Disarming the Struggle AgaiAIDS: Anti-Science Obscurantism, Conpsiracy Theories

Christopher B. Hajib-Niles cniles at wanadoo.fr
Tue Dec 5 23:54:45 PST 2000



>
> Well, since you reject the rules of the race game, and I accept them, to the
> extent that I do, under duress, let's set that aside.

no, stuart, i don't think you understand. i really AM black by standard race rules...unless you have a different idea of the standard rules.
>
> I am not a scientist, and certainly not a medical doctor or epidemiologist.

neither am i. but i think both of us are smart enough to recognize the classic sighs of a theory in deep trouble.

But I am not aware that there are "thousands" of respectable dissenting
> scientific views;

well, i should have said that the number of doctors and scientist who dissent number in the thousands. and the nature of the dissent varies, from those believe that HIV has been isolated but could not possibly be doing all the things that are claimed for it to those who believe that retroviruses themselves are a byproduct of a cancer research establishment that until very recently refused to even consider dietary and environmental factors as causative agents of cancer.

Mbeke could produce only handful of skeptics with any
> qualifications at his AIDS conference.

i did not follow it

The overwhelming weight of scientific
> opinion is that the standard view is right.

yes, indeed it is...

The consensus is muschs tronger
> than the (string) consensus about global warming.

san doute...

It is regarded as so
> obvious that the only questions are about how to beat HIV, not whether HIV
> is the cause of AIDS.

even big-time standard theory types like luc montagnier, who claimed to discover HIV, has publically stated that the virus alone could not possibly be doing all the things claimed for it.

Moreover, treatments targeting HIV (like the cocktail)
> seem to work--I have friends who are alive because of this, as I am sure so
> do we all.

ok, so you have friends who have gotten better with the cocktail. i've got four friends who originally tested positive, went on the cocktail, saw their health begin to plummet, took themselves off the cocktail, got better (one because of my talking with her about the problems with the standard theory), went to get tested, and tested negative! this is in addition to the aquanitances i mentioned earlier. also, i can think of two people i know who got better--but not well--when they switched from the straight up AZT regimen to the triple protease. but this could be because the TPT is a much less demanding therapy than AZT--allowing you to get a full nights sleep, not disrupting the digestive process so dramatically, less cytotoxic, etc.

at the very minimum, it is worth asking how it is that an increasing number of people are taking themselves off the drugs, getting better and staying better, isn't it? should we not be asking why several ACT-UP outfits have rejected the standard theory AND are asking gay men to think twice before they go on any drug therapy? are all these people just clueless loonies?

So I conclude that HIV skepticism is like creationism, a wacko
> position.

i urge you to go and check out the opposition. i also urge you to stop using overinflated terminology. 15 years ago, my jaw used to drop in amazement when i saw these books that questioned the reality of HIV or AIDS. i was convinced, as you seem to be now, that only a nut could advocate such a position. now i am ashamed of that response, one that indicated how easily a population of people is trained not to ask questions.

That is why Mbeke should not accept it and promulgate it.

AIDS, as i said earlier, is a paradigm in serious crisis and it has been for a long time. that should be clear to anybody who takes a careful look. just as one need not be a trained economist to figure out that capitalist logic does not quite add up, one need not be a medical doctor to know when a certain medical logic is not explaining, in any plalusible manner, all the phenomenah it is supposed to explain.

As far
> as we know, the standard view is true,

who is we? i am suggesting that there is a tiny minority of folks who are on to something, not unlike the tiny minority of explicitely anti-capitalist are on to something.

and we should act accordingly.

again who is we? NIH? the UN? WHO? AMA? the State Department? African NGO's? Robert Gallo and CO? that we ain't me...

This
> is especially important for someone in charge of public health policy where
> AIDS is epidemic.

does anybody on this list really believe that public health departments have anything, fundamentally, to do with health? in the most technologically advanced country, the u.s., almost all of the major health institutions are still waging war against homeopathy and vitamin c supplementation when the benefits of these practices are obvious.

chris niles

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