Gun control, from New York

"Let loose gunfire." What a poetic euphemism, and it linguistically absolves the gunman of guilt - he didn't "shoot and murder" a number of people. Odd. I hate following up with "guns don't kill people," but it does take more than a gun.
The classic give-guns-to-potential-victims policy, from the Maverick State. In Alaska, you can carry a gun anywhere outside, and into non-school, -government, or -airport buildings.
There is no coercion here.
Concealed carry laws require accuracy and safety examinations to get a permit. Aside from this, an background checks, it might be interesting to add a psychological exam to weed out the potential crazies. (Though who is to say the shrinks would recognize the crazies.)
So there's a law in Utah, and no problems since? And yet a classmate poll indicates that some students here think guns are scary. There's proof.

Adolescents and crazy pills

Why are kids depressed? Are they more depressed? Can we find more depression? Or is the bell-curve narrowing, and we're accepting less variation in defining the "normal" child?
Drugs don't empower children, don't work...
Real problem: We don't understand neurochemistry enough to mess with it (effectively) in very plastic brains. Check out the "This American Life" about Testosterone for a fascinating crash course in how much just one chemical affects our perception and personality.
Oh no. She's blaming the internet. Srsly.
Oooh, alternative therapies, like analysis, exercise, and going outside. Medicalization of everything, this is the sin of public health.

A redhead writes about skin cancer

And come to think of it, in stereotypes, an Indian guy wrote about beef?
In other news, someone should have written about the sex trade, specifically at laws that punish prostitutes and not their clients. The DC Madam, who supposedly ran a prostitution ring serving Capitol Hill, hung herself to avoid a 4-6 year jail sentence. Mmm, corruption.
Instead, let's rock the totally sexualized sunscreen ad. Problem here? One is aimed at parents of small children, one displays nude men and includes "largest organ" in the slogan. Perhaps not overlapping audiences.

A deep, abiding love of bad TV

Shout-outs.
Removing personal responsibility from obesity awareness - the American Dream is hurting our overweight population. No lapel pin here.
Corporate culture shirking responsibility - problem users cause obesity, not problem products.
I'd like an evolutionary argument here somewhere, people are built to survive, not buy 3L bottles of Coke for $2 and eat whole 3500-calorie pans of brownies for less.
100g sirloin: 259 calories.
100g Betty Crocker brownies: 397 calories.
100g Coke: 40 calores. But that's only 4 ounces, and who drinks 4 ounces?
100g white rice: 361 calories.
100g black beans: 227 calories. Also, 15g protein and 15g fiber.
Compare the above two to 100g whole-wheat bread: 261 calories, 6 grams of fiber, 8 of protein.
Superfood, anyone?

Twice as much sauce as noodles...

Sounds like an atkins thing. Or a noodle-hater.
Widely traveled, and has cooked with Rachel Ray, now he'll talk about downer cows.
We waited until 2004 to stop allowing downer cows into the food supply, and the USDA brought downer cows back, pending veterinarian examination.
Problem: You need to biopsy cow brains to find spongiform encephalitis (mad cow), which no vet is going to do, and no existing group of vets will be able to do for all the downer cows.
Conflict of interest? Yes. Flawed data? Maybe.
Real problem? Economics and cost-cutting reduces the quality of treatment and feed of cows, and farming is already horribly over-subsidized in the US. Botswana, where there are more cows than people, currently is supposed to have no mad cow. Can you buy Botswanan beef? No.
Best slip? "Inhumane Society."
What did the policy do? Remove mad cow controls.

Archery?

Vertical transmission of the hiv through breastfeeding. Black on fuchsia background - completele unreadable with any light.
Cultural incompetence: You will give your baby HIV, maybe. So don't breastfeed if you can manage not to, otherwise, whatever.
HIV kills babies, so does diarrhea. Formula causes microabrasions in the esophagus? Is there broken glass in formula?
The real problem: It's that difficult to feed babies in many parts of the world.

Oversharing!

