I saw the film The March of the Penguins last night. It was very enjoyable. A documentary (mostly) about the life cycle of Emperor penguins, in the extraordinarily harsh conditions of Antartica. The voiceover (read by Morgan Freeman) and the added sounds had some slightly over-the-top anthropomorphic tendencies here and there, but it was forgivable. And the penguins are cute. Really really cute....and that's not even counting the baby ones, which are impossibly impossibly cute. So I came away thinking that penguins are amazing, and the struggles they go through are staggering, and it's so interesting and nice that they struggle so valiantly (and bizarrely) over the year in the name of survival and propagation, and I had a bit of a worry about what would happen when/if the recent changes to our environment modify the conditions they've adapted to... ...And I left it at that and went to sleep (well, after a mojito, and a bit of physics) hoping that since this film was so successful at the box-office in the USA, maybe Hollywood will get into the act and start making films of this sort for general release. I'd go see them on the big screen, and I would not mind a limited amount of anthropomorphisation, if it helps get people to see more of the gripping dramas that exist out there already, rather than have to sit through the ones we end up paying for which are mostly badly written by the usual suspects. What harm could come of this? Well, today I read* today's article, by David Smith, in the Observer entitled How the penguin's life story inspired the US religious right. So I got a bit concerned, but I do worry that it might be a bit of a storm in a teacup. (The Observer and its sibling the Guardian -papers I love and read regularly- do sometimes have their fair share of loud left-wing whining for its own sake, and all the British press love their "Those whacky Americans!" stories, so one has to be careful.) So let's tread carefully here. It seems (from the article) that "The March of the Penguins" has become "The Passion of the Penguins", in that it has become popular in devout Christian circles for various reasons. Nothing wrong with that in and of itself, I would say. The thrust of the article is that the film is being used as propaganda for everything from Intelligent Design (of course) to antiabortion and "traditional family values" (and we know what that really means, don't we?) This could be a cause for concern, although on the strength of this article alone (its quotes and examples) I'm not convinced that the sky is falling in (any more than it already is, in this context). It probably would help to point out that I do not have a deep hatred for religion and all things religious. (Sorry to dissappoint you if you think that I should, by simply being a scientist.) So I am not in principle against religious groups picking a film and using it in their teaching, as long as they are not teaching harm to others, and as long as they do not teach things that attempt to replace science by junk. So I don't mind the extract:
As happened with Mel Gibson's Christian blockbuster, churches have block-booked cinemas and organised visits for their members. The 153 House Churches Network in Sidney, Ohio, runs a March of the Penguins Leadership Workshop after screenings of the film. Its website, [...] provides a form that can be downloaded and taken to the cinema. It advises: 'Please use the notebook, flashlight and pen provided to write down what God speaks to you.' Ben Hunt, a minister at the network, said of the penguins' struggle for survival: 'Some of the circumstances they experienced seemed to parallel those of Christians. The penguin is falling behind, like some Christians are falling behind. The path changes every year, yet they find their way, like the Holy Spirit.'
...even though it might scare some of you, it doesn't me (well, not much!). So far, it's just an analogy that they're stressing in their own peculiar manner. Fine. But then we get to:
Andrew Coffin, writing in the Christian publication World Magazine, said such miracles of nature were evidence that life is too complex to have arisen through Darwinian random selection: 'That any one of these eggs survives is a remarkable feat - and, some might suppose, a strong case for intelligent design. It's sad that acknowledgment of a creator is absent in the examination of such strange and wonderful animals. But it's also a gap easily filled by family discussion after the film.'
Oh boy. Here we go. Will it never end? This would certainly be bad if all those church groups are indeed trying to use this as support for ID. It is not clear from the article whether this is so however, (is the interestingly named Mr Coffin also involved in organizing these same church group viewings? Not clear) but sure, let's keep an eye on it. So do feel free to comment if you have read other articles which suggest that this is really a significant new and damaging assault on reason, or if you have another point of view on this article. I should say that I am glad that the possibility that the film could be misused was pointed out to me by the article....It had not yet occured to me....I'm just not convinced that I should be overly upset, as though it was a shocking new change of tactic. I could be wrong. Don't be shy in expressing a different view. (Parenthetically: For some reason -I don't know if they thought this would help all the Observer readers digest the breakfast they just choked on- the article ends with a penguin joke! And a link to a whole website of penguin jokes. Hmm....) By the way, I must say I'm amused by some obvious inconsistencies, such as:
Rich Lowry, editor of National Review, told a conference of young Republicans: 'Penguins are the really ideal example of monogamy. The dedication of these birds is amazing.'
Really? Ideal? Ok.... so the fact that the birds randomly change mates at the end of the year, and abandon their children (explicitly mentioned in the film) is ok then? Wow! It seems that a whole new kind of Christian has been launched! There's a bit of back and forth about ID with the usual quotes from each side, which I won't repeat here, since we've a whole archive of posts and comments here at CosmicVariance bursting at the seams with this sort of (important) chatter. I'll end with my favourite quote from the article, which is:
...its American distributors, Warner Independent Pictures and National Geographic Feature Films, insist that it is simply a tale about penguins. Laura Kim, a vice-president of Warner Independent, said: 'You know what? They're just birds.'
-cvj (*Thanks Samantha!)
