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Calling All Skepchicks!

madmonk76 said:
"Most Naturopathic providers are women who want to serve women."

Is that code for something else?


Seriously, though, why is having ovaries taken as some kind excuse for gullibility?
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I guess they need to ignore chiropractic (a field still dominated by men).

I remember someone made the more generic version of this assertion before (that women are more inclined to supernatural beliefs than man), but it sure isn't born out by all the male-dominated religions.
 
Lithrael said:
"The idea is to treat the cause of disease, as opposed to symptoms"

Every time I see that all I can think is - wouldn't that idea kill children suffering from most kinds of severe dysentery? Isn't it far more important to keep kids hydrated than to try to cure the bugs causing the problem?
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Much worse than that is with the next statement, they claim to treat the causes of disease without doing research. The implications of that are just staggering.
 
I tried responding to that very post at feministing community, but comment moderation is up to the OP, and erica matluck wouldn't let the following comment pass.

Me rejected said:
I'm unimpressed by the requirements and doctrine of "naturopathic" doctoring. First of all, you've tried to stick "nature" right into your title, so that's ten points off right away. It does you no more good than it does Kevin Trudeau and his 'natural cures' or any other quack/scam artist/shill/psychic/mentalist/etc. Yeah, most medicine is derived from plants. Cool. But so are most poisons. Nature don't mean ****. Stop trying to trick people into trusting you with buzzwords.

Second, Homeopathy is bs.. The idea that if you dilute a medicine until there's none of it left in a bottle of saline, and shake it up, and it magically becomes medicine again, is ridiculous. (This is what homeopathy is. If you think it's something else, you're just using homeopathy as a buzzword. Like "natural.")

I wonder what you think the difference is between "physical medicine, botanical medicine," because as far as I'm aware, there's just medicine and surgery. You might as well just call yourself an herbalist. No matter than most medicine is already derived from plants. You get to pretend this isn't so, stick the word 'botany' in there, and say you've reinvented something.

Pharmacology. That's good. But pharmacists already take 4 years of college just to do pharmacology alone. Think about that. You think you're doing all the work pharmacists have done plus a bunch of other stuff, with only 1 extra year? I'm calling bs on that, too.

Last time I checked, people with real phD's in medicine (md's, they're called), do at least the whole college thing, plus years going through internship, residency, while continuing doctorate programs. It's no less than 7 to 9 years work.

But no. You did the "natural" thing and cut the time in half. I'm sure it makes you much more competent. *wretch*

I can see why naturopaths are only licensed in 16 states. The other 34 saw through the pseudoscientific bunk.
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There is plenty patriarchal and wrong with western medical institutions, but trading real science for pseudoscience is not going to help women. In fact, since pseudoscience is by default lacking in efficacy, it's going to hurt them. Literally. Doctors who abandon science, whether they trade real effective drugs for placebos, or denying their children vaccinations, or using chelation therapy instead of chemo, kill people. Stop it.

The key to helping women right now pretty much the same as the key to spreading scientific literacy in all areas. Comprehensive scientific education early and throughout the school experience, and open access to information.

Right now there's a project called Science Commons, which seeks to lift the fees required to directly study scientific papers. That will help.

Getting otherwise competent doctors like Steve Novella to stop stop apologizing for molester surgeons will go a long way. People need to learn, and doctors need to re-learn apparently, that unconscious people are not truly consenting. The doctor is contracted, obligated, not given temporary ownership of a patient. The parallels between medical malpractice and rape apology are appalling, when you think about it.

With comprehensive sex education, and ending the practice of c-sections scheduled for convenience, will immediately recover our birth mortality rates.

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Socialized medicine potentially could immediately strike a deathblow to the way the super-large pharmaceutical companies, unscrupulous doctors, and inattentive peer review journals interact. The second blow would have to be completely rebuilding the entire United States patent system. Copyright/patenting as we know it was never intended to be about intellectual property or compensating inventors. It is and always has been about capitalistic exploitation.

Pharmacists are by and large unethical professionals not only because they can be found trying to control how women use their reproductive organs, but because they assume that if the FDA didn't approve it, then it's automatically harmless, and put anything and everything out on the shelves.

But when people give up real medicine that works for all the flashy flimflam on the shelves, they get hurt. Some of them die. A huge effect could be had if pharmacists would have some scruples and only sell scientifically proven medicines.

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It's hard not to be rude to people who believe in 'alternative medicine', gingerakimbo. Do you know why?

Because believe it or not, almost all doctors really would use better drugs and techniques if they existed. And when these things do come a long, they do use them. That's what modern medicine is all about.

Modern medicine is not "riddled with science." It is science.

Alternative medicine is not alternative medicine. It's non-medicine. It's pseudoscience. It's magical thinking. It's placebo.

If it worked, it wouldn't be alternative medicine. It'd just be medicine.

That drug patents are abused does not automatically mean that said abused drugs are not effective.

You can't call rejecting something so obviously false as alternative medicine "narrow minded." When you do this, you're trying to treat "the scientific method" and "freedom of speech" as meaning the same thing. But they do not. Not at all.

You're free to say that a coffee enema detoxes you and cures cancer, or any other alternative method of your choice. Sure, in an open forum. But you don't get to pretend it's science. You don't get to subvert, corrupt, and completely evade the scientific processes that confirm that what you say it does, it actually does, and call it science. It's lying. And when people's health and very lives are at stake, guess what? Lying doesn't cut it.


