Orac is the nom de blog of a humble surgeon/scientist who has an ego just big enough to delude himself that someone, somewhere might actually give a rodent's posterior about his copious verbal meanderings, but just barely small enough to admit to himself that few probably will. That surgeon is otherwise known as David Gorski.
That this particular surgeon has chosen his nom de blog based on a rather cranky and arrogant computer shaped like a clear box of blinking lights that he originally encountered when he became a fan of a 35 year old British SF television show whose special effects were renowned for their BBC/Doctor Who-style low budget look, but whose stories nonetheless resulted in some of the best, most innovative science fiction ever televised, should tell you nearly all that you need to know about Orac. (That, and the length of the preceding sentence.)
DISCLAIMER:: The various written meanderings here are the opinions of Orac and Orac alone, written on his own time. They should never be construed as representing the opinions of any other person or entity, especially Orac's cancer center, department of surgery, medical school, or university. Also note that Orac is nonpartisan; he is more than willing to criticize the statements of anyone, regardless of of political leanings, if that anyone advocates pseudoscience or quackery. Finally, medical commentary is not to be construed in any way as medical advice.
To contact Orac: [email protected]
View Archive →
50 replies on “Yet more evidence that Andrew Wakefield is anti-vaccine”
God, the amount of stupid in that video makes me want to cry.
The anti-vaccine movement seems to worship bumper sticker slogans, rather than any kind of understanding.
These bumper sticker only suggest that the understanding of English, among the anti-vax mob, is as poor as the understanding of science, among the anti-vax mob.
Injecting foreign virus mixtures into your tissues and Central Nervous System contrived from avain and swine will obviously do damage!! You’re an IDIOT to think otherwise but the drug cartels have done a convincing job and its all about $$$$$$$! BTW according to stats, flu vaccines do NOT confer any additional immunity to flu!
@gg “Injecting foreign virus mixtures into your tissues and Central Nervous System contrived from avain and swine will obviously do damage!”
No wonder there’s a problem. They’re FOREIGN viruses. We should insist that only good British, patriotic viruses be used. And “contrived” as well! Must be painful for them – and for the “avains” (sic).
I suggest, dear “gg” that you return to your pasture before you get used, yourself, for vaccine manufacture. Oh, and read a little about vaccines and how they work.
Oops! for “British” read “Murkan”! I’d forgotten that this is a Stateside blog.
@#3 0_o
Curse Poe’s Law..
http://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Poe%27s_Law
gg:
Has anyone you know ever contracted smallpox or polio ?
If not, why not ?
gg, please explain what “avain” and swine virus are in the MMR. And how the MMR is related to flu.
gg, please explain what “avain” and swine virus are in the MMR. And how the MMR is related to flu.
You state that by posting the link to that video Dr. Wakefield has provided “yet more evidence that Andrew Wakefield is anti-vaccine”.
Thus, according to this logic, posting the same link to that same video yourself within your blog entry must also be at least “some evidence, that Orac is anti-vaccine”, right?
Regards.
Avain is Finnish for key, so obviously (a) gg is Finnish, and (b) we should only handle our keys with extreme care.
*looks carefully*
Hang on, gg is actually saying that our tissues and CNS are contrived from pigs and keys.
Mother’s Matter
Heh.
In Lancashire, “matter” is a dialect word for the stuff that exudes from boils and sores.
(Yes, I’m easily amused.)
@10
So, just because orac wishes to educate us by letting us see the amount of stupid that the anti-vaccine side is willing to put out, means that he is “anti-vaccine?”
That is one hell of a jump to conclusions that you put out there. But then, I shouldn’t be so surprised by the amount of bad science and logic that some of them do put out.
This is similar to the old jibe about the recently paroled criminal who is caught red-handed meeting up with his old cronies in crime to plan a new job. When his parole officer reads him the riot act about associating with known criminals, the parolee whines “But if it’s so wrong to associate with known criminals, how come you do it all the time??”
Sorry, Puschel, but simply acting as if there is no importance to context cannot make it so. Given the delicensed-for-cause physician’s notorious opposition to the MMR, it is unreasonable to suggest that he posted it for any other reason than to recommend its sentiments.
I watched and listened to the video, and I still can’t figure out the meaning of the repeated line, “the trucks don’t work, they only make you worse,” Is this some sort of post-apocalyptic scenario, some sort of vaccine-induced “28 Days Later,” where society has collapsed and motor vehicles are all breaking down?
Or do they just need a singer with better diction, one who doesn’t confuse “drugs” with “trucks”?
Has it really been a week ? My, how time flies ….. I think that our esteemed host, his “friend” and other “pals” @ SBM , and our SB commenters/ bloggers all deserve a hearty round of applause for fighting the good fight, sticking to their guns, always being prepared, tolerating frustration, keeping an even keel, never missing an opportunity for snarky repartee, and calling attention to *Andy*, who has brought so many diverse people from all corners of the earth together, united against him and what he has wrought.
