Headline is weird. It's not a copyright thing, as I had assumed. It was because it was an editorial criticizing how the administration is running the NIH.
> > Some questioned how handing out reprints of an editorial published in the ADA’s own journal, at the ADA’s own annual conference, could be construed as a violation of that code.
You're not allowed to hand out your own articles you've published in the journal that the conference is about? One could start questioning what this conference is really about, if authors aren't allowed to provide a copy of their work to people they talk to... No one bats an eye about that almost every paper author shares their papers with you when you email them, but when you do so in person it's suddenly a problem?
>The scientists were not disruptive or disorderly in their conduct, based on the videos posted by MedPage Today, although the fact that they were handing out reprints just before an NIH representative was scheduled to speak might be construed as a form of protest. But it could just as easily be argued that such actions fall under valid scientific dissemination and discussion, the conference’s stated objective.
An editorial published in the (reputable) journal Diabetes Care, which they handed out at a diabetes conference. I imagine if it wasn’t critical of the administration they would not have been told to stop, but this is Louisiana so
Though there is a good case that breaking that rule is the best action. Getting kicked out probably did more for their cause then their protest. They just need the guts to publicly stand by.
Others have already quoted TFA, which rightly points that the distributing (by some of the coauthors) of an article published in the journal of a medical association, at the conference of the said medical association, a conference which has the claimed purpose of exchanging information between the members who attend the conference, can hardly be called a "protest" or a "violation of the code of conduct".
There are few cases where it is so clear cut that only the organizers have violated the code of conduct, and not those who were expelled from the conference.
Yeah this is like pointing out that it’s raining, when it is raining, at a conference about rain, when the only controversial thing is that a massively corrupt administration has announced that there’s no such thing as rain.
If assertions of truth are cast as an anti-government protests, that says a lot about the government.
Yep, the article itself, Misguided Brushes of a Pen Continue to Dismantle and Destroy Biomedical Research in the United States: We Can No Longer Afford Complacency and Fear. We Must All Act Now!, is marked as "free" and is available without a paywall-
https://diabetesjournals.org/care/article/49/6/901/164764/Mi...
It was because the group made the mistake of inviting the federal appointee currently running NIH.
This would probably have been fine if this administration was not comprised of individuals that cannot abide any sort of pushback.
The protest would not have been needed without the official there - but their presence made the organizers so nervous that they tossed the editor in chief of their own journal.
The problem is how deep the federal dollars go into these systems that enable fear of pulling it. That is the mechanism of control. Our own tax dollars being weaponized.
> problem is how deep the federal dollars go into these systems
The problem is no state AG suing to stop OMB and HHS from illegally re-appropriating funds directed by the Congress for diabetes research. Like, the multi-year funding shenanigan called out in the article is literally accounting fuckery.
> The Emperor was vexed, for he knew that the people were right; but he thought the procession must go on now! And the lords of the bedchamber took greater pains than ever, to appear holding up a train, although, in reality, there was no train to hold.
".Some questioned how handing out reprints of an editorial published in the ADA’s own journal, at the ADA’s own annual conference, could be construed as a violation of that code.."
I'm hoping the Streisand Effect will take hold, and this editorial becomes the most read article ever of that journal. I've posted this news on my FB (yes...) page. And I downloaded a PDF, in case the journal takes the editorial down.
Well, there is one problem here: not everyone is interested in diabetes/nutrition. So the Streisand effect may kick in with regards to the ousted individuals, but I am not sure it will generate more interest in the topic/paper at hand. For instance, I am not particularly interested in diabetes per se; I'd be more interested in molecular medicine and what not. Either way the current administration is very hostile to science. It is kind of a sign of a dictatorship model. Trump wants to be the final authority. His cognitive decline is enormous though, it's like a broken stick that will remain broken.
Good point, so here's how I worded my FB post without even mentioning diabetes (URL truncated here because that's how FB displays them, but it works):
"Scientists were ejected from a meeting of the American Diabetes Associate for distributing printouts of an editorial that had appeared in the ADA journal. Here's the link: https://diabetesjournals.org/.../Misguided-Brushes-of-a.... The article highlights "the many threats the current U.S. administration pose[s] to the health of our nation". I recommend that you do read it: it is not technical, you don't need to have a degree in medicine or biology to read it.
What do people not understand about the First Amendment?"
Now it is funny to look for signs enabling us to decide whether Trump presidency is a personal enrichment or a vanity project. It seems that it is both, but I can't decide what is more important to him.
Trump and his cronies try to repurpose everything they slurp up into
a propaganda tool. Recently Hegseth babbled about how Europe will
perish because of immigration. Today five people were evicted from a
conference about science. Their crime? Not supporting Trump.
Something is fundamentally broken in the USA. It's like Neo-Russia, or
rather handled like that by those cronies.
> “They physically grabbed us, forced us out of the conference center, and now are telling us we can no longer attend this meeting,” Kelly told MedPage Today, which first reported the incident. “They’re taking our lanyards. It really has come to this in America. Censorship is real. America needs to stand up. Scientists, stand up. Physicians, stand up.”
It's become very evident from the outside that the best time to stand up was yesterday, and you might already be too far down the slope to be able to quickly recover for this. I really do feel for all Americans who just want to have a normal life with an average quality of life or above, but at one point the environment around you change so quickly that that stops being even a possibility in the future. If your life hasn't been affected yet, it will be shortly.
The best day to stand up against the ongoing censorship and repression might have been yesterday, but the second-best day to do so is today. You really need to start caring about this before it's way to late. One "no kings protest" every 6 months is not gonna do anything, what you need is wide solidarity across industries, and a real general strike across the country. The second you do this, you'll see that the many and poor can control the few and rich.
By actually striking, or by waving a sign outside?
Don't get me wrong, anything is better than nothing, and many small streams may form into one big river, eventually. But short of a general strike across impactful industries, I think the current wave of protests won't actually achieve anything.
There is a reason "general strikes" are so feared by the political and wealthy class, and it's because there is no way for them to get rid of them without actually agreeing to some of the demands, otherwise the strikes actually impact their lives. Protesting by going out on the streets waving signs isn't gonna accomplish that, sadly.
It's not that I'm a fan of the method, it is that it id historically the only non-violent way for a population at large to enact change, once the government stops listening to the people.
Protesting is very effective when you have a government that listens, which clearly isn't the case here, then besides a bunch of violent options, you're basically left with general strikes.
> short of a general strike across impactful industries, I think the current wave of protests won't actually achieve anything
If like another 5% of eligible voters committed to voting every election, minor or not, and committed to calling their electeds on one issue every quarter, we’d likely see a sea change.
The threshold for laziness is very low, currently only 1 in 5 [1]. That’s both annoying and an opportunity.
The problem is not turnout. What the Democrats seem unable or unwilling to accept is that the American public doesn't agree with their platform and are also unable or unwilling to change their platform to something that voters will elect them for.
You’re only looking at the general. 5% more eligible voters turning out to primaries could easily flip the outcome, or at the very least, signal a political bloc that will show up for someone. 5% of eligible voters contacting their electeds would represent a 25% increase from baseline; this is the sort of power that makes e.g. regulating supplements impossible. (If you try your office’s phone lines get blown up by constituents.)
> unable or unwilling to change their platform
Changing your platform for a group that doesn’t turn out is incredibly risky. Sometimes it works. Most of the time, they keep up not turning out.
One of the major union leaders in the US—I forget exactly who; it might've been the head of the Teamsters, but this was a while back, so I don't have the details—has, in fact, called for a general strike, as soon as it can be effectively organized.
That's 2028.
General strikes are not something you can just Make Happen. They're certainly not something you can reasonably scoff at an individual (one who's not the head of a major union) for not having Made Happen. They require significant amounts of coordination between unions if you want them to have a prayer of success, and that takes a lot of time.
Don't denigrate protests of the sign-waving type. They are a very important rallying activity for the resistance. Among other things, they help ensure that people who want to fight back know they're not alone, and ensure people who want the fascists to win know their feelings are not universal.
General strikes are something you can make happen, as an individual, if you push others around you to follow you along. Sure, the US is lacking a lot in the department of having unions and a labor movement, but that doesn't mean it's somehow out of reach. The existing ones in other countries mostly started as grass-root movements, born out of a bunch of individuals going together and deciding they've had enough.
Relying on "union leaders" or political leaders of parties isn't gonna get you anywhere. What you need is active action, something that hurts the people who are trying to hurt you and non-violent protests every 6 months doesn't hurt them one bit.
I agree that protests are important, but they also have their time and place. When the government actively listens, then it's a great way to enact reform. Once the government stops listening though, you need to up your tactics, otherwise you're playing it straight into their pocket.
No, they published their rules ahead of time. When you do that you can’t just go and make up new rules on the spot. That’s a central tenet of “the rule of law” that the rules are written down so we can interpret them.
