UTMC

DNA Sculpture exhibit at UC Berkeley playground turning heads, sparking complaints



The large, plastic and metallic sculpture parked outside UC Berkeley’s Lawrence Hall of Science, is stoking the angry fires of parents of children who attend nearby Claremont Park Elementary School.

“My daughter suggested that it was funny,” said John Copeland, whose 7-year-old daughter attends summer camp there. “She shouldn’t be talking to me about this. Now I’m forced to explain genetics to her, and why the Bible doesn’t say anything about it.”

...

“There are 1000 kids in the school that are going to be exposed to it,” he said. “It’s vile and offensive, and kids have no business seeing what God thought fit to hide from our eyes.”

Crazy Lady went on to say, "Sometimes I doubt your commitment to Sparkle Motion!"

Confirms people are fucking retarded. But that's okay, because when they talk we can identify them.

That is ... troubling. However, according to some comments on the article, it could be a hoax.




*edit

The best comment from that article, evar !

cousinavi wrote:DNA? How is having a sculpture of DNA going to hurt the kiddies? Art is not supposed to be educational, it should be entertaining, inherently interesting and provocative.
I say take down the DNA! Replace it with a giant erect cock plunging into a huge slippery pussy.
Hide some speakers inside it so it moans and grunts and says, “F**k me! Oh my GOD, I love it!”
Every hour the cock can shoot great ropey strands of marshmallow silly string and all the kids can gobble it up! FREE CANDY! And condoms for everyone!
Now THAT’S educational.

RevCBL wrote:Hoax.

I don't feel so bad, being taken in. I'm apparently not in the minority, either: the bullshit story is ENTIRELY plausible.

It's direct satire of this real story (linked from inside the piece):

http://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/palm-b ... 4016.story

The author explains himself well enough here, but for fun of joining the discussion or expedience for those who don't care to read the jump, my two cents.

The point for those who think it's true and disapprove: have we choked on so much that we no longer bother to filter? Hellhouses, damnation, and funeral protests... OH MY!! It's a skepticism test, reminder, or simple novelty when contrasted with the real (almost equally absurd) piece. For me, I had my doubts about the local government going along with it so I read further. I'm troubled by the fact that I -could- see it as happening, and it makes a belly-laughing-sick-to-my-stomach punchline with the real cardboard fig leaves. In other words, I see virtually no difference between the satire piece and the real story, which highlights that I'm -not- too sensitive, the theo-crazy is gettting to a fever pitch. You may see it the other way for yourself.

For those who skoff that it's clearly utterly rediculous and that secularists, humanists, and those generally concerned about the braying of the superstitious have become too sensitive.. can you see how close it is to the real piece? Hopefully (speaking from the skeptic, humanist, secularist camp) if the original piece would have slipped by with "I can see their point" or hearty support if seen first, the satire will give you pause as to why we should all deny the perfectly natural and gloriously mundane in deference to what we see as silly superstitions and ultimately harmful taboos.

Either way, very clever work.[/url]

RevCBL wrote: In other words, the target of his satire (religious beliefs and the people who hold them) were not involved in the actual events he was satirizing.

I accept your premise, but not the point. The fact that the article in a commercial newspaper didn't highlight the source of the silliness, I don't have to pretend to be confused if the news doesn't report "the swimmers swam in water".

That's a perfectly valid point, that I don't deny.

Which is why I still think it was a clever exercise and that I learned something about myself for having gone through it.





(Can i post skank pics now? Or is it too soon?)

Lots of good points here, and I thank you for them.

I'm the author of the satirical article in question (and I also happen to ride), and I'm glad to see hearty discussion about the article, its contents, and the issues in the original.

I found this rather awesome forum because this thread linked to the article.

If anyone would like to ask me any questions here, I'd be happy to try to answer them. Also feel free to yell at me, or whatever you feel is appropriate. I think I've heard it all, but I'm always open for more criticism.

