Nutters

I find it so amusing the things that people connect sometimes!

Example: "because President Obama has a Kenyan side of his family he can't be American."

Today I had someone try to convince me that Ayaan Hirsi Ali is pro banning the teaching of evolution in schools. When I asked for them to support their conclusion they sited the instance of the Discovery Institute (which supports the teaching of creationism in schools) sponsoring a speaker who later ended up becoming president of the American Enterprise Institute (which Ali is a fellow of) as proof that she supports all things Discovery Institute...

Ummm....

First, if you don't know who Ayaan Hirsi Ali is I suggest you look her up. She is an amazing woman in my opinion. She escaped an arranged marriage and the subjugation to the male members of her family and country of origin as well as (in her opinion) the oppression on the Muslim religion. She ended up being a highly influential Dutch politician and was targeted by Muslims who felt that her leaving of the Muslim religion and her open criticism of it as warranting death. She wrote a great book called "Infidel". Good book.

Anyways, she ended up as an atheist and continues to fight things like female genital mutilation to this day. She highly values education and choice and feels that many religions are openly hostile to those things.

She is a fellow at the American Enterprise Institute (this is a conservative think tank).

The American Enterprise Institute is a notably conservative think tank but no where that I can find does it support suppression of science. If you can find it, let me know. Though I don't agree with it's stances generally, I don't find them openly hostile to science/evolution or any more religious that many other groups.

Now, you have to know what the Discovery Institute is to get where the connection comes in. The Discovery Institute is another think tank that is best known for it's advocacy of Intelligent Design. It is openly hostile to anything that doesn't support the Christian viewpoint.

So let me draw the lines this person was trying to convince me supported their stance. In 2006 the Discovery Institute sponsored a speaker who went to visit the American Enterprise Institute as a visiting fellow. This person, in 2008, became the president of the American Enterprise Institute.

So because Ali is a fellow at AEI she must support the stances of the Discovery Institute because at one time they sponsored the now president of AEI.

Anyone see a problem here?

First, just because you generally support an organization doesn't mean you support everything they do. Second, just because an organization sponsors a person doesn't mean that person supports everything that organization does.
and Third, even IF a president of an organization holds an opinion it does not mean that the whole organization holds that opinion.

It's just to far fetched for me... am I missing something or is this person seeing connections where their really aren't any?

Is Kevin Bacon a radical Jihadist because he can be linked to one??? Oh, poor Kevin... he's linked to a bunch of nutters!!!