The Infectious Myth

The Infectious Myth - Flawed Forensics with Frederic Whitehurst

Frederic Whitehurst, a PhD chemist, lawyer, and former employee of the FBI Crime Lab, speaks with David about flaws in forensic evidence. While at the crime lab he was involved with major cases including the 1983 World Trade Center bombing, a 1993 assassination attempt on President Bush, the 1989 Avianca Airlines bombing and the 1995 Oklahoma City bombing. Frederic was a whistle blower about lab misconduct in the 1990s. When the FBI tried to shoot the messenger, he was involved in a ten year court battle. He was vindicated with ha major financial settlement and an agreement to reform practices. Years later the Washington Post discovered that at least one major promise was broken. Flaws in forensic evidence include the scientific basis for the analysis, lack of proper validation and, perhaps most importantly, outright fraud. 

 

To learn more about Frederic’s work at the National Whistleblower Center, see: https://www.whistleblowers.org/members/dr-frederic-whitehurst/

 

The Infectious Myth - Detransitioning

This week’s guest, a Canadian woman going by the name of “Ben”, lived as a transman for a while, before deciding that this was a mistake, and that she was actually a lesbian. Classifying herself as a “butch", and using a masculine name, she still sees herself as a woman. She is establishing an organization for the many people who are detransitioning, out of the sight of most of the media and so-called support organizations, who do not like this phenomenon, in an era of gender affirmation. As her views have changed, she has become aware of the dangers to females of self-identification, and the physical and psychological risks of transitioning, whether socially, chemically or through surgery. She is currently establishing an organization to help the increasing number of detransitioners, including many who are suffering the after effects of hormones or surgery that they now regret.

 

You can find her as “gnc centric" on twitter, YouTube and Medium.

 

The Infectious Myth - Fluoridation Again, with Paul Connett and Bob Dickson

After our last discussion of water fluoridation in 222, it was expected that the University of Calgary would deliver a pro-fluoridation report, which would be used by a city council committee to recommend fluoridation of this major Canadian city (well over one million people). But the report, while pro-fluoride overall, admitted that the data on neurological effects (e.g. lower IQ) was concerning, and city council cancelled the committee meeting, presumably to regroup the pro-fluoride forces. David is joined again by Paul Connett of the Fluoride Action Network and Bob Dickson of Safe Water Calgary, with some written comments from Hardy Limeback, formerly head of preventive dentistry at the University of Toronto.

 

Some of the documents mentioned in this discussion are: (A) CADTH report: https://www.cadth.ca/sites/default/files/pdf/HT0022%20CWF%20-%20Clinical%20report.pdf (B) Response to the CADTH Report: http://fluoridealert.org/articles/20-experts-show-cadth-review-seriously-flawed (C) O’Brien report: http://fluoridealert.org/wp-content/uploads/calgary.obrien-report.july2019.pdf (D) Till/Green IQ Study: https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamapediatrics/fullarticle/2748634

The Infectious Myth - Fluoridation Again, with Paul Connett and Bob Dickson

After our last discussion of water fluoridation in 222, it was expected that the University of Calgary would deliver a pro-fluoridation report, which would be used by a city council committee to recommend fluoridation of this major Canadian city (well over one million people). But the report, while pro-fluoride overall, admitted that the data on neurological effects (e.g. lower IQ) was concerning, and city council cancelled the committee meeting, presumably to regroup the pro-fluoride forces. David is joined again by Paul Connett of the Fluoride Action Network and Bob Dickson of Safe Water Calgary, with some written comments from Hardy Limeback, formerly head of preventive dentistry at the University of Toronto.

 

Some of the documents mentioned in this discussion are: (A) CADTH report: https://www.cadth.ca/sites/default/files/pdf/HT0022%20CWF%20-%20Clinical%20report.pdf (B) Response to the CADTH Report: http://fluoridealert.org/articles/20-experts-show-cadth-review-seriously-flawed (C) O’Brien report: http://fluoridealert.org/wp-content/uploads/calgary.obrien-report.july2019.pdf (D) Till/Green IQ Study: https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamapediatrics/fullarticle/2748634

 

The Infectious Myth - Intersex and Transgender with Claire Graham

Claire Graham is a British intersex advocate, and an intersex woman herself. David discusses the new attention given to intersex issues, as they are often used to bolster the claim that sex and gender are not binary. But ‘intersex’ is a misleading term, because almost all cases are quite easily determined to be men and women, and in many cases, such as Claire’s, there are no characteristics of the opposite sex at all, just an abnormal development of the sexual anatomy. Claire has experienced significant hostility from some transgender rights activists, and has been banned on Twitter. Yet other transgender people have supported her, and don’t want the idea of distinct sexes banned.

 

Claire maintains a blog at: https://mrkhvoice.com

The Infectious Myth - Walkable City Rules with Jeff Speck

Jeff Speck is a well known urban designer who has a passion for making cities more walkable, as shown by his book, “Walkable City” and the recent follow-on, “Walkable City Rules”. David and Jeff discuss why it is important to make cities more walkable, what’s wrong with many current North American cities, what should be done, and how this can be accomplished politically. Optimistically, change is coming, one step at a time.

 

For more, see Jeff’s website: https://www.jeffspeck.com

The Infectious Myth - CO2 and Temperature: Friends, Enemies or Ships crossing in the night?

W. Jackson Davis is a Berkely, Oregon and Stanford educated climate science who has studied historical estimates of temperature and CO2. He first explains how these are estimated historically using so-called proxies, and then how there is little correlation between the two phenomena and, when there is, it is generally temperature changes that precede changes in CO2 levels. This was document in a 2017 paper entitled, “The Relationship between Atmospheric Carbon Dioxide Concentration and Global Temperature for the Last 425 Million Years”. Davis does not believe CO2 is harmless, however, he does believe that it contributes to the acidification of the oceans.

 

For more information on this week’s guest see: http://EnvironmentalStudiesInstitute.org

The Infectious Myth - Psychological Dangers of Gender Affirmation with Oren Amitay

Oren Amitay is a Canadian psychologist, practitioner and university teacher, who has been outspoken about the dangers of gender affirmation, unquestioningly accepting someone’s claim that they are not their biological sex without dealing with the other conditions and life factors that they are almost certainly dealing with.. The vast majority of teenagers with gender dysphoria will normally ‘grow out’ of this by the time they are 20, but gender affirmation will encourage more of them to proceed to hormones and surgery, with lifelong health problems, and no possibility of returning to their original biological state. Amitay also talks about censorship, being kicked off twitter and out of the Ontario Psychological Association, and describes how many colleagues support him but are afraid to speak out. Despite this Amitay continues to advocate for an open discussion of the best psychological approaches to children and teens who in genuine distress due to their inability to accept their biological sex.

 

The Infectious Myth - Medical Dangers of Affirmative Care for Gender Dysphoria, with William Malone

William Malone is an MD and endocrinologist who is concerned about so-called affirmative care for youth with gender dysphoria. He discusses these concerns with David, including how they are diverting attention from pre-existing psychological conditions that are almost always present, how social transition makes the use of cross-sex hormones more likely, and the medical dangers of these hormones. He also points out that gender dysphoria will resolve by age twenty in over 80% of youth, and they will eventually accept their biological sex. 

 

More information on William Malone’s viewpoints can be found here: https://www.scribd.com/document/416757257/Gender-Dysphoria-Resource-for-Providers

The Infectious Myth - The UK “Bad Blood” Inquiry

David, in his role as the president of Rethinking AIDS, recently wrote to the UK “bad blood” inquiry. The inquiry believes that the clotting factor that hemophiliacs need to reduce the risk of bleeding severely, was infected with HIV. But David cites the evidence that it was actually impurities in the “intermediate purity” clotting factor used in the 1980s that was one  problem, and the use of the drug AZT in HIV-positive hemophiliacs (and not in those who tested negative) was the cause of the extremely high death rate in hemophiliacs starting in the late 1990s, up to 13% of seropositives in one year, almost all taking AZT. The survival of some hemophiliacs in good health, who consistently refused AZT and later AIDS drugs, is further evidence that HIV was never the problem.

A copy of David’s letter to the inquiry, including citations, can be found here: http://reference.rethinkingaids.com/Letter_to_UK_Hemophilia_Inquiry.pdf