KEN HAM - Answers In Genesis

Ken Ham on Revelation TV

By Roger Stanyard

Ken Ham, Chief Executive of Answers in Genesis, a Christian fundamentalist movement, appeared on Revelation TV on 26th April 2006, In a one hour interview with presenter and station manager/owner Howard Conder, Ham discussed his views on religion and science and answered a number of live questions from the station's viewers.

Revelation TV is a British Christian Evangelical TV channel noted for its adherence to dispensationalist and creationist (YEC) views.

Unfortunately, technical problems with the transmission of the programme, World in Focus, meant it was unwatchable, Indeed, the show had to switch to another channel r music TV (also controlled by Revelation TV).

Your correspondent eventual saw the programme in full the following day when it was retransmitted on Revelation TV. Ironically, Revelation TV also interviewed another YEC earlier in the day on the 26th April. This was Vance Nelson, a Canadian who is involved in the controversial tour of the UK by Australian creationist John Mackay. However, I was not aware of this at the time and therefore missed it.

I assume that the Nelson appearance was done at short notice, possibly in connection with apparently substantial problems arising with the Mackay tour.

Revelation TV is well know for its support of the YEC viewpoint and not surprisingly, Conder gave Ham an easy time. Indeed, Ham only faced one, slightly adversarial, telephone call and that was from a man (they were all men) in Northern Ireland who wanted his views on Intelligent Design.

Ham's basic proposition became very evident as the show continued. Armed with a bible, Ham repeatedly insisted that this was the source of all truth and that anything that contradicted it was wrong. It was very clear that Ham believed in a literal interpretation of the bible.

Ham also demonstrated a very nasty streak – the repeated rubbishing of anyone who believed in the Theory of Evolution. Not only was Ham shooting the message (that there is lots of evidence for Evolutionary Theory) but also, repeatedly, the messenger.

He attacked the current Archbishop of Canterbury; he attacked the 19th Century Anglican clergy for accepting the world was millions of years old – he argued that the clergy had hijacked the idea.

He accused Australian state schools and the media of Australian children about the Theory of Evolution although, as is so often the case with those that make this extravagant claim, failed to show who did the brainwashing, how and when (it takes a lot of preparation, effort and skills to brainwash a person). Moreover, there is no known case ever of someone being brainwashed to believe in Evolutionary Theory anywhere in the world, ever.

Ham also accused the schools of indoctrinating children with the Theory of Evolution, again, without showing evidence. Indoctrination is an extremely strong word and Ham clearly knows how to use it to advance his case.

However, the institutional attacks didn't stop there – they extended to the Natural History, the Geological and Science Museums in South Kensington in London (Ham seemed to be confused which was which – the Geological Museum is, now, part of the Natural History Museum, not the Science Museum).

Ham rubbished the Geological Museum's Darwin exhibition and accused the Natural History Museum of being fraudulent. It is indoctrinating the public, he claimed.

Note the technique, time and time again, of demonising decent people who can't answer back. It may be good rhetorical skill to advance "the cause", honest and decent it is not. It sounds like a combination of cowardice and bullying.

Ham argued that the public had been "misled" over evolutionary theory. Again, behind such rhetoric is the underlying claim that those who do not subscribe to Ham's religious views are either stupid or frauds.

It is clear in Ham's world that the public are easily duped by experts and he knows better, even though his scientific credentials are pretty thin. He's a school teacher by profession.

Ham is also certain that what he calls "Evolutionists" do not want people to believe in the bible because this would undermine their position. Such astonishing and unfounded claims are easily stated and unchallenged when you have a presenter like Conder who is both onside, and to his own admission, almost completely ignorant about science.

Ham also managed to get in attacks on Professor Steve Jones (who he tried to make a fool of) and Professor Richard Dawkins, who he described as an atheist (so what) and whose understanding of the Theory of Evolution was contemptuously dismissed as "blind faith"

Your correspondent has not detailed, in this report, Ham's statements on his "scientific" evidence against Evolution.

Having heard him speak, I concluded that he didn't demonstrate any such evidence at all. His rhetoric chopped and changed between stating that the scientists were wrong and the bible had it all right and couldn't possibly be wrong.

Underneath Ham is playing a very simple-minded game: the only valid science is that which proves his personal religious opinions are right. Anything or anyone that contradicts his religious views must therefore be wrong.

That includes most religious people, virtually all scientists and all believers in Intelligent Design.

Ham clearly has no respect for anyone who doesn't agree with his own opinions on science and religion.

All of Ham's "scientific" arguments can be found on the Answers in Genesis web site www.answersingenesis.org and are all fully debunked at www.talkorigins.org and elsewhere, ad nauseum, ad infinitum.

Ham clearly has as his target audience the scientifically illiterate; that his own arguments are just wrong all of the time doesn't register with such an audience. It doesn't matter, therefore, that they don't stack up or aren't even in agreement with other creationists.

In personality, Ham came over as deeply dogmatic and authoritarian. His attitude towards the rest of the world was a parody of a school master responsible for a class of children. The rest of the world were uninformed children who he had to put right.

Indeed, the schoolmaster appears never to have left him.

The idea that others might be his peer group or, indeed, considerably more knowledgeable on their subjects than him (that's the fact that everyone else in the world has to face) doesn't show through.

In appearance, Ham is also somewhat odd. He was seated during the programme so I could not judge how tall he is. However, Ham does have a beard (it's common amongst Christian fundamentalists), looks to be relatively thin for his age but doesn't appear to have any dress sense for a public figure. His shirt was a darkish green and his trousers a kaki colour. The tied was black/grey (no colour, in other words).

Ham kept picking up the bible; I would normally take this as a stage prop for someone long experienced in public performance and presentations but, in this case, it looked almost like an emotional prop – the prop of a man who presents personal certainty to the world but, underneath, is covering something up (knowingly or otherwise). It just didn't feel or look right.

In style, Ham has a quick answer or response for everything; it doesn't matter to him that all of the answers are either wrong or highly contentious. I suspect that if he is ever effectively challenged he would easily evade the issue (he's clearly a skilled performer).

Areas not Addressed by Conder: My view is that Conder deliberately gave Ham an easy time. Indeed, Ham was able to plug the recent Swanwick fundamentalist conference in which he was actively involved, claiming that 400 people turned up (in what appeared to be footage of the event, there were, indeed, a lot of people there).

However, Conder asked no questions at all about the huge rifts in AiGm which has resulted in the split from its parent organisation in Australia. Nor did Conder ask about the growing competition in the UK from John Mackay's Creation Research movement, ven though Mackay and Ham had started out together.

Note: John Mackay is due to appear on revelation TV's World in Focus programme at 9.00pm on 28th June 2006. Mackay is a past colleague of Ham but, nowadays, runs his own YEC operation called Creation Research.

© Roger Stanyard, 2006