As a satire, it is clumsy.
Had they, rather than a sculpture of DNA, used a common occurrence of electricity or something equally every-day, it would have worked as a poke against the ignorance many loud-mouthed religious nutters espouse.
Howsoever, I don't think anyone who believed it is automatically themselves bigoted or ignorant.
The last couple of years have been full of events where people, because of their own religious reasons, have displayed a level of ignorance and intolerance towards science and rationality that, to anyone who actually values science and rationality, is simply headache inducing. Not to mention all the "think of the children" stuff going on. Especially since the news media tends to focus on the most outrageous, stupid, idiotic and over-the-top comments that are just about barely credible in such situations.
So yeah, it's a little bit surprising that somebody, anybody, could have religious objections to that sculpture. But, based on previous experience, it is not incredible but, unfortunately, credible, as it isn't entirely as far out as some of the other stuff I recall (remember those guys prostrating themselves in front of the courthouse and crying and speaking in tongues because somebody was removing the ten commandments monument? Remember fucking nipplegate? The Phelps clan? Praying for Chavez to die? Every single time somebody seriously declared that the scientific community supported intelligent design?).

This isn't prejudice or anything, this is believing that a previously documented mode of behavior not by individuals but by people proclaiming their faith in the bible has once again occurred.
This is the experience that, while individual self-proclaimed biblists may be reasonable people, there are biblists who use the bible as an excuse for ignorance.

If there had been complaints about that sculpture that didn't mention the bible, and somebody would have started off on the biblists, that would have been anti-biblist prejudice. However, this piece of satire pointed out biblists as the source of complaints to begin with.

Procrustes wrote:(and I also happen to ride)

How many fingers you got?

MotorCityN8 wrote:

Procrustes wrote:(and I also happen to ride)

How many fingers you got?

It depends.

I'm not sure I'm smart enough to judge how good or effective the satire is. If it weren't for my quickly scanning the comments and seeing GG's "hoax" post, my initial very quick skimming of the of the article would have led me to believe it's true. And for our newly minted terrorist's benefit, I'm a devout Catholic. The stereotype of the touchy religious believer has some grounds in truth and while the satire may be clumsy, it is IMO, at least moderately effecitve.

Procrustes wrote:

MotorCityN8 wrote:

Procrustes wrote:(and I also happen to ride)

How many fingers you got?

It depends.

Depends on what? How tall (or short) you are? Whether you're "procrastinating" on the way to Athens? Or whether your name is Theseus?

--Jaeger

(P.S. -- cool handle. )

(P.P.S -- the pinkie removal squad will be by shortly. )

RevCBL wrote: Hey, neat.
I'm sure you've heard all the criticisms we're likely to provide, and maybe Guder has a point that we all learned something from it. For my part, the issue isn't so much the satire itself, but the response to it. For all our claims of skepticism, we're way too quick to believe something, as long as it fits with our own view of the world. Just because I don't agree with the unstated premise of the article doesn't mean you shouldn't have written it, but now that it's out, I'm sure there are plenty of folks who will never go back to find out it's not true, so in your small way you've contributed to the problem of misinformation on the internets. You can't put the genie back in the bottle, but you could, now that the point's been made, make a more prominent link to your second post about satire.

I considered doing just that, and even suggested it in various comments. The general response from those who understood and appreciated the satire was that I shouldn't try to make it more clear that it's satire. Of course, some were opposed merely to the idea that I made it "look" like a news article. I really thought I had thrown in enough hints, but I do agree that, at this point late in the game, it couldn't hurt to link very prominently to my article about satire. I will be doing so shortly, and thanks for the suggestion.

Having said that, here's my criticism: If I'm understanding your purpose correctly, I think you failed.

What I tried to do was bring attention to the double standards imposed by the religious upon society. But more importantly, I tried to show how even the non-religious or the moderately religious perpetuate those double standards irrationally.

