Tuesday, June 09, 2009

Oprah promotes bad medicine

Newsweek examines Orpah Winfrey's habit of promoting quack medicine and new age gibberish.

[T]he truth is, some of what Oprah promotes isn't good, and a lot of the advice her guests dispense on the show is just bad. The Suzanne Somers episode wasn't an oddball occurrence. This kind of thing happens again and again on Oprah. Some of the many experts who cross her stage offer interesting and useful information (props to you, Dr. Oz). Others gush nonsense. Oprah, who holds up her guests as prophets, can't seem to tell the difference. She has the power to summon the most learned authorities on any subject; who would refuse her? Instead, all too often Oprah winds up putting herself and her trusting audience in the hands of celebrity authors and pop-science artists pitching wonder cures and miracle treatments that are questionable or flat-out wrong, and sometimes dangerous.

1 comment:

Sheldon said...

As I recall, she (Oprah) was also promoting that fake progressive snake oil called Obama, now our POTUS. At least he can speak in complete grammatical sentences, though.

Anywhoo, I did pick up that article in the library the other day and read the first page. Found it hugely ironic Suzanne Summers railing against the pharmacuetical industry, meanwhile signicantly and singlehandedly expanding the marktet share of hormone and vitamin manufacturers.