I have plenty of reasons not to like Jenny McCarthy, what with her pseudo-scientific belief that vaccines are toxic and causes autism (both of which have not only been proven false, but are also based off of fraudulent research) which due to her "activism" in spreading this belief scared millions of parents into not vaccinating their kids, which has also caused measles to return to the United States. But now I have another reason to dislike her: She's a dangerous driver.
During her new Sirius XM radio show (why do people keep giving her jobs despite of all the damage she has caused) she brought up some "amusing" stories about how her son calls the police on her... a lot.
One of the stories she told was that her son called 911 on her because she went outside to smoke (and for some reason she thinks she is qualified to give health advice) and he thought she had abandoned him, and she had to explain what happened to the 911 operator.
Now she might find that funny, and I'm sure some people might find that story funny too, but I don't because her son was probably terrified the whole time.
This ofcourse is forgivable as her son was never in any danger.
But then she also talked about another incident involving her son calling 911 on her that one person on my Skeptic Wars Facebook page commenting on this story so adequately put it, "it appears that potentially killing innocent people because of her selfish entitlement extends beyond her antivax idiocy."
The story goes is that she was texting while driving while her son was in the car. That is dangerous as heck in itself and shows how little she cares about others as she is willing to put her son and other people in danger just so she can send a text message to someone while getting to where ever she is going on time.
Her son, showing that he is clearly the smarter and more responsible of the two, called the police on her.
So, what was Jenny's reaction you might ask? Pull over? Stop texting?
Nope, she grabbed her son's phone and threw it out the window!
She was doing something while driving that is as dangerous as driving drunk, her son does the right thing and calls the cops on her, and she prevents him from doing so.
Not only did she pretty much punish him for doing the right thing (she took his phone away), but she probably scared the heck out of him.
So, still think she is someone to take advice on anything, let alone health advice from?
Source: Mediaite
Showing posts with label autism. Show all posts
Showing posts with label autism. Show all posts
Tuesday, July 29, 2014
Tuesday, July 15, 2014
5 Things I've noticed about... Andrew Wakefield
In 1998 then Doctor Andrew Wakefield published a study in the medical journal The Lancet that claimed that the MMR vaccine causes autism, which was later found to be not true but still lead to a worldwide increase of measles cases, and in the end destroyed Wakefield's career.
There are many things that I've noticed about Andrew Wakefield (none of them good) and I've come up with about five different things.
So here are five things I've noticed about Andrew Wakefield:
5. He committed a terrible fraud.
I'm sure that everybody is aware that his aforementioned "study" was retracted in 2010 by The Lancet after a long investigation by the British Medical Journal and journalist Brian Deer. The investigation showed that not only had he manipulated the data in his study, it also found that he had patented his own measles vaccine a year before publishing his study, and that the study was funded by lawyers who sued vaccine manufactures.
To better understand how Wakefield manipulated the data in his study, please watch this video by Youtube science vlogger C0nc0rdance:
As awful as his fraud was it would not have been as bad as it became if it wasn't for the fact that so many people took his study seriously and decided not to vaccinate their children because of it. This has directly resulted in the world wide increases of measles and mumps infections and infections from other diseases as well because many people were not vaccinating themselves or their children due to fear of any vaccines, a fear that was brought on by Wakefield's study, which has also lead to numerous unnecessary deaths.
As for Wakefield himself his fraudulent study lead to his own career being ruined and his name being struck off the UK medical register, making it illegal for him to practice medicine in the United Kingdom.
4. He turned parents in paranoid liars.
One of the direct results of Andrew Wakefield's study is that many parents have become paranoid of vaccines and have chosen not to vaccinate their children despite being legally obligated to do so in many places before they enter them into school, and the fact that it's just good common sense to do so.
Inorder to keep their children in school while at the same time keep them un-vaccinated parents will often lie to health officials and school officials about either their religious or philosophical beliefs inorder to get a vaccine exemption for their child.
Other things that some parents will do inorder to fool health and school officials is that they will go to a fake doctor (ex. Naturopath, Homeopath) and get them to write up an exemption from getting vaccinate for their children, or write up they vaccinate the child when really they didn't.
These types of actions are dangerous not only to the children whose parents did not vaccinate them, but also to anyone that couldn't get vaccinated for a legitimate medical reason, or those who the vaccine didn't immunize them for some reason.
3. He's become the Lord Voldemort of science and medicine.
Much like Lord Voldemort from the Harry Potter book series Andrew Wakefield's name is something you don't use in a discussion about science and medicine, unless he is used as an example for when bad or fraudulent research is taken to seriously by the public.
As for the scientific and medical communities any research done by him before his 1998 autism/MMR vaccine "study" is somewhat taboo, and is usually avoided in research unless necessary. Any research done by him after his 1998 autism/MMR vaccine "study" is to never be used, unless you never want to be taken seriously and risk your career.
Also, you don't compare a doctor or scientist to Andrew Wakefield as doing so would be considered a huge insult, unless their research was sloppy or fraudulent and caused peoples' deaths.
2. He created alot of waste.
While the dramatic increase in vaccine preventable infections has been the most obvious result of Wakefield's fraudulent study, another thing his study has done is wasted alot of money.
The amount of money wasted because of Wakefield's study is probably within the hundreds of millions of dollars, and possibly within the billions. These costs include health care and hospital stays for people (especially children) who got an infection from diseases that are vaccine preventable.
Other costs include lost wages for parents who had to stop working inorder to take care of their sick children, and wasted money (not to mention man hours) to disprove and try to undo the damage caused by Wakefield's "research", money that could have used for more legitimate and better research projects.
Then there are the costs of funerals that can go into the thousands per funeral, and with thousands having died because of his research, the costs really adds up, but is overshadowed by the amount of pain caused by those deaths, which is a cost that is immeasurable.
1. He refuses to accept responsibility for what he's done.
Andrew Wakefield's fraudulent 1998 autism/MMR vaccine "study" has been described as "the most damaging medical hoax of the last 100 years". So far he has never accepted any responsibility for the damage done by his "study", nor has he faded from the public light.
To this day he continues to claim that his study was accurate, and that he didn't commit fraud, and that there is a conspiracy by pharmaceutical companies and public health officials to discredit him, and that they were paying bloggers to so, and also inflate the reports of deaths from measles.
In 2012 Wakefield attempted to sue Brian Deer, the British Medical Journal and it's editor Fiona Godlee for defamation, which was described by many as being frivolous, and was dismissed on jurisdictional grounds.
To this day Wakefield continues to work in autism research and claim the title of "doctor", both of which are considered to be highly inappropriate for him to do, and that many have said he should stop doing. He currently lives and does all of this in the United States because legally he can not in the United Kingdom.
There are many things that I've noticed about Andrew Wakefield (none of them good) and I've come up with about five different things.
So here are five things I've noticed about Andrew Wakefield:
5. He committed a terrible fraud.
I'm sure that everybody is aware that his aforementioned "study" was retracted in 2010 by The Lancet after a long investigation by the British Medical Journal and journalist Brian Deer. The investigation showed that not only had he manipulated the data in his study, it also found that he had patented his own measles vaccine a year before publishing his study, and that the study was funded by lawyers who sued vaccine manufactures.
To better understand how Wakefield manipulated the data in his study, please watch this video by Youtube science vlogger C0nc0rdance:
As awful as his fraud was it would not have been as bad as it became if it wasn't for the fact that so many people took his study seriously and decided not to vaccinate their children because of it. This has directly resulted in the world wide increases of measles and mumps infections and infections from other diseases as well because many people were not vaccinating themselves or their children due to fear of any vaccines, a fear that was brought on by Wakefield's study, which has also lead to numerous unnecessary deaths.
As for Wakefield himself his fraudulent study lead to his own career being ruined and his name being struck off the UK medical register, making it illegal for him to practice medicine in the United Kingdom.
4. He turned parents in paranoid liars.
One of the direct results of Andrew Wakefield's study is that many parents have become paranoid of vaccines and have chosen not to vaccinate their children despite being legally obligated to do so in many places before they enter them into school, and the fact that it's just good common sense to do so.
Inorder to keep their children in school while at the same time keep them un-vaccinated parents will often lie to health officials and school officials about either their religious or philosophical beliefs inorder to get a vaccine exemption for their child.
Other things that some parents will do inorder to fool health and school officials is that they will go to a fake doctor (ex. Naturopath, Homeopath) and get them to write up an exemption from getting vaccinate for their children, or write up they vaccinate the child when really they didn't.
These types of actions are dangerous not only to the children whose parents did not vaccinate them, but also to anyone that couldn't get vaccinated for a legitimate medical reason, or those who the vaccine didn't immunize them for some reason.
3. He's become the Lord Voldemort of science and medicine.
Much like Lord Voldemort from the Harry Potter book series Andrew Wakefield's name is something you don't use in a discussion about science and medicine, unless he is used as an example for when bad or fraudulent research is taken to seriously by the public.
As for the scientific and medical communities any research done by him before his 1998 autism/MMR vaccine "study" is somewhat taboo, and is usually avoided in research unless necessary. Any research done by him after his 1998 autism/MMR vaccine "study" is to never be used, unless you never want to be taken seriously and risk your career.
Also, you don't compare a doctor or scientist to Andrew Wakefield as doing so would be considered a huge insult, unless their research was sloppy or fraudulent and caused peoples' deaths.
2. He created alot of waste.
While the dramatic increase in vaccine preventable infections has been the most obvious result of Wakefield's fraudulent study, another thing his study has done is wasted alot of money.
The amount of money wasted because of Wakefield's study is probably within the hundreds of millions of dollars, and possibly within the billions. These costs include health care and hospital stays for people (especially children) who got an infection from diseases that are vaccine preventable.
Other costs include lost wages for parents who had to stop working inorder to take care of their sick children, and wasted money (not to mention man hours) to disprove and try to undo the damage caused by Wakefield's "research", money that could have used for more legitimate and better research projects.
Then there are the costs of funerals that can go into the thousands per funeral, and with thousands having died because of his research, the costs really adds up, but is overshadowed by the amount of pain caused by those deaths, which is a cost that is immeasurable.
1. He refuses to accept responsibility for what he's done.
Andrew Wakefield's fraudulent 1998 autism/MMR vaccine "study" has been described as "the most damaging medical hoax of the last 100 years". So far he has never accepted any responsibility for the damage done by his "study", nor has he faded from the public light.
