Conservapedia: Fun for All the Family...

Yes, folks, it's official: the Conservative/Christian/Creationist "equivalent" to the popular cyber-encyclopaedia Wikipedia is out and it's called (drum roll!)... Conservapedia.

So far, all indications are that the main object of this new fountain of wisdom is to conserve stupidity. Lemmesee, a new encyclopaedia that aims to provide an alternative to the "liberal bias" in Wikipedia and calls itself Conservapedia: if ever there was a declaration of bias this must qualify as one of the most blatant cases.

Conservapedia has also chosen to shamelessly mimic Wikipedia in everything from layout (identical to Wiki's) to structure, except for content which in many cases will be a sort of "anti-Wikipedia".

Currently Conservapedia is still in its infancy and entries remain few and far between. But they've got one for Kangaroo. So, according to Stupidopedia, the origins of Kangaroos are as follows:

According to the origins model used by creation scientists, modern kangaroos, like all modern animals, originated in the Middle East[1] and are the descendants of the two founding members of the modern kangaroo baramin that were taken aboard Noah's Ark prior to the Great Flood. It has not yet been determined by baraminologists whether kangaroos form a holobaramin with the wallaby, tree-kangaroo, wallaroo, pademelon and quokka, or if all these species are in fact apobaraminic or polybaraminic.

Also according to creation science, after the Flood, kangaroos bred from the Ark passengers migrated to Australia. There is debate whether this migration happened over land[2] -- as Australia was still for a time connected to the Middle East before the supercontinent of Pangea broke apart[3] -- or if they rafted on mats of vegetation torn up by the receding flood waters[2].

If you're not amused enough, do check out the entry's references...

But Conservapedia, like Wikipedia, is supposed to be a source of wisdom for the people and by the people and so, in that spirit, fellow blogger Bacon Eating Atheist Jew tried to edit the entry with a plausible Young Earth Creationist style amendment:

Kangaroos could have floated on the back of crocodiles from the Middle East to Australia. Since there was plenty of fresh dead people and animals in the water, and crocodiles live in the water, they were full, and had plenty of leftover food. So they didn't have to eat living animals, and even thought ahead (probably God inspired), to bring living animals with them to Australia so that crocodiles in the future would have something to eat. [my italics]

It seems that for the time being, Stupidopedia's doors are somewhat closed to the general public as our intrepid editor's efforts were in vain. No doubt hordes of pranksters will try and post entries and amendments but I wouldn't recommend it. Firstly, let the Conservapedists make fools of themselves on their own accord: they really don't need our help. Secondly, they'll only try and do the same to Wikipedia, resulting in the "pedia-wars" (am I coining a phrase or am I coining a phrase?)

And after all, aren't those people entitled to their opinions? Of course, 100%, no less. But something in all this does trouble me: no doubt some in the rising tide of conservative home-schoolers will use Conservapedia as an on-line source of "didactical material", to ensure their kids grow up thoroughly stupid and ignorant but uncontaminated by "liberal bias". It might not hail the coming of a New Dark Age just yet but it doesn't bode too well...

I'll be digging up some entries myself shortly. I tried "primates" but no such luck. I guess primates are still a bit too hot a potato to handle for the thoroughly Conservative/Christian mind...