Mike Adams attacks Jimmy Kimmel for "hate speech"

The last couple of days have been unrelentingly serious and depressing, with posts on the (probably) preventable death of a young Australian woman named Jess Ainscough of a rare cancer because she made the mistake of choosing the quackery that is the Gerson protocol rather than conventional medicine. Unfortunately, the "natural health community" will almost certainly learn nothing from her story, in which Ainscough, facing the very unpleasant prospect of a radical amputation, instead chose Gerson therapy and became an evangelist for that particular form of cancer quackery and "natural healing." I felt sorry for her, even though I couldn't approve of how she potentially led people with cancer down the road of pseudoscience and quackery with her enthusiastic promotion of coffee enemas and the rest of the nonsense Charlotte Gerson sells based on her father's protocol.

I need to lighten up.

Who better to provide the comic relief from this thus far grim week than that buffoon of buffoons, Mike Adams? Even better, unlike Ainscough, who was herself a victim of whatever cancer quacks sold her on the Gerson protocol in the first place, Adams is no victim. He's also pissed off (his usual state of mind) Why is he so ticked off? Well, he's not happy with Jimmy Kimmel over this bit he did Friday night on his show:

Normally, I don't watch Jimmy Kimmel, even on the now rare times when I'm up that late. (My wife and I tend to be so beat on Friday nights that our typical ritual on most Fridays is to order pizza, maybe with a glass of wine—or not—and then fall asleep with the dog on the couch by 10 PM.) I saw it Saturday morning, as it was making the rounds on social media, and I thought it was hilarious.

Mike Adams was not so amused. doing that faux outrage schtick he does so well to fire up his minions against the evil depredations of big pharma and the government, he published a spittle-flecked rant (are there any other kinds from Mike Adams?) entitled OUTRAGE! Jimmy Kimmel makes fun of vaccine-damaged children, revives hate speech bigotry on national TV. I must admit, I was surprised it took him nearly four days to come up with this, but I did chuckle at the histrionic title of the post before I read a single word:

Throughout U.S. history, certain selected groups of citizens have been subjected to extreme verbal, judicial and even physical abuse at the hands of bigoted oppressors. The historical abuse of African-Americans -- subjected to generations of abusive language and racism that still lingers today -- was villainously summed up with a bigoted hate speech label I dare not utter here.

Gay Americans were similarly subjected to the label of "f-@@-t," a hate-based derogatory slur invoked to demean a human being because of their sexual orientation. It was this campaign of verbal abuse and derogatory hate speech that helped give rise to violence against gays in America.

Importantly, every effort to demean and denigrate a selectively targeted class of citizens -- whether for their skin color, their sexual orientation or their beliefs -- has been preceded by a campaign of verbal abuse intended to dehumanize that targeted group. The invocation and use of bigoted, derogatory labels lays the social and cultural groundwork for not only discrimination but even actual violence committed against the groups being targeted.

Racism and hate speech are wrong. It is morally, politically and socially incorrect to use hate speech labels in a derogatory manner in a civilized society. These terms are hate-based forms of speech meant to emotionally hurt and demean targeted groups of innocent people. Yet, astonishingly, it has now emerged in America that it is socially acceptable to use precisely the same bigoted hate-speech language against another group: children who are damaged by vaccines (and children who are unvaccinated). This group is now being widely and aggressively disparaged with the hate-based term "anti-vaxxers."

Did you watch the video? I did. Kimmel didn't make fun of any children, "vaccine-injured," autistic, or neurotypical, or otherwise. Not at all. Rather, he made fun of "antivaxers," basically mocking their sense of entitlement and, above all, their apparent belief that their Google University knowledge trumps the actual knowledge of doctors, using a rather hilarious fake public service announcement with doctors complaining about this and using slightly profanity-laced exhortations to parents to get their kids vaccinated. It was an excellent deconstruction of the Dunning-Kruger effect that makes antivaccinationists antivaccinationists.

Kimmel's five minute comedy bit is not "hate speech," although complaining about "hate speech" or "bullying" has become the go-to whine from antivaccinationists facing criticism for their choices, a whine that's become even more intense in light of the Disneyland measles outbreak since Christmas. Criticism of pseudoscience and quackery is not "hate speech." It's just not. For one thing, hate speech usually involves attacking groups who are the way they are through no choice of their own. Think attacking Jews or African-Americans on the basis of their religion or race. Think attacking homosexuals because of their sexual orientation. Yes, those are the examples Adams used, but how is one of these things (antivaccinationists) not like the others (blacks or homosexuals)? That's right. Antivaccinationists choose to be antivaccinationists. Also, blacks and gays do no harm to society by being black or gay. Antivaccinationists, through their choices not to vaccinate, are largely responsible for the resurgence of diseases once thought vanquished—like measles.

Not that that stops Adams when he's on a roll even more ridiculous than one of his typical rants:

In a stunning demonstration of demeaning hate speech targeting children who have suffered brain damage from vaccines, comedian Jimmy Kimmel unleashed a satire comedy hit piece that, fifty years ago, would have almost certainly seen Kimmel making fun of black people. Twenty years ago, he would have been making fun of gay people. But today, in 2015, Jimmy Kimmel directs his ignorance, bigotry and demeaning hate speech toward vaccine-damaged children who are now labeled "anti-vaxxers."

Given that Adams brought race into this, you know where this is going; that is, if you've been following this blog at least since August and recall the kerfuffle over the trumped up "CDC Whistleblower" manufactroversy:

Not only is Jimmy Kimmel using bigoted hate speech language to demean crippled children who were damaged by vaccines; he's also doing so in a manner that is utterly ignorant of the special risks posed to African-Americans by vaccines.

It was Dr. William Thompson, a top CDC scientist, who blew the whistle on the CDC's vaccine research fraud last year, going public with his confession that the CDC knowingly covered up data linking vaccines to an increased risk of autism in young African-American boys.

Except that the CDC study in question showed nothing of the sort, and there's no credible evidence of a "cover up," just the stress-induced claims of a single CDC psychologist whose claims have gained no traction and failed to be corroborated. This whole kerfuffle came to be known among antivaccinationists as the "CDC whistleblower"/#CDCWhistleblower saga. Let's just put it this way: Andrew Wakefield glommed onto this fake controversy. That ought to tell you all you need to know.

Adams even invokes a statement by Mahatma Gandhi, who, if the reference is accurate, was apparently amazingly ignorant about vaccination, leading me to wonder: Where did Gandhi get his medical degree? (For a more skeptical take on Gandhi's views on vaccines, check this out.) On a scientific basis, I care no more what Gandhi said about vaccines than what Mike Adams says, things like:

Vaccines, it turns out, are a form of medical violence against children for the simple reason that they provably cause extreme, permanent damage in many children year after year. But medical violence isn't the only violence that Jimmy Kimmel now seems to be promoting... he's also provoking individual acts of violence against so-called "anti-vaxxers" through his emotionally-charged, hate-filled rhetoric disguised as comedy.

Historically, it was the public tolerance of hate speech against African-Americans and gays that encouraged some people to engage in violent acts against them. After all, a group of people who are verbally belittled with derogatory and bigoted hate speech by public figures is an easy target for those with violent tendencies.

