We’ll let Noah Carl tell it:
The Western world appears to be in the midst of a “woke” Cultural Revolution. Historical monuments are being toppled, popular authors are being denounced for saying “sex is real,” and corporations are rushing to pledge fealty. A question that naturally arises at the beginning of any such period of upheaval is, “Who will survive the purge, and who won’t?” I fear that even Charles Darwin might not be safe.
Activists with a penchant for iconoclasm have set their sights not only on monarchs, imperialists and slave traders, but on scientists too. Earlier this year, University College London published the final report of its “Inquiry into the History of Eugenics at UCL.” Among the report’s recommendations were that the Pearson Building, the Galton Chair and the Galton Lecture Theatre “should lose their current names as soon as possible (de-named).”
Noah Carl” I’m a sociologist who got canceled – and I fear CHARLES DARWIN might not survive this purge of science & history” at RT
Statistician Ronald Fisher is a target too.
Carl admits that “Up until now, Darwin has been considered something of a hero on the political left, due to the religious right’s opposition to the teaching of evolution in schools (or at least, their insistence that one should“teach the controversy” that supposedly surrounds evolution and creationism)” and that “Darwin’s writings contain ample statements that would put him far beyond the pale of what is now considered acceptable.”
In short, all that dynamite (Darwin’s racism) was lying around, just waiting for someone to find it and make an issue of it—but the Darwinians didn’t want to deal with it themselves in case doing so complicated their culture war? Darwinism’s likely on the wane now for unrelated reasons but not many people are going to miss this part of the story.
Hat tip: Robert F. Shedinger, author of The Mystery of Evolutionary Mechanisms: Darwinian Biology’s Grand Narrative of Triumph and the Subversion of Religion
Note” Carl is not the only one to be worried. Jerry “Why Evolution Is True” Coyne is thinking along similar lines.
The thing to see here, perhaps, is that “disappearing” people is a mistake because the underlying assumption is that no one would develop bad ideas if we could just protect them from hearing them. Nope. Bad ideas are not viruses. They need to be heard and opposed.