Conclusion The Future of Plausibility Politics

Abstract

Why did creationists build a museum? The short answer is because the Creation Museum would be unexpected. Who would anticipate that an extreme, creationist group would build something that professional—or for it to endure so long? This conclusion summarizes a key argument throughout Creating the Creation Museum, that Answers in Genesis’ success is about a distinction between accuracy and plausibility. Rather than making claims to the accuracy of knowledge, AiG’s focus is to provide enough evidence to make its narrative plausible to a broader public. This chapter concludes with how the Creation Museum is a site of social movement activity, a place to contest the secular mainstream, to persuade people of AiG’s point of view, and to provide believers new narratives to defend their beliefs. The Creation Museum and other AiG sites like the Ark Encounter anchor the movement for outsiders so that when other sites emerge, such as the Museum of the Bible in Washington D.C., AiG is positioned to yoke themselves to these broader-reaching, less extreme sites, securing their continued relevance and affirming steady persistence.