Oh, please, Mr. Adams. Pot. Kettle. Black. This nonsense is from a man who routinely refers to scientists as being the equivalent of "Nazis" (no, actually, he likened Monsanto and pro-GMO advocates explicitly to Nazis and strongly implied that it would be right to kill them for their "heinous crimes," starting up and later shutting down a site called "Monsanto Collaborators") and castigates science itself as evil, while ranting against big pharma. Hypocrisy, thy name is Mike Adams (among others). By Adams' own definition, he engages in hate speech himself far beyond any accusation he can come up with against Jimmy Kimmel in his fevered imagination. It's just another example of what a joke Mike Adams is. Unfortunately, he's an influential joke.

Over the last few years, antivaccinationists have tried to liken themselves to traditionally oppressed or discriminated against groups, such as blacks, gays, or others in a transparent ploy to deflect criticism and paint it as "oppression." Adams' little screed takes that technique and hilariously puts it on steroids and cranks it up to 11. (Yes, when it comes to Adams, I like to shamelessly mix metaphors.) It's over-the-top, even by Mike Adams' standards.

For Mike Adams, it's always, "Do as I say, not as I do."

ADDENDUM: Jimmy Kimmel now has a followup. It's hilarious, as Kimmel shows actual Tweets directed at him and lets antivaxers advocate for a "child's right to choose":

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At least Mike Adams is known to all by his real name.
Perhaps "orac" has something to hide.
From this infantile polemic, that is what I would choose to believe.

Silly Tim. The answer is right here on this very blog for any who figure it out, and it's not hard to figure out.

Yeah, it's just what they do. They hide behind the children. If you challenge the crooks, quacks and charlatans, or the lying parents who enter their kids in clinical research in order to launder their legal claims into scientific "evidence", they dodge behind the kids.

Even, as you point out in this case, no mention was even made of "vaccine damaged children".

By Brian Deer (not verified) on 03 Mar 2015 #permalink

Mike Adams is a moron regardless of the name he chooses. Orac has a real identity known to anyone with an iota of curiosity and a google iq above 20.

I don't think there are enough movie screens within 30 miles of me to match Mike Adams for projection.

I saw that clip over the weekend, on an economics/finance blog where I lurk. One thing the host of that blog and Orac have in common is a low tolerance for willful idiocy, which is what almost all of this anti-vax nonsense is. And no, it does not attack helpless children, only adults who are willfully endangering helpless children (who are too young to get the vaccine).

It would have been reasonable for a few years around the turn of the century (after Wakefield et al. published that infamous Lancet paper, but before the hypothesis was disproven and the paper shown to be fraudulent) for a layman to wonder if there was anything to the claims linking autism and the MMR vaccine. That window is now firmly shut. And people like Adams keep on running into that window like birds colliding with glass skyscrapers. Except that birds who survive that experience learn from it. Adams et al. proudly learn nothing.

By Eric Lund (not verified) on 03 Mar 2015 #permalink

Oh, I was so hoping Jimmy Kimmel's hilarious "public service announcement" would find its way into a RI post. Even if it had to come with a side order of Mike Adams, you just made my day :)

@Tim #1 - I am an occasional visitor and despite that I have learned Orac's "secret" identity long ago. But for the sake of an experiment I checked if there's any clue about it on this very site. And lo and behold - you're but one click from learning everything you need to know.

Hint - there's a certain pseudonym highlighted in blue on this site. It's a hypertext.

By The Smith of Lie (not verified) on 03 Mar 2015 #permalink

Oh, I was so hoping Jimmy Kimmel’s hilarious “public service announcement” would find its way into a RI post. Even if it had to come with a side order of Mike Adams, you just made my day :)

Then you should thank Mike Adams for his epically stupid rant about the Kimmel bit, because before that I hadn't planned on doing anything more than Tweeting the video and posting it on my Facebook wall (both of which I did over the weekend).

At least Mike Adams is known to all by his real name.

And how do we know that Mike Adams is not a fictional character?

Oh yes, that's right. Fictional characters have to be believable. Unlike Mike Adams.

P.S. Orac maintains another blog on which he uses his real name. He's also on Twitter, again using his real name.

By Eric Lund (not verified) on 03 Mar 2015 #permalink

Why is it that people such as Mike Adams equate an opinion different from theirs as "hate speech" and "bigotry"? The more I delve into this whole quagmire of "alternative", the more amazed I am at how intolerant, close-minded, and biased the advocates of alternative "medicine" are. And it's not just the rot they're expounding, it's the arguments they use to expound the rot. They take such fantastic leaps of "logic", that I'm left bemused by how the hell they got to B from A based on the data they've offered as "proof".

So, yes. When you put yourself out there like that with the drivel you're supporting; you can expect to get lampooned. But nowhere have I seen anyone critical of antivaxxers poke fun at the children they've put at risk.

By SelenaWolf (not verified) on 03 Mar 2015 #permalink

Adams uses hyperbolic crap like this to protect his payment stream. He has a ready band of loons willing to believe pretty much anything he says, without evidence or even a modicum of critical thought. If he didn't poke them now and again, they might look elsewhere for lies and crazy. Where would Mikey be then?

A few things...

- I think the reason these people eternally harp on *the children* ((shudder)) is because no one would have any interest in what they have to say otherwise.

Would anyone- even their friends and cohorts- ever read their book or posts if they weren't about _ the children_?

They have very little to say.

- Yesterday, Null ranted about the same television spot as well ( tape is not yet up on PRN). Of course, he used his "science" to support his opposition to vaccines as he always does. Why didn't Kimmel have a person with an opposing view in the skit, he asked cluelessly.

- Mikey is trying to drum up interest in his latest project, Food Rising: for the uninitiated, he has 'invented' a hydroponic system that will revolutionise food production in the Third World and 3rd grade classrooms everywhere by printing his very own innovative 3D printed parts. He's getting people to donate money for the parts so he can send them to classrooms through his 'charity'
.
Unfortunately, for him, the only way he can get his audience interested in his writing is if he does what he did re Kimmel.

- AND with great trepidation, fear and trembling even, I cautiously approach, the great and benevolent, *hostus with mostus*, our fearless and peerless leader, Orac.... both Dr and Mr,
as a grammar n-zi, to say ( Draconis protect me!)
because, dear Orac, correct me if I am wrong, but you said "on a role" when you meant "on a ROLL"-
although that may be a pun because Mikey is such a role playing idiot and has us rolling in the isles.. I mean aisles and he is 'toast' after Orac gets done with him.

I'm not a n-zi, really, I'm a liberal
So I apologise but I HAD to say it.

By Denice Walter (not verified) on 03 Mar 2015 #permalink

Since the American Lung Association points out that African American men have a 34% higher incidence of lung cancer than white men, pointing out the dangers of smoking is obviously racist hate speech.

It's always educational and fun to read the comments on Mikey's particularly looney posts. Here's one:

"Was it really Kimmel's opinion, or is it some of ABC's sponsers? Big pharma controls the national news broadcasts on all networks."