That was the intended result. The story isn't that people were escorted out, it's that they knew they were going to be escorted out and proceeded anyway. That they felt the need to break the rules is the story, because... why did they feel so strongly? Maybe there's a reason behind it?
> Refusing to cease by an even organisers order will, yes, result in being escorted out forcefully by security
Sure. But if two groups of people are distributing articles published in the organisation’s own journal, with one of them containing elements of political speech, and the organization censors that one, it’s absolutely valid to ask if anyone in government directed that censorship.
The core of the argument is they should not have been asked to cease distributing their article, that’s literally one of the purposes of an academic conference, plenty of other people were doing it in various ways. The ADA, in claiming it was enforcing its rules, was in fact not following them.
Yes I agree that it's quite silly, of course if we assume they acted in a reasonable way (which I can't say for certain if the security had to result to forcefully ejecting them).
It very badly damages credibility to misrepresent what happened. It doesn't further the cause, only damages it.
I completely agree with what you are saying, but I have grown too cynical to believe it will ever happen. American capitalism has been very effective at ensuring 2 outcomes:
- The population is kept just comfortable enough to become complacent, with easy access to intoxicants, brainrot media and fast food. Now there are even robots that can do our thinking for us. A large percentage of people are brainwashed into thinking that all change is bad because it will cause them to lose the paltry, ersatz freedom they have rather than gaining real liberty.
- The labor pool is kept large enough that any of us could be replaced immediately with no significant loss to our employers. As the ISP mantra goes, “we have nothing to lose but our jobs”.
Yes, we know that they couldn’t replace _all_ of us at once, but combine points 1 and 2 and you will start to understand why there is no appreciable labor movement in the United States.
What chills me the most, is the self-censorship Americans engage on social media today, everywhere online. It seems Americans today are afraid of talking clearly about general strikes, protesting, rape, sexual violence, censorship and more "taboo" topics, and I'm guessing it's because the platforms kind of shadow-ban people quickly for it.
Growing up, I always heard Americans bragging about freedom of speech, and how important it is. I'll admit I swallowed that wholesale as a young impressionable person in another country, and I still believe in it, just not the American freedom of speech flavor I suppose. But it's so sad to see the state of affairs compared to just ten years ago, where discussions could be freely held, even on mainstream social media, and people weren't afraid of talking about things with clear words.
But the chilling effect is in full effect today, and I think it's having a large impact on how well (or not) the working class could actually mobilize. Because as soon as anyone mentions "general strike" on social media, they seem to disappear into a black hole and that stuff never shows up in people's feeds. Regardless of the size of the labor pool, if you can't organize people somehow, especially across a large country like the US, it's short of impossible to actually get any change in reality.
> Americans today are afraid of talking clearly about general strikes, protesting, rape, sexual violence, censorship
Americans are talking about protesting, rape, sexual violence, censorship all the time ... and I mean literally all sides - liberals, conservatives, leftists, feminists, MAGA ...
Using what words specifically? Besides HN, even people commenting on reddit tends to self-censor words like "r@pe" just because they've realized they get penalized if they talk about things too clearly, on other platforms. Same with general strikes, censorship and more, even on platforms where you don't get downranked automatically just because you used specific terms, people have now started self-censor in those ways.
Using the example of someone typing “r@pe” to get around auto moderation is a pretty specific complaint, and not really an example of self censorship since that person clearly still got to say whatever they wanted to say.
At least online, there is a decent argument to be made that a good cohort of people have significantly lost the ability to self moderate.
Whenever you see something like this, it's because the platform has some kind of automoderation policy that is liable to delete/shadowban content containing the word. Typing that, then, is not self-censorship; it's the exact opposite, the defiance of external censorshop.
Americans don't talk about "general strikes" because they don't care about general strikes and never really have. That concept doesn't have a place in American culture. I know socialists keep trying to make it salient but that is like trying to impose democracy on Afghanistan.
You have to work with what you have, not what you wish you had.
The chilling effect on speech on social media platforms is because they are ad funded, nothing more. Advertisers have no desire to be associated with controversy.
If someone wants unfettered speech, it has to be someplace for which they are willing to pay the hosting and moderation bills. "Private businesses don't owe you a platform for your speech" as the American left liked to say.
Meanwhile, the Swedes seems able to run a forum entirely supported by ads, yet still enable unfettered freedom of speech, together with really strong moderation, which results in a place where you can actually discuss pretty much anything. Online since 95 although taken offline in various points of it's life: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flashback_Media_Group
Maybe it's just the American way of doing ad-funded social media that is the problem?
It's not "captialism." Sweden is capitalist. Norway is capitalist. It's about America going from a high-trust wealthy society, to a low-trust, mostly lower class society with increasing wealth inequality.
If you look around the world, this is effectively the natural state of affairs: India, South Africa, Nigeria, Russia... they all have the same pattern. The US and the West was the outlier in the '50-'90 because we had a lot of wealth redistribution AND free markets. Then the boomers were like, fuck that, we want to all be rich... and they mostly are, but everyone else is fucked.
Government is hard, you need people to give a shit. We decided we don't care somewhere along the way.
This might be reading too much in to minor drama at a diabetes conference. The gentleman in question could have gone to protest outside (and probably did).
The article linked doesn't even say what exactly they were protesting (beyond a rather vague "attacks on scientific research" which could mean a lot of things).
> This might be reading too much in to minor drama at a diabetes conference.
Indeed, my view and perspective is built by a culmination of recent events, not based on a single event. The widespread self-censorship Americans currently engage in (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48434091) is also a large part of it.
I don't have any "index of events" handy that could explain why I think the slope is so evident currently, but based on the ongoing journalistic suppression, individual self-censorship, centralization of control and power in governments and society together with lots of other smaller incidents like this one and others, makes it pretty clear to me at least.
Their so-called "protest" was just distributing an article already published in the journal of the medical association to which this conference is attached, which probably discussed matters of interest for the attendance, like the future of research financing in this domain.
I can hardly think of a more peaceful form of protest, which only intended to make aware the participants about the content of the article. Those who were not interested presumably refused to take the article copy or did not read it.
Even on HN you can still see claims that USA is a "free" country where anyone can say anything about the government, without consequences. This example shows clearly that this claim is false.
I'm no doctor, but I suspect the conference organisers wanted the conference to focus on diabetes. Rather than exploring whether the USA is a "free" country where anyone can say anything about the government, without consequences.
> suspect the conference organisers wanted the conference to focus on diabetes
The article they were distributing is pretty clearly about diabetes. If the actions it describes continues, significant efforts towards treating and even curing diabetes will be lost.
> Just a year ago, in these very pages, we highlighted the many threats the current U.S. administration posed to the health of our nation (1). Since then, there have been actions by the administration that have caused grave health consequences, and their current approach will continue to do so.
The article is not a long read [1]. It describes how current policy is dismantling and destroying the research infrastructure for diabetes, infrastructure which has started or has already borne significant fruit. It encapsulates a criticism of the administration, and it’s definitely scathing, but it’s far from a partisan rant.
For example: “This CD3-directed monoclonal antibody has been approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration to prevent type 1 diabetes in people aged 8 years and older with stage 2 type 1 diabetes. As a result, we are a major step closer to a cure for type 1 diabetes. With the potential to prevent the disease, screening programs for type 1 diabetes are being initiated worldwide.
…
Two examples are the Human Islet Research Network (HIRN) and the Integrated Islet Distribution Program (IIDP). HIRN aims to advance our understanding of how β-cells are lost in human type 1 diabetes and to find inventive strategies to protect or replace β-cells in people with the disease.”
The funding for that research is being cut. If you have a loved one with or at risk of getting diabetes, this could be the difference between vastly different levels of quality of life and years of life versus death.
> The funding for that research is being cut. If you have a loved one with, or at risk of getting, diabetes, this could be the difference between vastly different levels of quality of life and years of life versus death.
So just to jump back to the "The article they were distributing is pretty clearly about diabetes" thing mere comments ago - this seems to be about budgets and administrative matters. Those are generic concerns. In fact, in my unhumble opinion, this looks a lot like the sort of document written by someone with poor marketing skills worried that their budget is going to get cut in the near future. Especially since the conference organisers didn't think there was special merit to it.
There isn't much (if any) research here. It can reasonably be said to be out of scope for a diabetes conference if the organisers don't want to include it. All of us would like a larger budget, we don't need to listen to other people present on the topic of how they also want larger budgets. That is a political topic.
> It can reasonably be said to be out of scope for a diabetes conference if the organisers don't want to include it
I’d agree with you if this happened at the journal level. It didn’t. The journal published it. Like, an astronomical conference paper describing why a new telescope design is a waste of money isn’t basic research, but it’s absolutely topical. (It could also reasonably be branded as political.)
The article is about the research infrastructure supporting diabetes research. If diabetes researchers aren’t allowed to comment on whether diabetes funding is working or wasteful in their own journals, or present their published journal findings at their own conferences, you’re not going to get any basic diabetes research.