To this day he continues to claim that his study was accurate, and that he didn't commit fraud, and that there is a conspiracy by pharmaceutical companies and public health officials to discredit him, and that they were paying bloggers to so, and also inflate the reports of deaths from measles.
In 2012 Wakefield attempted to sue Brian Deer, the British Medical Journal and it's editor Fiona Godlee for defamation, which was described by many as being frivolous, and was dismissed on jurisdictional grounds.
To this day Wakefield continues to work in autism research and claim the title of "doctor", both of which are considered to be highly inappropriate for him to do, and that many have said he should stop doing. He currently lives and does all of this in the United States because legally he can not in the United Kingdom.
Friday, June 6, 2014
10 Lies Anti-vaccers tell
The anti-vaccination has caused alot of harm over the years with their fear mongering and lies. These lies have caused parents to become to afraid to vaccinate their children, and themselves as well, despite the danger in not doing so.
The following is a list of ten lies the anti-vaccination movement has told, and why they are just bogus:
10. Studies indicate that vaccines cause autism.
While there are "studies" that claim that vaccines cause autism, only one of these so called studies have been published in a well respected, peer reviewed scientific and medical journal. That study, the Wakefield study (which was published in The Lancet in 1998) was retracted in 2010 after it had been discovered that the main author of the study, Andrew Wakefield, had committed fraud. On top of that the findings in the study itself had been long since discredited and disproved before the formal retraction.
The studies that followed since the Wakefield study that claim that vaccines cause autism have never been published in any credible medical or scientific journals. The only places that these studies have ever been published are either in non-credible pay-for-publish journals, or websites that promote alternative medicine and/or conspiracy theories.
9. Signs of autism show up in children only after they have been vaccinated.
As the old skeptics' saying goes "correlation does not equal causation".
Just because a child starts to show obvious signs of autism after they have had their vaccinations, it's far more likely that they were showing signs of autism before they received their vaccinations and that no one noticed simply because the child was to young to show any noticable signs of autism to anyone but trained professionals.
8. Adverse reactions to vaccines are common, often severe, and can cause death.
Actually only about one out of every 300 people will have adverse reactions to vaccines. Most of the time these adverse reaction are mirror, short lived, and are more annoying than debilitating.
Occasionally a person will have a severe adverse reaction to a vaccine, some of which can be fatal, but these types of adverse reactions are very rare, only about one to two out of every million people. You have better odds dying in a car wreck to get a vaccination than you from the vaccination.
7. Vaccines have never been shown to be effective against reducing the spread of disease, and has even been shown to increase the spread.
I'm sure smallpox and polio would disagree. Actually alot of diseases would disagree because it's been proven time and time again that anytime vaccines were in wide spread use the rate of infections of a disease that the vaccines are meant to protect against will go down dramatically, sometimes even eliminating a disease in an area.
6. Natural immunity is superior to immunity via vaccination.
If you try to get natural immunity from a disease (i.e. getting infected and sick from said disease) there is a pretty good possibility that the disease that you hope to make yourself or your child immune from will actually kill you or your child, or atleast cause a permanent disability. Also in many cases it takes several weeks for this form of immunity to happen, during which time you will be sick as heck.
On the other hand immunity via vaccination is much faster, doesn't leave you sick, and is far, FAR less likely to kill you than getting immunity from a disease by getting infected by that disease.
5. Vaccines contain aborted fetuses.
This is completely false and is a distortion of the fact that the weakened forms of some viruses in vaccines are grown in a culture of cell lines derived from fetal tissue of fetuses aborted in the 1960's.
There are no fetal cells at all in vaccines.
4. Vaccines cause shaken baby syndrome.
No, rapidly shaking a baby back and forth and causing their head to flop around causes shaken baby syndrome.
This isn't even just a bold faced lie, this is child abuse apology.
3. Vaccines contain high amounts of toxic ingredients.
While vaccines do contain chemicals that in high enough amounts are toxic to humans, the amounts of these toxins in vaccines are so low that it wouldn't hurt anyone even if they took that chemicals by itself.
As the old saying goes "the dose makes the poison" and no vaccine contains enough of a certain chemical to make it poisonous.
2. Vaccines cause SIDS.
While DPT/DPaT vaccines have been suspected of being one of the causes of SIDS in the past, current studies into SIDS point to that abnormalities in the development and function of medullary serotonin may be the more likely cause of SIDS, and that vaccines do not cause SIDS at all.
1. Most diseases meant to be prevented by vaccines are rare and mostly harmless, and thus there is no reason to vaccinate.
Most diseases prevented by vaccines use to be rare, but a few diseases such as measles and mumps are making a comeback due to people not getting their children the MMR vaccine. Outbreaks of more common diseases such as the flu and whooping cough are made worse if large groups of people do not get vaccinated.
Also, while many people can get over these diseases they are far from harmless and can kill, especially if the person is very old, or very young, or has something wrong with their immune system and they are unable to fight off the disease.
Even if a disease is rare there is still no reason not to vaccinate against it, as vaccinating will help guarantee that disease remains rare, and may even wipe out that disease.
The following is a list of ten lies the anti-vaccination movement has told, and why they are just bogus:
10. Studies indicate that vaccines cause autism.
While there are "studies" that claim that vaccines cause autism, only one of these so called studies have been published in a well respected, peer reviewed scientific and medical journal. That study, the Wakefield study (which was published in The Lancet in 1998) was retracted in 2010 after it had been discovered that the main author of the study, Andrew Wakefield, had committed fraud. On top of that the findings in the study itself had been long since discredited and disproved before the formal retraction.
The studies that followed since the Wakefield study that claim that vaccines cause autism have never been published in any credible medical or scientific journals. The only places that these studies have ever been published are either in non-credible pay-for-publish journals, or websites that promote alternative medicine and/or conspiracy theories.
9. Signs of autism show up in children only after they have been vaccinated.
As the old skeptics' saying goes "correlation does not equal causation".
Just because a child starts to show obvious signs of autism after they have had their vaccinations, it's far more likely that they were showing signs of autism before they received their vaccinations and that no one noticed simply because the child was to young to show any noticable signs of autism to anyone but trained professionals.
8. Adverse reactions to vaccines are common, often severe, and can cause death.
Actually only about one out of every 300 people will have adverse reactions to vaccines. Most of the time these adverse reaction are mirror, short lived, and are more annoying than debilitating.
Occasionally a person will have a severe adverse reaction to a vaccine, some of which can be fatal, but these types of adverse reactions are very rare, only about one to two out of every million people. You have better odds dying in a car wreck to get a vaccination than you from the vaccination.
7. Vaccines have never been shown to be effective against reducing the spread of disease, and has even been shown to increase the spread.
I'm sure smallpox and polio would disagree. Actually alot of diseases would disagree because it's been proven time and time again that anytime vaccines were in wide spread use the rate of infections of a disease that the vaccines are meant to protect against will go down dramatically, sometimes even eliminating a disease in an area.
6. Natural immunity is superior to immunity via vaccination.
If you try to get natural immunity from a disease (i.e. getting infected and sick from said disease) there is a pretty good possibility that the disease that you hope to make yourself or your child immune from will actually kill you or your child, or atleast cause a permanent disability. Also in many cases it takes several weeks for this form of immunity to happen, during which time you will be sick as heck.
On the other hand immunity via vaccination is much faster, doesn't leave you sick, and is far, FAR less likely to kill you than getting immunity from a disease by getting infected by that disease.
5. Vaccines contain aborted fetuses.
This is completely false and is a distortion of the fact that the weakened forms of some viruses in vaccines are grown in a culture of cell lines derived from fetal tissue of fetuses aborted in the 1960's.
There are no fetal cells at all in vaccines.
4. Vaccines cause shaken baby syndrome.
No, rapidly shaking a baby back and forth and causing their head to flop around causes shaken baby syndrome.
This isn't even just a bold faced lie, this is child abuse apology.
3. Vaccines contain high amounts of toxic ingredients.
While vaccines do contain chemicals that in high enough amounts are toxic to humans, the amounts of these toxins in vaccines are so low that it wouldn't hurt anyone even if they took that chemicals by itself.
As the old saying goes "the dose makes the poison" and no vaccine contains enough of a certain chemical to make it poisonous.
2. Vaccines cause SIDS.
While DPT/DPaT vaccines have been suspected of being one of the causes of SIDS in the past, current studies into SIDS point to that abnormalities in the development and function of medullary serotonin may be the more likely cause of SIDS, and that vaccines do not cause SIDS at all.
1. Most diseases meant to be prevented by vaccines are rare and mostly harmless, and thus there is no reason to vaccinate.
Most diseases prevented by vaccines use to be rare, but a few diseases such as measles and mumps are making a comeback due to people not getting their children the MMR vaccine. Outbreaks of more common diseases such as the flu and whooping cough are made worse if large groups of people do not get vaccinated.
Also, while many people can get over these diseases they are far from harmless and can kill, especially if the person is very old, or very young, or has something wrong with their immune system and they are unable to fight off the disease.
Even if a disease is rare there is still no reason not to vaccinate against it, as vaccinating will help guarantee that disease remains rare, and may even wipe out that disease.
Saturday, May 17, 2014
5 Things I've noticed about... Autism cure promoters
Autism cure promoters are people who claim they "cure" people with autism.
The claims made by these people are very conversational, both in their claims about autism and it's causes, and what they say can cure autism.
Now there are a lot of different things I have noticed about autism cure promoters, but I've narrowed it down to five different things.
So here are five things I've noticed about autism cure promoters:
5. They're closely aligned with the anti-vaccination movement.
Autism cure promoters and the anti-vaccination movement are pretty much like peas in a pod. Anti-vaccers often promote these so called "therapies" that the autism cure promoters claim can cure a person with autism, and autism cure promoters also tend to publish on their websites anti-vaccination movement propaganda, mainly in the form of claims that certain chemicals in vaccines can cause autism.
Some of these promoters also like to use certain words that the anti-vaccination movement also uses inorder to sell their therapies to people with autism or have autistic children, such as "vaccine damage", "vaccine injury", or "autism epidemic".
They also ignore the fact that such words are not only incorrect and misleadinf, but very insulting to people with autism. Ofcourse they're not actually promoting their therapies towards people with autism, they're really promoting them towards parents of children who have autism and just want their kids to be normal.
4. They exploit the fears and desires of parents with autistic children.
For some parents when a child is diagnosed with autism it can be devastating to them, and the fact that there is no way to cure autism can make that devastation to them even worse. Then comes along someone who claims they can do things that the medical industry cannot do and can "cure" their child of autism, and if they don't know any better they may take that person up on their offer.