As I've put out, all the patriarchal problems with medicine are ethical, not scientific. So no. I will not respect alternative medicine, pseudoscience, for one iota of a second. It doesn't deserve it. It hasn't earned it. It has earned our scorn, it deserves to die out.

(there's a difference between fringe science and pseudoscience, by the way)

It's real science that has provided effective contraception that improves women's lives. It's real science that has improved abortion procedures to make them less painful, less harmful, easier and cheaper to obtain. It's real science that dispels sex myths that result in unintended pregnancies. It's real science that help women have healthy, full-term pregnancies.

The biggest harm to women in modern medicine? Not using modern medicine.

It's not just misogyny that causes medicine to fail. It's even well-intended people who don't understand the science behind medicine and turn others away from it, depriving them of the help they need. It's people like Kevin Trudeau, AIDS denialists, Jenny McCarthy and Jim Carrey, Larry King, ericamatluck, gingerakimbo, acupuncturists, homeopaths, etc. etc. etc.

Spreading false science does far more harm to women in medical need than inattentive or incompetent doctors any day.
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And just before anybody blames feminism for erica matluck's ignorance, STOP IT. In fact, it's sexism that caused her ignorance.

It's a cycle.

1) Teach children that science and sports are for boys, barbie and cooking are for girls

2) science positions then fill up with misogynistic turds.

3) The girls, now grown up much more ignorant than males about how science actually works, think rejecting science is rejecting sexism.


That's it. Sexism did this to her, not feminism, so I don't want anybody blaming it for this thread.
 
Like with my "what can your spouse do?" thread, I was hoping for exciting attachments in this here thing. :eye-poppi
 
Aerik said:
<snip>

2) science positions then fill up with misogynistic turds.

<snip>
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This is patently false.

Anyway, haven't you got some cooking or knitting to do rather than worrying your pretty little brain with man stuff such as science?
 
Hey, just because I argue against sexism I must be a woman, eh Ivor? I'm a man, genius. I'm not even a fruity man, either.
 
Hey, it's the 21st Century! Women can be anything they want.

Why there are even female radical muslim suicide bombers nowadays!

Death to the glass ceiling!
 
Two ovaries are chatting; one says, "Madge, did you order some furniture".

The other responds, "No, why?"


"Because two nuts are trying to bring an organ in here."

(Ba dum dum)


:fg:
 
Naturapathy is a gullible incredulous approach to any kind of care.

And what about male naturopaths? Are they all femmy now?

I wish those quacks wouldn't insult females so, but here they are, trying to get gullible chicks to pay for a quacky education by this strange type of appeal to "females".

Good marketing gimmick. Too bad it is only going to keep the women trained in it ignorant and incredulous.
 
About ten years ago there was a sign in the lobby of a nearby hotel that read:
"Women and Heart Disease"

In that conference room the women were lectured on how to take care of their husbands who have heart disease.

Women have had to fight to get included in testing trials, to get the same level of care as males, and to have their doctors take their syptoms seriously (not just nerves).

As a woman I don't want a "feminine" approach to health care I just want the best health care.
 
For those who want to read more about naturopathy: www.naturowatch.org

Aerik, the standard ND only requires four years, there are five- and six-year options, I have no idea what that is about. Today, pharmacy programs begin with two years of basic science, followed by four years studying pharmacy, leading to a doctorate (PharmD). So, you are right that they spend four years learning pharmacy; but the overall program runs six years.

The naturopath claim that they emphasize prevention is nonsense. I once heard a naturopath on the radio talking about cancer prevention, she never mentioned that 1/3 of cancers are due to smoking!! Nor did she mention alcohol as a risk factor. To naturopaths, prevention is normal advice about diet and lifestyle; with added nonsense about bogus supplements and detoxification schemes.

You say that's not enough, you say you want more? They oppose a crucial aspect of disease prevention- vaccinations (except, of course, homeopathic vaccines)!! My brother was once prevailed-upon to attend a talk by an ND, and someone in the audience asked if she should take away her daughter's asthma inhaler. The ND looked ready to say 'yes' but stopped and said "I could get in trouble if I say yes." I thought the inhaler was intended to prevent and attack from getting worse.
 
Ivor the Engineer said:
Anyway, haven't you got some cooking or knitting to do rather than worrying your pretty little brain with man stuff such as science?
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lmao :D It's funny cos it's true!!

Starthinker said:
I'm not sure that's a word I'm comfortable with. Cooch.

Cooch cooch cooch cooch

I guess it could grow on me.
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I don't like the way '****' and 'pussy' sounds :(
Edit: Oh 'pussy' isn't considered to be a naughty word? I see.


If boys are taught to play with science kits and thus(?!) end up being misogynistic scientists - wouldn't that mean that girls (being taught to play with Barbie) would end up being misandristic models?

Misandry did this to her, not feminism nor sexism (except her own). Just plain old man-hatred.
Endangering women and excluding men from treatment has exactly 0% to do with feminism.
I'm pretty sick and tired of misandrist giving feminism a bad name by blaming absolutely everything on men - patriarchal this, misogynistic that. The ones who truly hate women are misandrists and people like Erica Matluck.
 
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