Mother Jones Writer Ridicules Oprahs Free Speech Stance on Vaccination Conversation
GOOD GRIEF: This is how fast and furious the vaccine injury denialists (aka pharmaceutical industry) can step on the neck of anyone it fears could call out their bullsh*t. Oprah Winfrey is pretty much an American treasure. The mere mention of her as a Presidential candidate must have riled up the troops to get writin' and fightin' and discreditin' Winfrey for having the audacity to allow many of our friends - including AofA's own Katie Wright - to discuss vaccine injury and autism on her talk show more than ten (10!) years ago. Read a snip of Mother Jones writer Megan Jula, a 2016 college graduate, which puts her at maybe 24 years of age, below. Her tone is classic "debunkisms" fed from the pharma playbook. Of course, Ms. Jula has a damn good chance of having a child of her own with vaccine injury and perhaps even autism. We'll be here if she needs us. We hope she never does. We don't roll that way . We don't wish ill on others as so many have wished our kids to die from"vaccine preventable" disease. And we never will.
I hope Oprah takes note of the instant attack. We want a world where 1 in 36 kids does not hear "And YOU get autism! And YOU get autism! And YOU get autism!!!"
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From Mother Jones
Calls for Oprah Winfrey to run for president may have begun as a joke, but in the wake of her rousing Golden Globes speech, speculation has swirled. CNN even ran live updates on a potential “Oprah 2020” campaign on Monday. President Donald Trump told reporters he doubts Winfrey will run, though he also declared he would win a campaign against her.
Some progressives welcomed the idea that Winfrey, a popular media icon whose star power could eclipse even that of Trump, might take on the president in 2020. Winfrey, who endorsed Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton, is well know for championing a wide range of important causes, such as promoting reading and founding the Leadership Academy for Girls in Johannesburg, South Africa. But there’s one area in which Winfrey and her would-be opponent are surprisingly alike: Both she and Trump have helped spread the inaccurate—and dangerous—myth that vaccines cause autism or other health problems.
@ Jonathan Rose
Great article on fake news (and great plug for AoA) at: https://opendemocracy.net/jonathan-rose/fake-news-didn-t-start-with-donald-trump
Looking forward to reading your "Reader's Liberation" book.
Thanks for everything you do.
Posted by: Mama Grizzly | January 13, 2018 at 12:18 PM
Person, I stand by what I said, albeit you may not think my word choice was politically correct. Absolutely, kudos to all the hard fighting women in this fight for child health; sad to say but Oprah seems to be ineffectual if not part of the swamp.
While things are going very slow with Trump and nothing good has happened specific to vaccines, I have faith that he is clearing the way with bigger issues first. Patience.
Posted by: False scientists | January 12, 2018 at 08:25 PM
Carol,
That is a good find. MJ also had a great article a few years ago about the research demonstrating that lead was responsible for the spike in crime and its subsequent decline.
http://www.motherjones.com/environment/2016/02/lead-exposure-gasoline-crime-increase-children-health/
Posted by: David Weiner | January 12, 2018 at 10:29 AM
Here's the best video I could find, to show how ANIMAL moms (..and dads!!) instinctively understand the importance of protecting their babies
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KnIxm-RS21Q
Here's the best video I could find, to show how HUMAN moms and dads, instinctively understand the importance of protecting their babies
(.... Sorry, couldn't find a single video .....)
So instead, I selected the following image:
http://beespace.net/blog/wp-content/uploads/2009/01/blogging.jpg
to show how little our 'blogging' has actually accomplished, when it comes to preventing other people's children from being injured by vaccines.
Just sayin'
Posted by: Barry | January 11, 2018 at 08:18 PM
Mother Jones used to be pretty good, as this 2004 article, "Toxic Tipping Point," shows: http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2011/02/toxic-tipping-point/
But something happened thereafter leading to the late addition of the comical Editors' Note.
Posted by: Carol | January 11, 2018 at 07:56 PM
Jonathan: Thanks for the heads-up about your book. My first order of business in the morning will be to go to B&N to pick it up or order it, as the case may be.
Posted by: Gary Ogden | January 11, 2018 at 07:13 PM
"My science is named Evan, and he's at home" McCarthy said. "That's my science"
That's actually the opposite of science -- it's an anecdotal assumption --
*******
It blows my mind, when I see a paid talking head resort to this line of reasoning in the defense of vaccines.
