A funny thing happened to Meryl over the last couple of years. She's gone from a darling of the media, regularly invited to give the "other side" in the name of "balance"... all the way down to outcast and pariah.
The majority of journalists have woken up to the fact that there is no scientific debate in terms of vaccination: the facts are settled in terms of scientific consensus. A handful of nutty & noisy science-deniers like Meryl have no bearing on the reality, however much they wish it was different.
What's more a number of Meryl's callous actions, starting with her harrassment of the grieving parents of Dana McCaffrey, have outraged ever-growing segments of the population.
Now Meryl stands revealed to all as she really is: lying science-denier, callous persecutor of grieving parents, promoter of practices which cause the spread of disease and resulting deaths, person who profits from paranoia and serial lawbreaker.
All of which is why today, her typical treatment by the media is like this:
After Meryl's recent outing at the Queensland Woo Festival, where she lied about all the usual vaccination topics including Shaken Baby Syndrome, decent people everywhere are again appalled at her bad behaviour and also disappointed that credulous, poorly-researched journalists continue to give her media coverage.
It's not many journalists these days, of course. Most of the industry have seen enough of her and learned their lesson. But still, every now and then she slips through and gets a story - which should never happen at this late stage.
To address the problem, the enviously talented Shelley Stocken produced this perfect and funny quick-reference guide to Meryl for the media. Enjoy and then check out her blog; there's a lot more good stuff where this came from!
Disease, False Balance and Meryl Dorey - a Guide for Media
Because her opinion isn't news.
For the benefit of media who think it's worth consulting anti-vaccine lobbyists for "their side" when writing about the serious issue of immunisation, I'd like to suggest a few points, if I may:
Evidence has shown that creating false balance by providing anti-vaccine speakers (who have opinions based on opinions) a platform alongside medical experts (who have opinions based on evidence), makes people give more credence to the anti-vaccine view than if it was presented in isolation.
As I see it, if you include an anti-vaccine lobbyist alongside an expert in a story about vaccination, you are hindering the success of public health initiatives and contributing to the spread of vaccine-preventable diseases.
Who says Meryl Dorey’s incorrect? My state’s HCCC. Who says Meryl’s claims are bulldust? People at the ABC. Who says Meryl is misleading? Why, the Office
of Fair Trading. So don’t put her in your story, ‘less your story needs
degrading.
Right now in Australia we're battling outbreaks of measles and whooping cough.
Evidence has shown that creating false balance by providing anti-vaccine speakers (who have opinions based on opinions) a platform alongside medical experts (who have opinions based on evidence), makes people give more credence to the anti-vaccine view than if it was presented in isolation.
As I see it, if you include an anti-vaccine lobbyist alongside an expert in a story about vaccination, you are hindering the success of public health initiatives and contributing to the spread of vaccine-preventable diseases.
Yes, brave Sir Meryl turned about, And gallantly she chickened out. Bravely taking to her feet, She beat a very brave retreat. Bravest of the braaaave, Sir Meryl!
[With apologies to Monty Python...]
Meryl is up to her cowardly tricks once again, but even by her standards this stunt is a clanger!
Back in 2012, Meryl applied for Apprehended Violence Orders (AVOs) against 3 people who said mean things about her online.
Her applications were breathtaking in their implausibility. While Meryl lives in the infectious diseasenutty fruitcake hippy capital of Australia, Bangalow, the 3 individuals supposedly causing Meryl to fear for her life were hundreds of kilometres away.
Dan Buzzard, for example, lives in Perth - hardly a location from which to threaten violence against a nutty conspiracy theorist near Australia's eastern most point.
And the subject of Meryl's most recent rantings, Peter Bowditch, lives over 750 kms away in the Blue Mountains, behind Sydney.
Meryl also pencilled on to the end of her AVO applications a request that her 3 supposed nemeses be prohibited from writing about her online, causing everyone but her most gullible supporters to wonder if perhaps that was the whole reason for the AVO applications.
The opportunity to use the courts to silence 3 of her critics was too tempting for Meryl to be concerned with small details like her total lack of supporting evidence. No, that's hardly an obstacle for someone with Meryl's extreme narcissism, so she pressed on.
Meryl dragged the case out for as long as she could, with no less than 9 reschedules and failures to appear before the courts patience finally ran out and the case was heard. Oops, Meryl's application was thrown out on its absurd and unsubstantiated ear!
Peter was even awarded costs, a rare occurrence in AVO applications and a confirmation that the court viewed Meryl's application as a frivolity.
