Answers in Genesis founder Ken Ham is on a mission to make sure children never get brainwashed. (I know, I know… stay with me here.)

Instead of shutting his organization down — something that would actually help his cause — he’s going after 19-year-old Zack Kopplin, the student who’s a thorn in the side of Louisiana Creationists:

Kopplin is simply pushing an atheistic agenda driven by a belief in evolution and an unwillingness to think critically about the claims that underlie it. Obviously, Kopplin has not been taught critical thinking skills in these areas. He is a product of the system and cannot see that. … We’re now seeing this sort of claim more and more from evolutionists. They, like Kopplin, believe that if a student is taught or believes in biblical creation, he will never be able to understand or achieve anything in the realm of science. And yet, here at Answers in Genesis and the Creation Museum, we have a number of researchers on staff with earned PhDs in their respective fields of science. In reality, evolutionary ideas are not necessary to understanding and performing operational science. A biblical creationist can design and build a bus just as well as an evolutionist. Actually, a creationist may do it better if the evolutionist, acting consistently with his worldview, applies the principles of chance processes to the engineering of the bus!

There’s a lot more where that comes from… We’re not the brainwashers, YOU ARE! After all of it, Ham challenges the 19-year-old to a debate… kind of:

Would Kopplin, obviously an intelligent young man, consider a debate with one of our scientists to look at the question of whether God’s Word, starting in Genesis, is true? However, we suspect he will use the same rhetoric used by most evolutionists when responding to such an invitation, and claim creationists should not be debated because they are not “real scientists.”

First of all, Kopplin is a science advocate, not a scientist himself. Just as Ham isn’t willing to do the debate himself, pawning it off on one of his staffers instead, it makes little sense to have a debate on scientific ideas between two people who aren’t professionals.

Second, that said, Kopplin would still kick AiG’s ass.

Third, if Ham wants his staff to do battle with their intellectual equals, he needs to look much, much lower. Don’t go after a college kid. Find a first grader who just melted an ice cube.

Fourth, Creationists are not real scientists. So at least Ham got that part right.

This example should be a warning to parents. Kopplin is a product of the secular education system — a system that is also indoctrinating generations of children from church homes. We urge parents to recognize that their kids need to be rescued from this evil age.

This sort of linguistic manipulation isn’t new coming from Creationists. It’s not surprising that the same people who say we need to be tolerant of their intolerance when it comes to gays and lesbians would call educating kids about science “indoctrination” and “brainwashing.” (Plus, you can’t spell “brainwashing” without “AiG,” amirite?!)

Speaking of which, this is the cover of the latest issue of AiG’s quarterly magazine:

Apparently, those scientists at AiG are still trying to figure out how many animals were on Noah’s Ark. (Finding evidence of the Ark’s existence? Not on their priority list.) Also, those “7 Cs of History” can be seen here. They include Creation, Christ, Cross, and Confusion. (So they got at least one of them right.)

When it comes to educating children about science, I’m going to stand firmly on the side of the people who use multiple sources of evidence, from any number of fields, all of which converge onto the same principles, including that of evolution… not the side that believes a book within a book written thousands of years ago holds all the answers we will ever need.



