AND you thought it could happen only in America! Think again. Britain looks like getting its own
creationism adventure park, where kids can be indoctrinated into the idea that Earth is about six thousand years old and man and the dinosaurs coexisted. According to today’s Observer, “The 5,000-capacity park will be the first of its kind in Britain, but not in the world.”
No, there are some in the USA, including the Holy Land Experience in Florida, and Dinosaur Adventure Land, also in Florida, where God is “given the glory for His creation”.
We can perhaps take as read what that is supposed to mean.
This “giant Christian theme park”, says the Observer, “will champion the book of Genesis and make a multi-media case that God created the world in seven days”.
Gosh! And this is Lancashire, where we thought folk had more sense.
The project “will boast two interactive cinemas, a cafeteria, six shops and a television recording studio, allowing it to produce its own Christian-themed films and documentaries”. The story continues:
The AH Trust, a charity set up last year by a group of businessmen alarmed by the direction in which they see society heading, has identified a number of potential sites in the north west of England to build the Β£3.5m Christian theme park.
. . .
By producing its own films, the trust believes it will be able to provide an antidote to modern culture. It says on its website: “On television today there is so much sex and violence, it is no wonder our youth are binge drinking . . . This is a revolutionary scheme requiring innovative people with the vision to bring about change and a new direction.”
Oh, but of course: telling kids the world was created in six days and the Creator rested on the seventh (all-powerful but needed a lie-down and a nice cuppa) will stop binge drinking and antisocial behaviour? And get those buzz words and phrases: revolutionary, innovative people, vision, change, a new direction. Dizzying, isn’t it?
The trust is not saying who the backers are, but the name of Peter Vardy is in the frame β he of religious “academies” that similiarly seek to lie to children. It says it is “talking to a number of businessmen who have invested in city academies, leading to speculation that it may have approached Sir Peter Vardy, who has given millions of pounds to advance the claims of creationism β the belief that God created the world and that Darwin’s theory of evolution is wrong”.
Best theory we have to date, guys, but, hey, don’t let us spoil your fun. However, the idea does start to get worrying, as the Observer story says:
The trust also says it plans to apply for government grants and European funding to help it realise its dream of turning the television studio into “an international leader in promoting family-oriented Christian programmes”.
So religion β “family-oriented” religion, to boot β in the form of big business hiding behind a trust, with all the tax breaks and charity privileges that status can bestow on it, will be going cap in hand to the taxpayer. Perhaps it should take a leaf out of Dinosaur Adventure Land’s book, and indulge in a bit of daylight robbery. Here’s a quotation from its website:
During this three-hour party [held in November] you will have the opportunity to experience a taste of the future β an exciting new maze! Sponsor a section of the maze for $25.00 and receive a dinosaur pin. Sponsor four or more and select an additional free gift. Not able to come, but still want to donate to the maze? Just call (850) 478-3466. Pizza and drinks will be available to purchase at mealtime.
Not happy with wanting to twist kids’ minds, they want to rob them of their pocket money. A pin badge for twenty-five bucks! Wow! And you can have pizza β at a price. And they’ve already paid a few dollars to get in, one assumes, and the park is run by people far richer than the kids are.
Here’s some more eye-popping stuff:
Be prepared to be challenged to think and to follow the Lord in the way God the Creator has planned for you. If you do not know your Creator, we will be overjoyed to introduce you to Him.
Our funny and experienced guides will lead your family or group on the tour, declaring the works of the Lord and the words of the Lord.
DAL is not an amusement park, for βamuseβ means βto not think,β and we want people to think. Rather, it is an amazement park. Come and stand amazed at the truths of the Creator and Savior of the world, Jesus Christ.
Jesus Christ! So this is a taste of what is in store for England’s green and pleasant land. Perhaps God wasn’t putting his feet up after all on the seventh day. Perhaps that’s when he created pillocks.
7 Comments
Can you please tell me just who is to be allowed freedom of thought? Apparently not anyone who you disagree with, or “pillocks” as I beleive they are known. By all means think freely, but for your own sake try to keep an open mind, cultivate some humility and a little respect.
Martin, you are confused. Where did you get the idea that pillocks should not be “allowed” freedom of thought? That is certainly not the stance of The Freethinker, and I can see nothing in this article which suggests otherwise.
On the contrary, pillocks are at liberty to espouse and propagate their pillocky opinions, provided they do so at their own expense. That is as it should be.