Evidently Jimmy Kimmel had a followup, both reading tweets, and having this skit below:

Last week on the show we got a group of real doctors together to do a public service announcement urging parents to vaccinate their kids. While a lot of people enjoyed it - it also made a small group of people unbelievably angry. Jimmy believes strongly in vaccination - but in the interest of fairness, we gave our community activist team Jack and Becky some air time to express their anti-vaccination views.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?t=16&v=i2mdwmpLYLY&app=desktop

@SelenaWolf #10, I think that they *have* to be close minded. If they were open minded, then they would see that their ideas are mostly totally without basis. I have a good friend who is into 'natural' everything and constantly shuts me down if I even try to discuss vaccination (her youngest is 2, the same as mine). Sometimes she's rude about it too. She's lovely, but just will not entertain that she's wrong about her pro-disease stance. It's like any religion in that respect. I suppose that's why they feel 'persecuted', because their inaccurate and unfounded faith is consistently proved wrong, and us 'unbelievers' don't perceive that this is religious devotion rather than pseudoscientific anti-community quackery.

By Jeliwobble (not verified) on 03 Mar 2015 #permalink

I'm bemused at the notion of entitled white people (like Mike Adams, or affluent anti-vax parents) claiming they are subject to discrimination of a piece with that experienced by people of colour and Jews over the centuries.

I mean, genuinely racist reactionary authoritarians (Limbaugh et al) often accuse people of "playing the race card" when they point out contemporary instances of racism or systematic discrimination, but I dare say Mike Adams really is "playing the race card".

(You might say that "playing the race card" is something entitled white people do, either ironically à la Mike Adams, or, er, projection...ally (?) à la Limbaugh.)

By Composer99 (not verified) on 03 Mar 2015 #permalink

And of course, I learn that Mikey's latest charitable project is also a PRODUCT that you can buy at Natural News. He sells all of the 'mini-farm' parts, plant food and seeds.

By Denice Walter (not verified) on 03 Mar 2015 #permalink

Dehumanizing, violent hate speech anyone? A commenter right on Mike's post about hate speech suggests that bigPharma wants to depopulate the world through vaccines, and they would agree with that if it were people like the Rothschild cartel, et al. who were the victims:

"They're sentient beings, I wouldn't go so far as to say human, but they do seem to be alive and children of their parents. They're scum, for sure, but still deserving of our compassion. Maybe we say a prayer for them as we cut their throats."

And nobody at NN bats an eye.

Maybe Tim couldn't figure out Orac's ID because it is SUPER secret. I used the concern troll language of all caps to help him out. Maybe he'll be super serial about figuring it out now.

Calling autistic people damaged is HATE SPEECH DANG IT AUTISTIC PEOPLE ARE NOT DAMAGED! ARG! Hate natural nutwitlery.

By Chromesthesia (not verified) on 03 Mar 2015 #permalink

Mike's ( and the others') continuous excoriation of vaccine advocates and SBM in general serves another less obvious purpose:
it DISTRACTS his loyal audience away from questioning his own motives as well as his yearly earnings.

SBM ( or governments, media et al) is populated by unbelievably corrupt, moey-hungry, devious, profiteering, psychopathic megalomaniacs who have absolutely no concern about the common person
whilst Mikey et al are humanitarians, spiritually enlightened sages free of prejudice and hate.

Since they have ALREADY called these tyrants out, how could they possibly be suspected of the same themselves?

By Denice Walter (not verified) on 03 Mar 2015 #permalink

That should be MONEY

By Denice Walter (not verified) on 03 Mar 2015 #permalink

Right. And he included racist images in his videos- e.g. the vaccinating nurse in 'Vaccine Zombie' stereotypes black women.

By Denice Walter (not verified) on 03 Mar 2015 #permalink

Tim: At least Mike Adams is known to all by his real name.

Well done, "Tim"! And thanks for your courage in fully identifying yourself. ;)

By Christopher Winter (not verified) on 03 Mar 2015 #permalink

Kimmel wins the anti-antivax Blue Ribbon. Those bits speak to a wide audience by using 'regular guy' humor, hoist the loonies by their own petards, and push public perception of them toward the fringe where they belong. The references to Google, Facebook, and (especially) forwarded emails in contrast to the educations of the doctors, and the everyday examples of.doctors' competency and trustworthiness (smoking, ER stitches, etc.) are spot on, and the doctors cast for the PSA are pretty much perfect.

The reactions from Adams et al. just double-down on the wacko – whipping up the base, keeping them in line, seeking to supporting the cash flow by raising the buying activity of the already-committed customer base. But they're building an ever-higher wall between their little woo sub-culture and anyone with a whiff of "common sense".

Denice Walter@24:

Mike’s ( and the others’) continuous excoriation of vaccine advocates and SBM in general serves another less obvious purpose: it DISTRACTS his loyal audience away from questioning his own motives as well as his yearly earnings.

Oh, you Pharma Shills with your filthy $$$$$$$$ fixations. Unlike you, noble Mr Adams ONLY takes payment in kitten smiles and sunbeams!!!!!

Selena Wolf: "But nowhere have I seen anyone critical of antivaxxers poke fun at the children they’ve put at risk."

True. Even in the 'Slap,' (an American adaptation of the Australian show) the crunchy ultra-hippie parents are clearly portrayed as being the ones who turned their five-year-old into a spoiled monster. (The kid's about four or five, and he's still breastfeeding, so no way is he vaccinated.) The nice thing is that the parents are portrayed in an unrelentingly unsympathetic light- and this mirrors the way anti-vax parents are being treated by the press.

Jeliwobble: Get out while you still can. She may be a lovely person, but in short order, she'll turn into an awful person who snarls about learning disabled children and anyone with a disability, runs a gluten-free house and ruins get-togethers for everyone.

By Politicalguineapig (not verified) on 03 Mar 2015 #permalink

By the way – RationalWiki’s article on NaturalNews is our latest front-page featured article!

http://rationalwiki.org/wiki/NaturalNews

Mike is so delighted that he redirects all hits with rationalwiki.org as a referrer to an advertising page. (So we had to run our reference links through something to remove that.)

By David Gerard (not verified) on 03 Mar 2015 #permalink

RE: Second video. Never take a lollipop from an anti-vaxer. $10 says the lollipops had been pre-licked by a child with an active case of chicken pox. Natural immunity! FTW!

By SpaceTrout (not verified) on 03 Mar 2015 #permalink

The most revolting thing is that anti-vaxers throw the terms "bullying" and "hate speech" around whenever someone expresses a viewpoint different than theirs. It's such a smarmy, entitled worldview.

"Given that Adams brought race into this, you know where this is going"

Godwin's law?

Nope too high profile to put that card on the table.

By Paul de Boer (not verified) on 03 Mar 2015 #permalink

I was hoping that Kimmel would have brought up the Mike Adams article in his follow up. Either way, I have a new-found respect for Kimmel.
Also, the basis of Mike's article is that Jimmy Kimmel is popularizing the term "anti-vaxxer", but unless I heard wrong he never used that term. He said something like anti-vaccination people, which sounds way less like a pejorative and more like a stance anyways.
It was hard not to laugh at the part where Adams argued that Kimmel was advocating burning down the homes of anti vaccinationists, and suggesting the "parents of vaccine-injured children being beaten on the streets". I must have missed where Kimmel mentioned that.

