One more lesson on what "antivaccine" means

Yesterday, I discussed the meaning of the word "antivaccine," using the example of Dr. Suzanne Humphries, an MD-turned-homeopath, as an example of why I refer to people like Humphries as "antivaccine." She really laid down the crazy, too, repeatedly calling vaccines the injection of "disease matter" and "unnatural," while piling conspiracy theory on top of conspiracy theory about big pharma. After seeing that, I didn't think I'd soon find another example of someone as antivaccine as Humphries.

I was wrong.

I was actually debating whether to subject you to this video a mere day after having subjected you to the gloriously unrelenting antivaccine pseudoscience that is Dr. Humphries. I wasn't sure that your fragile eggshell minds (or mine, for that matter) could tolerate another dose of anti-vaccine insanity cranked up to 11 and beyond. But then I thought: Why not? What better to drive my point home about why I call people like this antivaccine than to deliver a double dose of crazy for display for my readers? They can handle it. (Well, at least the ones who have--amazingly--read this blog for many months or years can. I'm not so sure about newbies, but there'll be no coddling here.) Besides, I'm in a somewhat perverse mood right now; there'll be time aplenty for serious blogging about peer-reviewed scientific research or sober treatments of various topics that skirt the interface of science and pseudoscience, medicine and quackery.

Now is not that time.

But who? Who could possibly surpass Dr. Humphries? She did indeed set the bar very, very high indeed--or low, depending upon your point of view, so low that no science, knowledge, or logic could manage to limbo underneath it. One would probably have to invoke quantum effects to pass under the low bar of the pseudoscience represented in this video. Behold:

Yes, it's our old friend Dr. Lorraine Day, someone I wrote about near the very beginning of this blog. Dr. Day was a seemingly normal, sensible orthopedic surgeon. She did have a bit of an inordinate fear of blood, but then she did trauma at San Francisco General back in the 1980s at the initial wave of the AIDS epidemic, back when the biology of HIV was really not well understood at all. In any case, she developed breast cancer in 1993 and tells an odd story of how she supposedly cured herself with dietary manipulations, prayer, and other woo. These days, she takes a dim view of criticism and likes to threaten her critics with the wrath of God.

Apparently she has an even dimmer view of vaccines.

Notice how the video starts out with a picture of two vials (presumably vaccine vials) festooned with a skull-and-crossbones, sitting next to a syringe, over which appear the words "VACCINES DO NOT WORK" in blood-red letters. Subtlety, let's just say, is not one of Dr. Day's strengths. She begins by claiming that the swine flu was a 'total hoax" designed to sell vaccines. It wasn't a hoax, of course. In fact, whenever I hear someone like Day claiming fears of pandemics or epidemics are "hoaxes," I can never figure out why scientists or the government would ever want to pull such a hoax. What would they get from it, other than a big bill for millions of vaccine doses? Yet, here we have Dr. Day assuring us that the swine flu scare of 1976 was a "hoax." Unfortunately, even though there were reasons to fear another pandemic like the one in 1918 in 1976, the government response, a mass vaccination program, coupled with a a vaccine with problems. Dr. Day, of course, makes it sound as though every person who was vaccinated came down with Guillain-Barre syndrome. In fact the Institute of Medicine did a thorough investigation in 2003 and concluded that there was a slightly increased risk of GBS associated with the swine flu vaccine, approximately one extra case per 100,000 people, the reasons for which remain unclear to this day. When you vaccinated millions of people, such an association will easily translate into about 100 extra cases of GBS per 10 million people, a risk that is too high and, to this day, poorly understood. However, we do know that subsequent flu vaccines have not been associated at all with GBS.

If the swine flu scare of 1976 really was, as Dr. Day claims, a plan for the pharmaceutical companies to make up a disease, make up a vaccine for that disease, and scare everyone into taking the vaccine, it was a colossal failure in that the association of flu vaccines with GBS tainted the reputation of flu vaccines to the point that, when H1N1 threatened two years ago, people were still talking about GBS as a possible complication of flu vaccination. Never mind that, as I just pointed out, since then there has been no evidence of a link between GBS and subsequent flu vaccines. Seriously. Dr. Day's conspiracy theory is hard to believe for the simple reason that, however nefarious the purpose and intent of big pharmaceutical companies may be, it's very difficult to accept Day's apparent contention that our pharma overlords could possibly be so incredibly incompetent.

Not that that stops Dr. Day from declaring bird flu nothing but "SARS with wings" and that, oh, by the way, SARS was a hoax too.

Almost as though in response to my question of just what on earth big pharma and the government has to gain from perpetrating the "hoax" of swine flu, SARS, bird flu, or whatever, Dr. Day enlightens us:

But what do they gain by manufacturing this terror? They gain control, because they can quarantine--they can quarantine whole cities with SARS. They can quarantine airplane loads of passengers. They can make vaccines and demand that everyone take them. It frightens everybody, plus they put things in vaccines--in vaccinations. There are preservatives like formaldehyde. It's grown in either animal or human cells, all of which are contaminated...And, so, vaccinations are very damaging to individuals--we can talk more about that later--but they are an absolute financial boon to the pharmaceutical companies.

Even better for big pharma, claims Day, vaccines damage the immune system (according to her), creating yet more business for big pharma. Truly, it is a nefariously perfect scheme: Create hoax that gets people to be vaccinated (and make tons of money doing it) while the vaccines harm the immune system of the people vaccinated, thus guaranteeing an unending flow of profit.

Call me crazy, but this seems to me like a rather risky and dangerous way to make a profit, actually. Think about it for a minute. First, you have to generate a panic, get the government on your side so that it launches a mass vaccination program, and do it all without getting caught actually making up the disease. Just think of the negative public reaction that occurred after only a slightly increased risk of GBS after swine flu vaccination. Maybe that's why the only scientists who have ever claimed that the government does this sort of thing are "brave maverick" doctors and scientists who are already antivaccine to the core. These "hoaxes" are nonexistent, or, more properly, only exist in the fevered imagination of antivaccine loons like Dr. Day.

"Brave maverick doctors" like Lorraine Day.

But to Dr. Day the agenda of the pharmaceutical industry goes far beyond just that. It's not enough just to make profits off of infectious disease "hoaxes." Oh, no. Big pharma goes far beyond this. If you believe Dr. Day, the goal of big pharma and mandatory vaccinations is to cause deterioration and destruction of the human race "more rapidly than we're destroying ourselves" so that there will "eventually be nothing left." I kid you not. That's the ultimate effect of mass vaccination programs, according to Dr. Day. Again, it seems to me like a rather bad business model. Destroying your customer base just doesn't strike me as a sustainable business model, and big pharma is nothing if not all about the business.

In the latter half of the video, Day spouts off old standbys, such as the claim that there was no autism and no sudden infant death syndrome before vaccines, proclaiming that it has been established "beyond a shadow of a doubt" that vaccines cause SIDS and autism. In fact, to Day "Vaccinations do not work. They don't work at all. They don't work." And, of course, they have "toxins"! You know, formaldehyde (never mind that formaldehyde is a normal byproduct of metabolism and that infants have far more formaldehyde in their bodies than exists in any vaccine), mercury (which is only present in trace amounts anymore in childhood vaccines). Oh, and let's not forget that the viruses are grown, according to day, in cancer cells. That's right! "Aborted fetal cells" aren't evil enough. They have to be grown in cancer cells! And even worse, according to Day, you can get cancer from vaccines because of it!

Not so fast.

