I just can't escape them. Even when I want to, even when I'd like to take a break, they're there.
The anti-vaccine nutcases.
This time around, they showed up at, of all places, Netroots Nation, where the deceptively named National Vaccine Information Center, an explicitly antivaccination group that spreads nothing but lies, set up a booth. Fortunately, the reaction to this incursion was not positive, but it just goes to show that these groups are trying to insinuate themselves anywhere they can.
More like this
Every so often, something happens that rekindles the need in me to discuss what, exactly, it means to be "antivaccine." As many of my readers know, if there's one thing about antivaccinationists, it's that they assiduously avoid ever admitting that they are antivaccinationists. In order to avoid…
I must admit, I'm surprised that it took so long for this to happen.
Remember back in April? Three months ago, uber-quack (in my opinion) Joe Mercola teamed up with the grand dame of the anti-vaccine movement Barbara Loe Fisher of the misnamed National Vaccine Information Center (NVIC) to run a "…
Many have been the times over the last five years that I've called out bad journalism about medicine in general and vaccines in particular, especially the coverage of the discredited notion that vaccines or mercury in vaccines somehow was responsible for the "autism epidemic." That's why I feel a…
"Anti-vaccine."
I regularly throw that word around -- and, most of the time, with good reason. Many skeptics and defenders of SBM also throw that word around, again with good reason most of the time. There really is a shocking amount of anti-vaccine sentiment out there. But what does "anti-vaccine…
Care to elucidate the reactions the booth received? I'm curious.
Looking at their booth, why am I reminded of scientologists?
You're telling me. Yesterday I was looking at the blogging on peer review website, and it lead me to a site that claimed that sham acupuncture isn't possible but that acupuncture is so powerful it doesn't matter which meridians are punctured. Of course in the sidebar they had an article "Vaccines: A double edged sword". People tried to inject reason in the comment section and the very first antivaxxer replied with "who are you paid by". They're a pitiful parody of themselves and it would be funny if it wasn't so depressing.
I wonder who's accepting the submissions over at researchblogging.org.
http://brainblogger.com/2008/07/29/there-is-no-sham-in-acupuncture/
http://brainblogger.com/2008/06/30/vaccines-a-two-edged-sword/
Actually, I wasn't at Netroots Nation. (The politics are way left of my general centrist bent.) Reports suggest a marked...lack of enthusiam--fortunately.
There was some "feedback" about them here:
Troll Booth
And here: Travesty!
The politics are way left of my general centrist bent.
Speaking as someone who isn't American, the sad thing is, you think left-leaning Democrats aren't centrists. If you're in the current "centre," that makes you a right-winger by any analysis -- which is funny, because I generally agree with you. Are you Golden Meaning yourself?
You realize, of course, that few things I read on blogs irritate me more than the "by any real definition of left and right you're a right winger." Bora over at A Blog Around the Clock in particular irritates me with this gambit. Just a comment
And why be surprised that you agree with me most of the time? Even if by your definition I'm a conservative, most conservatives are not raging idiots. Could it be that you have a bit of a bias here?
How about "by any globally relevant definition," then? I'm sure most people would be quite happy to concede that the US has a political left, in much the same way that a researcher at Vostok Station might consider -15degC to be rather pleasant :P
I think what Orac's getting at is that, in U.S. political tems, he is a centrist. Why the hell should it matter to him if he's considered a conservative elsewhere? There is no "globally relevant" definition of left and right, becaue I know of no global elections or candidates. Global issues, yes, but alignments there are usually by common interest, not name. Who cares if "Uncle Bob's Ultra-Green Fundamental Workers' Party" is considered to be right-wing and reactionary on the world stage? Policy means more than name.
I get sick of it, too. Besides, this also assumes that the U.S. standards are not politcally relevant anywhere else. Given how much global policy is influenced by the U.S., for better or worse, our standards should at least average in. Just because our entire public policy scale is to the "right" of the average doesn't make the argument relevant; in fact, I think it turns into a huge "No True Scotsman", and frankly, it's annoying.
....And there, sitting at the top in full view on the NVIC web page:
The tab marked LAWYER REFERAL
Geee. How big of a role do you think ambulance chasers have with this 'organization'?
At the second link provided by Mariah, there is a comment where they notice that on the board of NVIC is Cliff Shoemaker and that he is a lawyer:
http://pandagon.net/index.php/site/comments/autism_vaccinations_safe_va…
We all know Cliffy from his trying to deal with the fact that a mere "mother and housewife" can find so much information (neglecting that she is a librarian with a MS from Columbia Univ.):
http://neurodiversity.com/weblog/article/157/
Shaheen Lakhan is part of GNIF and Brainblogger.