Paul -- never underestimate the depths to which Adams will stoop. They have yet to be plumbed fully.

The Spudd is on the case, with a vaccine against stupidity.

“We are very excited about this, very hopeful,” says lead researcher Dr. James Kimmell. “The only thing we are concerned about is whether or not stupid people, i.e. anti-vaccers, will be willing to get the shot.”

The key difference between gay people or blacks and anti-vaxxers is that anti-vaxxers are harming society, including their own children. That would be equally true if it turned out that being anti-vax wasn't a choice, but the result of some weird infection. (Religious bigotry doesn't become acceptable when the people being slandered chose their religion as adults.)

Paul @38: We've seen Adams resort to argumentum ad Hitleram before. It's not a stretch to imagine him going there.

There is a reason why, in many statements of Godwin's law, the side that analogizes their opponents to Nazis is considered to have lost the debate. Mike Adams is a living embodiment of that reason.

By Eric Lund (not verified) on 03 Mar 2015 #permalink

Is anyone aware of any updates regarding the fallout from Adams’ Monsanto Collaborators “call to violence” from last July? I searched RI, Neurologica, and GLP but can’t find anything new. There was some talk of FBI involvement. It would be unfortunate if that episode passed too quietly into the memory hole.

By CTGeneGuy (not verified) on 03 Mar 2015 #permalink

Being a (mostly) stay-at-home mom who is too busy planning her next affair to consider giving my children diseases instead of immunity, I almost missed this. TV never happens, Facebook is a rare event and Twitter is entirely off the table; in short, RI is the short interlude of personal enrichment most days. Today, thanks to Mike Adams, my day is completely made. Space Trout @ #36 was the cherry on top. Thanks guys!

@ has:

We like dollars in all of their multi-national variety altho' nothing is quite as weighty as the pound
but the euro, tho' exceedingly crappy, will be accepted
nevertheless.

By Denice Walter (not verified) on 03 Mar 2015 #permalink

@ Paul de Boer:

Adams has used quite n-zi-ish illustrations whenever he discussed Obama and Obama-care and often, when depicting doctors or SBM as well. These are sprinkled amongst his entire oeuvre so it's hard to isolate them.

His so-called 'cartoons' are on a site called 'Counterthink' which is apropos since it doesn't reflect anything that reasonably could be called 'thought'.

Then, there are the videos of his uh... music.

By Denice Walter (not verified) on 03 Mar 2015 #permalink

Oh and fancy that!
A black n-azi.

By Denice Walter (not verified) on 03 Mar 2015 #permalink

That follow up video is wonderful.

By Dorit Reiss (not verified) on 03 Mar 2015 #permalink

Just to clarify, if a baby cries, that's a no, right?

By Dorit Reiss (not verified) on 03 Mar 2015 #permalink

"A commenter right on Mike’s post about hate speech suggests that bigPharma wants to depopulate the world through vaccines"

Yeah, that is always a good one. Before vaccines you got plagues that would wipe out as much as 50%, or more, or a population. Since vaccines, the number of the people on the planet has doubled like what 23 years, more or less. Yeah, all those chemicals and vaccines are doing such a hugely effective job of "depopulating" the planet. lol

Seriously, these people's nonsense is why the phrase, "not even wrong", was invented. Being wrong requires you still, at minimum, deal with facts and evidence in **this** universe, then, come to the wrong conclusion via poor logic. When you make up evidence, don't have any, and fail to apply even the basics of logic to reaching a conclusion, you're not just not right, you are, "not even wrong", i.e., on the wrong bloody planet, in the wrong universe, and addressing a non-existent problem, etc.

@Dorit Reiss

Hard to say. The follow-up study is really only applicable to children who are capable of understanding English, so it's not generalizable to non-verbal infants or to non-English speaking tots.

Who knows. The wee babes could cry from joy at being protected.

@Todd W.: LOL.

By Dorit Reiss (not verified) on 03 Mar 2015 #permalink

Wow, just wow!
The first few times I clicked on the link to the Health Deranger above I just got his "puff piece" on the 10 wonderful things that he and his ICP-MS had done for the world. That was hilarious, but clearly not what I was supposed to be seeing.
But a minute or so ago - after I'd read the whole of Orac's column and most of the comments - the same link actually took me to the column by Mad Mike that our snarky blinking box of lights referred to. If Mad Mike hadn't gone straight to the argumentum ad Hitlerum, he was getting perilously close. And most of the commenters agree with him - even the mildest criticism gets dogpiled.
One did ask if the photos were real, i.e. of "vaccine damage". I believe it's possible to search for photos on the Internet - perhaps some suitably skilled person can look and see where they originally came from.

PS: Jerry Coyne, of "Why Evolution is True", has a post up this morning with the same pair of YouTube excerpts.

By Derek Freyberg (not verified) on 03 Mar 2015 #permalink

You know, I think I've made it in the world! Mike Adams is known for setting up redirects so that incoming traffic from certain sites goes straight to one of his ads or puff pieces. Maybe he's done that with this site. If that's the case, there's only one thing to do: Google Cache. Make a downloadable PDF of the offending post and put a link to it in mine. :-)

@ Derek Freyberg:

One of the 'vaccine injured' photos is of a young woman who died ( I'm not sure from what cause) whose mother wrote a book about her and is affiliated with AoA.

By Denice Walter (not verified) on 03 Mar 2015 #permalink

@ Denice:
It's the photos of children with various cutaneous conditions that I particularly suspect are "borrowed".

By Derek Freyberg (not verified) on 03 Mar 2015 #permalink

Narad@26 --

To say nothing of:

The very premise that black people are systematically oppressed in modern-day America is a myth.

Obama takes to the airwaves and claims racism remains so bad in America that Trayvon Martin could have been him, implying that even the President could have been shot by an angry Latino who the brain-damaged media continues to somehow call "white."

The plan, of course, is to foment so much contrived hatred that America collapses into a massive race war that distracts everybody from the monumental failures of bad government.

Detroit, a city largely run by Obama-supporting African-Americans, has collapsed into bankruptcy. The same kind of failed thinking that brought Detroit to its knees is now being unleashed by people like Al Sharpton -- the Don King of race-baiting hatred -- who is behind a new call for an economic boycott of Florida.

This idea, just like most of the racism industry's ideas, make absolutely no sense.

Moral: All forms of bigotry and hatred and oppression are, a priori, aimed exclusively at Mike Adams, apparently.

(All quotes from:

http://www.naturalnews.com/041283_racism_theater_Obama_mainstream_media…)

I have decided that every time anyone disagrees with me about anything I am going to call it hate speech.