I said it above, but there's no indication that the (real) concern over the (real) statue is religious in nature, so while there may be a double standard, this ain't it (digression: "double standard," to me, implies that religious people have one standard for themselves and a different standard for everyone else, but what you seem to be talking about is the problem of religious people holding everyone to their standard). If your second sentence is implying that even though it's not mentioned in the article, religion is behind the protest of the statue, I don't think that's clear. There's a difference between protesting an idea and protesting a big abstract dick in your kid's face. They may both be silly, but there's a difference.

You're absolutely right that I injected religion into the satire where it was not overtly evident in the original. I did this based partially on what Guder suggested above, that it' be naive to think that the persons in the original article did not base their standards on their interpretation of religious morality, and partially to give more of a distinct and quickly acceptable reason for readers to think that someone would publicly object to a DNA sculpture.

I do, however, disagree in principle with the idea that there is something fundamentally distinct between DNA and nudity. I am arguing that there isn't anything different other than what our religious and culturally established fears tells us is different. Nudity IS DNA. We are just taught to find it lewd, especially in public. I'm challenging the non-believers and skeptics who perpetuate that idea that there's something wrong with public nudity, and I'm posing the challenge in the form of seeing whether they disagree with those who oppose DNA on display. If they disagree with the opposition to DNA, what is the logical, rational reason to agree with the opposition to nudity on display? (What I'm saying here is perhaps subtle, but it's that there are plenty of so-called skeptics and rationals that perpetuate the taboos that were set in place by puritans and others -- for what reason?).

The target you have hit, though, is the anti-religious skeptics, who are willing to believe without question that people will be offended by a statue of DNA.

Ding!

Swift wrote A Modest Proposal after trying to propose earnest solutions to poverty in Ireland and getting no response to them, so he took the inhumane treatment and neglect and carried them to an obviously immoral conclusion. All you've done here is get a bunch of people to agree that cannibalism is bad.

Unfortunately, that's all you see. Not everyone saw it that way. It could be that I didn't execute it well enough, but I think I used a good parallel (despite what DerGolgo suggests above), since I am using in my satire the essence of human substance, and comparing it to human substance in the flesh, asking what, really, is the difference, and why we're so utterly and irrationally opposed to the display of the latter.

Anyways, crusty, what do you ride?

I currently ride a Yamaha V-Star 650 Classic. It's my 5th bike.

And thanks for your comments!

RevCBL wrote:
Also, DerGolgo:

This isn't prejudice or anything, this is believing that a previously documented mode of behavior not by individuals but by people proclaiming their faith in the bible has once again occurred.
Generalizing from individuals to large groups is exactly the root of prejudice, usually used in hindsight to justify it. I've known a few lazy Mexicans, or dumb women, or homicidal Germans... you see where I'm going with this.

Anyways, crusty, what do you ride?

I disagree with that this is generalizing from individuals to groups.
It is believing that individuals, whoever they may be, can be ridiculously stupid, and that someone proclaiming faith in the bible can also be stupid. Failing to immediately cry out "Why, this is silly, nobody would be that stupid!" is not a sign of being prejudiced against anyone, it is a sign of cynicism about people's general intelligence, especially intelligent behavior from individual biblists. The fact that this article mentioned biblists rather than scientists or whomever, so it actually made sense, given the nature of the public discourse about science vs. religion. Putting such a statement of protest into the mouth of a science-teacher would have been totally incredible - people would have said "I can't believe a science teacher would say something stupid like that!".
But they wouldn't have refused to believe it entirely. Because silly shit like this happens all the time.
The fact that, overall, we have read about that many stuff like that coming from biblists reaffirmed the non-refusal to believe the story.

Not because anyone thinks that this is typical of biblists or can only come from biblists, but because when it has come in the past, it came from them.

Not being surprised at actions by person with self-proclaimed worldview X because other individuals with worldview X doesn't make a person prejudiced against all of group X.

When you open the paper, and another islamist nutter has blown himself up, are you surprised? Or do you think "Oh, fuck that bastard!". Are you then prejudiced against all Muslims, or even against all islamist extremists?

Jaeger wrote:

Procrustes wrote:

MotorCityN8 wrote:

Procrustes wrote:(and I also happen to ride)

How many fingers you got?

