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Trump Administration Prohibits CDC Policy Analysts From Using the Words 'Science-Based' (washingtonpost.com)
Long-time Slashdot reader hey! writes: On Friday the Washington Post reported that the Trump Administration has forbidden the Centers for Disease Control from using seven terms in certain documents: "science-based", "evidence-based", "vulnerable," "entitlement," "diversity," "transgender," and "fetus".
It's important to note that the precise scope and intent of the ban is unknown at present. Scientific and medical personnel as of now have not been affected, only policy analysts preparing budgetary proposals and supporting data that is being sent to Congress. So it is unclear the degree to which the language mandates represent a change in agency priorities vs. a change in how it presents itself to Congress. However banning the scientifically precise term "fetus" will certainly complicate budgeting for things like Zika research and monitoring.
According to the Post's article, "Instead of 'science-based' or 'evidence-based,' the suggested phrase is 'CDC bases its recommendations on science in consideration with community standards and wishes."
The New York Times confirmed the story with several officials, although "a few suggested that the proposal was not so much a ban on words but recommendations to avoid some language to ease the path toward budget approval by Republicans."
It's important to note that the precise scope and intent of the ban is unknown at present. Scientific and medical personnel as of now have not been affected, only policy analysts preparing budgetary proposals and supporting data that is being sent to Congress. So it is unclear the degree to which the language mandates represent a change in agency priorities vs. a change in how it presents itself to Congress. However banning the scientifically precise term "fetus" will certainly complicate budgeting for things like Zika research and monitoring.
According to the Post's article, "Instead of 'science-based' or 'evidence-based,' the suggested phrase is 'CDC bases its recommendations on science in consideration with community standards and wishes."
The New York Times confirmed the story with several officials, although "a few suggested that the proposal was not so much a ban on words but recommendations to avoid some language to ease the path toward budget approval by Republicans."
As someone who had to work with crassly incompetent bosses, too, I can feel for them. This must really be really painful. The best thing they can do is leaking every bullshit those Trumpist idiots are demanding and destroying to the press.
If you hate science because it conflicts with your religious beliefs, you probably donâ(TM)t want people using it to justify stuff.
China will.
So if the community standards and wishes means they prefer to rely on religion, superstition and other make-beliefs mumbo-jumbo, science has to stand aside?
#DeleteFacebook
If you are making a scientific report and are saying "science based," you're doing it wrong.
I'd rather let them slip in stupid monickers and trendster terms like "science based" and "evidence based" to allow the writers to make fools of themselves.
Authorized clerics have the final say on what is true and proper in our society.
Since "fetus" is banned, they will now use "small Trump-like being" in its place. Hand size is about right, also.
Table-ized A.I.
In 298 days, President Trump has made 1,628 false and misleading claims
Are "superstition-based", "cult recommended", or "not superstition based" permitted?
What the fuck does "community standards and wishes" have to do with scientific evidence.
Sorry, teleporters just kill you and then make a copy. A perfect, soul-less copy.
"in official documents being prepared for next year’s budget"
Go into any big office or typical start up and say that someone does not change gender by identifying as another gender (including "non-binary" genders) or going through a "transition" and you'll be treated far worse than this.
Because it's bigotry to say that gender dysphoria is a mental illness wherein the brain does not recognize the material truth represented in one's genetic code and post-puberty sexual characteristics.
CDC bases its recommendations on science in consideration with community standards and wishes.
I'm sure that's the same community that would wish for Pi to be 3.0 to make life easier...
And when asking Republicans for budget money use the word "God" a lot. They like God. Finding a Bible verse to back you up is pure gold.
Science does not care about your "community standards", your religious viewpoints, or any other fantasies you believe in this week.
CUR ALLOC 20195.....5804M
I've gotten the list of words that will be banned on Slashdot in 2018:
- cryptocurrency
- malware
- systemd
- unicode
- diversity
- indochimp
- Russia
- artificial intelligence
You are welcome on my lawn.
If that's the case, then the solution isn't to disallow certain words. The solution is to get rid of the Republicans in Congress.