By Sullivanthepoop (not verified) on 03 Mar 2015 #permalink

@Denice (57):
I did a little mousing around, and there's a site called TinEye (www.tineye.com) that does image searches without needing a program on your computer. I put the one of the body of the African-American child in, and it found it on an old CDC webpage - it's eczema vaccinatum from smallpox (it also found the same photo on around ten other sites, including everyone's friend whale.to and a bunch of other cranks).
So Mad Mike is using a smallpox eczema vaccinatum photo as his horror story when he talks about Dr. Thompson's "confession" of vaccine-induced autism in black children.
I'm old enough to have had a couple of smallpox vaccinations - you had to have them for international travel. But according to the CDC, routine smallpox vaccination in the US ceased in 1972 and travel vaccination in 1982. So, unless that child came into contact with a recently-vaccinated individual - and I believe US military personnel are still vaccinated - this is an old photo.
So Mikey lies - but what's new there?

By Derek Freyberg (not verified) on 03 Mar 2015 #permalink

The plan, of course, is to foment so much contrived hatred that America collapses into a massive race war that distracts everybody from the monumental failures of bad government.

I.e., Obama is just recycling Charles Manson. Sharp thinking.

The same kind of failed thinking that brought Detroit to its knees is now being unleashed by people like Al Sharpton — the Don King of race-baiting hatred — who is behind a new call for an economic boycott of Florida.

I guess the AoA brain trust just thought that he'd be a useful stage nіgger.

For a more skeptical take on Gandhi’s views on vaccines, check this out.

Unfortunately, the quotes from the original at the Stack Exchange link leave out some of the best parts, e.g.,

"We are all terribly afraid of the small-pox, and have very crude notions about it. We in India even worship it as a deity. In fact it is caused, just like other diseases, by the blood getting impure owing to some disorder of the bowels; and the poison that accumulates in the system is expelled in the form of small-pox. If this view is correct, then there is absolutely no need to be afraid of small-pox. If it were really a contagious disease, everyone should catch it by merely touching the patient; but this is not always the case."

@Derek: You're correct, the military still does smallpox vaccinations prior to deployments into certain regions (I had mine in 2004). They do a pretty good job of educating individuals on how to take care of it so nothing spreads beyond the vaccination site...but now and then you do find those special ones who play with the scab and go on to stick a finger in their eye, etc. You can't fix stupid...

By Lenala Azhketh (not verified) on 03 Mar 2015 #permalink

Ann, you wouldn't happen to have the text of that page in your cache, would you? Adams now has a server-side redirect from it to his "Top 10 Scientific Achievements" page. Now I'm really curious to read it, if it is something that embarrasses even him.

By Daniel Welch (not verified) on 03 Mar 2015 #permalink

Adams now has a server-side redirect from it to his “Top 10 Scientific Achievements” page.

Just delete the "#ixzz3TMiMAbnp" tracker.

@Derek Freyberg #55

You can do image searches as you described pretty easily through google. Google images has an option to copy or upload an image and return sites where that image exists. You should be able to save the images in question (right click -> save image) and upload them into a google image search.

Unfortunately, the quotes from the original at the Stack Exchange link leave out some of the best parts, e.g.,

Perhaps the Table of Contents of Gandhi's book best conveys a sense of his profound, self-imposed ignorance of all post-medieval medical knowledge.

Chap. I. The Meaning of Health 9
Chap. II. The Human Body 11
Chap. III. Air 14
Chap. IV. Water 25
Chap. V. Food 29
Chap. VI. How much and how many times should we eat?55
Chap. VII. Exercise 59
Chap. VIII. Dress 64
Chap. IX. Sexual Relations 69
Part II: Some Simple Treatments
Chap. I. Air Treatment 83
Chap. II. Water Cure 86
Chap. III. The Use of Earth 95
Chap. IV. Fever and its Cures 98
Chap. V. Constipation, Dysentery, etc. 101
Chap. VI. Contagious Diseases Smallpox 104
Chap. VII. Other Contagious Diseases 112
Chap. VIII. Maternity and Child-Birth 117
Chap. IX. Care of Child 121
Chap. X. Accidents —Drowning 127
Chap. XI. Do —Burns and Scalds 130
Chap. XII. Do —Snake Bite 132
Chap. XIII. Do —Scorpion-sting, etc.

By herr doktor bimler (not verified) on 03 Mar 2015 #permalink

You can do image searches as you described pretty easily through google.

Unless they're spurning your browser. I have change the user agent to IE9 to get the little camera icon to appear.

I'm not a dermatologist, so this is purely opinion - but I am suspicious that one of Mike Adam's 'vaccine-damaged' children pictured in his article is afflicted with itchyosis - which is a genetically-linked skin condition, not a vaccine injury. The fact that he posts disturbing pictures with no explanation of how vaccines caused the displayed injuries makes me think he has no reliable evidence at all.

Just delete the “#ixzz3TMiMAbnp” tracker.

In retrospect, ignore that (although deleting those strikes me as a good idea in general); the suggestion is the same as to copy and paste the link, which has nothing to do with a redirect based on referrer.

Daniel Welch @65: it's still in the WayBackMachine. I saved a PDF of it too just in case. I didn't read the whole thing but just reading his section headers it seems quite rank. Case in point "The myth of systematic oppression of blacks in America". Wow.

By capnkrunch (not verified) on 03 Mar 2015 #permalink

In his newest article on how some vaccine-related We the People petition reached its signature goal despite the White House "censoring" and "oppressing" its signing, Mike Adams mentions that it was signed by "...Natural News readers and health freedom advocates who also forced Jimmy Kimmel to publicly respond to accusations that he thinks handicapped children who were permanently brain damaged by vaccines are a laughing matter to be used as the butt of his jokes attacking 'anti-vaxxers.' "

I guess he was satisfied with the second Kimmel clip?

Pity the poor anti-vaxxers:
according to KIm ( AoA facebook today) they and their children " have become the new lepers".etc.

By Denice Walter (not verified) on 03 Mar 2015 #permalink

Thanks for the more better linkage to that piece, you guyses who provided it.

I don't know how I missed this one:

And thanks to Obama, race-based paranoia is now at an all-time high in America. Distrust between those of different races has reached a frightening peak, and there are race-based beatings and shootings happening all across the country right now because of all this. (It's mostly young black kids beating up whites and Hispanics.)

Even as more wise black cultural leaders like Bill Cosby are calling for peace and calm, it's people like Al Sharpton -- whose very power depends on continued racial hatred -- who are whipping up division and paranoia.

I guess I just reflexively averted my eyes.

(Look out! Helter Skelter.)

Consistency is really not his strong point, though.

I.e., Obama is just recycling Charles Manson. Sharp thinking.

That's one way to look at it.

But Manson thought that the black man was being programmed to arise and that race war was inevitable. He was just gaming it in order to speed it up because he thought he and other whiteys in the know would come out on top.

So I agree that someone is recycling him. I just wouldn't have said it was Obama.

I wonder what KIm @ AoA thinks of people who do, in fact, have leprosy, and whether she'd be upset to have one living near her.

Since this blog may be getting read by Mike Adams himself:

Dear Mr. Adams:

Were your ancestors dragged over here in chains? Were their children ripped out of their arms to be sold in markets? Or were your ancestors herded into gas chambers or gulags? Were you denied a seat at a restaurant, a seat on a bus, or a marriage license? I didn't think so.

Please take two coffee enemas and call me in the morning. Given what's wrong with you (starts with "full of...") they might actually cure it, or at least put it into temporary remission.

Sincerely, -GS.