For one thing, there are no live cells left from the cell cultures in which the virus used to make the vaccine. For another thing, Day is basically misrepresenting the true situation. (Big surprise.) This claim that vaccine viruses are grown in cancer cells seems to come from reports during the H1N1 pandemic by a German doctor named Wolfgang Wodarg and spread around the Internet by--who else?--Joe Mercola about a version of the H1N1 vaccine made by Novartis. Wodarg claimed that the virus was grown in "cancerous cells." Not surprisingly, as is the case with so many antivaccine claims, there is a grain of truth in this, but the way it's represented by Day is related to reality only by coincidence. It turns out that Baxter tried growing an H1N1 vaccine in a Vero cell line. Vero cells are cell lines derived from om kidney epithelial cells extracted from an African green monkey. Although they are immortalized (i.e., they can replicate indefinitely), but they are not cancerous in that they do not form tumors. Other H1N1 vaccines apparently are being grown in Madin-Darby Canine Kidney (MDCK) cell culture. Again, these are cell lines that are immortal but not cancerous.

Believe it or not, there once was a time when I was blissfully ignorant of antivaccine views like the ones above. In fact, I never could have conceived of such hostility towards vaccines, modern medicine, and science. Dr. Lorraine Day is, as we have seen, Dr. Day is crank magnetism epitomized: A Holocaust denier, homophobe, cancer quack, and 9/11 Truther. Not surprisingly, antivaccine views fit right in.

Thus endeth the lessen (for now) on antivaccinationism. Sadly, I'm sure it won't be long before I'll have to add another installment.

More like this

@ clavis, aka sagtackiliver

Nothing exlploded in my basement. However, the portable EMP device did take out half the neighborhood lights one time.

I do need help. The schematic on that thing is wrong or something. I replaced the 1N3904 transistors and swapped the flux neon phase adaptir with the twisted pair linear coaxial sulfide extractor cables just like the documents suggested, but I still cannot get the EMP device to target individual targets properly. Perhaps Edwin Costello could tell me where Kaarthsh keeps his and i could steal it from him. Oh well. Guess I could make my money like the liberals do. Lay in a tent, make coommunist hate speech posters and hope someone gives me a handout. Seems to work for millions.

Glen Beck sock puppet. That is actually a huge compliment. If I were as successful as Glenn beck and as good at predicting events accurately, I would not being clowning around with a bunch of hostile fascist nutjobs on a fake science blob or facecrook or twister even though it pleasureable to annoy a marxist. Ann Coulter eat your heart out.

By Santas Little helper (not verified) on 22 Dec 2011 #permalink

Pure. Unadulterated. Batshit. Crazy. She's like Ramtha without the fake accent.

By Pareidolius (not verified) on 19 Dec 2011 #permalink

Okay, now I've been down the rabbit hole of this very disturbed person's mind via her websites. She lives completely in Lord Draconis' world of shills, minions, Rothchilds, Lizard Queens, Illuminati and Satan (I'm sure I left something out, but I really had to stop reading since I love my iPad and was tempted to hurl it into the koi pond on several occasions).
These are the quacks that make me apoplectic. Her section called "Dr. Day Responds" would be funny if she weren't so completely hateful and delusional. She actually says "some of my best friends" are jews after one particularly paranoid, hateful diatribe. Right, with friends like you, honey . . .

By Pareidolius (not verified) on 19 Dec 2011 #permalink

Day also misunderstands (or deliberately fails to mention) the huge scale of the global conspiracy there would have to be to perpetuate hoaxes of this type. Think of the tens, possibly hundreds of thousands of utterly dishonest medics, nurses, virologists and epidemiologists who would have to have been in on the scam.

What I want to know is where is my check from Bigpharma? I have risked my professional career by inventing, misdiagnosing and perpetuating a swine flu outbreak scam in my own hospital, so I expect at least $10k is appropriate compensation for the fraud I have perpetrated. After all, it could be exposed at a moments notice by a single honest labtech who could spill the beans, so I think a decent sum is fair. Does the pharmaco-industrial-political complex expect me to go to all this trouble for nothing?

You'd think that these anti-vaccine wackos could start naming, names - if Big Pharma is evil, then why don't they start putting out a list of names of CEOs and Presidents of these companies that are part of the "conspiracy."

Of course, they love to paint with the biggest brush possible, so they can demonize the entire industry - because if they started targeting individuals, it would become extremely easy to refute their claims (plus, I guess those pesky libel laws get in the way).

To even finance, much less control, a conspiracy of that size, it would dwarf even the supposed activities that would have been necessary to "fake the moon landings." Since you'd be talking about governments across the globe (and many of them not even friendly to each other, much less to industrial concerns), hundreds of thousands of researchers, millions of doctors, all the way down to secretaries and even janitors.

When you start to just get your head around just how vast any type of conspiracy would need to be (throw in chemtrails, FEMA Camps / Black Helicopters, 911 Inside Job, etc) you can see how ridiculous these claims are (above and beyond the fact that they are incredibly stupid at face value).

Mark Crislip put the number of GBS cases caused by the 1976 swine flu vaccine in perspective by comparing it the grester number of people fatally trampled by cattle in the US that year. Speaking of fatal bovine tramplings, what happened to the famous Neil? Inquiring minds want to know.

Is Loraine Day still licensed to practice medicine. It would scare the hell out of me to think that a practicing MD could be that underpants on the head level crazy.

By Militant Agnostic (not verified) on 20 Dec 2011 #permalink

Considering the number of mouths they'd have to shut to contain a conspiracy at such a big scale, almost everyone should be in on it.
Doctors, nurses, physicians assistants, lab techs, accountants, law enforcement agencies, the judiciary, the government, patients and their friends and families who claim to have benefited from vaccines (and other aspects of modern medicine), employees of "big pharma", insurance agencies; and that too in all the countries across the globe. So who's really left who's not in on the conspiracy to subjugate us?

Someone needs to tell our resident troll that polio is now asceptic meningitis NOT acute flaccid paralysis. Really, science/medicine is only evil enough to create one lie, not two :/

I don't think it's wrong to subject us to anti-vax crazies from time to time, but I think the schedule on which you're doing it is too much, too soon. I'm not against videos-of-wackos -- I'm for safe videos-of-wackos.

Because, y'know, videos of wackos just aren't natural, and they're full of teh toxins.

By palindrom (not verified) on 20 Dec 2011 #permalink

Why is it that self-cures for cancer are a dime a dozen, but none of these people ever cure themselves of the crazy?

"In fact, to Day "Vaccinations do not work. They don't work at all. They don't work.""

This woman is an Average White One-Woman Band.

By Dangerous Bacon (not verified) on 20 Dec 2011 #permalink

What I don't get, in all this Big Pharma conspiracy to make Big Pharma bucks off of "hoax" illnesses via vaccines is why should anyone ever get sick from a vaccine designed specifically for an illness that doesn't exist? Just take a page out of homeopathy's big book o' BS, and just inject distilled water, or saline solution. Call it whatever you want, claim whatever benefits you want, and honestly say it is perfectly safe. Why put all sorts of awful ingredients that will (according to the anti-vaxers) have negative effects on people? Especially if it's all about profit, why spend all that money on long, tedious methods of making these "fake" vaccines, when they could just put the empty vials in one end of a black box, fill them with whatever neutral solution, and pop them out the other end?

It's all just another case of the evil genius conspiracy with the massive fatal flaw that they somehow miss every time, and only the select clever few have seen it. "There actually is no flu! It's a conspiracy to make money! That's why they spend so much money to research and manufacture an active medication that they then sell for almost no profit, and which has potential for actual negative reactions which could result in losses from lawsuits. Ingenious!"

By Richard Smith (not verified) on 20 Dec 2011 #permalink

I love the sad violin music towards the end. It's as if it's saying, "Behold the raving paranoid, and take pity on her."

I need to bookmark that video for the next evening of anti-vax bingo. As for Ms. Day, she needs to watch V. Scaring your people with disease and controlling them with vaccines leads to a true god-fearing (well, fearing anyway) population, not customer elimination. So that might lead to a true mind split, vaccines are bad for you, but they bring you closer to god ....

Watching her ramblings I realized that I knew about one doctor who could be called brave maverick doctor without use of quotation marks. Well, maybe not maverick, but certainly brave and thinking out-of-the-box. Carlo Urbani.

For all who doesn't recognize this name, google it. It certainly is worth remembering.