A person who is misinformed about what autism is and what causes autism, mixed with both the fear of what will happen to their child and how their life will turn out due to their autism, combined with their desire to have a "normal" child, would be very temped by someone whom claims they can cure their child of autism and give them a chance at a normal life and be willing to pay whatever price they can inorder to do so.
The people who are promoting these so called autism cures know this and know that they can exploit these fears and desires to sell people products and services that scientific research has concluded are useless at curing autism.
4. They're trying to give a simple solution to a complex issue.
Autism is a neurological disorder, and like all neurological disorders it's complex without any simple solutions.
Autism cure promoters try to make it look like autism is caused by toxins in the body, and that by removing these toxins a person whom has autism one can be cured of autism.
While some toxins can cause neurological disorders, all legitimate scientific research has shown that autism isn't one them.
While the actually cause of autism is still technically unknown, most scientists who study autism agree that it's most likely caused by genetics.
The therapies these autism cure promoters promote are just a bunch of quick fixes for something that can't be fixed quickly or entirely. There are legitimate therapies out there to give autistic people the tools they need inorder to thrive in society, but they don't cure people of autism, which is not something that many people can accept. This fact is exploited by autism cure promoters that claim that they can cure autism, but in reality they can't.
2. They promote therapies that are dangerous and abusive.
Not only are autism cure promoters promoting therapies that don't work (atleast for curing autism), the therapies they are promoting are considered to be dangerous if used improperly, or even used at all.
Chelation therapy for example, which is a legitimate medical treatment for treating people with toxic metal poisoning, is often used by autism cure promoters as a way to cure autism. Infact it has never been proven to cure any person of autism, and if done improperly could harm a person, and even kill them.
Miracle Mineral Supplement, another product that is said to cure autism (along with many other things) contains 28% sodium chlorite, a toxic industrial chemical, and can cause a person to become very ill, and possibly kill them. MMS is very dangerous and should never be used for anything and is approved by no one.
These are just two of the many useless so called "cures" for autism, but there are many other kinds out there that are not only useless, but also dangerous, and forcing any child to use one of this therapies, autistic or not, is viewed by many people to be child abuse, and could be legally considered child abuse too.
1. They try to make autism look like something that it is not.
Autism cure promoters try to make it look like people with autism are "damaged" and that autism itself is bad and that a diagnose of autism is the end of the world, and thus your child must be cured of autism no matter what.
Autism is not bad, nor is a diagnose of it the end of the world, and autistic people are not damaged, they just think differently than everyone else.
Most autistic people are considered high functioning, and can live relatively normal lives. Some are so high functioning that you couldn't even tell that they were autistic unless they told you.
Autism is not a problem. The real problem is with people who claim that autistic people are "damaged" and they can cure autism.
They are the ones who make autism look worse than what it is, all so they can exploit parents who just want their children to be perfect, when they can't see that their children are perfect just the way they are.
The claims made by these people are very conversational, both in their claims about autism and it's causes, and what they say can cure autism.
Now there are a lot of different things I have noticed about autism cure promoters, but I've narrowed it down to five different things.
So here are five things I've noticed about autism cure promoters:
5. They're closely aligned with the anti-vaccination movement.
Autism cure promoters and the anti-vaccination movement are pretty much like peas in a pod. Anti-vaccers often promote these so called "therapies" that the autism cure promoters claim can cure a person with autism, and autism cure promoters also tend to publish on their websites anti-vaccination movement propaganda, mainly in the form of claims that certain chemicals in vaccines can cause autism.
Some of these promoters also like to use certain words that the anti-vaccination movement also uses inorder to sell their therapies to people with autism or have autistic children, such as "vaccine damage", "vaccine injury", or "autism epidemic".
They also ignore the fact that such words are not only incorrect and misleadinf, but very insulting to people with autism. Ofcourse they're not actually promoting their therapies towards people with autism, they're really promoting them towards parents of children who have autism and just want their kids to be normal.
4. They exploit the fears and desires of parents with autistic children.
For some parents when a child is diagnosed with autism it can be devastating to them, and the fact that there is no way to cure autism can make that devastation to them even worse. Then comes along someone who claims they can do things that the medical industry cannot do and can "cure" their child of autism, and if they don't know any better they may take that person up on their offer.
A person who is misinformed about what autism is and what causes autism, mixed with both the fear of what will happen to their child and how their life will turn out due to their autism, combined with their desire to have a "normal" child, would be very temped by someone whom claims they can cure their child of autism and give them a chance at a normal life and be willing to pay whatever price they can inorder to do so.
The people who are promoting these so called autism cures know this and know that they can exploit these fears and desires to sell people products and services that scientific research has concluded are useless at curing autism.
4. They're trying to give a simple solution to a complex issue.
Autism is a neurological disorder, and like all neurological disorders it's complex without any simple solutions.
Autism cure promoters try to make it look like autism is caused by toxins in the body, and that by removing these toxins a person whom has autism one can be cured of autism.
While some toxins can cause neurological disorders, all legitimate scientific research has shown that autism isn't one them.
While the actually cause of autism is still technically unknown, most scientists who study autism agree that it's most likely caused by genetics.
The therapies these autism cure promoters promote are just a bunch of quick fixes for something that can't be fixed quickly or entirely. There are legitimate therapies out there to give autistic people the tools they need inorder to thrive in society, but they don't cure people of autism, which is not something that many people can accept. This fact is exploited by autism cure promoters that claim that they can cure autism, but in reality they can't.
2. They promote therapies that are dangerous and abusive.
Not only are autism cure promoters promoting therapies that don't work (atleast for curing autism), the therapies they are promoting are considered to be dangerous if used improperly, or even used at all.
Chelation therapy for example, which is a legitimate medical treatment for treating people with toxic metal poisoning, is often used by autism cure promoters as a way to cure autism. Infact it has never been proven to cure any person of autism, and if done improperly could harm a person, and even kill them.
Miracle Mineral Supplement, another product that is said to cure autism (along with many other things) contains 28% sodium chlorite, a toxic industrial chemical, and can cause a person to become very ill, and possibly kill them. MMS is very dangerous and should never be used for anything and is approved by no one.
These are just two of the many useless so called "cures" for autism, but there are many other kinds out there that are not only useless, but also dangerous, and forcing any child to use one of this therapies, autistic or not, is viewed by many people to be child abuse, and could be legally considered child abuse too.
1. They try to make autism look like something that it is not.
Autism cure promoters try to make it look like people with autism are "damaged" and that autism itself is bad and that a diagnose of autism is the end of the world, and thus your child must be cured of autism no matter what.
Autism is not bad, nor is a diagnose of it the end of the world, and autistic people are not damaged, they just think differently than everyone else.
Most autistic people are considered high functioning, and can live relatively normal lives. Some are so high functioning that you couldn't even tell that they were autistic unless they told you.
Autism is not a problem. The real problem is with people who claim that autistic people are "damaged" and they can cure autism.
They are the ones who make autism look worse than what it is, all so they can exploit parents who just want their children to be perfect, when they can't see that their children are perfect just the way they are.
Monday, May 12, 2014
Anti-vaccers go to far... again.
This weekend members of the Anti-vaccination movement/cult proved once again just what type of people they really are, and just what lows they are willing to go to inorder to spread their propaganda.
And by "people" I mean scum bags.
This whole thing that I'm p*ssed off about starts off with something that has nothing to do with either vaccines or autism, but actually has to do with the kidnapping of over 200 school girls in Nigeria by the terrorist group Boko Haram, who are threatening to sell the girls off as "wives" (i.e. sex slaves).
So far there has been a huge outpouring of both condemnation against the terrorists who kidnapped these girls, and support for bringing the girls home.
Infact First Lady Michelle Obama recently posted this picture on the internet to show her support for these girls and their hopefull rescue, and also encouraging the terrorists to let them go:
Unfortunately there are some people who don't care how serious or sensitive a situation such as this is and will take a photo like this and digitally manipulated a photo such as this inorder to promote their own propaganda...
That is exactly what happened with this photo:
Now I could get into how BS the information on this poorly photoshopped picture is, or how insulting it is to autistic people, but I just want to focus on the group that decided it was okay to manipulate a photo of the First Lady showing her support to bring home a group of kidnapped school girls who may very well be sold as sex slaves if they aren't found and freed!
The group who manipulated the photo is call The Canary Party, a Anti-Vaccination group that barely pretends to be a political group.
Besides just publishing lies about and conspiracy theories about vaccines, they also publish anti-GMO propaganda, pro-alternative medicine propaganda, insist that autism is an epidemic, makes autism look like it's something that is life destroying and that autistic people can't function in society, both of which are horrible lies, and declares that anyone that says they are wrong to be bullies.
All of that is bad enough by itself, but then they go and manipulate a photo of the First Lady showing support for those many kidnapped school girls inorder to promote their lies while completely and totally disregarding the seriousness of the kidnappings, as well as being completely insensitive to what these girls are going through.
I guess there really is no low for the Anti-Vaccination movement. But on the bright side it does appear that this "stunt" has backfired on them, as they are receiving a bunch of negative comments on their Facebook page.
One last thing: I really hope these girls are freed and freed soon, and that the scum bags who kidnapped them are left in such a way that they can never do something like this ever again.
And by "people" I mean scum bags.
This whole thing that I'm p*ssed off about starts off with something that has nothing to do with either vaccines or autism, but actually has to do with the kidnapping of over 200 school girls in Nigeria by the terrorist group Boko Haram, who are threatening to sell the girls off as "wives" (i.e. sex slaves).
So far there has been a huge outpouring of both condemnation against the terrorists who kidnapped these girls, and support for bringing the girls home.
Infact First Lady Michelle Obama recently posted this picture on the internet to show her support for these girls and their hopefull rescue, and also encouraging the terrorists to let them go:
That is exactly what happened with this photo:
The group who manipulated the photo is call The Canary Party, a Anti-Vaccination group that barely pretends to be a political group.
Besides just publishing lies about and conspiracy theories about vaccines, they also publish anti-GMO propaganda, pro-alternative medicine propaganda, insist that autism is an epidemic, makes autism look like it's something that is life destroying and that autistic people can't function in society, both of which are horrible lies, and declares that anyone that says they are wrong to be bullies.
All of that is bad enough by itself, but then they go and manipulate a photo of the First Lady showing support for those many kidnapped school girls inorder to promote their lies while completely and totally disregarding the seriousness of the kidnappings, as well as being completely insensitive to what these girls are going through.
