Conservapedia:Andrew Schlafly's greatest insights

The question under consideration is: what is Andy Schlafly's greatest insight? To answer that question, let's properly define the term insight from the perspective of Conservapedia.

An insight is when you just make up some random pseudo-explanatory conjecture about something. For example, a writer could say


 * "Criminals drive cars. And Barack Obama has a car. Therefore, it's an interesting insight to note that Barack Obama shares many traits with the criminal mind".

The fascinating thing about "insights" is that they are incontestable &mdash; there can be no evidence provided against an "insight".

There are a few things one can do with an "insight" - you can publish it to your blog, you can use it as the foundation of a much larger, more complex theory, or you can just slap a price tag on it and build it for $27 million.

The very nature of an "insights" as coming from somewhere above makes it impossible to back away from it, even in the face of logic and/or overwhelming evidence against the underlying observations.

For your amusement, we have prepared a shortlist of his insights below, with backgrounds and relevant quotes.

Autumn foliage disproves evolution
Insight: Beautiful autumn foliage lacks any plausible evolutionary explanation.

Background: Andy added this item to one of his pet articles, "Counterexamples to Evolution". After being heckled by users on the talk page, Andy excreted his explanation directly onto the dinner table for all to see: autumn foliage is beautiful, but said beauty has no use to the trees, and could not have possibly arisen by chance alone. Therefore Goddidit.

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Best of the public
Insight: The "best of the public" is better than a group of experts.

Background: This is arguably Andy's magnum opus. Andy has a long history of not liking experts, because they have a habit of saying things which are counter to the alternate reality in which he lives. In an attempt to discredit his detractors, he spouted this phrase, and then went on to develop it into a full-blown insight. Most people would consider an expert to be the best of the public, but in this case, it appears "public" means unqualified laymen, such as himself, and the criteria for identifying the "best" among them remain suspiciously undefined. When Andy likes someone that most people would consider an expert, he twists the definition so that the person is no longer an expert but "the best of the public." In trying to apply his insight to the entire world, Andy began generating a list of examples of the "best of the public," ranging from the Olympic Games to Conservapedia itself.

This insight is actually just a perversion of the concept of the wisdom of the crowd (or expertise without credential), with a huge pile of stupid thrown on top of it. The twisting of the concept of what is "best" to conform to whatever he likes, as well as his attributing the titles of "public" versus "expert" haphazardly (the US Olympic basketball "Dream Team" was "the public"; The Beatles, who generally lacked formal musical training, were "experts") makes his distinctions meaningless. Likewise, some actual good examples of this phenomenon he rejects for not fitting his worldview, such as Einstein, and even Wikipedia (which he decided was an example of "the worst of the public").

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(This quote is particularly noteworthy as Gary Kasparov did once play the "best of the public" using computers and won. However, it is uncertain whether the four advising chess masters and 50,000 players all followed a "Conservapedia-like" process, as there is no clear definition what this means in the context of a chess game. It can also be assumed that a significant number were liberals and therefore doomed to failure. They probably voted for Obama as well, the bastards.)

The Bible foretold modern science
Insight: Modern principles of science were foretold in the Bible.

Background: Now one of Conservapedia's flagship articles, Biblical scientific foreknowledge was created by others but soon adopted by a wide-eyed Andy, whose determination to prove the inerrancy of the Bible has seen it become an unwieldy list of complete rubbish. With each square peg of a Bible passage that Andy forces through the round hole of a scientific principle, the pegs get squarer and the holes get rounder.

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Black holes are a liberal conspiracy
Insight: Liberals are pushing the idea of black holes. It is possible that doing so discourages people from reading the Bible.(???)

Background: Relativity again. Andy claims that black holes are unfalsifiable (a claim which, when repeated by a user months later, got that user banned for "obvious parody"). "If tests existed that might falsify General Relativity, then in the nearly 100 years since its proposal we would have seen many of them." *cough* *cough* Anyway, professors teaching physics (who "are the most liberal group in the world"), science magazines and the New York Times are all going on about black holes. Thus, black holes must be part of the liberal agenda.

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Conservative insights increase at a geometric rate
Insight: Conservative insights increase at a geometric rate over time, hence, societies become steadily more conservative. There's no real way to put this in simpler, more understandable terms, because it's just bollocks at every conceivable level.

Background: After starting his bewildering "Best New Conservative Words" project, Andy began applying statistical analysis to his findings, resulting in a rapid downward spiral of insanity to finally land at one of the most bizarre "insights" ever to grace Conservapedia. This project simply defies all kinds of sense - first, Andy takes a word and decides whether it's a liberal word or a conservative word. Andy then finds out when each word in the "conservative" pile was first used in the English language according to the Merriam-Webster dictionary. Andy then groups the words by century, tabulates the numbers, and has an epiphany: the numbers are increasing at a geometric rate! Andy reinforces his conclusion by selectively adding more words to the project, but only if they conform to this geometric rate. Never before have so many utter failures of logic and common sense been strung together so eloquently into one, seamless brainfart - a brainfart that eventually budded off and became its own article: "Conservapedia's Law". This is arguably Andy's most cherished insight and pet project, as he's uncharacteristically kept developing the list for quite some time now. This insight also became the topic of a rare semi-open debate at Conservapedia, and even though Andy's theory and methodology were completely discredited, he's still happily adding layer after layer of crap new words.

