Note the weasel wording/buzz words (“not opposed to #covidvaccines IN GENERAL”) that gives away the game. FLCCC is *clearly* antivax. It’s quite obvious from this statement. If this statement were the only thing I knew about FLCCC, I’d say, “Yep, they’re *definitely* antivax.” 1/
So is this shtick about how “some of us are vaccinated.” Antivax mom groups used to say the same thing prepandemic. Antivax pediatricians would say, “Many of my patients are vaccinated.” 2/
Indeed, taking a “neutral” stance on #CovidVaccine like this while spreading fear of the vaccine based on pseudoscience, bad science, and conspiracy theories is a CLASSIC antivax ploy. I am not fooled. No one should be fooled. 3/
Before #COVID19 antivax doctors did the same sort of thing as @Covid19Critical when asked out as antivax, taking a similar studied “neutral” stance of “not recommending or discouraging vaccination,” all while demonizing vaccines elsewhere, which made their true views obvious. 4/
One pediatrician in particular I remember bragging in response to accusation of being antivax about how he vaccinated patients every day. Meanwhile, he had been quoted saying he would only vaccinate “reluctantly” but “respected parents’ wishes to vaccinate.” 5/
Then there’s Dr. Paul Thomas. He claimed to be “not antivax” and “neutral” regarding vaccines. When his medical license was finally suspended, it turned out that Dr. Thomas had been bullying parents into accepting his “alternative vaccination schedule.” 6/ respectfulinsolence.com/2020/12/14/pau…
I appreciate that Dr. Walker is bending over backwards to be fair and charitable, but I’ve been down this road too many times over the last 20 years. I am not in the least bit convinced that FLCCC is not antivax. In antivax world, “neutral” is NOT truly neutral. It’s antivax. 7/
I mean, their whole conspiracy theory is that science about #Ivermectin being such a “wonder drug” to treat #COVID19 is being “suppressed” in favor of #CovidVaccine. 8/
To believe @Covid19Critical’s “neutral” stance on #COVIDVaccination, you only have to forget about all the antivaccine misinformation about #covidvaccines that they’ve long been spreading and what its member doctors write and say almost every day. 9/9
Forgot to mention: Another obvious “tell” in @Covid19Critical’s statement is the conspicuous lack of a clear statement that current #covidvaccines are safe and effective. This sort of omission is also a classic page from the antivax playbook going way back. 10/10
Upon further thought, I’m starting to conclude that @Covid19Critical might not be strongly antivax, but it has at least some antivax leaders, and it knows its audience, which is definitely antivax. Pandering or antivax? I suspect now it’s a little of both. 11/11
Also, claiming that its science is being “suppressed” in favor of vaccines works so much better as a sales pitch and a conspiracy theory if the vaccines are *also* portrayed as ineffective/dangerous/etc. 12/12
When CALLED out as antivax.🤦🏻‍♂️

And here I thought I'd gotten through the thread without a single typo/autocorrect/predictive typing error.😬

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More from @gorskon

12 Aug
This applies to *all* pundits regardless of topic or profession, actually.

An interesting (I hope) anecdote follows. 1/ mcgill.ca/science/outrea…
in 2010 I was invited by @joeschwarcz to speak about cancer quackery at the Trottier Symposium in Montreal, with @bengoldacre, @michaelshermer, and James Randi. It was a huge honor to me. 2/
The night before the symposium, there was a roundtable discussion with a lot more guests than just the main speakers. 3/
Read 12 tweets
11 Aug
Amazing how many people have credulously fallen for @missmayim's attempt to memory hole her previous antivaccine stylings by doing a video last fall saying she'd get #CovidVaccine and then bragging about how she got it when she finally did. Actually, no, it's not amazing.
In any event, Bialik hasn't really changed, at least not much. She still spews antivax talking points but has just decided that she thinks #CovidVaccine is OK because of how bad #COVID19 is.
For a reminder, this is the sort of antivax nonsense she was spewing in 2012. What she says in the video in the previous Tweet is not materially much different, if different at all, just "kinder, gentler" and more canny. respectfulinsolence.com/2012/02/21/say…
Read 5 tweets
11 Aug
WTF, @jeopardy? This is in a way almost worse than the first deal. So now, on the one hand, you have a man with a history of misogyny hosting part of the time. On the other hand, you have an antivaxxer and supplement hawker @missmayim hosting the rest.🙄🤦🏻‍♂️ washingtonpost.com/arts-entertain…
What's a @jeopardy fan to do. Alex Trebek must be doing backflips in his grave right now.
I mean, @jeopardy: Do you remember all the times Alex Trebek made nasty comments about pregnant models or fired them? I don't either. Ditto the times he promoted antivaccine misinformation and hawked bogus "brain health" supplements.
Read 8 tweets
10 Aug
Back in the early days of my blog, I had a recurring shtick in which I’d go on and on and on about feeling the need to put a paper bag over my head whenever a fellow surgeon wrote embarrassing pseudoscience. 2/
Back in those days, it was mostly surgeons spewing evolution denial (a.k.a.) creationist nonsense. (A certain frequently offending neurosurgeon comes to mind.) 3/
Read 4 tweets
21 Jul
Having unwillingly undergone a five week intensive exposure to "gender critical" arguments, I've concluded that a disturbing number of them boil down to taking "Ew, trans people ick me out" and cranking that feeling up to, "Trans people are an abomination against nature/God/etc."
Look, there are scientific controversies surrounding the treatment of trans adolescents, but a dispassionate, science-based discussion of how best to medically and surgically treat trans teens is not what the GC movement is about.
Moreover, science denialism is less about how "settled" a given scientific/medical issue is and more about the types of misleading arguments and conspiracy theories deployed against that issue.
Read 5 tweets
19 Jul
Some very basic points:
1. You should know that the Nuremberg Code ONLY applies to human subjects research. You should ALSO know that, after phase 3 trials with 10s of thousands of subjects and hundreds of millions of doses, #CovidVaccine is NOT human subjects research anymore.
2. Calling #CovidVaccine "experimental" is a conflation of a legal definition of "investigational," in which @US_FDA requires that designation on any drug not yet given a full FDA approval. Scientifically, it's just not true any more.
3. The Nuremberg Code is nearly 75 yrs old and mainly of historical interest. It was long ago supplanted by the Belmont Report and Declaration of Helsinki. Both ALSO emphasize informed consent, but antivaxxers love the Nuremberg Code because of its association with Nazi doctors.
Read 9 tweets

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