I found a link to Wade’s blog that talked basically about how proud he was of the 10 or so people who attended the ‘Simpsonwood remembered‘ conference this weekend (big get together for tinfoil hat fanciers).
He linked to a few images of the event and as if I needed it, I was given a pertinent reminder of the average intelligence of the rank and file Mercury Militia members.
Please, feel free to point and laugh.
This, by the way, supplants my other favourite picture, taken at a David Kirby book reading:
Left Brain Right Brain 
I love these people.
That’s funny. I’d suggest Googling ‘Simpsonwood skeptico’. Excellent conspiracy takedown.
Is laughing at people’s spelling (and implying it has something to do with their intelligence, and that lack of intelligence is something to be laughed at) okay as long as we don’t like them, or something?
They could very well have learning disabilities or be on the spectrum themselves, or just have been careless or in a hurry that day.
It is to me :o)
Sorry, call me shallow. I find the idea of these guys having the word on their t-shirts, at the place they’re visiting and exhorting people to google the misspelling word hilarious.
Thanks for pointing that out Amanda. This dyslexic could not see why the picture was so funny. Having had it pointed out, however, I will agree that, between the three of them, and the person taking the picture, and considering that they wanted people to use that string of letters in a search engine, it’s pretty incompetent, and as such, pretty funny.
The funniest picture is the Misteries/Science Fiction one… The misspelling is more pathetic than funny to me. Even though the mercury parents are misguided individuals, and I disagree with most of what is said in the biomed circles, I still feel sorry for them, because it must be very painful and tragic to believe your child has been poisoned.
I misspell on a regular basis but I’d like to think that I’d get it right on a Rally poster telling people keywords to Google.
Of course the Network of Biblical Storytellers misspelled it too.
Yet another example of your complete lack of maturity or decency, Kev.
Won’t it soon be time for you to grow up?
I didn’t know that respecting all neurodiversity was only for our own political allies. 😦
Hell no, Harold. If growing up means being a supercilious wanker then I’ll leave that to you. You seem to require little practice :o)
Amanda – its not the misspelling that’s particularly funny, its the misspelling and telling people to google it.
I think it’s all about the real Simpson family…….
By the way, are those guys’ white socks part of the protest?
If an autistic person, in a socially inappropriate way, introduced a speaker at an autistic rights conference, would that be funny?
I did Google it. 82 hits, none of which make them look too bright.
qchan63 blue line slapshot for the win
Go USA!
Obviously none of you have read the minutes from the meeting held in June, 2000 at Simpsonwood. Before you laugh take a look at the minutes of the meeting.
Go to http://www.safeminds.com and click on the link for the June, 2000 meeting. It is over 250 pages and based on many of the posts of people who find this funny, they probably won’t be able to read it all. Try to locate the comment by one of the doctors who attended the meeting, Dr. Johnson, who left the meeting because his daughter in law just gave birth and he wanted to make sure that none of the vaccines his new grandson was given contained Thimerosal.
Already have read it Russel. Whats your point?
Joel – I guess it could be funny, yes. Is it not OK to have a little humour about yourself and/or others sometimes? I’ve seen t-shirts with the message on them ‘autistics rock’ – they made me smile. Is that wrong?
Dear Mr. Leitch,
I took a moment to look over your blog. I was saddened to read that you have a daughter that suffers from what has been called “classic” or “Kanners” autism.
You are missing the big picture here. The parents of children who developed neurological disorders after reciving vaccines containing mercury are not situated as you are. Our children did not exhibit the symptoms of autism until after they reached developmental milestones. Suddenly they began to show signs and symptoms similar to those described in autistic children. However what was lost in the translation was the fact the the label of ‘autism” which may apply to your daughter does not fairly represent the syndrome suffered by the children who recived toxic levels of thimerosal in vaccines.
Our children, unlike you daughter, have suffered mercury induced neurological disorders. They are not autistic. This is not our label it is the label scientists gave to them. The distinction between the development of the signs and symptoms is critical to a thoughtful and fair assessment of what the parents of children damaged by mercury exposure are arguing. Autism was diagnosed before the toxic vaccinations were given. It is a different syndrome. You can’t compare what your daughter has with what our kids have because you would be comparing apples to oranges.
Perhaps you are disgruntled because your daughter does not have a chance to recover
using the modalities available to children who were poisioned. Pehaps your daughter actually fits into this category and her father is just a coward who will not take the time to fight to help her. In either case you have business being critical of what other parents are doing for their kids. It may be you right to speak out but before you do you should have the facts straight.
With all due respect
Russel V. Mancino
Mr Mancino – you need to do quite a lot of study on the people who use your words. Your words have been appropriated by people who believe that mercury poisoning _is_ autism. Your words have been appropriated by people who believe autism did not exist until 1931 – when thiomersal was first used.
Do you have a clarifying message for these people?
The very same SafeMinds you quote above commissioned a study called ‘autism: a novel form of mercury poisoning’. Do you have a clarifying message for them?
