Homeopathy is water.
Lots of people out there think that homeopathy is some kind of "natural medicine" (both false) that is a reasonable comparison to "western" medicine. These people have heard all sorts of things in the news making homeopathy sound like a reasonable choice. But, in my experience, almost none of these people realize that homeopathy is almost always 100% water. So, in my tiny effort to spread the truth about this nonsense, the following is how to create your very own homeopathic cure! Specifically the homeopathic product Oscillococcinum, a product that is marketed as flu relief.
Step 1: Get a duck heart and liver and grind them into a paste.
Step 2: Take a single drop of that paste and dilute it with 100 drops of water.
Step 3: Shake vigorously.
Step 4: Take a single drop of this new solution and dilute it with 100 drops of water.
Step 5: Shake vigorously.
Step 6: Repeat steps 4 and 5 four hundred (400) times in a row.
Step 7: Drink 1 gram of this solution!
...
Yes, that's really it. Check out homeopathy and Oscillococcinum on Wikipedia if you don't believe me. How does this in theory work? Well, you see, when you shake the solution the water "remembers" the important bits, and you therefore gain all the benefits even though you are diluting the original solution.
...
Doesn't make any sense, does it? That's because homeopathy is batshit insane. Water memory? Diluting it makes it stronger? And why in the fuck would you start with a freaking duck heart and liver?
So remember, next time someone mentions homeopathy, there's only one response to that: "Homeopathy is water".
I will also accept "Homeopathy is bullshit." Not technically true, but it sure gets the point across.
January 12, 2011
Immunize for Good
http://www.immunizeforgood.com/
I have become a crusader for vaccines, as you may have noticed. Now whenever I need someone to read up on vaccines and get the actual unvarnished truth, I have a great website to send them to, that being Immunize for Good as seen above. It gives direct honest answers while not sweeping anything under the rug. As sources of information about vaccines go, this is about the best one I've seen. It's easily accessible for anyone who can read, laid out simply and logically, and a lot better than trying to wade through forum discussions to find the truth. Spread the word!
I have become a crusader for vaccines, as you may have noticed. Now whenever I need someone to read up on vaccines and get the actual unvarnished truth, I have a great website to send them to, that being Immunize for Good as seen above. It gives direct honest answers while not sweeping anything under the rug. As sources of information about vaccines go, this is about the best one I've seen. It's easily accessible for anyone who can read, laid out simply and logically, and a lot better than trying to wade through forum discussions to find the truth. Spread the word!
January 11, 2011
The AZ nightmare
As someone who found out about the shooting thing early this morning by reading a blog, I'm a bit behind on the commenting/twitter/whatever conflagration that's going on right now. I have thoughts that I really want to work through, so here I go.
"Don't politicize this tragedy!"
It's kind of hard not to politicize an attempted assassination of a political figure. However, it's really easy to hide behind politicization to avoid actually having to think clearly. This whole Sarah Palin nonsense is just that, utter nonsense. Yes she made an inappropriate graphic, that's not in question, but did that graphic cause this situation? Um... That's one hell of a stretch. Yes it would be nice to have someone to blame, but life is never so easy.
What about the fact that it was a right wing psycho that killed a left wing target? Well, Loughner (the assassin) wasn't a right wing psycho. He was described as liberal by his friends, he has been reported as a registered Republican and Independent which is confusing, and unless the Tea Party put the Communist Manifesto on their reading list recently, he's just not fitting the cookie cutter "right wing" shape.
Well Giffords was obviously a right wing target, I mean, remember that Sarah Palin document? Once again, details cloud the issue: Giffords was a "Blue Dog" democrat, which isn't the leftest of the lefts. As much as it would be easy to say this is is Red on Blue crime, reality complicates things by not making perfect sense.
Most importantly, we don't, as far I as know right now, know why this happened. It may not have been politically motivated. It seems to make logical sense, but as someone once said "Logic is a method by which we go wrong with confidence." This situation is neither simple nor easy and certainly isn't logical. I read today that Loughner had a gripe with Giffords because she failed to answer one of his fairly incoherent questions to his satisfaction, but was that enough to drive him to try to kill her? As he's not talking, we may never know.
Guns
I have heard over and over that if this man didn't have access to a gun this never would have happened. As this particular event took place outside, Loughner could have done as much damage, or more, with a well aimed car. One of the main reasons the shooting stopped where it did was because Loughner took time to reload and was overwhelmed by two bystanders. Imagine if he had brought a sword and was any good with it? Don't need to reload a sword. He could have done as much damage and more. Yes, the gun is bad, but if sufficiently motivated, any weapon would have done.
I have also heard that a bystander helped the situation by pulling his legally concealed weapon and firing on Loughner, but I can't verify that.
I'm sure I'm beating a dead horse here, but it's not a gun that killed those people, it was a person. He made the choice.
Mentally Ill.
As I am mentally ill, this particular point is really grating on my nerves. I am mentally ill; I have mentally ill friends; the stigma attached to "mentally ill" is not fair to the millions of people in this country who are mentally ill but wouldn't ever do something like this. Not every person with a mental illness is sitting on the edge of a knife, a random thought away from a murder spree.
I've heard it guessed, by a doctor no less, that Loughner was very likely a paranoid schizophrenic and I tend to agree that this is likely. I still have to point out that for every paranoid schizophrenic that does something horrible like this, there are tens if not hundreds of thousands who do not. Demonizing the diagnosis isn't helping anyone, and may indeed endanger people who have this diagnosis. It makes as much sense to say that every person who has a heart defect will eventually die because of that heart defect.
