Slashdot Mirror
Are Online Activists Silencing Researchers of Chronic Fatigue Syndrome? (reuters.com)
Zorro (Slashdot reader #15,759), shares Reuters' report about Michael Sharpe, a medical researcher studying chronic fatigue syndrome, "a little-understood condition that can bring crushing tiredness and pain."
Eight years after he published results of a clinical trial that found some patients with chronic fatigue syndrome can get a little better with the right talking and exercise therapies, the Oxford University professor is subjected to almost daily, often anonymous, intimidation... They object to his work, they said, because they think it suggests their illness is psychological. Sharpe, a professor of psychological medicine, says that isn't the case. He believes that chronic fatigue syndrome is a biological condition that can be perpetuated by social and psychological factors...
Sharpe is one of around a dozen researchers in this field worldwide who are on the receiving end of a campaign to discredit their work. For many scientists, it's a new normal: From climate change to vaccines, activism and science are fighting it out online. Social media platforms are supercharging the battle. Reuters contacted a dozen professors, doctors and researchers with experience of analysing or testing potential treatments for chronic fatigue syndrome. All said they had been the target of online harassment because activists objected to their findings. Only two had definite plans to continue researching treatments. With as many as 17 million people worldwide suffering this disabling illness, scientific research into possible therapies should be growing, these experts said, not dwindling. What concerns them most, they said, is that patients could lose out if treatment research stalls.
Sharpe says he's no longer researching treatments, because "It's just too toxic." And he tells Reuters that other researchers appear to be reaching the same conclusion.
"Of more than 20 leading research groups who were publishing treatment studies in high-quality journals 10 years ago, Sharpe said, only one or two continue to do so."
Sharpe is one of around a dozen researchers in this field worldwide who are on the receiving end of a campaign to discredit their work. For many scientists, it's a new normal: From climate change to vaccines, activism and science are fighting it out online. Social media platforms are supercharging the battle. Reuters contacted a dozen professors, doctors and researchers with experience of analysing or testing potential treatments for chronic fatigue syndrome. All said they had been the target of online harassment because activists objected to their findings. Only two had definite plans to continue researching treatments. With as many as 17 million people worldwide suffering this disabling illness, scientific research into possible therapies should be growing, these experts said, not dwindling. What concerns them most, they said, is that patients could lose out if treatment research stalls.
Sharpe says he's no longer researching treatments, because "It's just too toxic." And he tells Reuters that other researchers appear to be reaching the same conclusion.
"Of more than 20 leading research groups who were publishing treatment studies in high-quality journals 10 years ago, Sharpe said, only one or two continue to do so."
Kind of moronic to shout down anyone researching the disease, then, isn't it?
And just who is going to find that actual treatment if the activists drive out all the researchers?
I want a new quote. One that won't spill. One that don't cost too much. Or come in a pill.
No. Social media doesn't turn people hateful. It simply allows already hateful people to express themselves in an environment where there's low risk of being judged by society and punished.
I.e. they are just unleashing their suppressed inner arsehole which has always been there.
It also amplifies what hateful people say because that's what draws attention, clicks and money. Me posting nice things about the post I'm responding to here on ./ usually gets me ignored unless its a really really good post. If however, I write a sarcastic, mocking, and funny post with some good details then I get lots of replies and moderations (sometimes good, sometimes bad). Most of human communication between folks is basically pleasant most of the time so you only notice when it isn't. And for some reason, probably the same reason people rubberneck at traffic accidents, people give more attention to the hateful comments. Until people change that basic behavior, the algorithms will keep pumping those more nasty posts your way. Don't know what to do about that though. Social media isn't truly a mirror of humanity, its more like a reality show where the most dysfunctional get the most attention. Or maybe it is...
"Those that start by burning books, will end by burning men."