Ark Encounter Sold Fewer Tickets This September Than Last September

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I am treading a fine line at times on my blog. I want to be accessible to YEC that are real seekers. I understand their concerns and know that bashing is neither effective nor the right thing to do. I am also calling out error where I see it if I think that interferes with what is really important: the message of the gospel.

Regarding the attendance thing. I do think is appropriate that RTB and BioLogos not engage in battles over the Ark attendance. They don’t need to be that messenger. Since I have been more engaged with the an assessment of the YEC movement and its influence I feel like I’m more in a position to comment on the significance of changes in the YEC sphere. I have a running blog post that comments on the attendance at the Ark. I hope it doesn’t sound like the Patheos or other atheist article out there. In fact I have been critical of them because the have over-reached in their conclusions and frequently misrepresented Ham’s words. My overall take is that the Ark isn’t the raging success, from a people walking through the doors perspective, as Ham and others had hoped but it hardly a failure. Its success, from an influence on the minds of his followers and beyond, far exceeds the simply financial bottom line. I think they Ark will be around far longer than most atheists hope and believe and I hope to provide help to those that go to the ark and find themselves confused and looking for other answers. I want to lead them to a theologically sound alternative not simply despair and rejection of Christianity that they believe is one in the same with Ken Ham’s Christianity.

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I hope it’s still there when we really need it!

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Indeed, there is a lot of money in in some ministries, and some religions. To most atheists it’s ministries like AiG that are miseducating people and scamming them for the money. When AiG gets tax breaks to build the Ark park, that’s coming at the expense of public tax dollars. Yes, I know this has all been done with careful maneuvering to make sure it is legal, but that doesn’t make it right.

RTB and BioLogos are not doing this, but maybe they should be.

But isn’t the Catholic church also very wealthy? I don’t have great sources on this.

Pseudoscience, and the political manipulations to allow Creationism to be taught in the public school science curriculum. There is a lot of money behind that effort. So far, the only major successes are Louisiana and Tennessee, but they are still trying.

Fixed! :slight_smile:

I’ve been seeing this for years already …

… and I suspect it been going on longer than that, fueling the rise of militant atheism.

Correct again (I says this too). I wish you were wrong, because we already have enough angry atheists.

@AllenWitmerMiller, I don’t want to give you the wrong impression: I agree that what people like Ham do is a travesty. In the atheism groups I see the people who are essentially refugees from religion, fleeing abuse from their friends, families, and community for the crime of seeing science as it is. It should not be this way. I’m not cheering for Ham to create new atheists because 1) I think it’s a bad way to come to that decision, and 2) I can’t condone the abuse that happens just because it creates new followers for the cause (whatever that is).

My own biggest criticism of many atheists is they do nothing but complain about religion. That’s not helpful, and even actively unhelpful. If I want to make things better, I need to be able to talk to people, and encourage the more reasonable voices like yours and many others. That, in a nutshell, is why I am here at PS.

I seem to have ranted. :slight_smile:

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They are quite wealthy, although most of the wealth is locked in non-liquid forms (e.g. the St. Peter Basilica and the art pieces contained therein).

However, the point of Ratzinger’s argument is that getting wealthy should not be the goal of the Church. Indeed, the quest for a smaller and purer Church is a criticism of how the Church was run.

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That I can understand.

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That was a really thoughtful series, Dan. Much appreciated. I usually don’t like you this much, but, people can change!! :slight_smile: (Yes, I like trees… I know… )

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11 posts were split to a new topic: Should We Tax Churches?

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The fact that they brought in nearly 70,000 people is quite surprising given the alleged poor quality of the exhibits and the cost of the tickets ($48-100 per adult, $25-70 for kids 13-17). For two parents and a couple of kids you are looking at $150 minimum to walk around at look at dioramas.

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My reaction as well. Moreover, I have my doubts that any of these families are going to return during future vacations. (Perhaps they will come back when the Tower of Babel attraction is ready—but that will be years later and another $100 million investment by AIG, perhaps?)

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But the number of ticket they gave away was more this September than last September. What should we conclude!?

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They also could have had more children under 5 which are not in the count because they are considered baggage. :rofl:

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You would think that they could construct a state of the art geochemistry and biology research center for $75 million and still have $25 million left over for staff salaries for the next 10 years. I guess they aren’t interested in such a thing.

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Update today. Ken Ham really didn’t take the latest reporting on the Ark attendance too well.

https://answersingenesis.org/blogs/ken-ham/2018/11/02/media-bias-again/

His responses are rather telling though. While trying to sound like attendance is great and better than ever last year (we could quibble over his accounting there but by some measures - not paid attendance-- it was higher but the trajectory over the past 6 months has been distinctly downward in paid attendance. What is notable about Ham’s response here is that he does not actually contest the paid attendance numbers which can be objectively confirmed and he provides no numbers himself. He is right that the the local area is being increasing helped because more attendees are staying locally with new hotels being built. To the reader that might sound like business is increasing at the ark but it is just shifting where people are spending their money not increasing the ark attendance. A lot of huffing and puffing but little else.

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Seems like there is an interesting conflict of interest the ark is in right now.

From a mission point of view, they are motivated to increase attendance by giving out discounts and free tickets. From a publicity and finance point of view, they are motivated to sell tickets to generate taxes, which are the only public record of attendance.