> we don't need to listen to other people present on the topic of how they also want larger budgets. That is a political topic
It is. It’s also about diabetes. Debating which research avenues are more promising than others is absolutely political. It’s also at the heart of science. And frankly, informing fellow researchers and policymakers of the boring parts of the science is part of a scientist’s job.
Also, importantly, they aren’t asking for more budget in the article. They’re pointing out that the appropriated funds aren’t being delivered. They’re being literally misappropriated by OMB and HHS.
I mean, so the concern here is what - HN disagrees with a decision made by an ADA organiser at a conference related to whether budgets and administration is appropriate in conference scope?
They got to have their say. Editorial published, made international news. I imagine all the conference attendees read it if they cared. Seems like a non-issue. Can we find a real problem for me to read up on instead? I'm having fun I suppose but I'm not seeing why we need to be all up in their business.
I bet less than 10% of the HN people who read the article even get to the "Misguided Brushes of a Pen..." editorial to find out what their complaint is.
ADA is violating its own code of conduct to suppress an article that calls out potentially-illegal misappropriation of diabetes-research funding by OMB and HHS, funding which falls in a results-oriented tradition and/or cuts off strong candidates for future therapies.
> Seems like a non-issue
Half of the front page usually is. You’re engaging with this content, so there is clearly something going on.
Personally, I flagged excerpts of the article to one of my Senator’s staffers. They weren’t aware of it, and will be surfacing the article to their boss, a doctor, tomorrow. If HHS is fucking around with Congressional appropriations on a healthcare issue germane to our state, they probably shouldn’t have gone out of their way to draw attention to it during an appropriation cycle.
> ADA is violating its own code of conduct to suppress an article
They published the article. That is the opposite of suppressing it.
> Personally, I flagged excerpts of the article to one of my Senator’s staffers.
Sounds like this article is indeed quite politically charged then? We're dealing with a hot potato here that has little to do with the actual science of diabetes and is going to cause random United Statesmen on the internet to start emailing their Senator. If you can't connect the dots with how that might reasonably be seen as inappropriate fare for a diabetes conference then you're probably going to figure it out later after a little reflection. It is likely that the conference organisers want to encourage technical discussion in a polite low-politics environment.
“When I am weaker than you, I ask you for freedom because that is according to your principles; when I am stronger than you, I take away your freedom because that is according to my principles.”
This looks like the shoe-on-the-other-foot version of what we saw during Covid and BLM. I didn’t like it then, and I don’t like it now. Whatever happened to just ignoring the guy handing out contrarian leaflets? As long as he’s not yelling at or berating people it shouldn’t be a problem. The paper does seem relevant to conference attendees, even if it’s political in nature.
> that has little to do with the actual science of diabetes
Not the takeaway I got from the article. They describe specific research and specific dollar-drawdown amounts.
The tools of science are just as relevant as the science per se to the process of science. I may be extrapolating from the astronomical circles I’m more familiar with. But folks debating telescopes and whatnot is commonplace, political, and absolutely germane. In many of those cases, simply handing out an editorial wasn’t the norm—you’d have straight-up advocacy going on. The idea that a conference organizer would eject someone for distributing a published paper would be absurd.
> likely that the conference organisers want to encourage technical discussion in a polite low-politics environment
And it appears that is about their limit for politics at the event. They put their foot down at letting it turn into a debate club.
I suspect if Bhattacharya didn't control the purse strings somehow he wouldn't have been invited to talk politics either, I bet the organisers were gritting their teeth when they offered him a slot. And nothing short of a significant cash infusion being involved would have induced them to let him speak. This appears to be a technical conference.
> They got to have their say. Editorial published, made international news. I imagine all the conference attendees read it if they cared. Seems like a non-issue.
If it's such a non-issue, why should they have been forcefully ejected from the premises over it? And why do you feel so strongly that they should have been?
> And why do you feel so strongly that they should have been?
I don't. It makes literally no difference to me; especially since I've skimmed through the actual paper they were handing out anyway.
I'm just trying to figure out if there is actually an issue here or whether we're just having an anti-Trump session. And I'm arguing with JCC which is its own reward.
It can reasonably be said to be out of scope for a diabetes conference if the organisers don't want to include it
So the organisers of a conference can control the topics that its attendees want to talk about in the hallways of the venue? They don't have to extend any agency to the attendees, they're just dumb consumers here?
It's not like the article is indirectly related to the subject of the conference. It is critical of the government, but not in the "human rights abuses of this administration threaten us all" way (though even that seems reasonable to discuss).
Is it your position that if an article is critical of a world government it must not be discussed at a scientific conference? Or even "you should expect to get ejected from a conference if you criticize the host government"? Because believe it or not, that's not been a problem in the USA prior to Trump. And it runs contrary to how science should work.
If Adria Richards and PyCon can make a such fuss about a joke [1], then other conferences can do the same about current political events.
I personally wouldn't mind or better said I wouldn't be offended because the topic might be boring for me.
This is a false equivalence. "What constitutes appropriate humor" versus "Government silences dissent." Just because the Diabetes conference cited their code of conduct doesn't mean that's actually what this is about.
This is what people seem to get mixed up about the First Amendment to the US Constitution. These scientists were removed from the conference because they were highlighting the scientific role to push back against government censorship. Not because it wasn't germane to the conference, but in furtherance of the censorship itself. The US Government participated here indirectly via its chilling on scientific discourse.
Comments in this thread suggesting that "this is just some private actors" are mistaken. This is absolutely the consequence of the Trump HHS policymakers decisions.
It wasn't in any way an article, and much less an article about diabetes.
They were distributing an Opinion Piece which title was (yes, this is the full title): Misguided Brushes of a Pen Continue to Dismantle and Destroy Biomedical Research in the United States: We Can No Longer Afford Complacency and Fear. We Must All Act Now!
One of science's most critical roles is to inform policymakers. And if they can't do that job effectively then it's right and just to point out the problems preventing it. Scientific conferences that fear critiques of the government chill new scientific publications.
It's not like they were handing out "Trump sleeps during press events" posters. You should read the article they distributed, it's very relevant to the conference attendees.
> One of science's most critical roles is to inform policymakers
Yup. From their article: “DCCT/EDIC revolutionized the approach to treating people with type 1 diabetes, establishing standards for glucose control and resulting in improved quality of life along with clinically significant reductions in the risk of diabetes complications and major adverse cardiovascular events.
After 44 years, it continues to provide new insights, including showing that in adults with type 1 diabetes, neurodegeneration is likely the result of non–Alzheimer disease mechanisms. DPP/DPPOS, which enrolled people with prediabetes, demonstrated the benefit of intensive lifestyle intervention and metformin in reducing the risk of developing diabetes. These findings led Congress to approve an amendment to the Social Security Act to establish the Medicare Diabetes Prevention Program and provide lifestyle intervention services for eligible individuals.”
Yes, but this detail is crucial to continuing to make progress on diabetes treatment and research. So it’s actually more fundamental than anything else.
> Even on HN you can still see claims that USA is a "free" country where anyone can say anything about the government, without consequences.
The first amendment applies to public spaces. Not private conferences which are invite-only. You're on an anti-U.S. tear in this discussion but lack understanding of the basics.
For the same reason I can't show up at your office and start handing out religious materials and/or pornography (take your pick) to everyone showing up for work and claim it's a free speech issue and my right to do so.
As someone else pointed out below, this exact argument was used to ban apps lacking "correct" moderation from the app stores a few years ago.
“When Fascism came into power, most people were unprepared, both theoretically and practically. They were unable to believe that man could exhibit such propensities for evil, such lust for power, such disregard for the rights of the weak, or such yearning for submission. Only a few had been aware of the rumbling of the volcano preceding the outbreak.”
Conferences have dozens of people distributing pamphlets, papers, ads, and all manner of literature. To share a publication from an authoritative body with peers is a common action.
>> If your life hasn't been affected yet, it will be shortly.
If your life hasnt been affected yet, you arent paying attention. Or, it has been affected for the better because you are one of the many who generally support the movement.
No, it’s not. You shouldn’t have to muzzle your opposition to feel safe, or to threaten them with jailing to feel like your ideas are being heard. That speaks to some pretty deep seated insecurity if you feel that way.
> Does this advice apply in every case or does it have a restricted scope?
In case you’re being serious, this has been debated in various liberal traditions since the conception liberalism was first born. In essence, the modern liberal tradition (modern as in post-Enlightenment, i.e. about the whole time America has existed) says you don’t censor anything except for forces seeking to censor (paradox of tolerance).
So now every force seeking to censor will just say its opposition is a force seeking to censor, and get them censored. Like how the Nazis claimed the Jews were the ones destroying Germany, then the Nazis destroyed Germany. How do you stop that?
Better minds than mine have debated the paradox of tolerance (a name only given in the 1950s, but a concept recognized for longer).
