Levi Quackenboss Gets An Award

Yesterday I told you about the flaws in Katie Tietje's article disparaging the work of Marco Arturo, a young science communicator.  Karen Ernst's article on the same subject, Anti-Vaxxers Defeated by Twelve-Year-Old Whiz Kid, also covered the disdainful remarks of a person using the nom de blogue of Levi Quackenboss. It turns out that the Quackenboss blog is probably written by a Colorado woman named Robyn Ross, who has used a number of alternative identities as listed on the award. 

So Ross, or Quackenboss, has written three articles on the Marco Arturo matter:

1. June 2 2016 I’ve got an empty folder for you, Marco.  Karen covered this post thoroughly in her post. 
2. June 4 2016 To every sucker who thinks a 12-year old is lecturing on immunology.  In this post the claim is made that Marco Arturo is a mouthpiece for his parents,  because he doesn't sound like a 12 year old and because Mexican kids are not capable of being as sharp as Marco Arturo appears to be. 
3. June 5 2016 Is Marco Arturo the prodigy a hoax? In this post, Ross, or Quackenboss doxxes Marco Arturo's stepfather and implies that he is a plant from Walgreen's. Or something. 

Before today's Ross/Quackenboss post was posted, the epidemiologist René Najera wrote a post about the anti-vaccine movement's "irrational, xenophobic, and bigoted reaction" to Marco Arturo, The Fear a 12-Year-Old Mexican Can Raise. 

Finally, the undertones of racism. “Quackenboss” claims that kids in Mexico can’t possibly be as bright as Marco. And, if they are, they are being coached as part of some multi-national conspiracy. They claim that Mexico is pretty much a slum where children can’t be bothered with science and technology. As I sit around at my ancestral home in Chihuahua,* I see that this is not true. Yes, Mexico has a lot of challenges, and children here deserve better, but there are many of us who are lucky enough to have parents who instill in us a sense of wonder about nature and then foment that wonder with books and tools and great people/mentors to lead us on our way to discover more and more.

So Marco Arturo's 2 minute video has had at this writing 7.2 million views. And a shout-out from Ashton Kutcher.  And Andy Wakefield's $400,000 hoaxumentary Vaxxed has had .... Well, Box Office Mojo  stopped reporting a month ago, with about 19,000 tickets sold. Let's be generous and say the sales continued at the same rate, so maybe 38,000 tickets have been sold. That's got to sting. 

Oh, and I'd forgotten I'd written about Robyn before.

Updated to add: it turns out that Marco Arturo responded to Ross/Quackenboss's first post with a guest post at A Science Enthusiast. 

Updated to add: my friends at RtAVM have made an image:

(image description: Four adults on the right looking at camera (Del Bigtree, Polly Tommey, Andrew Wakefield); movie has had maybe 50,000 views to date;  young white boy holding piece of paper reading MIC on the right; his video has had >7 million views)

Updated to add: Karen Ernst just published Anti-vaxxers Dox a Child

Doxing has real consequences, and an adult shouldn’t have to deal with those consequences, but a child really, really should not have to. The doxing of Marco Arturo is despicable and has to stop now.

All this because a child made a satirical video. Grow up, anti-vaxxers. If you disagree with him, discuss your disagreement. Don’t disparage and harass a child.

Comments

[David Andrews]

What in the name of hell is wrong with this woman that she has to do THIS crap to a bloody 12 year old kid? How messed up must your head be to feel the need or desire to act in this way toward someone that young?

There's clearly a psychopathology involved. Unless she's just naturally an unspeakably shitty person.

[Adelaide Dupont]

Thank you for exposing Quackenboss.

I had only read the 2nd June post.

Really great to see the Mexicans and their STEM work. [and indeed a lot of Central and South America up to and including the Caribbean].

Would doxxing not work as well because of the bureaucratic holdups and lack of access to information? Doxxing, for me, is a very First World privilege [and natural and human disasters get in the way - for example in a lot of Central Europe at the moment, the rivers are flooding, as in the east coast of Australia].

[Frau Heather]

Allow me to expose Liz the lying Ditz!!!

Liz and her cohorts NEVER doxx people, Oh wait yes they do. And if you'd like to see first hand how NASTY and VILE they can be go to www.avwos.com

Or go directly to the DOXXING page where you can see countless examples of they themselves doing it.

http://www.avwos.com/#!doxxing/c16st

[Lauren Edwards]

Did the Frau get released from her padded cell? On another boxed wine fueled rage attack?

[Liz Ditz]

Lauren, thanks for the comment, but I do not appreciate disparaging comments such as yours about mental illness. Shaming other people's anti-social behavior, ok; shaming the mentally ill with remarks by "padded cell", not ok.

[Liz Ditz]

Frau Heather is the woman who has been relentlessly harassing Allison Hagood. If you go to her page above, you will see that no doxing (or doxxing) has occurred.

Professor Hagood merely announces that she has the real names, addresses, and other information about her harassers. Does she make them public? NO she does not. Does she make them public and incite others to harass these misguided individuals? No, she does not.

That's not doxing.

And nasty and vile? Nope, not that either.

[Allison Hagood]

It continues to amuse me that Ms. Murray and her fellow harassers post endless repetitive screenshots of things that do not say what they claim. The lack of self-awareness is a fascinating case study.

[Adelaide Dupont]

I did go to that page. On the 8th.

And I read all the Hagood High School pages.

Hagood: I agree!

[Lauren Edwards]

My apologies, Liz, I was out of line. I'm not overly fond of the Frau as I've had my go rounds with her.