-----

Re. Google University: In fact Google is probably contributing to anti-vaxism.

Look up the article "Filter Bubble" on Wikipedia. Google's "personalized search" system figures out what each person's preferences are, and then feeds them more of whatever they apparently "prefer." So if someone has been searching on a keyword that's also used by quacks and suchlike, chances are that when they search "vaccine" or similar, they'll get a load of anti-vax links. And then they'll be more likely to be convinced that the anti-vax crap is true since it came up first in their search.

It turns out that the filter bubble effect can also shift public opinion by 12 - 13% when it comes to voting preferences. If that's the case, then it can shift public opinion about other issues as well. It would not surprise me if this was aiding the spread of anti-vax garbage.

I'd suggest that all good skeptics & rationalists should stop using Google for the sake of objectivity, and boycott it as a matter of principle. Use Ixquick.com, Startpage.com, and/or DuckDuckGo.com, which don't track you and don't stick you in a filter bubble.

By Gray Squirrel (not verified) on 03 Mar 2015 #permalink

Orac, one reason the grifters are freaking out is because they're doomed.

Yes, doomed.

Their entire propagation method is based on gaming Google's search rankings system, and that's about to be taken away from them:

https://phoenixwoman.wordpress.com/2015/03/04/google-strikes-blow-for-t…

Once Google activates their new reality-based rankings system, the crapmeisters are screwed. No longer will their screeds outrank PubMed pieces. No longer will Jenny McCarthy sites be the first things you see when Googling for information on vaccines.

They're freaking out like vampires in a holy-water shower.

By Phoenix Woman (not verified) on 03 Mar 2015 #permalink

Grey Squirrel:

Google's getting sick of getting gamed by crapmeisters -- and here is the solution (http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg22530102.600-google-wants-to-rank…) :

-- Instead of counting incoming links, the system – which is not yet live – counts the number of incorrect facts within a page. “A source that has few false facts is considered to be trustworthy,” says the team (arxiv.org/abs/1502.03519v1). The score they compute for each page is its Knowledge-Based Trust score.

-- The software works by tapping into the Knowledge Vault, the vast store of facts that Google has pulled off the internet. Facts the web unanimously agrees on are considered a reasonable proxy for truth. Web pages that contain contradictory information are bumped down the rankings.

By Phoenix Woman (not verified) on 03 Mar 2015 #permalink

@ Denice #75

according to KIm ( AoA facebook today) they and their children ” have become the new lepers”.

So in essence, Klm sees itself and its kin as being treated like they are potential disease vectors.
A little more effort, Klm. You are about to get it.

By Helianthus (not verified) on 03 Mar 2015 #permalink

They’re freaking out like vampires in a holy-water shower.

Yah. It's mildly amusing, in the same way as people who are all excited based on somebody's picking up on an arXiv entry with G—le authors and weaving some fantasy as a result.

It would help if journalists were to at least try to understand (1) the paper (hint: how expressive are those triples?) and (2) how search results are already prioritized (hint: it hasn't been mainly PageRank in a long time, and that's not why it comes up in the paper anyway).

^ I'm criticizing the underlying news report(s), BTW.

^^ Actually, on second reading, it didn't come off that way at all. I apologize.

Adams appears to have retitled "legitimate criticism" as "hate speech" in the same way I've renamed "household chores" as "quests" in order to make them sound a bit more exciting to my ten-year old daughter.

By Rich Scopie (not verified) on 03 Mar 2015 #permalink

I noticed that Ed Yazbak has been writing articles and comments on that AoA blog. Seems entirely fitting.

Re. Phoenix Woman @ 80 and 81:

Fact-checking sounds like an improvement, but the first comment on your blog spotted an obvious problem:

"When this takes hold, a lot of those penny a word online writing and editing outfits will suddenly have decent paying jobs for writers able to use established facts while undermining them in some way that tricks Google."

In the end it's just another algorithm, and humans excel at beating algorithms when they make the effort. Gaming with facts and "facts" is a high art in advertising, PR, and political propaganda. For example: Use emotional narratives (including photos and videos) that don't have any factual claims to check. Load up a statement with plenty of checkable facts and a honking hooter: the lie brings down the rating a little, but not enough to get it off the first page of results.

There's also the issue of who holds the "facts" and how the "facts" themselves are ranked. Google's chief of engineering is Ray Kurzweil, who believes in all manner of "life extension" quackery, and takes over 100 supplement pills a day on orders from an alt-med doctor by the name of Terry Grossman, who also believes in using "alkaline water" and green tea to reverse aging. See also Robert O. Young, who believes cancer is caused by "excess acid." Or find both on the same page, for example: http://kangenwellmalaysia.com/drink-restructured-alkaline-water/

So even if Google's "Knowledge Vault" dumps anti-vaxers, I wouldn't trust it as far as I could throw it when it comes to other kinds of alt-med.

The general public shouldn't be at the mercy of de-facto search monopolies and opaque algorithms. At minimum, search-ranking and fact-rating algorithms should be published and transparent so they can be subjected to peer review and public critique. As well, universities should launch their own search engines and fact databases, open to the general public, using algorithms that are published.

In the end there's still no substitute for critical thinking.

By Gray Squirrel (not verified) on 04 Mar 2015 #permalink

Ever notice how Mike Adams' bio never mentions any medical degrees or training he has? He might be easier to take seriously if he was an MD who actually studied the stuff on which he pontificates. He should be prosecuted as a fraud.

Haha.
Thanks to Jimmy Kimmel.
Now we can laugh at US antivaccinationists here on the other side of globe, too.
:D

By MrrKAT, Finland (not verified) on 04 Mar 2015 #permalink

Kim Stagliano appears to be unhappy about Jimmy Kimmel's little skits:

I love naughty, irreverent, in your face humor. Harpooning families dealing with the aftermath of vaccine injury is about as funny as calling Child Services on parents of kids emaciated by chemo.

Yes, antivaccinationists really do think that way.

Re. Scott at 90:

No he wouldn't (be taken more seriously). "Mike Adams MD" would be right up there with a bunch of other quack MDs: right about where arch-quack Jack Wolfson MD is (he of numerous screechy rants against parents who vaccinate their kids).

OTOH he might be taken more seriously by alt-med adherents. OTTH (On The Third Hand) they don't much seem to care about degrees. Hmm, I guess it's a toss-up.

In a sane world, Mike Adams would be a Poe or a character in a satire. As it is, he's laughing his way to the bank, until such point as we can sic the FDA on him and get him shut down. Someone needs to go undercover and record him saying something incriminating.

Or at least get Adams on TV along with Wolfson and see how they interact. That would be a riot. (Will they tear each other to shreds, or become best buddies? Stay tuned!) Do likewise for Grossman and Young. Hey, this could become a series!

By Gray Squirrel (not verified) on 04 Mar 2015 #permalink

God Bless Mike Adams for standing up for the truth. I feel sorry for the poor souls that are still asleep. I used to be a fool just like 99% of the ignorant people on this page. Thank you GOD for waking me up! Most people have no idea of the mass mind control that is happening on a global scale. Learn to detoxify your body and mind, and I guarantee you will think differently. Start with eliminating fluoride in every way possible, eat real food, like fruits and vegetables, avoid all processed foods, detox your mind & body from heavy metals with "zeolite" and drink only natural spring water. Eliminate EMF radiation from your home as much as possible, examples include wifi, smart meters, florescent lights, microwaves etc. Pray to God for enlightenment.