Also, not tolerating something doesn’t mean forcefully censoring it. Norms and conventions largely keep e.g. frowned-upon slurs out of common usage. The person getting told to shut up for using the N- word isn’t being censored by the state, but they are being encouraged to engage respectfully.
In practice, it seems that whenever someone is told to shut up for using the N- word, they react by saying it many more times. So it doesn't work very well.
> whenever someone is told to shut up for using the N- word, they react by saying it many more times
One, not my experience. (Indian family.) Two, people spouting out the N- word have generally caused themselves to be ignored, which sort of solves the problem as well.
The comment is not excusing censorship, but illustrating that censors don't like to call what they do "censorship". Even a justification for it is not enough - they don't want to call it "justified censorship", they want to call it something else entirely, and even then they want as little attention paid to it as possible, to trick people into thinking their discussions are free.
You’re pretending like the vast majority of people are being oppressed by some military government but easily forget that tens of millions of us support the president and aren’t intimidated whatsoever by anything people like you could do.
In the beginning the people who vote for them may or may not support the ideology.
But once the regime is in place, over time a fraction of supporters start gaining benefits from it. Wealth, recognition, you name it. The regime controls resources of an entire country they can do it.
This core or supporters become the champions of the regime and will eradicate its competitors. Mentally or physically.
Example: try becoming an opposition party in Russia.
Historically if the erosion of institutions is already bad, there is no going back. Only external pressure (sanctions/wars) or civil war.
Elections work only if every group that has real power has agreed to yield it to institutions that will be elected. Either because they believe or because cumulatively the power they own is not enough to challenge the institutions.
> You’re pretending like the vast majority of people are being oppressed by some military government
I wasn't, or at least I don't think I am. What did I write that gave you that impression? I mainly wrote about freedom of speech and censorship, and nothing of meat about the military really, but maybe I don't realize what I wrote sounds like.
> handing out copies of an editorial, published in the journal Diabetes Care on April 29, sharply criticizing the Trump administration’s ongoing attacks on scientific research.
You could have simply searched this versus posting, but he never completed a residency. To go into US medical school debt and not complete your training is strongly indicative of deep rooted problems.
A reminder to anyone who finds themselves in this kind of situation, do not engage with the rhetoric of the enemy. You cannot win an argument where they set the rules. So here, where they question whether or not they were "protesting" distracts from the reality of a censorious organization that will weaponize regulations it controls without good faith. Instead you need a simple, memorable statement of condemnation which is repeated consistently and a clear action which those who hear it can take in response.
"This organization is controlled by Trump loyalists. They are not scientists. You do not owe them respect. Speak over them. Let no manipulation go unchallenged or derided."
I’d disagree with trying to make it political. If it’s just about funding, plenty of people are happy the grant spigot is being turned off.
Something that may resonate with a broader spectrum is how science requires debate and polite disagreement. Good ideas can survive being pressure tested. Compelling consensus has terrible long-term outcomes.
> do not engage with the rhetoric of the enemy. You cannot win an argument where they set the rules
Strongly disagree. If they went straight up partisan at the conference, I’d be sympathetic to the notion of throwing them out. Not every space needs to be a protest venue.
They didn’t do that. They distributed an article published in the organization’s own journal. They argue why what they did cannot reasonably be considered “protest” under the organisation’s rules, given it’s literally what the conference is for. Challenging the notion that their ejection was the ADA following its own rules is the difference between them breaking the rules and the ADA breaking its own rules to censor their speech. (To cut off an aside, no the ADA isn’t bound by the First Amendment. Yes, the government is, and if they’re corruptly influencing to yank these researchers from the conference, that’s a legal issue. But more broadly, the concept of free speech is broader than the First Amendment.)
The point being that we're beyond where that's a responsible choice. Empathy for an organization enforcing its rules above the actions of those protesting them means either an ideological alignment with the censorship or an ignorance/disbelief of the severity of the harm the organization is causing. The former audience will never be persuaded. The latter require education and persuasion, and while its useful to create a sense of martyrdom via forcing the enemy to act in an obviously unreasonable fashion, it's a waste of time to argue with their definitions of rules. If the rule were "you are not allowed to say the governing body is corrupt" and they say its corrupt, that exposes clearly and plainly the problem, and enforcement of the rule provides no authority because the rule itself is obviously designed to quash dissent. If the listener is so blithely oblivious to how the intent of a rule has been manipulated to quash dissent, as it has here, then there is no loss in squarely addressing that. "We are protesting your abandonment of scientific principles" is both what they were doing and should be doing.
> means either an ideological alignment with the censorship
Yes. I’m saying I would be ideologically aligned with censoring disruptive protest at a conference. The fact that they didn’t do that is why this is getting attention and sympathy.
> The former audience will never be persuaded
Literally me. I’m being persuaded.
> while its useful to create a sense of martyrdom
Usually only within the group. Exhibit A is all the employee protests at tech companies. Entirely useless and generally unsympathetic to anyone not already in the choir.
> "We are protesting your abandonment of scientific principles" is both what they were doing and should be doing
Sure. Not at the conference. (Like, I’m sure being ejected for traditionally protesting would rank well on BlueSky and sympathetic parts of X. But it wouldn’t be on HN. And I wouldn’t have bothered reading their article if I figure I already know what will be in it.)
Ah, ok. There's a whole body of literature here that I think divides our opinions. I would recommend "Why Civil Resistance Works: The Strategic Logic of Nonviolent Conflict (Columbia Studies in Terrorism and Irregular Warfare)" to start. The history of effective change in the face of organizations acting in bad faith may not be what you think it is.
Right. This is sort of what I would be sympathetic with a diabetes-conference organizer drawing the line on, and why I suspect they’ve had a no-protest code of conduct for years.
These kind of behaviour should trigger the dismantling of the whole ADA organisation, then to be rebuilt on proper grounds.
As usual i’m not surprised these fascist behaviours (“you’d better align with us and publicly pledge allegiance to us or else”) comes from the left. They’re the real fascist.
All this proves to me is the current US admin. is intent on turning China into the number 1 scientific research country.
At this rate, English could be replaced by Mandarin as the main international language of commerce. The only thing that could hold it back is the writing system.
If China could convert its writing to use the Latin alphabet I think that could happen with the US now on the path of destroying its research institutions.
They were quietly, politely protesting, but protesting. If two identical conferences had a rule against protesting, but conference A had a plan to have zero tolerance for it, and conference B decided to play it by ear, evaluate based on the disruption and reasonableness and respond as the situation required ... I'd rather go to conference A. I'd feel the same way about a no smoking rule.
> They were quietly, politely protesting, but protesting
How? Researchers handing out a journal from the conference organizer’s own journal is now protesting and banned at conferences?
The “protestors” include the editor of the journal. They knew what the rules were and they followed them. If Conference A gets to yank research because a non-science MBA at the journal thinks it could hurt their stock price, and Conference B doesn’t allow that, which conference do you think will do more important work?
Took them long enough to finally object, as this is just the latest in a long line of attacks against science. Previously, scientists were forced to make an ideological oath to diversity to get hired [1,2], were hired primarily based on adherence to that ideology [3,4,5], were told by major scientific publications to avoid or simply not publish studies that might question that ideology [6,7], disavowed studies based solely on them being used to criticize favored causes [8], were prosecuted by the state (in Sweden) for true findings that harmed that ideology [9]. Papers were rejected if their results went against the liberal worldview, but methodologically-identical papers with pro-liberal results were accepted [10], and scientists were barred from accessing taxpayer-funded data if there was a risk their research might harm the dominant ideology [11].
[4] A recent report from the Goldwater Institute found that 80% of job postings for Arizona’s public universities required applicants to submit a statement detailing their commitment to diversity, equity, and inclusion. - https://www.goldwaterinstitute.org/policy-report/the-new-loy...
“If you write: ‘I believe that everyone should be treated equally,’ you will be branded as a right winger,” Vinod Aggarwal, the chair of Asian Studies at the university, said in an interview. - https://www.nytimes.com/2023/09/08/us/ucla-dei-statement.htm...
UC Berkeley’s rubric for evaluating diversity statements penalized candidates for saying that they prefer to “treat everyone the same,” or for objecting to racially segregated affinity groups. As my reporting has shown, by the early 2020s, the Berkeley rubric had become something of a gold standard, used by search committees across the country, including at the University of New Mexico, University of South Carolina, Northwestern University, and Ohio State University. - https://www.city-journal.org/article/a-death-knell-for-diver...
- the organizers are doing what they think is best for the attendees, and what the majority of attendees want
And, you should consider: "what if everyone did that?"
I gather they had a paper they thought was important, but was not accepted to the conference (so they had no formal chance to present it). What would happen if everyone who's paper was rejected could just wander around passing it out and pitching it to random passerby's? I think almost everyone who attends conferences would not want that.
