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Antivaccine nonsense Medicine Politics Skepticism/critical thinking

Nazis. With the Brownstone Institute it’s always Nazis.

The Brownstone Institute is once again promoting the tired narrative that public health interventions for COVID-19 are incipient fascism and those supporting them Nazis. Unfortunately, this false narrative resonates.

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Medicine Politics Pseudoscience Skepticism/critical thinking

No, there is no evidence that Hillary Clinton has Parkinson’s disease

Remember Vox Day? Vox Day is the pseudonym used by a truly vile man named Theodore Beale. I first encountered him 11 years ago on the precursor to this blog, thanks to his antivaccine stylings and outright misogyny. Later, I learned the depths of his wingnuttery, such as his accepting pseudoscientific claims that vaccines cause […]

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Antivaccine nonsense Autism Complementary and alternative medicine History Holocaust Quackery World War II

The autism “Holocaust”? Why antivaccine advocates are not autism advocates

A typical response to a charge of being antivaccine coming from someone whose rhetoric is definitely antivaccine is to clutch her pearls mightily and retort, “I’m not ‘anti-vaccine.’ I’m pro-vaccine safety.” Similarly, a common retort of antivaccinationists who believe that vaccines cause autism, particularly those who believe that vaccines caused their children’s autism, is to […]

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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 Medicine

The annals of “I’m not anti-vaccine,” part 7 (argumentum ad Nazium edition #2, 2011)

Time and time again, anti-vaccine activists will piously and self-righteously tell those of us who criticize their pseudoscientific fear mongering, “I’m not anti-vaccine,” followed by something like, “I’m pro-vaccine safety,” “I’m a vaccine safety watchdog,” or “I’m pro-safe vaccine.” Nothing puts the lie to these denials better than looking at the sorts of things anti-vaccine […]