In the short time since it was announced, the March for Science has generated an impressive amount of coverage. The last month notwithstanding, most marches struggle to get much notice.
The highest profile piece was an op-ed in the New York Times that argues the march is a bad idea because it will further polarize and politicize science. The author, a scientist himself, somehow neglects to mention the fact that the Kochs, Exxon and the like have spent millions of dollars over the past few decades politicizing science, funding the GOP and employing surrogates to cast evidence and fact as a liberal conspiracy.
As Joe Romm puts it, the piece is simply victim blaming. Scientists haven’t run ads that are contrary to mountains of evidence, or pushed Senators to support oxymoronic “sound science” legislation. Scientists haven’t flooded the editorial pages of the Wall Street Journal with conspiracy theories and innuendoes.
In a follow-up piece, Romm suggests the marching scientists keep in mind the simple human fact that numbers numb and stories sell. Sage advice from the man who literally wrote the book on language intelligence.
At Quartz, Dr. James Dyke pushes back on the politicization frame, arguing that the march isn’t partisan or anti-Trump, but is simply pro-fact. But that’s not quite right, is it? Because being pro-fact is, de facto, being anti-Trump.
But it goes deeper than that. Eric Holthaus gets to it an abstract way, saying science is fundamentally political as it upends the status quo and speaks truth to power. This is similar to part of the argument offered up in Shawn Otto’s book about The War on Science, which we discussed in the context of Harold Hamm last summer.
That gets us to the real point that needs to be made here. While traditionally Republicans and Democrats have differed on policies, they used to agree about the basic facts. That’s changed, thanks to the campaigns of Koch and Exxon and Phillip Morris. That change was deliberate, well-funded, and as we see now, fabulously successful.
Trump got his political start by opposing the fact that President Obama is an American. Trump’s administration introduced “alternative facts” and continues to use them. Be it in regards to immigration or crime rates or climate change, being pro-fact means you’re not going to agree with most, if not all, of Trump’s policy positions.
But it’s not just Trump’s alt-facts that corrupted an otherwise staunchly pro-science party. By and large, empirical evidence contradicts a number of modern GOP positions, including many in their official platform, and right down to the state level. From school vouchers to send public money to private schools where creationism is still taught, to opposing stem cell research, to abstinence-only education (ask the Palins how effective that is), to opposing regulations on second-hand smoke, to gay conversion therapy, to the holy grail of GOP economic policy known as Trickle Down, climate change is far from the only anti-science/fact/evidence position the GOP holds.
It’s also Republicans who produce the annual “Wastebook,” where they collect silly-seeming studies that have received government funding, and pretend like there isn’t good reason for basic research. They deliberately ignore the benefits of these studies to use them as a pretense to attack government funding of science.
It hasn’t always been this way. And it need not continue like this. But Republicans desperately need to face the facts, especially those they don’t like. Case in point, a March for Science shouldn’t immediately be considered a political event. But as we see, it already has been cast as such. And as we’ve come to know all too well these days, perceptions are reality.
So it would be great to see a large conservative contingent at the March for Science to push back on the stereotypes. If Republicans become the party of Alt-Facts, you lose all legitimacy with those who don’t believe exactly as you do, and that’s no way to govern. So push back, reality-based conservatives, and take back your party. The March for Science is a perfect place to start.
Don’t let alt-facts turn all of the right into the alt-right.
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