Re. how should we respond to the anti-vaccine movement:
I will honestly try and help you people to realize the extent of the problem.
SO many doctors and researchers are concerned about vaccine safety ( a few would be Wakefield, Hewitson, Dunbar, Harper,Healy, Blaylock, Dr Jay etc. Etc. Etc- the actual list would be huge). And therein lies your real problem. You cannot really expect parents to think things are fine when so many of your own don’t think think the question has been asked and answered, can you? I mean that really would be an up-hill battle. And you have to marvel at why even the large number of doctors who have spoken out with concerns over vaccination, do so when they risk being shunned and their research being frozen out. The vast majority of these doctors and researchers are not selling bio-medical products but rather just want to practice according to their integrity. until real safety studies are done ( yes, including primates), you guys just look foolish and parents look at the fact that so many scientists ARE concerned that vaccines are doing harm.
@ Denice Walter @ 16
Yep. We don’t want more babies dead of whooping cough. I think that’s a *good* thing to gather for, from anywhere.
@ Jen @ 17
Please learn stats (not *hard*, just *weird*), look at the evidence, and then come back and discuss this? Your blatant innumeracy is getting SERIOUSLY irritating.
Every bad occurrence is a tragedy to those who are closest to it (relatives, significant others, friends), and that can’t be denied. But failing to learn from it, in the context of other such occurrences, both dishonors the memory of loss and increases the likelihood that OTHERS will have to suffer in like fashion.
Don’t you understand this? Your experience is one anecdote, that, combined with as many similar others as can be found & analyzed to find significant similarities, can PREVENT such a particular bad thing from happening in the future.
Man, I was seriously tempted to get snarky here. I haven’t yet. But where there’s life, there’s hope.
Jen,
Your list is exceedingly tiny compared to the number of doctors practicing. Maybe you do not understand the meaning of the word ‘huge’. Also, science is not a majority sport. It is based on evidence, not the number of morons who cannot understand it or choose to ignore it for financial gain.
‘They’ are The Verve, a British rock band.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Drugs_Don't_Work
I wonder how Richard Ashcroft would feel about someone using his song for a soundtrack on such a crappy video. It would be a shame if someone dropped a dime…
I thought former-doctor Wakefield was pro-vaccine… but only provided people used vaccines that derived from his “safer measles vaccine” patent claim filed in London in June 1997?
But perhaps that’s not where the money is now, so he goes after the money elsewhere.
The anti-vaccine movement seems to worship bumper sticker slogans, rather than any kind of understanding.
These bumper sticker only suggest that the understanding of English, among the anti-vax mob, is as poor as the understanding of science, among the anti-vax mob.
It might be different if some of those slogans were actually clever. They’re not. Most are just stupid, and some make no sense at all. What, for instance, does “Mother’s Matter Repeat Mother’s Matter” mean? Is it referring to some sort of matter belonging to the author’s mother? What’s that got to do with MMR vaccine? What does Ministers Migrate Rights mean? And how are we supposed to interpret Moderated Multiple Regression?
@Randy:
I’m guessing it means something like “mothers have a special insight into the etiology of the diseases/syndromes that their children suffer from”.
Someone just posted a link to an aerial view of UberWooMeister Jo$eph Mercola. >5000 sq ft, 4 car garage, private lakeside beach, 2 acres, etc. Altruistic my gluteus maximus.
Hey, I’m glad Wakefield posted the video. I thought it was great. I really liked the song, and knew it sounded vaguely familiar when I realized it was a somewhat obscure old song from The Verve back in the day. Also, I was befuddled and amused by the nonsensical sloganeering. It kept me mildly entertained for 5 minutes.
Other than that, it was a useless piece of crap. Hey, can’t win ’em all.
But it reminded me of a good old song, though if I want to hear it again now that my memory has been jogged, I think I prefer to watch the original music video from the band. It’s better and won’t increase the view count for the garbage.
I’ve heard of apostrophe overuse before, but how doe’s someone get it exactly backward’s?
Presumably “mother’s matter” would be some form of matter belonging to the mother – possibly lactic fluids or the placenta, but could be almost anything.
Or “mother’s matter” could be a contraction for “mother is matter”, a relatively obvious statement that mother is not a creature of pure energy.
jen: “you guys just look foolish and parents look at the fact that so many scientists ARE concerned that vaccines are doing harm.”
Given that 1) the researchers who’ve done work on vaccines overwhelmingly report their safety and efficacy, and 2) physicians in practice (including the vast majority of pediatricians who get their own kids vaccinated according to the recommended schedule) quietly follow good medicine instead of supporting idiotic antivax rallies, I believe your quote should be amended to say:
“parents look at the fact that a handful of cranks and quacks are concerned that vaccines are doing harm”.
