"Why are the editors at Science-Based Medicine steadfastly refusing to engage? Why is David Gorski (AKA Orac, above) using a blocking tool on anyone who broaches the subject (and all those who ‘like’ such challenges)?
We may never know as the blog posts are bluffing out the false view that this is settled. People who raise this are blocked. This is the antithesis of science-based medicine. No clinical question should be off-limits. No evaluation of risks should be brushed aside. No acceptance of a treatment can be made without it being in the context of science, evidence and medical ethics.
However this now unfolds, this is becoming a very damaging event for, not just the SBM blog, but for the very fight that it is right to insist medicine happens within a rational and scientific framework, where free discussion of evidence and its meaning can take place."
Needless to say, this has been TMR's experience with the "online Science community" almost from the start: with few exceptions (PandaBear MD being the most notable) all of the Doctors online block serious challengers to their worldview. It's intellectual cowardice at it's best - and not just that they do it, but the way they apply it: it's not for being wrong, but for merely OPPOSING them. They're too used to people sucking their dicks. Meanwhile, SCAM, scammers, Oprah and cults get bigger and stronger on their watch - as the rest of us are consigned to watching it happen - because we can never get their support.
And I'm not alone in how I look for it - simple skepticism.
The guys behind South Park use it - and doctors, too. Check out Orac busting Carol Alt, another self-appointed "Miss Information":
Before I wrote this post I Googled “Carol Alt cancer,” and what I found was surprisingly thin. There’s this article from 2008 in which Alt is quoted as blaming cervical and uterine cancer for the failure of her marriage to Ron Greschner because she had been rendered unable to have children and Greschner very much wanted to have children. This happened back in 1997; so her cancer diagnosis must have occurred before that. There was also this article, which said basically the same thing but also revealed that Alt is very much into raw food woo. This article reinforces the same points, but doesn’t mention Alt’s battle with cervical cancer and instead attributes her adopting a raw vegan diet to feeling run down and larger as she got older. In the article, she also spews many of the tropes and bits of misinformation about raw vegan diets. She even blathers on about “acid diets” and how the body likes to be “alkaline.” Holy Robert O. Young, Batman!
Here’s the interesting thing. Alt takes a lot of supplements. A lot of supplements,...
Another fool "on the path" - Glenn Reynolds has promoted the wonders of "raw food woo" as well. And wouldn't you know it? Carol Alt's possibly using supplements provided by who else?
Mitt Romney.
Corruption, profiting from spreading bad advice, losing elections, selling and/or taking worthless concoctions, giving money to criminals, etc., it's always the same.
Seriously:
NewAgers - and the problems they'll eventually accrue for us - just aren't that difficult to discover ahead of time,...
Gloryhallastoopid, the esteemed Edzard Ernst (MD, PhD, FMedSci, FSB, FRCP, FRCPEd) has finally caught up with (or heard the pleas of) TMR - check it out:
"A cult can be defined not just in a religious context, but also as a” usually nonscientific method or regimen claimed by its originator to have exclusive or exceptional power in curing a particular disease.” After ~20 years of researching this area, I have come to suspect that much of alternative medicine resembles a cult,..."
Orac was figuring things out a while back, but I think the cult phenomena weirded him out too much for him to stick with it (Ann Althousedid the same thing when Obama used it) because when you say "cult" a lot of people think you're nuts, rather than observant of the forces running through society.
You know they can (and do) say whatever they want about me:
If there’s one thing that a certain subset of people who view themselves as reasonable and science-based don’t like, it’s harshness: Harshness in criticism, harshness in discussion, or—horror of horrors!—anything they view as “incivility.” That’s all well and good as far as it goes, but the problem is that sometimes there are things that demand a harsh response because they are just that bad.