He co-authored Nutritional therapies for mental health disorders (pdf) in one of the pay-to-publish journals that is popuar with supplement manufacturers who want to publish their research and people with a particular agenda.
Bipolar disorder can be attributed to food allergies and caffeine. A report in Med Hypotheses is relied upon for evidence that magnesium can clear severe depression in less than 7 days for most of the participants. Rimland is cited to support the relationship between plasma levels of Vitamin C and the prevention/treatment of autism.
In the conclusion, they really start to express themselves. Evil pharma conspiracy etc., no valuable patents etc. Then:
Brainblogger is very odd - it has some very good people who blog there from time to time but also some who are a cause for concern.
"I think what Orac's getting at is that, in U.S. political tems, he is a centrist. Why the hell should it matter to him if he's considered a conservative elsewhere?"
This goes along with non-American posters wondering why Americans are fussing about high gasoline prices ("when _we_ pay so much _more_").
So what? When our prices jump 33% or more it doesn't matter to us what the price at the pump is in France.
In political terms, maybe Bernie Sanders (Vermont's socialist rep in Congress) is considered to the right of the Neanderthals in Sweden. Who cares?
I have to wonder who's funding all these anti-vax websites, public presentations and so on. Rather hard to believe it's just people tossing in their 20 bucks here and there.
As for the political comments
No True Leftist . . . No True Scotsman. . . not much difference is there ? And, "Globally Relevant" ?
Was the United States somehow lifted off the globe ?
Perhaps one of you Europeans would like to explain what the differences are between your "left" and ours ?
I'd like to know.
Western Europe population (June 2008 est): 368 million
EU population (June 2008 est): 491 million
US population (June 2008 est): 304 million
I'd say that by any globally relevant measure, what counts as "right wing" or "left wing" in the US is as valid as what counts for "right wing" or "left wing" in Europe. Attempts to make Europe or the UK the "preferred frame of reference" are as futile as trying to claim a preferred frame of reference under general or special relativity.
Personally, I found it curious that the NVIC - which is most popular among US extreme right-wing groups (which would, naturally, be off-the-scale-right-wing in most of the EU) - had a booth at a meeting of what is undeniably a left-of-center-in-the-US group.
No wonder they were greeting with a lack of interest. It would be like having a booth for the Branch Davidians at a Unitarian Convention.
Even more interesting is the rise of similar anti-vaccination (anti-science and anti-reason?) groups in the UK and - from what I hear - in the rest of the EU as well. Poland has a lively "intelligent design" group going, as well, from what I've seen. Add in the rising Muslim population in most of the EU coutries and it may be that Europe is about to experience its own "lurch to the right"?
I hope not, for all our sakes.
Prometheus
Is there a name for the tactic that HerdRebel deploys in the comments for that Brainblogger article?
S/he presents no less than 133 references to cases or studies that 'prove' vaccine damage, virtually all of them dating from over 15 or twenty years ago and most having been debunked already; HR then says triumphantly "Refute these!". When nobody can find the time/energy to trawl through libraries and archives to disprove each and every one of them, HR will then spread the list all over the internet, claiming that pro-vaccinators couldn't refute them.
We really do need a comprehensive vaccination FAQs site to counter this kind of stuff. However, running it will be a full-time job for somebody who's professionally qualified; so who is going to pay for it? Oh, wait, let's just ask Big Pharma to increase our paychecks.....
Sophia8 wrote:
I agree. The information exists in bits and pieces on all sorts of blogs so people are wasting valuable time and energy by repeating the rebuttal or discussions.
Mary and Sophia, I couldn't agree more.
In fact I already made the same point on one of Orac's previous posts http://scienceblogs.com/insolence/2008/07/the_wall_street_journal_blog_…
Blogs are excellent as far as they go but to really combat these claims a stable, easily searched website is what's needed. The same applies to any response to anti-scientific lobbies. Such a website could also provide the nucleus for a more organized campaign should one be necessary.
Does anyone have the feeling as to whether we need to ask Orac for a specific thread where this can be discussed? Or a feeling for a natural venue such as Rational Wiki (I'm not familiar with it but saw it mentioned on Denialism and Science Based Medicine)?
Paul, Sophia, Mary:
YES! We need a site (make that sites) that we can all link to so that when people Google "autism vaccines" or "toxic vaccines" or "mercury vaccines", the first twenty or so search results aren't all woo pages.
This is probably the single most cost-effective thing we could do on ScienceBlogs: Get all of the SBers, at least in the bioscience areas, to put links to the same handful of legit sites addressing the woo in their sidebars.
It is pretty irritating to see that University Reviews has listed Brain Blogger and Ginger Taylor in the top 100 Mental Health and Psychology blogs. Left Brain/Right Brain is a surprising omission. It seems as if the people who compiled this list were concerned with 'balance' in controversial areas rather than quality.