Underseer
Contributor
Like most of you, I don't like ideologies. Every truth claim should be evaluated on its own merits and we should not allow some list of dos and don'ts form our opinions. All the same, I identify pretty strongly with liberals. This of course means that my Facebook feed is choked with specious health claims. Natural this, organic that, paleo diet this, coconut oil that, gluten-free this, OMG GMO BADBADBADBAD MOSANTO!!!!!
The source of this of course is all that alternative medicine crap.
While some of the origins go back to hippy nonsense from the 1960s, this mostly goes back to a particularly dimwitted act of deregulation by two idiot liberal senators. This allowed certain health claims to bypass the normal FDA regulations and created the alternative medicine industry overnight.
Being wildly irresponsible, the mainstream media touted alternative medicine as something valid and sold the public on the idea that alternative medicine claims made in a regulation-free and science-free environment were just as valid as regular health care based on science and government regulation. They even touted "experts" they could site to "prove" to the public that this new alternative medicine stuff was valid and could be trusted. That the "experts" were quacks with no scientific basis for their claims didn't seem to matter.
So now a whole industry has sprung up around deregulated medical claims and medical products. Hordes of idiots buy into this stuff and have created a whole subculture in which they reinforce to each other in an echo chamber that they are in fact making perfectly reasonable choices about their health.
We've all heard the horror stories about people killing themselves or family members by choosing alternative medicine over real medicine.
What's stupid is the role ideology plays in all of this. Like I said, I don't like and don't trust ideologies, but in this case ideology should have saved these idiots and their idiot parents. Liberals frequently argue that profit-driven corporations sometimes need regulation to keep things safer. Based on these arguments, you would expect a liberal to prefer regular regulated health care over the unregulated free-for-all of alternative medicine. Yet this is not what happens in many cases, is it?
On the flip side, conservolibertarians frequently argue that a completely unregulated industry would produce better results and be safer than a regulated industry, thanks to the magic of the free market. Somehow, "rational self interest" is supposed to cause corporations to choose customer health over higher short term profits. By their own arguments, the quality of health care provided by the unregulated alternative medicine industry should be producing better and safer results than regular regulated health care, yet they consistently choose regulated health care over unregulated health care.
I find all of this incredibly bizarre.
It's as if no one is listening to the arguments coming out of their own mouths.
The source of this of course is all that alternative medicine crap.
While some of the origins go back to hippy nonsense from the 1960s, this mostly goes back to a particularly dimwitted act of deregulation by two idiot liberal senators. This allowed certain health claims to bypass the normal FDA regulations and created the alternative medicine industry overnight.
Being wildly irresponsible, the mainstream media touted alternative medicine as something valid and sold the public on the idea that alternative medicine claims made in a regulation-free and science-free environment were just as valid as regular health care based on science and government regulation. They even touted "experts" they could site to "prove" to the public that this new alternative medicine stuff was valid and could be trusted. That the "experts" were quacks with no scientific basis for their claims didn't seem to matter.
So now a whole industry has sprung up around deregulated medical claims and medical products. Hordes of idiots buy into this stuff and have created a whole subculture in which they reinforce to each other in an echo chamber that they are in fact making perfectly reasonable choices about their health.
We've all heard the horror stories about people killing themselves or family members by choosing alternative medicine over real medicine.
What's stupid is the role ideology plays in all of this. Like I said, I don't like and don't trust ideologies, but in this case ideology should have saved these idiots and their idiot parents. Liberals frequently argue that profit-driven corporations sometimes need regulation to keep things safer. Based on these arguments, you would expect a liberal to prefer regular regulated health care over the unregulated free-for-all of alternative medicine. Yet this is not what happens in many cases, is it?
On the flip side, conservolibertarians frequently argue that a completely unregulated industry would produce better results and be safer than a regulated industry, thanks to the magic of the free market. Somehow, "rational self interest" is supposed to cause corporations to choose customer health over higher short term profits. By their own arguments, the quality of health care provided by the unregulated alternative medicine industry should be producing better and safer results than regular regulated health care, yet they consistently choose regulated health care over unregulated health care.
I find all of this incredibly bizarre.
It's as if no one is listening to the arguments coming out of their own mouths.
