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The Town That Banned Wi-Fi
An anonymous reader sends a story from The Guardian about Green Bank, West Virginia, a small town housing the National Radio Astronomy Observatory. There are other telescopes nearby, too. Because the telescopes are so sensitive, stray electromagnetic signals are strictly regulated in the surrounding area, which is called the National Radio Quiet Zone. But the town is running into a problem: its population was around 120 when this began, and by now about 40 people have moved there because they want to get away from radio waves and Wi-Fi signals and other types of electromagnetic radiation.
There have been reports of tensions in the town: tales of threats and abuse unfitting to a sleepy mountain village. And it is all the stranger when you consider that no serious scientific study has been able to establish that electrosensitivity exists. ... Where the locals might have been happy to tolerate one or two of the sensitives, the mass migration was beyond the pale. ... People would walk towards [one woman] with concealed electronics, in an effort to provoke a reaction. A meeting she and her husband organised to help educate the others about electrosensitivity descended into a slanging match.
Isn't this an acceptable solution? Give them space where they can have their way. Radiosensitivity is a harmless crazy. It's not like the United States of America lack space. Every year many thousands of tech freaks gather in a desert to live out their dream of a high tech tribal life. Isn't there room for other loonies too?
Just like the recent vaccine scare. It is hard to prove to people that something is indeed safe. One off comment that something is dangerious our a dangerious word is used to explain it is enough to turn off their brains and go into fear mode.
If something is so important that you feel the need to post it on the internet... It probably isn't that important.
That is almost a well designed experiment. For counter-balancing it should randomise when something is being transmitted, and not, independently of the light. That would collect data on all four conditions.
Sorry, I have to pick these things apart for a living and it gets difficult to stop sometimes.
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I was going to suggest that the more sensible option would be to get rid of the woman as she was faking sickness to get days off - especially if the "sickness" goes when the light is off - but then she would probably have sued because just because it's psychosomatic it doesn't mean she's actually sick.
The town only had 120 residents. From their perspective, 40 new people is a mass migration. Heck, most towns of this size are slowly decreasing in population. They lack the resources to absorb 40 new people, let alone 40 new nut jobs with bizarre needs.
In an effort to make Green Bank more navigable, Schou made some requests of local businesses. A Dollar Store was opening, but its fluorescent and halogen lights would be intolerable. She asked that they were changed. “They wouldn’t do it. And without the light it gets very dark in there, so they’re not willing to turn off the power.” She took to eating her meals in the senior citizens’ centre, where a gap in the lighting gave her some peace. But walking to collect her food entailed exposure to problem bulbs, so she would ask others to wait on her.
Things came to a head. A town meeting was called. “She became very demanding, asking other people to turn their lights off or replace their bulbs,” said Stewart. “It was too much. And Schou was encouraging other sensitives to move here, and this is not a town with many jobs or houses to begin with.”
Where the locals might have been happy to tolerate one or two of the sensitives, the mass migration was beyond the pale. Another sensitive who moved to Green Bank was reported to have flown into a rage at the library, denouncing the “dumb hillbillies”. “People tell me to stop encouraging others to move here, and to stop bringing them into stores,” Schou confirms. “The hostility continues.” People would walk towards Schou with concealed electronics, in an effort to provoke a reaction. A meeting she and her husband organised to help educate the others about electrosensivity descended into a slanging match. Schou, who has called herself a “technological leper,” said the ill will went further: “I had a visitor staying, a fellow refugee, and the air was let out of our car tyres overnight.”
At best, she is a nuisance demanding everyone accommodate her invisible disability that she has zero evidence for. At worst, it sounds like she might be trying to literally take over the town by creating a solid electro-senstive voting block.
As for the townsfolk harrassing her, well we once again have only her word on that. And after almost a year seeing unverified and outright known to be false accusations of harrassment trumpeted in the media--the Guardian itself being one of the (very) guilty outlets--yeah, I'm gonna need some substantial evidence before I believe a word of that either.
A synonym for electrosensitivity is hypochondriac.
Are they interfering with your life?
Did you RTFA? They are interfering. They are going about town demanding that other people turn off electrical stuff that they imagine causes their imaginary disease.
There seem to be two types of such humans: security guards for the building, who are very underpaid and unlikely to take sick days, their companies can replace them quickly. And cheeful pretty women with curves, who are still effective first contacts for making people feel welcome. And if they're playing the "wahhh, I need sick days!!" card, they're related to someone on staff.
My father taught me "make friends with these people", and I *always* make friends with them and the cleaning staff. They work there, they're often treated like furniture, and they know material that the board and HR keep behind very poorly managed masks of confidentiality.
True, but there's a bit of a difference. Someone with PTSD could very well have that disease (which is a mental illness) due to traumatic experiences, such as being in combat. You can't just wish that away, at least until they develop memory-erasing technology like in the movie "Paycheck". Similarly, someone with severe anxiety disorder may have that problem because of (or have it greatly exacerbated by) various life experiences, too much stress, etc. Not everyone is rich enough to just go take a nice, long vacation and relax.
Someone who gets sick because of WiFi (even when the WiFi device is turned off and they don't realize this) is doing it to themselves; it hasn't been done to them. It's another version of hypochondria, and a lot like religion. With people with PTSD or anxiety disorder, there's things you can do to help them: give them counseling to help deal with their traumatic memories, do things to make their lives easier so they can de-stress, etc. There's nothing you can do for one of these wifi-hypochondriacs, because it's all based on their irrational belief about EM fields, which you can't change using logic and reason; similarly there's nothing you can do for someone who believes the earth is 6000 years old, or they're infested with Body Thetans or demons, because these beliefs can't be changed with logic and reason, they're completely irrational.