My favorite creationist web page of all time


I just had to share. Look at this sample: at least 5 different fonts, 6 different colors, shadowed text, and all superimposed on an irrelevant and elaborate background.

And then there’s the content: It’s a creation museum! It’s a taxidermy collection! And it’s run by some antique tools!

Savor the Creation Museum and Taxidermy Hall of Fame of North Carolina; I don’t think it will change any time in the near future, so there’s no hurry. It’s so nice of creationists to erect these monuments to stupidity and tastelessness on the web.

(Also on Sb)

Comments

  1. Audley Z. Darkheart OM, purveyor of candy and lies says

    My eyes! My brain!

    Yo, Creation Museum and Taxidermy Hall of Fame– the mid-90s called. They want their web design back.

  2. pitbone62 says

    In the questions an evolutionist can’t answer:

    How Did Life Come From Non-Life?
    (By the first law of science – a scientific impossibility)

    You can’t do that; it’s against the laws of science!

  3. ashakspeare says

    They can perform one miracle, when viewed on an iPod screen those awful red letters somehow appear 3D!

  4. unbound says

    PZ forgot to mention that there are a whopping 3 links in the site.

    From the slide show, it looks like a pretty small affair. And the taxidermist side of the place looks as poorly done as the creationist side. My father has more mounted trophies in his house. NC hunters are probably embarrassed by this place…

  5. Ashley Davis says

    PZ, seeing as you have just made this web site famous, I would love to hear hear your answers to their so called “5 Questions An Evolutionist Can Not Answer”

    (I am aware that most of the questions are just plain stupid, that’s why it would be funny to hear what you have to say).

    Ash

  6. Kieran says

    I remember in school getting a thwack for leaving the wood plane flat on the surface of a table. All those planes seem to be left flat on the surface of the shelf. You can tell alot about someone and how they treat a tool!

  7. ohnhai says

    What is the first rule of science anyway?

    and as to how can thought come from on thought, the correct response is “You will know that on the day you become an atheist…”

  8. Sajanas says

    I actually used to go to this story occasionally growing up, because I had a coin collection, and they had a variety of old coins for sale (in addition to books, old tools, and fudge). What doesn’t come across from the webpage is that the Creation Museum is in a scary looking basement. I never actually went down in there to see it… as a kid, I didn’t understand why my Mom wouldn’t let me go see the Museum, and going by later I realized that even my very religious mother thought creationists were full of shit. The couple that owns it was pretty old even back then… I can’t imagine it will survive them, since most of the people that go there are more interested in the fudge.

  9. Moggie says

    “Taxidermy Hall of Fame of North Carolina”?

    The only famous North Carolinians I know are John Coltrane and Thelonious Monk. If they’ve got those stuffed, it might be worth a visit.

  10. says

    Perhaps the most miraculous thing about this train-wreck of a site is that it wasn’t “created” using FrontPage, or indeed any other code generator — they usually are!

  11. Jackob van Beverningk says

    Have you read their hypothesis?
    I particularly liked this phrase:
    “The only requirement for testing this hypothesis is simply accepting the assumption.”

    (It’s in the paragraph that starts with ‘Simple minded persons’!)

  12. marko says

    Nobody has mentioned the horrible little pop up on the home page that appears if you hover over the start of the address.

  13. Corey Schlueter says

    Rules of creating a web site:
    *Write your pages clearly and concisely – fail
    *Do not overuse emphasis – fail
    *Organized text so readers can scan for important information – fail
    *Do spell check and proofread pages – fail
    *Be careful with background colors and colored text so it is not unreadable – fail

  14. says

    I would love to show this to my resident creationist- who I have doing some math back on mah blog. I think it would entertain him.

  15. Jacob van Beverningk says

    #8:

    I am aware that most of the questions are just plain stupid, that’s why it would be funny to hear what you have to say

    What’s so funny about PZ debating a 4 your old with his fingers in his ears?

  16. Nightjar says

    How Did Life Come From Non-Life?
    (By the first law of science – a scientific impossibility)

    Huh. I have no idea what they mean here. My first guess was the First Law of Thermodynamics, but I fail to see what that has got to do with abiogenesis even in the muddled mind of a creationist. My second guess was one of the statements of the Cell Theory (“all cells arise from pre-existing cells”), which would be a little more relevant in this case and which I’ve seen creationists using in this context before, but I fail to see why they’d call it a first law of anything in the first place.

    I’m clueless.

  17. Bruce Heerssen says

    Chris,

    If I were to guess, that train wreck was created using Macromedia Dreamweaver. (Macromedia was bought by Adobe a few years ago. This site appears to predate that.) The clue is in the javascript source, which uses an “MM_” or “mm_” naming convention.

  18. dean the bean says

    I saw two bumper stickers on two different cars within 3 minutes this morning:

    “The big bang theory: God spoke and bang it happened.”

    “Let go and let God.”

    Both appeared to have originated from the same school of design thought as that mess of a website.

