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There’s some real ‘merchants of doubt’ commentary out there right now – like the tactics of tobacco companies and climate denial lobbies it doesn’t need to be right, it just needs to create controversy. 1/4
Rigorous interpretation of data means understanding data points relative to one another; the conditions under which the data were made; and triangulating across different data sets. That’s as true of historical sources as it is of thermometer readings. Context matters. 2/4
If you remove the relevant context, then you remove the necessary conditions for interpretation. That’s especially irresponsible when the material concerns marginalised groups, because by doing that what you replace it with is the default assumptions of the dominant group. 3/4
When research is open access and text searchable and the context is set out in depth it is hard to see a good faith excuse for making misleading and inaccurate accusations. Unfortunately, the bad faith is very vocal. It shouldn’t need saying but research integrity matters 4/4
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