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Feudalism: Not all bad
Insight: Feudal society had its advantages.

Background: This insight cropped up in Andy's "World History" lectures. In writing Lecture Five, which covers the Middle Ages, Andy started a chapter on "Feudalism in Western Europe," which somehow went in the direction of identifying the good points. Andy seems to have realised/decided that a feudal society would have positive results for some of his pet issues, like home-schooling. It is quite possible that Andy fancies himself a Lord of the Manor in feudal times; in some ways Conservapedia resembles a fiefdom.

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To prove that Andy can shoe-horn any of his pet peeves into any argument, he goes on to speak about the possibility of gun control during feudal times.

George Orwell was a secret conservative
Insight: George Orwell was a conservative and merely pretended to be a socialist in order to introduce conservative concepts from within.

Background: Andy has, on occasion, shown admiration for Orwell, mostly for one particular quote: "All issues are political issues." This phrase echoes Andy's worldview perfectly, provided that it is kept strictly out of context (a fact which Andy is oblivious to). After taking a shine to the phrase, he made Orwell his personal hero and decided that he must be a conservative (and not a democratic socialist, which Orwell identified himself as), because Andy only likes conservatives. This has led to one of the most absurd strings of rationalizations Andy has ever embarked upon.

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The greatest works throughout history have been produced by teenagers
Insight: Most - if not all - of the greatest achievements of human history have been made by teenagers.

Background: This insight resurfaces from time to time, especially when Andrew Schlafly gets impressed by his home-schooled students. It eventually culminated in an article, in which Andy lists teenage achievements by age. Among them is the virgin Mary.

Although a thorough analysis is hardly necessary to see what's wrong with Andy's bullshit hypothesis, one is available here.

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This claim has been thoroughly debunked here.

The invisible hand of marriage
Insight: The invisible hand of marriage is an unseen force of productivity that results from the marriage of a man and woman.

Background: This concept is analogous to the invisible hand of the free market, and is, somehow, more influential. According to Andy's essay on the subject, "Self-interest and greed are not the primary driving forces of the invisible hand [of the free market], but marriage is." So somehow, marriage is what drives capitalism and economic productivity. But not, as the article notes, same-sex marriage. In the 'References' section he boasts that "[t]his concept was first discovered and developed on Conservapedia", showing that he hasn't a clue of how a citation or an encyclopedia is supposed to work.

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Jesus invented comedy
Insight: Comedy did not exist before Christianity.

Background: Out of the blue one cold February morning, Andy added this item to his list of "Greatest Mysteries of World History" essay: "Did humor exist prior to Christianity?" There is no indication of where this one came from. It might have emerged spontaneously from the murky depths of a (possibly) alcohol-befuddled psyche, or it might have its origins in some conversation Andy had, in which he accidentally said something phenomenally stupid and then defended it to the death to save face, culminating in this insight. Naturally, after adding this item to the article, other users came out of the woodwork in droves to ask him about it and cite Greek comedy, among other examples of pre-Christian humour. Andy then went on to redefine "humour."

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Jesus disproves Einstein
Insight: Jesus healed a man instantaneously, therefore "action at a distance" is real, and the Theory of Relativity is wrong.

Background: This is just one item in a long list of "Counterexamples to Relativity", but it is by far the dumbest. Andy's on-going tirade against relativity seems to be a result of his delusion that scientific relativity and moral relativism (something most conservatives superficially reject but do in practice hold as a view anyway) are somehow equivalent, and if one is accepted, both must be accepted. His determination to trash relativity has spilled out many more truly amazing nuggets, chief among them the idea that black holes were "invented to sell magazines" (see above).

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Um, radiated heat IS infrared light?

Obama's lack of dancing proves he's a Muslim
Insight: Obama doesn't appear to dance much in public. Sharia law prohibits dancing. Therefore, Obama is a Muslim.

Background: One cannot help but wonder if there's some subtle racism behind this one: black people are well-known dancers and if Obama (a black guy) isn't dancing it must be because he's Muslim. Except, Andy even points out a "highly staged politically correct dance" with Ellen Degeneres (if by "politically correct" Schlafly meant tame, well, Obama is married and he's not Degeneres' type). Later still, a poster provides two more examples of Obama dancing, but of course this only strengthens Andy's thesis. And never mind that Obama's been known to eat pork.

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Because a certain film won an Oscar, Palin won't get the GOP nomination
Insight: Because the "conservative" film The King's Speech defeated the "liberal" Social Network at the Oscars, Sarah Palin, who is "one of the biggest Facebook users", won't be the Republican nominee for president.

