Docgrubb’s Weblog

Fair Weather Darwinists December 2, 2009

[  Yes, I know...I'm talking about bumper stickers again.  (Well, not exactly: see below.)  I should re-name this blog, "bumpercipher" or whatever.  I suppose my attraction thereto is simply that bumper stickers cut to the chase, without all the fru fru.  You could talk to a new acquaintance for an hour and not have a clue, yet see in an instant what he really thinks and cares about by glancing at the rear-end of his Toyota.  So here goes....]

Not too awfully long ago, commuting to work, I spied on a car one of those metallic appliques with the word “Darwin” encased by the Christian fish symbol, newly fitted with amphibious feet.  These were quite popular in the ’90′s, and apparently are still in production.  This particular one was affixed to a shiney new Chrysler PT Cruiser driven by a well-groomed young lady.  She was either alone or with a child, and dutifully using her turn signal at the traffic light.  I soon lost sight of her, but could not shed the discordance over the scene then germinating in my mind. 

Full-grown, that discordance accused her of either hypocrisy, unreflectiveness, or ignorance.   Was she celebrating natural selection?  Would she welcome living under an active natural selection applied to her personally?  Even if her husband/man could accompany her without failure, would she relish the constant fear of him being overpowered by the inevitable bigger man, leaving her to be raped, possibly enslaved, or have the Cruiser commandeered?  In other words, would she welcome survival-of-the-fittest, with brute force the rule and decider of all outcomes not governed by instinct?  Indeed, if I were a buff, 280 lb body builder, it would be tempting to call the bluff of such a fair weather Darwinist, apeing threats, but stopping short of …criminality……..of course.

Why the “of course”?  Oh, because we are civilized.   And does she ponder the source of our present civility, the orderliness at the traffic light, the unmolested finish on her Cruiser?  Or is her worldview an unexamined one, absorbed without mental effort from the likes of Ophrah, Ellen, and peers?  For without a doubt, our present (though jeopardized) civility, indeed our civilization, is the child of Christianity.  The Christian religion tamed the Viking, the Visigoth, the brutal Roman, and the painted Celt.  And anyone who would argue with that has been in mental limbo their whole education, or raised on revisionist pseudotextbooks more concerned with feminism and race relations than history.  They have not read or comprehended Beowulf or any of the confirmatory tomes which followed.  How Christianity accomplished that feat is a wonderful story in itself, but may best be summed up by the prophecy in Malachi 4:6: “And he shall turn the heart of the fathers to the children, and the heart of the children to their fathers…”  This is the very last verse in the Old Testament, and the very next verse in the Bible, Matthew 1:1, reads, “The record of the genealogy of Jesus the Messiah, the son of David, the son of Abraham: “   A coincidence?  I don’t think so.

The discordant scene, and others like it, are vaguely similar to those unruly children at the zoo, taunting the fanged predator behind the safety of iron bars.  Their bravery is situational…and illusory.  I recall years ago seeing – also in traffic – a gothic youth in a black, low-slung Honda.  His car sported a license plate which read, “BELZBUB”, if my memory is correct.  I experienced no inner dissonance then, just a quiet chuckling as I imagined the reaction of this fellow (who no doubt fancied himself mean, and a force to be reckoned with) should he happen to meet face-to-face the real  Lord of the Flies (or worse, his master).  At the very minimum, a change in underwear would be in order. 

Yet, then as now (for now), that myopic modern Goth was safe – safe behind iron bars of another kind:  “And having disarmed the powers and authorities, He [Christ] made a public spectacle of them, triumphing over them by the cross.”  Col 2:15.  Iron nails, and a dislocated stone.  Later, the spear of St. George, and the prayers and sacrifice of untold saints and martyrs.  The dragons are dispersed. 

And Grendel is dead. 

So, in our (temporarily) exorcised civilization, gothic youths can flirt with satanism without obvious harm, like kids before a zoo’s tiger.  And pampered suburban moms can pretend to be die-hard Darwinists…