Embedded Files
( - previous issue - )
Subject line:
AR 14:17 - The onward march of “Generation Me”
In this issue:
CULTURE - from parents indulging kids to pastors indulging their flock, more of us are growing certain that "It's all about me"
ISLAM - milking current climate of political correctness, pro-Muslim group tries to slant textbooks
ORIGINS - Fazale Rana takes Behe's argument "a step further"
Apologia Report 14:17
May 7, 2009
CULTURE
"Generation Me" by Raina Kelley -- the author opens by saying: "I shudder to think what a monster I would have become in the modern child-rearing era. Gorged on a diet of grade inflation, constant praise and materialistic entitlement, I probably would have succumbed to a life of heedless self-indulgence. ...
"Jean Twenge and W. Keith Campbell point out in their excellent book The Narcissism Epidemic [3], released last week, we've built up the confidence of our kids, but in that process, we've created a generation of hot-house flowers puffed with a disproportionate sense of self-worth (the definition of narcissism) and without the resiliency skills they need when Mommy and Daddy can't fix something. ...
"The fact that nearly 10 percent of 20-somethings have already experienced symptoms of narcissistic personality disorder, compared with just over 3 percent of the 65-and-over set? Not surprising. That 30 percent of college students agree with the statement: 'If I show up to every class, I deserve at least a B'?"
Where does such behavior lead us? Kelley believes it will be "failed marriages, abusive working environments and billion-dollar Ponzi schemes. Seems that the flip side of all that confidence isn't prodigious success but antisocial behavior.
"Armed with a steady influx of trophies just for showing up, 'I Am Special' coloring books and princess parties, it is hard for kids to understand why an abundance of ego might be bad for them. ...
"But no matter how you were raised, the handiest cure for narcissism used to be life. Whether through fate, circumstances or moral imperative, our culture kept hubris in check. Now, we encourage it. Pastors preach of a Jesus that wants us to be rich." Newsweek, Apr 27 '09, n.p.
"The Praise Craze" by Dana Mack -- in which she reviews The Parents We Mean to Be, by Richard Weissbourd [4] and Free-Range Kids, by Lenore Skenazy [5], observing that "Parents have abandoned the 'moral task' of rearing children, she says, and are more concerned about fostering their happiness than their goodness. Therapeutic interaction takes precedence over moral instruction; intimacy is maintained at the cost of authority."
"Blaming peers and popular culture lets adults off the hook," writes Weissbourd. "The parent-child relationship is at the center of the development of all the most important moral qualities, including honesty, kindness, loyalty, generosity, a commitment to justice, the capacity to think through moral dilemmas, and the ability to sacrifice for important principles." Weissbourd notes as well that "Though some violent children have high self-esteem, the self that is being esteemed is immature, incapable of empathy."
Mack opines that "As a psychologist, Mr. Weissbourd is at his best when he analyzes the all too familiar phenomenon of the overzealous sports parent." On the other hand, she asserts that his anecdotally driven methodology "does not inspire confidence." Wall Street Journal, Apr 24 '09, pW12,
---
ISLAM
"What are US students learning about Islam? Politically correct textbooks are distorting key concepts and historical facts" by Gary Bauer, president of American Values [1] -- "In his 2008 study 'Islam in the Classroom: what the textbooks tell us,' [2] Gilbert Sewall, director of the American Textbook Council (ATC), reviewed 10 of the nation's most widely used junior and senior high school history textbooks. ...
"Sewall found that many textbooks gloss over or delete important facts. For example, in the 1990s, 'jihad' - which has many meanings, among them 'sacred' or 'holy' struggle but also 'holy war' - was defined in the Houghton Mifflin junior high school book [not further identified here by Bauer] only as a struggle 'to do one's best to resist temptation and overcome evil.' ...
"ATC notes, 'by 2005, Houghton Mifflin apparently had removed jihad from its entire series of social studies textbooks.'
"In discussing sharia law, the Islamic code that can be used to subjugate women and deal death to wayward believers, many textbooks are intentionally vague. Holt Rinehart Winston's 2006 Medieval to Early Modern Times [6] junior high textbook states simply, '[Sharia] sets rewards for good behavior and punishments for crimes.' Another popular history textbook states, 'Muslim law requires that Muslim leaders offer religious toleration.'