Dr Barrett says it best: "Stay away from Lorraine Day"

Anti-vaxxers- like others who promote alt med theories- absolutely need conspiracy talk as a prop to explain exactly *why* their brilliant, awe-inspiring hypothesis is utterly shunned by reasonable scientific journals and why it has a snowball's chance in hell of becoming part of the mainstream.

Since they address people who don't always have enough of a background to discern blaringly obvious errors and virtually impossible scenarios their audience's objections probably won't come from this side of the page but from common-sense questioning that asks," Why- if this is true- are you the only one saying it?"

Because there's a Plot aimed at keeping the Truth from the People! That's why! Introducing the woo-entranced to the structure and functions of conspiracy reliance might be a way to gain easy access to their common sense prior to blinding them with science. Woo-meisters all toss a spate of studies at them ( albeit bad, ficitonal, or unrelated studies- but studies nevertheless!) and many can't tell the good from the bad *but* explaining how conspiracies work as smoke-and-mirrors for dodgy science can be understood instantly.

By Denice Walter (not verified) on 20 Dec 2011 #permalink

@puppygod - don't forget poor Ignaz Semmelweis, he's the epitome of "brave maverick doctor" who paid a very high price for his findings. But then, this was 19th century.

I guess Big Pharma slipped up when they invented SARS - they forgot to make a vaccine for it.

By Lancelot Gobbo (not verified) on 20 Dec 2011 #permalink

You know, it is easy to call Day "crazy," but I wonder if she might be a little mentally ill.

Is there no limit to the crazy? I am waiting for one of these nuts to finally speak out against toilet paper (obviously a Jewish conspiracy to make men gay and destroy the American family while lining the pockets of Johnson&Johnson).

But I do like Day's idea of describing things as being other things with wings. I'll have to try it... Goering was just Hitler with wings!

By Conspicuous Carl (not verified) on 20 Dec 2011 #permalink

@ Doris D:

That's a question some who investigate pseudo-science ask," At what point do bizarre, un-realistic, or idiosyncratic ideas indicate a mental illness?"
When does denial of facts known through research and accepted by the consensus in the relevant field become "malignant or pathological"** denial?

** Seth Kalichman

By Denice Walter (not verified) on 20 Dec 2011 #permalink

MESSAGE BEGINS----------------------

Shills and Min . . .

No. No, I can't do it. It's just too easy, like venching flenk in a kordonk. She's done my work for me. Might as well take the day off . . . maybe the week. Spend some time with the family . . . yes, I'll spend time with the family.

Carry on, evil, etc., etc.

Lord Draconis Zeneca, VC, iH7L

Forward Mavoon of the Great Fleet, Suzerain of V'tar and Pharmaca Magna of Terra, Knower of When to Fold Em

PharmaCOM Orbital HQ
0010101101001

------------------------------------------ MESSAGE ENDS

Day seems to be operating out of a style of prejudice common to certain groups of Americans -- it isn't real if it didn't happen in the US. After all, the vast majority of people affected by SARS were either in China or Toronto. The jolly old Province of Ontario's health system was much more well-equipped to deal with H1N1 a couple of years ago after they got all their procedural ducks in a row after SARS.

And if H1N1 was made up, then how come I got so damn sick a couple years ago (a week before the vaccine came out in Ontario, blast and damn it)? I still have scar tissue in my lungs, I'm sure of it. (A nasty case of secondary bronchitis will do that to you, particularly if you have had -- as I have -- other respiratory issues in the past.) Man, I think that was the worst influenza I've ever had...first 30 hours were just the standard high fever and total-body migraine headache, and then I vomited solid for about 30 hours, and then it (suddenly!) dropped into severe respiratory problems. Gack.

These days, when the doctor asks me if I want a flu shot, I'm already rolling up my sleeve. Haven't had it since.

By Interrobang (not verified) on 20 Dec 2011 #permalink

@ Militant Agnostic: Yes, crazy loon is still licensed in California and still is "credentialed" in orthopedics by the ABMS...I just checked their websites.

I couldn't resist going to the streaming banner advertisement on her video...conspiracycards.com where one can purchase laminated conspiracy cards chock full of "talking points" for all the conspiracies you could ever imagine:

teh Joos, teh vaccines, teh 9/11 "truth", teh fluoridation of water, teh cancer, etc., etc.

Take a look at the Truther Toys at that website...it includes an action figure of Lorraine Day...but with a better hair dye job. (Eat you heart out Todd W.)

Now sashay over to Wikipedia and look up ex-congressman William E. Dannemeyer who is married to this loon. He is also a major hater...with particular animosity directed at immigrants and homosexuals. Truly a marriage "made in heaven".

obviously a Jewish conspiracy to make men gay and destroy the American family while lining the pockets of Johnson&Johnson

Sadly, my first thought was about how greatly she overestimated the competence of Johnson&Johnson. They can't even keep up manufacture of an expensive, on patent drug going. I'm sure they aren't competent to run the alien conspiracy to steal our eyeballs and kidneys.

SARS was a hoax, huh? This woman is despicable. 44 residents of Toronto, including several health care workers, died of SARS during the epidemic and she just waves their deaths away because they don't fit into her absurd conspiracy theories. I worked in a building very close to all Toronto's downtown hospitals while the SARS outbreak was on. It was a scary time.

I guess the CBC got bought off by Big Pharma too: http://www.cbc.ca/news/background/sars/

By Edith Prickly (not verified) on 20 Dec 2011 #permalink

seriously. what is the motivation these deniers have?

1) assholes who lie to make money?

2) mentally ill?

3) scientifically illiterate and trying to do good?

lest I seem too provincial, the 800 people who died worldwide of SARS count as well, not just the ones in my home city. Lorraine Day is still despicable for dismissing them all.

By Edith Prickly (not verified) on 20 Dec 2011 #permalink

One thing that always puzzles me when I read these "massive global conspiracy" rants is the one question that never seems to be asked:

"Why is the ranter still breathing?"

Seriously, if there was a "massive global conspiracy" to hide the "fact" that vaccines don't work - a conspiracy that, according to certain reality-challenged individuals, is killing thousands or millions of people - why can't this "massive global conspiracy" kill (or otherwise permanently silence) a few 'bloggers?

The Chicago Mob was (is?) far smaller than this conspiracy, yet they had no problem dealing with irritating individuals. It is rumoured that the Dan Ryan expressway has a dozen or more enemies of the Mob entombed in its concrete slabs. So why can't this "massive global conspiracy" get rid of a few fringe gadflies?

Maybe, because it doesn't exist?

Prometheus

Yes, crazy loon is still licensed in California and still is "credentialed" in orthopedics by the ABMS...I just checked their websites

What kind of lame-assed conspiracy allows an enemy like Dr. Day to continue to hold a licence to practise? Any conspiracy worth the name would have "disappeared" her and wiped out all records of her existence from the database.

Come on, you guys, what are my fees paying for here?

MESSAGE BEGINS------------

Excellent Work Minion Lilady,

Spread the word of ConspiracyCards.com, our marvelous and lucrative new front for Glaxxon PharmaCOM Orbital. Our motto is "Emskreech ham'k v'shaamz" or as you would say, "Hide in Plain Sight." I do hope they fashion my action figure to the correct scale. I'm terribly excited about it, as they tell me it features "Swingin' Battleclaw Action" whatever that means. All I know is that they'd better get Eggmother Li'izz's countenance right, including her Switch-a-Faceâ¢, Pack-o-Corgisâ¢, Bonnie Prince Dunderheadâ¢, and Pink Handbag of Death⢠accessory packs.

Perfect for the holidays. "Just sayin'," as the hatchlings say.

Lord Draconis Zeneca, VC, iH7L

Forward Mavoon of the Great Fleet, Suzerain of V'tar and Pharmaca Magna of Terra, CAMster Master Supreme

PharmaCOM Orbital HQ
0010101101001

------------------------------------------ MESSAGE ENDS

Dannemeyer is married to Lorraine Day?

