It's no secret that an alarming number of left-wing people hate science - and scientists.  But why do far-left anarchists really hate science, enough to get violent about it? And why don't the right do anything more than be Freedom of Information Act pests?

Sure, more people on the right than on the left deny evolution, but they aren't shooting evolutionary biologists, we just have to be embarrassed that fringe sectarian zealots in backwater counties try to teach children how God planted fossils as some sort of faith-based head fake. There is no physical danger.

But science is deadly if you get a left-wing group after you.

The gunning down in Italy of one of the "sorcerers of the atom" by a left-wing kook and the blatant advertising of the date when eco-terrorists were going to attack plant scientists because they were modifying wheat to not need aphid pesticides are just the tip of the cultural iceberg - a large chunk of the left believes scientists are running us headlong into a science-based apocalypse, and they are willing to blow people up to show how they will protect us.

Sometimes these militants even target groups that other activist groups like. Shaklee Inc. of Pleasanton, California was listed as a "Caring Consumer" on PETA's website but the Animal Liberation Brigade attacked the company with a nail-covered, 10-pound ammonium nitrate bomb  - because the parent company of Shaklee, Yamanouchi Pharmaceutical, did business with animal testing company HLS. 

Now, the FBI is worried that activist froth about fracking is inspiring a new wave of violent causes. 

What is behind this mentality?  It may be the thing that social scientists extol as a virtue of being liberal, only twisted into the unbalanced notions of progressivism that gave us social authoritarian concepts like eugenics and forced busing in schools. Namely, the idea that being left-wing is mentally harder. Don't believe it?  Well, they did surveys outside bars, so it must be true. They found people get more conservative as they get drunk which makes being liberal more thoughtful.(1)  Perhaps social scientists have a point. It certainly  takes 'nuance' and 'complexity' and more 'focused concentration' to invent ways that it is right to kill innocent people. Mentally lazy right-wing brains just accept science and obey laws about not blowing up people unless their country has a lot of oil.

Basically, the same traits that allow for understanding the subtleties of global warming during a blizzard make it easy to rationalize killing scientists.

I'm not saying it is true but it is a logical extrapolation and anyone who agrees that liberals think with more complexity can see my point - I know that simple-minded conservatives lack the sophistication to glean it and would say you have to be a total moron to believe that the common political leaning of people who accept UFO conspiracies, ghosts, psychics and the link between vaccines and autism leads to a greater inclination to kill people. 

But it doesn't hurt to be safe, so if you are in food science, biotechnology, medical research, energy research or apparently anything except climate science, stem cells and evolutionary biology, watch your back.  Justin Solondz, who bombed a University of Washington research facility, was sentenced to seven years in prison earlier this year - but the other members of his eco-terrorist cell known as “The Family” are still out there.

NOTES:

(1) Obviously, it may also be that when people are drunk they become less inhibited and drunk left-wing people simply say what they really think instead of stating what they are supposed to think and never reveal when the filter in place - i.e., maybe they are hypocrites, no different than some guy who gets drunk and starts making racist jokes.