After The Fact

This morning, I got an email regarding Dr. David Hager, and his reappointment to the Food and Drug Administration's (FDA) Reproductive Health Drugs Advisory Committee. Actually, now that I'm looking at the letter closely, I see that this is the *original* chain letter, from 2002, and the fact that this man, the author of such great works as Jesus Cared for Women: Restoring Women Then and Now", has been recently re-appointed to this committee is merely coincidental. The sender had no idea that these events had already occurred. Not that the letter-writing campaign against them did any good, even when it was on time.

Time magazine ran an article about Dr. Hager when the subject of his nomination first came up. It was not, in my opinion, the most flattering article ever. If you click on the Amazon link I've provided above, you'll see that all the visible "reviews" of the book are unflattering, and that two of the entries aren't really reviews at all, but comments on this particular chain mail. A lot of people really seem to dislike this guy.

When I first received word of Hager's possible nomination, I joined a letter writing campaign against it. Before doing so, I read up on the man, I looked for every article I could find, including the ones that were pro-Hager. I researched, and I made up my own mind that this wasn't a person whose opinion was based on science and safety, but rather someone who let faith guide his decisions. That's fine on a personal level, but not a national one. So, I wrote a letter, for all the good it did. The man was appointed to the committee, proceeded to make all the kinds of statements and recommendations that I thought he would, and when his term was up, he was reinstated. What really burns my britches about that one was that it never crossed my radar. It happened, and was reported on by news agencies that I'm supposedly paying attention to, and I didn't notice. I'm pretty cheesed off that something like that gets past me so easily. But it did, and he's there, and good gravy, I hope you don't buy his book, because that would just send him money.

On to my next point: while this passed right over my head when it was happening, today I found out all about it, because I received a petition via email. What's the first thing I do when I get something like that? Well, if it's from someone whom I think might be the least bit flaky, I instantly delete it. Sorry folks, I know you really don't understand what you're doing. If, however, it's from someone I know and trust a bit, or even trust implicitly, I go out to Google and find out what I can about it. That's right, even when it's someone I trust. The Internet is notorious for its ability to create what I call "zombie causes". This is a cause that *was*, at one point, legitimate, but due to the eternal nature of the web, lives on despite its time being long over. Emails to that Brandeis address about Afghan women being mistreated? Probably still circulating. Dire warnings about underarm deodorant causing breast cancer? Out there every day. Warnings about Swiffer-brand (Swiffer® is a registered trademark of Procter & Gamble) cleaning supplies killing "my neighbor's dog"? I got one last week.

STOP IT!

Do not sent out a mass email on a subject that you haven't done the least bit of checking on. Just because you're not some news agency that has to answer for this kind of mistake to the whole nation doesn't mean you shouldn't care enough to be responsible for the kind of information you spread. And, to spare you the repetition, I won't even consider commenting on the news agency thing.