Something to think about before getting that flu shot

August 26, 2009

I ran across this blog and just had to pass it on.

What this lady says covers far more than just vaccines, it goes to what is

pushed about cancer treatments, and many other diseases and their treatments.

They don't do the testing they should, the just incessantly preach about

established procedures and anything else is quackery.

Cheryl

http://adventuresinautism.blogspot.com/

August 24, 2009

Unscientific Scientists

My letter in response to the LA Times article: Bringing science back into

America's sphere on Chris Mooney's book " Unscientific America "

Lori, Chris and Sheril,

I am an autism parent with an MS is Clinical Counseling from Johns Hopkins

University and a contributor to Age of Autism. I maintain my own blog at

Adventures in Autism.

I saw Lori's piece today and would like to point out a few things that seem

incredibly obvious from where I am sitting, but you genuinely don't seem to have

on your radar (from what I could tell from the article), in regards to why

America is not embracing " science " as you think they should. I hope you will be

open to hearing from me for a moment, because there is a problem, but the

problem may not be the public.

I feel like you may have confused actual hard " Science " with " things that most

scientists think " , as there seems to be a denial of the fact that scientific

consensus has quite often been, and most assuredly still is in many places,

wrong.

Chris and Sheril wrote: " ...today this country is also home to a populace that,

to an alarming extent, ignores scientific advances or outright rejects

scientific principles. "

I would put it to you that it may not be the " scientific principles " that are

being rejected, but the principles of the scientists.

When my son regressed into autism following his 18 month shots and I spent a

year trying to reconcile all of the contradictory positions of my own

pediatrician, the AAP, the CDC, HHS, the " science " you say exonerates vaccines

from autism causation, the whole of the research out there and the facts of my

own son's case. What I found was a ridiculous mess.

What you keep referring to as " science " is making contradictory statements all

over the place. It resembles nothing like the thing that " Science " is actually

supposed to be, the methodical study of phenomena to figure out what is

ACTUALLY, TRULY happening.

Yet the statements that scientists make claim that all the vaccine/autism

questions have been answered, purport that all the possibilities have been

explored and suggest that people should just kill what intellectual curiosity

and concern for child safety that they have left and move on? How is that

" Science " ? How is that not laughable?

Case in point from Lori's article: " science has come in and we can't detect the

correlation between a rise in autism diagnoses and use of childhood vaccines.

And study after study has been done. "

Yet " science " has never done a simple study that took a large group of

vaccinated children and a large group of children whose parents chose not to

vaccinate them, and compared them for autism incidence! Yet you suggest that it

is time to let the vaccine/autism question go? The FIRST study that " science "

should have done, still has never been done! And it may take an act of congress

to actually make " science " do something it apparently really does not want to

do. And that is only the beginning of the studies that have not been done.

Not to mention the fact that " study after study " is picked apart by other

researchers, and even by lay parents, but those critiques are ignored by people

like you who don't want to follow the actual scientific method. This same

bizarre conversation is carried out over and over:

Mainstream science: " Here is a study... look no vaccine/autism connection " .

Autism community: " Hey... look here... you guys forgot to carry the 3. Wait...

half of our kids' medical histories are in the exclusion criteria! " .

Mainstream science (now with their back to the autism community and facing the

microphones): " Awww.... poor desperate, scientifically illiterate parents

looking for someone to blame. At some point they really have to let go. "

There are about a thousand questions on the vaccine/autism connection that

neither scientists nor research has ever addressed, and the medical

establishment won't even allow to be asked in their " pulpits " because " science "

is the new religion and their dogma cannot be questioned. Scientists are the

priests, and those who diverge from the canon are branded heretics. Vaccines

are inherently " good " and cannot be " bad " . The research that points to vaccines

causing autism is treated like the evidence that priests were molesting young

boys... ignored, buried and those who dared call attention to it are bullied

into silence. And yet you have a problem with the suppression of discussion of

evolution in churches? Again.... from where I sit, the hypocrisy of your

statements are stunning.

The scientific community overstates the benefits of vaccination and understates

the risks. And of course they do, vaccination is their baby. Yet they don't

seem to have the insight to understand that there is a conflict of interest

there. Last year the AAP sent a representative to a Defeat Autism Now!

conference to evaluate the state of their science into autism/vaccine causation.

They sent Louis Cooper of the Sabin Vaccine Institute, one of the inventors of

the Rubella vaccine. Seriously? Lou Cooper is the objective guy that is going

to return to the AAP and declare, " You know what guys... I think the vaccine I

invented and that is my greatest accomplishment in life may be playing a role in

an epidemic of lifelong and deadly neurological disorders that are striking

around 1 in 100 kids! I think we may have caused an epidemic! " ????

I don't think that you have fully grasped what has happened in the

vaccine/autism wars. A very large group of parents, physicians and researchers

have made the accusation that mainstream medicine, the scientific community and

public health authorities have created one of the largest iatrogenic epidemics

of all time via an overzealous and under researched vaccine program. A very

serious charge. Your community has responded to that charge by doing a minimal

amount of shoddy research, in most cases paid for and carried out by the

pharmaceutical companies that made the products in question and the agencies

that made the policies that put these products into almost every tiny body in

this country regardless of their risk factors, while simultaneously mocking

those making the charge.