I guess there really is no low for the Anti-Vaccination movement. But on the bright side it does appear that this "stunt" has backfired on them, as they are receiving a bunch of negative comments on their Facebook page.
One last thing: I really hope these girls are freed and freed soon, and that the scum bags who kidnapped them are left in such a way that they can never do something like this ever again.
Wednesday, April 9, 2014
It's been a bad month for Anti-vaccers
The Anti-vaccination movement has had a pretty bad past month, and I would feel sorry for them too if it wasn't for the fact that their propaganda (which is mainly based upon a long since dis-proven and fraudulent study by Mr. Andrew Wakefield that was published in 1998 in The Lancet, and formerly retracted in 2010) has scared parents into not getting their kids vaccinated, which has caused numerous deaths and unnecessary illnesses, as well as permanent injuries.
First is the news reports of multiple outbreaks of measles in several communities in the United States and Canada. Many of the people who have gotten infected are young children who were deliberately not vaccinate, the results of which have been directly attributed to causing these outbreaks.
Suffice to say there has been quiet a bit of backlash against the Anti-vaccination movement, which they rightfully have coming to them. Also, since these outbreaks first started making the news there have also been multiple articles published telling parents why they need to ignore the Anti-vaccination movement and vaccinate their children, which I feel is sort of sad because it shows we as a society have to publish numerous articles about why you need to vaccinate your children and make them immune to diseases that could kill them because some parents have been scared into not doing so.
Then there is ofcourse what happened to the cult... I mean group formerly known as the deceptively named Australian Vaccination Network, which is now known as the still kind of deceptively named Australian Vaccination-Skeptics Network.
What happened to the group is that it finally changed it's name after it lost an appeal against the New South Wales Office of Fair Trading, which had ordered the group to change it's name in 2012 due to group's deceptive sounding name. Shortly after the group changed it's named, it also lost it's charity status. Now I admit I'm not sure what that means for such a group under Australian law, but here in the United States that would mean losing what ever tax exemptions that comes from having been recognized as a charity by the government.
Then there's what happened to Jenny McCarthy when she asked on Twitter what one looks for in a potential partner. Now for most talk show hosts/Playboy Playmates/D-list celebrities most people would have given some BS answer. In Jenny's case however most people were very honest. By honest I mean that a lot of people were telling her that they want someone whom vaccinates their children and accepts the science behind why you should (as well as calling her a kid killer).
Finally there's the situation that happened to Chili's Bar & Grill, which was going to give 10% of the money it made from all sales on April 7 to an autism awareness and support "charity". While on the surface this sounds like a great thing for Chili's to do, there was just one little problem with this: The "charity" they were planning to donate to wasn't a autism awareness and support group. It was a Anti-vaccination group called the National Autism Association.
Almost immediately after the announcing that Chili's was going to be donating 10% of it's sales to this group there was a huge public outcry over this, as well as threats of boycotts. Within a few days time the executives at Chili's reversed their decision to donated to the ANN. This decision was praised by people who accept science and have common sense, but was also scorned and ridiculed by stupid people who still think that vaccines are dangerous and cause autism, and that there is some kind of conspiracy by pharmaceutical companies to cover it up. Suffice to say that some of the comments made on Chili's Facebook page is something that psychologists might want to study, but also shows the type of people that supports the Anti-vaccination movement.
So in the end it has been a bad month for the Anti-vaccination movement. They've had so much bad press and so many people are standing up to them, but I for one could not be happier about it!
First is the news reports of multiple outbreaks of measles in several communities in the United States and Canada. Many of the people who have gotten infected are young children who were deliberately not vaccinate, the results of which have been directly attributed to causing these outbreaks.
Suffice to say there has been quiet a bit of backlash against the Anti-vaccination movement, which they rightfully have coming to them. Also, since these outbreaks first started making the news there have also been multiple articles published telling parents why they need to ignore the Anti-vaccination movement and vaccinate their children, which I feel is sort of sad because it shows we as a society have to publish numerous articles about why you need to vaccinate your children and make them immune to diseases that could kill them because some parents have been scared into not doing so.
Then there is ofcourse what happened to the cult... I mean group formerly known as the deceptively named Australian Vaccination Network, which is now known as the still kind of deceptively named Australian Vaccination-Skeptics Network.
What happened to the group is that it finally changed it's name after it lost an appeal against the New South Wales Office of Fair Trading, which had ordered the group to change it's name in 2012 due to group's deceptive sounding name. Shortly after the group changed it's named, it also lost it's charity status. Now I admit I'm not sure what that means for such a group under Australian law, but here in the United States that would mean losing what ever tax exemptions that comes from having been recognized as a charity by the government.
Then there's what happened to Jenny McCarthy when she asked on Twitter what one looks for in a potential partner. Now for most talk show hosts/Playboy Playmates/D-list celebrities most people would have given some BS answer. In Jenny's case however most people were very honest. By honest I mean that a lot of people were telling her that they want someone whom vaccinates their children and accepts the science behind why you should (as well as calling her a kid killer).
Finally there's the situation that happened to Chili's Bar & Grill, which was going to give 10% of the money it made from all sales on April 7 to an autism awareness and support "charity". While on the surface this sounds like a great thing for Chili's to do, there was just one little problem with this: The "charity" they were planning to donate to wasn't a autism awareness and support group. It was a Anti-vaccination group called the National Autism Association.
Almost immediately after the announcing that Chili's was going to be donating 10% of it's sales to this group there was a huge public outcry over this, as well as threats of boycotts. Within a few days time the executives at Chili's reversed their decision to donated to the ANN. This decision was praised by people who accept science and have common sense, but was also scorned and ridiculed by stupid people who still think that vaccines are dangerous and cause autism, and that there is some kind of conspiracy by pharmaceutical companies to cover it up. Suffice to say that some of the comments made on Chili's Facebook page is something that psychologists might want to study, but also shows the type of people that supports the Anti-vaccination movement.
So in the end it has been a bad month for the Anti-vaccination movement. They've had so much bad press and so many people are standing up to them, but I for one could not be happier about it!
Sunday, March 16, 2014
This would be considered satire if it hadn't come from Mike Adams
On the internet I occasionally see statements from people that are so blatantly outrageous that I would naturally assume it was some sort of satire, unless I knew that person was prone to make such outrageous statements.
Today I saw one of those statements, and if it had come from someone other than professional conspiracy theorist Mike Adams, I would have assumed it was satire.
Just read what he wrote and you'll know what I mean:
I'm certain the irony of what he wrote hasn't been lost on anyone who has read that.
I'm fairly certain that Neil DeGrasse Tyson endorse the "core philosophy" of Natural News, and that's because, contrary to what Mike Adams claims, Natural News does not "follow the evidence wherever it leads, and question everything!"
Natural News does not do this. What it really does is make things up, cherry picks certain quotes and data in a piss poor attempt to back up it's own BS, refuses to back down on their claims no matter how much evidence is brought forth showing they are wrong, and then mocks and insults anyone who calls out the site for it's BS, and then for good measure calls that person a "shill".
As you read in the last line you can see that this is a blatant attempt to "encourage" (i.e. trick) Neil DeGrasse Tyson into endorsing a couple of their views that they hold, that being that vaccines cause autism and still contain mercury (which it doesn't contain, nor does it cause autism) and that modern day dentistry is dangerous (which it isn't, it's just painful).
This is just a another attempt by Mike Adams to sneak his views into the scientific community (which totally rejects his views and would never even consider using Natural News as a source) and the public in general by trying to ride the coat tails of a popular and well respected scientist.
Just one more little note: Neil DeGrasse Tyson does support vaccines and has said that they do not cause autism, so I don't see him supporting Adams on this, or anything really, in the near or distant future.
Today I saw one of those statements, and if it had come from someone other than professional conspiracy theorist Mike Adams, I would have assumed it was satire.
Just read what he wrote and you'll know what I mean:
I'm certain the irony of what he wrote hasn't been lost on anyone who has read that.
I'm fairly certain that Neil DeGrasse Tyson endorse the "core philosophy" of Natural News, and that's because, contrary to what Mike Adams claims, Natural News does not "follow the evidence wherever it leads, and question everything!"
Natural News does not do this. What it really does is make things up, cherry picks certain quotes and data in a piss poor attempt to back up it's own BS, refuses to back down on their claims no matter how much evidence is brought forth showing they are wrong, and then mocks and insults anyone who calls out the site for it's BS, and then for good measure calls that person a "shill".
As you read in the last line you can see that this is a blatant attempt to "encourage" (i.e. trick) Neil DeGrasse Tyson into endorsing a couple of their views that they hold, that being that vaccines cause autism and still contain mercury (which it doesn't contain, nor does it cause autism) and that modern day dentistry is dangerous (which it isn't, it's just painful).
This is just a another attempt by Mike Adams to sneak his views into the scientific community (which totally rejects his views and would never even consider using Natural News as a source) and the public in general by trying to ride the coat tails of a popular and well respected scientist.
Just one more little note: Neil DeGrasse Tyson does support vaccines and has said that they do not cause autism, so I don't see him supporting Adams on this, or anything really, in the near or distant future.
Monday, January 6, 2014
10 reasons why the Anti-GMO and the Anti-vaccination movement are a lot alike.
The Anti-GMO movements and Anti-vaccination movements are probably two of the biggest and most well known pseudoscience movements out there, with millions of people that adhere to their claims.
Besides the fact that both groups do have millions of proponents world wide and promote pseudoscience, both groups are a lot alike in other ways as well. Infact I've come up with about ten different reasons why they are so much alike, starting with the fact that...
Proponents of both get very emotional when you criticize and/or debunk them.
Ever get into an online discussion with someone whom either promotes Anti-vaccination or Anti-GMO nonsense, and you start to tell them what they claim is BS, and tell them why what they are claiming is BS? If you've answered yes then you know what usually ends up happening, and that is that they tend to go off the deep end and use all of these made up "facts" and logical fallacies and conspiracy theories, and in the end threats and accusations of being a shill are often made.
A proponent of one tends to be a proponent of the other.
It shouldn't be to surprising, but usually if someone is an Anti-GMO proponent, they usually tend to be an Anti-vaccination proponent as well, and vice-verse.
While this isn't necessarily true many websites that promote Anti-vaccination nonsense also tend to promote Anti-GMO nonsense as well. Infact some websites that claim to be "natural health" websites promote both equally instead of one overshadowing the other. Also, another thing about proponents of both are...
They tend to promote alternative medicine.