I wonder what other options they considered. Did the conference have a less formal forum, like workshops or something? Could the topic be discussed there? A poster session?
> you should consider: "what if everyone did that?"
Literally every academic conference.
> but was not accepted to the conference (so they had no formal chance to present it)
One, source for it not being accepted to the conference? It was accepted to the conference organizer’s journal.
Two, again, literally every academic conference. Folks handing out their papers, including preprints not published at the organizer’s journal, is ridiculously common.
The last CS conf I went to (admittedly, a while ago), I did not run into people passing out papers unprompted. Is that what you mean? Just going up to people you don't know and handing it to them? Or, giving it to people you know, or are already talking to? I'm not sure I understand the situation.
There could be some people who are afraid to be seen as involved in criticism of the administration, either for themselves or students/staff in the lab, for immigration or funding reasons. Not sure how relevant this is or how aggressive the approaches are. It would be helpful to hear from a neutral eyewitness.
> It would be helpful to hear from a neutral eyewitness
Agree. In the meantime, I’m glad their article is seeing daylight. I would have edited it a bit more neutrally. But the shenanigans it calls out are damaging to diabetic care and research and almost certainly illegal.
They were not handing an Article, they were handing an opinion piece titled :Misguided Brushes of a Pen Continue to Dismantle and Destroy Biomedical Research in the United States: We Can No Longer Afford Complacency and Fear. We Must All Act Now!
If they wanted to be political in a scientific conference, they could have done so by handing the opinion piece outside the venue at the entrance. Whoever wanted to get into their politics could do it, and whoever wanted to be left alone and be there for the science could do it as well.
It's extremely disrespectful to be pressuring the other people in the conference with their ideology.
I can totally understand that protesters get kicked out of a conference. Although there are ways to handle it professionally and non violently ofcourse
Find a public square, get a permit and you can rant all day about Jesus, Palestine or space lizards.
The editor-in-chief of a journal handing out a paper that was published in that journal at a conference for that journal... is quite different from ranting about space lizards in a public square.
Your argument is a strawman: you are refuting an argument different from the one actually under discussion. The argument isn't "is protesting at a conference acceptable?" The argument is "does this behavior constitute an unacceptable protest?"
They weren't handing a paper published in the journal (which implies some kind of scientific paper); they were handing an opinion piece titled :Misguided Brushes of a Pen Continue to Dismantle and Destroy Biomedical Research in the United States: We Can No Longer Afford Complacency and Fear. We Must All Act Now!
jfengel | 11 hours ago
Terr_ | 11 hours ago
> > Some questioned how handing out reprints of an editorial published in the ADA’s own journal, at the ADA’s own annual conference, could be construed as a violation of that code.
embedding-shape | 10 hours ago
astura | 10 hours ago
>The scientists were not disruptive or disorderly in their conduct, based on the videos posted by MedPage Today, although the fact that they were handing out reprints just before an NIH representative was scheduled to speak might be construed as a form of protest. But it could just as easily be argued that such actions fall under valid scientific dissemination and discussion, the conference’s stated objective.
Forgeties79 | 11 hours ago
eesmith | 11 hours ago
astura | 8 hours ago
bluGill | 10 hours ago
Though there is a good case that breaking that rule is the best action. Getting kicked out probably did more for their cause then their protest. They just need the guts to publicly stand by.
adrian_b | 9 hours ago
There are few cases where it is so clear cut that only the organizers have violated the code of conduct, and not those who were expelled from the conference.
brookst | 8 hours ago
If assertions of truth are cast as an anti-government protests, that says a lot about the government.
astura | 9 hours ago
sailfast | 9 hours ago
This would probably have been fine if this administration was not comprised of individuals that cannot abide any sort of pushback.
The protest would not have been needed without the official there - but their presence made the organizers so nervous that they tossed the editor in chief of their own journal.
The problem is how deep the federal dollars go into these systems that enable fear of pulling it. That is the mechanism of control. Our own tax dollars being weaponized.
JumpCrisscross | 9 hours ago
The problem is no state AG suing to stop OMB and HHS from illegally re-appropriating funds directed by the Congress for diabetes research. Like, the multi-year funding shenanigan called out in the article is literally accounting fuckery.
nritchie | 11 hours ago
netsharc | 10 hours ago
> The Emperor was vexed, for he knew that the people were right; but he thought the procession must go on now! And the lords of the bedchamber took greater pains than ever, to appear holding up a train, although, in reality, there was no train to hold.
From https://americanliterature.com/author/hans-christian-anderse...
hnarayanan | 10 hours ago
KnuthIsGod | 10 hours ago
The God Emperor is not to be questioned.
Leptonmaniac | 9 hours ago
mcswell | 10 hours ago
shevy-java | 10 hours ago
mcswell | 10 hours ago
"Scientists were ejected from a meeting of the American Diabetes Associate for distributing printouts of an editorial that had appeared in the ADA journal. Here's the link: https://diabetesjournals.org/.../Misguided-Brushes-of-a.... The article highlights "the many threats the current U.S. administration pose[s] to the health of our nation". I recommend that you do read it: it is not technical, you don't need to have a degree in medicine or biology to read it. What do people not understand about the First Amendment?"
throwaway394085 | 7 hours ago
Are you implying that the ADA is bound by the First Amendment in this case? If so, can you elaborate how?
ordu | 8 hours ago
I believe that the time for counting signs of dictatorship had gone already. The signs were counted all before Trump was elected. For example: https://acoup.blog/2024/10/25/new-acquisitions-1933-and-the-...
Now it is funny to look for signs enabling us to decide whether Trump presidency is a personal enrichment or a vanity project. It seems that it is both, but I can't decide what is more important to him.
FerretFred | 3 hours ago
shevy-java | 10 hours ago
Something is fundamentally broken in the USA. It's like Neo-Russia, or rather handled like that by those cronies.
embedding-shape | 10 hours ago
It's become very evident from the outside that the best time to stand up was yesterday, and you might already be too far down the slope to be able to quickly recover for this. I really do feel for all Americans who just want to have a normal life with an average quality of life or above, but at one point the environment around you change so quickly that that stops being even a possibility in the future. If your life hasn't been affected yet, it will be shortly.
The best day to stand up against the ongoing censorship and repression might have been yesterday, but the second-best day to do so is today. You really need to start caring about this before it's way to late. One "no kings protest" every 6 months is not gonna do anything, what you need is wide solidarity across industries, and a real general strike across the country. The second you do this, you'll see that the many and poor can control the few and rich.
quietsegfault | 10 hours ago
embedding-shape | 9 hours ago
Don't get me wrong, anything is better than nothing, and many small streams may form into one big river, eventually. But short of a general strike across impactful industries, I think the current wave of protests won't actually achieve anything.
There is a reason "general strikes" are so feared by the political and wealthy class, and it's because there is no way for them to get rid of them without actually agreeing to some of the demands, otherwise the strikes actually impact their lives. Protesting by going out on the streets waving signs isn't gonna accomplish that, sadly.
sailfast | 9 hours ago
I understand you’re a fan of the method and it can be impactful but that’s not a reason to state that protesting does not accomplish anything.
embedding-shape | 9 hours ago
Protesting is very effective when you have a government that listens, which clearly isn't the case here, then besides a bunch of violent options, you're basically left with general strikes.
JumpCrisscross | 9 hours ago
If like another 5% of eligible voters committed to voting every election, minor or not, and committed to calling their electeds on one issue every quarter, we’d likely see a sea change.
The threshold for laziness is very low, currently only 1 in 5 [1]. That’s both annoying and an opportunity.
[1] https://www.governing.com/archive/gov-national-survey-shows-...
ThrowawayR2 | 7 hours ago
The problem is not turnout. What the Democrats seem unable or unwilling to accept is that the American public doesn't agree with their platform and are also unable or unwilling to change their platform to something that voters will elect them for.
JumpCrisscross | 7 hours ago
You’re only looking at the general. 5% more eligible voters turning out to primaries could easily flip the outcome, or at the very least, signal a political bloc that will show up for someone. 5% of eligible voters contacting their electeds would represent a 25% increase from baseline; this is the sort of power that makes e.g. regulating supplements impossible. (If you try your office’s phone lines get blown up by constituents.)
> unable or unwilling to change their platform
Changing your platform for a group that doesn’t turn out is incredibly risky. Sometimes it works. Most of the time, they keep up not turning out.
danaris | 8 hours ago
That's 2028.
General strikes are not something you can just Make Happen. They're certainly not something you can reasonably scoff at an individual (one who's not the head of a major union) for not having Made Happen. They require significant amounts of coordination between unions if you want them to have a prayer of success, and that takes a lot of time.
Don't denigrate protests of the sign-waving type. They are a very important rallying activity for the resistance. Among other things, they help ensure that people who want to fight back know they're not alone, and ensure people who want the fascists to win know their feelings are not universal.
embedding-shape | 3 hours ago
Relying on "union leaders" or political leaders of parties isn't gonna get you anywhere. What you need is active action, something that hurts the people who are trying to hurt you and non-violent protests every 6 months doesn't hurt them one bit.