OMFG. You could not make this stuff up.

By palindrom (not verified) on 20 Dec 2011 #permalink

@Palindrom #8: You can talk all you want about alternative schedules, but as far as I'm concerned, no amount of exposure to batshit insane conspiracists on YouTube has been proven to be safe.

By Roadstergal (not verified) on 20 Dec 2011 #permalink

seriously. what is the motivation these deniers have?

In large part it's fear. Reality is a scary place where sometimes it isn't possible to prevent bad things from happening. If bad things happen (like children developing autism) there has to be something that could have done to keep it from happening (like choosing not to comply with routine vaccinations). If bad things can happen to good people without any way to prevent them there's no way I can ensure they won't happen to me...

And that vulnerability is just too scary to contemplate.

So for peace of mind I have to believe a reason can be identified and there is something I can do. It doesn't have to be true, there can be even be evidence that it isn't--I just need to believe.

And acommunion with other true believers validates mybeleif and enhances my felling of security ("We got that bad thing covered! It'll never happen to us!") so of course I'm going to argue for my belief. The more of us who beleive the safer I'll feel (even if in reality it'll mean we're all actually less safe than before) and my need isn't to be safe but to feel safe.

As Robin Lakoff stated in one of her books, "Conspiracy theory is a way to make sense of the randomness of the universe". And I love this quote, it neatly sums up the conspiracy believers.

The Aristocrats!

Won't someone think of our pristine, virgin, immunologically naive subcutaneous tissues???!?!?

By Dangerous Bacon (not verified) on 20 Dec 2011 #permalink

Sixty-seven seconds of that video and my right anterior lobe mdfs kdhasd gfhsdhsgd kfas don't work no murr.

Am I the only one who really wants conspiracy cards? THe problem is I really, really don't want to give these people money. So conflicted...Crazy person trading cards, so tempting, must resist giving money to crazy people.

In these kind of situations I always fall back on the wisdom of William Burroughs

"Do not offer sympathy to the mentally ill. Tell them firmly, 'I am not paid to listen to this drivel. You are a terminal fool.'"

By Fan of the crazy (not verified) on 20 Dec 2011 #permalink

I'm not letting a junkie tell me not to offer sympathy to the mentally ill. (OK, that's snarky and not entirely relevant: Fan of the crazy probably isn't a junkie, and I wouldn't take the quoted advice even if it wasn't credited to Burroughs.)

But sympathy doesn't mean agreeing with what someone says. You can sympathize with (say) a depressed person's difficulty in getting stuff done without agreeing with them if they say those things are impossible or worthless. (In one case in the past, I told someone truthfully that I was sorry their marriage was ending, but that I didn't think that certain specific things their ex had done were wrong. The person was asking me to affirm that those things were wrong, so I wasn't in a position to ignore the question.)

There were Illuminati conspiracy card games back in the day....and even "tongue in cheek," they were more believeable than the drivel that these people believe.

Does this lady completely lose her mind if she gets, say, a skinned knee?

By Melissa G (not verified) on 20 Dec 2011 #permalink

My dearest Lord Draconis,

I would like to asure you that everything is proceeding as scheduled so don't you worry your crested little head about anything. Of course I'll see to it that we pay only *minimal* attention to the festivities during the next fort-night: I have meetings, meet-and-greets, networking parties and seminars that should keep all shills and minions in attendance extremely *busy*... no wasting time on office party fol-de-rol, drunken bacchanals and musical-bed week-ends for your loyal shills and minions. No siree!. Just good hard work. Because we are serious people, devoted to PharmaCOM.

At any rate, have a nice time with Little Queenie ( even though she's not really English and wears breath-takingly bad hats). I am very happy indeed with the controlling interest you bought me in that fashionable company that does tan plaid so well. My best to her Ladyship and the kiddies. Kiss kiss. Falalalala.

Most sincerely yours,
DW ( what are titles between friends?)

It can't be stressed enough how these people dismiss,ignore,or simply don't care about children,and adults who happened to be born immunocompromised.They ignore us,we don't exist.To admit we do would blow most of their theories all to hell.

Or maybe they just want to get rid of us in a eugenics sort of way.

By Fragile Eggshe… (not verified) on 20 Dec 2011 #permalink

Thanks lilady.The site is filled with goodies like

Can Mosquitoes Transmit AIDS?
$10.00 Booklet
The government says "YES"
Information in this booklet reveals that:

The HIV virus survives for 48 hours in a mosquito and for 72 hours in a bedbug.

Experiments have shown that AIDS can be transmitted by mosquitoes.

This 43 page booklet entitled "Do Insects Transmit AIDS", initially published by the U.S. Congress, is now available only through Rockford Press.

DVD
$19.95

In this DVD she reveals:

that the entire foundation of conventional medicine is based on ERROR

why germs DON'T cause disease anymore than flies cause garbage!

why a healthy body is resistant to germs just as a healthy plant is resistant to insects and other plant pests

The ADHD page is a joke,especially after what we now know about the genetics.It's like an Adele Davis book from the 60s.

Oh and the CDC is run by the Bilderbergers.

The Coming New World Order
How It Will Dramatically Change YOUR Life!
by Lorraine Day, M.D.

⢠Your Rights ⢠Your Privacy ⢠Your Marriage ⢠Your Children

⢠Your Food ⢠Your Water ⢠Your Security ⢠Your Home ⢠Your Assets

⢠Your Independence ⢠Your Free Speech ⢠Your Finances

Because of Dr. Lorraine Dayâs enormous television and radio exposure over the last twenty years, she has developed an extensive network of âinsidersâ both nationally and internationally, who want to get the truth to the public but are afraid to speak out individually, neither do they have the public forum to do so

In this book you will find

The Merging of the United States, Canada and Mexico by 2010

By Roger Kulp (not verified) on 20 Dec 2011 #permalink

I'm not so sure about newbies, but there'll be no coddling here.

How Darwinian! Can't you start off with a little rash of links for those of us who haven't built up a tolerance? You know, like a vaccine?

I don't understand why someone would give a whole city SARS to quarantine and then vaccinate them, but it is an interesting window on what she's thinking about. I also don't know how childhood leukemia is connected to childhood vaccination. But I'm sure she'll have a cure for it any day now.

I second the admiration of the sad strings of pity and want a little button to press to play them while I read these posts.

MESSAGE BEGINS-----------

CADRE LEADER DW:

Not really English? Try not really human. I do think the Rothchilds are human . . . ish. They may have been tampered with a couple of centuries ago by agents of the Ventz-Monsantoid Invective but who can really say? All I know for certain is that they're delightfully droll, thoroughly evil and make a delightful Chateau Mouton.

And speaking of spirits brings me to the subject of drunken Bacchanals, fols-de-rol and other such holiday hoopla. May I remind you that we're not monsters here at PharmaCOM (well, okay, I suppose we are) and that we want our Shills and Minions to be happy, traitorous and efficient, so party on with your "bad selves" or whatever quaint euphemisms you all use for festivities. Let your hair down as it were. Until the first of the terran year, consider the great PharmaCOM teat of PharmaLucre to be set on "excess."

Just be here all the earlier on January first, the rebels never sleep . . . and neither do I.

Lord Draconis Zeneca, VC, iH7L

Forward Mavoon of the Great Fleet, Suzerain of V'tar and Pharmaca Magna of Terra, Master of the Teat of Treats

PharmaCOM Orbital HQ
0010101101001

------------------------------------------ MESSAGE ENDS

Our Great Lord Draconis, You just reminded me of last year's festivities. Could you ask Cindy to make that Pomegranate with "something" punch? Good grief I haven't had that much fun in years and that "no hangover" additive was well-worth waking up in the buff with...well, we don't have to go there now do we?

As always, looking forward to my Festivus bonus and a new year filled with more targets blogging material. It is quite a deep pool these days.

What is a homopath? Is that like a phsychopathic gay person or something? Do you have hompathic tendencies?