It's an asinine argument! Because there IS no bigger anecdotal assumption, than the claim that vaccines are safe and effective.
You can spend your whole life looking, but you will never find a shred of science which proves that vaccines are effective... or safe.
Posted by: Barry | January 11, 2018 at 06:30 PM
Truth in the comments looks like the old one divide and rule first act cause confusion to disunite movements that would be stronger together.
Interesting to see how it plays out...
https://www.infowars.com/pop-singer-slams-oprah-over-weinstein-youve-been-part-of-the-problem-for-decades/
Pharma For Prison
MMR RIP
Posted by: Angus Files | January 11, 2018 at 05:54 PM
Didn't Oprah just deliver a ridiculous rant defending the mainstream media's integrity? Maybe this attack is karma for that idiocy.
Posted by: David Weiner | January 11, 2018 at 04:59 PM
I recall in her interview with Del Bigtree Jenny McCarthy mentioning something referring to the many calls the Oprah Winfrey show had received concerning the issue of vaccine-induced autism prior even to her appearance on Ms. Winfrey's show. I believe Ms. Winfrey has first hand knowledge of this issue unlike any other icon of her caliber. Unlike Trump, I don't think she would throw the vaccine-injured and their parents under the bus with her HHS and CDC appointments. While racism and misogyny make for good TV, I really do believe they had far less to do with winning Trump's win then this issue did. How is it that Democrats believe a disease that afflicts 1 in 36 American children does not hit the ballot box? I hope Ms Winfrey is made aware of Lipkin's lawsuit so she doesn't fall for the same trap that Mr. DeNiro did.
WINFREY/KENNEDY 2020!!!!!!!
Posted by: annie | January 11, 2018 at 04:58 PM
Just as the media attacks on Vaxxed backfired and publicized the film, these attacks on Oprah may well backfire. Remember, young couples who are planning to have children today are too young to remember Jenny McCarthy's appearance on Oprah, which happened a decade ago. Now the much-distrusted mainstream media (staffed largely by sexual harassers) is telling them that the much-trusted Oprah thinks they should listen to Jenny. They might just do that.
My new book "Readers' Liberation" doesn't address autism per se, but it does argue that the media is riddled with "fake news" and manipulative PR -- and it recommends that readers have to find the truth for themselves. I've just published an excerpt from the book in the UK webpaper OpenDemocracy (and note the plug for AoA):
https://opendemocracy.net/jonathan-rose/fake-news-didn-t-start-with-donald-trump
Posted by: Jonathan Rose | January 11, 2018 at 03:30 PM
Google "Oprah" and "vaccine."
The results read like a Who's Who of corporatist publications and amoral cranks.
Posted by: nhokkanen | January 11, 2018 at 02:50 PM
These articles haven't trickled down to the Buzzfeed crowd yet, btw (you know who I mean, those who get their news alerts from Facebook). They're still all "Oprah rocks!" I give it the weekend. The hate-object Jenny "bimbo Playboy bunny" is red meat to them.
Ironic, that in this age of fake science there still exists science; it's within these propaganda tracts, disseminated en masse like wildflower seeds from a benevolent gardener. They are very scientifically created. This is science in 21st c America - the science of deceit, the scientific perfection of propaganda, achieved by media control. This is where the 'topminds' of today coalesce. It's all self-injurious to them in the end but what can we expect from a generation who have been poisoned? Self injury is practically a hallmark. "That stupid Playboy Bunny I hope she dies!!"; this is the level of the average intellect. It's like a pickpocket in a crowd of the blind and the deaf.
Posted by: Joy B | January 11, 2018 at 02:20 PM
@false scientists Trump really is taking the circuitous route to draining the swamp. He should be getting there about 2075 at the rate he is going despite his praised "man balls". So far man balls have not been that effective in this area and anyway someone should point out that he is headed in the wrong direction.
By the way kudos to all the hundreds or thousands of women really fighting for vaccine safety every single day. No man balls but actually getting something done.