Once more – I think your invocation of a conspiracy theory at Simpsonwood is very, very wrong. Both factually and in its implications for people like my daughter. However, now you have raised it but somewhat obliquely. Do you have a point?
Oh, shut up, Russel.
(Kev, feel free to moderate this out.)
My point, Mr. Lietch, is quite simple.
When the children who received vaccines regressed and showed symptoms, traits, habits etc. of children with clasic autism, they were misdiagnosed. Unfortunately the “autism” label stuck to these kids and it is incorrect. It was easy for doctors to label these kids in this manner because the signs were similar. The etiology, however, is much different. My son showed no signs of any
neurological disorders until he was four years old and after receiving numerous vaccinations.
Classic autism is discovered much sooner in life and children with this diagnosis never show signs of normal development. Thus the point is that I reject the label of autism that has been given to my son because he is not autistic as he does not meet the DSMV-IV criteria. Autism is not the same as mercury induced neurological disorders. Unfortunately semantics have blurred the line distinguishing the different syndromes. People like you fail to see the distinction.
Respectfully
Russel V. Mancino
Mr. Mancino: Do you have a rebuttal for Skeptico’s analysis of the Simpsonwood transcript?
There’s a big difference between laughing at something because it’s something you recognize in yourself, or laughing “with” someone, and laughing at someone.
I am surprised to hear the “We’re not laughing at you, we’re laughing with you” response paraphrased here. It doesn’t work when you’re “pointing and laughing” to mock people. That’s at.
About the “making fun of” issue, I think that if the gentlemen who wrote the sign are cognitively disabled in some way, then yeah, it’s not that funny. If they are what most people would consider cognitively “normal”, it’s as appropriate to find that funny as it is to find any blooper or blunder funny (which, evidently, not only is something most people do find funny, but humor in general seems to be based on that sort of thing: sillyness, mistakes, misunderstandings, etc.)
“When the children who received vaccines regressed and showed symptoms, traits, habits etc. of children with clasic autism, they were misdiagnosed. ”
Indeed.
It isn’t mercury ponisoning, though.
It’s called Heller’s Syndrome. And it is at least in ICD 10, if not in DSM IV-TR.
http://www.psychnet-uk.com/dsm_iv/childhood_disintegrative_disorder.htm
Amanda
It took someone pointing out that the photo is asking the world to google a misspelling before I got the joke. And that’s funny. What it isn’t is poking fun at dyslexics/spectrumites/spelling challenged. Otherwise this seems like ‘welcome to the new Victorians’ system of political correctness cum wowserism.
shit… typing at 2.30am doesn’t do me much good:
“It isn’t mercury ponisoning, though.” X
“It isn’t mercury poisoning, though.”
I’m shallow, too. I laughed. Out loud. I guess I laughed in part because only 10 people showed up for the rally thing. It sounds like they had more organizaitons listed on the back of the t-shirt than they had actual people show up to protest. Someone thanked one of the EoHam regulars and said he had driven from NY state with his two brothers. I’m guessing that’s the EoHam guy in the middle with the sign and his two brothers on the right and left. I haven’t been to Wade’s blog to see if they are identifiied.
It’s schadenfreude or something, isn’t it? I have plenty of that for people who chelated little autistic kids for non-existant mercury poisoning in an effort to cure them of their “mercury induced autism” …
I am also glad someone pointed out the mispelling because I also missed it at first. 😀
About the Kirby bookstore thing. There’s another photo of him up closer, in that one you can see three signs at the top of three bookshelves that say, “fiction” “fiction” and “fiction” they are sort of above his head. You can almost see them in the photo Kev posted.
Ugh, no, political correctness has nothing to do with it. Blech. Good phrase to use to totally stop discussion though.
I also think this is inappropriate, and after the last few days of $#@! online about “neurodiversity is everyone”, why should some people get special protection from being laughed at while others don’t? It sure seems like the response is based on orthodoxy. 😦
I didn’t laugh, although I can understand why Kev did. Simpsonwood can actually be a great proof article AGAINST the mercury mob – if it’s read in context….
*looks at Mancini and wonders what his marks were in reading comprehension*
Bottom line, mercury poisoning Autism (or an ASD). In all cases. Any positive reaction to chelation is because there was another problem (symptom) contributing to a sensory overload. Reduce the overload, you’ll get positive results – but you won’t get an NT kid. That’s impossible.
Welcome back, Kev!
“why should some people get special protection from being laughed at while others don’t?”
Why should some people get to have special parking spaces?
If it’s never OK to laugh at mistakes, foolishness, misunderstandings and blunders, you’ve basically abolished most forms of humor.
Jeesh, I’m writing close to the boundaries these days. Last comment could be misinterpreted due to extreme tiredness. You all go away and be perfect while I go away and have a quiet nervous breakdown.
Edit: Not being very explanatory here either:) Moving hemispheres is taking a toll, mostly on sleep and the prospect of flying circa 24 hours which I hate. Naturally, the whole family is mouthing eulogies to trans-Pacific flights, the unfeeling, insensitive clods:)
Joseph, it depends on what caused the blunder/mistake/whatever what you want to call it. If the person who made the blunder can laugh – no problem.