It shouldn't be to surprising that people in the Anti-vaccination movement are big proponents of alternative medicine, but it shouldn't also be to surprising that people in the Anti-GMO movement are also big proponents of alternative medicine as well.
Infact many people in the Anti-GMO movement will, besides just promote the usual alternative medicine nonsense, claim that organic foods can heal you of just about anything and everything as well (including stuff that doesn't even exist).
The only papers they've ever had published in creditable scientific journals have been debunked and retracted.
There are lots of studies that have been published over the years about the "dangers" of vaccines and GMO foods, and while the number of papers published may look impressive to some the reality is that it isn't, especially when you consider the fact almost all of these papers are published in "scientific journals" that a person pays to be published in.
Infact the only Anti-vaccination and Anti-GMO papers that I know of that have ever been published in credible scientific journals are the Wakefield study (published in the Lancet) and the Séralini study (published in Food and Chemical Toxicology) both of which have been formally retracted by the respective journals that they were published in after it was found that both studies data was founded off of both unethical experiments and fraudulent data, and they were only retracted long after both studies had been thoroughly debunked.
They both claim the same things about the products in terms of health effects.
Both the Anti-GMO and Anti-vaccination movements not only claim that both GMO foods and vaccines are bad for you and cause a large amount of health problems (all of which have been proven to be untrue), but they also claim that they cause the same health problems!
Both most notably are claimed to cause autism, but both are also claimed to cause the spreading of diseases, and increases in infant mortality, and sterility, and cancer, and who knows what else. It almost seems like Anti-GMO and Anti-vaccination movements are claiming that GMO foods and vaccines causes something new every week.
They both claim that the products have ingredients in them that they do not.
One of the biggest and most obvious BS things that both the Anti-vaccination and the Anti-GMO movement tend to do is that they both claim that the respective products that they believe are bad for you also contain ingredients that infact they do not contain at all.
For the Anti-vaccination movement they sometimes claim that vaccines contain the remains of aborted human fetuses (they do not) and the Anti-GMO movement claims that GMO foods contain animal DNA in them (they do not). While these are the more outrageous claims made by both respective movements, both also claim that the products that they are protesting against contain other chemicals in them that infact they do not.
Both groups claim that there is little to no regulation in either industry.
One of the main "claimed" reasons by so many people in the Anti-GMO and Anti-vaccination movements is that they believe that GMO foods and vaccines are dangerous because they believe that there is very little to no testing and safety regulations what so ever in either industry.
In fact this couldn't be further from the truth for either one. Both the vaccine industry and the GMO foods industry are heavily regulated and go through numerous testing stages, and have to go through numerous government agencies before they are able to put their products onto market.
Both groups make claims of a conspiracy.
Both the Anti-GMO and Anti-vaccination movements claim that the respective industries that they are protesting are involved in some kind of conspiracy. These conspiracy theories range from the plausible, but still disproven corporate greed and not caring about the health of others and putting out a product that has very little to no testing type of conspiracy theories, to some type of New World Order mass depopulation type of conspiracy theory (which if true then they've done a horrible job at it).
Also both groups claim that there is a conspiracy to suppress "information" (i.e. Anti-GMO and Anti-vaccination claims) about the "truth" about GMO foods and vaccines. If this happened to be true then whoever is suppose to be suppressing this "information" has clearly done a terrible job at it because there are thousands of Anti-GMO and Anti-vaccination websites, not to mention multiple groups that promote their beliefs.
Both groups have caused deaths.
One of the dark yet well known little secrets of both of these groups is that both groups have caused the deaths of thousands of people.
For the Anti-GMO movement the deaths caused by their propaganda comes in the form of people in developing countries starving to death because the leaders in some of these countries refused to accept food donations because they believed that the donations contained GMO foods (wouldn't matter if it did or didn't) and believed the Anti-GMO movement's claims that such food were poisonous.
For the Anti-vaccination movement the deaths caused by their propaganda comes in the form of children who's parents believed the Anti-vaccination movement's claims and didn't vaccinate their children, and their children got an infection from a disease that was completely preventable if they had been vaccinated, and the child died from that disease. Also the deaths are by children who were to young to be vaccinated, or couldn't be vaccinate for some medical reasons, but got a disease from a child that was infact old enough to be vaccinated but wasn't, and they died because of some other parent's carelessness.
While this fact about both groups are often ignored by both groups, it is not however ignored by skeptics and critics of the Anti-GMO and the Anti-vaccination movements.
Both groups don't talk about the good things what they protest have done.
Both groups just love to talk about all the "bad" stuff (i.e. made up stuff) about GMO foods and vaccines. What they don't tell you is all of the good things that GMO foods and vaccines have brought us, such a extending our life expectancy, and suppressing and even eliminating certain diseases, and over all improving our quality of life, as well as helping prevent people from dying.
Infact talking about all of the good things about GMO foods and vaccines almost seems like a kind of blasphemy to these Anti-GMO and Anti-vaccination groups...
Besides the fact that both groups do have millions of proponents world wide and promote pseudoscience, both groups are a lot alike in other ways as well. Infact I've come up with about ten different reasons why they are so much alike, starting with the fact that...
Proponents of both get very emotional when you criticize and/or debunk them.
Ever get into an online discussion with someone whom either promotes Anti-vaccination or Anti-GMO nonsense, and you start to tell them what they claim is BS, and tell them why what they are claiming is BS? If you've answered yes then you know what usually ends up happening, and that is that they tend to go off the deep end and use all of these made up "facts" and logical fallacies and conspiracy theories, and in the end threats and accusations of being a shill are often made.
A proponent of one tends to be a proponent of the other.
It shouldn't be to surprising, but usually if someone is an Anti-GMO proponent, they usually tend to be an Anti-vaccination proponent as well, and vice-verse.
While this isn't necessarily true many websites that promote Anti-vaccination nonsense also tend to promote Anti-GMO nonsense as well. Infact some websites that claim to be "natural health" websites promote both equally instead of one overshadowing the other. Also, another thing about proponents of both are...
They tend to promote alternative medicine.
It shouldn't be to surprising that people in the Anti-vaccination movement are big proponents of alternative medicine, but it shouldn't also be to surprising that people in the Anti-GMO movement are also big proponents of alternative medicine as well.
Infact many people in the Anti-GMO movement will, besides just promote the usual alternative medicine nonsense, claim that organic foods can heal you of just about anything and everything as well (including stuff that doesn't even exist).
The only papers they've ever had published in creditable scientific journals have been debunked and retracted.
There are lots of studies that have been published over the years about the "dangers" of vaccines and GMO foods, and while the number of papers published may look impressive to some the reality is that it isn't, especially when you consider the fact almost all of these papers are published in "scientific journals" that a person pays to be published in.
Infact the only Anti-vaccination and Anti-GMO papers that I know of that have ever been published in credible scientific journals are the Wakefield study (published in the Lancet) and the Séralini study (published in Food and Chemical Toxicology) both of which have been formally retracted by the respective journals that they were published in after it was found that both studies data was founded off of both unethical experiments and fraudulent data, and they were only retracted long after both studies had been thoroughly debunked.
They both claim the same things about the products in terms of health effects.
Both the Anti-GMO and Anti-vaccination movements not only claim that both GMO foods and vaccines are bad for you and cause a large amount of health problems (all of which have been proven to be untrue), but they also claim that they cause the same health problems!
Both most notably are claimed to cause autism, but both are also claimed to cause the spreading of diseases, and increases in infant mortality, and sterility, and cancer, and who knows what else. It almost seems like Anti-GMO and Anti-vaccination movements are claiming that GMO foods and vaccines causes something new every week.
They both claim that the products have ingredients in them that they do not.
One of the biggest and most obvious BS things that both the Anti-vaccination and the Anti-GMO movement tend to do is that they both claim that the respective products that they believe are bad for you also contain ingredients that infact they do not contain at all.
For the Anti-vaccination movement they sometimes claim that vaccines contain the remains of aborted human fetuses (they do not) and the Anti-GMO movement claims that GMO foods contain animal DNA in them (they do not). While these are the more outrageous claims made by both respective movements, both also claim that the products that they are protesting against contain other chemicals in them that infact they do not.
Both groups claim that there is little to no regulation in either industry.
One of the main "claimed" reasons by so many people in the Anti-GMO and Anti-vaccination movements is that they believe that GMO foods and vaccines are dangerous because they believe that there is very little to no testing and safety regulations what so ever in either industry.
In fact this couldn't be further from the truth for either one. Both the vaccine industry and the GMO foods industry are heavily regulated and go through numerous testing stages, and have to go through numerous government agencies before they are able to put their products onto market.
Both groups make claims of a conspiracy.
Both the Anti-GMO and Anti-vaccination movements claim that the respective industries that they are protesting are involved in some kind of conspiracy. These conspiracy theories range from the plausible, but still disproven corporate greed and not caring about the health of others and putting out a product that has very little to no testing type of conspiracy theories, to some type of New World Order mass depopulation type of conspiracy theory (which if true then they've done a horrible job at it).
Also both groups claim that there is a conspiracy to suppress "information" (i.e. Anti-GMO and Anti-vaccination claims) about the "truth" about GMO foods and vaccines. If this happened to be true then whoever is suppose to be suppressing this "information" has clearly done a terrible job at it because there are thousands of Anti-GMO and Anti-vaccination websites, not to mention multiple groups that promote their beliefs.
Both groups have caused deaths.
One of the dark yet well known little secrets of both of these groups is that both groups have caused the deaths of thousands of people.
For the Anti-GMO movement the deaths caused by their propaganda comes in the form of people in developing countries starving to death because the leaders in some of these countries refused to accept food donations because they believed that the donations contained GMO foods (wouldn't matter if it did or didn't) and believed the Anti-GMO movement's claims that such food were poisonous.
For the Anti-vaccination movement the deaths caused by their propaganda comes in the form of children who's parents believed the Anti-vaccination movement's claims and didn't vaccinate their children, and their children got an infection from a disease that was completely preventable if they had been vaccinated, and the child died from that disease. Also the deaths are by children who were to young to be vaccinated, or couldn't be vaccinate for some medical reasons, but got a disease from a child that was infact old enough to be vaccinated but wasn't, and they died because of some other parent's carelessness.
While this fact about both groups are often ignored by both groups, it is not however ignored by skeptics and critics of the Anti-GMO and the Anti-vaccination movements.
Both groups don't talk about the good things what they protest have done.
