The proverbial light of an angry, grief-stricken, homosexual-hating God once again shines on The Westboro Baptist Church, this time in the way of Kansas Board of Education candidate Jack Wu. Although not an official member of the Topeka, Kan. based church, Wu attends the church religiously. For those of you who may not know, The Westboro Baptist Church has become infamous in recent years for their overt, shameless display of God-fearing, homophobic, ultra conservative send offs from a wrathful God who supposedly hates (nearly) all mankind. Also referred to colloquially as just the “Phelps clan,” this marauding gang of hate-mongers will attend the funerals of deceased military personnel and AIDS victims with such signs as “thank God for IEDs,” and “AIDS cures fags.”
Wu, whose website states “fell victim to the lies of his evil teachers and thought evolution was real science for a time,” plans to “make a difference in this evil city of Topeka and this perverse state of Kansas.” That was verbatim mind you, also [sic] if you read the entirety of his website; apparently he didn’t agree with his English teachers either. All insults aside, his plan, should he be elected, is to rid the current public school curriculum of the teaching of evolution and the abolishment of “funding for evolution textbooks.” Do those exist? According to Wu, once again from his website, “The very bad teachers that teach that men descended from apes via evolution need to have their teaching licenses revoked.”
Does this mean that there will be a Joseph McCarthy ‘list of names’ for teachers who teach evolution and thereby will be fired? Does he plan to re-hire only ‘qualified’ teachers for every single school district in Kansas? Does he think that replacing science textbooks with Bibles will really go over well with the scientific community? Even if he is elected, his “plan” is not at all feasible, let alone a series of cohesive steps that would effectively rework the public school curriculum in Kansas.
Not only does Wu suggest that we rid the curriculum of evolution, but that Bibles be placed in the hands of children in place of his so-called “evolution textbooks.” This should sound familiar to us, even redundant, considering the amount of debate these issues have gone through (Abington School District v. Schempp, Epperson v. Arkansas, Crowley v. Smithsonian Institution, etc.). Each time it has proved perfectly lawful to teach evolution in a public school, and unlawful to force students to participate in any religious act(s) while at said school. Perhaps Mr. Wu needs a lesson on the U.S. Supreme Court, and the history of the separation of church and state in general.
Wu’s views are not popular by any means, and seem to only perpetuate his likelihood of not getting elected. Especially considering that we live in an age where tolerance is a virtue, and no one, save for the WBC crew, believes that God is a soldier-killing fire breather who seeks to destroy mankind because of their wrong doings. Let me say here that I am not trying to impede upon or otherwise invalidate the first amendment rights of Wu or his fellow WBC members, but merely stating that he might invest in hiring a statistical analyst so that he doesn’t embarrass himself any longer with this pathetic excuse for a political campaign.
Albeit a good reason to believe that literally anyone can run for public office regardless of intellect, motive or morality, I still think that Jack Wu should not be elected for Kansas Board of Education. Vague generalization, hasty name calling, religious motivations and a hate mongering, apocalyptic attitude are all that Jack Wu seems to be offering at this point, and I can bet that our science teachers here at Northwest probably won’t be voting for him in the upcoming election.