Background: It all started in January 2011, with a main page post by Andy claiming that "Liberals are stunned that the conservative movie The King's Speech defeated the movie promoting the liberal Facebook for top movie of the year," after the former won the Producers' Guild Award for best picture.

Now the only reason that Andy could have leapt on TKS as being conservative, is that he really doesn't like Facebook, describing it as "the gossip site that lowers academic performance and breaks up marriages." It's more likely that nobody would accept his friend requests, so he left in a huff. It's also worth mentioning that several current and former high-ranking sysops have Facebook profiles, including Ed Poor, Karajou, DeanS, Geo.plrd and. However, in Andy's black-and-white world, if something (anything!) beats something he perceives to be liberal, it must be conservative.

Roll on the Oscars, and as everybody who hadn't been in a coma for the last year knew, The King's Speech cleaned up the major awards. This prompted one of Andy's weirder musings on the main page:

He went on to elaborate in cp:Presidential Election 2012, highlighting as a negative under Palin's nomination chances, "Relies heavily on Facebook, but it was crushed by The King's Speech at the Oscars - an omen, perhaps?"

As far as Andy's insights go, this has to be one of the more bizarre ones, as he links the reaction of a small panel of judges to a certain film, to the political ambitions of somebody who just happens to use the media in question. Despite Andy's gloating, The Social Network was by no means an unsuccesful film: it took in almost 100 million dollars domestically, got rave reviews from critics and won no less than three Oscars. And that's not even considering the massive popularity of the actual website, just a movie about it. However, given that Palin has a snowball's chance in hell of winning the GOP nomination, it's quite likely that this is one insight that will be bang on the mark... for totally different reasons.

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"Christian" is a secularized form of "Christ"
Background: Andy had been on a "secularization of language" kick for a few months, with a hilarious article on the subject. In May of 2011, he doubled down on the crazy when he decided that "flooding" was a secularized version of the "biblical" word "flood", and went all-in when he decided "Christian" was a secular form of "Christ" despite their obviously different meanings. Additionally, he fails to acknowledge numerous times in which floods were materials other than water, such as tar, mud, and even molasses.

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Liberals are against phonics because Democrats rely heavily on illiterate voters at the polls
Insight: Liberals prefer the "whole language" method to phonics because it ensures students never learn to read, and are therefore much more likely to vote for Democrats.

Background: teaching children to read using phonics has been part of the culture wars for decades, with conservatives supporting phonics, apparently believing that without it people will go through their adult lives with no idea what sound a "D" makes. Andy, like with all conservative causes, jumped on this bandwagon with both feet, penning his essay Mystery:Why is Phonics Taught in the UK but not the US? Apparently unaware that illiterate adults are quite rare in the United States (as opposed to functional illiteracy, which is more common but a different issue) and are certainly among the demographics least likely to vote, Andy nevertheless believes they make up a substantial percentage of the Democratic party's constituents, who want to make sure few Americans can read.

Estimated illiteracy rates vary greatly in the U.S., with somewhere in the neighborhood of 2% to 3% actually illiterate, with a much higher number (estimated from 14% to 23%) having very poor reading comprehension skills. The latter would seem to have little to do with phonics, as the subjects can read the words (which is what phonics teaches) but not fully comprehend what they mean when put together. Andy could not cite any statistics that either of these groups vote Democratic more often in elections.

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Atheists hate underdogs
Insight: Atheists are almost incapable of supporting underdogs, as it runs contrary to everything atheists believe.

Background: This one appeared out of nowhere, with the hypothesis emerging from the (utterly made up) result. Andy decided, based on absolutely no evidence, that atheists did not root for the (3 point underdog) Giants in Super Bowl XLVI. When asked to back this up, he doubled down on the crazy and made up a list of why atheists cannot like the underdog. Included was the assertion that atheist Joseph Stalin "probably did not like underdogs". At no point did he ever cite any source indicating any of it was true (which is hardly surprising). Atheistic Brits, in particular cannot root for an underdog.

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Fidel Castro is dead and has been replaced by a body double
Insight: Fidel Castro has been dead since 2006 and all appearances of Castro since have been staged by body doubles

Background: Andy has long suspected that the Cuban Communist leader, Fidel Castro, died in 2006. When in early 2012 the Pope visited Cuba and had a much published and talked about audience with the ailing Castro, Andy (who cannot ever be wrong) declared that Castro had in fact been replaced by a body double. After studying media photos of the meeting Andy noted differences between the Castro of the past and this new impostor which have slipped past everyone, including the Pope, his entourage, Hugo Chavez, the President of Brazil, the entire population of Cuba and the media. Andy, with a few photos at his disposal, has exposed the truth, noting differences in the lookalike's beard and height among other things.

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Fidel Castro actually passed away on November 25, 2016. On November 27, 2016, the following appeared on Mainpageright: