NaturalNews
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NaturalNews.com (formerly Newstarget) is a website founded and owned by self-proclaimed "health ranger" Mike Adams. The site promotes almost every sort of medical woo known, though it specializes in vaccine hysteria and quack cancer medicine.[1][2] The site also promotes conspiracy theories about modern medicine, geared to gain sympathy for alternative medicine.[3]
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[edit] Beliefs
Adams is a flat-out opponent of modern medicine and opposes any medication or doctor visits. He is a committed anti-vaccinationist. Adams calls himself a holistic nutritionist and is a raw food proponent who opposes food that contains sugar, was cooked or made to last, "red" meat, sweeteners, glutamate, homogenized milk, bread and "white" flour, washing powder of some brands, deodorants and shampoos as well as fluoride toothpaste.
He thinks Scientology (of which he is an ex-member) is treated unfairly.[4][5] According to Adams, this is due to attempts by anti-religious bigots and (you guessed it) Big Pharma to oppress their belief system in order to protect their profits.[6]
Adams' love for woo isn't restricted to medicine. Cold fusion and so-called free energy ideas and devices like the Energy Catalyzer are presented on his website with the same enthusiasm as the latest alternative medicine fad.[7][8]
In the event you still thought he had a shred of credibility, note that he has broken Scopie's Law multiple times.[9]
[edit] Rejection of evidence-based medicine
A recurring theme of the website is its contrast between the site's exacting criticism of evidence-based medicine and its unquestioning acceptance of nature woo, New Age and alternative medicine.[10] This often involves rejection of the scientific method's application to medicine as "inherently flawed", with a preference for quackery in general and anecdotal evidence in particular.[11]
The response to any alternative medicine claim, however, is blind acceptance, whether the topic at hand is homeopathy, chiropractic, dental woo, water fluoridation scares, aspartame scares, vitamin woo, detox diets or AIDS denial. Furthermore, the site blames the pharmaceutical industry for drug overdose-related deaths rather than looking at any other surrounding factors. For example, it blames the death of Whitney Houston on the drug Xanax and its makers.[12] That NaturalNews does this was first noticed more than 3 years earlier by Denialism Blog, with specific regard to Tony Snow and Bernie Mac.[13]
[edit] Conspiracy theories
Being the vast repository of quackery and paranoia that it is, NaturalNews wouldn't be complete without Big Pharma conspiracy theories.[14][15] There is no depth Big Pharma will not sink to, no lie too big for them to tell, in order to poison American citizens and cover up their "junk science."
While Adams started out by spreading mostly Big Pharma conspiracy theories, he has descended into complete insanity over the years. He claims that the "pharmaceutical industry" has created HIV vaccines with the sole purpose to create as many "HIV positive people" as possible to which one could sell anti-retroviral drugs at a huge profit. Screening with mammography would also create cancer, which would have to be expensively treated and bring again profits. He refers to chemotherapy as quackery.[16]
There's also usually a front page article about how some loophole in an obscure new law or regulation will enable alternative medicine or natural supplements to be banned forever!
Adams loves "news" about chemtrails as well.[17] He considers David Icke a reliable source.[18] Naturally, he supports Ron Paul and "health freedom."[19]
Adams has also come out as a hardcore 9/11 truther, birther, and pretty much everything else-er. He considers Alex Jones, Jeff Rense, and David Icke to be "REAL heroes."[20]
More recently, Adams has begun to formulate bizarre conspiracy theories claiming that Bill Gates and Microsoft are in the process of developing weaponized, ethnically-targeted influenza viruses as part of a sinister eugenics plot.[21] He has also managed to misinterpret attempts to develop reversible forms of male contraceptives as deliberate attempts to permanently sterilize minorities.[22]
[edit] Mike's cartoons
One of the more ridiculous features of NaturalNews (aside from all the other ridculousness on the site) is cartoons drawn by Mike Adams which are seemingly even less entertaining than Mallard Fillmore. These are usually followed by paragraph after paragraph of the author having to explain the point of the cartoon to an audience who otherwise wouldn't find them "funny."[23]
[edit] Music
More ridiculous still is Mike Adams' "Music" section on NaturalNews, where he posts hiphop videos and songs he wrote about the alternative quackery of the day. Most of the so-called "music" is cheap-sounding hiphop injected with Mike's screeds about how terrible vaccines and anti-depressants are.[24] Just like his cartoons, his hiphop postings are also followed by paragraphs of his own self-aggrandizement and boring explanations of his works for those who didn't care to listen to the actual song.
[edit] Twitter silliness
In 2010, Adams was in the running for the Shorty Awards, basically a personality contest for Twitter users. He had the most votes in the health category, and his fellow lunatic Joseph Mercola was closely behind. Skeptics decided to vote up Rachel Dunlop, a skeptic and doctor based in Australia.[25][26]
Eventually, Dunlop got to the top of the health charts. Adams and Mercola threw an Internet shit-fit and went vote-canvassing. Hundreds of their supporters turned up and set up new accounts to vote. Those votes were promptly disqualified as only existing accounts were allowed to vote. Adams was briefly put back into pole position, but then was disqualified after the fraudulent votes were removed. He got really angry about this.
Shortly thereafter, Adams childishly posted a list of all the terrible things he believes that skeptics believe on NaturalNews, including:
| “ | Skeptics believe that many six-month-old infants need antidepressant drugs. In fact, they believe that people of all ages can be safely given an unlimited number of drugs all at the same time: Antidepressants, cholesterol drugs, blood pressure drugs, diabetes drugs, anti-anxiety drugs, sleeping drugs and more -- simultaneously!
Skeptics believe that the human body has no ability to defend itself against invading microorganism and that the only things that can save people from viral infections are vaccines.[27][28][29] | ” |
[edit] External links
- The webshite itself
- NaturalNews profile at Ratbags
- Denialism blog has an entire category dedicated to Adams' bullshit.
- Orac has been documenting his insanity for years.
- Mike Adams: Pretentious git, slandering liar, PZ Myers
- NaturalNews takes idiotic to the next level, Depleted Cranium
- Ten Misconceptions from Natural News
- Even other quacks think it's a quack site.
[edit] Footnotes
- ↑ an example of their vaccine hysteria
- ↑ An example of the cancer woo they promote
- ↑ An example of said conspiracy theories
- ↑ Crazed Swordsman Attacks Scientology Guard Who Fires Back in Self Defense, Mike Adams, Natural News November 24, 2011, retrieved 2011-05-21.
- ↑ Baseless Accusations against John Travolta Demonstrate Cruelty, Intolerance of Pill Pushers and Religion Bashers, Mike Adams, Natural News January 5, 2011, retrieved 2011-05-21.
- ↑ Nevermind that Scientology makes billions off of pushing their brand of nonsense.
- ↑ E-Cat Cold fusion device independently validated producing 800% more energy than input, Neev M. Arnell, Natural News May 19, 2011, retrieved 2011-05-21.
- ↑ Free Energy Technology Could Destroy the Natural World (But It Doesn't Have To), Mike Adams, Natural News April 24,2011, retrieved 2011-05-21.
- ↑ 5 Times in this article alone, actually!
- ↑ A glaring example of this
- ↑ Shattering the false philosophy and junk science of conventional medicine... supposedly
- ↑ We kid you not!
- ↑ How dare they!
- ↑ Big Pharma Mind Control!
- ↑ AMA conspiracy against chiropractic
- ↑ The Quackery of Chemotherapy, Gunpoint Medicine and the Disturbing Fate of 13-Year-Old Daniel Hauser, Mike Adams, Natural News May 20, 2009, retrieved 2011-05-21.
- ↑ They have a whole category for chemtrails, in fact
- ↑ David Icke on AIDS
- ↑ Ron Paul articles
- ↑ This post puts most of his insanity on display in one place.
- ↑ [1]
- ↑ [2]
- ↑ An example of this insult to good cartoonists
- ↑ Listen if your ears dare.
- ↑ Orac post
- ↑ Asshole Skeptic post
- ↑ His screed about the shorty awards
- ↑ Pharyngula's post about the incident
- ↑ Mike Adams thinks he knows what skeptics believe