What has a big streak of yellow running through it?

I often wonder about the experience of atheists in the US and whether the Bible-belt and religious right over there are as powerful as sometimes claimed. It seems so completely alien to the experience of being an atheist in the UK, which is frankly no experience at all. Day to day, nobody really gives a toss, quite rightly, and it's certainly never negatively impacted on me.

In the news though, a curious thing: that a British film on Charles Darwin, Creation, has apparently thus far failed to find a distributor in the US. The reason is believed to be the subject matter, which follows Darwin's personal life and alleged spiritual struggle, Christianity vs science. I say alleged, because I'm not sure that it was a big issue for Darwin. There's a terrible temptation to rewrite history and endow protagonists with prescient imagination for our own agendas, when writing a book or making a film about someone. A bit like the way Dr Who always hands Shakespeare that killer quote when he meets him.

Personally I can't see why evolution and god are necessarily incompatible (and neither can plenty of Christians and the RC church, if they know anything about it all). Besides, he's supposed to work in mysterious ways; it's part of the job description. Why would a lack of instantaneous kapowing creatures into existence be the god-killer?

Big cowardy custards, I say to those film distributors, if it's true.

It all seems so terribly unlikely somehow. It does not fit with the world according to Mephit, (which is of course the way the world should be).