I've noticed, over the time I've been active on this site. In areas of technology and science, it's possible to get some real good information. In ANY circumstance where the story is about how people interact, especially politics, it rapidly devolves to kindergarden-level arguments. If this site is supposed to represent the best and brightest, we're screwed.
You're confusing sex and gender. Sex is determined by chromosomes, gender is a social construct and can be fluid in some individuals.
"For a successful technology, reality must take precedence over public relations, for Nature cannot be fooled." - Richard Feynman
" Instead of 'science-based' or 'evidence-based ,' the suggested phrase is 'CDC bases its recommendations on science in consideration with community standards and wishes."
It little behooves the best of us to comment on the rest of us.
I think the list is a stupid idea, especially not using the word "fetus" in an environment where you may be talking about Zika for example...
But here's the thing - why complain specifically about "science-based" when the replacement is "science"? "Science-based" is a terrible word, the most waffly term ever. You could argue an e-meter is "science-based" because it relies on conductivity of wiring. I hate the term so much if they had just banned that word, I think I might actually support the list...
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
Fetus! Fetus! Fetus!
Ban me now, Don!
Sent as ripples into the electromagnetic field. No single photon has been harmed in the process.
"Donald Trump's is an idiot"!
Sent as ripples into the electromagnetic field. No single photon has been harmed in the process.
Your religious beliefs, made law, impinge upon my freedom. Why can't you live your own life, mind your own business, and leave the rest of us alone? You've already proved that you don't really believe what you espouse(voting for Roy, etc) so please don't force your so-called beliefs on the rest of us.
by George Carlin.
The Seven words you can never say on television.
Which fits, sadly, since our government has become one long never ending stream of stand up comedy :|
No.
Murder is legal definition, and until recently had never been applied to fetus... and the only reason it is now, in a few places, is because conservative con artists prey on the lack of intelligence of religious extremists and idiots like you to get into office, so they blur the line between your bullshit fantasy and reality... EXACTLY as this article points out they're doing now.
If you want to see the cause of many more abortions, look at the worthless cocksuckers refusing to teach sex ed to teens so they can make better choices, and making contraceptives even harder to get so unwanted pregnancies can be avoided. Those are the worthless fucking baby killers... cunts like you.
So, what we've shown is you know nothing about science, and nothing about the law... you're completely fucking worthless in this conversation.
Fascism: An authoritarian and nationalistic right-wing system of government and social organization. See also: NAZI's
isn't leftist, it's authoritarian/fascist. Look to the Scandinavian countries, France and when they're not taking after the USA Britain for leftist ideals.
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It's easy to tell the people who don't want abortions happening, they try to prevent them through education, making birth control available and empowering women to say no.
Then we have the average right winger who really wants to dominate women, keep them ignorant, impregnate them as early as possible, throw a big guilt trip on them to make them go through with the pregnancy and then put them down for being a single mother.
You're right, the repression of women will be compared to slavery, just not for the bullshit reasons that you give.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inverted_totalitarianism
And yet a fetus is a baby, just still in the womb. If you remove the baby from the womb, it is still a baby, thus all fetus are babies, but according to the pro baby killers, fetus are not babies and that distinction in language has made the murder of millions of babies easier to get away with by calling them fetus, parasites and blobs of tissue instead of what they are, babies.
100 years from now abortion will be viewed as we today view slavery, with horror and disbelief that a civilized society could condone and legalize the murder of their own children for the sake of convenience.
You are aware that quite consistently the abortion rates are lowest in non-conservative countries like the Netherlands where the legal and social barriers against abortion are lower that in countries like the U.S.?
Treating women as breeding cattle not permitted to control their own body results in less rather than more responsible behavior. Puritans have much higher abortion rates than atheists. Your ways don't work. And upping the punishment for being a woman doesn't work.
Trumps first steps towards a Theocracy!!
If you hate science because it conflicts with your religious beliefs...
I don't think this has anything to do with religious belief. I think it is due to a dangerous mix of ignorance (partly willful and partly due to lack of intellectual capacity) and short-sighted financial self-interest. If Trump and co were capable of understanding science and were open-minded enough to realize that there is a lot of money to be made developing green technology they would be cheering science on, not desperately trying to hide and/or ignore the truth of it.