But if they start demanding public money to do so, then they will quite rightly find their pillock-brained ideas in the firing line.
As the evolution/creation “debate” was pretty much settled over a century ago, and the evidence for evolution has accumulated exponentially since then, you would certainly have to be a pillock to continue to espouse the “talking snake hypothesis” of human origins.
And who but a pillock would insist that the opinions of a pillock deserve respect?
Unfortunately it is not new in England. New on that sort of scale, sure, but we already have Noah’s Ark Zoo Farm. http://www.noahsarkzoofarm.co.uk/
Looks like a fairly innocuous petting zoo type place, but several parents have got caught out only realising their religious extremism once arriving at the park. Even the website looks “normal” until you click the education tab and scan down the headings on the left.
Actually, I have no problems with the existence of such places, or of specialist children’s programs (on dedicated god channels). What I SERIOUSLY object to is them not declaring it openly and making it out to be “educational” particularly referencing science curriculum material. I would be extremely unhappy if my child’s school took them on a daytrip to that zoo under the guise of an educational visit.
I should point out that Kent E Hovind, aka Dr Dino, β the founder of Dinosaur Adventure Land β is a FRAUD in the fullest sense of the word.
He is currently serving a ten-year jail sentence in South Carolina, for 58 tax offences, obstructing federal agents and related charges. He was convicted in January, 2007.
His wife Jo is serving a one-year prison term for related fraud offences.
An American Young Earth creationist, who became a born-again Christian at the Age of 15, he is most famous for creation science seminars, which aim to convince listeners to believe in biblical creation and to reject evolution.
In 2001 Hovind started Dinosaur Adventure Land, a young earth creationist theme park located behind Hovind’s home in Pensacola, Florida. The park depicts humans and dinosaurs co-existing in the last 4,000-6,000 years and also contains a depiction of the Loch Ness monster.
In 2004 the Committee for Skeptical Inquiry visited Hovind’s dinosaur theme park and said that the park was deceptive and purposely misled visitors
The Southern Poverty Law Centre noted the park also “claims that a few small dinosaurs still roam the planet.β
Hovind once allowed himself to be interviewed on TV by Ali G, played by comedian Sacha Baron Cohen. He was less than amused to be told by Ali G that, because he ate bananas, he was clearly descended from monkeys. You can see the video at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FjKMhtyI3L8
And you can read more of the Hovind saga at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kent_Hovind
I don’t make a habit of commenting on my own posts, and won’t be doing so here or taking issue with any of the comments so far; but I just had to share this with you, since I was prompted to look at the AH Trust website and mosey around, having read Barry Duke’s comments above. Those who prefer their English at least semiliterate will find it a hoot.
And take at look at their so-called “annual report”, which doesn’t read like an annual report so much as a rant (note that this will open as a Word document, not HTML). You’ll notice in the so-called comments that have been culled from a so-called survey that there are similar punctuational and grammatical errors and stylistic infelicities that really make you think they were all written by the same person. It’s a hoot. Get the wonderful ellipsis on “it is no wonder our youth are binge drinking………………this is a revolutionary scheme”. Yes, eighteen dots for an ellipsis that requires only three. Delight in the many spaces between sentences (often between words within a sentence), and be enraptured by the syntactical disagreements between sentence elements (perhaps English isn’t the first language of the writer, in which case perhaps they should have got an English writer to write the copy, since, like, er, it’s in English; but it is “signed” by a trustee called Peter Jones, CEng, BSc, and CEng (or chartered engineer) is, as far as I can make out, a British qualification, though I may be wrong).
And to think they are setting themselves up as some sort of educational facility β not that they’re claiming to be teaching English, I know, but their lack of proficiency in the basics makes you wonder how fit they would be to pass on knowledge of any description. Perhaps, I thought optimistically, this will show them up and their “science” will fall with their crummy English in people’s minds; but, then again, mused I, standards are so crap generally these days that few will notice the difference.
I took a peek at their entry on the register of charities (no.1113917) and note something else interesting. Their entry gives a possibly now defunct website ( ‘christianassembly.co.uk’ ). If you look for ‘Christian Assembly’ on the charities website you’ll find charities linked to the Assemblies of God cult. Incidentally ‘Assembly Hall’ ( they were originally ‘The Assembly Hall Trust)seems to be a name favoured by charities linked to the Jehovah’s Witnesses, so these guys seem to be covering all the bases!
thankyou
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