I agree that protests are important, but they also have their time and place. When the government actively listens, then it's a great way to enact reform. Once the government stops listening though, you need to up your tactics, otherwise you're playing it straight into their pocket.
eudamoniac | 7 hours ago
Vaslo | 7 hours ago
emilfihlman | 10 hours ago
I understand the want to protest, but you do know that misrepresentation doesn't help, right?
Refusing to cease by an even organisers order will, yes, result in being escorted out forcefully by security.
mcphage | 9 hours ago
What behavior exactly were they being given an opportunity to cease?
40four | 8 hours ago
throwaway173738 | 7 hours ago
JumpCrisscross | 7 hours ago
Now I’m actually curious for names. One of the people thrown out is an (the?) editor of the ADA’s journal. Who in the chain of command made this call?
ModernMech | 9 hours ago
emilfihlman | an hour ago
JumpCrisscross | 9 hours ago
Sure. But if two groups of people are distributing articles published in the organisation’s own journal, with one of them containing elements of political speech, and the organization censors that one, it’s absolutely valid to ask if anyone in government directed that censorship.
The core of the argument is they should not have been asked to cease distributing their article, that’s literally one of the purposes of an academic conference, plenty of other people were doing it in various ways. The ADA, in claiming it was enforcing its rules, was in fact not following them.
emilfihlman | an hour ago
It very badly damages credibility to misrepresent what happened. It doesn't further the cause, only damages it.
donkey_brains | 10 hours ago
- The population is kept just comfortable enough to become complacent, with easy access to intoxicants, brainrot media and fast food. Now there are even robots that can do our thinking for us. A large percentage of people are brainwashed into thinking that all change is bad because it will cause them to lose the paltry, ersatz freedom they have rather than gaining real liberty.
- The labor pool is kept large enough that any of us could be replaced immediately with no significant loss to our employers. As the ISP mantra goes, “we have nothing to lose but our jobs”.
Yes, we know that they couldn’t replace _all_ of us at once, but combine points 1 and 2 and you will start to understand why there is no appreciable labor movement in the United States.
embedding-shape | 9 hours ago
Growing up, I always heard Americans bragging about freedom of speech, and how important it is. I'll admit I swallowed that wholesale as a young impressionable person in another country, and I still believe in it, just not the American freedom of speech flavor I suppose. But it's so sad to see the state of affairs compared to just ten years ago, where discussions could be freely held, even on mainstream social media, and people weren't afraid of talking about things with clear words.
But the chilling effect is in full effect today, and I think it's having a large impact on how well (or not) the working class could actually mobilize. Because as soon as anyone mentions "general strike" on social media, they seem to disappear into a black hole and that stuff never shows up in people's feeds. Regardless of the size of the labor pool, if you can't organize people somehow, especially across a large country like the US, it's short of impossible to actually get any change in reality.
watwut | 9 hours ago
Americans are talking about protesting, rape, sexual violence, censorship all the time ... and I mean literally all sides - liberals, conservatives, leftists, feminists, MAGA ...
embedding-shape | 9 hours ago
astura | 9 hours ago
That's just because reddit is almost entirely children and bots/shills. Yes, a platform full of children is going to be childish.
embedding-shape | 9 hours ago
JumpCrisscross | 9 hours ago
Using the example of someone typing “r@pe” to get around auto moderation is a pretty specific complaint, and not really an example of self censorship since that person clearly still got to say whatever they wanted to say.
At least online, there is a decent argument to be made that a good cohort of people have significantly lost the ability to self moderate.
applfanboysbgon | 9 hours ago
Whenever you see something like this, it's because the platform has some kind of automoderation policy that is liable to delete/shadowban content containing the word. Typing that, then, is not self-censorship; it's the exact opposite, the defiance of external censorshop.
jandrewrogers | 8 hours ago
You have to work with what you have, not what you wish you had.
ThrowawayR2 | 7 hours ago
If someone wants unfettered speech, it has to be someplace for which they are willing to pay the hosting and moderation bills. "Private businesses don't owe you a platform for your speech" as the American left liked to say.
embedding-shape | 2 hours ago
Maybe it's just the American way of doing ad-funded social media that is the problem?
LocalH | 3 hours ago
scoofy | 38 minutes ago
If you look around the world, this is effectively the natural state of affairs: India, South Africa, Nigeria, Russia... they all have the same pattern. The US and the West was the outlier in the '50-'90 because we had a lot of wealth redistribution AND free markets. Then the boomers were like, fuck that, we want to all be rich... and they mostly are, but everyone else is fucked.
Government is hard, you need people to give a shit. We decided we don't care somewhere along the way.
roenxi | 9 hours ago
The article linked doesn't even say what exactly they were protesting (beyond a rather vague "attacks on scientific research" which could mean a lot of things).
embedding-shape | 9 hours ago
Indeed, my view and perspective is built by a culmination of recent events, not based on a single event. The widespread self-censorship Americans currently engage in (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48434091) is also a large part of it.
I don't have any "index of events" handy that could explain why I think the slope is so evident currently, but based on the ongoing journalistic suppression, individual self-censorship, centralization of control and power in governments and society together with lots of other smaller incidents like this one and others, makes it pretty clear to me at least.
adrian_b | 9 hours ago
I can hardly think of a more peaceful form of protest, which only intended to make aware the participants about the content of the article. Those who were not interested presumably refused to take the article copy or did not read it.
Even on HN you can still see claims that USA is a "free" country where anyone can say anything about the government, without consequences. This example shows clearly that this claim is false.
roenxi | 9 hours ago
JumpCrisscross | 9 hours ago
The article they were distributing is pretty clearly about diabetes. If the actions it describes continues, significant efforts towards treating and even curing diabetes will be lost.
ciupicri | 9 hours ago
It sounds to me like criticism of the government.
JumpCrisscross | 9 hours ago
The article is not a long read [1]. It describes how current policy is dismantling and destroying the research infrastructure for diabetes, infrastructure which has started or has already borne significant fruit. It encapsulates a criticism of the administration, and it’s definitely scathing, but it’s far from a partisan rant.
For example: “This CD3-directed monoclonal antibody has been approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration to prevent type 1 diabetes in people aged 8 years and older with stage 2 type 1 diabetes. As a result, we are a major step closer to a cure for type 1 diabetes. With the potential to prevent the disease, screening programs for type 1 diabetes are being initiated worldwide.
…
Two examples are the Human Islet Research Network (HIRN) and the Integrated Islet Distribution Program (IIDP). HIRN aims to advance our understanding of how β-cells are lost in human type 1 diabetes and to find inventive strategies to protect or replace β-cells in people with the disease.”
The funding for that research is being cut. If you have a loved one with or at risk of getting diabetes, this could be the difference between vastly different levels of quality of life and years of life versus death.
[1] https://diabetesjournals.org/care/article/49/6/901/164764/Mi...
roenxi | 8 hours ago
So just to jump back to the "The article they were distributing is pretty clearly about diabetes" thing mere comments ago - this seems to be about budgets and administrative matters. Those are generic concerns. In fact, in my unhumble opinion, this looks a lot like the sort of document written by someone with poor marketing skills worried that their budget is going to get cut in the near future. Especially since the conference organisers didn't think there was special merit to it.
There isn't much (if any) research here. It can reasonably be said to be out of scope for a diabetes conference if the organisers don't want to include it. All of us would like a larger budget, we don't need to listen to other people present on the topic of how they also want larger budgets. That is a political topic.
JumpCrisscross | 8 hours ago
I’d agree with you if this happened at the journal level. It didn’t. The journal published it. Like, an astronomical conference paper describing why a new telescope design is a waste of money isn’t basic research, but it’s absolutely topical. (It could also reasonably be branded as political.)
The article is about the research infrastructure supporting diabetes research. If diabetes researchers aren’t allowed to comment on whether diabetes funding is working or wasteful in their own journals, or present their published journal findings at their own conferences, you’re not going to get any basic diabetes research.
> we don't need to listen to other people present on the topic of how they also want larger budgets. That is a political topic
It is. It’s also about diabetes. Debating which research avenues are more promising than others is absolutely political. It’s also at the heart of science. And frankly, informing fellow researchers and policymakers of the boring parts of the science is part of a scientist’s job.
Also, importantly, they aren’t asking for more budget in the article. They’re pointing out that the appropriated funds aren’t being delivered. They’re being literally misappropriated by OMB and HHS.
roenxi | 8 hours ago
They got to have their say. Editorial published, made international news. I imagine all the conference attendees read it if they cared. Seems like a non-issue. Can we find a real problem for me to read up on instead? I'm having fun I suppose but I'm not seeing why we need to be all up in their business.