And yet a fetus is a baby, just still in the womb.
Where for nine months a woman can legally poison that "baby" through smoking, excessive drinking and drug use, not to mention cause it to have deformities by the woman being obese.
Where are the laws fining women for poisoning their "baby" while in the womb? Why isn't the religious right up in arms women can poison their "baby" without repercussions? Where are the laws forcing women to undergo twice monthly exams to verify they aren't poisoning their "baby"?
They're nowhere because people like you are hypocrites. You want to tell a woman what she can do with her body, claiming it's for the "child's" protection, yet don't bat an eye while she poisons her "baby" because that would be too intrusive.
If the idea is that a fetus is a living person then there is no excuse for not making it illegal to poison that "baby" while in the womb. Either put up or shut up.
Fucking morons that don't want the word fetus used do not understand is that making abortions illegal will increase the number performed. There are options available, readily available outside the U.S., that would make it simple to set up an illegal service & charge much less that is currently charged. Abortion drugs are already being used in many places, like Texas, where it's nearly impossible to get an abortion.
FUCKING UNDERSTAND A LITTLE MORE NOW? Make it illegal & it will become easier to get one. It was easy to get one when it was illegal in states before row-v-wade & it will be quite a bit easier if you outlaw safe abortions today. You want less abortions? Me too. Avoiding unwanted pregnancy is the how it's done. If you wanna spread your "morality" go right ahead. As long as we also make birth control easily obtained.
It should be applied to everyone in the government.
It might force them to make a rational argument instead of appealing to their own authority.
My karma was manually wiped by site staff https://slashdot.org/~slshdtisctrldbysjws 18 mod up, 10 mod down = bad karma
My wild guess is for Christianity to have slowed scientific progress by ~1500 years.
Really? Back in the day science was a product of Christianity. The belief that nature was all ruled and ordered by god lead various clergy to look for that order which in turn lead to the development of science. Many early scientists held religious positions since, unless they were from a wealthy family, this was the only way to get the education and the time and support required to be able to perform their studies.
;-).
For example, Oxford and Cambridge dons were all originally clergy and when they retired they took up positions as vicars around the UK. Bacon, who gave us the very idea of the scientific method, was a staunch Christian and Newton even wasted time trying to figure out the date of the rapture from the bible (IIRC he came up with 2060 so we haven't got too long to wait!
Christianity may have restricted and held back some areas of science in the past but let's not forget that its overall impact on science has been such a positive one that it is not even clear that we would have a modern concept of science without it. The conflict between religion and science in modern times is fuelled by an ignorance of both and seems to be primarily a US-based phenomenon although it is sadly starting to spread.
> And yet a fetus is a baby, just still in the womb.
This is not reflected by the legal or medical definitions. Merriam's Dictionary publishes this:
* Definition of fetus
* an unborn or unhatched vertebrate especially after attaining the basic structural plan of its kind; specifically
* a developing human from usually two months after conception to birth — compare embryo 1b
Note, in particular, that "fetus" may not mean a human baby. This has medical and legal distinctions.
Does that mean we will be allowed to start using 'emacs' and 'vi' again?
There are some such laws. Tennesse, for example, has laws specifically targeting pregnant women for illegal drug use while pregnant. The purpose seems to be to provide grounds for getting the mother off the streets and into treatment or a controlled environment where the illegal drugs are not available. The damage to a fetus can be very real, and the state is claiming a strong interest in preventing a child being ill and requiring extensive social and medical support from birth.
[quoteblock]The summary itself states the reason for the guideline is to make passage of legislation easier to get past Republicans in congress. ...
The idiots on the left and the right will believe just about anything if it makes the other side look evil.[/quoteblock]
So you're saying that if this isn't an attempt at suppressing phrases by Republicans, but instead a suggestion (presumably from non-Republicans) to avoid using those words because they're going to trigger a predictable response from enough Republicans to be a problem... yeah, evil Republicans.
Either way, the Republicans are definitely the bad guys in this case.
> Either put up or shut up.
Don't forget to add 9 more months of Social Security and Medicare.