It depends.

Depends on what? How tall (or short) you are? Whether you're "procrastinating" on the way to Athens? Or whether your name is Theseus?

--Jaeger

(P.S. -- cool handle. )

(P.P.S -- the pinkie removal squad will be by shortly. )

It depends on how many visitors I've had.


And thanks, but please no more talk of that no-fun Theseus.

Welcome new guy, and thanks for being here to engage readers of your work. Paper-era writers didn't really get that kind of access to the end-user.

There’s an interwebnet problem with certain frequencies of sarcasm, so the kind of statements that can be made with a smirk among friends become unacceptable online in the absence of the ‘wink’ that disarms them. There’s also a human propagation problem when material gets passed along- the childhood game of ‘telephone’ comes into play when stories get aggregated and propagated, attributions and context get lost, and the remaining content may not be everything its author intended.

I think this piece is more correctly mockery than satire. Mockery can include many kinds of derision, but in this case I’m put in mind of ‘mock’ in the sense of mimicry or counterfeit. Stripped of a winking context in which its intent is clear, it goes out into the world as a fake. I didn’t get a chance to read it cold because I finished this thread first, but my suggestion is that the loving attention to realistic names, quotes, and journalistic format is where it misses the mark from satire and goes into mockery. Funny names make a good ‘wink’, ask the Onion.

Pattio wrote:Welcome new guy, and thanks for being here to engage readers of your work. Paper-era writers didn't really get that kind of access to the end-user.

There’s an interwebnet problem with certain frequencies of sarcasm, so the kind of statements that can be made with a smirk among friends become unacceptable online in the absence of the ‘wink’ that disarms them. There’s also a human propagation problem when material gets passed along- the childhood game of ‘telephone’ comes into play when stories get aggregated and propagated, attributions and context get lost, and the remaining content may not be everything its author intended.

I think this piece is more correctly mockery than satire. Mockery can include many kinds of derision, but in this case I’m put in mind of ‘mock’ in the sense of mimicry or counterfeit. Stripped of a winking context in which its intent is clear, it goes out into the world as a fake. I didn’t get a chance to read it cold because I finished this thread first, but my suggestion is that the loving attention to realistic names, quotes, and journalistic format is where it misses the mark from satire and goes into mockery. Funny names make a good ‘wink’, ask the Onion.

Hi, thanks for the welcome.

Unfortunately, I thought I had put a lot of winks in there. For instance, it was "written" by Richard Vernon, P.O.E. A nod to Poe's Law. I also thought using Da Vinci's Vitruvian Man would be funny, since it's a nude depiction, itself (and the way it mimicked the original article at that point). There were a few other things I thought would bring the satire/mockery/whatever to the attention of anyone intelligent paying attention, but that's quite a challenge when I, the author, already know the punch line.

You might be right about it being more of a mockery than satire, but I have read a lot about satire, and I think it's a broad category, under or beside which might fall mockery. So, perhaps it is a satirical mockery. Hmm, I like that.

(And thanks for your recognition of my loving attention to real names/places/etc., and thanks for the suggestion that the very act of doing that opposed to coming up with much sillier place names might be one major difference between my attempt at satire and The Onion's successful satire).

It provided me a giggle. IMO it was well done.

Also, welcome!

RevCBL wrote: Procrustes-- All right, I guess you were being more subtle than I gave you credit for, but I still think the religion thing muddied the waters. So you're not satirizing the people who wanted to ban the naked sculpture per se, you're targeting the people who think that's okay, but find the banning of a DNA sculpture to be over the line, and asking what the difference is. At the same time you're chiding the so-called skeptical audience for not holding your claims to the same standards. Do I have that right now?

I think that's a fair assessment.

