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On April 6, William Shatner had a Twitter spat with noted physician Dr. David H. Gorski, founder of Science-Based Medicine, a blog which takes a sceptical and scientific look at controversial medical claims. A few days earlier Shatner made pleas to support Autism Speaks, a controversial group which has has been criticised for an approach which stigmatises autism, and for only recently changing its position from suggesting a link between vaccines and autism to accepting the overwhelming science that such a link does not exist (and they still don't seem to have unequivocally rejected anti-vaccine views). Many people attempted to call Shatner out on this, including Dr. Gorski, and Shatner responded by doubling down and responding with hit pieces on Dr. Gorski from dubious pseudoscience sites critical of him, such as TruthWiki, Newstarget, and NaturalNews. Slate has an article about the incident:
With that, millions of followers were treated to a hit piece about Gorski hosted by TruthWiki. It's hard to overstate the unreliability of TruthWiki, a haphazard collection of conspiracy theories and pseudoscientific nonsense riddled with typos and bizarre assertions. The exercise section, for instance, includes only two entries: "Natural Help for Diabetes" and "Deepak Chopra's Eye Exercises."
When Science-Based Medicine objected to Shatner's tweet, he posted another set of links discrediting Gorski, this time to the websites Newstarget (motto: "Obliterating Your Safe Spaces With Truth Bombs") and NaturalNews, which is run by Mike Adams, aka "the Health Ranger"—who also founded TruthWiki.
"All on Google," he added after them, as if that certified their authenticity.
NaturalNews is like TruthWiki but without the veneer of reliability: It's a cesspool of pseudo-scientific insanity seasoned generously with political vitriol and outlandish conspiracy theories. That's not biased journalism—it's the only way to report accurately on the site.
[...]Shatner is a celebrity, which means that he has outsized influence. That he would use his platform to lend credibility to such sites, spreading them to 2.5 million followers, could have terrible consequences. Shatner has made his support of vaccination very clear, but NaturalNews has tons of "articles" demonizing vaccinations—an example is a video titled "Vaccine Cannibalism Exposed." But there's an upside: The real-time tweeting of his thought process provides a helpful window into the practices of everyday intelligent people trying to figure out the truth. They Google, they find a few articles that confirm their biases, and they're done. No matter that the articles are on websites that spread virulent misinformation. What look like dead giveaways of quackery for some go completely unnoticed. This is instructive, even if it's frustrating.
It's unfortunate that Shatner is now on the receiving end of a lot of outrage because of a few misinformed tweets. At the same time, celebrities wield tremendous power, and to be cliché about it, that comes with some responsibility. I can only hope this will serve as a lesson to him and to others about the importance of applying information literacy before tweeting. Ideally, he would have perhaps recognized his misstep and deleted the problematic tweets instead of doubling down, but human pride is a powerful thing.
As for the rest of us, well, let's just say that a part of information literacy is realizing that just because someone is famous doesn't mean they have it.
Dr. Gorski himself (writing under the pseudonym Orac) has written of the affair from his perspective.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday April 08 2017, @08:41PM (15 children)
Autism Speaks can be considered as site that condones oppression and extinction of people that have Asperger or Autism. They also perpetuate misrepresentation of the group. One group with interests in the organization is parents that just want to cure people of autism even if it calls for exorcism and the patient gets traumatized for life.
Oh, did I forget the self interest of obtaining funds..
As for being famous. A lot of people are famous but when the amount of attention to your person is higher than the mental capability it will eventually show. Being famous carries responsibilities, but they just aren't capable of exactly that. People are also fallible regardless and with constant scrutiny, people will eventually slipup.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday April 08 2017, @09:00PM (14 children)
A lot of people are famous but when the amount of attention to your person is higher than the mental capability it will eventually show.
Kanye and the Kardashians are prime examples.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday April 08 2017, @09:17PM
I think that's a special case. It even says something about the fans too.. ;)
It's almost pathetic how people assume that because someone can act, sing, look pretty, etc. That they have any mental capability that counts.
Another more sneaky practice is to label someone a professor. But forgetting to tell what they are a professor in.
Or assume that knowledge that has been acquired outside the educational-industrial-complex doesn't amount to anything.
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Saturday April 08 2017, @10:26PM (5 children)
Sorry... who?
Did I fail to pay attention to something significant?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday April 08 2017, @10:33PM (4 children)
Kanye is/was going to run for POTUS 2020. Kardashians is a new earthquake fault running through Hollywood, it's crack is deeper than the Grand canyon.
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Saturday April 08 2017, @10:40PM (1 child)
Thanks. I haven't lost anything of importance then.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday April 09 2017, @01:16AM
Idiocracy was a documentary..
(Score: 5, Insightful) by butthurt on Sunday April 09 2017, @05:34AM (1 child)
> Kanye is/was going to run for POTUS 2020.
If Mr. Shatner is really treating his readers on Twitter to "conspiracy theories and pseudoscientific nonsense riddled with typos and bizarre assertions" it may be a sign that he, too, has his eyes on the presidency.
(Score: 2) by butthurt on Thursday April 13 2017, @11:49AM
(but probably not, for he is Canadian)
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday April 08 2017, @10:40PM (4 children)
A lot of people are famous but when the amount of attention to your person is higher than the mental capability it will eventually show.
Kanye and the Kardashians are prime examples.
And yet, as the current POTUS has demonstrated, with enough celebrity you can get a ~35% of the population to support you without question.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday April 09 2017, @05:22PM (3 children)
What the current POTUS is a good example at is that when the choice is between a crook and a businessman people will choose the lesser evil. Adding to the fuel is that the crook supporters direct their militia to harass the parts of the population that contribute a lot in terms of hard cash and a lot of other tangible societal contributions.
Media and a lot of others seems to have gigantic blind spots both in input and mental capability to analyze what's going on.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday April 09 2017, @05:30PM
Nah, the current potus is a good example of how a con-man can take advantage of Cardinal Richelieu's most famous quotation. The Cardinal was so correct in his observation that not only did you buy it, you still desperately cling to it so as not to accept culpability for your complete and utter failure to do your civic duty.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by mcgrew on Sunday April 09 2017, @06:28PM (1 child)
Except that the "businessman" WAS a proven crook, as he settled a fraud case against him. Nobody ever proved Clinton was a crook, fools simply believed the real crook's vacuous lies.
The President is also a proven racist, as he was found guilty, twice, of housing discrimination based on race. THAT is what got Trump elected--every racist, bigot, and nationalist showed up at the polls to vote for him. Then there was Clinton's poor campaign, Russia, and a lot of other variables (including the electors; Clinton won the popular vote).
mcgrewbooks.com mcgrew.info nooze.org
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday April 10 2017, @09:59PM
You really are separate from reality. The truth is, more minorities and women voted for Trump than most recent republican presidential candidates have had. Remember also, exactly zero presidential races in the US have been decided by popular vote. The popular vote is only a thing because the media makes it a thing. With Jill Steins silly "recount", they discovered there were even more voters for Trump than previously counted anyway and eve *gasp* voter fraud! Especially in areas like Detroit with counties reporting more votes for Clinton than they had voters. Keep thinking like you do though. Trump will get elected to a second term as long as people like you keep bleating your spittle laced rants.
(Score: 0, Disagree) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday April 08 2017, @10:56PM (1 child)
Wait! What do Chuck Norris and Ted Nugent say about vaccines and autism? Enquiring Minds want to know!
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday April 09 2017, @01:34AM
Ted Nugent seems to be silent on the matter, but here you go [scienceblogs.com].