the senate should shut sotto up. he has become a national embarrassment. not only does he plagiarize bloggers and in the next breath disparage their work, his discourse vs. the RH bill also takes the low low ground, thanks to his incompetent staff, whose asinine research (include bad writing na rin) he takes for, and peddles as, gospel truth. and this is the last straw: the punchline kumbaga, of his turno en contra part II:
here is the original material from The Truth Of Contraceptives blog:
In Great Britain, in 1949, a report prepared for the Royal Commission on Population found that the incidence of induced abortion as a percentage of all pregnancies was nine times higher for women using contraceptives than for women not using birth control. [emphasis mine]
note that sotto’s press release does not enclose in quotes or attribute most of the sentence that is clearly lifted, copied, from the blog. note, too, that “in 1949” was deleted, omitted, deliberately i would think, because it would have dated the “nine times higher” stats. but using that data at all to convince pro-RH senators that contraceptives induce abortion was the most monstrous mistake of all.
the Pill was approved only in 1960. what contraceptives were being used in 1949? i googled “history of birth control” (which he or his staff should have done, too) and found this blog: MedicineNet.com.
Before the Industrial Revolution, birth control devices in America relied largely on condoms for men — fashioned from linen or from animal intestines — and on douches made for and by women from common household ingredients. Abortion-inducing herbs such as savin and pennyroyal also were used, as were pessaries — substances or devices inserted into the vagina to block or kill sperm.
The invention of rubber vulcanization in 1839 soon led to the beginnings of a U.S. contraceptive industry producing condoms (now often called “rubbers”), intrauterine devices or IUDs, douching syringes, vaginal sponges, diaphragms and cervical caps (then called “womb veils”), and “male caps” that covered only the tip of the penis. British playwright and essayist George Bernard Shaw called the rubber condom the “greatest invention of the 19th century.”
When these devices were declared illegal, the flourishing trade simply began selling them as “hygiene” products. For example, vaginal sponges were sold to protect women from “germs” instead of sperm. This led to misleading if not downright fraudulent advertising. From 1930 until 1960, the most popular female contraceptive was Lysol disinfectant — advertised as a feminine hygiene product in ads featuring testimonials from prominent European “doctors.” Later investigation by the American Medical Association showed that these experts did not exist.
so there. hindi lang outdated ang stats, ni hindi birth control pills ang salarin. what a howler of a screw-up, mr. sotto. on the senate floor yet. enough is enough, mr. senators, your time is up. pass the RH bill, now na!
*
read, too, manuel buencamino’s Sen. Sotto busted for serial plagiarism
and sarah pope’s On Plagiarism, the Pill, and Presumptuousness
I don’t know why the written word isn’t valued at all in this country. Copywriters get paid crap. In advertising, you have to be promoted to “creative director to make the big bucks. No one pays for skill and experience; everyone who knows a little grammar think they can write copies. Speechwriters? They think six figures is too big for very experienced speechwriters so they go for fresh grads.
Just a thought. This already looks to me to be so inane that it almost seems contrived. They cannot all be that (@#$%^) Are his staff pro-RH and offered themselves up for sacrifice in the altar of maternal health by fudging on the research and omitting the datedness in the hopes that it would get found out?
Try working in an office. People can really be that stupid.
whoa, that’s a thought! inside job? sabotage? there’s hope yet :)
Let’s see if Sotto will fire his chief of staff.
In the 2nd chapter of his anti-RH speech, Sotto said in the end before his “thank you”:
“With the foregoing, I think I have adequately shown that the proponents of the bill have been misled by deceptive and misleading information to push for the bill’s passage.”
Look who’s talking of deception and disinformation. Sotto is dangerously being given the privilege to do just that…dangerously deceiving and disinforming the public just to push death to the RH bill.
are any of his comments factually untrue? apart from plagiarism, are his facts wrong?
Please remind SenActor Sotto that he is not an “Iskul Bukol” character in the Senate.
WORSE
What’s worse than plagiarism is NOT vetting the source.
An older study cited by Sotto was questioned years later because the baseline data will not effectively result to a cause-and-effect conclusion as regards hormonal contraceptives and congenital cardiovascular defects. (Contraceptives causing congenital cardiac defects)
What’s worse than plagiarism is NOT digging deeper into the how-and-whys of cited source.
An idea cited by Sotto discredits the use of hormonal contraceptives when in the first place a hormonal contraceptive is just one of the many factors that can cause illness. The other factors that may cause such illness are commonplace compared to the use of hormonal contraceptives, for example, stress, infections, use of antibiotics, and poor diet which the author herself had given. (Contraceptives and gut dysbiosis)
What’s worse than plagiarism is NOT weighing the pros and cons; in appropriate terms, NOT obtaining the balance between the benefit and the risk of hormonal contraceptives AND just enumerate their ill effects.
The impression that is made publicly known by Sotto is that hormonal contraceptives is dangerous to women’s health when all the while current (and not outdated!) medical evidence points to their safety if used by women.
The risk-to-benefit ratio is so low that presently they are not banned in the market just like antibiotics. The benefit of contraception (Read: prevent unintended pregnancies) which is the primary goal of these drugs far outweigh the risk it may pose to women.
Sotto must first prove to the public that the risk-to-benefit ratio is high to even “criminalize” the use of hormonal contraceptives.
What’s worse than plagiarism is mimicking to be an authority on the issue of hormonal contraceptives.
Sotto’s haphazard research on the subject matter does NOT make him an authority. The consideration of just the negative effects of hormonal contraceptives in order to advance his motive does NOT make him an authority.
This situation is a logical fallacy called “Argumentum Ad Verecundiam” (argument from authority)—the misleading notion of appealing to the testimony of an authority outside his expertise, for example, a lawyer doing medical research. In Sotto’s case, a senator talking like a medical expert. It’s no worse than a celebrity advertising how good a pharmacy is.
At any given time, I would rather believe former DOH Secretary Cabral than relying on Sotto for medical information.
What’s worse than plagiarism is the one-of-a-kind SOTTOISM.
Sotto declares he is not against contraceptives when he said:
Yet he isolated the bad side of contraceptive use and made it into a speech for everyone to hear. Sotto is NOT against contraceptive use BUT went on to criticize his colleagues and a medical expert. Sotto is NOT against contraceptive use BUT went on to scare the public.
Does the doublespeak reek of uncertainty on his part? Does the doublespeak signify that his agenda may prove to be untenable because he is hiding the good side of contraceptive use?
Sotto cannot be relied upon because Sottoism is of the dangerous kind—even worse than what he claimed to be an existence of danger in the use of hormonal contraceptives.
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