The set of their arguments and actions are incoherent nonsense, unless you understand the core single truth: they know an unwanted child in an unsuitable family situation is intensely undesirable---the purpose is to punish women for sex. That one supposition explains nearly all the observations.
It is the de-Christianization of the Renaissance, followed by the more clearly anti-clerical Enlightenment philosophy of Europe. These philosophies were unique in the world. Europe was the wealthiest region at the time, and Isaac Newton was English. Newton is to my mind the most important human ever to have lived.
"a few suggested that the proposal was not so much a ban on words but recommendations to avoid some language to ease the path toward budget approval by Republicans."
Might I also suggest:
- Ample usage of drawings and kindergarten level explainers - McDonald's Happy Meal style;
- "It's in the Bible";
- "It was reported on Fox and Friends", "there was an article on Breitbart about it";
- Some choice quotations from Mein Kampf, Charles Davenport, Paul Popenoe and Henry Goddard;
- Other choice quotations from Schopenhauer's "On Women";
- Eliminating everything that might be miscontrued as "the reds" aka socialism, or liberalism;
- Concluding the analysis with "Wake up sheeple!", "give up we won", "MAGA", etc.
Oops, forgot the sarcasm tag
Avantgarde Hebrew science fiction
It took 800 years to recover from the last Dark Age. It should take much longer this time.
Note the first four words of my post: I was not advocating the position myself, I was only stating how the situation might be viewed by someone of that alignment.
every time somebody lies. Stalin and Mao where not Communists. Not even a little. At no point did they relinquish power to the proletariat. At no point was actual ownership given to the proles. They just traded one aristocracy for another.
Also, while we're on the subject of logical fallacies nice appeal to authority.
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when they point to them as a failing of socialism. Venezuela is a country that lived through nearly two hundreds years of abject poverty. Then for a very brief time had the resources to function as a first word country. It's a testament to their government's decency that they didn't just pocket all the money for themselves like most do. What I'm saying is that it's unreasonable to expect them to solve decades and decades of systemic poverty with 20-30 years of usually high oil profits.
And you're completely missing my original point: What we call communism isn't. It's authoritarianism that borrows communist rhetoric. Kinda like those preachers who buy private jets with the money they fleece out of people. They're not really men of God. People _can_ lie. They can misrepresent themselves. Dr Nick Riviera is not, in fact, a Doctor. In the same vein Stalin and Mao weren't communists. They were basically kings who seized the thrown with violence.
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Censorship.
Suppression of words.
Forbidden ideas.
That's where the USA are going.
Irrelevant news and morons using moderation to mod down what they disagree on. 2018 resolution: so long.
"Science-based" implies that science is the only consideration.
What? It implies exactly the OPPOSITE, It implies something that is based PARTLY on science, but not wholly or it would be "science" not "science-based".
Only it doesn't say how much it is based on science, but when you heard marketing terms like "science-based" you know the actual science involved will be very thin to non-existent.
The replacement term is also kind of wishy-washy but at least it does not hide what is going on the way the term "science-based" does. However like I said, the list is a stupid idea and the replacements are also stupid. I am not arguing for any aspect of the list, just saying that the revelation they would regularly use the term "science-based" is disturbing on the face of it.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
The extent and intent of the âoebanâ is known: itâ(TM)s about the budget proposal. Using terms like âoefetusâ or âoetransgenderâ or âoescience-basedâ is going to cause pushback from conservative representatives in Congress, and since these are in the majority now, if Trump wants his budget passed, he wants to avoid those kinds of controversies. Given a Republican majority in both houses, that is what an administration has to do. If Hillary were president, sheâ(TM)d have to do the same thing if she didnâ(TM)t want her budget sent back to her.
Yah know DNS, you've been a whiny little bitch every time i've posted anything for weeks now... ever since it was pointed out to you that your notion that the "lefts" only goal is to destroy this country is so full of shit it's the only thing keeping your ears apart. How about you grow up and quit being a little hypocrite. You hate having to be politically correct, and then you whine like a whipped bitch when people "just tell it like it is" with opinions you don't agree with.... so, fuck off if you can't grow up. You treat people like shit, eventually that's going to come back to you...quit fucking whining about it, hypocrite.
