
The Bible is not JUST a history book, a roman, a poetry book.
It’s a COOKBOOK!!
I for one live my life by the one true book. “Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell.” Have you accepted the Raven King into your life?
Yes indeed. I prefer the fiction which runs (ruins?) my life to at least be entertaining.
I dropped by a friend’s place while he, his girlfriend and a couple others were watching the last Lord of the Rings movie, which I’d never seen before, and somebody pointed out that many shots would be perfect for commercials. For example, that giant “Eye of Sauron” thingy would make a wonderful Clear Eyes commercial.
“For dry, flaming eyes. . .”
We spent the next ~40 minutes giving the movie an ad-themed MST3k treatment. It didn’t exactly inspire me to see the rest of the series (“End. Just fucking end, will you?”). I would like to see that Clear Eyes commercial, though.
Or if you have kids, you know he also voices fairies in “Fairly OddParents.”
CURSE YOU, INTERNET, FOR STEALING MY JOKE.
the unfortunate thing, though, Blake, is that Stein would definitely be working for Sauron. He’d probably be that metal-toothed spokesman guy whose head Aragorn removed from its body.
Hmmm… I guess that’s what we’d call a “bad Le.”
No?
I wonder if Le’s mom ever spanked him with a wet bible. If not, she probably should before he gets any older.
Ben Stein does not voice fairies, he voices pixies.
[/pedantry]
I hate to disagree with you Jennifer, but Ben Stein wasn’t that smart back when he was on Ben Stein’s Money: He was arrogant yes, but smart no. I heard him get terribly upset with Jimmy Kimmel on one show, when he insisted that he was correct even though he had given the wrong answer to a question about the Immaculate Conception. Ben thought it was Jesus’ conception and not his mom’s (Jesus’s mom, not Ben’s).
“he had given the wrong answer to a question about the Immaculate Conception. Ben thought it was Jesus’ conception and not his mom’s (Jesus’s mom, not Ben’s).”
I think I remember that episode.
It’s a common mistake, though embarrassing for an Ivy-leaguer.
Knowing the correct answer to this earns instant respect for me from practicing and former Catholics alike, who are astonished to find I was raised Presbyterian.
Just one of those pieces of cultural trivium it’s good to know, I guess.
I also knew Stein was a minor Nixon staffer who was emotionally distraught by Nixon’s resignation.
Most of his acting roles accentuate his being a monotone bore and total dork–obvious typecasting.
If anyone qualified has time, could they go to Captain Ed’s blog and beat those people up about the review of “Expelled”. It’s barfingly stupid. Thx.
http://www.captainsquartersblog.com/mt/archives/016920.php
Ben Stein is not Black Francis!
What’s really hilarious is an atheist trying to prove there is no God.
What’s really hilarious is a Christian who thinks s/he’s going to heaven.
Everyone knows the Nizari Ismailis are right and that we’re reincarnated after death. It’s obvious.
Hey, what happened to my italics for the quote?
More obvious proof of Allah’s benevolence, eh le?
Remember, it’s not too late for you to start reading the Qur’an.
I’m just a hop and a skip from 40, and while I’m almost ashamed now to say it…hubby and I LOVED Win Ben Stein’s Money. Until our first child was born, watching it was almost a nightly ritual, along with The Daily Show (anyone else remember Craig Kilborn?).
I love how these x-tian yahoos are commenting all over the Net: “God bless Ben Stein for leading people back to Jesus!”
Your bed, Ben. Lie in it. Without a nightlight.
They say that God loves us.
Love is such a tricky word.
Do the fattened cows tell each other that humans love them?
Why does no one come back from Heaven to tell us how great it is?
Maybe that’s better than the alternative.
windy wrote:
Mr. Chambers! Mr. Chambers…don’t get on that ship! The rest of the book, To Serve Man, it’s…it’s a cookbook!
Who should I stone first? Dobson? Hinn? Roberts? Haggard? Because they’re all heretics and I’m not going to waste my time on “teh gays”, the adulterous, people who wear cloth-lined leather coats, eat shellfish or any of the more common abominations.
Oh wait, my daughter mocked me for being bald. Like Elisha, I will set some bears on her and 41 of her friends.
Yezah! That’ll work for this weekend. Then I can see which heretic is closer and work from there…
Frack! This is the 3rd time today I’ve failed to close my blockquote properly… Damn broken finger!
I LOVE the trailer! It’s hilarious! The ego of the man!
Although, this is Saturday night/Sunday morning in sunny South Yorkshire and I am not long back from the pub. Maybe if I had a slightly lower blood alcohol concentration the trailer would have a more emetic effect.
Or perhaps with this.
