Healthy, Wealthy, and Dumb

[vovat]

1. I don't read the Huffington Post very often, but I find that I usually agree with their politics. On the other hand, I'm not so keen on their promotion of so-called "alternative medicine." Apparently, their "wellness editor" is called "Dr." despite not having a medical degree. If you thought accepting things with no evidence was the exclusive province of the right wing, think again! Really, it seems to me that New Age stuff in general is basically the opposite side of the coin from fundamentalist religion. That's not to say that some people don't incorporate elements of both, mind you. Advocates of "natural health" and the like claim that there IS evidence, but the government is suppressing it. I'm not going to deny to stranglehold the drug companies have over the government, but if these alternative cures really work, why suppress them instead of marketing them themselves and getting even richer? Then again, why try to outlaw gay marriage instead of taking advantage of the marketing possibilities inherent therein? Hey, Disney was smart enough to do that, so why not the rest of you in the generally pro-business section of the political spectrum? And by the way, Arianna, how long have you lived in this country? Lose the accent already!

2. Speaking of "natural health," the people who hold that pretty much anything can be accomplished through diet and exercise...well, they have a valid point, but I still think there's a significant flaw in that philosophy. To wit, they seem to think that health is simply a single measure, like a life bar in a video game. From what I've seen and experienced (which, admittedly, isn't exactly hard data), it's completely possible to be healthy in some respects and unhealthy in others.

3. I've heard that there's been a certain amount of controversy over the latest Family Guy episode, which is kind of bizarre. I mean, the last new episode before that had a running joke about Peter being raped, and it's this new one that gets flak? I kind of feared the worst when they introduced the girls with Downs Syndrome, but they ended up treading pretty lightly as far as Seth MacFarlane shows go. Of course, Bill O'Reilly's complaint on the show has nothing to do with mocking mental illness, and everything to do with (surprise, surprise) someone having different political views than him. See, at one point, the girl says her mother is the former Governor of Alaska. You know, because Sarah Palin has a kid with Downs Syndrome? Honestly, the joke really didn't make much sense, as far as I could tell, but it was slightly amusing. To O'Reilly and Palin, however, it constitutes an "attack on her family." My God, what horrible network would air such a terribly insulting program? Oh, wait, the same one that employs O'Reilly. But we already know Mr. Falafel and Mrs. Deathpanel are people who can dish it out but not take it. What I don't get is how someone who gets indignant about two-second jokes on comedy shows can reasonably expect to be President. Hey, I'll admit I'm too personally sensitive to hold public office, so why can't you, Sarah? Oh, by the way, the FG character said her dad was an accountant, which Todd Palin isn't, so why aren't you bitching about the implication that you have an illegitimate child? Or did you not pay that much attention?

Comments

[poisonyoulove.livejournal.com]

What makes Sarah Palin's outrage extra hilarious is that a week or so ago she threw a fit about someone saying "retard" and then Rush Limbaugh talked about that, using the word repeatedly and she defended him, saying that it was ok because it was SATIRE.
So . . . satire is fine unless it's done by a liberal? OKAY. LOL!

[vovat.livejournal.com]

I'm not entirely sure Palin knows what satire is, aside from something that allows you to say offensive things without being criticized for it.

I've also since learned that the person who did the voice for the FG character actually HAS Downs Syndrome, which kind of puts a damper on Palin's insistence that they were mocking her kid.

[onesto-hotel.livejournal.com]

Wow, fake doctors? Really?

You've completely hit the nail on the head with your comparison of New Age medicine to fundamentalist takes on the the matter though. It's like if you go far enough left or far enough right you run into the same sort of anti-intellectual nonsense.

I will admit to being horrifically biased on the issue though, speaking as a biology major.

[vovat.livejournal.com]

Science was never my best subject in school, but I have to say that it usually just makes more sense than the religious and mystical explanations. Let's see, did modern species come into being through a natural process that we've actually observed, or some dude in the sky making them out of clay? It really doesn't seem like there's much of a contest to me, but ask a Creationist if that's what they think.