Posted by: Person | January 11, 2018 at 02:15 PM
How fortuitous for the corporate sector(choose any) that the new generation, having been sufficiently poisoned and brain-damaged, are ever more willing to deny these connections without any objective examination of the subject at all. To me what it is all starting to look like is that the past few decades of experimentation have been towards the goal of finding the perfect level of poison. We're in the last stage, profit. Even the victims are clamoring for continued injustice.
I am seeing millennials all around me having their first children, consuming as many vaccines as possible before during and after, themselves. Then come the inevitable stories of "my son screamed for months", "my daughter had a rash and was irritable for a year", "he's slow to talk", "she's sensitive to textures in food...". These millennial parents don't see much out of place because their own childhoods were similar. And they are also fighting peculiar physical symptoms - autoimmune issues, anxiety, IBS. None of them are drug free and clear minded, due to these things which nearly all of them are medicated one or more for. We need a multi-generation-rescue at this point.
Posted by: Joy B | January 11, 2018 at 01:55 PM
At the time of Oprah's taping of the show on children with Autism in 2007, 1 in 150 children in America had Autism. At the time of this "Age of Autism" article at the start of 2018, 1 in 36 children have Autism; from 1 in 25 to 1 in27 boys, 1 in 14 children are Developmentally Disabled Not including Autism, 1 in 5 children under age 5 have seizures, 1 in 5 high school kids has ADHD, 1 in 3 toddlers now requires Speech, physical or occupational therapy just to walk or talk .I guess we got better at diagnosing children who can't walk or talk, as if kids who could not walk or talk 20 years ago were simply Undiagnosed-tee hee. Vaccines with Neurotoxic Aluminum, Thimerosal/Mercury, Formaldehyde, antifreeze is surely something to TALK about!
Posted by: Shelley Tzorfas | January 11, 2018 at 01:32 PM
Winfrey just got Couriced. The real test of Winfrey's character, her integrity comes now. Will she stand up to medicopharma media bullies? Or will she do a "the sky is blue..."? I think it could be equally or better to write Oprah. We shall see, won't we?
Posted by: michael | January 11, 2018 at 01:10 PM
Oprah wouldn't do squat about vaccines. Trump may be taking the circuitous route with the swamp draining, but I think he has the man balls to keep going. I believe the vaccine cabal that is leaving our young decimated, will not be getting away with their tactics much longer.
Posted by: False scientists | January 11, 2018 at 12:27 PM
A while back Alison Singer openly bragged in the Guardian that she had helped organize a coordinated media assault on Vaxxed, including even Teen Vogue. (Evidently the editors of Teen Vogue thought that if you tell teenagers not to watch a movie, they won't.) Anyway, they seem to have swung into action again.
Posted by: Jonathan Rose | January 11, 2018 at 11:56 AM
statnews did a hit piece on Winfrey also.
https://www.statnews.com/2018/01/09/oprah-2020-unscientific-advice
I wonder what backdoor channel compensated them for this.
Posted by: greyone | January 11, 2018 at 11:14 AM
I agree that the liberal media is vaccine-indoctrinated, but I don't see that the conservative media is any better (e.g. Fox News). Happy to be proven wrong if anyone has examples...links...
I like Sally's point - "We need one of our esteemed experts to pitch TED for a talk that makes the point that efficacy (yep, they *do* often work) and safety (and, yet, they often DO injure) are two different matters."
Why can't experts on our side get a hearing from any of the media? Maybe a stupid question, but maybe a targeted approach - from a number of experts - would work.
Posted by: Aimee Doyle | January 11, 2018 at 11:06 AM
Comment #2. I just finished reading her article. What a bunch of tripe! She really has NO IDEA what she's talking about and she is just parroting the media echo chamber. How old is she? I'm in with the picture campaign I suggested. c/o Mother Jones, 222 Sutter St., Suite 600, San Francisco, CA 94108 She needs some visuals.
Posted by: Sally Rubin | January 11, 2018 at 10:25 AM
Mother Jones magazine is hopelessly pro-vaccine-indoctrinated. But, so is TEDTalks. We need one of our esteemed experts to pitch TED for a talk that makes the point that efficacy (yep, they *do* often work) and safety (and, yet, they often DO injure) are two different matters.
