Wedge strategy

The Wedge Strategy is a creationist political and social agenda authored by the Discovery Institute, the hub of the pseudoscientific intelligent design movement.

Its goal is to change American culture by shaping public policy to reflect politically conservative fundamentalist evangelical Protestant values.

Wedge strategy proponents are opposed to materialism,[2][3][4] naturalism,[3][5] and evolution,[6][7][8][9] and have made the removal of each from how science is conducted and taught an explicit goal.

Support for the creation of popular-level books, newspaper and magazine articles, op-ed pieces, video productions, and apologetics seminars was hoped to embolden believers and sway the broader culture towards acceptance of intelligent design.

In 20 years, the group hopes that they will have achieved their goal of making intelligent design the main perspective in science as well as to branch out to ethics, politics, philosophy, theology, and the fine arts.

[13] The preamble of the Wedge Document[14] is mirrored largely word-for-word in the early mission statement of the CSC, then called the Center for the Renewal of Science and Culture.

Drafted in 1998 by Discovery Institute staff, the Wedge Document first appeared publicly after it was posted to the World Wide Web on February 5, 1999, by Tim Rhodes,[16] having been shared with him in late January 1999 by Matt Duss, a part-time employee of a Seattle-based international human-resources firm.

The conference brought together key wedge and intelligent design figures, particularly Michael Behe, Stephen Meyer, William Dembski, and myself.

Here, Behe presented for the first time the seed thoughts that had been brewing in his mind for a year--the idea of 'irreducibly complex' molecular machinery.

He goes on to state: "I have built an intellectual movement in the universities and churches that we call The Wedge, which is devoted to scholarship and writing that furthers this program of questioning the materialistic basis of science.

and refusing to get sidetracked onto other issues, which people are always trying to do.Other statements of Johnson's acknowledge that the goal of the intelligent design movement is to promote a theistic and creationist agenda cast as a scientific concept.

Our strategy has been to change the subject a bit so that we can get the issue of intelligent design, which really means the reality of God, before the academic world and into the schools.This isn't really, and never has been a debate about science.

[34] Intelligent design proponents, through the Discovery Institute, have employed a number of specific political strategies and tactics in their furtherance of their goals.

[35] The Discovery Institute has provided material support[36] and assisted federal, state and local elected representatives in drafting legislation that would deemphasize or refute evolution in science curricula.

[37] During school board meetings in Kansas, Ohio, and Texas, the political and social agenda of the Discovery Institute were used to call into question both the motives of the intelligent design proponents and the validity of their position.

But when speaking to what the Wedge Document calls their "natural constituency, namely (conservative) Christians," ID proponents express themselves in unambiguously religious language.

This in the belief that they cannot afford to alienate their constituency and major funding sources, virtually all of which are conservative religious organizations and individuals such as Howard Ahmanson.

"[46] The term "intelligent design" has become a liability for wedge advocates since the ruling in Kitzmiller v. Dover Area School District.

Having come closest to accomplishing getting ID into public school science classes in Kansas and Ohio where they succeeded in getting the State Board of Education to adopt ID lesson plans, intelligent design proponents advocated "teach the controversy" as a legally defensible alternative to teaching intelligent design.

The Kitzmiller ruling also characterized "teaching the controversy" as part of the same religious ploy as presenting intelligent design as an alternative to evolution.