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Trevor Clayton Mrs. Young English Composition 1 25 October 2013 Mind Control Liberty University, Gods will and testimony given to the world. Liberty is a Christian evangelical school, where a student can go and learn in a holy environment away from the secular groups of the world. However, what they might not know is the education they are receiving is a means of altering their faith. Liberty Universitys educational ignorance is a means of altering the beliefs of the students attending the university. They do this by giving untrue testimonies of homosexuality, teaching biased beliefs on the beginning of man, and incorporating God into classes. These are drilled into the students mind and eventual the student believes them to be true. Issues with Homosexuality have gone back to biblical times, and obviously, Evangelicals still do not agree with the orientation. Liberty interoperates the Old Testament of the Bible very literally when it talks about the wrongfulness of homosexuality. Liberty University has many jabs to use against homosexuality, including a section out of a GNED II class work book, Myth: The homosexual lifestyle is happy, healthy, and responsible. Response: AIDs is most prevalent among gay men and is rising rapidly among lesbians (Roose 168). These two points have no correlation between each other. Even though AIDs is most prevalent in homosexuals and bisexuals, they can still live their lives happy, and responsibly. Yet, the work book continues by saying, response: Monogamy among homosexuals is the exception not the norm. It is a compulsive lifestyle involving many sexual partners throughout a lifetime (Roose 168). This is

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true on some accounts but not all; the exact same thing could be said about heterosexuals. For example, response: Monogamy among heterosexuals is the exception not the norm. It is a compulsive lifestyle involving many sexual partners throughout a lifetime. By changing one word in that statement it appears as though heterosexuals are lustful and polygamist. Then the work book presses further by saying, The Average Gay has multiple sex partners during their gay life, many of which are anonymous encounters in bathhouses, nightclubs, and porn shops (Roose 168). It took the second example and pushed the line. What the work book has done here is stereotyped a group of individuals to make them sound like horrible lustful people. This technique of warping opinions could be used on any group of people, For example, all Muslims are terrorists, this is obviously untrue but, due to the 9/11 attacks, many Americans believe this. The educational system of liberty has used stereotyping to their advantage to make the homosexual orientation seem unhealthy, inappropriate, and wrong, when in fact there are many homosexual relationships that are healthy and monogamist. Additionally, Liberty has taken a very strong stand against Evolution, because they interpreted the first book of the bible Genesis literally. It states that God created the world as it is today in a literal six day period and a resting day 6000 years ago, completely voiding the theory of evolution. Dr. Dekker, a professor for the History of Life class said, Evolution, , is like The Emperors New Clothes. What we have in our society is a public school system,,the discovery channel all of these avenues built off the fact of evolution [here, he air quoted] and if I want to be perceived as intelligent [again] I need to go along with it. but all it takes is one person to point out the obvious flaws in the theory [one more time] and then everyone can see evolution for what it is: a fraud. (Roose 86)

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What he has said here is a type of brain washing. Once one person says theres a flaw then another person will then see it and tell another and it creates a scenario where in a short period of time many people begin to believe the new problem/idea. The only problem with his statement is theres scientific information gathered from multiple species that shows that there is in fact evolution happening. Darwins Finches are one of the most widely known evolutionary animal. These finches were named after Darwin because they exhibited mutations of the beak showing that when a food supply was running low their beak changed so there was more food for it to survive, which supported the hypothesis (at that time) of survival of the fittest. However, the ones that did not or could not mutate quick enough died off, evening out the population of the Finches. This theory is taught in public school as part of the curriculum. Dr. Falwell has taken a different stand on the issue by saying, We, with Gods help, want to see hundreds of our graduates go out into the classrooms teaching creationism of course theyll be teaching evolution but teaching why its invalid and why its foolish, and then showing the proper way and the correct approach to the origin of the species (Roose 33-34). Notice he never says why its invalid and foolish but rather says that the correct thing is creationism. In order to make a justification like that, supporting facts would be necessary for it to be credible, and on the other side science has supporting data proving its side of the argument. Evangelicals belief that god created man then as he is today is faith based with no real evidence to back up the statement. If evolution has a substantial amount of supporting facts to prove its existence, and creationism only has faith to back up its statement, why believe creationism? Evangelicals has the belief that god created everything beaten into their heads when they are very young. Yet they are exposed to evolution based ideas in public school. So, why believe in creationism if the proof evolution exists is everywhere?

