If you went to your doctor and he prescribed slaughtering a chicken at midnight while chanting the words to the Sex Pistols' 'Anarchy in the UK' as a cure for your ailment, would you do it?
Or would you seek out another doctor? One who bases their medical practice on facts rather than on superstition?
Suppose you go to your doctor with a case of ringworm and he firmly declares that it is not ringworm but a reaction to butter, and makes up some figures on the spot to 'prove' that people who eat butter are 74.8% more likely to erupt in circular fungal infections than those who use plasticine (I can't call it margarine. It's not). What do you do? Ditch the butter or ditch the doctor?
I don't visit the doctor. Well, I'm not ill so there's no need but sometimes I damage myself, or catch something, and even then I don't visit the doctor. Why? It's simple.
I no longer trust the medical profession at all.
This is why. I now know that if I were to visit the doctor with a throat infection, he is going to tell me it's because of smoking. If I visit with a gut infection, that will be because of smoking and drinking and probably butter and salt too. Not because I've eaten something that wasn't quite dead. No, the medical profession is no longer interested in bacteria or viruses. They come out instead with superstitious nonsense with nothing to back it up at all. Like this:
I believe that parents who smoke in cars carrying small children are committing a form of child abuse; I suppose the same people also smoke at home in front of their children.
Telling perfectly healthy children that they are obese and going to die is child abuse. Telling children that because their father smokes, they are going to die, that's child abuse. Taking childrens' lunches away because you don't agree with their contents is child abuse. Using children as experimental subjects when giving them untested vaccines is severe child abuse. Medics approve of all these things. Yet when it comes to a little bit of leaf wrapped in paper, they call it child abuse.
And they think we should trust them?
Evidence from the US indicates that more young children are killed by parental smoking than by all unintentional injuries combined.
He is not 'mistaken'. He is lying. This is the man who expects you to trust him when he wants to ram a camera up your jacksi. He expects you to trust him when he injects you with something or gives you a little bottle of mysterious pills. He expects you to trust him, and take advice from him.
Yet here he is, blatantly and unashamedly lying. As Stewart points out, no child has ever died from this witchdoctor's curse called 'passive smoking'. None. Not one. Not ever. Not even when smoking prevalence was far, far higher than it is now. He is not mistaken, he is lying.
If it was one lie, we could maybe overlook it but...
Cot death, or Sudden Infant Death Syndrome, is also directly related to smoking.
No, it is not. There is no evidence for this at all. These 'caring professionals' use this lie to make grieving parents suffer more by instilling guilt. Caring? Ha!
Other causes of death include lung infections, burning to death as a result of fires caused by cigarettes and asthma.
All lung infections? Really? All caused by smoking and never by bacteria? Non-smokers rejoice, you cannot possibly ever get ill because the medical profession has banished all causes of disease. Now they need to explain why people still get sick. So they blame it all on smoking, drinking and eating.
Burning to death is caused by something called 'fire' and while it is possible to start a fire with a cigarette, it's not that easy. Most home furnishings are fire-retardant at least nowadays. Besides, if a smoker drops a lit cigarette, they tend to notice they've done it and take steps to ensure that it doesn't set fire to their home. When was the last time you heard about fire caused by cigarettes? When was the last time you heard about fire caused by something else?
As for asthma, it is my experience that asthmatics tend not to take up smoking. It really wouldn't be a good idea. It is also my experience that certain asthmatics of my acquaintance used to visit the pub often before the smoking ban and were untroubled by the smoke in the air. They don't visit now because none of their friends are there any more. People who were troubled by smoke in the air didn't go to those pubs before the ban - and they didn't go afterwards either. They are still outside those pubs and now they are complaining about smokers being out there too. If it bothers you, go inside the pub. We aren't allowed in there.
Asthma is not caused by smoking. It might be irritated by smoke, in severe cases, but smoking does not cause it. Think of the smokers you know, and have known. How many have developed asthma?
This empty suit with a 'medic' badge on it is just making up a load of nonsense on the spot. There are those who believe him because he is a doctor. There are doctors who believe this rubbish.
There are doctors who believe that if a patient smokes, all their ailments are caused by smoking. Doctors will repeat these lies to you, they will tell you that your dead child was your fault, they will tell you that the boil on your backside is smoking-related, they will tell you that your lung infection was caused by smoking - and if you protest that you have never smoked, they will call you a liar.
Frank Davis's solution sounds extreme but doctors have brought this on themselves.
Would you return to a mechanic who says that your car is beyond repair because your ashtray is full? Or would you take it home and change the oil yourself?
What would be the point of me visiting a doctor? He is not going to diagnose anything. All he will do is trot out the tired lies that no matter what is wrong with me, it's all down to smoking. He is not even going to try to find another cause because in his mind, smoking causes everything.
Oh, I know someone will be along soon to tell me I am killing the cheeeldren and that I am subhuman and worthless. Yawn. Heard it all before. Someone will come along and relate how they watched a smoker die and therefore all smokers will die the same way. My grandmother never smoked. She died. How can that happen?
Then there will be someone who works in medicine coming along to relate how they see sick people every day. Such a thing does not surprise Longrider and it doesn't surprise me.
GPs are not spoilsports. We genuinely want people to be able to live healthy, fulfilling and productive lives. But every day we are confronted with the harm caused by smoking, excessive alcohol consumption and obesity.
Plumbers are not spoilsports, but every day we are confronted by leaking pipes and blocked waste systems.
Mechanics are not spoilsports, but every day we see cars in desperate need of repair.
Do you see where this is going, doctors? Plumbers don't tend to get called to houses where the water stays in the pipes. Nobody takes a perfectly functioning car to a repair shop. People who are not sick do not go to the doctors.
You see sick people every day because you're the one people go to see when they are sick. Yes, they do expect you to fix them. That is your job. It is what you are paid to do.
It is not your job to control other people's lives. There were many in the past who have tried to do that and it did not end well for them.
I cannot entrust my health to people who tell me barefaced lies. I will not put myself in the hands of people whose stated intention is to control my life. As for hospitals, well, it's part of my job to fix those people you've handed out free infections to. So you won't get me in there conscious either, and don't get too settled with your machines and drugs because as soon as I wake up, I'm gone. You can infect your Puritan friends to your heart's content.
There was a time when medicine was based on superstition and random decisions created by each medic's personal prejudices. Then there was a time when it was based on logic and research and facts. Funny how things go in circles, isn't it?
More on this here and here.
And Dick Puddlecote has yet another arrogant arse nicely skewered.
13 comments:
The skewered arse's followers didn't want to debate much either. ;)
Great piece, LI.
What DP said. Even though my own experience of GPs on the coal face (as opposed to those who purport to speak for them) shows me they are not beguiled by this ready-made explanation for all ailments and don't bother asking when I'm giving up.
And I've known three asthmatics who smoked because, according to them, it helped their asthma.
Nice skewering job, DP.
PT Barnum - I don't know any smoking asthmatics, but I don't know any who are adversely affected by smoke (unless it gets to the point where we're all choking!).
Maybe there are different forms of asthma, perhaps some are made worse by smoke while others are actually relieved by it.
I'd ask a medic but they'll just lie.
This is going to be interesting! Gave up smoking back in May, didn't really want to but had to admit that it made my job difficult (it's very physical and I got very short of breath very quickly). Bit of a bugger but there we are. I'm 57, self-employed, and need to work for at least another 30 years before I can afford to retire. Point is, the old sawbones is going to have to scrabble around a bit to find something else to blame everyday ills upon. Looking forward to this and will keep you posted!
In the meantime, have a fag for me will you?
