[Vision2020] I hope I'm not too late

[nickgier at adelphia.net]

Hail to the Fading, Divided, and perhaps Doomed Vision!

I promised myself that I could go back and play in the Visionary Sandbox only after I got my conference paper done.  Well, so much for promises to one's self.

I've got things to say about Wilson, Zarqawi, and Reagan and I will post in that order.

I'm thrilled to see that Doug Wilson is (was?) back on the Vision.  I think he has acquitted himself fairly well on the Sitler case, assuming that we now have most of the facts. 

I agree, however, with James Reynolds that given Wilson's top male theology, women and girls in such a patriarchal community have very little protection against deviant males.  Indeed, the temptation for ordinarily good guys to take advantage of females in such a religious community might be very great. In fact, I am reminded of a column that Wilson wrote for the “Daily News” many years ago in which he admitted that no male could really be trusted and that is why we must put women on a pedestal.

Wilson and a few others on this list are really presumptuous about guessing the motives of those who criticize them.  From the very beginning I've made my motives clear: they are primarily ethical and academic.

My relations with Wilson were cordial until I experienced his reaction to criticism of his slavery booklet in November 2003.  A few years ago I received a critical review of my book "Spiritual Titanism." Now, I could have chosen Wilson's option and called the reviewer vicious names and contacted the Governor of South Carolina insisting that the professor be fired.  But I chose a different type of response.  I contacted the editor of the journal and asked for an opportunity to respond.  My reviewer chose not to respond to my five-page rebuttal.

In January of 2004 when it was clear that Wilson could no longer defend the slavery booklet, especially after it was demonstrated that 20 percent of it was lifted from another book, he pulled it from circulation.  He said that he still stood by the contents of the book and that it would go back into publication as soon as he fixed the footnotes.

The booklet was not reprinted as promised; rather, a new book came out (about 18 months later) under the title "Black and Tan," which dumped Steven Wilkins as co-author and which essentially corrected most of the errors that two UI history professors pointed in their critical review of the booklet. So much for standing by the content of the original.

I joined the Vision just as Wilson was on his way out.  I would like to share with you part of one of the last exchanges that we had until Wilson and Atwood put me on their Bozo filter.  This is #6 of "12 Articles for Repudiation" that I presented to Wilson in December, 2003.

Article 6.  George Grant and Steve Wilkins are regular guest speakers at 
annual meetings of your Association of Classical and Christian Schools 
and Colleges.
 
Do your unscholarly views of the Civil War appear in the 
curriculum?  Yes or No? 
NOT ONE OF MY UNSCHOLARLY VIEWS APPEARS IN THE 
CURRICULUM.  (full caps in the original)  

In the spring of 2004 I got a call from the husband of a teacher in one of Wilson’s school in Cary, North Carolina.  He had learned that the slavery booklet was part of the curriculum and he was mad as a hornet.  The principal, trained in Moscow, was forced, under much public pressure, to withdraw the booklet from the curriculum.

We have now logically transitioned from the unscholarly to the unethical. The principal of Wilson’s Logos School lied about the flying of the Confederate Flag at social functions and the presence of Robert E. Lee’s portrait in the school’s classroom.  Roy Atwood and John Dickison said that NSA was accredited long before it actually was.  

Writing for Wilson’s “Credenda Agenda,” Dickison wrote that “when we have our way,” then there would be the death penalty for gays and lesbians.  When Wilson was quoted saying the same thing (albeit giving banishment as an alternative) in the Daily News, he claims that he was misquoted.

I have reiterated these claims along with many others on this list and elsewhere, and these are some of the reasons why I have no respect for Wilson & Co. and why I don’t trust them.

For more details than most of you would ever wish to know, see “The Doug Wilson Story” at http://users.adelphia.net/~nickgier/Wilson.htm.

Nick Gier, Head Banshee and God Hater
Two of my favorite of the many names that Wilson has called me.