The Peterson AFB incident today made me crazy. It also made me reflect on why I had bittersweet memories of living in Colorado Springs, CO.
In my mind it is almost Dickensian to live there. Some call it the vatican of the religious right. Some claim it is the center for family values. Some say it has the best four-seasons climate in America. There is truth in all of those things. But the "Springs" also led the nation in spousal and child abuse, per captia. There are more churches and religious headquarters there, per capita, than anywhere else in the nation. The climate is great! The golf in the area is some of the best anywhere. I've even played golf in Pueblo in January, although the fairways and greens were frozen stiff. That teaches you to play golf in Scotland.
I worked for a civic entity that tried to bring new businesses into town. My boss was an absolutely delightful lady who thought Christianity and Christians represented all things wonderful in the world. So, as part of her job, she negotiated the emigration of James Dobson and his Focus on the Family minions. They virtually gave him the land to build his campus. Some would say it is a vulgar display of wealth. He received tax incentives and other goodies to make it very attractive to move from California. As I understand it, Dobson promised to create many jobs. All this occurred, of course, during an employment slump there brought on by overbuilding and the usual land grabbing, etc. Well, the jobs he "created" were mostly minimum wage jobs involving menial tasks like counting money and donations, running the tourist trap gift shop, and the like. This action started the tax benefitted stampede of the evangelicals to Colorado Springs. Meanwhile, Dobson set up his radio operation and all the trappings needed to manage this $300 million per year behemoth. I forgot. Focus on the Family spends no money on child care for single parents. Indeed, Dobson has called single mothers who date a very un-flattering, inner city name. Oh. The higher paying jobs were given to those he brought with him from California. O.K. Enough about this clown, the former child psychologist who advocated corporal punishment in his books.
I taught high school science for 7 years there. My last job was at a high school just a driver and 3-wood away from the above axis of ignorance. I heard stuff from parents and kids I'd never heard before about creation and evolution and Darwin and evil and satan and all those other things that will make us all burn in hell. I even had a child stand up in class and start waving his bible while ranting that the good book said that God created it all and that evolution is a sin and we'll all burn in hell for believing in it. I told him that evolution was a science and not a belief. Finally, after he calmed down I informed him of the school's policy about religious discussion in class. That brought his parents out from under some rock to wail at my principal and me. This was not an isolated incident. In one of my other diaries I mentioned that a science teacher I respect to this day told me that he didn't touch evolution because he didn't want to have to deal with these raving loonies. I even had a kid tell me that he knew for sure that Darwin was/is the "Beast" and the anti-Christ. I asked him where he heard this and he told us all that his minister said it was true. There you have it. Propaganda by any other name...
The other side of this coin is that there are many, many free-thinking, intelligent, curious and moral people living there. It doesn't matter to them that one of the more loopy citizens ran for state government under the banner of legislating divorce. The good people I know all laugh at the antics of the renown Douglas Bruce who ran a petition to get the state so tied up in citizens rights that it couldn't spend the taxpayers money to fix a traffic signal without having the entire state vote on it. No, there are many people like some of former students who are teaching and working and learning still. They have recovered from the Ted Haggard hypocrisy to lead purposeful and intelligent lives without the yoke of the New Life Church's "charisma" thwarting their minds. They appreciate what they have, what they learn and what they can do without being imprisoned by dogmatic nonsense.
It's the goofy stuff that drove me away from Colorado Springs, but it will be the wonderful, cool, free-thinkers that will keep me coming back for a visit. That and the great golf courses.