I bet less than 10% of the HN people who read the article even get to the "Misguided Brushes of a Pen..." editorial to find out what their complaint is.
JumpCrisscross | 8 hours ago
ADA is violating its own code of conduct to suppress an article that calls out potentially-illegal misappropriation of diabetes-research funding by OMB and HHS, funding which falls in a results-oriented tradition and/or cuts off strong candidates for future therapies.
> Seems like a non-issue
Half of the front page usually is. You’re engaging with this content, so there is clearly something going on.
Personally, I flagged excerpts of the article to one of my Senator’s staffers. They weren’t aware of it, and will be surfacing the article to their boss, a doctor, tomorrow. If HHS is fucking around with Congressional appropriations on a healthcare issue germane to our state, they probably shouldn’t have gone out of their way to draw attention to it during an appropriation cycle.
roenxi | 7 hours ago
They published the article. That is the opposite of suppressing it.
> Personally, I flagged excerpts of the article to one of my Senator’s staffers.
Sounds like this article is indeed quite politically charged then? We're dealing with a hot potato here that has little to do with the actual science of diabetes and is going to cause random United Statesmen on the internet to start emailing their Senator. If you can't connect the dots with how that might reasonably be seen as inappropriate fare for a diabetes conference then you're probably going to figure it out later after a little reflection. It is likely that the conference organisers want to encourage technical discussion in a polite low-politics environment.
iamnothere | 7 hours ago
This looks like the shoe-on-the-other-foot version of what we saw during Covid and BLM. I didn’t like it then, and I don’t like it now. Whatever happened to just ignoring the guy handing out contrarian leaflets? As long as he’s not yelling at or berating people it shouldn’t be a problem. The paper does seem relevant to conference attendees, even if it’s political in nature.
trumpdong | 6 hours ago
iamnothere | 6 hours ago
Basically neither of the two primary parties believe in free expression anymore.
trumpdong | 6 hours ago
JumpCrisscross | 7 hours ago
Not the takeaway I got from the article. They describe specific research and specific dollar-drawdown amounts.
The tools of science are just as relevant as the science per se to the process of science. I may be extrapolating from the astronomical circles I’m more familiar with. But folks debating telescopes and whatnot is commonplace, political, and absolutely germane. In many of those cases, simply handing out an editorial wasn’t the norm—you’d have straight-up advocacy going on. The idea that a conference organizer would eject someone for distributing a published paper would be absurd.
> likely that the conference organisers want to encourage technical discussion in a polite low-politics environment
They invited a political appointee to speak!
roenxi | 6 hours ago
And it appears that is about their limit for politics at the event. They put their foot down at letting it turn into a debate club.
I suspect if Bhattacharya didn't control the purse strings somehow he wouldn't have been invited to talk politics either, I bet the organisers were gritting their teeth when they offered him a slot. And nothing short of a significant cash infusion being involved would have induced them to let him speak. This appears to be a technical conference.
trehalose | 7 hours ago
If it's such a non-issue, why should they have been forcefully ejected from the premises over it? And why do you feel so strongly that they should have been?
roenxi | 7 hours ago
I don't. It makes literally no difference to me; especially since I've skimmed through the actual paper they were handing out anyway.
I'm just trying to figure out if there is actually an issue here or whether we're just having an anti-Trump session. And I'm arguing with JCC which is its own reward.
JumpCrisscross | 7 hours ago
I don’t think any of your comments deserve to be downvoted, for what it’s worth.
roenxi | 7 hours ago
tremon | 8 hours ago
So the organisers of a conference can control the topics that its attendees want to talk about in the hallways of the venue? They don't have to extend any agency to the attendees, they're just dumb consumers here?
wyldfire | 9 hours ago
Is it your position that if an article is critical of a world government it must not be discussed at a scientific conference? Or even "you should expect to get ejected from a conference if you criticize the host government"? Because believe it or not, that's not been a problem in the USA prior to Trump. And it runs contrary to how science should work.
ciupicri | 8 hours ago
[1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donglegate
JumpCrisscross | 7 hours ago
Your takeaway from Donglegate was that Richards was in the right?
ciupicri | 4 hours ago
wyldfire | 7 hours ago
This is what people seem to get mixed up about the First Amendment to the US Constitution. These scientists were removed from the conference because they were highlighting the scientific role to push back against government censorship. Not because it wasn't germane to the conference, but in furtherance of the censorship itself. The US Government participated here indirectly via its chilling on scientific discourse.
Comments in this thread suggesting that "this is just some private actors" are mistaken. This is absolutely the consequence of the Trump HHS policymakers decisions.
brookst | 8 hours ago
The idea that a science based defense of science is anti-government and therefore off limits for a conference is downright Soviet.
skywhopper | 8 hours ago
throwaway173738 | 7 hours ago
MemoryHoleHQ | 5 hours ago
They were distributing an Opinion Piece which title was (yes, this is the full title): Misguided Brushes of a Pen Continue to Dismantle and Destroy Biomedical Research in the United States: We Can No Longer Afford Complacency and Fear. We Must All Act Now!
wyldfire | 9 hours ago
It's not like they were handing out "Trump sleeps during press events" posters. You should read the article they distributed, it's very relevant to the conference attendees.
JumpCrisscross | 9 hours ago
Yup. From their article: “DCCT/EDIC revolutionized the approach to treating people with type 1 diabetes, establishing standards for glucose control and resulting in improved quality of life along with clinically significant reductions in the risk of diabetes complications and major adverse cardiovascular events.
After 44 years, it continues to provide new insights, including showing that in adults with type 1 diabetes, neurodegeneration is likely the result of non–Alzheimer disease mechanisms. DPP/DPPOS, which enrolled people with prediabetes, demonstrated the benefit of intensive lifestyle intervention and metformin in reducing the risk of developing diabetes. These findings led Congress to approve an amendment to the Social Security Act to establish the Medicare Diabetes Prevention Program and provide lifestyle intervention services for eligible individuals.”
skywhopper | 8 hours ago
866-RON-0-FEZ | 7 hours ago
The first amendment applies to public spaces. Not private conferences which are invite-only. You're on an anti-U.S. tear in this discussion but lack understanding of the basics.
For the same reason I can't show up at your office and start handing out religious materials and/or pornography (take your pick) to everyone showing up for work and claim it's a free speech issue and my right to do so.
As someone else pointed out below, this exact argument was used to ban apps lacking "correct" moderation from the app stores a few years ago.
st-keller | 9 hours ago
— Erich Fromm, Escape from Freedom
joemazerino | 8 hours ago
tapoxi | 8 hours ago
throwaway173738 | 7 hours ago
3eb7988a1663 | 5 hours ago
sandworm101 | 8 hours ago
If your life hasnt been affected yet, you arent paying attention. Or, it has been affected for the better because you are one of the many who generally support the movement.
like_any_other | 8 hours ago
"Yesterday" they were largely in favor of censorship: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48434589
joemazerino | 8 hours ago
throwaway173738 | 7 hours ago
trumpdong | 7 hours ago
JumpCrisscross | 7 hours ago
In case you’re being serious, this has been debated in various liberal traditions since the conception liberalism was first born. In essence, the modern liberal tradition (modern as in post-Enlightenment, i.e. about the whole time America has existed) says you don’t censor anything except for forces seeking to censor (paradox of tolerance).
trumpdong | 7 hours ago
JumpCrisscross | 6 hours ago
Better minds than mine have debated the paradox of tolerance (a name only given in the 1950s, but a concept recognized for longer).
Also, not tolerating something doesn’t mean forcefully censoring it. Norms and conventions largely keep e.g. frowned-upon slurs out of common usage. The person getting told to shut up for using the N- word isn’t being censored by the state, but they are being encouraged to engage respectfully.
trumpdong | 6 hours ago
JumpCrisscross | 6 hours ago
One, not my experience. (Indian family.) Two, people spouting out the N- word have generally caused themselves to be ignored, which sort of solves the problem as well.
like_any_other | 6 hours ago
Vaslo | 7 hours ago
whatever1 | 7 hours ago
Vaslo | 2 hours ago
Or maybe your ideas are just bad, and maybe the other side thinks your ideas are weak and doesn’t want any part of them.
How would you “fix it” without voting? And if it involves “force” why do you ever think we’d let you do that?
whatever1 | an hour ago
But once the regime is in place, over time a fraction of supporters start gaining benefits from it. Wealth, recognition, you name it. The regime controls resources of an entire country they can do it.
This core or supporters become the champions of the regime and will eradicate its competitors. Mentally or physically.
Example: try becoming an opposition party in Russia.
Historically if the erosion of institutions is already bad, there is no going back. Only external pressure (sanctions/wars) or civil war.