And that’s why most parents continue to do the right thing for their children and other vulnerable members of society.
Name five.
Seriously, name five doctors who take this viewpoint and have no skin in the game, no well-defined conflict of interest or quackery to sell.
I will patiently wait for that list of names.
The really troubling part is that many of the anti-vaccine people I’ve met readily admit that vaccines are good for public health. They’re willing to get vaccinated only if there is some sort of an emergency. This is hilarious to me since, by the time the emergency is underway, it’s too late to vaccinate or it’ll be a while before we have a vaccine (H1N1), in most cases.
Don’t be fooled, folks. Most anti-vaxers know what is good and what isn’t. They’d roll up their sleeve if they saw the bodies hit the floor. Our own Augie and Sid know that vaccines are good, and they are, no doubt, vaccinated themselves.
What draws these people to the controversy is just that, the controversy. Prison Planet would not be what it is if it didn’t touch on conspiracies but only said “vaccines don’t work”, period. No, that blog, and HuffPo and all the others have to give us a plot behind the story. They have to make their followers feel important, feel part of a group that will supposedly save the world.
Our own Augustine and Sid (and now, apparently, “gg”) will back off and stop arguing the minute they are ignored. If they were real in their assertions, they’d step into the light of day and tell us not only their real names, but their real intentions. Instead, we get more controversy, more conspiracy, and more drama.
It’s not about the Benjamins. It’s about trolling, and feeling important (more so than being important).
@Rogue Medic: Reminds me of one of the signs from the “Colbert / Stewart” rally where the sign side, “If your view fit on a sign, think harder”….classic, sad and true all in one.
That is the nature of a troll; they are there for controversy, not to present an actual argument. (Augustine in particular has been reluctant to expose his actual position, which is a strange tactic to take unless one is more interested in “winning” than in actually conveying any sort of information.)
However, I do not think anyone should be expected to reveal their real names. Anonymity on the ‘net is valuable, and I would never begrudge anyone using a pseudonym. I use one myself. There are many, many reasons to use a pen name, and as long as they aren’t sockpuppeting, there is nothing wrong with it.
More signs that Andrew Wakefield has lost all credibility:
link
http://twitter.com/DrWakefield/statuses/1430402216501248
text
http://www.autismrecoveryhomeopathy.com/ http://fb.me/L7LtlNHm
[so you don’t have to go there]
Sheesh. I guess no woo is too ludicrous for Wakefield to promote.
I also agree on the pseudonym use. As long as they aren’t using multiple names (sockpuppeting) and aren’t just trolling for the sake of trolling it is fine. One shouldn’t have to post their RL information (other than maybe vague ideas to give context to their expertise in a subject) in order to be worthy of expressing their thoughts.
People on the Internet have been known to do crazy things in retaliation to things posted on the web. I do not agree with practically anything augustine or Sid say (who truthfully does carry many traits of a troll), but I personally fully support their use of anonymity. I find it horrible that Orac and a few others have had their real lives negatively affected by choosing to speak publicly on this subject and I would personally feel very hypocritical if I felt it was ok to change the rules simply because I don’t like what Sid says.
@ Rene- I totally agree with you about contrarians, be they leaders or followers, grandiosely believing themselves to be the ” Next Galileo” or Semmelweis ( or in his posse), with a heapin’, helpin’ of Saviour complex, ranting and railing against Authority, the Elites, the Powers-that-be : the successful woo-slinger knows how to capitalize ( in more ways than one) on this sentiment ( and probably believes most of his own press, e.g. Mercola, Null, Adams). Herbal Tea-Party, anyone? I believe that even the most mercenary ( see above) are not motivated solely by the money factor, but it *sure* helps. However, when we get to the followers, I think that those *directly* affected ( especially parents of kids on the spectrum) are trying to avoid the idea of heredity as a factor in ASD’s and clinging to external causality ( vaccines, toxins) as a self-protective mechanism. Those *less* affected ( who aren’t providing so-called bio-med services or selling books) are probably purely contrarian. Anti-vaxxers parallel the HIV/AIDS denialists in many ways.
One tweet alone does not make or break the hypothesis that Andrew Wakefield is anti-vaccination. However, multiple repeated tweets expressing support for unlikely therapies purported to “cure” “vaccine toxicity” (like the one promoting homeopathy as a cure for autism) and the latest tweet
http://twitter.com/DrWakefield/statuses/1419182218420224
Text
The shortened URL resolves to
http://www.nvic.org/NVIC-Vaccine-News/November-2010/New-NVIC-Advocacy-Portal.aspx
Why would Andrew Wakefield, if he were indeed “pro-vaccine safety” (as he often proclaims), link to this blatant anti-vaccination advocacy group?
