Debunking Wikipedia’s Warrior Against Complementary and Alternative Medicine

Debunking Wikipedia’s Warrior Against Complementary and Alternative Medicine

 Richard Gale, Gary Null PhD, Victoria Theophanis

Progressive Radio Network, February 26, 2020

 

Rarely do we question the integrity, veracity and hidden motivations of an expert speaking or writing on any given topic.  Patients rarely question the diagnosis or prescribed treatment of their cardiologist, oncologist, urologist, etc. Nor do we question the accuracy and objectivity of mainstream medical journalists or news anchors reporting on health issues. It is presumed that the sacred trust we project upon the authority and veneration of so-called “experts” should cancel out honest scrutiny and critical thinking. 

The logic behind this is simple and should be self evident, not just in the medical profession but for any field or discipline. Those who have obtained a coveted position of authority are expected to be blindly deferred to with the presumption that the top of the food chain is equivalent to being knowledgeable, insightful and correct. Consequently, a school teacher  may defer to the authority of an adjunct, who defers to a professor, who defers to a department chair, and further up the ladder to the Dean. But in the real world, these hierarchical differences of power and authority are more mythology than reality.

One glaring example of a non-expert who has been uncritically praised and lifted as an authoritative voice for medical orthodoxy is former psychiatrist Stephen Barrett. Barrett has had a fifty-year career attacking every premise and scientific legitimacy of medical treatments that fall under Complementary and Alternative Medicine (CAM). 

 

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