Right at the beginning of the segment, we’re introduced to a breast cancer survivor named Diane Miller, who is portrayed as having endured the rigors of surgery, chemotherapy, and radiation and shown doing exercises in what is presumably her home. We are told that she has lymphedema, which is unfortunately a not-uncommon complication of breast cancer surgery, particularly when the cancer is advanced enough that it requires the removal of all the lymph nodes under the arm on the side of the cancer. It’s a major problem in breast cancer survivorship, because when it is bad it can seriously interfere with a woman’s quality of life. It is a complication of breast cancer surgery that, when it happens, is permanent, and it can happen at any time after surgery for the rest of a woman’s life.
Not surprisingly, Ms. Miller is also a big fan of acupuncture in addition to exercise, and the next segment shows something that makes me cringe as a breast cancer surgeon, and that’s an acupuncturist sticking needles into her lymphedematous arm. It’s even worse than that, though. The acupuncturist is clearly not wearing any gloves! I kid you not! Yes, I did indeed cringe when I watched that segment. In fact, I more than cringed. I started ranting at the television set. Why was I so upset by this? It’s because lymphedematous limbs, because of the edema, are very susceptible to infection, and acupuncturists are not exactly known for their rigorous adherence to sterile technique. Indeed, in general we try to avoid as much as possible blood draws, IVs, and even blood pressure readings using lymphedematous limbs because they can cause problems; yet here, at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, we see an acupuncturist blithely sticking sharp objects into a lymphedematous extremity after just doing a quick wipe with an alcohol swab and not even using gloves!
Conclusion:
NewAge medicine hasn't changed much since The Third Reich.
This also could explain how Ann Romney can sit on the board of the New England chapter of The National Multiple Sclerosis Society while openly engaging in flapdoodle - NewAgers simply don't care. Which, as I've been telling you, shouldn't surprise anyone:
While discussing the mixture of medicine with it's "alternative," Orac describes the best reason for not electing Romney with a cult behind him - without ever mentioning Romney with a cult behind him:
As Mark Crislip so famously put it, “If you integrate fantasy with reality, you do not instantiate reality. If you mix cow pie with apple pie, it does not make the cow pie taste better; it makes the apple pie worse.”
And if you “integrate” pseudoscience with science, it does not make the science more rigorous. If you mix quackery with real medicine, you do not make the real medicine better—or even more “holistic.” Much of “integrative medicine” represents, more than anything else, a return to pre-scientific beliefs, such as vitalism, miasmas, and illnesses being caused and cured by, in essence spirits or gods or magic. After all, reiki is nothing more than a form of faith healing, and most energy medicine is nothing more than magic, the belief that if you wish for something really, really hard, you can bend the universe to do your bidding and provide you with that thing, in this case, healing.
I'll have more on this, as some seem to think I've been saying we're going to be forced to become Mormon if we elect Mitt Romney as president - which I haven't - but, for now, keep Orac's "garbage in/garbage out" critique in mind and try to figure out what I've been saying on your own - without being reductionist, pleeeeease.
I can't wait to see what you'll come up with this time,...
Orac responds to James Randi's challenge in the most plainspoken way possible - which isn't easy for a scientist - making us very happy:
I do like the spirit of the protest, in particular how it drives home a very simply message about homeopathy: There's nothing in it. It's water placed in sugar pills. That's it.
Well done, Sir! Also, it should be made clear (since we didn't say it in our previous post) Randi's $1 million offer is "a challenge to homeopathy manufacturers and retail pharmacies that sell homeopathy, in particular large national chains like Walgreens and CVS and large national chains that include pharmacies in their stores, such as Walmart and Target." And let's not leave out such blue state stalwarts as Whole Foods, Trader Joe's, and all those pseudo-NewAge mom-and-pop health food stores. They - and the entire country of "modern" France - should always be included in any homeopathic debunking.
The Mighty Orac has done what's thought by many to be impossible - actually recording the post-Andrew Wakefield "snapping" of an antagonistic anti-vaccination warrior - the great Craig Willoughby:
I'm sure you can understand a few digs here and there at those you consider enemies, right?
I kid.
