Thread by @center4inquiry

One day, CFI's legal director Nick Little was scrolling through Facebook, which he totally doesn't spend too much time doing. He can quit any time. Anyway, he was scrolling and look what he found! An advertisement!

(Oh, this is a thread.)

Facebook is FULL of ads, of course, but this one was special. It was by a company called Modern Allergy Management (or "MAM"), and they offer an AMAZING service: they can tell you what you're allergic or intolerant to by analyzing a sample of your hair! WOWEE WOW WOW.

In fact, they say they can test you for intolerance for up to 750 foodstuffs and environmental items. They can even use hair that isn’t from your head—for bald customers—or diagnose your dog, cat, or horse! (For their own intolerances, not yours. We think.)

Capybara owners are out of luck, but you never know what the future will bring.

MAM says they can test you for intolerances to things like gluten, sesame, sugar, nuts, eggs, mushrooms, milk, and a bunch of other things, including GMOs.

Wait a minute.

When Nick saw this during his VERY OCCASIONAL use of Facebook, he was not pleased. No, by golly, not one bit.

Wanna know why? Because there is no such thing as an intolerance to genetically modified products.

You are either intolerant to a product or not intolerant to it.

If you are intolerant to soy or corn or sesame, you are intolerant to GMO soy, GMO corn, or GMO sesame as well as to “natural” forms of it, whatever “natural” actually means.

Nick knew that what MAM was doing here was pure scaremongering, seeking to capitalize on public mistrust for, and misunderstanding of, GMO products to sell its tests.

Nick's not a scientist, and doesn't know if they can test for all those other things they say that can, but, as he puts it, he "sure as hell knows" they can't test for a nonexistent intolerance.

Nick realized that MAM probably ALSO knows they can't test for GMO intolerance, because it's not even on the list of things they test for on their own website.

MAM was stoking up antiscientific fears of GMO products to get people's money. Nick was annoyed.

Actual footage:

So Nick did what he does best: browsed Facebook.

NO WAIT THAT'S WRONG.

He composed a strongly-worded letter to MAM and Facebook, threatening to take legal action. centerforinquiry.org/wp-content/upl…

Now, that may not sound like much to you, but when one gets a strongly-worded letter from the Vice President and General Counsel of CFI, one quakes in one's footwear.

Actual footage of MAM:

Just a couple of days after sending his letter, Nick was on Facebook again, WHICH IS AN INCREDIBLY RARE OCCURRENCE, but here we are.

The SAME AD showed up in his feed, but something was different!

The ad **no longer listed GMOs** as one of the things they test for intolerances for. The purple beaker is still there, but it now says "Drinks." Um, okay, like, all potable liquids? It's not clear.

Now, Nick can't be certain that MAM changed their ad because of his strongly-worded letter.

But, you know, probably.

Nick is itching for a fight. If YOU see ads on social media that make false, pseudoscientific health claims, tell Nick about it at legal(at)centerforinquiry(dot)org.

He, and everyone at CFI, wants to protect consumers from quackery and fake medicine.

Nick's got a lot more strongly-worded letters where that came from. And when the letters don't work, well, that's when things get serious.

Nick says that together, "we can push back against bullshit advertised on social media."

Read Nick's "official" account of this story, "Can You Detect My Intolerance To Pseudoscience?, or, Just the Facts, MAM" at the CFI Blog. centerforinquiry.org/blog/can-you-d…

And if you'd like to join CFI's fight against quackery, pseudoscience, and fake medicine, we need you on our side! Support the effort at centerforinquiry.org/support-cfi/

END!