@ Gray Squirrel:

Mike obfuscates about his actual education: in his bio ( health ranger.com) he goes on and on about his studies in science and mathematics as well as the humanities. He had fabulous grades on standardised testing, offers of graduate schools at esteemed universities ad nauseum. But he never said *what* university he attended and *what* degree he received.

But then, he wrote about how he was 'impoverished' -
long story short- he married a woman from Taiwan and they moved there, thinking they'd get great jobs - HOWEVER, they found that married women aren't considered the best candidates and he was a foreigner who couldn't speak Chinese.
Thus, he confesses that his degree was in *technical writing* and how he went to trade shows and courted tech companies via brochures to hire him as a writer for selling their products.
( This was an article at Natural News last July IIRC)

His bio mentions his 'self-studies' in nutrition and alt med after his brilliant career led to health issues.

If you look closely at Mike and other merchants of woo, you'll find that indeed, most of their so-called education is self-directed and shattershot. Which is probably why they hate elitists like Orac and his minions- if there are a string of letters after their names, they're most likely not purchased through the mail.

By Denice Walter (not verified) on 04 Mar 2015 #permalink

Denice Walter@75:

Pity the poor anti-vaxxers: according to KIm ( AoA facebook today) they and their children ” have become the new lepers”.etc.

Chance'd be a fine thing. Leprosy's one of those horrible, vicious diseases that could be wiped from the world if only rich, spoiled first-worlders like them gave a shit for anything but themselves. :(

Julian Frost @87:
Man I love xkcd. The title text:

I can't remember where I heard this, but someone once said that defending a position by citing free speech is sort of the ultimate concession; you're saying that the most compelling thing you can say for your position is that it's not literally illegal to express.

However, they did get one thing wrong. When it affects public safety the governnent CAN arrest you for what you say. The classic example is yelling fire in a crowded theater. I don't think the government ever would (nor do I think they should) but I think there's definitely a legal argument that silencing antivaxxers is protecting public health and therefore within their power to do.

By capnkrunch (not verified) on 04 Mar 2015 #permalink

Phoenix Woman@80:

Orac, one reason the grifters are freaking out is because they’re doomed. Their entire propagation method is based on gaming Google’s search rankings system, and that’s about to be taken away from them

Eh, let the lying liars build their own search engine then. If there's one thing alt med &co. have proven, it's that there's no lack of people in the world who want to be lied to and will hand them good hard money for the privilege too. Then they can all go be special flowers over there, and leave the rest of us in peace. /optimist

Ani Bani:

I used to be a fool just like 99% of the ignorant people on this page.

This is an impressive estimate for comment number 94 on a thread.

Start with eliminating fluoride in every way possible, eat real food, like fruits and vegetables, avoid all processed foods, detox your mind & body from heavy metals with “zeolite” and drink only natural spring water. Eliminate EMF radiation from your home as much as possible, examples include wifi, smart meters, florescent lights, microwaves etc. Pray to God for enlightenment.

Praying to God for enlightenment sounds like a great idea. You should probably try it, Ani; you might benefit.

Eliminating EMF radiation? Pff. You've barely scratched the surface. Remove your WiFi router, remove smart meters (no matter how many fines you get from the power company), remove your fluorscent lights, remove your microwave, and then now you must remove the *really big* sources. Do you have any idea how many radio waves are passing right through you from broadcast television and radio, not to mention cell phone towers? You might want to consider moving to the National Radio Quiet Zone. Staunton, Virginia would be a suitable town. Radio transmissions are strictly limited there.

Mind you, you'll still be subject to the beams of geosynchronous commsats. It takes a *lot* to get a signal to cross 22,000 miles and still be clear and crisp on a puny DirectTV dish antenna. And they absolutely cannot avoid hitting the NRQZ. The beams pretty much hit most of the continent. And there is *some* radio coverage in the NRQZ as well. Folks aren't completely cut off there. So maybe Antarctica would be a better choice. Very few commsats are able to operate there, since it's got terrible to nonexistant line of sight to the geosynchronous ring. They have to make do with short-term access to old weather satellites that occasionally loop over them. But then you'll have a new problem -- cosmic radiation.

Cosmic radiation is everwhere on Earth, but it's strongest at the poles where the protection of our magnetosphere becomes more of a funnel directing the particles down. You will get measurably higher exposure to ionizing radiation there, as well as more exposure to UV radiation from the Sun, thanks to the ozone hole. Plus it's insanely cold and you won't see the sun for several months out of the year, without the great night-life you can expect in Arctic Circle locations. On the plus side, you get to see aurora australis, as that radiation pumps energy into the atmosphere, making it glow like a neon sign.

Mind you, the radio radiation from the cosmos is pretty much universal. 1% of the static between stations is actually the Big Bang itself, and you cannot escape that. Not anywhere. Much of the rest is other natural sources, like the Sun and Jupiter and the center of the Milky Way -- that's right, you can actually listen to that monster of a supermassive black hole if you tune your antenna right.

Maybe that's why we're not immortal? Alas.

And don't forget -- you'll have to be careful of those real foods. Fruits and vegetables are great, but if you want to avoid radiation, dang . . . bananas will register on geiger counters. So will broccoli and potatoes. It's the potassium. Heck, that zeolite can be too, if it's natural zeolite and not synthetic, depending on its composition and origin.

BTW, on a totally random note, I am fond of a particular type of zeolite. The mineral thomsonite is surprisingly abundant on the north shore of Lake Superior, and I spent many a happy childhood vacation searching for it on the rocky beaches.

By Calli Arcale (not verified) on 04 Mar 2015 #permalink

Pray to God for enlightenment.

In this arena, God helps those who help themselves. I'd suggest you get started on that, Ani.

Learn to detoxify your body and mind, and I guarantee you will think differently.

Sure thing--right after you provide credible evidence demonstrating I need to do so.

Got any?

Ani Bani, I assume that back in 1999 you bought your $1000 worth of storable food for only $479 so as to be prepared for the world wide crisis that happened when all the software failed?

I have never figured out the demonization of fluoride. It is after all a natural element found in the earth's crust, and abundant in certain water sources. Some areas have naturally occurring levels of fluoride in their water significantly higher than what is added to water systems for the benefit of the teeth. I thought everything natural was good? Good on Calli Arcale for pointing out the ubiquitous nature of cosmic radiation as well as other sources. My husband (the physicist) would weep a tear of joy as the drive to ban sources of EMF leave him in a rage.

It's funny, because... I didn't know Orac's real name. When Tim at the top here accused him of hiding, I decided to type "real name of Orac" into Google.

You know what I got? His Wikipedia page. First hit.

Oh, Orac is trying SO hard to hide...

Of course, when Orac does it, he's being a coward, but when the people at, say, ThinkingMoms or AutismSpeaks use screen names, they're protecting themselves from hate and so forth.

I hate hypocrisy.