Simple fact of the matter is that I'm tired of fighting. Much of what has been going on in these online autism wars is just people pointing fingers, making angry posts, or in the case of some groups (not you guys), making what some could perceive as threatening posts while posting pictures of that person and her child. I will freely confess that I am guilty of hurling insults at those who don't follow my point of view.
But, what is this doing to help my son? What is this doing to help parents of children like my son? Particularly those new to this diagnosis.
Honestly, my perusal of Wakefield's dishonesty took quite a bit of the wind out of my sails. It forced me to evaluate what I am fighting for, and it also forced me to realize that, while I don't agree with the tone of what is written here and other places, I have come to realize that you and others are doing what you think is right. That is certainly admirable.
So, in the spirit of this epiphany, future posts from me will not be as antagonistic toward those I don't agree with.
Way to go, Craig! Glad to have you back with the rest of us! TMR salutes you! You have made a major leap, one we look for daily as we survey the NewAge landscape, while taking the slings and arrows of the loons.
We wish you and your son all the best, and will do anything we can to help you escape the clutches of pseudoscience - in any way we can. Do not be scared or despair:
You're amongst friends now.
And, finally, a big high-five to Orac:
We're winning, baby! Those bastards tried (unsuccessfully) to get you fired, but we're still here - and we're winning! One mind at a time, my good man, one mind at a time.
Poor Orac. The guy's a fucking cancer surgeon and he has to deal with the kookiest NewAge shit imaginable being rubbed in his face for shits and giggles. Seriously, if you ever thought adulthood isn't all you thought it was cracked up to be, put yourself in his shoes:
Years and years of training, study, and life-and-death experience, but more people would still rather listen to Jenny McCarthy - fucking brutal.
Hell, in relative terms, The Macho Response - a blog run by a crackhead artist with an anti-cult fetish - has more cache' than Respectful Insolence does, and RI's run by someone who can literally pull a life back from the abyss.
It shouldn't be that way. Orac should be able to speak and know the entire world is cupping it's ear to catch every word but, instead, it's TMR that's trying to advise Respectful Insolence on how to stop looking like a laughing stock every time some NewAger pops up and starts spouting off about some cult nonsense that any 5 year-old should be able to see through.
The worst though, from where we sit, is that dumb fuck, Orac, is too damned arrogant to accept the help when we offer it to him - and that arrogance is the same reason NewAgers have his type targeted for destruction to begin with. Does any of this sound familiar?
"You doctors think you know everything."
"You think you're God."
"You never listen to anyone else."
Well, if it doesn't, then you're not a doctor because even the nurses are saying it now - and many of the nurses are NewAgers, or do you think "wellness" has made it into hospitals because doctors thought it was "all that"? The NewAge has got the docs surrounded and, doing it Orac's way, there's absolutely no way out for the poor bastards:
Anyway, Gupta was on television talking to Susan Casey, editor-in-chief of O Magazine - that would be the editor-in-chief of Oprah Winfrey Magazine - about a faith healer who goes by the name of John of God:
Now, rightfully, Orac got upset at all the usual stuff a typical skeptic doctor would be upset about, starting with the fact that Gupta refers to "Western" medicine, as though what Orac does is part of some separate form of science than what's practiced elsewhere in the world. Lame.
What Orac should've said was "What in the fuck is Gupta doing talking to some plant from Oprah Magazine?!?"
See, it was just last month that Orac was screaming "about how Oprah Winfrey produced a despicably credulous shill job for faith healer John of God." And it was at the beginning of this month he reminded us of how little Oprah cares about the lives of her fans. It's not like he don't know what the bitch is about. But, like so many others, he ignores what Oprah is, and what her influence means, in favor of acting like Dr. Jeff Rediger, in the Gupta clip above, professional, competent-sounding, and useless.
And by the way, what were they recently honoring Oprah for, at the Kennedy Center Honors Gala, again? Her racism? Her weight-loss tips that didn't even work on her? Spreading quackery? Promoting The Secret? Promoting NewAge "beliefs" at all? Promoting the worst president in American history? For doing all that, for so long, on American television? Well oh goody.