I wonder if that conflict is at least part of his frustration.

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I think that is right. I’m not unsympathetic to Ham’s anger here. He is right that a million visistors is having an economic impact which these articles he is talking about don’t acknowledge.
He is the salesman for the Ark Encounter and I would not expect him to give out numbers or acknowledge any problems. He is in a bind with respect to the data, actual paid attendance is down but in his mind they are doing what a company does early on, they are taking losses via free tickets and givaways to hopefully get more people in the door who will then go home and tell their friends they have to go. So he thinks that promotions today will lead to better sales down the line. Its a dangerous path to take and I don’t think they expected to be in this position just 2 years in but he has to put the best face on it because if it sound at all like interest is fading he knows that could bring a collapse of sales. He is right in a way that negative stories do hurt Kentucky because he needs local hotels to be built so that more money is spent in the area which will bring positive press.
I just saw that Ham has announced that all veterans get in free on Veterans day. I think this is new over last year. It does smack of just trying to get people in the door (remember they make a lot of money on food and other extras while people are there) and at the end of the year he can claim more people came this year than last even if ticket sales are down. This year is probably very critical for the long-term success of the AE and so he is pulling out all the stops.

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No, Ken does this every year.
Also there is a problem here that Ken is missing. The town of Williamsburg needs to respond to emergencies at the Ark Encounter. This little town is overwhelmed. It needs to buy ambulances, staff and equipment to respond to emergencies in reasonable time given by State of Kentucky guidelines. The town put the 50 cents a ticket fee to raise the money necessary to have adequate response time to emergencies. If Ken Ham is now letting in a lot of people for free. The fee method needs to be revised. It should be 50 cents per headcount (free or paid) And it should be the responsibility of Ark Encounter to count every head and give the town 50 cents per head. Ken is not going to like that as he doesn’t want to report headcount.

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I’ve been thinking the same thing from the beginning. It might be a little different if the Ark Encounter was paying property taxes on the $100 million attraction. That would quickly give the local government entity enough money to invest in more EMT, fire, police, and emergency response infrastructure. Indeed, imagine what might happen if some crazy terrorist—whether home-grown or otherwise—decided to stage some sort of mass causalities tragedy. I would think the small community’s manpower and resources would be quickly overwhelmed (even though they would no doubt get assistance from outside the area as soon as possible.)

A head tax/visitor tax is definitely the most efficient way to address the fairness issue at this point. (By the way, if large numbers of small children are coming in free, they can actually pose special problems for emergency response teams in small communities. Not all of them can afford the kinds of “miniature” equipment that is required in treating infants, for example. I saw an expose on this problem across America where some of the standard procedures undertaken by EMTs on the way to a trauma center must be delayed for small children—because they don’t have the proper equipment on board. Indeed, in some small communities not even the ERs have sufficient of the specialized equipment. This does impact survival rates.)

Also, I don’t know how Fire Codes are enforced for such large and atypical structures but I would think that the local Fire Marshall would want to be able to “audit” admission figures in order to make sure that safe capacities aren’t exceeded and egress times are not compromised.

I know that for-profit tourist attractions don’t usually make public their visitor counts—but I don’t know of any museums and educational venues which don’t. I must admit that Ken Ham has skillfully played the game of playing both sides of the “We are a for-profit so we don’t have to follow those rules” and “We are a religious entity so we are Constitutionally exempt from those rules.”

Even though it is a small community, I’m really surprised that local government didn’t iron out the emergency response costs prior to ever selling Ark Encounter all of the land for $1 or whatever. (For that matter, I’m surprised that they didn’t require that the Ark Encounter didn’t build its own fire station and EMT infrastructure, especially for a place that’s bound to have tons of retirees on a hot summer day standing in those long lines they were expecting!)

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Ark Encounter is on the DHS (Department of Homeland Security) watchlist, like the Statue of Liberty and Disneyland. There are credible mass casualty possibilities at Ark Encounter and local, county, state and Federal First responders need to be ready. Unfortunately, the sweetheart deal Ken Ham got with the town, county and State of Kentucky says that the town, county and state has to use public money to be ready.

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One of the reasons why I have trouble believing that there are “countless sleeper cells” of terrorists in the USA is the fact that so few well planned events happen. If I were someone like ISIS and wanted to really stir up America’s fears, I wouldn’t attack well-covered, well-rehearsed response sites like Statue of Liberty or even the Capitol building. I think it would be far more unnerving to strike in the remote heartland of America at a really “soft” site—especially one with Christian ties. (After all, the Crusades must be avenged.) How far is nearest SWAT team from the Ark Encounter. Plus, the Ark Encounter has no windows. I would think a mass-hostage situation in the Ark Encounter would make the Raid on Entebbe mass-extraction rescue seem like a piece of cake. (Entebbe even had a conveniently located international airport for landing a hospital-equipped plane—not to get too flippant about this. Yes, I’m probably walking on tender ground.)

Of course, a terrorist organization could also get huge mileage by simply choosing some random Friday night Texas high school football game. In that case, the randomness itself could have a far more unsettling impact. (Perhaps all football game attendance nationwide would go down for several years. I don’t know.)

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Of note, findamentalist Muslims are sometimes committed to a literal reading of Genesis. Who knows for sure, but may be they like the Ark!

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