“Louisiana has the best elected officials money can buy,” or so goes the joke I’ve been telling since the time I was finally able to flee the state when I was 17. Like all good humor, this joke is rooted in truth and reality–something that can’t be said for the 2008 Louisiana Science Education Act.
And, because of the anti-science nature of that Act, the Society for Integrative and Comparative Biology has announced that they will not hold its annual meeting in Louisiana as long this Act is law, and has so informed Governor “Bobby” Jindal of their decsion.
For those of you who may be thinking “so what, this is not a huge organization, and an annual meeting that brings 2000 people to New Orleans for a week isn’t going to bring the state to its knees”, just remember that even the largest dam (or levee, for that matter), can be completely destroyed by a single trickle of water (piping, I believe it is called).
So kudos to the SICB for being the first to make a bold statement regarding Louisiana’s hostility to science and science education. They surely won’t be the last.
[via Mississippi Atheists, Pharyngula, and Louisiana Coalition for Science]