H1N1? Bird Brain Flu? Technically the diseases were real, but the media hype acted as if the entire earth's population would be wiped out in a matter of seconds if people didn't get their flu vaccine immediately. I never have taken a flu vaccine and certainly not one for the pig flu or bird brain flu.

I wish I could get my hands on one of those vaccines and send it to my people's lab to get it tested to see what people are really taking. I would be willing to bet there is more than a flu strain in it. Hell, they already poison people and dumb down people with sodium flouride. There is no telling what these vaccines have in them.

Don;t belive me? Ever try to have an intelligent conversation with a Canadian? It won't happen unless the Canadian is a politician who drinks water that is flouride free. The rest of the population are rather dumb. I lay it off on the sodium flouride, but then again, living in a socialist society where most people have the government think for them instead of thinking for themselves can make a population less intelligent as well. Over time the need to think diminishes and brains do not function normally.

I have noticed that if you talk to numerous people in cities where the water is heavily poisoned with flouride and then talk to rural communities where water is normal or the people have their own well, the rural people seem more intelligent and quicker thinking. Is it just me or was Hitler on to something when his team discovered flouride makes people dumb and more willing to cooperate?

@ Ren: You sucker-punched me again. I love to see videos of Paul Offit "stickin' it to the anti-vaxers".

Yes, I watched the entire video...and "caught" the Offit-Stalking Jake Crosby at ~43.00 minutes into Dr. Offit's Q&A session. The only difference here, is that Dr. Offit "headed him off at the pass"...by calling out Boy Wonder Ace Reporter for the POS-Wakefield-apologist-stalking-creep, that he has become. I'll be "slumming" at AofA to see how Jakey spins this...and report back.

Further along...at ~47.20 minutes into the video, a real epidemiologist mentions the "Melanie's Marvelous Measles" children's book. Jake's attempt to attack Dr. Offit and the children's book met with derisive laughter at the NIH meeting.

Oh, look, it's "Doctor Smart," here to reprise its own 17-month-old performance. It must be on a timer or something.

BTW...don't even bother to link to "Santa's Little Helper's" link...it leads to fu**campfema.com...which is a dead end link.

@lilady

You're going to go look for a post that vilifies Dr. Offit? That's like me going tuning into WBAL to see if they talk bad about the Steelers. In essence, it's a sure thing... And you won't have to wait long.

@ Ren: I shall be slumming at AoA and will be reporting back. In the meantime, I will be away from my laptop for a few short hours...I'm glamming up...to meet with our Big Pharma overlords to "negotiate" our contracts for 2012. If any of you Big Pharma Shills have special requests...let me know. Me...I'm going for the new car...with the keys and the registration papers sent to me in a plain brown envelope.

Alas, lilady, everyone knows where I work... There's no glamor or money there.

As for my other three jobs... hehehehe...

@ Ren and lilady, I had to laugh at Jake's clarification that he was a grad student that was hastily and clumsily added after he said he was from GW Public School of Health. Also, I wonder if he had some help shutting up since he went silent so suddenly and we all know, when Jake wants to talk, he keeps going.

MESSAGE BEGINS-----------

Squadmother Science Mom:

Cindy assures me that she'll be tending bar again and that there will be ample supplies of whatever ingredients constitute Gramma Flinders' Pometini recipe that was such a hit with you last year. As I recall one of the hatchlings found you and the Ventraxian Oligarch the next morning, blissfully asleep in a slightly compromising position down by the y-axis thruster access hatch (such a lovely view from there). I do hope the tentacle marks went away quickly. A little enscreex tells me that a certain planetary Oligarch will be attending our fete again this year.

Shill Representative Lilady, I look forward to facing you over the negotiating table, your steely visage and implacable demeanor are what make you such a valuable ally. Just remember who has the keys to the matter-driver interlock.

We know where you work Minion Ren, that's all that matters. Look for a little extra in your courier pouch this week for your tireless service to the Empire.

Lord Draconis Zeneca, VC, iH7L

Forward Mavoon of the Great Fleet, Suzerain of V'tar and Pharmaca Magna of Terra, Keeper of the Skeletons

PharmaCOM Orbital HQ
0010101101001

------------------------------------------ MESSAGE ENDS

@Narad

The complexity of my outstandingly brilliant argument cannot be comprehended by those who confuse their buttcheeks and their real cheeks in a mirror.

Are you one of those homopaths of which this article speaks? Is it even possible for a phsychopath to be a homo? Then again, gayism is by choice or sometimes subconciesly dreamed up to cover past terrors of abuse by people of the same gender. This is not a conspiracy or hate speech. For decades phychologists labeled homosexuality as a disease as a result of sexual and physical abuse in early childhood. They don;t do it now becuase the fascist leftists would crucify them for it. Modern doctors are scared of the leftists fascists becuase the leftist fascists are violent agressive terrorists who will cheat, lie, steal, and kill to dispose of truth and exchange it for satanic paganist perverseness. Don't believe me? Seen protestors lately? Read their signs? need I say more?

Back to Narad the nut nudger

Seriously? Doctor Smart? Are you on cocain or something? Nevermind, you are liberal. Drugs are your thing. It's part of not being judgemental or some bullcrap like that.

I never got the whole judgemental fetish that liberals have. They call conservatives untolerant and judgemental. yeah, says the people who will burn your house down if you disagree with their global warming fraud.

narad, please don't hurt yourself. Try not to be homopathic. Seek therapy. They can cure it. Maybe your smart doctor can help you unclog your butthole.

A little advise. Please do not take a muscle relaxer. We do not want to see the large stick slide out.Of course if you live in San Franscico, taht would be considered a normal morning.

@41: "Does this lady completely lose her mind if she gets, say, a skinned knee?"

Objection, assuming facts not in evidence, to-wit, that she hasn't already completely lost her mind.

Seriously? Doctor Smart? Are you on cocain or something? Nevermind, you are liberal.

Bite me, Rob.

And Rob, just out of curiosity, what's with the "don;t" routine? It seems to be a constant of the motion for you.

m'Lord Draconis,

Thank you. I do what I can, and I like it.

Following the "two there are always, no more, no less" rule, can we get me an intern? A cute one with really long legs? (And only TWO legs, mind you. The insectoid you sent last year creeped-out the whole department.)

Who is this Rob that you speak of? Have you been robbed? What is your major malfunction? "Don;t" is a perfectly good phrase to use on my new EYE phone to send them fancy texty messagy thingys to people on facecrook and twister.

Lord Draconis? Didn;t one of his siblings help Thomas Costello escape an underground military prison? I believe it was a female who planned the escape and killed multiple black berets in the process allowing thomas and a few others to escape. They are all dead now. "Suicide" was he ruling by the coroner. I guess the coroner gets paid well to keep his mouth shut.

(And only TWO legs, mind you. The insectoid you sent last year creeped-out the whole department.)

Really, what sort of closed minded office do you work in Ren? My division all enjoyed the ocotopoid intern Lord Draconis sent to us. Especially after he agreed to...take care of...all the neurosurgical consults.

Speaking of conspiracy theories and pharma presents, I've got one (a conspiracy theory, that is, not a pharma present): Pharma companies are behind all the recent restrictions on doctors taking presents from pharma. Why, you might ask? Their secret research(TM) proves that the presents don't influence prescribing practices nearly as much as they had previously thought so they want to dump this money sink. But they can't just come out and say that because that would be admitting that they'd been trying to influence doctors by means other than the wonderfulness of their drugs so they started funding movements to restrict gift giving via shell companies and fake non-profits. Don't know that it's true, but it seems to me a vaguely plausible idea and might even be testable if anyone's up for it.

@ Ken: I also found this on her website:

I am no stranger to attacks from the media, from medical groups, from special interest groups or from the government. My previous experience in speaking out about the AIDS cover-up by organized medicine and the government has trained me well and has given me increased information and discernment about the forces behind these attacks.

