The Conspiracy of Water Fluoridation Essay -- Conspiracy Theory, Fluori

Few object to the therapeutic use of fluoride to bring out tooth decay, but fluoridisation, the addition of fluoride to the public water supply, can spark zealous controversy. Most dentists, medical groups, and government officials argue that fluoridation is a gaudy and risk-free venture that doubles cavity prevention. In contrast, a clarified minority of dentists and conservative political groups argue that fluoride is a hazardous, poisonous center of attention that should not be consumed. Some antifluoridationists even claim that fluoridation is an untrusty form of socialise medicine. But rather than just attacking fluoridation as socialized medicine, opponents originally claimed that it was a conspiracy to poison or brainwash Americans through the water supply. This theory arose in the 1940s when the scientific community refused to endorse or reject fluoridation, thus allowing the debate to exsert into the social sphere. While fluoridation opposition may be subconsci ously inspired by naturalism, the social development of fluoridation into a communist or fascist conspiracy resulted from a conscious effort by conservatives to suppress a growing government.The fluoridation debate results from a macroscopical conflict of paradigms profluoridationists seek to protect the communal good, while antifluoridationists defend separate rights. According to William Gamson, Antifluoridation literature is frequently concerned with intrusion of government into snobbish realms and with impact of individual liberty and choice (Gamson, 527). Such concerns are a great deal embodied in the characterizations of fluoridation as mass medication and socialized medicine. One expression identifies water treatment as a violation of free choice while the other po... ...3 May 2003. Schrecker, Ellen. The Age of McCarthyism. capital of Massachusetts Bedford/St. Martins, 2002. The Blue Book of the John Birch Society. Belmont, Massachusetts Robert Welch, 1961. United States. foretoken of Representatives. Committee on Interstate and Foreign CommenceHearings on fluoridation of Water. Washington, GPO, 1954. United States. House of Representatives. House Special Committee on disloyal Activities. Investigation of Un-American Propaganda Activities in the U.S. Volume 9. Washington,GPO, 1972. United States. Supplement to cumulative Index to Publications of the Committee onUn-American Activities, 1955 through 1968. Washington GOP,1970. Waldbott, George L. fluoridisation the Great Dilema. Larwerence, KansasCoronado Press, 1978.