jordan_tar

Last week, I read a book by Tim LaHaye - called "Mind Siege", it was basically a shambling, pathetic attempt to establish that secular humanism is a religion, that Xians are persecuted, and so forth. I'm thinking of sending my review of this book to LaHaye himself, and seeing what kind of response I might get. Any opinions on this?

The review can be found here:
<a href="http://home.sprintmail.com/~jruudatniagara/mindsiege.html" target="_blank">http://home.sprintmail.com/~jruudatniagara/mindsiege.html</a>

beoba

I've read the same book, and so have the authors of <a href="http://www.atheistparents.org" target="_blank">www.atheistparents.org</a> , you may want to check out their review.

Actually, it wasn't the same book, it was an earlier version I found at my college library called "Battle for the Mind" (I think). The book I saw described in atheistparents.org's review seemed to basically be a rehash of the book that I read.

Here's the thread on their forum that discusses the book and the review: <a href="http://atheistparents.org/forum/viewtopic.php?topic=116&forum=12" target="_blank">http://atheistparents.org/forum/viewtopic.php?topic=116&forum=12</a>

Here's the post I made on that thread about the book I'd read, when I still had it on me and was able to type out the pages I'd dogeared:

Tim LaHaye also made a book in 1980 called "The Battle for the Mind", which is probably an earlier version of the book you reviewed, since it also covers the subject of a “Humanist Conspiracy”. The difference with this version is that it probably has a lot more references to communism then your book does, since at the time of print, that was (apparently) still a good scare tactic. While I was skimming the book, I dog-eared some of the more interesting portions of the book, and here they are:

Pages 109-110:

Evolution – The biggest hoax of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries is that evolution is a scientific fact. Admittedly, it is a widely accepted theory of man’s origin, held chiefly by those who reject a belief in God, but theories are not accepted as scientific fact until they can be proved […] Not only do the 600 Creation Research Society scientists referred to earlier reject the idea that evolution is a fact, but many nontheistic scientists admit to a startling lack of evidence. In chapter 4 we cited several sources, beginning with Thomas Huxley, who admitted that evolution was only a hypothesis. […] In fact, the best evidence for evolution should appear in fossils embedded in rocks, but so many questions arise in this study (paleontology) that even many evolutionary paleontologists put little stock in the record of the rocks. Besides, all such formations can be accounted for by a universal flood, which both the bible and modern archeology substantiate.

The last statement there is weirdest to me, especially since he avoids providing any evidence to back it up other then a quote by a Robert A. Millikan, who is a physicist (because after all, physicists know biology best, right?). The quote is “The pathetic thing about it is that many scientists are trying to prove the doctrine of evolution, which no science can do.” Oddly enough, Tim LaHaye forgets to mention that “The National Academy of Science, American Association for the Advancement of Science, National Association of Biology Teachers, and 72 Nobel Prize winners all have gone on record as supporting evolution and rejecting the teaching of creationism in science classes.” (Tim M. Berra, Dept. of Zoology, University of Ohio)

Page 164:

The American Civil Liberties Union. The most effective humanist organization for destroying the laws, morals, and traditional rights of Americans has been the ACLU. Founded in 1920, it is the legal arm of the humanist movement, established and bolstered by the Ethical Culture Movement. The anti-Christian, anti-American, and pro-socialist causes espoused by the ACLU should not be surprising, when one identifies it founders and understands their philosophy. Its first chairman was Dr. Harry Ward, professor of social ethics at Union Theological Seminary, a man who for thirty years worked tirelessly to socialize the United Methodist Church. The well-known parallel between the social positions of the Methodist Church and the Communist Party can be attributed largely to Dr. Ward’s thirty years of indoctrinating the young, impressionable minds of Methodism’s finest ministerical candidates. [Insert more communism scare tactics here.]

Something odd about this excerpt is the part about destroying laws and morals. I’m curious as to what laws or morals were destroyed by the ACLU, but LaHaye just makes his bullshit statement and never attempts to explain it anywhere else in the book.

There are several other colorful entries in the book, but I think that those two excerpts are the most interesting of the bunch. A lot of the arguments I saw in the book were pure speculation with a few scare tactics thrown in, that often completely ignored any arguments saying otherwise. Tim LaHaye was preaching to the choir, and he told them what they wanted to hear.

There was particularly strong preaching against something referred to as the “ERA” throughout the book, and I only learned on the last few pages that it stood for “Equal Rights Amendment.” Curious about why he was railing against it, I looked it up and found the entirety of the amendment:

Section 1. Equality of rights under the law shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any state on account of sex.
Section 2. The Congress shall have the power to enforce, by appropriate legislation, the provisions of this article.
Section 3. This amendment shall take effect two years after the date of ratification.

I’m curious as to why LaHaye considers this amendment to be such a big deal. Is he so lost in the 50’s mentality that he sees mortal danger in women and men being treated equally? I find it strange that a man who has such trouble with such simple matters of human rights considers himself a worthy speaker on the subject of transitions in the world view. Perhaps the “morals” that he advocates so much in the book aren’t so moral, after all.

What was kind of funny in my mind was that I thought, based on the book's title, that it was going to be analyzing the psychology of religion. I don't know why I thought that at the time, but I was sure surprized when I read the book

beoba

Wow, I'm already at 95 (96 now I guess..) posts. It's amazing how fast these things pile up when you start coming here regularly.

skuwiph

This has to be my oxymoron of the day...

Ian

beoba

Yeah, thats what I thought.

Panta Pei

<a href="http://www.atheistparents.org" target="_blank">www.atheistparents.org</a> <img src="graemlins/notworthy.gif" border="0" alt="[Not Worthy]" />

&lt;smacks forehead&gt;

Thanks for the great site, alphatronics, I've managed to miss it all these years.

beoba

They've had advertising in a few places.

I first saw them on <a href="http://www.morons.org" target="_blank">www.morons.org</a> .