  19. says

    I actually think antique tools are cool, but I’m not that into taxidermy. I also happen to think that antique tools were intelligently designed. So that’s something.

  20. Leona Gray says

    This place is on the main (and touristy) street in Southern Pines, NC. Bicycling friends and I go to Southern Pines every March to get a head start on the Ottawa cycling season. From my experience over the last 10 years or so, the place has always been a Christian bookstore. It looked enough like a regular bookstore for me to go in…once.

    This coming March, I’ll have to check out their museum. It might be worth a laugh.

  21. Steve says

    The best part about the 5 questions an evolutionist can’t answer is that they are all the same question: “How did something come from nothing?” reworded five times. Brilliant!!!

  22. Anubis Bloodsin III says

    It is to be considered that font text and color catastrophes are a unfortunate side affect of intense ignorance and extremely poor analytical capability and a general cognitive paucity, possibly the very reason why they go all gah gah at such a dufus story like Creationism in the first place!

    They all do it, never come across a creationist leaky khazi of ideas that did not display such an absence of taste….it is what they do!
    It is in fact a dead giveaway when confronted by such impeccably bad taste that you are confronted with religio woo woo idiocy supreme.

    Some might consider it a Poe, but even a Poe is not that downright unstable and demented.
    Whatever they certainly surpass themselves with trying to insult the readership and not so much trying, more like being past masters at that game and if not in vision then certainly in content.

    Damned anti-social methinks!

    ‘Answers in Nonsense’ might be an aberration, but the text does make up for this visual shortfall in all the other departments, and then some.
    I blame lack of imagination in worldly matters, cos they need all they got to drool after jeebus, and make ridiculous apologetic excuses up for their utter banality..

    It would be funny…if it were not for the fact that they are deadly serious…that is not just scary but well nigh certifiable!

  23. marko says

    I actually think antique tools are cool

    I agree. I also enjoy the way he fumbles around trying to explain why they are in his creation museum. He clearly loves his very tangible antique tools, and wonders where that all fits with his love of god.

  24. Nic George says

    I work right near this museum and for years I’ve wondered if my profound annoyance with creation museums could be suppressed long enough to go look at the tools.

  25. Aspect Sign says

    The couple that owns it was pretty old even back then…

    Well they do advertise an old tool collection!

  26. Margaret says

    At least from the picture they’re probably not flat-earthers. Or am I being overly optimistic and that’s a circular flat earth?

  27. DLC says

    And Solomon said unto the faithful: “know ye then, that a sign of a true believer in the Word shall be his hideous web design. “

  28. Nemo says

    Five Questions an Evolutionist Can’t Answer (because he’s standing their slack-jawed at your stupidity):

    1. How Did Nothing Turn Into Something?

    Quantum physics suggests that “nothing” turns into “something” on a regular basis. But I won’t pretend we have a definitive answer to this yet.

    2. How Did Life Come From Non-Life?

    Life isn’t magic. It’s just chemistry. Really complex chemistry, but there’s no point at which it stops being chemistry and starts being something else. It’s hard if not impossible to even draw a sensible line between life and non-life — consider a virus.

    3. How Did Millions of Life Forms Evolve With Absolutely No Evidence of Major Change?

    This of course is nonsense; there are mountains of such evidence. I can only assume the person posing this question is looking for a crocoduck.

    4. How Can A Watch Come Into Existence Without A Watchmaker?

    It can’t. But a lifeform is not a watch, nor reasonably analogous to a watch.

    5. How Did Thought Come From Non-Thought?

    I’m not even certain what this question means, but again, thought is not magic. It’s a physical process arising from the brain. We don’t fully understand it yet, but the fact that thought is physical is easily and routinely demonstrated by changes in thought accompanying physical changes in the brain. If you doubt it… go have a few drinks.

  29. grumps says

    @ Dan #50

    That is damaging. I’ll go back and hope that the shock subsides enough for me to take in some details, but… Goddamn!!

    Seriously though anyone prone to photosensitive seizures don’t go there… no, seriously, don’t.

  30. marko says

    Questions an evolutionist can’t answer, but isn’t afraid to say so, roll up his sleeves and try to figure it out instead of sticking his fingers in his ears and proclaiming that some big magic guy done it and is now hiding in space. Is “I don’t know” not one of the profound and important answers you can give, and the starting point of ever knowing anything?

  31. 'Tis Himself, OM says

    Leona Gray #34

    Bicycling friends and I go to Southern Pines every March to get a head start on the Ottawa cycling season.

    You bicycle all the way from North Carolina to Ontario? I’m impressed.

  32. Nick says

    onhai @ 13

    ‘and BTW. what’s with the “Date Christian Girls” advert???’

    And why do they look like drag queens?

