I'm sorry. "The Dark Ages" is a very misleading term. The Early Middle Ages in Western Europe were, however, marked by gross corruption in the church. You cannot refute that the various Western Christian empires suffered horribly from infighting, intellectual stagnation, and the unavailability of Greek/Latin texts in the sciences. The Byzantine Empire (which is left out of the 'Dark Ages' label) and Arabic countries did not suffer so.
Yes, the 'Dark Ages' are largely a misnomer and not as terribly as popular culture leads us to believe, but the Early Middle Ages in Western Europe were indeed dictated by the various Christian churches and much of previous scientific knowledge was blocked by the church. Don't go all Devil's Advocate on this shit.
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