I have "been here" before. To quote a television comedian, "It's deja vu all over again!"

Hmmm, Yogi Berra is a television comedian?

@ Narad: There was something vaguely familiar when I read the Spawn Of The Devil's rants...something about the homophobia, the politics, the misspellings and the syntax.

"Yikkes!
Found this on her web site-
ht_p://www.drday.com/tumor.htm"

And if you get past that, there's a swell rant about all the people and organizations who are Attacking Dr. Day and who will rue the consequences (when Armageddon comes, at the very least). She reproduces an indignant letter she sent to Dr. Dean Edell, in which she trumpets her friendship with Holocaust denier Ernst Zundel:

"So who is behind this reprehensible travesty of justice against Ernst Zundel? Who wants to repress ANYONE who investigates history, including the supposed "Holocaust," and ANYONE who disagrees with the official party line?

The answer: Those who gain the most from perpetuating the establishment's version of the "Holocaust," those who have reaped billions of dollars in reparations from Germany for the "Holocaust", those who collect billions of dollars in "loans" from the U.S. - "loans" that are NEVER repaid, those who use those funds to keep other groups of people, including the Palestinians, the Iraqis, and soon to be many other countries, under totalitarian control and in abject poverty.

Who are these people? The Zionist Jews!"

The woman is not a crank magnet; she's a crank superconducting supercollider.

By Dangerous Bacon (not verified) on 20 Dec 2011 #permalink

This nasty women was an orthopod at the Mission General during the 80's? As a medic, in SF, during that time period, I could have handed her patients. The General is not only a level one trauma center but it's San Francisco's only county hospital. She would have operated on the unwanted and the unclean, which could have fueled her aids paranoia. The emergency room was always functioning over capacity and on diversion status.

She must not be worried too much on the health of her lungs as she moved from San Francisco to Riverside County, which is in the ozone belt. I don't know anyone in their right mind that would move to Riverside. It's much cheaper to live there than San Francisco, so quakery must not be too lucrative for her.

I wonder if she communicates with "old crazy eyes" Robert O Young. She's not too far away from his avacodo ranch in San Diego county. If she needed to be defungaled, would he give her a professional courtesy discount?

By Black-cat (not verified) on 20 Dec 2011 #permalink

@ Dangerous Bacon: That ain't nothin'...she has another website:

The Good News About God

"Whatever happened to REAL Freedom of Speech in America? On this web site, you will find an in-depth analysis of the story behind the news, the real truth - from the political, social, religious and medical perspectives - and where each story fits into the bigger picture of the diabolical plan of the Illuminati and the Zionist Jews to destroy America and to rule the World."

This hateful hag calls herself a Christian!

BTW, Happy Chanukah.

@lilady: That action figure was a hoot. Is there a disorder that is the opposite of body dysmorphic disorder, where a 70 year old hag thinks she looks like a voluptious 20 year old.

By Black-cat (not verified) on 20 Dec 2011 #permalink

If government of any kind isn't your thing, crank @48 & 59, try moving to Somalia. I hear it's a government-free paradise. Or something.

She only wishes she is that young...she was born in 1937. You know she is a natural blond, who dyes her roots black and the photoshopped air-brushed picture on her website is supposed to be her at age 60.

Is there a disorder that is the opposite of body dysmorphic disorder....yes, it's called narcissism.

So if my math is correct, she is 74. Maybe her problem is organic brain syndrome.

By Black-cat (not verified) on 20 Dec 2011 #permalink

Organic brain syndrome which she has had for the last 30 years.

By Black-cat (not verified) on 20 Dec 2011 #permalink

Or, perhaps her brain is fried from a bad acid trip or another substance. It's hard to believe that she, at one time, actually practiced medicine.

She's just a nasty old broad filled with hate.

Yes, it is hard to believe she was a surgeon at the Mission General with the most vulnerable of patients.

I wonder if she left on good terms or if she got so bad shit crazy, they ended up 4 pointing her in restraints and throwing her in the psych ward on a 72 hour hold.

By Black-cat (not verified) on 20 Dec 2011 #permalink

Or, perhaps her brain is fried from a bad acid trip or another substance.

Now, now, LSD by itself is one of the least toxic psychoactive drugs one is likely to run across.

Does anyone wonder how this lady could go so crazy, so quickly?

I remember when the first "cases" of the disease now known as AIDS were first reported, based on clustering of Kaposi Sarcomas and PCP infections affecting young gay men. Certainly health care workers and surgeons especially, were very concerned about the routes of transmission, even before the virus was identified as a blood/body fluids-borne transmissible disease. In the health care field these are the risks you deal with, yet she completely went off the rails in her medical practice and in her public speaking engagements.

How could a well-educated physician simple ignore a lump in her breast for at least a year...it simply doesn't make sense.

I often wonder how the personal physicians of patient/celebrities who claim natural cures for cancers, are "able" to refrain from commenting.

MESSAGE BEGINS---------------

Minion Ren,
I'm so sorry that the K'thraax we sent "creeped out" your department. I suppose the very qualitified gelatinous Slubenoid intern I was sending your way with her multi-tasking prehensile scillia would be right out (they do require a bit of mopping up after). So it's long legs you like, eh? I think I have just the intern for you, I hope you have high ceilings where you are and aren't sensitive to subsonic blenning. Enjoy!

And Satan's Little Helper, now, surely you know that I'm just a fictional character portrayed here to mock the likes of you with all my talk of Reptiloid Pharma Conspiracies, Rothchilds and planetary subjugation through stupefying drugs deployed through vaccines and chemtrails. I'm obviously a simple figment of some fevered monkey's imagination defending science and reason against semiliterate dunderheads, dunderheads rather like you. The fabulous world of conspiracies I inhabit couldn't possiblly exist . . . or could it? No, I'm just fucking with you . . . or am I?

Idiot.

Lord Draconis Zeneca ih7L
000101001001

Foreward Mavoon of the Great Fleet, Pharmaca General of Terra, Phantom of Fiction . . . or not

Glaxxon PharmaCOM Orbital
-----------------------------------MESSAGE ENDS

By Glaxxon Pharma… (not verified) on 20 Dec 2011 #permalink

@lilady: That action figure was a hoot. Is there a disorder that is the opposite of body dysmorphic disorder, where a 70 year old hag thinks she looks like a voluptious 20 year old.

Well, I would be looking for the delusional disorders rather than somatoform ones. I would never go as far as diagnose someone over internet, but some form of persistent delusional disorder would have quite an explanatory power in this case.

Again I bang on about Australia, but IN AUSTRALIA ;) nobody would tolerate an orthopaedic surgeon pretending to know more about immunology than an immunologist.

Really, when you have big opinions outside your area of expertise, you are just begging to be pilloried.

I see the regulars have been posting here, whilst I was engaged elsewhere (posting a snarky comment at the Ho-Po...pushing our Big Pharma antibiotic agenda for treatment of Group B strep infection), rather than homeopathy treatment. I tend to "push the envelope" a bit, there...hoping to get the snark past moderation.

@ Spawn of the Devil: Now you've gone and done it by incurring the wrath of Lord Draconis...look for a big lump of coal in your Xmas stocking...serves you right.

@ lilady

Does anyone wonder how this lady could go so crazy, so quickly?

Not really, because I doubt that it really happened that suddenly. My speculation is that this starts fairly young, with someone who lacks even the most basic of critical reasoning skills. That makes them receptive to a lot of stuff that the rest of us would reject out of hand. So, a slightly off uncle or family friend talks about the "Jews" or "Bilderbergers" in the presence of an over-impressionable Lorraine Day and those ideas start to take root.

The next step is some serious confirmation bias. Once they have the basic mindset that there are "others" out to ruin their world, they see the presence of those "others" in everything that goes wrong. It's around this time that things start to manifest in the form of cryptic remarks like "it figures" and "typical of them" when they make the connection between their prejudice and the "other."