Fascism: An authoritarian and nationalistic right-wing system of government and social organization. See also: NAZI's
By leftists you really mean radical feminists. Aside from occasionally making you take a dumb gen Ed class they have little or no day in public policy. Evangelicals OTOH have massive power. They own the South and thanks to our Senate have veto power over just about any law (save for the ones really calling the shots want a e.g. the billionaire aristocracy). What I'm saying is, you're wasting time and energy worrying about a total non threat. You might just as well rail against the scourge of the Amish...
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The officially sanctioned replacement terms:
"science-based" -> "theoretical"
"evidence-based" -> "alleged"
"vulnerable" -> "lazy"
"entitlement" -> "waste, fraud and abuse"
"diversity" -> "discrimination against white men"
"transgender" -> "Bay Area resident"
"fetus" -> "0 year old"
I prefer scientifix method based. That would save a lot of budget by not funding "research" that claims that this and that happened millions of years ago without any glimpse of hope for verification or falsification.
I do not believe in karma. "Funny"=-6. Do good and forbid evil. Yours, Oft-Offtopic Flamebaiting Troll.
Now we have communism without calling it that.
As I read it, this was someone offering advise on how to write research funding requests to members of congress, including Republican members.
Writing for your audience is not a new concept.
I despise Trump as much as any sentient being,
but there are better examples of anti-science policy decisions.
Q: How do I know when my gender fluid needs changing?
A: When the tranny starts to make an irritating noise.
echo -e 'global _start\n _start:\n mov eax, 2\n int 80h\n jmp _start' > a.asm; nasm a.asm -f elf; ld a.o -o a;
The emperor will not tolerate dissent.
The Russians have won. They have made the world a cesspool of distrust, greed, fear and hate.
So I read the summary with a critical eye and this jumped out at me:
although "a few suggested that the proposal was not so much a ban on words but recommendations to avoid some language to ease the path toward budget approval by Republicans."
That tells me the heads of CDC most likely came up with this set of "recommendations" because they think it will help them get a larger budget.
This doesn't read as the Trump Administration banning words, it sounds like career staff has an insulting view of the politicians that determine their funding level.
Ken
Ever see that line before a movie? Lots of people will think that what follows actually happened. No, it didn't. It was cherry-picked for a few details to make it seem real but it's mostly B.S. Ergo, science-based should be treated the same way. People have gotten into the habit of using the word "science" as a trump card, no pun intended, when the reality is that a) they don't know what they're talking about and b) whomever they are quoting is probably full of crap but expects to be taken as gospel because, you know, they are scientists.
The CDC needs to differentiate between their completely speculative and politically biased communication, and that politically biased communication which appeals to a scientific study, and hence is 'science-based'. I suppose they could switch to the boolean opposite, which is 'horseshit based' for everything they publish which does not directly conjecturally apeal to a scientific study for backing.
https://www.pbs.org/newshour/politics/cdc-director-says-there-are-no-banned-words-at-the-agency
I am not at ALL sure the "Trump Administration" (whatever that LEGALLY means!) can actually "Ban" (whatever THAT means!) a Government Agency from the exercise of Free Speech.
For example, certain Protections, such as Copyright, do not apply to the Government. Afterall, just WHO is the Government going to enforce that Copyright AGAINST?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...
But, apparently, Federal Agencies, like the CDC, do NOT have First Amendment rights against the Federal Government:
https://www.washingtonpost.com...
Oh well, it was worth a try...
Quoting AC who said it well:
"Argues that it's not a medical definition. Goes to a dictionary instead of a proper human embryology reference......."
If you disagree, please post your argument. (-1, Overrated) isn't your personal censorship tool for views you don't like
So you cite criminal behavior (child abuse in most states if the mother takes illicit drugs while pregnant) and think that is justification for an unborn baby not being a person?
As stated by others, there are many laws that make it illegal for pregnant women to abuse their unborn child by using drugs etc.
There is also plenty of judicial precedent for charging the mother with child abuse for such acts, but as with all crime, we punish the crime after it is committed, not before in our free society, which is why we don't have mandatory maternal monitoring...
There are also laws and judicial precedent for charging anyone who commits homicide on a pregnant woman with two counts of homicide. If the unborn child is not a person, how would this be justified?
How about you cite some actual, medical evidence for how a 20 week unborn baby is not a distinct person... "Put up or shut up?" Oh please, try and string together a few medical facts and some logic...
If you disagree, please post your argument. (-1, Overrated) isn't your personal censorship tool for views you don't like
> Either put up or shut up.
Don't forget to add 9 more months of Social Security and Medicare.
The set of their arguments and actions are incoherent nonsense, unless you understand the core single truth: they know an unwanted child in an unsuitable family situation is intensely undesirable---the purpose is to punish women for sex. That one supposition explains nearly all the observations.
I honestly cannot see a single fact or piece of rational logic in this entire statement. I couldn't even figure out which side of the issue you were arguing for until the bit about punishing women for sex... Are you an idiot? Are you a space alien? Here on this planet we have a bunch of different contraceptives, including pills, condoms, morning after pills and the list goes on all of which do not stop a beating heart or terminate brain activity of distinct, unique human beings. I get that this debate is all emotion for many people, but the science is pretty clear if you are willing to look at it. Either way it has nothing to do with punishing women for sex, which can be safely had using contraceptives. It has to do with protecting an innocent human being who is currently in danger of being murdered because it's existence is inconvenient. There are thousands upon thousands of people waiting to adopt healthy babies, so the unwanted argument is not even legitimate. It is just inconvenient for the mother for about 7 months...
If you disagree, please post your argument. (-1, Overrated) isn't your personal censorship tool for views you don't like
LOL the sock puppet mods are out in force today +5 for that alt left drivel is laughable. From the last few months, it is clear that most of the real abuse of women happens on the far left, not the far right (Harvey Weinstein and 50:1 of the rest of the woman molesters were far left guys, not "right wingers"). Hell, Bill Clinton straight up raped several women and you elected him president twice where he sexually harassed an intern in the oval office... It is surprising to me how often the left projects their own shortcomings onto the right. Conservatives are not perfect, but the facts are what they are.
Personal responsibility and morality have nothing to do with punishing women (or men for that matter) but are pre-requisites for a healthy society. All of this male hating alt left propaganda is going to backfire massively. Women in the US are on parity for men across the board socially (and in the work place once you control for hours worked, time off and job commitment). Compare that to the third world or the Muslim world and get yourself a reality check. The Judeo Christian philosophy, western civilization and chivalry have afforded modern women more freedom than any other force in history bar none and now you spit on it because you want the right to murder your children because it is inconvenient to have a baby. The fact that you hate the very institutions that have freed you and attribute repression of women to them is a sick joke.
If you disagree, please post your argument. (-1, Overrated) isn't your personal censorship tool for views you don't like
No.
Murder is a moral definition that also happens to have a legal definition. The concept of murder far predates law (see Cain and Able), but the immorality of murder as a concept is fairly easy to grasp: the un-justified taking of another person's life. Killing someone because their life is inconvenient to you is clearly immoral, yet that is exactly what abortion on demand is. (We are not talking about the 0.1% of abortions that are performed to save the life of the mother, which most people don't have an issue with, because saving a life where two lives would be lost is justifiable morally, but the pro abortion crowd always trots out because that is literally all they have at this point, where babies are viable after about 22 weeks and science shows them to be a person at around 10 weeks.)
Your devolution into an obscene ad homonym tirade only underscores your weak position with no actual facts to support it. You may want to try going for a walk, getting some fresh air and maybe a little perspective, I wouldn't want you to die of a heat attack from all the stress that your irrational beliefs are clearly causing.
If you disagree, please post your argument. (-1, Overrated) isn't your personal censorship tool for views you don't like
Watch out DNS, I suspect that meglon is running some sock puppets to dish out his "social justice". Sad but apparently true.
If you disagree, please post your argument. (-1, Overrated) isn't your personal censorship tool for views you don't like
Just wondering.
There's no time like the present. Well, the past used to be.
So, it's OK to use homophobic slurs? Seriously? This sort of thing gets people fired from their jobs and it's acceptable to do it openly?
Shutting down free speech with violence isn't fighting fascism. It IS fascism!