Bottom-feeding carp that Stein is, he does continue to receive bookings:
On the other hand, after Expelled is revealed for the shrill scam that it is, plus Stein’s disastrous abilities at predicting the economy (add to that his yelling “Gestapo” re Larry Craig), I wonder how many bookings he’ll have a year from now. He has already played the martyr, saying that he’s lost opportunities over this film.
Of course he’ll be claiming persecution for being ratted out as a ranter and all-around theocratic bigot. Yeah, yeah, just like ol’ David Duke, he’s being picked on for stupidity and lies. Learn to deal with it, Stein, even Duke has never played the martyr card like you have.
Glen D
http://tinyurl.com/2kxyc7
Stein makes for a rather odd Xian missionary. I wonder how much he got paid for “Expelled”? The going rate used to be 30 pieces of silver.
Shelley @ 45:
Good luck with CaptainsQuarters. It is usually that barfingly stupid, just about different topics.
Hmm I of course sympathize with the review, but that gawker site, if I’m not mistaken, is kinda creepy too. I am glad that at least the creationists are too stupid even for those gossip sites.
Re CaptainsQuarters, I attempted to post this:
As of now, I can’t see it, hence my posting of these comments here. I realize that it may be posted later, but can’t count on that hope.
Glen D
http://tinyurl.com/2kxyc7
Anyway, the Captains Quarters, Ed Morrissey, just shows what we’re up against with this movie. The guy seems to accept evolution, to find it to be compatible with his religion, and yet he swallows the film’s BS about an atheist cabal out to prevent any questioning of “Darwinism.” How does that even jibe with his own theistic evolutionary beliefs, since at the very least evolution isn’t evidence that there is no God, and he knows it?
He even thinks that the photos of the Berlin wall are effective, despite the fact that the USSR–and no doubt many of its satellites followed its lead on this during Stalin’s time–was against the reigning neo-Darwinist synthesis during the mid 20th century. Ed thinks he’s smart enough not to believe the propaganda about the “Nazi connection” to “Darwinism,” then falls for a communist link which for a time mirrored Ruloff’s opposition to science.
I really don’t doubt that by far the most reviewers of this movie will pan it as anti-science junk. But lazy and/or stupid bloggers like Ed (he could have found reams of information about how wrong Expelled is on the web, if he had the intelligence and/or will to discover truth) will continue to fall for the most brazen propaganda. And however lazy or stupid he may be, I’ll wager that there are plenty who are his equal in swallowing BS, without even choking on its taste.
Glen D
http://tinyurl.com/2kxyc7
“I love how these x-tian yahoos are commenting all over the Net: “God bless Ben Stein for leading people back to Jesus!” ”
Apparently Moses, Prince of Egypt is a Christian movie.
I wonder how Steven Spielberg, Jeffrey Katzenberg, and David Geffen feel about that.
Dkew @ 62:
I only go there to see what the other side is up to. And yes, the site is unimpressive but far from the worst of the R blogs.
Shelley,
Of course, you are right to keep an eye on the other side. “Barfingly stupid” stupid writers may learn, while “batshit insane” writers can’t. And CaptainsQuarters allows at least some criticism.
“Stein salutes the scientists who are bad enough to question Darwinism…”
What an astonishing statement. A scientist who dares question “Darwinism” is, by definition, a bad scientist? That’s the kind of ant-science thinking that makes a movie like this necessary. And if the theory is so secure that it’s bad to question it, I wonder if any of you can tell me how the first life came about, and what’s the scientific proof for however you think it happened?
Uh, scott, that’s abiogenesis you’re talking about. Not evolution or “Darwinism”. Youy completely missed the point on the bad scientists remark too it seems, the reason they’re bad is not because they criticised a well-established and incredibly well supported theory, but becasue they did it on such ludicrously precarious grounds that undergraduates can destroy their arguments with ease, and do so regularly.
“Questioning” is not what is happening. What the “bad” scientists are doing is utterly rejecting the theory of natural selection, and asserting that a supernatural untestable agent can effect biological change, and that this idea of a supernatural agent, which is not even a potentially testable hypothesis, let alone an evidence-supported scientific theory, be taught alongside the actual scientific theory of natural selection.
That is indeed bad science, since it isn’t science at all.
Science cannot tell how life did come about, since we don’t have time machines. However, we can examine the palaeontological evidence to determine what sort of chemical reactions took place billions of years ago (leaving its mark in the geological strata), and study complex organic chemical reactions, and hypothetically offer a testable model of how life can arise.
Since no-one else has any better idea, that’s going to be the best answer that can ever be hoped for — unless someone does build a time machine, in which case the question might well answer itself.
Whoa… what if the person from the future who went back sneezed and was the one who started life? There you go, a better theory than ID.