Bad Medicine

Sally Satel, a psychiatrist and lecturer at Yale, makes a long-awaited return to the Remnant ...

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Sally Satel, a psychiatrist and lecturer at Yale, makes a long-awaited return to the Remnant to discuss the influence of woke culture on medical science. In our woke moment, Sally argues, doctors are at the mercy of “indoctrinologists” who want them to become more concerned with social activism than healing the sick. What’s driving this trend, and should we fear for the future of science? Furthermore, how has psychotherapy changed over the years? What can be done to address the opioid epidemic? And will people only get crazier as the COVID-19 pandemic refuses to end?

Show Notes:

– Sally’s page at AEI

– Sally’s previous Remnant appearance

– Sally: “What is Happening to My Profession?”

– Sally: “Taking on the Scourge of Opioids”

– Critical race theory and medicine

– The cardiologist suing the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine

– False advertising

– Political religions

– Barry Goldwater’s mental fitness

– Jonah: “Fear and Loathing in the Time of COVID”

– The Remnant with Paul Bloom

– John Tooby on coalitional instincts

– How the Mind Works, by Steven Pinker

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  1. Avatar photo
    The Bell Tower

    This is not unlike the anti-intellectual zealotry of the Nazis if William Shirer is to be believed.

    If people who know better don’t push back on this garbage, people who don’t will. Bullies must be bullied back. My fear is the nature of the backlash.

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    1. Richard Fulmer

      I don’t think that the right response is to bully back - that just leads to a downward, tit-for-tat spiral. I think that a better solution is to *rigorously* enforce classical liberal principles and the Constitution and it’s amendments.

      When a public university’s administration tolerates, say, professors or students shouting down speakers, they should be met with lawsuits.

      Companies that create toxic work environments with mandatory “whites-are-bad, minorities-are-victims” training should also face lawsuits.

      We need to publicize every instance of woke intolerance and document them with scrupulous honesty so we can give the lie to woke fellow travelers who claim that there’s “nothing to see.”

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      1. Avatar photo
        The Bell Tower

        Absolutely. We’re pretty much saying the same thing. When I say bully back, I mean speak up and stand your ground, not sink to the level of the opposition. The passive silence of those in positions of authority who understand what’s happening is troubling.

        The problem that liberals face is that we are (and should be) confined to a fair fight and the tools of persuasion and debate. This is often insufficient to combat the scoundrels and zealots who do not recognize such confines.

        Trumpism is an example of the backlash I fear. Many of his supporters think “Finally, someone is fighting back and never mind the methods.”

        It’s Boromir, frustrated that his people keep losing and dying. Lend me the ring! Tolkien’s point, that you will only become another Dark Lord, is essentially the argument for liberalism.

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        1. Richard Fulmer

          Wasn’t there a line in LOTR that described a possible future Middle Earth in which only the two towers were left, grinning at each other across a blasted landscape? Sometimes I think that’s an apt description of what America would be like if MAGA and wokism prevail.

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          1. Avatar photo
            The Bell Tower

            I don’t recall that specific line. I remember that Minas Morgul (The Tower of Sorcery) was once Minas Ithil (The Tower of the Moon). It became Minas Morgul through neglect and decay so that the bad guys were able to use something built for good and turn it to evil uses.

            Perhaps an apt analogy for Yuval Levin’s argument about institutions.

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  2. Avatar photo
    Ben Connelly

    Great episode. I’m please have her back on the podcast sometime. I’ll try to go back and listen to her earlier episode.

    As far as sound quality goes, I honestly don’t notice a difference. There’s never been a problem with Dispatch podcasts (including the Remnant) and sound quality. Maybe that’s not what you wanted to hear since you paid for fancy equipment but this episode sounded good so maybe it was worth it.

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  3. Avatar photo
    Bel

    Regarding pod recording, I do not notice any difference in audio quality regardless of where The Remnant is recorded. The only background noise I remember hearing ever is sirens on the recent-ish George Will episode. In general Dispatch podcasts have …balanced may be the right word … audio.