Those cryptic remarks, which get more explicit as time goes on, lead them to other people with similar or related mindsets. A little curiosity and the deluded one will seek others like them. Now we get reinforcement in the form of the echo chamber. It becomes safer and easier to state their craziness more openly, since there is a receptive audience. That also leads to pushing the boundaries in normal society with more and more off-the-wall statements. It's not enough at that point to label them as "crazy," but others may observe this as a personal quirk and just subtly avoid the delusional one.

Hanging out with other crazies also helps the delusional one expand their "world view" with different conspiracies. The lack of critical thinking allows them to build a complex web of impossibilities, relating Big Pharma, the UN, the Tri-Lateral Commission, the Bilderbergers, the Illuminati and anyone else they can think of. As the delusional one builds their web, they get more and more divorced from reality.

Some people are just recipients of delusions like this, doing little more than stockpiling food for when the black helicopters come. Others show a talent for spreading the delusion -- Dr. Day falls into this category. Being an MD adds to her credibility with the deluded, so that helps make her a go-to person.

Some people manage their delusions at a level that allows them to function acceptably outside of the conspiracy community. Others will end up living on the edge -- I'm sure that most of us have seen that creepy guy in the library talking to himself, carrying stacks of photocopied documents and using the library computers to write some massive screed. Others, like Dr. Day, find success within the conspiracy community.

It's possible that being at ground-zero for the AIDS epidemic or her own breast cancer served as a tipping point for her craziness, but if we could go back in time and observe her, we'd most likely see signs of this far earlier.

How could a well-educated physician simple ignore a lump in her breast for at least a year...it simply doesn't make sense.

It makes sense to me; the issue is fear. While it's an undiagnosed lump, it can be dismissed as "probably nothing." After all, she is a trained physician. Having it diagnosed would mean having to deal with the possibility that it is something very bad. Many very intelligent, non-delusional people will do this same thing. I don't know if Orac feels like weighing in on this, but I'm reasonably certain that he sees this all to frequently in his practice.

@lilady
posting a snarky comment at the Ho-Po...pushing our Big Pharma antibiotic agenda for treatment of Group B strep infection), rather than homeopathy treatment.

You're kidding me, right? Please, please tell me that nobody there was actually encouraging homeopathy for GBS. Lie to me if you have to.

@the rest of the thread
Well that got...interesting. I have to say, I've never seen anti-vaxiness overlapping with holocaust denial or batshit homophobia before. Something new to add to the loon bestiary, I guess.

By missmayinga (not verified) on 21 Dec 2011 #permalink

Well that got...interesting. I have to say, I've never seen anti-vaxiness overlapping with holocaust denial or batshit homophobia before.

I'm just surprised that he can get a wireless signal in that closet.

Oh my gosh, Day's site is a goldmine. I'm on her page on ADD right now, and I'm dying. ht_p://www.drday.com/attentiondeficit.htm

(From her steps to "prevent and reverse" ADD)
13. Trust in God and teach your child to trust in God. Study the Bible and pray with your child every day. Read Bible stories to your child. Children (and adults) become like those they admire. If they learn about Jesus, they will admire Him and want to be like Him. This has the most calming influence of all.

Yes, you heard it here first - the reason my executive functions are impaired is because I'm not Jesus-y enough.

(Actually, Orac, you might want to do a post or so on ADD woo sometime - it can be pretty damn hilarious, when it's not rage-inducing.)

By missmayinga (not verified) on 21 Dec 2011 #permalink

I see the Glenn Beck sockpuppet troll is back. The meth lab in his basement must have exploded again.

By Edith Prickly (not verified) on 21 Dec 2011 #permalink

@ missmayinga

Well that got...interesting. I have to say, I've never seen anti-vaxiness overlapping with holocaust denial or batshit homophobia before. Something new to add to the loon bestiary, I guess.

It's common enough that there's a term for it, "crank magnetism." As I noted above, the lack of critical thinking skills that allows someone to be open to one type of crankery allows them to be open to any and all types.

And Rob, just out of curiosity, what's with the "don;t" routine? It seems to be a constant of the motion for you.

I'm curious about that, too. Is that some sort of code, a bat signal of sorts to other disturbed folk?

"I have to say, I've never seen anti-vaxiness overlapping with holocaust denial or batshit homophobia before. Something new to add to the loon bestiary, I guess."

Day is not the only antivaxer to embrace Holocaust denial. Both themes are exploited at such places as whale.to and CureZone.

If you're convinced that vaccines are a conspiracy to undermine your health/decimate humanity, it figures that you'd settle on a favorite scapegoat (Jews), and Holocaust denial and anti-Semitism go together like, well, lox and bagels. :)

By Dangerous Bacon (not verified) on 21 Dec 2011 #permalink

@ missmayinga: I posted at Ho-Po on the blog "A Personal Case for Classical Homeopathy, Part I" (Judith Acosta)...when there were 2-3 comments. There are now 13 comments total (6 from Acosta) and 1 comment (ahem) pending. I wonder why mine is still pending.

She tells the story about her episodes of painful cysts in one ovary when she was childless at age 26. No mention at all about being diagnosed with polycystic ovarian syndrome. She underwent one surgery for draining the cyst and claims to have been diagnosed with GBS infection in her ovary. "The doctor told me I should have a complete hysterectomy".

She had a friend who was heavily into homeopathy for her pet and that piqued her interest. She claims to have been cured by a homeopathic practitioner who prescribed some herbal extracts.

She is a licensed social worker who increased her clinical skills by taking classes in homeopathy.

I (merely) pointed out to her that GBS is treated with antibiotics, not homeopathy, water molecules do not have "memory" and no matter how few or how many dilutions the "medicine" undergoes and how many times you whack the vial against a bible, it still is not curative.

I also told her that one infected ovary doesn't call for a hysterectomy...worst case scenario would be a single oopherectomy. Too snarky, yes?

@ArtK - Oh, I know about crank magnetism - I'd just never seen these particular crossbreeds before. One can only pray that the rule of hybrid sterility applies to cranks too.

@lilady - Well that's...mildly better than what I was expecting? After I read your comment, I googled GBS so I could know what you were talking about, and when I saw that it commonly affected infants (!) and that the complications included sepsis, pneumonia, and meningitis, I was a bit worried. Treating GBS with homeopathy may still be incredibly stupid, but at least Ms. Acosta is only making dumb decisions about her own health, not some poor kid's.

By missmayinga (not verified) on 21 Dec 2011 #permalink

@lilady - also, the title of Acosta's article is just killing me dead. Oh, you've got a personal case for classic homeopathy? That's nice; I've got a personal case for antibiotics. Wanna have an anecdote fight?

"Facecrook" and "twister"? Are Facebook and Twitter part of the Conspiracy now?

By Matthew Cline (not verified) on 21 Dec 2011 #permalink

"Facecrook" and "twister"?

Well, they only work because of technology originally developed by the power-crazed guvmint. And those black helicopters will surely need rapid communication. See? It all hangs together.

If you want to see a conspiracy, you can see one anywhere. Just like looking for horses or faces in the clouds overhead. See? Oh, you missed it. It was definitely there! You should watch more carefully.

"Well that got...interesting. I have to say, I've never seen anti-vaxiness overlapping with holocaust denial or batshit homophobia before."

Oh we've had that type here on the blog before. One of the few people Orac banned is that type - obsessed with gay sex and with the Rothschilds.

By Historical note (not verified) on 21 Dec 2011 #permalink

"Facecrook" and "twister"?
Well, they only work because of technology originally developed by the power-crazed guvmint

Fair enough, but a blog on the DARPAnet is an odd place to express one's distrust of the electronic media.

By herr doktor bimler (not verified) on 21 Dec 2011 #permalink

Fair enough, but a blog on the DARPAnet is an odd place to express one's distrust of the electronic media.

When one has a 6.5-year-old "blog" that has only garnered nine comments, something nefarious is obviously afoot.