Both groups just love to talk about all the "bad" stuff (i.e. made up stuff) about GMO foods and vaccines. What they don't tell you is all of the good things that GMO foods and vaccines have brought us, such a extending our life expectancy, and suppressing and even eliminating certain diseases, and over all improving our quality of life, as well as helping prevent people from dying.
Infact talking about all of the good things about GMO foods and vaccines almost seems like a kind of blasphemy to these Anti-GMO and Anti-vaccination groups...
Wednesday, October 16, 2013
6 Conspiracy Theories that have no reason to exist
There are a lot conspiracy theories out there, most of which have no evidence to support the claims made, either because whatever evidence that has been put forth has been debunked, or no evidence has ever been put forth in the first place.
In fact there are some conspiracy theories that have no reason to continue to exist, or have no reason to exist in the first place, such as:
Moon Landing Hoax
Perhaps one of the older conspiracy theories out there, there are a lot of people who do not believe we went to the Moon, and that all of the videos (the hundreds of hours worth) and photos (the many thousands of them) taken from the Moon were all done on a sound stage.
The reasoning behind this is that it is believed by people who claim we did not go to the Moon that we did not have the technology to go to the Moon.
The problem with this argument is that we actually did have the technology to get to the Moon. Also, as surprising as this may sound, we actually didn't have the technology to fake going to the Moon.
There is also a ton of other evidence that says we did in fact go to the Moon, such as several tons worth of rocks and dirt that were brought back, the fact that not one of the hundreds of thousands of people who worked on the Moon landing project has ever said we didn't go to the Moon, or that the Soviets never said that we didn't get there, or the fact that the landing sites have been photographed by satellites orbiting the Moon.
9/11 conspiracy theories
Ever since that tragic day over 12 years ago there have been multiple conspiracy theories put forth concerning what happened that day, and while all of them tend to be different (from both who did it to how it was done) they all have one thing in common: They have all been debunked.
I know, a lot of people in the 9/11 "Truth" movement will say otherwise, and will claim that they have "evidence" that backs up their claims, the facts are is that when this so called evidence has been examined it's been shown to be either incorrect, or completely false, and it is now seriously considered by skeptics and debunkers that the only reason why anyone would continue to make these 9/11 conspiracy theory claims is that they are either self deluded, or mentally ill, or they are lying.
Autism - MMR vaccine connection
Ever since 1998 when Andrew Wakefield wrote and published a "research" paper in The Lancet that concluded that there was a "connection" between the MMR vaccine and autism (research of which has since proven to be both unethical and fraudulent and resulted in both the research paper being formerly retracted and Mr. Wakefield's name being removed from the General Medical Council, which is the British equivalency of having one's medical license revoked) there has been a conspiracy theory going around concerning the alleged connection and vaccine manufactures trying to suppress such information.
Besides the fact that none of this "information" has ever been suppressed, it has been proven by multiple scientific and medical research institutions that there is no connection what so ever between any vaccines and autism, and that all of the claims made by the anti-vaccination movement are wrong and false (and dangerous).
Project Blue Beam
Project Blue Beam was a conspiracy theory that was first brought to public attention in 1994 by an investigative journalist by the name of Serge Monast in which he claimed that NASA would use advance technology to simulate the second coming of Jesus Christ in order to start a New World Order.
So how much of this is true?
None of it.
Monast had no evidence what so ever of Project Blue Beam, or that anything like it even existed, and there is still no evidence to this day that there is or ever was a Project Blue Beam. Plus he also made several claims of when it was to implemented (1995, 1996, and 2000), all of which have clearly never happened.
Chemtrails
The chemtrail conspiracy theories first showed up in 1996, but hasn't really gained popularity amongst conspiracy theorists until about the last few years.
The basics of the conspiracy theory is that the government, or Illuminati, or some other group, is spraying chemicals from airplanes, and that what we believe to be contrails coming off of those planes are actually these chemicals that are being sprayed around the world some sort of malevolent purposes (what ever those purposes may be, as no one can seem to agree upon what they are for).
This conspiracy theory, despite how obviously easy it would be to prove it was true, has never been proven to be true, and that all of the claims made about what chemtrails are suppose to do have been proven false (sometimes at a level in which it is considered to be laughable).
President Obama was not born in America
Even before President Obama took the oath of office in 2009 there has been this huge conspiracy theory floating around that the President was not born in the United States, and is not an American citizen, and that there has been this huge cover up in order to keep him in office. The people who make these claims often times use a "Kenyan" birth certificate that has his name on and date of birth on it as "proof" of this.
Of course there are a few problems with this:
First, that "Kenyan" birth certificate is actually Australian, and it is an admitted hoax.
Second, President Obama has released his long-form birth certificate. The birth certificate that was certified by Hawaii Governor Linda Lingle, a Republican.
So what evidence is there that President Obama wasn't born in the Untied States? None.
Every single claim of this conspiracy theory has been disproven, and every single time it's been taken to court, the judges have thrown it out and have even fined and imposed sanctions against some of the people who brought it to court for wasting the court's time.
In fact there are some conspiracy theories that have no reason to continue to exist, or have no reason to exist in the first place, such as:
Moon Landing Hoax
Perhaps one of the older conspiracy theories out there, there are a lot of people who do not believe we went to the Moon, and that all of the videos (the hundreds of hours worth) and photos (the many thousands of them) taken from the Moon were all done on a sound stage.
The reasoning behind this is that it is believed by people who claim we did not go to the Moon that we did not have the technology to go to the Moon.
The problem with this argument is that we actually did have the technology to get to the Moon. Also, as surprising as this may sound, we actually didn't have the technology to fake going to the Moon.
There is also a ton of other evidence that says we did in fact go to the Moon, such as several tons worth of rocks and dirt that were brought back, the fact that not one of the hundreds of thousands of people who worked on the Moon landing project has ever said we didn't go to the Moon, or that the Soviets never said that we didn't get there, or the fact that the landing sites have been photographed by satellites orbiting the Moon.
9/11 conspiracy theories
Ever since that tragic day over 12 years ago there have been multiple conspiracy theories put forth concerning what happened that day, and while all of them tend to be different (from both who did it to how it was done) they all have one thing in common: They have all been debunked.
I know, a lot of people in the 9/11 "Truth" movement will say otherwise, and will claim that they have "evidence" that backs up their claims, the facts are is that when this so called evidence has been examined it's been shown to be either incorrect, or completely false, and it is now seriously considered by skeptics and debunkers that the only reason why anyone would continue to make these 9/11 conspiracy theory claims is that they are either self deluded, or mentally ill, or they are lying.
Autism - MMR vaccine connection
Ever since 1998 when Andrew Wakefield wrote and published a "research" paper in The Lancet that concluded that there was a "connection" between the MMR vaccine and autism (research of which has since proven to be both unethical and fraudulent and resulted in both the research paper being formerly retracted and Mr. Wakefield's name being removed from the General Medical Council, which is the British equivalency of having one's medical license revoked) there has been a conspiracy theory going around concerning the alleged connection and vaccine manufactures trying to suppress such information.
Besides the fact that none of this "information" has ever been suppressed, it has been proven by multiple scientific and medical research institutions that there is no connection what so ever between any vaccines and autism, and that all of the claims made by the anti-vaccination movement are wrong and false (and dangerous).
Project Blue Beam
Project Blue Beam was a conspiracy theory that was first brought to public attention in 1994 by an investigative journalist by the name of Serge Monast in which he claimed that NASA would use advance technology to simulate the second coming of Jesus Christ in order to start a New World Order.
So how much of this is true?
None of it.
Monast had no evidence what so ever of Project Blue Beam, or that anything like it even existed, and there is still no evidence to this day that there is or ever was a Project Blue Beam. Plus he also made several claims of when it was to implemented (1995, 1996, and 2000), all of which have clearly never happened.
Chemtrails
The chemtrail conspiracy theories first showed up in 1996, but hasn't really gained popularity amongst conspiracy theorists until about the last few years.
The basics of the conspiracy theory is that the government, or Illuminati, or some other group, is spraying chemicals from airplanes, and that what we believe to be contrails coming off of those planes are actually these chemicals that are being sprayed around the world some sort of malevolent purposes (what ever those purposes may be, as no one can seem to agree upon what they are for).
This conspiracy theory, despite how obviously easy it would be to prove it was true, has never been proven to be true, and that all of the claims made about what chemtrails are suppose to do have been proven false (sometimes at a level in which it is considered to be laughable).
President Obama was not born in America
Even before President Obama took the oath of office in 2009 there has been this huge conspiracy theory floating around that the President was not born in the United States, and is not an American citizen, and that there has been this huge cover up in order to keep him in office. The people who make these claims often times use a "Kenyan" birth certificate that has his name on and date of birth on it as "proof" of this.
Of course there are a few problems with this:
First, that "Kenyan" birth certificate is actually Australian, and it is an admitted hoax.
Second, President Obama has released his long-form birth certificate. The birth certificate that was certified by Hawaii Governor Linda Lingle, a Republican.
So what evidence is there that President Obama wasn't born in the Untied States? None.
Every single claim of this conspiracy theory has been disproven, and every single time it's been taken to court, the judges have thrown it out and have even fined and imposed sanctions against some of the people who brought it to court for wasting the court's time.
Tuesday, June 4, 2013
Anti-Vaccination & Anti-GMO: Proof that bad things do come from "Good Intentions"
Many of you probably already know about the Anti-vaccination and Anti-GMO crowds, and what they stand for. For those that do not, I'll refresh your memories:
The Anti-vaccination crowd claims that vaccines can cause debilitating in children, primarily autism, while the Anti-GMO crowds claim that food from genetically modified plants are unhealthy and possibly dangerous.
While I know that both of these groups believe very strongly that what they are saying is true, and that they are spreading whatever they think is true because they only have "good intention" and think what they're doing is right, the reality is what they are doing is very wrong.
Besides the fact that the information that both of these groups put out tends to be out right false, or is based upon outdated information, they don't seem to realize the real damage they are actually doing.
For the Anti-vaccination, the damage is very obvious.
The spreading of the anti-vaccine propaganda has caused some parents to become unnecessarily fearful of vaccines, which in turn has cause those parents to choose to not allow their children to get vaccinated, which has caused the rise of many illnesses among children that I had not even heard of anyone getting when I was in school, and that for the most part I didn't even think could kill someone because I had never heard of anyone dying from these illnesses before, more or less know someone who died from something like the measles.
