This Tuesday we will be showing The Scopes Monkey Trial in Class for extra credit - plus it is a really good movie. If you saw the movie, plase take a few minutes to discuss your thoughts and reactions about the movie below. Thanks!
The Scopes Monkey Trial (Extra Credit)
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As a result of watching this movie I have learned how the learning in grades one through twelve are very different than learning material in college. Although studies are being done today about the theory of evolution in many classrooms there aren't any teachers challenging religious views like they sometimes do in universities. I have experienced a few professors demonstrate how pieces of evidence of a certain religion do not match up to other pieces of evidence. Now, they never say this religion is wrong to believe in. It is just a part of history that is worth being discussed.
Going back to the trial I could not believe that a study of science was acted on so harshly. It is a theory. Nobody said that this is the right way it all happened. My question is why weren't all schools in Tennessee private religious schools? If they thought the beliefs that man was created from God, why weren't they teaching that in schools in place of a biology class?
What surprised me most about this film was learning about how this whole trial came about. The whole thing was a publicity stunt designed to get the town more money. What surprised me even more was that the teacher who was on trial was completely ok with the whole deal. The whole thing just seemed like a huge fiasco. Although that is what the town wanted. The town definitely got the publicity it desired through the trial.
I feel that it wasn’t so much the teacher on trial as much as a belief system. The trial seemed to be a landmark in the changing of the times and an eye opener to many people throughout the United States. It seemed to me that the whole thing was less of a trial and more of a debate on the belief system of American’s at the time.
I had heard some vague information about the Scopes Monkey Trial, but there was a lot of information in the film that I had not previously been aware of. For example, I didn’t realize that Scopes actually volunteered to be arrested and put on trial. I also didn’t realize that the trial was basically a broadcasted debate over the theory of evolution.
I personally could not believe how much power the members of the church had over laws involving education. I found it very interesting that the beliefs of the bible influenced the creation of a law banning the teaching of evolution in schools. I strongly believe with the statement above that if the members of the church wanted religion taught strenuously in the schools, all schools should have been transferred into private, Christian schools.
I found the movie to be very informative and a lot more interesting than I had anticipated.
The evolution and religion topic is great fun. The late nineteenth century and early twentieth are incredible with the railroads and all. I enjoyed how the Scopes Trial was reported the first live broadcast court case. In this case, the Chicago WGN covering a court case in Dayton, Tennessee. Thanks.
I feel that there was information left out of the Scopes trial that would have been beneficial to understanding why teaching evolution was such a big deal. How was evolution taught? I strongly believe that if a teacher was telling the kids in the biology class that this was something they had to believe in, and there were no other possible explanations, then this would have been a problem. I personally by no means believe that a human evolved from a monkey, but I do strongly believe that this subject should be brought up in biology classes. It is a theory, and should be taught as a theory only.
Scopes was extremely gutsy to voluntarily be arrested. This aspect of the movie threw me off quite a bit. I do agree with the statements above. The church should have just formed their own private schools if they wanted to keep evolution out.
Besides thinking the music in the video was a little funny due to the time in history, I really enjoyed watching this movie.
Watched the second half today-
As the trial was concluding I found it interesting that Bryan died immediately after the trial while taking a nap. Also, I really enjoyed the people that talked in the last bit of the movie about hopefully integrating evolution with Christian beliefs. I believe that was very important.
I had actually never heard of the Scopes Monkey Trial. I may have heard about it in classes a long time ago but it’s hard to remember every big trial there has ever been. Not only that, the debate between religion and science is one that is still going on today. My sister is actually a school teacher and just by what she tells me, schools are moving farther and farther from religion. This has become an extremely big issue because schools do not want to offend people with different religions. To keep it fair, they remove anything that may raise concern. I also know when I went to junior high that I had actually been taught about evolutionism in my biology class. Our teacher made sure to explain to us that we may have different beliefs, but this is what science tells us. We could believe whatever we chose to believe, but we still had to learn about the scientific view for test purposes. No one seemed to raise any concern because we all went to public school and we need to understand all aspects of the world not just one view or another.
I feel that evolutionism has become more accepted today than it had in the past. Since I have learned about it when I was attending school, I am sure that it is making its way into more schools and is continued to be taught. I agree with what another person mentioned about going to private religious schools. I think that if people do not want to hear about evolutionism or any other ideas that conflict with their own, that it is probably best to stay away from public schools and go to a private school where others think the same way you do. I never had a problem with learning about different ideas, even if I didn’t agree with them, I still listened and knew I could decide for myself what I wanted to believe and what I didn’t want to believe.
I think that this trial was so interesting just because science was shunned and everything was so traditional. No one could speak up and have a different idea that questioned the Bible. They felt that because evolutionism wasn’t written in the Bible, it was impossible for it to be true. Since Scopes tested the Butler Act by teaching evolutionism in his biology class, he went to court and was found guilty. However, this case wasn’t about whether or not Scopes was guilty, it was all about creationism vs. evolutionism. I am not really sure if this is a debate that will ever go away. Has it become more accepted today? Yes, but there are still people testing the government and the school systems. Maybe it will continue to get better and people may lighten up a bit, but the idea that it will ever fully go away is probably false hope. We should all just agree to disagree and believe whatever it is we choose to believe, just don’t be so quick to not listen to what others have to say, you may learn something.