Jared Lee Loughner
This man killed 6 people and wounded at least 14 others. It bothers me that this, his defining moment, will be all we're ever likely to know about the man since he's not talking. He'll be branded as left or right wing, a psycho, and a killer. But is that all there is to him? Just some political beliefs and that he killed people? He liked the Communist Manifesto and Mein Kampf, but is that it?
It is the usual reaction of people to take someone like this, paint him in black and white, and leave it alone. But this young man made choices, some good, some very bad, and I want to know why. Aside from his choices, he was also a son, a friend, someone who read a lot, and had strong opinions. He liked YouTube and MySpace. He read The Wizard of Oz, Peter Pan, Gulliver's Travels, and Through The Looking Glass. I want more.
My point is Loughner was a person. Whatever his faults may have been, however bad his choices, he was still a person and should be treated as more than just a killer. Yes, he killed people, but if we brush the person off, accept the "right wing psycho" label, and don't try to understand why he did what he did, how can we ever hope to prevent this in the future? He had friends and family. They could see he was unhinged. Could they have done anything to help? Is there anything useful we can learn from Loughner's tragically bad choices?
Imprisoning all the mentally ill isn't an option. Telling politicians they can't do anything that can possibly be taken out of context in a bad light isn't going to work. Restricting guns from responsible adults won't work. We need to find out, from Loughner, how he could have been reached, how someone could have helped prevent this tragedy. Otherwise, we're doomed to repeat this tragedy.
"Don't politicize this tragedy!"
It's kind of hard not to politicize an attempted assassination of a political figure. However, it's really easy to hide behind politicization to avoid actually having to think clearly. This whole Sarah Palin nonsense is just that, utter nonsense. Yes she made an inappropriate graphic, that's not in question, but did that graphic cause this situation? Um... That's one hell of a stretch. Yes it would be nice to have someone to blame, but life is never so easy.
What about the fact that it was a right wing psycho that killed a left wing target? Well, Loughner (the assassin) wasn't a right wing psycho. He was described as liberal by his friends, he has been reported as a registered Republican and Independent which is confusing, and unless the Tea Party put the Communist Manifesto on their reading list recently, he's just not fitting the cookie cutter "right wing" shape.
Well Giffords was obviously a right wing target, I mean, remember that Sarah Palin document? Once again, details cloud the issue: Giffords was a "Blue Dog" democrat, which isn't the leftest of the lefts. As much as it would be easy to say this is is Red on Blue crime, reality complicates things by not making perfect sense.
Most importantly, we don't, as far I as know right now, know why this happened. It may not have been politically motivated. It seems to make logical sense, but as someone once said "Logic is a method by which we go wrong with confidence." This situation is neither simple nor easy and certainly isn't logical. I read today that Loughner had a gripe with Giffords because she failed to answer one of his fairly incoherent questions to his satisfaction, but was that enough to drive him to try to kill her? As he's not talking, we may never know.
Guns
I have heard over and over that if this man didn't have access to a gun this never would have happened. As this particular event took place outside, Loughner could have done as much damage, or more, with a well aimed car. One of the main reasons the shooting stopped where it did was because Loughner took time to reload and was overwhelmed by two bystanders. Imagine if he had brought a sword and was any good with it? Don't need to reload a sword. He could have done as much damage and more. Yes, the gun is bad, but if sufficiently motivated, any weapon would have done.
I have also heard that a bystander helped the situation by pulling his legally concealed weapon and firing on Loughner, but I can't verify that.
I'm sure I'm beating a dead horse here, but it's not a gun that killed those people, it was a person. He made the choice.
Mentally Ill.
As I am mentally ill, this particular point is really grating on my nerves. I am mentally ill; I have mentally ill friends; the stigma attached to "mentally ill" is not fair to the millions of people in this country who are mentally ill but wouldn't ever do something like this. Not every person with a mental illness is sitting on the edge of a knife, a random thought away from a murder spree.
I've heard it guessed, by a doctor no less, that Loughner was very likely a paranoid schizophrenic and I tend to agree that this is likely. I still have to point out that for every paranoid schizophrenic that does something horrible like this, there are tens if not hundreds of thousands who do not. Demonizing the diagnosis isn't helping anyone, and may indeed endanger people who have this diagnosis. It makes as much sense to say that every person who has a heart defect will eventually die because of that heart defect.
Jared Lee Loughner
This man killed 6 people and wounded at least 14 others. It bothers me that this, his defining moment, will be all we're ever likely to know about the man since he's not talking. He'll be branded as left or right wing, a psycho, and a killer. But is that all there is to him? Just some political beliefs and that he killed people? He liked the Communist Manifesto and Mein Kampf, but is that it?
It is the usual reaction of people to take someone like this, paint him in black and white, and leave it alone. But this young man made choices, some good, some very bad, and I want to know why. Aside from his choices, he was also a son, a friend, someone who read a lot, and had strong opinions. He liked YouTube and MySpace. He read The Wizard of Oz, Peter Pan, Gulliver's Travels, and Through The Looking Glass. I want more.
My point is Loughner was a person. Whatever his faults may have been, however bad his choices, he was still a person and should be treated as more than just a killer. Yes, he killed people, but if we brush the person off, accept the "right wing psycho" label, and don't try to understand why he did what he did, how can we ever hope to prevent this in the future? He had friends and family. They could see he was unhinged. Could they have done anything to help? Is there anything useful we can learn from Loughner's tragically bad choices?
Imprisoning all the mentally ill isn't an option. Telling politicians they can't do anything that can possibly be taken out of context in a bad light isn't going to work. Restricting guns from responsible adults won't work. We need to find out, from Loughner, how he could have been reached, how someone could have helped prevent this tragedy. Otherwise, we're doomed to repeat this tragedy.
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