Now, as long as I'm trying not to get any work done, I'm not convinced that the nudity taboo is based on religion.
It's worth noting that a wide variety of peoples have developed some kind of genital covering, which could just be there for warmth or so as not to get your dick caught in a car door, but the shame of nakedness, in this case projected onto the statue, could also be lurking in our monkey brains as a guard against arousal leading to adultery, which would threaten the social fabric (FABRIC! HAR!) which we developed as a way to survive, which would put the blame on a much older force than religion-- survival of the fittest.
Now, does that make banning the statue okay? Of course not, it's absolutely stupid, and I'm not defending it. But that taboo wouldn't exist in the case of the DNA sculpture, so the two cases are different, without bringing any kind of religion into it.

You know, I could very well have left out the religious basis for the objection and still have gotten the same reaction (I have, in other satires I've done). The skeptics tend to attribute such behavior by default to religious influence. There are certainly, as you suggest, other reasons for wanting to create and perpetuate nudity taboos.


And, to Flatline, thanks!

Procrustes wrote:

It depends on how many visitors I've had.


And thanks, but please no more talk of that no-fun Theseus.

Hahahaha -- between you and Sisyphus we're growing a goddamn pantheon here! Ha!

Welcome! Oh, and good mousetrap-article. Heh.

--Jaeger

Welcome! I enjoyed this immensely. Keep us posted as to future endeavours, and keep up the terror!

You know, I feel less and less chagrined at being gulled, as I've unwittingly recruited another brainy terrorist!

HUZZAH! Welcome, Crusty! You seem to be a good fit here...

guitargeek wrote:You know, I feel less and less chagrined at being gulled, as I've unwittingly recruited another brainy terrorist!

HUZZAH! Welcome, Crusty! You seem to be a good fit here...

Thank you. I'm glad I found my way here (thanks to you). So far, this is a pretty fun damn forum. (Much better than that old Nuns' Buns Anonymous forum I was at before they found me out)

And thanks for the kind welcomes, Jaeger and Metalredneck.

Procrustes - welcome. As long as you're not selling any beds around these parts, we'll get along fine.

This is definitely one of the better thinking threads we've had in a while. Bravo!

Welcome Procrustes!

GG, LOL at your Donnie Darko reference.

Hmmm, I read the article, and became more and more incredulous. Huh? Someone thinks a DNA sculpture is obscene?

My brain would not or could not wrap around it. I checked to make sure I wasn't reading the Onion.

Then, I scrolled down to the comments....and saw everyone going up in arms about crazy religious people wanting to ban DNA sculptures...and I then started to think, "Oh, gods, no, please don't tell me this is an actual real event."

Then, like shithook flying into a hotspot under fire, Crusty said, "Click the last link".

Yay! I have been saved!

For the record, I do not believe that DNA sculptures are the same as Nude sculptures. We've been wearing clothing for far longer than we have had an organized religion. Neanderthal man wore clothing and s/he had been around a couple hundred thousand years.....and while I haven't gone to look up cultural anthropology studies or archaeological studies on that, I am willing to question the idea that not subjecting young children to nudism or sex doesn't have some evolutionary cause.

Or maybe it stems from some ancient, reptile brain, fear that if we don't cover them up, evil spirits will infect our junk. Who knows?

I would rather not have my young children view sculptures depicting nude people or people having sex. For one, even when it is freezing, it is hard enough getting a young child to stay INSIDE their clothing. The second reason, involving sexual depictions, is that I don't want them trying it out for themselves....they could cause themselves injury.

When they are ready to know, they'll ask. When they ask, I'll explain. It's MY job to teach my children about sex and human relations....not a school, not a religion....and most certainly not some stranger who makes abstract sculptures.

For the record, I have a soft spot for Yammer-Hammers.

So, Caliann, you wouldn't take your young children into most museums?

Rewind a bit. Do you think that a nude sculpture (abstract or not), not in a "sexual position," is "obscene"?

You're right that nude and DNA sculptures are not "the same." I'm looking for a rational explanation for why we should treat them so differently. And you've certainly come up with some theories.

I'm too tired to be all smart and shit, so Ill let David say something.


Welcome Procrustes, creepyrabbitgyllenhallmuddafugga...