Lion of the Blogosphere has a good post up about the media’s double standard when it comes to calling out presidential candidates (and their families) for promoting pseudoscience. Perhaps there was no more glaring an example of this hypocrisy than the recent controversy over presidential candidates giving credence to the discredited alleged link between vaccines and autism. When Republican candidates like Governor Christie and Rand Paul expressed ambivalence about vaccines they were derided as anti-science loons and a menace to public health, but when far more influential Democratic candidates did the same thing, liberal elites were either silent, or claimed they were taken out of context.
For example in 2008 Hillary Clinton stated in a written response to the issue:
I am committed to make investments to find the causes of autism, including possible environmental causes like vaccines
One of the few liberal publications that was honest enough to admit that candidates on both sides of the political spectrum have waffled on the vaccine issue is Ezra Klein’s Vox, which noted that in 2008, Barack Obama said the following:
We’ve seen just a skyrocketing autism rate. Some people are suspicious that it’s connected to the vaccines. This person included (gesturing to an audience member). The science right now is inconclusive, but we have to research it.
So how did liberals react when they learned that their God Obama waffled on this all important issue. Similar to how they reacted to the news that their other God, Charles Darwin expressed pro-HBD views. By either outright denial blaming Vox for misrepresenting Obama, or my favorite, claiming Obama was taken out of context: “What he really meant was….”
Apparently, when Obama said “the science right now is inconclusive”, he only meant the science of what causes autism. He couldn’t possibly have meant the science of autism and vaccines, because suggesting a link between vaccines and autism would have made Obama as ignorant or as evil as a Republican, and that’s just not possible because he’s an elegant svelte Democrat who went to Harvard (and half-black to boot!), not an overweight prole Republican like Chris Christie or an uneducated playboy model like Jenny McCarthy. Only the latter two could genuinely be evil or ignorant enough to promote the pseudoscientific anti-vaccine movement, Democrats tell themselves, ignoring the fact that elite liberal regions of America are the most afflicted with anti-vaxxers.
But it should be obvious to any honest liberal that part of Obama’s genius is he’s able to make statements that are ambiguous enough that he can pander to one group at one time, but have plausible deniability if and when his liberal defenders need to cover for him.
Apparently, when Obama said “the science right now is inconclusive”, he only meant the science of what causes autism.
Seems to be the plain meaning of the statement. But even playing devil’s advocate doesn’t get the whole suggestion very far: the MMR controversy was still going on even as late as 2008. While some literature reviews and case studies had been done before 2008, the huge studies and literature reviews that put the Lancet paper definitively to rest came out after 2010.
I understand that you have a reader demographic to which you must cater, and they eat up the liberal conspiracy stuff…but a) this isn’t even the right issue to make this point on — liberals are definitively anti-science on GMOs and nutrition (think the nonsense that is ‘Whole Foods’) and b) there’s more mileage you can get out of this angle when you focus on how liberals are allowed to get away with racist statements while conservatives are not.
I understand that you have a reader demographic to which you must cater, and they eat up the liberal conspiracy stuff
What conspiracy stuff? I’m simply pointing out the double standards liberals display. Just because there are a lot of liberals behaving hypocritically in the service of the same goal, does not imply a conspiracy. It just implies they have access to the internet, television, and newspapers, and thus can learn the propaganda.
And many people can also have the same hypocritical attitudes independently.
You’re implying that a large bloc of people which shares a set of viewpoints has the same goal and acts in the same way to reach that goal. Now sure, it’s not necessarily a conspiracy, but the implication is strong. It’s not unlike using scientific words in a non-scientific sense toward a certain end.
But, fine, “they eat up ‘liberals are hypocrites,” “liberals are BAD,” etc. etc. etc.
The media double standard is truly breathtaking.
I’ll just leave this link here for SSC because there are some very good HBD related links in there you all should check out: http://slatestarcodex.com/2015/02/19/links-215-land-of-linkin/
BTW, is Mugabe gone for good?
I have no idea where Mugabe is. He’s posted prolifically on this blog or my other blog almost every single day for the past many months, yet this week he’s suddenly been completely absent. Haven’t seen him on any other blogs either
Probably for the better. Anyway, check the links on how parental interaction has no effect on whether the child later becomes a criminal or not. Basically shared environment = 0
HBD deniers would just argue that adoption studies do not sample a wide enough range of environments to detect the effect of parenting
For example serial killers often come from horrifically abusive homes (Henry Lee Lucas’ mom made him attend school dressed as a girl) and such terrible parents might not show up in adoption studies (where parents tend to be good )
White privilege is not a conspiracy theory too??
The first observation about human behavior pattern similarities is based in ourselves. Called self knowledge. Education and environment made my personality and intelligence???
NO. I always to be like that’. My behavior is more variable like whealth but my personality no, like climate.
Serious cognitive dissonance.
Ugh. I really hate this vaccines cause autism thing. I have a good copy pasta at home. Will link it later.
These people don’t know what they’re talking about.