As The Church Lady used to say on Saturday Night Live, "Isn't that special?"
Anyway, back to Orac. He ends his Gupta post with this:
I won't be alive 100 years from now, but I'd be willing to bet that "energy healing" will not be at the forefront of medicine in 100 years. I'd even be willing to bet that it won't be at the forefront of medicine in 20 or 30 years (when I should still be alive, accident or serious illness aside). Of course, Casey threw a nice bit of misdirection in there, didn't she? After all, what John of God does is not "energy" medicine; it's faith healing. I also can't help but notice that Dr. Rediger claims that he tried to verify some of the anecdotes of people who claimed to have found healing through John of God by looking at medical records and scans, but, strangely enough, he either can't or won't produce a single example of real healing by John of God. The best he can come up with is the lame observation that this sort of research is "complicated," which implies to me that he hasn't really found a convincing case. If he had, no doubt he would have trumpeted it to anyone who would listen.
Finally, I expect people like Susan Casey and Dr. Rediger to lay down a barrage of credulous excuses for John of God. It doesn't surprise me. What I don't expect is to see someone like Dr. Gupta wrapping up his report by saying that he is "honestly not sure what to make of this" and that this is something he should see for himself. This worries me. It sounds as though Dr. Gupta is planning on taking a trip to Brazil sometime soon to visit John of God. If he exercises the same lack of skepticism that he just exercised in this interview, I expect that his report, should he do it, will be no better than the segment on John of God that Oprah Winfrey aired last month. At the very least, if Dr. Gupta plans on going through with this, I hope he talks to someone like James Randi or Joe Nickell first. He desperately needs an education.
Seriously. That's what you expect from this guy?
A doctor - in need of an education? Imagine that. There seems to be a lot of that going around.
Doctors, scientists, professors - why the entire "credentialed but not educated" class seems to be in need of being taken back to school by somebody - but who could it be?
Orac sounds as credulous about Gupta as Gupta is to the claims of John of God:
"What I don't expect is to see someone like Dr. Gupta wrapping up his report by saying that he is 'honestly not sure what to make of this' and that this is something he should see for himself."
Really? We are talking about the same Dr. Sanjay Gupta, aren't we? The goofball surgeon who believed what the Raelian U.F.O. cult was putting down? When Gupta was picked to be Surgeon General, Orac said:
Do I think Dr. Gupta is sympathetic to antivaccine views? Not at all. But he clearly does not recognize them when he sees them, and he seems tainted by the journalistic tendency to 'tell both sides' even when there is no scientific support at all to one side.
In other words, not only is Sanjay Gupta potentially anti-vaccine but he (like so many others today) is not a man but a fool - and Orac knows it. Gupta's hospital, The University of Arizona, is even on Orac's Academic Woo Aggregator, so the idea that Orac would be surprised about any position this loon holds is,...well, surprising. Well, actually, not really.
Because, of course, what Orac's missing (or more accurately, has been rejecting now for years, because we show more "humanity" than he does) is the big picture regarding The NewAge Movement. Things like how it was, nonsensically, NewAgers Oprah "John of God" Winfrey and Arianna "John-Roger" Huffington (who Orac said runs a "wretched hive of scum and quackery") that provided busses to The Daily Show's "Rally To Restore Sanity". Because we don't treat NewAge in a piecemeal fashion, people in the anti-cult business don't miss ass-backwards things like that - while, we're positive, good ol' Orac wrong-headedly approved with all his heart, merely because the rally had "sanity" in the title. Duh. Brilliant cover, right? Yea, if you're simple and checked your skepticism at the door.
So Orac's missing NewAge. Hell, Orac's even missing what he's written about it - and Sanjay Gupta - so what can one expect? He'll keep on writing about Gupta, or Oprah, or whoever, and, each time, act surprised like it's the first time he ever discovered their pushing NewAge quackery - because it probably will be the first time - all over again. Like we said:
