In Which Christine Flowers Makes a [Greater] Fool of Herself

Christine Flowers is an occasional columnist at the Philadelphia Daily News who would be mediocre and uninspiring but for the fact that she is wrong on just about everything. She's a Democrat who supports Bush; she makes silly arguments in favor of the "pro-life" movement, against women's rights, and comparing breastfeeding in public to public urination. You name the topic and Christine Flowers will have something to say about it, and her comments will be completely wrong.

Last week, she wrote a particularly silly article, "Dover and the Cult of Science", in which she opined on "the double standard that seems to apply to scientists. The judge in the Dover case showed his disdain for anyone who would challenge the established scientific dogma of evolution, labeling them as transparent liars." I wrote a brief, and harsh, letter to the editor:

I thoroughly enjoyed Christine Flowers recent column,
"Dover and the Cult of Science", because it proved one
of my favorite Mark Twain quotes: "Better to keep
one's mouth shut and be thought a fool, than to open
it and remove all doubt."

Please cancel this woman's worthless, wrongheaded
ramblings: Philadelphia already has a bad reputation
for mediocrity and stupidity, and Flowers' column just
makes things worse.
Brendan Skwire

Although I didn't see the Daily News over the weekend, I assume the letter was published, because Ms. Flowers sent me a reply:

Dear Brendan (I hope you won't be too upset at my familiarity)

I had a chance to read your letter to the editor in response to my recent oped on ID and hypocritical judges in the Daily News. Sorry you don't like my writing, but since I'll probably be around for a while, just save yourself the indigestion and don't read anything that has my byline in the future.

And next time, you could always email the source; I have more respect for people who actually engage in dialogue with the writers. I may disagree with them, but I respect them nonetheless. I don't have a blog, but my email is out there for all to use. I don't shy away from challeges.

Cheers,

Christine Flowers

P.S. Nice quote by Twain; it's my favorite. And about evolution-I think it has a lot of gaps. There are a number of missing links out there, and they all seem to have access to computers (present company excepted).

There are some things I don't do, and one of them is get in debates with people about "Intelligent Design" which is "Creationism" but with one extra word and one fewer syllable (I can shorten it to one word and two syllables: BULLSHIT). So I wrote back:

Why would I have a debate with someone who's wrong
about everything, and why would I care whether someone
who's wrong about everything has respect for me or
not?

You obviously misunderstand the purpose of a letter
the the editor, which is to call public attention to
disagreement (or agreement) with a writer who's
writing toward the public?

And please, call me Mr. Skwire. I don't care for
familiar terms from people I don't know personally.

For someone who doesn't "shy away from challenges", Ms. Flowers is certainly a delicate, and quite fragrant, lily:

Oh my, touchy touchy MR. SKWIRE.

I suppose that explains everything. You have an amazingly closed mind, so I think you might want to stay out of Oliver Wendell Holmes free marketplace of ideas...you're a stranger there.

By the way, you might want to consult a dictionary more often and evaluate the meaning of 'mediocre.' It doesn't mean "anyone who doesn't agree with MR. SKWIRE."

And for an analysis from someone who has actually been published in an actual magazine, you might want to review this gem.

Regards,

Christine (I'm not so self-important that I mind when people use my first name...you really need to lighten up)

THE POLITICALLY INCORRECT GUIDE TO SCIENCE [Peter Robinson]
Longtime NR contributor Tom Bethell has just published a superbly outrageous
new book, The Politically Incorrect Guide to Science. Tom exposes the fraud,
greed, self-dealing, and sheer humbug in the "science" of half a dozen
topics, includingthe ban on DDT, cloning, and global warming. Does Tom take
on Darwinism? Oh, indeed he does.
Evolutionists say that intelligent design does not rise to the level of a
theory, and they may be right....If the advocates of design can invoke an
invisible Designer, or God, who can prevail over all difficulties any time
He wants and design any form of life at will, then we are more within the
realm of magic than of science. If there is nothing that an Intelligent
Designer cannot do, then the theory of intelligent design is unfalsifiable,
and not scientific for that reason. One critic of intelligent design,
Douglas H. Erwin, a paleobiologist at the Smithsonian Institution, told the
New York Times: "One of the rules of science is, no miracles allowed. That's
a fundamental presumption of what we do." But a comparable criticism can
also be leveled at Darwinism. If material causes only are admitted, and
nothing exists in the universe but molecules in motion, then evolution must
be true-a logical deduction from the premise of materialism. We are
indubitably here, along with millions of other species, so how did we get
here? Materialists have no choice but to accept that the molecules whirled
themselves into extraordinarily complex, conscious beings.

