It’s not immediately obvious why fundamentalists so despise Darwinism. I mean, yeah, they advocate a literal interpretation of the Bible, and creation through evolution does not map perfectly on to the Genesis story. But the fundys have little problem ignoring other inconvenient teachings (that eating shellfish is an abomination, that rich men cannot get to heaven, etc) and construct elaborate explanations as to why these particular injunctions do not mean what they plainly seem to mean. Why can’t they accommodate Darwinism also?
Country music provides an answer, as it does for so many of life’s perplexing questions. Here’s my quick rendition of the chorus to “Drop Kick Me Jesus Through the Goalposts of Life:
As the song clearly explains, the “killer app” of Christianity, the hook that reels in so many minds and hearts, is its teaching that each of us is special, so special that we are the prime focus of care and concern by an all-powerful God. A God that has a particular plan for each and every one of us; that we are His children; that we need only trust blindly in Him and all will be well. In other words, that we can be again as we were when infants, adored and cared for by an infallible being whose greatest concern is our welfare and happiness.
Copernicus was first to implicitly attack this beautiful and comforting story, but feared that putting the sun at the center of the universe would invite persecution, and so published posthumously. This seems a bit odd when you think about it – why would religious authorities care about the relative paths and positions of the Earth and Sun? That seems much more a cartographic or geometric issue than a religious one. But removing Earth from the center of the universe meant removing mankind as well, and thus was denounced as heresy.
Darwin completed this process of removal, and made it much more personal. It’s pretty darn hard to reconcile the dogma of personal salvation with the impersonal forces of chance and necessity.
Denialism is fundamentally about preserving one’s own place at the center of the universe. All the pseudo-scientific and ever-changing criticisms of Darwinism are just means to that end.
NB, drop kicks are more a thing in wrestling now, but the song refers to football drop kicks.