“Mommy myths” is my shorthand for pseudo-scientific notions that seem to be largely passed along and promoted by networks of middle- and upper-class women. These women tend to be college-educated, mostly progressive in their politics, and moms, as many of these notions relate to child-rearing. Good examples of the mommy myth phenomenon include fear-mongering about the “danger” of immunizations [long disproven per CDC and other leading authorities] and hysteria about the danger of fluoride, especially fluoridated water [good Aussie government fact-check sheet here.]
We had our own water fluoridation controversy here in very progressive Portland, Oregon, a few years back. Opposition to fluoridating Portland water was led by extremely progressive folks who bizarrely asserted that fluoride was “a dangerous chemical,” and who apparently couldn’t understand the difference between therapeutic levels of fluoride and toxic levels of the stuff. [*Note 1] The fluoride opponents won. That may have been when my fascination with mommy myths as a phenomenon was born.
What’s particularly interesting is that these notions are accepted at face value, largely uncritically, by women who’ve had ample opportunity to learn how to be discerning consumers of information. These notions are often supposedly supported by “scientific evidence,” but if you bother to look at the studies being cited, the “evidence” usually boils down to studies that either don’t exist, aren’t reliable, or have been disproven, or simply bizarre claims based on an appallingly idiotic misreading of legitimate scientific studies (see, e.g., fluoride.) Proponents also often agitate to change public policy based on complete pseudo-science because of “concern for our children,” so their confused and unnecessary policy solutions to non-existent problems end up being foisted off onto the rest of us.
We had our own water fluoridation controversy here in very progressive Portland, Oregon, a few years back. Opposition to fluoridating Portland water was led by extremely progressive folks who bizarrely asserted that fluoride was “a dangerous chemical,” and who apparently couldn’t understand the difference between therapeutic levels of fluoride and toxic levels of the stuff. [*Note 1] The fluoride opponents won. That may have been when my fascination with mommy myths as a phenomenon was born.
What’s particularly interesting is that these notions are accepted at face value, largely uncritically, by women who’ve had ample opportunity to learn how to be discerning consumers of information. These notions are often supposedly supported by “scientific evidence,” but if you bother to look at the studies being cited, the “evidence” usually boils down to studies that either don’t exist, aren’t reliable, or have been disproven, or simply bizarre claims based on an appallingly idiotic misreading of legitimate scientific studies (see, e.g., fluoride.) Proponents also often agitate to change public policy based on complete pseudo-science because of “concern for our children,” so their confused and unnecessary policy solutions to non-existent problems end up being foisted off onto the rest of us.