"Descriptions of Islam since 9/11 are particularly disturbing. Though Islamic extremism has become a fact of life throughout much of the world, most of the reviewed textbooks suggest instead that poverty, ignorance, and the existence of Israel are at the root of terrorism. ...
"The whitewashing of Islam becomes even more noticeable when contrasted with how history textbooks treat Christianity. One book describes the Crusades as 'religious wars launched against Muslims by European Christians.' But when Muslims attacked Christians and took their land, the process is referred to as 'building' an empire.
"A McDougal Littell volume claims that non-Muslims in Muslim-ruled territories converted to Islam because 'they were attracted by Islam's message of equality and hope for salvation.' A good history class should teach students to ask critical questions. Are students asking how much of that 'conversion' was coerced by the sword? ...
"Sewall says the pressure tactics used by some Muslim groups on publishers to portray Islam in a favorable light amount to a kind of 'cultural jihad.' This essentially is what the founder of the Council on Islamic Education, the main Islamic group for vetting textbooks in America, was saying when he described his work as a 'bloodless revolution ... inside American junior high and high school classrooms.'" Christian Science Monitor, Apr 22 '09, n.p.
---
ORIGINS
The Cell's Design: How Chemistry Reveals the Creator's Artistry, by Fazale Rana [7] -- reviewer Mary L. Vanden Berg explains that "Following in the footsteps of Michael Behe's Darwin's Black Box [8], originally published in 1996, Fazale Rana argues the case for intelligent design from the point of view of biochemistry.
"Rana begins by not only defending his use of analogical reasoning to support the existence of a Creator, but also by outlining the proper parameters of analogical reasoning. His overall argument is that because humans are made in the image of God, there should be some similarity between humanly crafted systems and divinely crafted systems [i.e.,] the work of an intelligent agent, a divine artist. Rana notes that while his argument uses the familiar concept of irreducible complexity, rather than simply asserting that evolutionary processes cannot generate complex systems, as Behe does, Rana takes the argument a step further and contends that 'irreducible complexity - a property that frequently characterizes humanly designed systems - is one of the indicators of intelligent design because such specified complexity results from forethought and planning.' In other words, it shows a pattern that can be recognized as purposeful. A demonstration of this sort of purposeful design in biochemical systems at the cellular level forms the majority of the book."
If you are unfamiliar with the terminology of cellular biology, you may find Rana's technical descriptions hard to follow. Vanden Berg adds that "Rana provides an excellent glossary of terms as well as numerous illustrations, but with over two-hundred pages of biochemical language and descriptions, the average reader might get bogged down. Nonetheless, for those willing to take their time and work through language and concepts that may be unfamiliar to them, this book offers an awe-inspiring glimpse into the intricacies of cell biology and compelling evidence for purposeful design in biochemical systems." Calvin Theological Journal, 44:1 - 2009, pp178-180. [9]
Rana serves with Reasons to Believe, <www.reasons.org>.
--------
Sources, Digital:
1 - <www.ouramericanvalues.org>
2 - <www.historytextbooks.org/islam.htm>
-------
Sources, Monographs:
3 - The Narcissism Epidemic: Living in the Age of Entitlement, by Jean Twenge and W. Keith Campbell (Free Press, 2009, hardcover, 352 pages) <www.tinyurl.com/cgou5k>
4 - The Parents We Mean to Be: How Well-Intentioned Adults Undermine Children's Moral and Emotional Development, by Richard Weissbourd (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2009, hardcover, 241 pages) <www.tinyurl.com/dygbac>
5 - Free-Range Kids: Giving Our Children the Freedom We Had Without Going Nuts with Worry, by Lenore Skenazy (Jossey-Bass, 2009, hardcover, 225 pages) <www.tinyurl.com/c9y3cq>
6 - Medieval to Early Modern Times (Holt, 2006, paperback, 93 pages) <www.tinyurl.com/d3ytsy>
7 - The Cell's Design: How Chemistry Reveals the Creator's Artistry, by Fazale Rana (Baker, 2008, paperback, 336 pages) <www.tinyurl.com/dglsl4>
8 - Darwin's Black Box: The Biochemical Challenge to Evolution, by Michael Behe (Free Press, 1998, paperback, 320 pages) <www.tinyurl.com/d2c3re>
( - next issue - )
Page updated
Google Sites
Report abuse