Captain we have a problem
what that private?
some suspicious character named narad the nut just broke into secuity files.He is considered a high risk target according to confederate commander Forest.
Quick private! Grab the quantum rectum nebulizer and give him what for.
YES SIR!
Now round his cohorts up and ream their rectums until they tell us how to defeat the marxists.
Will Do sir, but should I use the quantum rectum nebulizer or the ectoplasmic alternate anal stretcher mechanism?
Neither soldier! Use the new highly top secret multidimensional horizontal anus phase modulator. Turn that hole into real black hole. Make him see plenty of stars.
Yes Sir, but wont the marxists find out and use their most anvanced weaponry against us?
No private, their most advanced weaponry includes posters with writing on them and harsh language about some guy named Rich Peoples. Protect Mr. Rich Peoples with everything you have. He is our only hope as a nation to survive. It is easy to spot the enemy. They usuaally are bitching about Mr. Peoples and holding up communist propoganda posters and taking a crap on cop cars and lighting things on fire. Look for anyone acting like an uncivilized heathen from the 1960s. It is possible they have a time machine. many look and smell like the 1960s. Be careful in there son. They tend to take a crap on your car if you threaten to arrest them. If they do, stretch their butthole out and place that dried terd back where it came from.
Yes Sir!

By Santas Little Helper (not verified) on 21 Dec 2011 #permalink

Santas little helper:

A fetish really should be kept private. You need help.

If I were as successful as Glenn beck and as good at predicting events accurately, I would not being clowning around with a bunch of hostile fascist nutjobs on a fake science blob or facecrook or twister even though it pleasureable to annoy a marxist.

Oh, I'm pretty sure that you can at least predict the responses that you'll receive, given your track record. The only question of interest is the psychosexual underpinnings.

Santa's little helper is Dr. Smart/Medicien Man.

Coming from general Mississippi or Yellow Fiber space, if I may ask? "Derender" has popped up elsewhere close on the heels of Rob Hood, and I do wonder.

Santa's little helper is Dr. Smart/Medicien Man.

And once again, he proves that hard-right homophobes dwell on gay sex more frequently and obsessively than any gay man or woman on Earth.

Whoop de do.

Colour me ...... oh dear.

@ Phila:

Well, you do *know* what Freud said about those who deride gay men and similarly, those who are always trying to prove what ladies' men they are!

By Denice Walter (not verified) on 22 Dec 2011 #permalink

@T Herling - is that website a gag or real? It doesn't have links to so many of the other sites like it so I can't tell...

I have to wonder about the ones who can believe everything...

@ Mrs Woo: Hell yes, it's real. I clicked on "Order Now" and it led me to an order site. You can order and pay through Visa, MasterCard, Discover and American Express credit cards, or through a PayPal account.

If you have any questions about your order, you can contact...er, I hesitate to even type it... BenDover@ConspiracyCards.com

I couldn't make that up. Are all right-wing conspiracists anally oriented and anally fixated?

Nah, you are better off getting the Steve Jackson Illuminati card game. It is a real game, from a real company... a company that once was raided by the Secret Service (which was later ruled illegal).

At first I thought that ConspiracyCards was a joke, but now I'm less confident. The first page looks like a parody, but reading deeper it sounds like he's a believer.

By Gopiballava (not verified) on 22 Dec 2011 #permalink

At first I thought that ConspiracyCards was a joke, but now I'm less confident. The first page looks like a parody, but reading deeper it sounds like he's a believer.

If Den Bouvais is faking it, he's doing a terrific job.

Oops, I should clarify that it was the Secret Service's raid on Steve Jackson Games that was declared illegal.

Glen Beck sock puppet. That is actually a huge compliment. If I were as successful as Glenn beck and as good at predicting events accurately at cynically manipulating the weakminded and delusional for my personal profit, I would not being clowning around with a bunch of hostile fascist nutjobs on a fake science blob or facecrook or twister even though it pleasureable to annoy a marxist.

FTFY.

BTW Clavis is a spambot, I made the original Glenn Beck sockpuppet crack. Do yourself a favour over the holidays and turn off the paranoia feed. You might wake up to reality again.

By Edith Prickly (not verified) on 23 Dec 2011 #permalink

Ms. Prickly, I suspect the ever morphing homophobic racist anti-science troll posts here only after a certain number of beers.

Oh, and this new Hitler video on vaccines is quite good (it is actually a different scene of the movie).

Click through the "conspiracy cards" site to find this:

http://www.truthertoys.com/Toys/TruthTroopers.jpg

"Action figures" of notable loony tunes such as Alex Jones, (the only one I can identify). Not yet available, but I'm what kind of person would play with dolls representing notable crackpots.

By T Herling (not verified) on 23 Dec 2011 #permalink

Oops, that should have been "I'm wondering what kind of person would play with dolls..."

Oh, now I see that they've got David Icke, too.

By T Herling (not verified) on 23 Dec 2011 #permalink

Here's a longer "tweet" from Dr. Jay to one of his fans:

T @MamaBurrr: Considering taking my 2yo to a chicken pox party. Smart or stupid? He has most vax thru 1yr. Delaying MMR and vetoed chicpox.// No way to handle this one in 140 characters so I won't even try to get close. The responses to my response will be brutal, I'm sure. IF your child were my patient, I would recommend exposing him to chicken pox in the first 4-5 years because I think that natural immunity might be better than vaccine acquired immunity. As with so many other issues, I have no proof but, at the very least, it's different immunity. The vaccine lasts for an unknown duration (3 years? 7??) and requires boosters one's whole life. I think that the risk of intentional exposure is outweighed by the benefits but easily acknowledge that 99% of experts disagree with me. Again, this is the advice I'd give the parents of a healthy toddler in my practice who is not in contact with immunocompromised children or adults.

@lilady

I promised myself I'd do no sparring with anti-vax over the Christmas break. But Dr. Jay is not so much anti-vax as just, in my personal opinion, incredibly misinformed, misguided, misplaced, mis...

I'm going to go bash my head against a desk before I decide whether or not to tweet at him.

Ren, it's unfortunate, but I don't have my special range of skin products available for this Xmas season.

Next year, rest assured, there will be a full range of products suitable to repair the ravages of face-palming, jaw-dropping, head-desking, coffee scalding and all that ails those who brave the further reaches of internet folly.

@ Ren: While you are on Jay's "Twitter" page...take a look at December 2nd...Jay advises a woman to not get her child immunized against MMR until three years of age.

(A play on your words, Ren) But Dr. Jay is not so much anti-vax as just, in my personal opinion, incredibly clueless.

Go for it, Ren.

Ren

But Dr. Jay is not so much anti-vax as just, in my personal opinion, incredibly misinformed, misguided, misplaced, mis...

a dangerous arrogant idiot

Keep it short and to the point. How the hell is such an assclown allowed to practice medicine, especially on children?

By Militant Agnostic (not verified) on 23 Dec 2011 #permalink

Seems to me, Dr Jay isn't the only one: if you look closely, you'll notice that those skewered by Orac often have real medical degrees ( Wakefield, the Burzynskis, Geier *pere*, lately Humphries... it's a long list).

People may be attracted to the easy promises and vastly over-estimated certainty of woo as patients and why should doctors themselves not fall enraptured to the same siren's song? Medical education and training is no absolute guarantee of remaining SB : in fact even medical schools have gone quackademic. Doctors can be frustrated with complexity and uncertainty like any one else. Perhaps they see easy money or being idolised by followers as a benefit.

Here's another dirty little secret: some real doctors have been known to work closely with woo-meisters like the ubiquitously annoying nutritionists and other spewers of offensively ridiculous nonsense like reiki artists. I get one of those New Agey brochures that consist of advertisement for woo-entangled services: the real doctors often list woo-specialities like homeopathy, TCM and "natural" hormones. Those providing psychological services do no better. Nor do nurses. All mixed in betwixt the astrologers, Ayurvedists, and spiritual counsellors.

By Denice Walter (not verified) on 24 Dec 2011 #permalink