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Oct. 20th, 2007
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some_fox
Calling Society of Homeopaths members
Oct. 20th, 2007 10:01 amThe Society of Homeopaths is Europe's largest professional organisation of homeopaths. If you haven't heard about this already, you may be horrified to learn that they have forsaken answering their critics in favour of suppressing them with legal threats.
Earlier this month, Dr Andy Lewis of the Quackometer blog posted the results of a little bit of investigative journalism he did. The Society's Code of Practice forbids members from claiming to cure named diseases in advertising, but a Newsnight investigation presented by Simon Singh showed over a year ago that this rule was routinely flouted, with claims to cure malaria rife. Lewis wanted to know if the Society had done anything to get its house in order and enforce its Code of Practice since then, so he picked a homeopath at random from the Society's website and looked at what they claimed.
You can read the results here. You may note that this link does not go to Dr Lewis's website...
What was the Society's response? Did they contact the homeopath in question and demand they take down the leaflet in question? Did they conduct a thorough investigation to make sure the homeopaths advertised on their website complied strictly with the Code of Practice? Did they, by contrast, roundly defend the wording in the leaflet as entirely in keeping with the letter and spirit of the Code of Practice?
No, of course not. They threatened to sue.
But they didn't threaten to sue Dr Lewis. There was a risk, after all, that he might stand up to the threat, and that the matter might be decided on its merits. No, instead they followed in the grand tradition of Dr Lawrence Godfrey and went straight to his ISP, who following the Godfrey decision had no choice but to fold no matter what the merits of the original discussion. They haven't made the slightest effort to answer what Lewis has to say; a threatening letter, with no specifics of how the post is meant to be libellous, has been their only response. Isn't this the sort of thing that Big Pharma is supposed to do to suppress alternative medicine, not the other way around?
The good news is that there's nothing they could have done to more effectively raise the profile of this blog entry. It has been copied into zillons of blogs around the world and propogated far and wide.
Now for the important bit. Some of you are members of the Society of Homeopaths. I'm guessing you're not at all happy to see the Society so lax in enforcing a Code of Practice that is vital to the credibility of the Society and its members. However even if you think that Dr Lewis's criticism of the Society is entirely wide of the mark, you're probably unhappy to see them choosing not to respond to criticism but to suppress it by heavy-handed legal means. I urge you to contact the Society and tell them you will reconsider your membership unless they withdraw the threat against Dr Lewis's ISP, and act to ensure their Code of Practice is strictly enforced. I know I'd be unhappy to be associated with a society that responded to criticism in this way and I hope you would too. Thanks.
Earlier this month, Dr Andy Lewis of the Quackometer blog posted the results of a little bit of investigative journalism he did. The Society's Code of Practice forbids members from claiming to cure named diseases in advertising, but a Newsnight investigation presented by Simon Singh showed over a year ago that this rule was routinely flouted, with claims to cure malaria rife. Lewis wanted to know if the Society had done anything to get its house in order and enforce its Code of Practice since then, so he picked a homeopath at random from the Society's website and looked at what they claimed.
You can read the results here. You may note that this link does not go to Dr Lewis's website...
What was the Society's response? Did they contact the homeopath in question and demand they take down the leaflet in question? Did they conduct a thorough investigation to make sure the homeopaths advertised on their website complied strictly with the Code of Practice? Did they, by contrast, roundly defend the wording in the leaflet as entirely in keeping with the letter and spirit of the Code of Practice?
No, of course not. They threatened to sue.
But they didn't threaten to sue Dr Lewis. There was a risk, after all, that he might stand up to the threat, and that the matter might be decided on its merits. No, instead they followed in the grand tradition of Dr Lawrence Godfrey and went straight to his ISP, who following the Godfrey decision had no choice but to fold no matter what the merits of the original discussion. They haven't made the slightest effort to answer what Lewis has to say; a threatening letter, with no specifics of how the post is meant to be libellous, has been their only response. Isn't this the sort of thing that Big Pharma is supposed to do to suppress alternative medicine, not the other way around?
The good news is that there's nothing they could have done to more effectively raise the profile of this blog entry. It has been copied into zillons of blogs around the world and propogated far and wide.
Now for the important bit. Some of you are members of the Society of Homeopaths. I'm guessing you're not at all happy to see the Society so lax in enforcing a Code of Practice that is vital to the credibility of the Society and its members. However even if you think that Dr Lewis's criticism of the Society is entirely wide of the mark, you're probably unhappy to see them choosing not to respond to criticism but to suppress it by heavy-handed legal means. I urge you to contact the Society and tell them you will reconsider your membership unless they withdraw the threat against Dr Lewis's ISP, and act to ensure their Code of Practice is strictly enforced. I know I'd be unhappy to be associated with a society that responded to criticism in this way and I hope you would too. Thanks.