By Jason "Man Cal… (not verified) on 04 Mar 2015 #permalink

"Learn to detoxify your body and mind, and I guarantee you will think differently."

My liver and kidneys work just fine, thanks.

Krebiozen - yeah it makes no sense. They demonize aluminum too and apparently are oblivious to the fact that aluminum is literally everywhere and we consume a large amount of it daily. In fact its impossible to eliminate. Yet they obsess over the tiny amounts in a vaccine. Obviously these people have some difficulty processing actual facts.

Kiiri,

Krebiozen – yeah it makes no sense. They demonize aluminum too and apparently are oblivious to the fact that aluminum is literally everywhere and we consume a large amount of it daily.

You know what contains vast amounts of aluminum? Zeolite, of the sort Ani Bani says will detox us. I believe at least some of the aluminosilicates in zeolite will dissolve in stomach acids and be absorbed. Luckily this is a special kind of aluminum that is rapidly excreted by the kidneys, unlike the tiny amounts of regular aluminum in some vaccines which hitches a ride on white blood cells straight to the brain (/sarcasm).

By Krebiozen (not verified) on 04 Mar 2015 #permalink

@ Krebiozen / Kiiri

They demonize aluminum

Oi. Ready yourself for a new round.
I just saw that a scientific meeting dedicated to all forms of studies on aluminium have recently ended in Lille.

In a alarmist French news article I just read, aluminium ingestion is mentioned, but almost immediately all the old tropes are invoked (i.e. antiperspirant and vaccines).
It's a bit difficult to parse the info. The article is not exactly replete with references, quite the contrary.

By Helianthus (not verified) on 04 Mar 2015 #permalink

I guess that Kim Stagliano has never actually seen Whatever Happened to Baby Jane?

You'd think that publicity still she posted of Bette Davis looking all dissolute and delusional would have raised a red flag or two, though.

Aluminum is good for you. I feel much better after I started riding my aluminum-frame bike daily.

By The Great and … (not verified) on 04 Mar 2015 #permalink

Thank you David G. I like your style of writing. Silly Tim. How did I find that soo quickly? It was right here in the blog the whole time ;)

@ Helianthus, An aluminium hysteria extravaganza and no Chris Shaw or Tomlawhatshername? I see that aluminium loons Claire Dwoskin and Gherardi presented though.

By Science Mom (not verified) on 04 Mar 2015 #permalink

@Science Mom

An aluminium hysteria extravaganza

It reads a bit like hysteria, indeed.
On one hand, the journalist talks about aluminium ingested from food or environmental sources. It needs some more numbers to be rolled in, but that seems worth a look.
On the other hand, the meeting organizer and the French scientist quoted in the French article are both very sure of aluminium toxicity coming from vaccines and cosmetics. But they lost me, the first when talking about daily exposure and vaccines in the same sentence, the second when asserting the link is proven and then that the results about antiperspirants and breast cancer will come this year.
Call it nitpicking, but I hunger for more substantial data.

By Helianthus (not verified) on 04 Mar 2015 #permalink

An aluminium hysteria extravaganza and no Chris Shaw or Tomlawhatshername?

There are a couple of students from UBC presenting results on autistic mice; I imagine they're representing Prof Shaw.
The meeting -- and its yearly predecessors) -- seems to have been organised by Chris Exley, who has spent the last 25 years looking for evidence that Aluminium Causes Diseases (with the specific disease changing every few years).
http://scienceblogs.com/insolence/2014/10/13/antiperspirants-not-a-caus…

His press releases are always happily received at the Daily Mail and the Torygraph.

By herr doktor bimler (not verified) on 04 Mar 2015 #permalink

Has: Leprosy’s one of those horrible, vicious diseases that could be wiped from the world if only rich, spoiled first-worlders like them gave a shit for anything but themselves. :(

I get what you're saying, but I think you picked the wrong disease. The reason we haven't managed to beat leprosy yet is that the bacteria responsible is quite hardy. It can live in soil for years and occasionally is picked up by animals who then give it to humans. There's quite a few cases of armadillo to human transmission. Luckily, it hasn't evolved an anti-biotic resistant strain.

By Politicalguineapig (not verified) on 05 Mar 2015 #permalink

Oh, Ani,
If you didn't exist, I'd have to make you up. You hit every clichéd point in the Crank Conspiracy Manifesto. Okay, you left out chemtrails, but I'm sure that was just an oversight on your part. You were once like us, eh? Well, I was once like a considerably milder version of you. Evidently change can go both ways.

By Pareidolius (not verified) on 05 Mar 2015 #permalink

To add to what PGP said: It's Mycobacterium leprae, which is the same genus as the tuberculosis bacterium. We don't have a really good vaccine against TB, which infects a lot more people than leprosy.

Also, yes there's armadillo-to-human transmission, but the bacterium got into the armadillo population from humans in the first place.

Vicki: Also, yes there’s armadillo-to-human transmission, but the bacterium got into the armadillo population from humans in the first place.

Thanks for correcting me. I genuinely didn't know that the transmission went both ways.

By Politicalguineapig (not verified) on 05 Mar 2015 #permalink

Mike Adams has been known to set up filters so that incoming traffic from certain sites gets redirected to one of his fluffy advertorial pages. Keep clicking. Usually the correct link pops up eventually.

Oddly enough, when I click on it, I get the right link. So I don't know what's happening.

Vicki, I'm going to have to disagree with your claim that "We don’t have a really good vaccine against TB, which infects a lot more people than leprosy"
From the Wikipedia page on BCG:

a systematic review and meta analysis conducted in 2014 demonstrated that the BCG vaccine reduced infection by 19-27% and reduced progression to active TB by 71%.

Those look like pretty good numbers to me, and I remember getting the BCG.

By Julian Frost (not verified) on 05 Mar 2015 #permalink

Great video although I must have missed the 'hate speech' part. Seeing as anti vaccinators are unnecessarily exposing everyone to disease I think they should be able to take a few hard words, particularly as they have a charming tendency to refer to the rest of us as 'sheep'.

Recently got into a pissing match with generational elders, our beloved seasoned-citizens, so to speak. Confirmational bias is rampant when it comes to infectious disease. "Nobody who got sick died" in their day, when in fact I try to explain the reporting and how dangerous this infectious can be. They don't believe it's anything more than an over-blown and made up crisis with medical institutions "brainwashing everyone" including myself. Unfortunately, I lost my professionalism in the heat of the moment, which sucks; granted, not as much as the disease process does.

It's healthy to question the basis of evidence, but you leave wondering, similar (unanswered) question posed to Dr Jay, does evidence-based medicine really matter, or should we just wing it on gut feeling even knowing the hazard and move with the risk taking of the popular herd?

I had thought similar to the Kimmel video point that this should have been settled in the 1950s. But, here we still are.

One day, maybe I'll have a handle on the science of infectious disease. Maybe one day.

M*ke *d*ms is a former technical writer?

On behalf of all sane technical writers everywhere, we are really and truly sorry that our profession has inflicted that particular waste of skin on the world. Would that there were some way to remediate the stain on our profession.

By Interrobang (not verified) on 09 Mar 2015 #permalink