9,487
edits
Changes
Jump to navigation
Jump to search
m
→Controversial remarks
Hovind maintains that biology textbooks are lying and advocates simply taking evolution out of the textbooks because he considers evolution to be a religion.<ref>{{cite news | url=http://www.drdino.com/articles.php?spec=67&kws=250,000 | title=Hovind's $250,000 Offer| publisher=Drdino.com | date= 2006 | first=Kent| last=Hovind | accessdate = 2006-10-20}}</ref> He has said, "I'm not trying to get evolution out of the textbooks, nor am I trying to get creationism into the textbooks. What I'm trying to do is get the lies out of the textbooks."<ref>http://www.drdino.com video tape #3.</ref>
Hovind has several conspiracy theories about the U.S. government. For example, he believes that the once-widely touted (but since discredited) cancer cure Laetrile actually works and teaches that the US government is conspiring to suppress a cure for [[cancer]].<ref name="CSICOP" /> On his radio program that he claims the U.S. government was behind the 9/11 attacks and that a "lot of folks were told not to come to work."<ref name="antisemitism">{{cite news | url=http://www.kent-hovind.com/articles/semite.htm | title=Kent Hovind: Semitic Semantics |publisher=Kent-Hovind.com | date=2006 | first= | last= | accessdate = 2006-12-14}}</ref> He attributes this belief to the films ''911 In Plane Site'' and ''Loose Change.'' He also believes the Oklahoma City bombing was carried out by the government. "Did you know the Federal Government blew up their own building to blame it on the militias and to get rid of some people that weren't cooperating with the system?"<ref name="Hovindconspiracy">{{cite news | url=http://www.kent-hovind.com/quotes/conspiracy.htm | title=Kent Hovind: Quacky Quotes|publisher= | date=2006 | first= | last= | accessdate = 2006-11-04}}</ref> He also alleges that "UFOs are apparitions of Satan" and that the US government possesses UFOs.<ref name="Hovindconspiracy" /> Additionally, Hovind believes that the Federal Reserve, the Council on Foreign Relations, the United Nations, and various other groups are actively planning to create a one-world government and that the 1993 World Trade Center attack was staged by the US Government in order to pass "anti-terrorism" legislation that restricts civil liberties. He says, "I love my country, but fear my government. And you should too."<ref> [http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=5240112600444883198&q=kent+hovind+new+world+order&hl=en Hovind's New World Order (Google video)]</ref>
Hovind disregards all fossil evidence, claiming "no fossils can count as evidence for evolution," because "all we know about that animal is that it died," and we do not know that it "had any kids, much less different kids."<ref> [http://exchristian.net/exchristian/2006/02/mike-shermerkent-hovind.html Hovind vs Shermer Debate]</ref> During a debate with Farrell Till, Hovind made the following claim about Donald Johanson: "[He] found the leg bones of Lucy a mile and a half away from the head bones. The leg bones were 200 feet deeper in a deeper layer of strata. I would like to know how fast the train was going that hit that chimpanzee."<ref>{{cite news | url=http://www.reall.org/newsletter/v02/n03/ | title=On the Till-Hovind Debate |publisher=The Real News | date=March 1994 | first=Karen | last=Bartelt | accessdate = 2006-11-04}}</ref> According to Donald Johanson, this is false, and although Hovind has been informed of this, he continues to make the claim.<ref>{{cite news | url=http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/knee-joint.html | title=A Case Study in Creationists' Willingness to Admit Their Errors |publisher=talk.origins | date=June 12, 2003 | first= | last= | accessdate = 2006-11-04}}</ref> He also claims the Grand Canyon was not created through gradual geologic processes but rather by the Great Flood as narrated in the Old Testament.