You have declared that YOU HAVE INVESTIGATED YOURSELVES AND FOUND THAT YOU ARE

NOT GUILTY ON ALL CHARGES! And the policy makers among you have made sure that

no appeal can be filed in an actual court where your accusers can bring evidence

against you, compel you to testify under oath, or compel you to turn over

internal documents, as you have passed legislation exempting yourselves from any

liability or litigation. You claim innocence and just tell us that we have to

take your word for it, as if " smart " also mean " honest " , " incorruptible " ,

" omniscient " and " looking out for the best interests of the public and all

individuals " .

Why in the world do you think that your reputation should be on the rise?!

What is happening is denial on a scale far grander than what transpired during

the initial Semmelweiss Reflex. You want the public to embrace science, even

the science that they don't want to face? You go first!

I started to write more on all of the corruption that is going on in the medical

and scientific industries, but who has that much time.

Yes... to solve the problem that you want solved, reportedly that you want

mainstream American to embrace " science " , " Scientists are going to have to have

a culture change. "

But the change you suggest is the wrong one. You don't need more scientists (or

more nerds rapping about super colliders), you need the scientists you already

have to have a come to Jesus moment. The scientific community needs to

understand that their hubris, arrogance, devaluing of the individual, ethical

problems, legal problems, widespread conflicts of interest and constant denials

of any evidence that is inconvenient to the advancements of their " scientific "

agenda is the problem, and has to come to an end.

The scientific community needs a big dose of humility, and needs to consider the

fact that their critics and those ignoring them, might have a few good points.

They need to listen to, and be able to cogently address their critics, instead

of marginalizing and maligning them. And if they don't have an answer, they

have to offer informed consent to the public and admit that they don't have an

answer.

People see right through condescending BS. People have a tendency to treat you

with the same dismissal with which you have treated them. What you are seeing

may not be a " deep-seated streak of anti-intellectualism " but a deep-seated

distrust of self-proclaimed " intellectuals " who openly disdain the unwashed

masses, then wonder why their scientific pronouncements hold no sway with them.

Take minute and go read any autism/vaccine post on Orac's blog, as he is the

rock star of the " woo " bashing 'skeptics' in your universe. Now pretend that

you are a parent who has learned that thimerosal at nanomolar amounts causes

mitochondrial dysfunction so severe that it can cause the cell to self destruct,

and that HHS has conceded that in the Poling case mito dysfunction + vaccination

= autism symptoms. And pretend that one of your questions are that if vaccines

are known to cause Guillian-Barre, an autoimmune disorder in which the immune

system attacks the central nervous system, then why can't they cause autism, an

autoimmune disorder in which the immune system attacks the central nervous

system? And pretend that you want to understand that if one vaccine contains

enough adjuvant to stimulate the immune system sufficiently to put it on a

search and destroy mission for viruses, then why do docs give five shots at once

and claim it couldn't possibly overstimulate the immune system in some into a

search and destroy mission for its own tissues; and why can't it cause the

autoimmune state and neuroinflammation found in autism? And then pretend that

you are confused by the stance of " science " that a fetus contracting Rubella is

a known cause of autism, but that that a one year old being given a live virus

rubella vaccine couldn't possibly cause autism; while remembering that VICP has

ruled that Baily Banks would not have had ASD if not for his MMR.

And pretend you saw Julie Gerberding go on CNN and say that vaccines can cause

autism and cannot cause autism.

And then pretend that you spend untold hours on pubmed and in chat rooms and on

HHS/CDC/AAP web sites and you can't find any cogent answers for the questions

you have. And pretend that your own pediatrician just got annoyed with you for

asking questions he couldn't answer and then just stopped returning your calls.

And then go read Orac again (or any 'skeptic' blog or even your own article in

the LAT) and ask yourself... 'why would any thinking person want to listen to us

when we can't answer their questions and instead treat them with contempt to

cover the fact that we can't answer their questions'?

Your 'skeptic' community's message to the public and parents like me? " You are

an idiot and we have nothing but contempt for you. Now think what we tell you

to think and do what we want you to do, even if it doesn't make sense " .

Treat your audience like crap, and they will leave. Claim to be a scientist and

spout completely unscientific and illogical statements (mean ones at that), and

no one will care what you say.

Chris, when your own suggestion on how to fix the problem that you have defined

is to lean more about the people who are resisting your message, not so that you

might learn from them as to where you might have gone off the tracks, not even

so that you might enter into a mutually respectful relationship with them where

you are on the same level (what with you being " super smart " , " highly educated "

and " doing great stuff " while they are way behind you on some imaginary starting

point), but so that you might condescend to where they are in order to

manipulate them into believing what you want them to believe... can you see that

you can't even see what the real problem is?

It is clear from this article that those you target, you do not consider your

equals.

" Smart " is not the only virtue, and it may not even one of the most important

virtues. Look back at the people who have done the most damage to humanity

through out history. You will be hard pressed to find a dummy among them.

Posted by Ginger Taylor at Monday, August 24, 2009 4 comments Links to this post

Labels: LAT, Media

August 26, 2009

In a message dated 8/26/2009 9:34:38 A.M. Central Daylight Time, webartogo writes:

ran across this blog and just had to pass it on.What this lady says covers far more than just vaccines, it goes to what is pushed about cancer treatments, and many other diseases and their treatments.They don't do the testing they should, the just incessantly preach about established procedures and anything else is quackery.

_____________

Wow, she knows how to pick her battles. Good job.

Terri