Wikipedia’s Anti-Health Bias
Here’s an interesting article someone shared with me about how Wikipedia is being manipulated, especially when it comes to health-related articles:
Wikipedia’s Bias Against Science in Natural Healing
I’ve run into evidence of this bias on multiple occasions, especially when I researched water fasting earlier this year. See for yourself by taking a look at Wikipedia’s water fasting entry. I think you’ll agree that it’s an absolute joke. It’s barely more than a screen’s worth of info and looks like it was written by someone who either knows nothing about water fasting or is just an all around idiot. The entry has a mere two sentences about the health effects of water fasting. Seriously? Half of the entry is about religion. There are only three references in the entry, one of which goes to Quackwatch, which isn’t even close to a credible or scientific source for health info. After all these years, this is Wikipedia’s summary of the knowledge we’ve accumulated from thousands of years of water fasting? Really?
In the past I’ve donated to support Wikipedia when they do their annual donation drive. Not this year. I do feel they do a provide a good service for the planet in many ways, and I’ve used their site a lot for research. But I find myself trusting them less with each passing year, especially when it comes to information that could affect my health and well-being (and by extension the health and well-being of my readers if I share such info). Wikipedia needs to do a better job of rooting out corruption and bias, especially in the health area. At the very least, their water fasting page should be filled with a lot more facts as well as links to scientific studies. If you know something about water fasting, see if you can fix that entry without having your changes rejected, as the article above suggests.
Earlier this year I completed a 17-day water fast without Wikipedia’s help, and I found it beneficial. It was easier than I expected. The summary blog post about my water fasting experience will give you a lot more info about water fasting than Wikipedia at present, and I’m just one guy who did this one time so far, able to share only from personal experience. Wikipedia’s entry on this topic should put my blog post to shame in terms of the facts and knowledge it provides, shouldn’t it?
Wikipedia, up your game.