@Calli and Ababa… If those are your real names, hehehe.
I’m done hiding behind firewalls, https, and spoofed IP addresses. I’m done putting aliases. If they want me, come and get me. But they better “get me” with facts and data, anything else will incur upon them all sorts of trouble.
Sid once “threatened” to go get me at the office and take me to some restaurant in Baltimore. He never delivered, and you all know why. And then there was the laughable instance when Kim “Stagmom” Stagliano “outed” me in the comment thread at AoA. I posted my real name!
Anonymity can only go so far.
You make good points, and I think it’s great you use your real name. I just think real names are a little overrated in the sense that they do not really give us that much more information to use in evaluating a person’s claims. I’m an idealist; I think people’s ideas should stand or fall on their own merits. Who they are is secondary. (I do not use any sort of spoofing; it would likely be easy to work out my real name, if anybody felt inclined to do so.)
That’s funny, being outed by someone when you use your real name. 😀
My real name isn’t Calli Arcale; my first outing on the ‘net was in an online RPG. Calli (short for Callivestigathera) was a name I stole from the Dr Who Role Playing Game’s Dalek expansion pack, and then used as an NPC in some games I was gamemastering. Then, when a friend of mine talked me into joining an online RPG, I just used the character again as it already had stats and such. The RPG was part of a larger BBS, and I eventually got to where I was spending more time in the discussion forums than in the game, and the name stuck from there on out. I think more people know me as Calli Arcale than by my given name. 😉
Calli,
My pseudonym also comes from online gaming. It was actually used by my nephew who played online with my sons and I learned of it in some emails regarding the account. He eventually switched to a different name but I sort of liked it and decided to use it when I started posting comments on some of these blogs.
I think I use a pseudonym for three reasons.
First, I think my arguments should stand or fall on their own merits. Adding my own name doesn’t make them any more or less valid. It would merely be a very weak argument from authority (which I don’t have very much of).
Second, it allows me to preserve a distinction between myself and my current or past employers. When I write my comments, I do so as myself, not as an employee or representative of Company X. Fortunately, on SBM, RI and similar blogs there isn’t much of a conflict of interest anyway.
Third, there are the crazies out there.
That said, I do applaud Rene and others who post under their own names. Since there are some who prefer to resort to threats when their arguments (or, more commonly, lack thereof) fail to convince others, it can be a useful way of telling them to put up or shut up.
The only time I think it is really important to use your own name in a comment is when someone mentioned in the main article or a comment writes a comment to respond.
Well, Calli, if you take your time and look closely at Orac’s posts from way back, I’m in there. The signs are all there. I dropped a lot of hints as to my true identity. I finally “came out” when he posted about my findings on a VAERS report that looked very much like it was Desiree Jennings. Once in a while, just for fun, I’ll use that old moniker, block my IP address, and fool AoA readers into following a link to a story about someone who would otherwise be fine if not for the lack of vaccines (polio, meningitis).
So many doctors and researchers are concerned about vaccine safety
Well, DUH!
I’m concerned about vaccine safety. Who isn’t concerned about vaccine safety? After all, they are given to huge numbers of people. This is why vaccines are tested extensively before being given to the general population
Fortunately, vaccines have proved over the years to be incredibly safe, particularly relative to the risks of the diseases that they protect against.
Trrll, keep telling yourself that. No, I mean many doctors and researchers are of the opinion that vaccines have caused a lot of problems for children, but then I think you know what I meant 😉
Sure, if by “many” you mean more than ten, but a ridiculously small number nonetheless.
I’m still waiting for that list of names I asked you for earlier.
Yeah, didn’t think so.
Any one who does some real research is bound to become anti-vaccine. I too used to be a brain-washed moron, until I found out that vaccination is a fraud. I even got a tetanus booster about 40 years ago when I was still a member of the cult of vaccinology.
“Belief in immunization is a form of delusional insanity.”
Dr. Herbert Shelton,USA
Vaccines have never prevented anything apart from health, sanity and common sense. As far as I am concerned, vaccination is an organised criminal enterprise dressed up as disease prevention.
For further information:
‘Vaccination Information Network’ (VINE)
http://www.facebook.com/pages/Vaccination-Information-Network-VINE/69667273997
“Vaccines have never prevented anything apart from health, sanity and common sense.”
Yeah, last year’s smallpox epidemic was bad, wasn’t it? I’m hoping this summer’s polio epidemic is a bit milder.
Cut Erwin some slack. I mean, he’s done “research.”
Of course, “I’ve done some research” is the first sign that something idiotic coming. Actually, the second – resurecting a 4 month dead thread is the first sign.
Or that Erwin thinks an obviously fake graph is real because he likes the way the Mac Paint line looks: