Category Archives: Scepticism

Health, science and scepticism/skepticism. From ‘Short & Spiky’

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False takedown claims filed against Burzynski critic...

Reblogged from Skeptical Humanities:

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Apparently, someone thinks that they are the only person allowed to have a public opinion about Burzynski in a moving picture, as false takedown order attributed by Google to Burzynski movie director Eric Merola's production company has been issued against c0nc0rdance, who posted a very good video about the Clinic in February. Whoever did this, well, they done somethin' ornery. …

Read more… 252 more words, 1 more video

This seems to be yet another dick move in the ongoing series of dick moves from the screechy, fact-free hate group that appears to be the Burzynski fan club.
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Smurf’s Up, Part I: Colloidal Silver not the only faeces detected on Seattle Organic website » Short & Spiky

So much fuckwittery, so little time. I took a fair amount of time out over the last year – to do some real writing, among other things – and came back to so much bookmarked insanity that a great cry went up to the heavens “Oh god, where do I start, for fuck’s sake?”

And lo, my prayer was answered.  Amidst the plethora of more-or-less dangerous (but always brain-numbingly stupid) quackery touted on Twitter, I found and retweeted this:

Colloidal silver supports natural defense system of the body by attacking & killing more than 500 microbial #health bit.ly/W45mIW

— Organic Whole Foods (@OrganicLiveFood) 2 mars 2013

To which I added the following comment:

Complete bollocks @organiclivefood Oh, I see from your site you also flog herbal #detox. Which is also bollocks.

— anarchic_teapot (@anarchic_teapot) 3 mars 2013

(…)

You can read the rest of this sorry tale here Smurf’s Up, Part I: Colloidal Silver not the only faeces detected on Seattle Organic website » Short & Spiky.

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French homeopaths panic and make false claims to save their income » Short and Spiky

Oscillococcinum

Well, how else can you describe it? Homeopaths in France are required to be qualified medical doctors and are therefore fully aware that what they’re punting is placebo.  Anyway, the ever-unreliable Debby Bruck, Canard-en-Chef to a legion of quacks, has Twatted forth to the world an appeal to save French homeopathy.  It’s… quite astonishingly brazen. They want to send this letter to President François Hollande.

Let us examine the fuckwittery with which they hope to bamboozle M. le Président. It’s short. I’ll translate as we go, starting with the introduction:

Les médecins homéopathes vous alertent sur la disparition programmée de vos remèdes homéopathiques. Suite à une directive européenne, 75% des remèdes homéopathiques deviennent indisponibles de fait sur le territoire français. La non-disponibilité de ces remèdes homéopathiques compromet la santé de nos concitoyens. France’s homeopathic doctors alertent you to the planned removal of your homeopathic remedies. As a result of an European Directive, 75% of homeopathic remedies would become de facto unavailable in France. The non-availability of these homeopathic remedies would compromise our health as a nation.

I haven’t seen the directive and of course they don’t link to it – or even give a title or reference I can look up. Par for the course for homeopaths, naturally. We’ll take the claims at face value, even though in my experience they tend to exaggerate wildly in order to play the victim. So, a dearth of homeopathy would compromise the health of the nation ? A bold claim indeed, and one that they would be hard put to provide evidence for, since it is no secret that homeopathy is merely a placebo.

Read the rest on French homeopaths panic and make false claims to save their income » Short & Spiky.

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The Australian Vaccination Network needs to change its name (Mamamia)

The anti-vaxxers reach a shocking new low

If you haven’t heard of the Australian Vaccination Network (aka the anti-vaxxers) and assume that opposition to vaccines must be confined to a handful of loons living in tree houses, you need to know what sort of people belong to the Australian Vaccination Network (AVN) and what lengths they’ll go to, to distress, frighten and misinform parents.

Until about three years ago whenever any media outlet ran a story about vaccination they would go to founder & President, Meryl Dorey for a comment on behalf of the AVN.

Read the rest on The Australian Vaccination Network needs to change its name. Mamamia.

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The methodology of insinuation: this is how a quack does it

English: A still shot taken during the video p...

A still shot taken during the video production of “Massage For Relaxation in 1985 (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Well, it had to happen sooner or later. Yesterday I came across my first suspicious “massage therapist” trying to drum up custom for herself via an association that exists to help and protect vulnerable people.

Background: for those who don’t already know this, I do some volunteer work for the education and health committees of a local LGBT association…

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