Next presenter, a whole-grain protester, has celiac. No worry, I'd protest the 24oz/24hours until I got osteoporosis.
So many cartoons.
How many people are looking at celiac as a killer weight loss option? Don't absorb any food? Terrible gastrointestinal cramping? Better than surgery, I'd guess.
Also, way, way too much history.
Opiate reaction - we need needle sharing for whole-grain lovers.
Unfortunately the list of non-gluten grains are all nutritionally inferior to wheat.
The real problem: She nails it, look at other foods, stop allowing public health to be subsidized by marketers for various food industries.
Also, daily fiber without wheat: black beans. More protein, more fiber, 75 cents a can.

Fabulous Prizes and Student Presenters!

The name of the game today is "what's the real problem?" - regarding presentations.
But first - Name that TA!
Fear of falling, same best friend since fourth grade, loves washing dishes - Moonstruck Milk Chocolate!
So many introductions.
Needle exchange for IV drug users: He's skipping the Snake Oil portion of the policy, including the elixirs of heroin.
Culture of drug use - ritual of procurement, preparation, and use. Culture, however, is not always a good thing. One could argue a culture of pedophilia should be eliminated, though this does include direct harm, whereas heroin only involves personal or secondary harm.
Harm-reduction model - vs. health and moral - I like the name. Drug user protests against cold-turkey approaches? Stigmatization?
Nobody is legitimately addicted to heroin for pain control. (Unless they've been hooked since 1914.)
No additional harm in community - good point, there's always alarm that any protective measures will support new users.
So needle-sharing programs need to legitimize an "acceptable level" of heroin use. How much rehab are we willing to pay for?
What's the problem? Treatment of addiction is terribly ineffective, and attitudes towards heroin use (user's/drug culture and outside).

Appleton Nutrution Report

Sports drink for breakfast. And now there are no dropouts, not at-risk children, because they're eating healthily. We need an epidemiologist, someone, please define causation and correlation.
And check the relative nutrition facts of gatorade and soda.
Also, "there's no too much seasoning or nothing like that." Wisconsin school-children: dropping out because the food's too hot.

Challenging Dogma Blog

The namesake blog has launched. Next week's seminar is public judgment, though that may have already begun.
Also, there should be adsense on this page - public health would probably have some fantastic content-related ads, and it could add to the candy fund.
Statcounter reveals Saudi Arabia, a search for irrational decions and car insurance. Have you seen this?

Wrap-Up

We need to do something, even if this doesn't solve everything.
1. We should listen to the rebellious kids. If we don't let them drink Coke, they'll drink beer. They should rebel against the fast food industry. Are all kids by nature rebellious? Or do they just rebel against those things they don't respect or don't believe, or test limits they can overstep?
2. Something? Amendments?
3. Physical activity is important.

Fabulous Prizes! - In their correct seminar colors.

Best info of the day - Orange Seminar is always the "bad" group, solely as part of Siegel's antagonism towards Christina, the TF.

Seminar Results and Town Hall Meeting

We're officially promoting the "Coke Cares, but not that much" position. Our corporate identity is unshakable.
Also, someone is trying to injure our panel, by dropping the screen on them. Consternation abounds. It's like a really, really, slow guillotine that'll give a nasty bump.

These are always so stilted.
Public Health Advocacy Institute: Think of the children, especially the obese children, who shouldn't be allowed to drink soda at school. (Just at home.) "Nutritional justice for our children."

A group is playing children? Please, let there not be acting. Gaffes, though, we have those. And anti-authority positions, and stereotypes of disobedient, rebellious kids! Nickelodeon is against the bill.

PTA: School system and higher taxes for rich town to support food in underclass area.

Teachers Association: Wrong cause, losing that good vending machine money. Also, how many people here don't realize Coke sells juice and water? Snark from legislators - are teachers implying they don't know how kids work?

Also, I don't ever take real notes anymore. Is it because there's very little learning happening? This whole "experience" isn't working.

Coke: Sell our juice and water. We still make money. And we "abstain," like those other public health initiatives, and like kids should based upon their individual choice.

Vending Machine Association: Yeah limiting choice, no limiting sales! They're going to have to pick something, and it won't be a nalgene unless we can sell those too.

BUSPH Students: Enlightened. Bill is the wrong approach (both), loses revenue, support to schools, and juice is expensive. (And not really any healthier? There's as much sugar in 100% juice as a Coke.) Micromanages nutrition, other approaches to health are necessary...and how much more dogma? Isn't this a step in the right direction?
And happy birthday...fabulous prizes!

BU Buys Alcohol for Siegel?

To protect him from angry bartenders. BU also buys alcohol for multiple graduation events, senior dinners, scholarship program dinners...

Town. Hall. Meeting. Welcome to Session 12!

Fabulous prizes denied! Apparently you can't have more than one t-shirt.

John Auerbach

Fabulous Prizes!
A Red coffee mug, Red BU hat, and a Gray Challenging Dogma Shirt! We make it worth your time.

Thank Prof. Siegel for what he didn't say...regarding his role in tobacco control. Interesting grammatical construction.

Welcome to Session 11

The Doll video! Next up, the Implicit Test.
We need more than two examples of internalized racism.
Not to play the inappropriate stickler, but is there any possibility that young children see this difference as stemming from the treatment they receive from adults? White adults, in a hyper-PC world, treat young black children as pleasantly as possible, not daring to scold another person's child (especially one of another race) whereas they are scolded by people within their own community, who are more likely to be black? They may similarly see reticence on the part of their own parents to scold white children, and therefore unless they are privy to white children being scolded by their white parents, have a limited frame of reference. I can't imagine a white parallel experience, so this seems pretty unlikely, but maybe.

Good commercials?

So this is painful. You can do things like athletes, without being an athlete. Walking is as good as running. BUSPH PSA. There's an acronym for you. "Emulate atheletes; you can be like those athletes. You can feel like you're Nomar."

Second option: Sunscreen, Protection for your pleasure. And spermicide.
"These students wanted to use a stronger core value. So they used sex. Use sunscreen because you're gonna have sex, right now."

Fruit and vegetable (inter)course: Sex and small carrots. And making fun of awkward American kid. Health food is easier to make food porn with, because healthy people aren't aroused by cheeseburgers. Other uses of food porn: anorexia web sites. This is the horror version.

Bad Commercials!

That was depressing. American Lung Association video: Child abuse - yelling, screaming...second hand smoke.
This is your emotional response, advertising theory, non-rational decision-making at work.

Suzie's parents never told her about drugs. They never told her that drugs maim. Drugs kill. There was one lesson Suzie had to learn on her own: How to freebase? Or huff? Try another take on "This is your brain on drugs."

Our kids are fat. The facts are clear, gibberish and ballroom dancing. This makes sense to you, and therefore must be effective. Siegel "Obesity is this really dark, dark, terrible thing. What they're doing is stigmatizing people who are obese. It's labeling them." Is it stigmatizing ballroom dance as well? This one was made for an anthro class, it comes up under the same search terms in Youtube.

Ethnic slurs

In his summary of Seminar 4 results, we've heard "Gypped" and "Wopped," what's next?

If you don't know who these offend, maybe that's a good thing?

Hip-Hop Hooray for Public Health

Time For Change - Boston rapper? Michael Sermac? Attack on obesity and fast food companies exploiting people.
See Dead Prez - Be Healthy, quite a bit better.

And Sammy's song, "To Niantic" - about the United States. Plus guitar. "To niantic, To Wellesley, To Boston, to Brookline..." obvious Johnny Cash "I've been everywhere" influence, but with the enunciation and the harmonica, he's more into Dylan. "To so many places that I've never seen." This is deep. Also, not having had such a large audience before, he's cracking under pressure, and may actually laugh himself blue. He does have a strong closing yell, very David Lee Roth.