I found the movie to be very informational. I was able to see that what we learn in our younger grades are much more beneificial. I felt like there was lots of information that was not included or looked into in the scoops trial.I found it interesting that the trail but their town on the map. I think that many people were more excited about media being at their town then the detail of the trail. I thing that a teacher has the right to teach what their text book is saying. The students could of learned about evolution if they would of read ahead. I found it more intersting that scoops was willing to be arrested and put on trail, I felt this was because he knew he did not do anything wrong.
What I thought was the Scopes Monkey Trial was actually not that at all. I figured Scopes was a teacher who truly wanted to fight for the right to teach evolution. I was surprised that the trial was actually just a big scheme to attract tourists to a town that was struggling to stay afloat. Dayton was even called “monkey town,” filled with gorillas and a little chimpanzee named Joe. It was just so over the top; definitely not what I had expected.
The attorneys for both sides of the case were real characters as well. They were such opposites of the spectrum, and that made this trial more of a spectacle than it was before. I thought it was funny that they would have drinks together after each day in court even though they were “enemies.”
If I were John Scopes I would not want to volunteer for something like this because there could be real consequences, like going to jail or paying a large fine, if he got convicted. It was a little strange that the trial ended up not even being about him, but whether evolution was real or not. He was forgotten pretty quickly, which I’m sure didn’t make him too upset. We didn’t get to finish the video, so I don’t know how it turned out. I would be interested in seeing the rest of it sometime!
What surprised me most about this film was learning about how this whole trial came about. The whole thing was a publicity stunt designed to get the town more money. What surprised me even more was that the teacher who was on trial was completely ok with the whole deal. The whole thing just seemed like a huge fiasco. Although that is what the town wanted. The town definitely got the publicity it desired through the trial.
I feel that it wasn’t so much the teacher on trial as much as a belief system. The trial seemed to be a landmark in the changing of the times and an eye opener to many people throughout the United States. It seemed to me that the whole thing was less of a trial and more of a debate on the belief system of American’s at the time.
I found video on the scopes monkey trial to be very interesting. The topic of evolution was then and still is a controversial subject that everyone seems to have an opinion on. It was shocking to me that a topic of this magnitude would be debated in such a small town. I also found it interesting to think all of the different players in this trial, and to think about what their motives were. The individuals who I thought played very unique roles in this whole thing were the people in power in the town, William Jennings Bryan, Clarence Dorrow.
The town officials in power from what I understand had a primary focus of making this trial a huge event and ultimately this is exactly what happened. I am sure that they were pretty happy with the outcome money wise. Bryan being invited to the town by fundamentalist had motives to defend the faith against the agnostics. I found it interesting that Clarence Dorrow found a way to use Bryan’s motives to his own advantage.
Clarence Dorrow set out to discredit individuals like Bryan by attacking their views on the Bible and I think that he was probably very successful. By focusing on more of the world view instead of just the view of the town I think he gained a lot more out of this trial than Bryan did. I also found it interesting that amid all of the things going on because of people’s motives John Scopes was sort of forgotten about.
All in all I think that the Scopes monkey trial was a very interesting one. I also like the way the video presented it all. The video held my attention well, and I also believe that it cover a lot of background and detail without seeming boring and dry.
While watching the monkey trial, I couldn’t help but think what this case would have been like if it were real. By real, I mean not for publicity. I truly believe that we should all stand up for what we believe in. After all, if we don’t stand for something, we’ll fall for anything. I think that this trial would have had a much greater impact on me if Scopes was teaching evolution because he felt Darwin was an important part of history or simply to inform students so they could make their own educated decision whether they believed in creation of earth by God or the theory of evolution. We learned in the movie that Scopes saw an ad in the paper saying that The American Civil Liberties Union offered to defend anyone accused anyone of teaching evolution as restricted by the Butler Act. In turn, Scopes taught Darwin’s theory to his class and the ACLU financed a very public trial. In the end Scopes was found guilty but because his $100 fine was set by the judge and not the jury, the Tennessee Supreme Court dismissed the case. To me, that is not a victory for those actually concerned with our Freedom of Speech, it’s a technicality. This trial may have drawn a lot of attention, but I don’t respect anyone involved. In my opinion, ACLU was simply advertising for the first version of Court TV.
I thought it was really interesting to see the battle royale of two of the most famous orators of the time, even if it was mostly a manufactured stage show. I also was intrigued by William Jennings Bryan, because the movie mentioned that he was a very religious man (a fundamentalist in fact), but that he supported a lot of reforms that were actually fairly liberal. I think that's a really strange idea in our time, mostly because the religious right has (in my estimation) become largely a tool of corporate interests. Anyway, I thought it was really interesting that Bryan was a reformer *and* a fundamentalist.
I also never knew that the Scopes trial was such a media spectacle. I was a little taken aback by it: although it was neat to think of two titans battling it out in the courtroom, I think it may have been a better execution of the justice system if it weren't such a high profile case.
I thought this movie was very interesting. I learned about the Scopes Monkey Trial when I read Inherit the Wind. After seeing this movie, I discovered that this was an inaccurate portrayal of what truly happened. I thought it was very interesting that this was a set up to gain attention in the little town and to boost their economy. The most surprising thing to me was that John Scopes was approached by people in the town, and this was all just a set up that he went along with. It is unclear whether John Scopes even taught evolution.
I also found it interesting that the attorneys were famous for their time, which drew in so much more media attention. This seemed to be like reality TV of their time, and was broadcast across the country. There were also songs and eventually a movie made about this trial. This just showed how influential this trial was of this time.