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Antivaccine nonsense Autism Complementary and alternative medicine Quackery

“Autism biomed” and the murder of Alex Spourdalakis

Sometimes, in the course of blogging, I come across a story that I don’t know what to make of. Sometimes, it’s a quack or a crank taking a seemingly science-based position. Sometimes it’s something out of the ordinary. Other times, it’s a story that’s just weird, such that I strongly suspect that something else is […]

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Antivaccine nonsense Complementary and alternative medicine Medicine Politics

Why won’t you call me, RFK, Jr.? Let’s talk about vaccines!

What’s Keith Kloor got that I haven’t got? What’s Laura Helmuth got that I haven’t got? Why won’t Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. call me to complain about all the not-so-Respectful Insolence I’ve directed his way over the years. I mean, seriously. I spend nearly eight years criticizing his antivaccine crank views, and these two get […]

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Antivaccine nonsense Cancer Clinical trials Complementary and alternative medicine Medicine

A couple of cranks: Compare and contrast

It was a busy day yesterday, and I had less time than usual to attend to the blog, but that’s OK. This random thought popped into my head after spending the last three days writing about Stanislaw Burzynski, first reviewing Eric Merola’s hagiography and infomercial about him, then seeing how well the BBC did in […]

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Anti-Semitism Antivaccine nonsense Autism Complementary and alternative medicine History Holocaust Medicine

Quoth antivaccinationist Hilary Butler: Non-vaccinators are the “new Jews”

I’ve never been able to figure it out. Antivaccine zealots seem to have an intense love of Nazi analogies and comparing those supporting science-based medicine to Nazis. While from a strictly nasty point of view, I can sort of understand the utility of such analogies to demonize one’s opponents. After all, to political extremists of […]

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Antivaccine nonsense Autism Complementary and alternative medicine Medicine Skepticism/critical thinking

A young antivaccine propagandist plans to teach his mad skillz to other antivaccinationists

As hard as it might be to believe, one time over 20 years ago I actually took the Dale Carnegie course and, as part of that course, read his famous book How To Win Friends and Influence People. I know, I know. It’s probably not obvious from my style of writing on this particular blog, […]