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The Mental Elf: Simon Wessely on PACE
- Thread starter JayS
- Start date
Holy shit! They've stopped moderating me and they just let this straight through:
I can't delete my own posts or I'd have done it myself.
James Coyne tweets:
https://twitter.com/CoyneoftheRealm/status/661851629721776128
.@Mental_Elf failed to get PACE investigators to engage critics in debate, so became PACE mouthpiece. shameful.
In other tweets he says you invited him to engage in a debate with the PACE authors and that he accepted and you declined.
Your site’s tagline says, “No bias. No misinformation. No spin.” and yet your next action was to publish this PACE puff-piece by Simon Wessely who tells us in the article that he is a friend of the PACE authors and has competing interests.
Anyone familiar with PACE with know what a travesty of the truth his article is.
You may argue that allowing comments is the same as a debate but it is not. Most people will just read the title – about PACE’s ‘prosperous voyage’ and move on. Some will read the begining of Simon Wessely’s puff-piece. Some might even read all of it but very few will read the comments where they’ll finally get some unbiased, spin-less appraisal.
I agree with James Coyne and as of now I’m boycotting your site and will not return to answer comments. Please remove all of my comments except the one that mentions the petition for the retraction of misleading analyses in the PACE trial.
And if you want to go some way to remedying the situation, mental elf, please withdraw the article from your site.
https://twitter.com/CoyneoftheRealm/status/661851629721776128
.@Mental_Elf failed to get PACE investigators to engage critics in debate, so became PACE mouthpiece. shameful.
In other tweets he says you invited him to engage in a debate with the PACE authors and that he accepted and you declined.
Your site’s tagline says, “No bias. No misinformation. No spin.” and yet your next action was to publish this PACE puff-piece by Simon Wessely who tells us in the article that he is a friend of the PACE authors and has competing interests.
Anyone familiar with PACE with know what a travesty of the truth his article is.
You may argue that allowing comments is the same as a debate but it is not. Most people will just read the title – about PACE’s ‘prosperous voyage’ and move on. Some will read the begining of Simon Wessely’s puff-piece. Some might even read all of it but very few will read the comments where they’ll finally get some unbiased, spin-less appraisal.
I agree with James Coyne and as of now I’m boycotting your site and will not return to answer comments. Please remove all of my comments except the one that mentions the petition for the retraction of misleading analyses in the PACE trial.
And if you want to go some way to remedying the situation, mental elf, please withdraw the article from your site.
I can't delete my own posts or I'd have done it myself.
Marco
Grrrrrrr!
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- 2,386
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- Near Cognac, France
Too big to sink?
Undisclosed
Senior Member
- Messages
- 10,157
Can't the internet ban Wessely for being a troll? 
Guys pls remember how the Internet works and ranking. He is just burying Tulle's work so so many articles have been released on PACE that now the one article is buried.
This is the objective and I think achieved. Goggle cfs and see what comes up.
The way to beat it is in their own game. Over ranking the pages on good vs bad pace articles.
This is the objective and I think achieved. Goggle cfs and see what comes up.
The way to beat it is in their own game. Over ranking the pages on good vs bad pace articles.
adreno
PR activist
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- 4,841
GO JAMES!!! SLAY! SLAY! SLAY!
I will give him one thing, he knows how to manage internet "persona" it is as if he hired an Internet image firm.Can't the internet ban Wessely for being a troll?
We need to do the same as a CFS organization.
Your posts there have been really good, for anyone reading into the comments (and the discussion is easier to read than the essay by Wessely), it gives good information.
snowathlete
Senior Member
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- 5,374
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- UK
In two minds as to whether it would help or hinder on Twitter right now.
Thanks - and it pains me to ask for their deletion but Coyne's tactics are spot on and he has the clout to carry it off. I want to support his boycott.
I hope he'll ask for them to remove Wessely's article and publish an apology. Anybody want to tweet him that? They need to remedy what they've done.
charles shepherd
Senior Member
- Messages
- 2,239
Interesting to note that the company that produces this 'nationalelfservice' website asked me a few days ago if I was willing to take part in a live webinar on the latest PACE trial analysis next week
This would include one of the other main (US) critics of the PACE trial and a member of the UK group that caried out the trial
I said I was very happy to do so
This webinar discussion has now been 'postponed' and replaced by a blog in defence of the PACE trial
Incidentally, there are some interesting comments from people who took part in the PACE trial over on the MEA Facebook discussion on this blog from SW:
https://www.facebook.com/ME-Association-171411469583186/
This would include one of the other main (US) critics of the PACE trial and a member of the UK group that caried out the trial
I said I was very happy to do so
This webinar discussion has now been 'postponed' and replaced by a blog in defence of the PACE trial
Incidentally, there are some interesting comments from people who took part in the PACE trial over on the MEA Facebook discussion on this blog from SW:
https://www.facebook.com/ME-Association-171411469583186/
I've just joined James Coyne's boycott of Mental Elf and have asked for my earlier posts to be deleted, except for the one about the PACE petition.
(BTW, @charles shepherd, would the MEA put something about it on FB and their main site? 7,000 signatures now, with a 10,000 target [link in my signature])?
Coyne is right that Mental Elf's publication of this puff-piece is shameful.
worldbackwards
Senior Member
- Messages
- 2,051
The US critic was presumably James Coyne. I thought he was just taking his ball in to little effect, but I can see why he was so furious now. Extremely shabby behaviour by Mental Elf.
OK, but I fear that will leave us without good representation there as most people will still read and not boycott at all
I hope it stands, we can use it as evidence. I don't think it's the same as when the newspapers publish false information, that should be retracted.
But sometimes it good to have these people condemn themselves, this is Wessely in his own words, so for this article I'd say it's best out in the daylight showing their true colours and not hiding behind closed doors.
What we really need are some good high-profile counter articles, that is what we're missing.
Any chance of a few "fair use" excerpts for those of us that can't or won't use FBook ?
Hutan
Senior Member
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- 1,099
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James Coyne makes reference to it on his twitter page.
James C.Coyne @CoyneoftheRealm 2 hrs2 hours ago
.@Mental_Elf asked me to join PACE investigators in live debate. I agreed, they did not.
charles shepherd
Senior Member
- Messages
- 2,239
This seems to explain why the webinar has been postponed!
charles shepherd
Senior Member
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- 2,239
Yes, people keep flagging this up on MEAF - there is one on our discussion on this blog