Expelled Pt. II: The Devil’s Advocate

In Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed, many are interviewed. Many being many scientists. I’m not sure on the technical specs as I haven’t seen it yet and won’t be paying a single cent to see it, so I can only await for third-party reviews with the full cast. Yes, I’m sure the full cast is around here somewhere, probably on IMDb or something.

Anyway, among those interviewed are two people whom I respect higher than the highest high (read: Jimi Hendrix is nothing to this high): PZ Myers and Richard Dawkins.

Apparently, however, something went awry at a recent screening and it has lead to a firestorm in which the facts are easily available, but as usual, people, usually creationists, tend to ignore.

What’s viewed optically is not really what is seen, so if seeing is believing, everything I’m seeing is probably false.

You’d think this statement would ring true in regards to the likes of Mark Mathis, un-intelligent producer of Expelled. It’s more to his fans who see exactly what they want.

It goes like this: PZ Myers, who was interviewed in the film, decides to sign up for a free screening of Expelled. This screening was open to anyone who would sign up online and was hardly hidden — you just had to be in the area. So PZ signs himself up (we’re also lead to believe he signed up his wife and possibly his daughter Skatje, but everyone reasonable knows that even though they got in there was no way they were signed up to see such a wholesome film) and a guest by the name of Richard Dawkins. Yes, that Richard Dawkins.

Lo and behold: PZ, who has caused no trouble in line, is told he can’t come in. The only thing PZ has done wrong is, ironically, criticising them on his blog. So they’re going to “expell” [sic] someone from their movie about being expelled?

So he goes to tell his family where he’ll be, and then he’s told he has to exit the premises at once.

Ooh, isn’t that odd? A man goes to a screening that was open in which he signed up for with his own name and gets escorted off the grounds despite doing absolutely nothing.

Not to mention he’s in the movie.

Now to why this post is called the Devil’s Advocate: If PZ, our anti-hero of the night, is the devil to Mark Mathis and company, then Richard Dawkins is his back-up. But back-up sounds lame so I decided to steal the title of a Keanu Reeves film of the same name.

Dawkins was signed on as a guest, and he was let in even after showing his ID. But yet it has been claimed that he was simply someone who happened to sneak into the film showing. Not only that, Mark Mathis clearly knew PZ and spotted him coming, whereas no one would expect Mr. Dawkins.

They’re going to claim that PZ was uninvited to a private screening that the rest of his family got into as well as the mighty bulldog of Darwin, Richard Dawkins.

Well, well, well…

There are roughly ten songs that came to mind shortly after I read Mark Mathis’ statement on PZ being “expelled”, most of them containing the word “liar” in some form, such as the songs of the same name by the bands the Sex Pistols and Megadeth. I’d say these songs describe Mark Mathis, the Disco ‘tute, and Expelled itself well.

To see how Dawkins responded, see his post on it at his site.

Quite frankly, a good overview.

I’ll be adding part III shortly, I just feel the need to split these posts to cover more ground with more focus.