And, I don't think it would hurt for Megan Jula to receive a massive letter write-in campaign giving her some other material to work with for her reporting. How about we send before and after pictures of our vaccine-injured kids to her? c/o Mother Jones, 222 Sutter St., Suite 600, San Francisco, CA 94108
Posted by: Sally Rubin | January 11, 2018 at 10:08 AM
Apparently .. Mother Jones is not the only media outlet to unleash a "fast and furious" attack on "vaccine injury denialists (aka pharmaceutical industy) .. eager to "step on the neck of anyone it fears could call out their bullsh*t.
Consider the following .. (edited for brevity) .. from a NY Post column written by Maureen Callahan on this past Tuesday, Jan 9, 2018:
"Winfrey is a singular presence in the culture. She is entirely self-made and a decades long mover in TV, film, publishing and philanthropy. As of 2017, she was one of only two women on Forbes Black Billionaires list. There is much to be admired ....... but none of it makes her fit to be leader of the free world.
Oprah, through decades of public life, has revealed a startling level of gullibility and greed.
Winfrey gave a platform to Jenny McCarthy, the former Playboy Play-mate-turned vocal-anti-vaxxer. In her 2007 appearance, McCarthy claimed her then-toddler son's autism was caused by a measles-mumps-rubella vaccination --- a wholly unproven and unscientific assertion, but one Winfrey largely ceded to her guest.
"My science is named Evan, and he's at home" McCarthy said. "That's my science"
That's actually the opposite of science -- it's an anecdotal assumption -- but Winfrey left that statement unchallenged, making McCarthy a regular guest and signing her to a talk show deal"
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Ms Callahan accusing Oprah of being "gullible and greedy" is ludicrous. Indeed, if anyone is "gullible and greedy" it would be Callahan .. who dismissed Jenny's "science" (her own son) as representing the "opposite of science".
Really? When Jenny's "then-toddler son" was diagnosed with autism .. the rate of autism had been steadily, inexplicably increasing .. from 1 in 10,000, 1 in 5000, 1 in 500, 1 in 110 .. now .. when Jenny's son is no longer a toddler .. the rate for autism in boys is 1 in 36.
Are we to assume that rate is just an "anecdotal assumption"? When our schools are being flooded with literally thousands upon thousands of "special needs" children?
Ms Callahan most likely believes the rate of autism has not really increased .. instead .. she believes the rising rate has been caused by a "broader definition and better diagnosing". If that is not a perfect example of "gullible" .. I don't know what gullible means?
In any event .. it is no accident that ANYONE who dares question the "safety and efficiency" of vaccines and the policies by which they are approved, recommended, administered and monitored .. (Katie Couric?) .. will FOREVER be savagely criticized by "gullible and greedy" imposters .. posing as independent journalists .. when in fact .. they are nothing but ADVOCACY JOURNALISTS .... SEEKING TO PROTECT AN INDUSTRY THAT HAS NO "SCIENTIFIC EXPLANATION" FOR THE DRAMATIC INCREASE IN ALL FORMS OF CHRONIC CHILDHOOD IMMUNE DISORDERS.
I would suggest .. if history is our guide .. Oprah allowing Jenny McCarthy .. speaking as a MOM ... rather than a "former Playboy Playmate Bunny" .. to raise a serious question regarding vaccines .. would not hurt her campaign for the Presidency .. which is why the questions of then Presidential candidate regarding critical statements he made .. such as .. "too many too soon" vaccines ... ceased when the media realized he was not going to cower in fear of being SMEARED as an "anti-vaxxer".
Posted by: bob moffit | January 11, 2018 at 10:05 AM
Today's Wall Street Journal ran an op-ed launching a simultaneous attack on Oprah from the right, making essentially the same points as the Mother Jones article. I suppose both writers had been handed the same press release.
Posted by: Jonathan Rose | January 11, 2018 at 09:34 AM
I'm embarrassed to admit I read Mother Jones from its inception in the mid-70's until about five years ago, when I realized it was all propaganda, all the time, or what Sharyl Attkisson calls "astro turf." Fake news. The real Mother Jones is rolling in her grave at what they are doing in her name. This writer is much too wet behind the ears to know or understand much of anything outside the political bubble in which she has been cocooned. But Oprah rocks! And she's a gazillionaire, so she could finance her own campaign, like Trump. In any case, I won't be voting for anyone for president any more. It makes no difference. We've become a medical-fascist state.
Posted by: Gary Ogden | January 11, 2018 at 08:48 AM