Fast-forward a few months, and Meryl is seeking someone to debate her face-to-face at an upcoming woo festival. So who does she call on, but that "scary" and "threatening" object of her legal timewasting Peter Bowditch!
In the process, she set up this ridiculous scenario for the benefit of her gullible cult members:
So Meryl, remind us again why you're so physically afraid of Peter Bowditch that you fear to be in the same room as him again?
Hmm, it actually looks like you're afraid of him for a totally different reason. Perhaps it's actually because he calls you out for your absurd claims and repeatedly highlights the idiocy of your comments about vaccines...
Meryl gets little credit for her tireless work as an environmentalist, perhaps because she’s opted to forgo the popular and trendy activities of protecting animals and plants to instead focus on protecting diseases.
It’s an issue that gets little publicity, but someone has to do it and so Meryl has taken up the banner on behalf of endangered diseases everywhere. Without Meryl’s good work, innocent diseases like Polio, Measles, Rubella and Meningitis could become extinct.
All good environmentalists worry about the destruction of habitats through human activities, and the loss of Amazon rainforest as a home for all manner of animals through logging is no more important an issue than the loss of human bodies as a home for diseases through vaccination.
Who will speak for the diseases? Who will protect THEM from dying out? Meryl will!
Meryl is a friend to all diseases, advocating tirelessly on their behalf. She works to correct misconceptions that diseases can injure or kill, explaining instead that they are mild or harmless – even a “gift from a goddess” in the case of Measles. But above all else, Meryl works to protect diseases from harm and ensure they continue to have plenty of human bodies available in which to live and breed.
Vaccination destroys the habitat of Meryl’s favourite diseases, so she opposes it relentlessly. The disappearance of Smallpox was a catastrophic event for the pro-disease community, one which rocked them to the core and brought home just how much we are at risk of losing these diseases from our world forever. Sickness promoters like Meryl swung into action, determined to preserve the diversity of illnesses circulating in our world.
Without Meryl’s efforts, diseases like whooping cough would be contained to small pockets of hippies around the country and Measles would be on the verge of disappearing, like Polio is. Fortunately with Meryl’s help, diseases that were once on the brink of extinction are now coming back strongly. Numbers are growing, populations are becoming self-sustaining as increasing numbers of parents are offering up their children’s bodies as breeding grounds for Meryl’s illnesses. Yes, Meryl is doing a fine job for her cause.
Alas, Meryl gets little respect for her tireless work and we think that $280,000 per year is a grossly inadequate reward for protecting and spreading disease so effectively. So as a small gesture of appreciation, the team over at RtAVM have gifted Meryl a selection of music for her iPod. The songs have been carefully chosen to represent Meryl’s passion and good work in the service of protecting diseases from harm. Here’s her musical top 20:
She certainly cries poor to soak extra cash out of her gullible followers whenever she has a bill to pay or wants a new computer. But then there is that $150,000 per year unaccounted for in the AVN’s official figures – and she is the only hands-on officer of the organisation. Hmmm…
Not content with with $150,000+ that “disappears” from the AVN accounts each year, Meryl has long had an online business selling makeup to supplement her income as editor of a non-existent magazine.
Oh, but wait a minute gullible AVN cult members! Don’t look too closely…after all, Meryl often insists she shouldn’t be judged by the standards she applies to everyone else…
Errr, little bit of a conflict with the naturalistic fallacies you usually push, Meryl. Oh dear…
This is a little old, but worthy of a wider audience:
The release of the 2011 financial accounts for the AVN causes the treasurer extreme concern about Meryl’s leadership of the organisation…
This video is loaded with in-jokes that regular AVN-watchers will enjoy and the cast is peppered with the usual suspects from the AVN crowd of quacks, charlatans, nutjobs and fruitcakes.
Awareness of Meryl’s idiocy is at an all time high this week!
After a lengthy campaign against vaccine refusal by scientists, doctors and the media, the cherry on top was this statement in the Australian senate, by senator Richard Di Natale. And what a ripper of a statement it is!
After giving a wonderful summation of Meryl’s stupidity, conspiracy theorist mindset, ongoing propagation of misinformation after being corrected multiple times, persecution of grieving parents and overall callousness, the good senator goes on to call on the AVN to disband. Check it out:
Alas, the AVN gravy train is too lucrative for Meryl to give it up willingly – at last count over $150,000 per year in the AVN accounts without any details of what it was spent on…
Ah Meryl, you’re famous at last! Just not the way you wanted to be famous though…
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