Media

A Display of Public Ignorance About Depression

People are dumb; there’s nothing new about that. Public ignorance about depression in particular was on display recently in a news article I came across, and it annoyed me, so I thought I’d write about it. First, let’s start with some background. The news related to the findings of an article published last month in …

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The Bizarre Spread of the COVID/5G conspiracy theory: cartoon of a train pulling a coronavirus particle and 5G symbol

The Bizarre Spread of the COVID/5G Conspiracy Theory

The COVID/5G conspiracy theory has been around since the early days of the pandemic. How did such an out-there idea become so widely known? The dumpster fire that is social media has a fair bit to do with it, with a combination of misinformation (wrong information spread without manipulative/deceptive intent) and disinformation (intentionally spreading wrong …

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Homelessness & Addiction: A Newspaper Embraces Stigma

Last year I wrote about a police wellness check gone wrong, in which a young woman was dragged half-naked in handcuffs through her building by a police officer. While the woman was apprehended under the Mental Health Act, a story about the matter in the Kelowna Daily Courier used the word “arrested” multiple times, including …

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What Is... Series (Insights into Psychology)

What Is… The Psychology Behind Conspiracy Theories

In this series, I dig a little deeper into the meaning of psychology-related terms. This week we’re looking at the psychology behind conspiracy theories. This topic came up in a recent post by Andy of Eden in Babylon. In particular, the Q-Anon conspiracy theory has become quite popular, despite its utter absurdity. Then there’s the …

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RCMP Cst. Lacy Browning with her foot on Mona Wang's head during a wellness check

A Police Wellness Check Gone Wrong

I’ve written before about defunding the police as a way to address the mismatch between the standard police approach and appropriate mental health crisis response. The picture below from a “wellness check” is a good illustration of just how significant that mismatch is. In June of this year, information became public about an incident that …

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Separating Reality from Fake Health News

During this global pandemic, there’s a lot of wild and wacky news out there in the world. This infographic from the International Federation of Library Association and Institutions gives some handy tips for separating the facts from the crap.  In this post, I’ll go through those tips with respect to spotting fake health news. Factors …

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