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For the Bible tells them so, and at Liberty the Bible is law. God is an obvious factor in the social and educational aspects of Liberty, and its taken very seriously. In one of Kevins classes one of the questions on a test was, God wants to be your_____. a)Slave b)Best friend* c)Priest (Roose 166). The answer here is notified by the author with a *, and interestingly the answer is he wants to be your best friend. If God wants to be a students best friend it might make them feel more on the in group strengthening their belief in God. This plays on peoples emotions/insecurity, because if someone has an aspect of their personality then this would be similar to saying, God accepts you for who you are, which people would find comfort in. On the same test it continues by asking, The ultimate goal of the universe is to show_____. a)the love of God b)the glory of God c)the power of God d)all of the above* (Roose 166). With the answer being All of the above on a test question its result is similar to a question such as two plus two. The person answering that question puts the answer four, because they have been taught to understand two plus two equals four. Here in this instance by saying the goal of the universe it to prove those three items, its saying that those must be true. Nevertheless, the tests are just a tool for the teachers to manipulate the beliefs of the student; the teacher themselves help this cause. In a class discussion the professor explains that, Complimentarians also maintain that the husband should be the head of the household. They quote Ephesians 5:24, As the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit to their husbands in everything (Roose 168). The professor quotes the Bible which only justifies complimentarian beliefs. Though this statement would appear to be okay, it could be taken in the wrong way, such as if the husband were an abusive partner. In todays society, the wife should not submit to this, not under any circumstances. This belief is outdated and crude. This is a necessary tool in altering the beliefs of the students, because if the power is limited to the

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just the men of the society not all the ideals would get expressed. In addition, it would take the power away from the women, making them weak and powerless. To top it off, since the women would be less educated, and have no work experience they would not be able to leave, or better yet escape, an abusive relationship even if they wanted to. These beliefs though good in intent and theory, are neither practical nor logical, and resemble a historic thought process. Now all of the ideals and beliefs have been shoved into the lives of the students, but a question remains. What is the outcome of the students beliefs? This would be similar to learning a language; repetition and exposure will reap the best results. Henry, Kevins roommate, is the best example of the success of Libertys ignorance in education. In the beginning of the book Henry is very reserved not very spoken about himself or where he was from. But, he soon begins to express his stances on various topics. The best way to show his ignorance is through his seemingly homophobic appearance. Its clear that Henry has taken a stance and closed his mind to the possibilities, instead of taking a step back to see the whole story. As Kevin attempts to make amends for the tension between them at the end of the year Henry pulls his curtain tight across my sight line, mumbling something that sounds a whole lot like faggot (Roose 276). Kevin obviously had tried to make amends by bringing Henry a Mountain Dew but instead Henry rejects the kindness and calls Kevin a faggot. Henry has such a bias towards those whom he believes are homosexual he wouldnt even accept a guesture of kindness. This is concrete evidence that Liberty Universitys Anti-Gay policy/bias has worked on a student. (Roose 275) Liberty University has, through strategy, found a way to convert most non-believer to evengelicals. Ignorance is the key to their plot, because through faux data and bias they have taken topics and twisted the actuality of them. They take the worst case scenario for

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homosexuality and made it seem like its the norm. They make evolution seem like an awful idea that only idiots believe, and they make God appear less mighty and more down to earth to connect the student to him. Through ignorance, Libertys educational system has and will warp the beliefs of students attending the university.

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Work Cited Roose, Kevin. The Unlikely Disciple. New York City: Grand Central Publishing, 2009. Print.