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Ignorance shouldn't be scoffed at and given a hard time. Willful ignorance however is a different story.

There are people who still believe in a flat earth. Should they be allowed their beliefs with no questioning? I'm not saying they should be denied the right to believe, but neither should their beliefs be beyond criticism. Any belief, faith, concept, etc should be able to be held up to the light of scrutiny, but sometimes we give faith or belief a free ticket. So I don't have a problem with scoffing at flat eathers if they've been given ample opportunities to see reality.

It's useless to argue creation/evolution with someone that believes in young earth creation, because if you dig a bit the belief is typically based on the presumption that the Bible is literal and inerrant. So if you take one thing as being by definition true (creation 6000 years ago because the Bible says so), then anything that contradicts it MUST be false, no matter how good it looks or how much scientific proof there is.

So while it can be interesting debating the particulars of one aspect of science or another, no one will ever be convinced of it if they have already decided what the "truth" is.

To the original topic, uneducated people are easier to control than educated ones. The final few chapters of Sagan's Demon Haunted World are good reading and speak to this.