Earlier today I was perusing incoming links. (Yes, most bloggers do that because we like to know who’s linking to us; any blogger who doesn’t do this from time to time is atypical or lying about it.) What to my wondering (and I do mean wondering) eyes should appear, but Respectful Insolence appearing on a most unusual list, so much so that I didn’t know whether to be proud or embarrassed.
That’s right, this blog is listed as one of the Top 50 Alternative Medicine Blogs on Live Smarter. Now, I’m as vain as the next blogger, possibly even more so, but even my vanity did not protect me from the visceral reaction upon seeing what other blogs were on the list. (No, it wasn’t because Terra Sigillata was also on the list; Abel’s a bud of mine.) Rather, it was being listed alongside all sorts of serious woo–serious, serious woo. True, I’m in the “Doctors” section of the list, but all the other doctors in that section are clearly true believers, doctors such as Dr. Brad (who, based on his credulity, really, really needs a dose of skepticism), Dr. Melissa Clouthier (who thinks Feng Shui “makes a lot of sense“), two naturopaths, and “integrative” pediatricians. Moving further afield, there are a bunch of acupuncture blogs, Ayruvedic blogs, traditional Chinese medicine blogs, and–ack!–the blog of arguably the most brain dead homeopath ever, Sue Young Homepathy. Even Julie Deardorff, woo-friendly antivaccination columnist for the Chicago Tribune, is there!
Abel and I are clearly the token skeptics on the list. This is almost as bad as having to admit that a creationist as clueless as Dr. Michael Egnor is a member of the surgical profession. Where’s that Doctor Doom mask again?
On the other hand, maybe I should be happy that there are two skeptics in a list of 50. For a list of alternative medicine blogs, a 4% skeptic rate is much, much higher than I usually see.