Also, if the blunder makes a person look like a huge hypocrite (which I think is why Kev laughed) then also no problem. I prefer the former myself, but I respect the latter.
I wouldn’t be surprised if I saw someone comment that “special parking places” shouldn’t be given to people, everyone should be treated equally – why should one group of people get close spots when others don’t? Are they better than anyone else (sarcasm here). But that aside, perhaps I’m sensitive here, but laughing at people bothers me in general, and when it’s something that could very well be a disability – disclosed or not – I have a huge problem.
Wasn’t there a huge fuss about people assuming someone wasn’t disabled when he really was just recently around here?
I didn’t think it was that funny, but I thought this one was funny.
I just think it is funny that a sign accusing somebody of doing something bad would have the bad thing misspelled. (It’s d-e-c-e-i-t.) It sort of reminds me of the bank robbery scene from “Take the Money and Run” where the teller thinks the robber’s note says “I’m pointing a gub at you.”
I think that might be Bob Moffitt (of the EoHarm group) holding the sign with is two brothers.
“Take the Money and Runâ€
Oh my God!! Great movie!! Hilarious!
As for this pic…Please. Did I get a giggle? Yes. Is it hilarious? For a one dimensional individual, perhaps.
Are we blowing this out of proportion? definitely.
I do laugh at blunders and stuff. I don’t understand why people suddenly seem unable to tell the difference between laughing at people in a malicious/mocking way and laughing about a situation in a more friendly (don’t actually know the word for it) way.
I am sure that if Kev made a mistake and one of these Simpsonwood sign holding people told everyone to point and laugh at him, the difference would suddenly and mysteriously become crystal clear to everyone here and there would be no need for explanation of this sort at all or debate about being PC and stuff. People would just grasp that this was not the same as a friendly laughing at a blunder. And in fact that has already happened when people have mocked people on “our side” and everyone could tell the difference, so why is everyone suddenly supposedly “unable to tell the difference” now?
Maybe those poor saps spelled it wrong on purpose… look at the attention it has received, a lot more then the orginal 10 at the meeting. They could be a lot smarter then you are all giving them credit for (except for the white socks…)
For me, the thing that makes the people in these pictures look ridiculous isn’t what they have done obviously wrong, but that they proudly proclaim a message that has been invalidated umpteen times and still they tout it.
The spelling errors (which, if they were indiciative of dyslexia, would need to be more like spelling inconsistencies than regularly misspelt words) are at most – for me – secondary to the above ‘fucked-up-ness factor’.
Amanda/Joel – come on. I have blundered many times on here and in the offline world. Sometimes people laughed sometimes they didn’t. The EoH crew get plenty of chuckles out the fact I once made a mistake and thought the DTP vaccine caused Meg’s autism for example.
It’s OK. Its not about my neurology, more about that I screwed up. Same as these guys.
Kev, our favourite imbecile is already at work on the Kev-piss-take blog. I’m sure you knew, but I can’t help noticing that – for all that wanker’s attempts to injure with ad hominem attacks against any-and-everybody connected with you and Kathleen – he’s demonstrating how hateful an idiot he really is.
Wonder if he’s okay with Autism Speaks going all parasitic on him and the rest of his twuntish sheep… sorry… ‘followers’! If he’s arsehole enough to support those greedy gitbags – after that organisation’s recently examined 990 form exposed their spending of the donation money – then he’s definitely worth the laughing at for being too stupid to know when to stop.
David – John can get up to whatever he wants. As I said in the other thread, the day I worry what he thinks or says about me will be the day I die :o)
This is a guy who can’t even get accepted to his local autism organisations as they realise what a psycho he is. Let him bleat. When the world comes to judge JBJr’s contributions to the world it will be demonstrated as a collective yawn ;o)
The way this page opened for me, I saw the three guys asking “got autism?” like “got milk?” – I did not see the rest until I scrolled down, so I took this as an advert and smiled 🙂
Okay, so they crayoned a minor typo. I say: so what? Do you realize that the guy on the left [fat, grinning, in white T-shirt] won the Lasker Prize for physiology; the one in the middle [fat, grinning, in white T-shirt] discovered T-Reg(bright) cells; and the other guy [fat, grinning, in white T-shirt] is Wakefield Professor of Molecular Biology at Harvard University?
These are just the kind of brains we need to unravel the Simpsonwood conspiracy.
Okay, I got it. It’s okay to laugh. It’s funny. It’s like when a kid falls out of a wheelchair (that’s like a blooper) or when someone else makes a mistake – the right response is to laugh at him, and that’s how people should be treated. Now I know. (yes, sarcasm)
The US President is an unstoppable factory spurning out gaffes day and night. That is far more comparable in this case than a kid falling out a wheelchair. I’m certainly not going to apoligise for laughing *at* people that managed to mis-spell something written correctly on each others shirts.
We only laugh *with* someone when we see them laughing too.
For goodness sakes get over yourselves! If I was the one who made that type of mistake, I’d laugh at myself.