  33. Albatross says

    Holy crap, my sister’s been there. She says that there are “thou shall not kill” anti-abortion bumper stickers all around the dead animals…

  34. GravityIsJustATheory says

    Pft. That was a bad website, but is it as bad as this one?
    http://www.hydrolance.net/

    (Although the one linked at #50 wins for eye-destroying horror. “Accept Jesus – or we’ll force you to watch this webpage FOREVER!!!”. I’ve alos just noticed the panther running backwards across the bottom-left corner of the screen WTF?)

  35. Charlie Foxtrot says

    Speaking of creationists, imagine my surprise earlier this week at finding myself sitting in an office right next to the offices of “Creation Ministries” in Brisbane!?

    Discussing this situation via sms with my sister, I liked best her suggestion that I should duck out, buy some toy dinosaur skeletons, then sneak in and bury them in their pot plants :)

    Next business trip, it may be awkward explaining the toys and small gardening trowel in my laptop case to the airport security… but totally worth it.

  36. marella says

    What is it with kooks and centre-justified text?

    It’s because they have an overwhelming need for order and symmetry, so they like centre-justified text.

    @Dan
    That web-site was too appalling to hang around noticing interesting details, sorry. I just gasped in pain and got the hell out!

  37. tushcloots says

    @Dan:
    I love that fake security warning! For even more laughs, WOT warned me not to go to the site, declaring it could be dangerous. I like the WOT rating page:

    “Other than the terrible design of this website, it is trying to brainwash people into Christianity. ”

    “I’m not one to pass judgement on whether we agree with the website itself or not, but some of the graphics on this website may pose a serious health risk to those at risk of epilepsy and similar disorders. It burns my eyes. ”

    “oh god this is just disgusting ”

    “AW MY EYES! “

  38. says

    To everybody that is perplexed about some of the elements of that Accept Jesus Forever Forgiven site… try visiting in Internet Explorer. If nothing else, it’ll be a good lesson in why web designers hate Internet Explorer.

  39. petzl20 says

    This kind of batshit only happens in the Red States (OK, or in the hinterland of the Blue States).

  40. Swann says

    I’d love to say: only in America, but as I’m not an American, I feel it would cause too much collateral damage.

  41. Xios the Fifth says

    I looked at Dan’s site and clicked a random link to get AWAY from the rainbow seizure-inducing background and hit ‘View Guestbook’.

    Monday 01/26/2009 9:32:17am
    Name: The Enlightened One
    Homepage Title:
    Homepage URL:
    Referred By: Friend
    Location: England
    Comments: God Made Marijauna, Man Made Drugs. Who do you trust? SMOKE THE SACRED HERB! it is a divine gift from god, The infadel government prevent us from enjoying this gift, stand up for yourself! In God We Trust!

    This may explain the rainbows.

    Monday 10/30/2006 4:55:31pm
    Name: Jesus_Lover_99_<3_<3
    Homepage Title:
    Homepage URL:
    Referred By: Just Surfed In
    Location: Alabama
    Comments: OMG THIS IS TEH GR8TIST GSUS WEBSITE EVER CAN WE MEET UP SOMETIME IN ALABAMAM AND TALK ABOUT
    P.S GSUS IS HOW ALL TEH COOL KIDS SPELL JESUS

    WTF?

    Monday 10/30/2006 4:58:15pm
    Name: 1337 J3zuz
    Homepage Title:
    Homepage URL:
    Referred By: Search Engine
    Location: Toronto
    Comments: The rainbows are what inspired me, but it’s the cat that made me stay. I think I may have finally come to accept Jesus as a
    revolutionary website designer.

    Thank You!

    I really, REALLY want to believe this is sarcasm.

    Saturday 06/03/2006 7:33:39pm
    Name: not yet
    E-Mail: not yet
    Homepage Title: not yet
    Homepage URL: http://not yet
    Referred By: Search Engine
    Location: not yet
    Comments: Sup, tite hp you got there. Keep up da work. Sweet job! Aight, peace out.

    Comments? Not yet.
    This one’s just scary:

    Friday 11/25/2005 8:46:15am
    Name: Dave Flang
    Homepage Title: Warn Every One
    Homepage URL: http://www.warneveryone.com
    Referred By: Web Ring
    Location: Groton NY
    Comments: When a priest confesses to his priest and receives forgiveness for sexual crimes against children, doesn’t that allow the Bishop to continue to keep that priest and then move him to another location?

    Public schools buses have video cameras and shouldn’t this also apply to the (con)fessional booth?
    Anyway stay in the fight.

    And my personal favorite:

    Monday 05/08/2006 6:28:02am
    Name: robert
    Homepage Title:
    Homepage URL:
    Referred By: E-Mail
    Location:
    Comments: weeeeeeeeeeee jesus rulz

    WHEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!!

    Excuse me, I’m going to go cry now.

  42. reisender says

    Aren’t there more than 5 or 6 fonts used on this site’s main page?
    Don’t kill me, just sayin.

  43. John Morales says

    reisender:

    Aren’t there more than 5 or 6 fonts used on this site’s main page?

    I dunno; are there? :)

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