Right-wing Anti-Science Threat

A century ago an influential man convinced the leader of great nation that his pseudo-scientific notions about agriculture were valid and used his influence to reject the findings of thousands of biologists. That nation outlawed teaching genetics and Darwinian evolution and disallowed plant hybridization which then led to the starvation of millions as crop yields projected by the pseudo-science purveyor failed to materialize. When the nation’s leader finally lost power the country was decades behind other competing nations in biological sciences and continued to have trouble feeding its population for decades more. The country was the Soviet Union, the political leader was Joseph Stalin, and the pseudo-science advocate was Trofim Lysenko.

In the U.S., over the past decade similar anti-science attitudes have taken over an influential group of politicians and their supporters. The clearest example of it is the current pandemic during which we’ve seen Republicans denigrate those who wear masks in public as unnecessary regardless of the public health science showing wearing masks reduces the spread of COVID-19. Our Governor prohibited cities from enforcing mask requirements. The previous White House occupant even claimed that the pandemic was a hoax and it would go away after the election.

In the United States, more than 565,000 deaths have been attributed to COVID-19, research results released at a Brookings Institute conference indicates 250,000 of those deaths were avoidable if by last May the country had adopted widespread mask, social distancing, and testing protocols while awaiting a vaccine, estimated Andrew Atkeson, economics professor at University of California, Los Angeles.

Recent polling shows that 42% of Republicans say they will definitely not get any of the COVID-19 vaccinations. The percentage hasn’t changed in months and recent concerns about the safety of the Johnson & Johnson vaccine have had no impact. For months conspiracy theorists have been claiming that Microsoft founder Bill Gates has worked behind the scenes to see to it that a microchip is injected into everyone when they are vaccinated. We’re not talking about a handful of loons, there are thousands of believers showing up at protests. They offer no evidence to support their ridiculous claims yet their movement grows.

I guess none of us should be all that surprised at any of this as Republicans have been taking anti-science positions on global climate change for decades but at least on that topic we could see that it was largely due to the influence of corporate campaign donations. In the case of the pandemic it seems to simply be a way to activate Republican tribal behavior as a goal unto itself rather than as part of a specific policy goal.

It seems as if anti-science attitudes have joined with guns and bible thumping as part of the identifiers for being a good Republican. It hasn’t always been this way as the National Academy of Sciences was founded under Abraham Lincoln and NASA was founded by the Eisenhower administration.

These right-wing anti-science views are not exclusive to the United States, in fact such idiocy has spread across Europe. If it were just about COVID-19 vaccines I’d says just let the fools die off but it’s not. It plays into the more important issue of fighting global climate change and that is an existential threat that will impact future generations and cause untold suffering if we allow the right to control national policy again while they are still in the grasp of insanity.

Published in the Seguin Gazette - April 21, 2021