I'm making this video to call attention to a grave injustice being done, and I need your
help to stop it.
Simon Singh is a British author and scientist with a PhD in particle physics. He writes
popular books on science, such as Fermat's Last Theorum, The Code Book, Big Bang, and
Trick or Treatment? Alternative Medicine on Trial. He also writes a column in the British
daily newspaper, "The Guardian". In 2008, he was sued by the British Chiropractic Association
...for libel ... for an opinion article he wrote that was critical of chiropractic treatment,
entitled "Beware the spinal trap". This is what the BCA are so upset about:
"The British Chiropractic Association claims that their members can help treat children
with colic, sleeping and feeding problems, frequent ear infections, asthma and prolonged
crying, even though there is not a jot of evidence. This organization is the respectable
face of the chiropractic profession and yet it happily promotes bogus treatments."
The BCA are able to sue a journalist for making this statement in an op-ed because of the
queerness of libel laws in the UK. And therein lies one of the two problems I want to address:
One, England's libel laws need to be reformed. People need to be able to speak out in newspapers,
and the case against Singh needs to be thrown out.
Two, the tolerance for chiropractic in mainstream medicine is not appropriate. It doesn't deserve
to be in the same category with chemotherapy, surgery, and antibiotics. It's not evidence
based medicine.
I'm going to break up this video into two parts. This first part is about Singh vs.
BCA and the British libel laws, and the second part is why I think chiropractic is a pseudoscience.
Each part has a challenge for you, the viewer to get involved.
We in America tend to look towards England as a progressive nation, more liberal than
the US in civil rights and free speech. And yet, London is known as the capital of libel
lawsuits. Why? The most striking issue is who can sue in British courts. Almost anyone.
If as much as a single copy of a book, newspaper, or magazine is sold in England, even in a
second hand shop, any claimant can sue the author for libel. This has led to a phenomenon
known as "libel tourism" such as when Kate Hudson, an American actress, went to London
to sue the National Enquirer, a US based ... well, I'm going to call them a newspaper, for claiming
she had an eating disorder.
So why would anyone want to choose England instead of, say, Belgium, to go to court?
Because the burden is placed mostly on the defendant, and 90% of cases are awarded to
the claimant. There is no cap on damages, and they tend to be on the extreme end. Costs
for a libel trial often exceed millions of pounds. Many times, the suit is brought by
very large organizations against a single journalist, as in the 'McLibel' case, where
McDonalds sued David Morris and Helen Steel for distributing pamphlets against McDonalds
food, business practices, and ecological impact. Simon Singh has the support of the Guardian
for his legal defense, but they aren't obligated to provide him financial support, they could
just as easily have left him to his own resources.
It's worth reflecting on what libel laws exist for. They're to protect people from undue
slander, false factual statements that cause harm to a reputation or an enterprise. They
protect personal privacy and well-being, and they provide a barrier to prevent companies
from constantly battling false claims. One can imagine a beer company alleging in print
that their competitor uses harmful industrial waste in the competing product. They would
have a legitimate claim to seek redress for lost current and future sales.
But when a journalist, writing an opinion piece, advances the idea that a professional
organization is overstating their ability to treat a condition, is it libel? If he had
said, 5,000 people died last year from chiropractic treatments, and that was not factually true,
that would be libel. If he had said that chiropractors do not receive any education, or have lower
than average IQs, and it were untrue, that would be libel. What he actually said is,
to me, no different than: saying that a politician is unqualified to judge a piece of medical
legislation because he or she is not a doctor. It's criticism, not damaging misinformation.
If we stifle that, or create a special category of protected speech for alternative medicine;
debate, and a free press, will grind to a halt.
The crux of the argument in court is over the phrase "it happily promotes bogus treatments".
According to the ruling of the most recent appeals process, on February 23rd, "Happily"
implies willfullness, and "bogus" implies a criminally negligent act of deception.
Simon has decided to make a defense of justification. That is, he's going to prove that what he
said was true in the essentials, so therefore cannot be libelous. He's going to put the
whole idea of chiropractic treatment on trial, or at least the claims about treating colic
and sleeplessness in children. He has a good shot, as I'll talk about in the next video,
there is no GOOD scientific evidence that chiropractic is effective at treating anything
other than lower back pain. The challenge will be convincing the court of what constitutes
good evidence in a scientific study. It's a bold move, but it forces the chiropractors
to either agree to stand by whatever the science shows, or to play lawyer's games with scientific
standards, arguing over what constitutes good, definitive studies. It may end up revealing
the seamy underbelly of chiropractic to the world at large.
Now I'm not afraid of the reasonable application of censorship for the protection of people's
safety and happiness. I've removed comments I felt were dangerous or spam from my videos.
But I think that this move by the BCA is a blatant case of: suppressing a dissenting
opinion by exploitation of a bad law. It reflects very poorly that the BCA chose to take Singh
to court, rather than, say, printing a rebuttal in "The Guardian", citing the evidence for
the benefits of chiropractic. Rather than engage in a debate, they decided to shut it
down, to prevent this journalist from having a voice. I think that's wrong, and I'm not
alone.
The bigger picture here is the right for advocates of science and reason to speak out against
pseudoscience and bogus treatments. If the champions of evidence-based-medicine can be
silenced by such tactics, then we have sacrificed 300 years of medical advancement.
There are things you can do if you feel motivated to help. First, sign an online petition for
British Libel Reform, the link is in the sidebar, and get the word out about Simon Singh on
your channel, or your blog, or your facebook page. You can mirror this video if you like,
or make your own. If you're a British citizen, contact your MP and let them know where you
stand on the issue of libel laws, chiropractic, and Simon Singh.
Thanks for watching.