As a result of this combination propaganda and paranoia, hundreds of children, if not more so, have died, and thousands of children have gotten sick unnecessarily because their parents failed to get them vaccinated, or because they were to young to get vaccinated, and they got sick from another child that was sick with something that could been prevent with a vaccine shot.
Then there is the Anti-GMO crowd, which while might not seem as harmful, could actually be worse.
While there is this popular belief that GMO foods are harmful, untested, and unregulated, all of these are false as GMO foods are heavily tested, heavily regulated, and are no more harmful than organic foods.
While organic food itself isn't actually bad, the people in the Anti-GMO crowd wants to ultimately ban GMO foods, and that is bad thing because the world population can not sustain it's current levels on organic food alone. In fact only 2/3 of that current world population would be able to sustain itself on organic food (and that's the high end).
The fact is that the world hunger problems are bad enough as they are, and would be far worse if the Anti-GMO crowd had it their way and the only food we grew was organic food.
I know that both groups have good intentions, and that both think what they are doing is for the betterment of human kind, but the fact is that they only things these two groups are doing are bringing needless suffering and death, and instead of being saviors of humanity, they are harming it.
The Anti-vaccination crowd claims that vaccines can cause debilitating in children, primarily autism, while the Anti-GMO crowds claim that food from genetically modified plants are unhealthy and possibly dangerous.
While I know that both of these groups believe very strongly that what they are saying is true, and that they are spreading whatever they think is true because they only have "good intention" and think what they're doing is right, the reality is what they are doing is very wrong.
Besides the fact that the information that both of these groups put out tends to be out right false, or is based upon outdated information, they don't seem to realize the real damage they are actually doing.
For the Anti-vaccination, the damage is very obvious.
The spreading of the anti-vaccine propaganda has caused some parents to become unnecessarily fearful of vaccines, which in turn has cause those parents to choose to not allow their children to get vaccinated, which has caused the rise of many illnesses among children that I had not even heard of anyone getting when I was in school, and that for the most part I didn't even think could kill someone because I had never heard of anyone dying from these illnesses before, more or less know someone who died from something like the measles.
As a result of this combination propaganda and paranoia, hundreds of children, if not more so, have died, and thousands of children have gotten sick unnecessarily because their parents failed to get them vaccinated, or because they were to young to get vaccinated, and they got sick from another child that was sick with something that could been prevent with a vaccine shot.
Then there is the Anti-GMO crowd, which while might not seem as harmful, could actually be worse.
While there is this popular belief that GMO foods are harmful, untested, and unregulated, all of these are false as GMO foods are heavily tested, heavily regulated, and are no more harmful than organic foods.
While organic food itself isn't actually bad, the people in the Anti-GMO crowd wants to ultimately ban GMO foods, and that is bad thing because the world population can not sustain it's current levels on organic food alone. In fact only 2/3 of that current world population would be able to sustain itself on organic food (and that's the high end).
The fact is that the world hunger problems are bad enough as they are, and would be far worse if the Anti-GMO crowd had it their way and the only food we grew was organic food.
I know that both groups have good intentions, and that both think what they are doing is for the betterment of human kind, but the fact is that they only things these two groups are doing are bringing needless suffering and death, and instead of being saviors of humanity, they are harming it.
Friday, May 24, 2013
5 Things I've noticed about... the Anti-Vaccination Movement
The anti-vaccination movement is a large group of like minded people whom believe that vaccines cause autism (along with some other stuff, but mostly autism). While there are a lot of things I've noticed about this movement, I've managed to narrow it down to five.
So here are five things I've noticed about the anti-vaccination movement:
5. There's no need for it to exist.
If you are part of the anti-vaccination movement, then you are in a movement that does not need to exist, and in fact shouldn't exist.
Every claim made about vaccines being harmful and causing debilitating neurological conditions (most commonly autism) has been proven to be false, and vaccines have been proven to be not only the cheapest method of disease control and prevention, but also the best, and the safest.
Complications from vaccines are rare (around maybe 1 and 1000) and mostly minor. Serious complications are extremely rare (around 1 to 2 per million), and deaths are even rarer than that.
4. It's biggest supporters are a bunch of cranks.
The biggest supporters (and leaders) of the anti-vaccination are not only people who should not be giving out medical advice, most of them aren't even doctors (and the ones that are tend to have some questionable credentials).
Jenny McCarthy, one of the top supporters, is not a doctor. In fact she left nursing school in order to become a model. She promotes therapies that are harmful, and she's also a liar too...
Andrew Wakefield, the ex-doctor whom's 1998 research paper that was published in the Lancet that claimed to show a connection between vaccines and autism, was stuck off of the British General Medical Council register (the British equivalent of having your medical license revoked) after the Lancet retracted his paper after it was proven his research was based off of fraud. He still claims his research was not fraudulent, and that there was a conspiracy against him to destroy his research (despite the fact that it took over ten years from the time his paper was published for his paper to be retracted, and for the GMC to strike off his name).
Then there is Alex Jones, who thinks that vaccines are being used to create genetically modified people and causes diseases, not prevent them.
3. The movement is based off of lies.
The whole bases for the anti-vaccine movement is based off of the proven fraudulent 1998 research paper by Andrew Wakefield that claims there is a connection between the MMR vaccines and austim. The paper was highly controversial even when it came out, and the claims made in it had been dis-proven years before it was formally retracted for fraud.
Other lies made by the movement are that vaccines have been made more dangerous over the years (in fact they have been made safer) and that and the rates of autism in children who are un-vaccinated is far lower then those that have been vaccinated, which is false. In fact the rates are the same.
2. People in the movement do stuff that's legally iffy.
Many of the things that people in the anti-vaccination movement do could be considered walking on the edge of the law, and even illegal.
Most states won't allow a parent to enroll their child into school unless they have been vaccinated.
Not vaccinating your child could be seen as form of child neglect.
The constant claims made against the companies that make vaccines could be considered liable and slander.
And even telling people that vaccines cause autism could be considered distribution of fraudulent medical advice.
1. What it's promoting is dangerous.
The anti-vaccination movement has been linked to the deaths of thousands of children, and not just children whom's parents got caught up in the anti-vaccine hysteria, but children who were to young to get vaccinated too.
Not only are people in this movement are putting their own children at risk of getting a serious illness, they're putting other children at risk as well. Not only is that dangerous, that's pretty selfish too.
So here are five things I've noticed about the anti-vaccination movement:
5. There's no need for it to exist.
If you are part of the anti-vaccination movement, then you are in a movement that does not need to exist, and in fact shouldn't exist.
Every claim made about vaccines being harmful and causing debilitating neurological conditions (most commonly autism) has been proven to be false, and vaccines have been proven to be not only the cheapest method of disease control and prevention, but also the best, and the safest.
Complications from vaccines are rare (around maybe 1 and 1000) and mostly minor. Serious complications are extremely rare (around 1 to 2 per million), and deaths are even rarer than that.
4. It's biggest supporters are a bunch of cranks.
The biggest supporters (and leaders) of the anti-vaccination are not only people who should not be giving out medical advice, most of them aren't even doctors (and the ones that are tend to have some questionable credentials).
Jenny McCarthy, one of the top supporters, is not a doctor. In fact she left nursing school in order to become a model. She promotes therapies that are harmful, and she's also a liar too...
Andrew Wakefield, the ex-doctor whom's 1998 research paper that was published in the Lancet that claimed to show a connection between vaccines and autism, was stuck off of the British General Medical Council register (the British equivalent of having your medical license revoked) after the Lancet retracted his paper after it was proven his research was based off of fraud. He still claims his research was not fraudulent, and that there was a conspiracy against him to destroy his research (despite the fact that it took over ten years from the time his paper was published for his paper to be retracted, and for the GMC to strike off his name).
Then there is Alex Jones, who thinks that vaccines are being used to create genetically modified people and causes diseases, not prevent them.
3. The movement is based off of lies.
The whole bases for the anti-vaccine movement is based off of the proven fraudulent 1998 research paper by Andrew Wakefield that claims there is a connection between the MMR vaccines and austim. The paper was highly controversial even when it came out, and the claims made in it had been dis-proven years before it was formally retracted for fraud.
Other lies made by the movement are that vaccines have been made more dangerous over the years (in fact they have been made safer) and that and the rates of autism in children who are un-vaccinated is far lower then those that have been vaccinated, which is false. In fact the rates are the same.
2. People in the movement do stuff that's legally iffy.
Many of the things that people in the anti-vaccination movement do could be considered walking on the edge of the law, and even illegal.
Most states won't allow a parent to enroll their child into school unless they have been vaccinated.
Not vaccinating your child could be seen as form of child neglect.
The constant claims made against the companies that make vaccines could be considered liable and slander.
And even telling people that vaccines cause autism could be considered distribution of fraudulent medical advice.
1. What it's promoting is dangerous.
The anti-vaccination movement has been linked to the deaths of thousands of children, and not just children whom's parents got caught up in the anti-vaccine hysteria, but children who were to young to get vaccinated too.
Not only are people in this movement are putting their own children at risk of getting a serious illness, they're putting other children at risk as well. Not only is that dangerous, that's pretty selfish too.
Tuesday, March 19, 2013
The Helmet that "Stops Alien Abductions"
Recently I came across a website that shows you how to make a helmet (actually it's a skullcap) that it's inventor, Micheal Menkin, claims to be able to not only prevent alien mind control, but alien abductions as well by preventing aliens from taking control of your mind and movements, thus preventing them from abducting you.
Basically, it's a tinfoil hat on steroids.
I find it quite strange that some head piece that, according to the website, cost only $25 to make (price may vary) can prevent beings that are so technologically advanced that they can travel through several light years of space, or go from one universe to this one, from finding you and abducting you.
The claim about this "helmet" isn't even the weirdest claims on that site.
According to the site, aliens are also causing autism (and possibly Down's Syndrome), that we are in a telepathic war with aliens, that aliens do not like cheap perfume (who does?), the smell of incense from White Sage, and that Vitamin-C is the Plan-B for alien hybrid fetuses.
There are also testimonials on the site as well. Of course, the names of the people giving these testimonials aren't given, so it is hard to say whether or not these testimonials are from actual people, or they were just made up for purpose of making people who believe that they are being abducted by aliens that these head pieces actually work. Considering how likely it is for the public in general to view people who believe they have been abducted by aliens to be "crazy" it doesn't surprise me that people giving testimonials about a head piece that is suppose to prevent alien abductions might not want their names to be given out.
So, would these helmets really prevent alien abductions? Most likely not.
