#492: Stephen Bennett

Stephen Bennett is the founder of Stephen Bennett Ministries, which reaches out to those wanting to leave the homosexual lifestyle. Bennett himself claims to have been “set free” himself a couple of years ago through the power of Christ. Accoringly, he pays ardent attention to the American Family Association’s call for boycotts of gay-friendly organizations, with sometimes puzzling results, such as here.

Apparently Bennett is “Emerging as One of the Nation's Key Speakers on the Issues of Homosexuality & the Homosexual Agenda” and, according to himself, he speaks the truth “in love”, because “in love” sounds better than the more accurate “hate and bigotry”. His take on the possibility of an HIV prevention pill displays his love clearly enough: “Why can't these intelligent scientists and doctors understand we need to educate people on abandoning their risky, unsafe sexual practices and behavior – not give them a pill to enable and encourage them?” Wouldn’t matter that it saves lives, in other words, when saving lifes might take the dangers away from living a sinful lifestyle.

Though “Stephen Bennett” is not an entirely uncommon name, I assume that the Stephen Bennett involved with Concerned Women for America is the same one.

Diagnosis: Another that kind of guy, who devotes his lack of insight and reason to bigotry and evil. Despite the blurb his actual impact is unknown, but he’s definitely a solid piece of mud in the landslide.

#151: Gary Glenn

The dishonest leader of the Michigan branch of the American Family Association (Bryan Fischer’s and Don Wildmon’s gang, who seeks to ban abortion, homosexuality and possibly even women’s voting rights), Gary Glenn is famous for lobbying for the banning of Gay/Straight Alliance groups in Michigan schools. He was also among the plaintiffs who recently filed a federal lawsuit claiming that the Matthew Shepard and James Byrd, Jr. Hate Crimes Prevention Act, passed in 2009, violated their religious freedom and freedom of speech rights (together with such charming fellows as Levon Yuille (to be covered later); René B. Ouellette, pastor of the First Baptist Church in Bridgeport, Michigan; and James Combs, pastor of four different churches in the state). The obviously ridiculous complaint (as usual backed by the insane fundamentalists of the Thomas More Law Center) was quickly dismissed.

Not only does Glenn hate gays, he is so thoroughly afraid of them that you’d suspect he might pull a Ted Haggard any day now.
Diagnosis: Perhaps Glenn is relatively insignificant – there are literally thousands and thousands of his kind out there. They are all loons, of course, and Glenn may very well serve as a representative for all of them.

#130: Bryan Fischer

Another big fish for our encyclopedia, up next is Bryan Fischer, the director of Issue Analysis for Government and Public Policy for The American Family Association. Now it is hard to keep these groups apart, but any organization with “Family” in their name is guaranteed to be, shall we say, over the top. AFA’s mission is to make homosexuality illegal, along with abortion, and possibly even women's voting rights. More information here (they have rather effective strategies, in particular targeting companies that have made statements or policies in favour of gay rights, advertised in gay publications or advertised during a commercial break in a TV show which they find objectionable. They call for members to bombard these companies with complaints, or boycott their products).

But turn to Fischer, an unrepentant theocrat who is known for wanting the government to force gays and lesbians into "reparative therapy" or prison (discussed here).

He has recently fallen out with Glenn Beck and Ann Coulter, since these are not sufficiently against gay marriage for his taste - they associate with organizations that want to destroy the American military and the institution of marriage.

Well, sometimes it seems that “ruining the military” isn’t the goal of the guys – rather, they want to take it over for their own nefarious purposes. Quote Bryan Fischer: “Homosexuality gave us Adolph Hitler, and homosexuals in the military gave us the Brown Shirts, the Nazi war machine and six million dead Jews. Gays in the military is an experiment that has been tried and found disastrously and tragically wanting. Maybe it's time for Congress to learn a lesson from history.” (Fischer actually bases his claims on a book by Scott Lively, who will be covered later).

He is apparently completely oblivious to the irony in this one.

Fischer received some flak when he blames a grizzly bear attack at Yellowstone National Park on America for turning their back on God: “History reveals that God's covenant with an ancient nation suggests that one of the consequences for a nation which walks in his statues is that it will have nothing to fear from wild animals”. He phrased the whole incident in a slightly peculiar manner.

The AFA has also called for an end to allowing Muslims to immigrate to the United States, for banning them from joining the military, and for a moratorium on all new mosque building in America.

He is also, unsurprisingly, a staunch creationist, and was formerly the head of the Idaho Values Alliance.

More on Fischer here (we’ve touched on just a small selection).

Diagnosis: Totally insane, vile and zealous, theocrat and Godbot, hatemonger and crackpot, loon, moron, dumbass, crank. You pick, they all fit. Yet he still seems to enjoy quite some influence. I can’t quite find words.

#41: Nancy Bryson

Bryson holds a Ph.D. in physical chemistry and was for a while a teacher at Mississippi University for Women.

Creationist (intelligent design) and witness for the minority at the Kansas evolution hearings (a general discussion of the hearings can be found here). Claims that she used to accept evolution, but that critical studies turned her around (yes, that canard). Currently a “creationist icon”.

Notorious for giving a presentation on creationism (mostly the argument from design and the unlikelihood of evolution since if there is no designer then evolution must be just random chance) at the university, “very warmly received by the students.” Afterwards, however, she was severely criticized by biologist professors and subsequently left the university (circumstances are unclear – her faculty evaluations were bad, and she claimed that she was harassed and realized she would never get tenure). Her story was picked up and publicized by the American Family Association and resulted in some outcry from fellow creationists. Bryson has subsequently achieved status as one of ID’s Expelled Martyrs. Currently she is used as one of the most notable examples of the discriminations (“hate crimes” against the religious, according to Jerry Bergman) against dissidents by “evolutionists”, and proof of the major “atheist and materialist conspiracy” that currently infests science.

During the Hearings, her story was by her supporters taken as evidence for the lack of academic freedom in that science curricula systematically exclude evidence for theism. By scientists her story was taken as evidence for incompetence and mixing religion with science. Bryson admits that her views on evolution is based on religion rather than science.

A discussion of Bryson’s role in the Hearings is here.

A sympathetic website, with links, is here.

This entry also indicts other witnesses for the minority, such as James Barham, an MD in classics and “independent scholar” who used to believe in evolution and materialism but who reasoned his way to Jesus and ID (surely a pattern of argumentation here). Christiancinema.com calls him a “Scholar and author specializing in evolutionary epistemology”. His basic argument is: “evolution leads to materialism and no meaning or purpose with life; God exists, and thus there is purpose; hence materialism is false, hence evolution is false” (yes, with the fallacy).