this post was submitted on 16 Apr 2025
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WASHINGTON- Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is doubling down on his view that toxins in the environment contribute to autism with a series of new studies to investigate the issue as scientists continue to push back on his claims.

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[–] [email protected] 11 points 2 days ago (1 children)

Would be hilarious if they discovered the rising rates were due to microplastics in the environment. Deregulation will surely fix that...

[–] [email protected] 3 points 2 days ago

No, micro plastics have now been shown to prevent cancer! Yeah! Drill baby drill!

[–] [email protected] 8 points 2 days ago (1 children)

So they defunded CDC cuz it was a waste yet this is not a waste?

[–] [email protected] 3 points 2 days ago

Anything and everything goes with fascists. Standards mean nothing to then, and if it weren't for double standards, they'd have none at all. Expect nothing except for the complete destruction of social and government programs that help society at large.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 2 days ago

"Toxins".

JFC

[–] [email protected] 5 points 2 days ago

Am I hearing this right... Toxins released from corporations are to blame so this administration is repealing all environmental protections it can.

So is this some perverse experiment to see if they can cause more suffering or are these people just insufferable twats!?

[–] [email protected] 4 points 2 days ago

Even if this was true... the current administration is all about rolling back all the regulations that protect us from things like this hypothetical toxin.

The government wouldn't ban it, they'd call it fake news and give companies producing it subsidies so they could make more.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 2 days ago

What an absolute waste of taxpayer money. Surely DOGE will be shuttering this... right? /s

[–] [email protected] 10 points 2 days ago (1 children)

They’ve run plenty of studies on this type of stuff. Promise this “study” will be biased and corrupt with an outcome that matches RFK’s previous ranting.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 2 days ago

In right wing world science is jumping to a faith based conclusion and then smashing together a bunch of data from random experiments that looks like something that comes to said conclusion. If something looks to change the conclusion then the process is wrong not the conclusion.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 2 days ago

And if those studies prove you are a fucking moron, will you still allow those studies to be published...?

Yeah that's what I thought.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 2 days ago

Government efficiency amirite?

[–] [email protected] 1 points 2 days ago
[–] [email protected] 4 points 2 days ago

lol kids gonna die

wait . . . that's terrible

[–] [email protected] 5 points 2 days ago (1 children)

Maybe our skills in identifying spectrum traits has improved with greater awareness? Y’know, maybe. Maybe that’s a plausible explanation.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 2 days ago

Seriously. Back when I was a kid, mild autism was "just a slightly weird kid" and severe autism was "mentally retarded" and lumped in with the kids who had Down's Syndrome, severe ADHD, FAS, and a host of other mental issues.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 2 days ago

Didn't they just declare open season on environmental toxins for oil, coal, AI, whatever? After we already know how bad they are for health, particularly in historically abused minority neighborhoods?

[–] [email protected] 10 points 2 days ago

So, they're shutting down actual research in order to rehash this bullshit for the hundredth time?

[–] [email protected] 14 points 2 days ago

toxins...which were pumped into the environment by his republican corporate sponsors. imagine our current administration holding a company responsible for something like this.

[–] [email protected] 9 points 2 days ago

Is there any research about hard drugs diminishing mental capacity? Oh there is, interesting!

[–] [email protected] 62 points 2 days ago

If he actually believed it, that would be bad. But he doesn't. He and all his family are vaxxed. That's much worse. They're just perpetuating the lie which keeps droves of uninformed idiots voting for them. At the cost of the lives of innocent children. But they won't lose a night's sleep over it.

[–] [email protected] 12 points 2 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago) (2 children)

RFK Jr should launch a personal study into the mechanics of jumping off a bridge.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 2 days ago

He should do us all a favor and relapse

[–] [email protected] 7 points 2 days ago

If he lands on his head he's liable to bounce back up.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 2 days ago

I think the the environmental toxin is a toxic brain worm.

[–] [email protected] 22 points 2 days ago (2 children)

It’s funny how many people that claim to believe that vaccines cause autism out themselves as not truly believing that.

The vast majority of people who parrot the vaccines cause autism bullshit also believe that autistic people should be punished for being autistic, even up to, in RFK Jrs own words: sent to labor camps. It’s not at all logically consistent to believe that autism is caused by an external factor outside of their control but also they need to be brutalized for daring to be autistic. It is, as always, a grift to get money from idiots.

There’s definitely some moms of autism horseshit in there where “I can’t possibly be responsible for my child being autistic, it MUST be something else” is a major driving factor too. Anything to shift the blame away from yourself for failing to take care of your child properly.

[–] [email protected] 13 points 2 days ago (1 children)

Not even that, that idea is driven, deep down, by seeing autistic people as less than human, or at least a less "valuable" human. Don't mistake it - Moms of Autism types absolutely, deep down, hate their children.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 2 days ago

I am well aware, first hand, of what mothers of autistic children think about their autistic children. Fucked me up for decades.

[–] [email protected] 10 points 2 days ago

As far as we can tell, these moms are indeed NOT responsible for the autism of their kids. As our society allows to care and accommodate for individuals who may or may not have issues integrating socially, autism is not negatively selected for and therefore individuals affected are only selected against on a sexual level if at all.

That means: These moms blame anything but the chance of their genetics, in consequence believing fascist ideas of a lost golden past that must be achieved again by ousting demonized parts of society.

[–] [email protected] 19 points 2 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago) (1 children)

"This is coming from an environmental toxin and somebody made it and put that environmental toxin into our air or water or medicines or food," Kennedy said during the press conference at the Department of Health and Human Services' headquarters in Washington, D.C.

“And we’ll announce the culprit as soon as the next corporate figure from any of those industries is critical of the Trump administration.”

[–] [email protected] 4 points 2 days ago

It's a communist conspiracy to scare people into thinking the mega corporations just don't care about them.

[–] [email protected] 13 points 2 days ago (1 children)

"Mentally Disabled Man Falls For Conspiracy Theory"