Remember, these alleged beings are suppose to be thousands, if not millions of years more technological advanced then us. Some cheap, homemade head piece is not going to stop them from abducting someone (unless it makes them feel so sorry for the person wearing the said head piece that they just decide to stop abducting them).
The fact is that there is no proof that alien abductions are even real, and that the phenomenon is most likely the result of mass hysteria (some people watch television programs about alien abductions, and think they have been abducted by aliens) or mental illness, and not because aliens are coming to Earth and experimenting on humans.
What this head piece really is isn't some creative mind shield to prevent being assaulted by Extra Terrestrials, but a ridiculous looking placebo that calms people who believe that they are being abducted by aliens by making alleged abducties believe that aliens won't be able to find them if they wear said placebo.
Basically, it's a tinfoil hat on steroids.
I find it quite strange that some head piece that, according to the website, cost only $25 to make (price may vary) can prevent beings that are so technologically advanced that they can travel through several light years of space, or go from one universe to this one, from finding you and abducting you.
The claim about this "helmet" isn't even the weirdest claims on that site.
According to the site, aliens are also causing autism (and possibly Down's Syndrome), that we are in a telepathic war with aliens, that aliens do not like cheap perfume (who does?), the smell of incense from White Sage, and that Vitamin-C is the Plan-B for alien hybrid fetuses.
There are also testimonials on the site as well. Of course, the names of the people giving these testimonials aren't given, so it is hard to say whether or not these testimonials are from actual people, or they were just made up for purpose of making people who believe that they are being abducted by aliens that these head pieces actually work. Considering how likely it is for the public in general to view people who believe they have been abducted by aliens to be "crazy" it doesn't surprise me that people giving testimonials about a head piece that is suppose to prevent alien abductions might not want their names to be given out.
So, would these helmets really prevent alien abductions? Most likely not.
Remember, these alleged beings are suppose to be thousands, if not millions of years more technological advanced then us. Some cheap, homemade head piece is not going to stop them from abducting someone (unless it makes them feel so sorry for the person wearing the said head piece that they just decide to stop abducting them).
The fact is that there is no proof that alien abductions are even real, and that the phenomenon is most likely the result of mass hysteria (some people watch television programs about alien abductions, and think they have been abducted by aliens) or mental illness, and not because aliens are coming to Earth and experimenting on humans.
What this head piece really is isn't some creative mind shield to prevent being assaulted by Extra Terrestrials, but a ridiculous looking placebo that calms people who believe that they are being abducted by aliens by making alleged abducties believe that aliens won't be able to find them if they wear said placebo.
Friday, February 1, 2013
One more thing we can call Jenny McCarthy...
There are a lot of things that Jenny McCarthy has been called in the past few years.
She's been called a bimbo, a moron, a nutcase, and even down right dangerous.
Now there is one more thing we can call the former Playboy Playmate of the Year: a liar.
For several days now there has been a huge amount of buzz and controversy going about the internet about how McCarthy was going to be headlining for the Ottawa Regional Cancer Foundation's March 2nd fundraiser at the Ottawa Athletic Club.
The reason why this was so controversial in the first place is because she is a big promoter of the belief that vaccines cause autism, which is a form of medical quackery that's based primarily on the fraudulent works of Andrew Wakefield that has been linked to the deaths of hundreds, if not thousands young children.
Immediately after it was announced that she was going to be headlining this event, there was a huge amount of backlash, and many people were calling for her to be dropped from the event. There was even a hashtag on Twitter called #DropJenny.
Well apparently the promoters of the event gave in because of the shifting (i.e. negative) attention her scheduled appearance was generating, and dropped McCarthy for fitness guru Tommy Europe, who is a far better choice.
So how McCarthy taking this? Is she angry? Is she saddened?
Nope. She's lying about it.
According to her (via her Twitter page) she was the one who dropped out of the event, and not the other way around, as you can see here:
But clearly that is not true: Read here.
The only thing in the statement that was true was that she wasn't going to be at the event (and that maybe she will be doing some taping for her new show that day).
I wonder if she will ever tell the truth about being dropped from the event, and the reason why she was dropped, and why she lied about it in the first place?
Only time will tell...
She's been called a bimbo, a moron, a nutcase, and even down right dangerous.
Now there is one more thing we can call the former Playboy Playmate of the Year: a liar.
For several days now there has been a huge amount of buzz and controversy going about the internet about how McCarthy was going to be headlining for the Ottawa Regional Cancer Foundation's March 2nd fundraiser at the Ottawa Athletic Club.
The reason why this was so controversial in the first place is because she is a big promoter of the belief that vaccines cause autism, which is a form of medical quackery that's based primarily on the fraudulent works of Andrew Wakefield that has been linked to the deaths of hundreds, if not thousands young children.
Immediately after it was announced that she was going to be headlining this event, there was a huge amount of backlash, and many people were calling for her to be dropped from the event. There was even a hashtag on Twitter called #DropJenny.
Well apparently the promoters of the event gave in because of the shifting (i.e. negative) attention her scheduled appearance was generating, and dropped McCarthy for fitness guru Tommy Europe, who is a far better choice.
So how McCarthy taking this? Is she angry? Is she saddened?
Nope. She's lying about it.
According to her (via her Twitter page) she was the one who dropped out of the event, and not the other way around, as you can see here:
The only thing in the statement that was true was that she wasn't going to be at the event (and that maybe she will be doing some taping for her new show that day).
I wonder if she will ever tell the truth about being dropped from the event, and the reason why she was dropped, and why she lied about it in the first place?
Only time will tell...
Wednesday, October 17, 2012
Gary McKinnon, threat to America, or another victim of conspiracy theories?
A British man by the name of Gary McKinnon, who ten years ago hacked into NASA and US military computers (apparently damaging some of them in the process) was spared from being extradited to the United States from the United Kingdom by United Kingdom Home Secretary Theresa May.
Now the reason cited for this isn't because the crimes he has been accused committing wasn't enough extradite him. The reason stated is because he has Asperger's syndrome (which is a mild form autism) and depression, and it has been determined that there is a high likely that if he were to be brought over here that he would most likely try to commit suicide.
Now many of you are probably asking why exactly did he hack into NASA and US military computers in the first place?
Well apparently back when he did this (which was about ten years ago) he was obsessed with UFOs and a alleged cover-up by our government, so he hacked into our government and military computers to find out any information about aliens that he believed the United States was covering up.
I have no doubt in my mind that Gary's autism caused him to become so obsessed with these UFO cover-up conspiracy theories that it caused him to do something that most people who do not have this neurological disorder, or any other type of neurological or mental disorder, would not do.
But, the existence of these conspiracy theories, and those who promote them, are also partially to blame as well.
Now most people don't take these UFO conspiracy theories that seriously. They might believe in it, but they usually don't obsessed with it to the point where they would commit a crime. Heck, I even once believed in them, but I never took it seriously enough to even buy a book on UFOs, much less do something that is as highly illegal as what Gary McKinnon is accused of doing (he admits to hacking into our computers, but not damaging them) but, if these conspiracy theories didn't exist then people who are like Gary who can become obsessed to the point where they have a great amount of difficulty controlling themselves and their actions, and thus they do stuff like this.
In my opinion this is another example of how destructive conspiracy theories can be, and how it can cause a person to rune their life.
The Slate article about this story
Gary's Wikipedia article
Now the reason cited for this isn't because the crimes he has been accused committing wasn't enough extradite him. The reason stated is because he has Asperger's syndrome (which is a mild form autism) and depression, and it has been determined that there is a high likely that if he were to be brought over here that he would most likely try to commit suicide.
Now many of you are probably asking why exactly did he hack into NASA and US military computers in the first place?
Well apparently back when he did this (which was about ten years ago) he was obsessed with UFOs and a alleged cover-up by our government, so he hacked into our government and military computers to find out any information about aliens that he believed the United States was covering up.
I have no doubt in my mind that Gary's autism caused him to become so obsessed with these UFO cover-up conspiracy theories that it caused him to do something that most people who do not have this neurological disorder, or any other type of neurological or mental disorder, would not do.
But, the existence of these conspiracy theories, and those who promote them, are also partially to blame as well.
Now most people don't take these UFO conspiracy theories that seriously. They might believe in it, but they usually don't obsessed with it to the point where they would commit a crime. Heck, I even once believed in them, but I never took it seriously enough to even buy a book on UFOs, much less do something that is as highly illegal as what Gary McKinnon is accused of doing (he admits to hacking into our computers, but not damaging them) but, if these conspiracy theories didn't exist then people who are like Gary who can become obsessed to the point where they have a great amount of difficulty controlling themselves and their actions, and thus they do stuff like this.
In my opinion this is another example of how destructive conspiracy theories can be, and how it can cause a person to rune their life.
The Slate article about this story
Gary's Wikipedia article
Saturday, May 19, 2012
Jenny McCarthy Posing for Playboy... Not Good
It was recently announced that Jenny
McCarthy would be posing for Playboy again, and quite frankly, I
don't like it at all.
It's not that I don't think that Jenny
isn't a beautiful woman. In fact I think she is one of the most
beautiful women in the world.
The reason I don't like it that Jenny
is posing for Playboy again is the fact that she is one of spokes
people against vaccines.
Jenny's son is autistic, and she firmly
believes that he became that way because of vaccines.
Despite the fact that the enormous
amount of research shows that genetics, not vaccines, are the most
likely cause of autism, there are still millions of people whom still
believe otherwise.
These people base their beliefs on
numerous fraud research articles that most major medical journals
will not publish due to a lack of creditable research. Most famous of
these is the article that started it all: The article that was
written by Andrew Wakefield and published in the British Medical
Journal.
The article was controversial from the
start, and in 2010 was removed from the BMJ for fraud.
He is also no longer allowed to
practice medicine in the United Kingdom.
Despite this, Wakefield still claims
his research is truthful, and that there is a conspiracy by public
health officials and pharmaceutical companies to discredit his work,
and that they paid bloggers to post rumors about him over the
internet and inflate the reports about the death from measles.
Jenny McCarthy is one of Wakefield's
biggest supporters, and continues to preach the anti-vaccine cause. A
cause that has been linked to the deaths of thousands of people,
mostly children.
It angers me that Playboy is giving her
another pictorial, despite the fact that her ignorance and
irresponsibility has led to so many deaths. I don't suggest that
people boycott Playboy, but I do think that people should mail
Playboy letters stating how disappointed they are that Jenny is
getting another pictorial, and that they should rip out and mail back
the pictorial to Playboy in protest as well.
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