I have, lurking on my computer somewhere the results of a study carried out in India which not only accepts that nicotine inhibits the allergic response which can trigger asthma attacks (indeed, the starting point of the study appears to have been “Why does nicotine inhibit ….” rather than “Does nicotine inhibit …..”), but also explains all the very complicated mechanisms which occur during an allergic reaction, and how nicotine inhibits these, thus making them much less severe. I won’t post it here because it’s absolutely chock-full of scientific-speak which will probably mean nothing to, and bore the pants off, pretty much everyone on here apart from science-y people like Leggy and any other scientists who read this blog and would understand it. But suffice to say that after translating it as best I could into proper English like wot most of us speak on ‘ere, (i.e. by looking up pretty much every other word) it was pretty damned convincing.
I think that one of the reasons that so few asthmatics smoke is that many of them first give up smoking (which is inhibiting their attacks) and then the asthma takes hold, and this study certainly gives some interesting reasons as to why this might be. I certainly know of lots of people who have developed it (or it’s got worse) since they gave up, but strangely none of them ever developed it all the time they were smoking ……
Caratacus - seriously, try Electrofag. No lung damage and feels similar. You still get the action but not the tar.
Anon - I think it was Frank Davis who highlighted an Indian study showing that ex-smokers burst onto the lung cancer scene.
It's not what you do to your body. It's what you change. Antismokers cannot comprehend this so nobody should waste their breath trying to explain it.
Excellent piece!
Sort of on PT's point: I have a smoker friend who gets hay fever, and after a bad few days he went to the doctor, who asked if he smoked. He said yes, and the doc said 'I shouldn't say this, but don't stop at the moment.' Turns out that smoking helped 'open the lungs' and alleviated somewhat the hay fever...
Thanks for the Linky, Leggy! I always get tons of click-throughs from you.
I am hopeful that all the bloggers out there can finally put the pieces together to uncover the truth about smoking and why the "military-industrial complex" who rule the West are so desperate to eradicate it.
One thing I have noticed is that many of the most clued-up bloggers are smokers. I have been wondering for a while if there could be a correlation between smoking and intelligence/critical thinking.
oddly enough the only "true" orgy i have ever seen and been involved in was with a group(20+) of final year doctor's at uni, no condoms no holes barred as many legal and illegal drugs as you would like.... and guess what all of them were smokers!!! Doctors used to be the highest group of professional's who drank too much and smoked...ODD how they have all found religion of one form or another now....
If this movement only had some money we could sue and take this to the courts. Each and every one of us has now been branded child abusers when there is other scientific evidence that says something a whole lot different about smoking when children are present, around the corner, up the road or a mile away from where we smoke.
If we had money in this movement, we could also take out a civil arrest warrant for Bannantyne who is inciting hatred against us. His twitter said smoking was child abuse "FACT." It is not a fact. There is evidence to dispute this. He has slandered us and because of his hatred of us, he is trying to incite violence against us.
If we have no money in this movement, then do we at least have any no win no fee solicitors who would do it for the mega publicity their firm would get?
Bannantyne has loads of money. He deserves dragging through the courts and once the real scientific evidence on this is finally out, then maybe, just maybe, foul-mouthed, bigoted, hypocritcal idiots like bannantyne might just think twice before spreading such hatred about a minority group of people.
A no-win, no-fee solicitor would be ideal but they only take cases they are certain to win. If it was anyone else being called a child abuser, they'd be in like a shot but because it's smokers, they'll be wary. Even though he stated that he considered it a 'fact' that smokers are child abusers, repeatedly, in writing and in public, the propaganda against us will make it hard to get a fair jury.
It relates to something I've been wondering about lately - why are there no adverts anywhere for Electrofag? It's not tobacco so it's not because of the ban on tobacco advertising. I wonder if advertisers are scared of it because it looks like smoking, so they're afraid to be associated with it.
You don't need an actual ban if you can make people too scared to touch it.
Yeeppp - I stopped visting the "medical profession" about 18 months ago - I then had a liver 'semi-failure' problem, which was promptly declared to be the result of my alcohol consumption (which has been unchanged for about 40 years !) ...
Bullshit ! - I just stopped eating Paracetamol (I have Sciatica on the right side) - changed to Ibuprofen with Codeine - works just great ! ...
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