Elections work only if every group that has real power has agreed to yield it to institutions that will be elected. Either because they believe or because cumulatively the power they own is not enough to challenge the institutions.
poly2it | 7 hours ago
embedding-shape | 3 hours ago
I wasn't, or at least I don't think I am. What did I write that gave you that impression? I mainly wrote about freedom of speech and censorship, and nothing of meat about the military really, but maybe I don't realize what I wrote sounds like.
sourcegrift | 5 hours ago
croes | 9 hours ago
wileydragonfly | 9 hours ago
JumpCrisscross | 8 hours ago
Doesn’t this just mean not practicing? Broadly speaking, that per se seems fine.
wileydragonfly | 7 hours ago
JumpCrisscross | 6 hours ago
iandanforth | 9 hours ago
"This organization is controlled by Trump loyalists. They are not scientists. You do not owe them respect. Speak over them. Let no manipulation go unchallenged or derided."
ungreased0675 | 9 hours ago
Something that may resonate with a broader spectrum is how science requires debate and polite disagreement. Good ideas can survive being pressure tested. Compelling consensus has terrible long-term outcomes.
JumpCrisscross | 9 hours ago
Strongly disagree. If they went straight up partisan at the conference, I’d be sympathetic to the notion of throwing them out. Not every space needs to be a protest venue.
They didn’t do that. They distributed an article published in the organization’s own journal. They argue why what they did cannot reasonably be considered “protest” under the organisation’s rules, given it’s literally what the conference is for. Challenging the notion that their ejection was the ADA following its own rules is the difference between them breaking the rules and the ADA breaking its own rules to censor their speech. (To cut off an aside, no the ADA isn’t bound by the First Amendment. Yes, the government is, and if they’re corruptly influencing to yank these researchers from the conference, that’s a legal issue. But more broadly, the concept of free speech is broader than the First Amendment.)
iandanforth | 8 hours ago
JumpCrisscross | 8 hours ago
Yes. I’m saying I would be ideologically aligned with censoring disruptive protest at a conference. The fact that they didn’t do that is why this is getting attention and sympathy.
> The former audience will never be persuaded
Literally me. I’m being persuaded.
> while its useful to create a sense of martyrdom
Usually only within the group. Exhibit A is all the employee protests at tech companies. Entirely useless and generally unsympathetic to anyone not already in the choir.
> "We are protesting your abandonment of scientific principles" is both what they were doing and should be doing
Sure. Not at the conference. (Like, I’m sure being ejected for traditionally protesting would rank well on BlueSky and sympathetic parts of X. But it wouldn’t be on HN. And I wouldn’t have bothered reading their article if I figure I already know what will be in it.)
iandanforth | 8 hours ago
JumpCrisscross | 8 hours ago
danaris | 8 hours ago
Because the fascists made it so.
Anywhere you try to declare an apolitical space is just a place where silence is serving the oppressor.
JumpCrisscross | 8 hours ago
mannanj | 7 hours ago
znpy | 9 hours ago
These kind of behaviour should trigger the dismantling of the whole ADA organisation, then to be rebuilt on proper grounds.
As usual i’m not surprised these fascist behaviours (“you’d better align with us and publicly pledge allegiance to us or else”) comes from the left. They’re the real fascist.
breckenedge | 9 hours ago
selimthegrim | 8 hours ago
cobertos | 7 hours ago
jmclnx | 9 hours ago
At this rate, English could be replaced by Mandarin as the main international language of commerce. The only thing that could hold it back is the writing system.
If China could convert its writing to use the Latin alphabet I think that could happen with the US now on the path of destroying its research institutions.
delichon | 9 hours ago
JumpCrisscross | 8 hours ago
How? Researchers handing out a journal from the conference organizer’s own journal is now protesting and banned at conferences?
The “protestors” include the editor of the journal. They knew what the rules were and they followed them. If Conference A gets to yank research because a non-science MBA at the journal thinks it could hurt their stock price, and Conference B doesn’t allow that, which conference do you think will do more important work?
brookst | 8 hours ago
There’s a word for countries where speaking literal, objective, scientific truth is framed as protesting and therefore objectionable.
like_any_other | 8 hours ago
[1] Required ‘diversity and inclusion’ statements amount to a political litmus test for hiring - https://www.wsj.com/articles/the-universitys-new-loyalty-oat...
[2] Diversity Statements Required for One-Fifth of Academic Jobs - https://www.schoolinfosystem.org/2021/11/11/study-diversity-...
[3] Berkeley Weeded Out Job Applicants Who Didn't Propose Specific Plans To Advance Diversity - https://reason.com/2020/02/03/university-of-california-diver...
[4] A recent report from the Goldwater Institute found that 80% of job postings for Arizona’s public universities required applicants to submit a statement detailing their commitment to diversity, equity, and inclusion. - https://www.goldwaterinstitute.org/policy-report/the-new-loy...
[5] Mathematicians divided over faculty hiring practices that require proof of efforts to promote diversity - https://www.sciencemag.org/news/2020/01/mathematicians-divid...
[6] Science Must Not Be Used to Foster White Supremacy - https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/science-must-not-...
[7] Science must respect the dignity and rights of all humans - https://www.nature.com/articles/s41562-022-01443-2
[8] I Cited Their Study, So They Disavowed It - https://www.wsj.com/articles/i-cited-their-study-so-they-dis...
[9] A Swedish professor proved that most rapes are committed by immigrants. The prosecutor's office took care of it - https://portal.research.lu.se/en/activities/a-swedish-profes...
[10] Human subjects review, personal values, and the regulation of social science research. - https://psycnet.apa.org/record/1986-12806-001
[11] The National Institutes of Health now blocks access to an important database if it thinks a scientist’s research may enter “forbidden” territory. - https://www.city-journal.org/nih-blocks-access-to-genetics-d...
Honorable mentions:
“If you write: ‘I believe that everyone should be treated equally,’ you will be branded as a right winger,” Vinod Aggarwal, the chair of Asian Studies at the university, said in an interview. - https://www.nytimes.com/2023/09/08/us/ucla-dei-statement.htm...
UC Berkeley’s rubric for evaluating diversity statements penalized candidates for saying that they prefer to “treat everyone the same,” or for objecting to racially segregated affinity groups. As my reporting has shown, by the early 2020s, the Berkeley rubric had become something of a gold standard, used by search committees across the country, including at the University of New Mexico, University of South Carolina, Northwestern University, and Ohio State University. - https://www.city-journal.org/article/a-death-knell-for-diver...
https://www.nas.org/reports/diversity-statement-then-dossier...
https://www.wsj.com/articles/nih-national-institutes-health-...
https://www.wsj.com/articles/the-nih-sacrifices-scientific-r...
https://www.wsj.com/articles/inside-ohio-states-dei-factory-...
lokar | 7 hours ago
- the organizers are doing what they think is best for the attendees, and what the majority of attendees want
And, you should consider: "what if everyone did that?"
I gather they had a paper they thought was important, but was not accepted to the conference (so they had no formal chance to present it). What would happen if everyone who's paper was rejected could just wander around passing it out and pitching it to random passerby's? I think almost everyone who attends conferences would not want that.
I wonder what other options they considered. Did the conference have a less formal forum, like workshops or something? Could the topic be discussed there? A poster session?
JumpCrisscross | 7 hours ago
Literally every academic conference.
> but was not accepted to the conference (so they had no formal chance to present it)
One, source for it not being accepted to the conference? It was accepted to the conference organizer’s journal.
Two, again, literally every academic conference. Folks handing out their papers, including preprints not published at the organizer’s journal, is ridiculously common.
> Could the topic be discussed there?
Again, literally just handing out their article.
lokar | 7 hours ago
JumpCrisscross | 6 hours ago
Standing in a hallway handing them out and discussing? I’ve seen it at aerospace conferences aplenty.
> giving it to people you know, or are already talking to?
This, too.
lokar | 6 hours ago
There could be some people who are afraid to be seen as involved in criticism of the administration, either for themselves or students/staff in the lab, for immigration or funding reasons. Not sure how relevant this is or how aggressive the approaches are. It would be helpful to hear from a neutral eyewitness.
JumpCrisscross | 6 hours ago
Agree. In the meantime, I’m glad their article is seeing daylight. I would have edited it a bit more neutrally. But the shenanigans it calls out are damaging to diabetic care and research and almost certainly illegal.
MemoryHoleHQ | 5 hours ago
If they wanted to be political in a scientific conference, they could have done so by handing the opinion piece outside the venue at the entrance. Whoever wanted to get into their politics could do it, and whoever wanted to be left alone and be there for the science could do it as well.
It's extremely disrespectful to be pressuring the other people in the conference with their ideology.
TitaRusell | 7 hours ago
Find a public square, get a permit and you can rant all day about Jesus, Palestine or space lizards.
cbarrick | 7 hours ago
Your argument is a strawman: you are refuting an argument different from the one actually under discussion. The argument isn't "is protesting at a conference acceptable?" The argument is "does this behavior constitute an unacceptable protest?"
MemoryHoleHQ | 5 hours ago