I'll concede that my letter to the editor was harsh, but tough titty: I've seen crueler letters in the Daily News. But other than stating bluntly that I think ms. Flowers is wrong about everything, I made no statements about Ms. Flowers as a person. Ms. Flowers, on the other hand, feels free to make a number of dubious (and by"dubious" I mean "completely baseless") statements about me. And you know, FUCK THAT. I wrote to her boss, Frank Burgos, who's responsible for the Editorial Page.

Dear Mr. Burgos,

A few days ago I sent a short Letter to the Editor at
the Daily News regarding one of Christine Flowers'
columns, "Dover and the Cult of Science", which I
disagreed with.

Ms. Flowers sent me an email, copied below, attempting
to engage me in a debate about "Intelligent Design", a
concept that has been discredited, and criticizing me
for responding to her column on the public forum of
your Letters page. In fact she discourages me from
writing letters to the editor: better I should email
her directly, as she would have "more respect" for me.

I wrote back informing the delightful Ms. Flowers that
I had no interest in emailing with her, and informed
her that a public column invites a public response.
That is the whole purpose of a letter to the editor,
which as you will read, Ms. Flowers doesn't quite
grasp.

Although I expected no further correspondence from Ms.
Flowers, I awoke this morning to find an incredibly
thin-skinned and highly unprofessional email waiting
for me, copied below, berating me and my point of
view.

Mr. Burgos, Ms. Flowers already has a powerful
platform to broadcast her perspective: a column in
your paper. It seems unfitting that one of your
columnists is unable to take criticism, harsh or
constructive.

As you will see, Ms. Flowers' letter to me, which
borders on the hysterical, makes baseless claims about
my character and my point of view simply because I
disagree with her. This is unfair, unwarranted, and
more than a little unhinged. While past
correspondence with your paper has occasionally earned
me a personal response from a writer, never once has
someone replied in such a coarse and vulgar fashion.

If Ms. Flowers wants to write about her belief in
intelligent design or any other pseudo-science she
happens to swallow, that is certainly her right.
However, she cannot expect that readers will not
respond to her writing simply because she has a column
at the Daily News and we don't: that is the worst kind
of Ivory Tower mentality. She is certainly off-base
levying personal attacks on a reader.

Please inform Ms. Flowers that if she wants any kind
of credibility with Daily News readers she has to
learn to take criticism, whether harsh or
constructive. She could learn from the example of
Will Bunch, who regularly gets comments bordering on
the profane at Attytood, and manages to shrug them off
with good humor.

I have copied all of our correspondence below, with
Ms. Flowers' original email to me at the bottom of the
scroll. I'm sure you will agree that her last email
to me is inappropriate, and not the way you'd like
your writers to represent the Daily News, which, like
all newspapers, thrives on the marketplace of ideas.

Mr. Burgos, I expect an apology from Ms. Flowers who
knows nothing at all about me other than that I
dislike her column, but feels compelled to call me
names and question my character. Please inform me as
to what actions you will be taking.

Sincerely,
Brendan Skwire

Updates as they come...
[Update: Welcome Atrios Readers! And I have heard back from the Daily News that they are looking into the matter. Enjoy the site everyone!]
[Update 2: It's interesting that all of Flowers' emails to me were sent before my letter to the editor was even published. Daily News Editor Frank Burgos asked me if I had cc-ed ms. Flowers in my original LTE: I had not. I have no idea where she found my email, or for that matter why she referenced blogging. Google my name: this blog doesn't come up until the 9th page of results.]