Conservative versus Liberal on the family--and national--scale.

[Ladyhawk]

I love natural history, but whenever I bring up evolutionary theory my mother gets nervous. It makes her uncomfortable that fossils of dinosaurs with feathers have been found. It makes her nervous that tiny relatives of Homo erectus were found on an Indonesian island.

These topics came up naturally. I have been drawing dromaeosaurs with feathers in my notes, possibly in preparation for a "real" drawing. Also, I like the fact that my parrot Gabby is, in fact, a dinosaur--with a temperament to match the most vicious Utahraptor.

I loved Peter Jackson's remake of King Kong and took my mother to see it as a Christmas present. Afterward over coffee we were remarking that it was obviously fantasy, but that good fantasy makes you buy into it, suspend incredulity and just watch (or read). Besides the obvious fact that King Kong's existence is impossible, I pointed out that the whole island ran counter to evolutionary tendency. Animals on islands tend to get smaller, not larger.

In both instances, I noticed my mother got quiet and didn't say much.

The final straw for her came tonight. When she came over, I was looking at Flying Spaghetti Monster t-shirts. When she finally asked what FSM was all about, she absolutely DID NOT WANT to hear Bobby Henderson's open letter to various school boards.

My mother likes to hide from reality. She doesn't want to hear about things that would shatter her fragile world view. In all honesty, I think she's too old to handle the shattering of a world view. I went through it alone and it hurt like hell. No one was there to help me pick up the pieces. I'd be there for her, but again, I think she's too old to change.

At the same time, my mother's absolute certainty that her way--fundamentalist Christianity--is the ONLY WAY directly endangers the freedoms we all hold so dear. She believes Falwell, Robertson, Limbaugh, Hannity--the screwballs who enable her delusion.

How do we deal with people like my mother who vote against basic freedoms and our right to believe as we choose--even our right to believe what is obvious fact? I go back and forth between fury and pity. Neither helps the problem on either the micro or macro scale. Good-hearted liberals all over the country find themselves unsure of what to do. I've tried cutting off all ties; full-on persuasion; dropping little "bombs" that will rock confidence in her world view (the fact of evolution works well); but nothing seems quite right. Nothing bridges the gap. Nothing really works.

She doesn't want to listen to what I have to say and at this point I've almost decided what she believes is none of my business. Unfortunately, she and others like her do not return the favor. She tries to re-convert me. She votes Republican, thereby curtailing science and the civil rights of those who don't think and feel (and look) the same way she does. My mother's willful ignorance does not make herless human. I'm hesitant to use the same tactics she cheerfully uses on me.

This is a real moral dilemma for me. It is a moral dilemma that is being played out all over the United States in families, in counties, in states and on the national level. How do we deal with the willfully ignorant? They are our family members and our fellow Americans.