    There is another pod I listen to where the intro music is very loud yet the speaking volume is so low I can’t hear it on a busy street or if I pass barking dogs, even with my earbuds cranked all the way up. Whatever your doing works.

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  4. Richard Fulmer

    Anti-racism may be more revolution than religion. Ibram X Kendi recently tweeted that one cannot be anti-racist without also being anti-capitalism: https://twitter.com/DrIbram/status/1302724276412387334?s=20

    What Kendi doesn’t (or refuses to) understand is that free markets punish bigotry. A business that hires people based on race or sex means doesn’t get the best people. A business that refuses to serve people because of their color or religion loses business. That’s not to say that business people never discriminate, but there’s a price for doing so.

    Without governments imposing Jim Crow, then, companies that don’t discriminate are more likely to survive and thrive than those that do. Capitalism is systematically anti-racist.

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    1. Avatar photo
      Ben Connelly

      I could not agree more with your second paragraph. That’s always been my attitude.

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      1. Richard Fulmer

        Much of what Kendi claims to hate about America came, not from free markets, but from government - the same government that he wants in complete control of society and the economy:

        Slavery
        Slavery was profitable only because slave owners were able to socialize the cost of catching runaways and of preventing and suppressing slave rebellions.

        Enforced ignorance
        Nearly every southern state had anti-literacy laws making it illegal to teach slaves to read. They didn’t want slaves to be able to forge passes, coordinate rebellion, or read abolitionist pamphlets smuggled in from the North.

        Ironically, many blacks are now kept illiterate, not by laws, but by a culture that militates against “acting white.” Kendi’s own anti-racist allies “help” by declaring that traits like objectivity and educational rigor are white characteristics.

        Laws against manumission
        After the 1831 slave revolt led by Nat Turner, most slave states passed laws making it nearly impossible for slave owners to free their slaves. Free blacks were considered dangerous to the institution of slavery. Because they could move about freely, they could aid in escapes and rebellions.

        Miscegenation laws

        Jim Crow laws
        As economist Walter E Williams asked: Why are laws needed to force racists to act like racists? The answer is that acting like a racist isn’t in anyone’s self-interest. In a free market, if my store requires blacks to enter through the back door, blacks can patronize stores where they’re welcomed in through the front door.

        Redlining
        The practice of redlining was introduced by the Federal Housing Administration during the New Deal: https://www.npr.org/2017/05/03/526655831/a-forgotten-history-of-how-the-u-s-government-segregated-america

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        1. Avatar photo
          Ben Connelly

          Oh exactly! Totally with you on this. I fail to see in any way how support for the free market should have anything to do with skin color. In a purely free market, there wouldn’t be restrictive covenant laws or publicly segregated schools etc. Jim Crow and slavery and everything in between were examples of governmental overreach and majorities abusing power to infringe on the natural rights of individuals who were members of minority groups.

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  5. Kevin H

    When bad things happen to us we can chose to be a victim or a survivor. Counseling should help us to make the choice to be a survivor.

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  6. Niku

    Good podcast. Interesting discussion and guest. You asked for technical feedback; I found your voice sometimes dropped in volume making the discussion hard to follow (I had to replay). I think you need a new microphone or to stop turning away from it.

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  7. Avatar photo
    Gennimarietw

    Anecdote: I was talking to the wife of an EMT who related an emergency incident where a transgender woman claimed to be a man. It later came out that he/she was biologically a woman and the EMT was furious because the medicine he had given her was dosed differently for men than women and based on her claim, he gave him/her the male dosage. If he/she had died from an overdose, would this EMT have been responsible? This kind of thing is definitely an issue in medicine in a multitude of ways.

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  8. Avatar photo
    Anne W (Raw5254)

    Why do we continue to treat blacks as though they are children. It’s insulting.

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  9. Avatar photo
    CynthiaW

    They sure take a lot of breaks from publication/podcasting at The Dispatch. Good thing I have Tides of History.

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  10. Josh Klooz

    Jonah...you can't remember if you were in Kansas or Nebraska. This Central Nebraska Farm boy...is deeply hurt. I had such a higher estimation of you!

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