MSNBC Links to my Blog About Earless Rabbits and Fukushima Radiation!

I wrote a while back demolishing that hyperventilated sensationalist nonsense that people were touting as proof positive that radiation from Fukushima was causing birth defects.


Now, after initially jumping on the band wagon, many mainstream media have thought about it for a while, did the minimum amount of research, and backtracked. 

One earless rabbit does not make for proof of massive nuclear contamination. Earless rabbits are born all the time.


(By the way, so are mutated plants and flowers that were first described in 1790 by Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe in Metamorphosis of Plants.)


MSNBC has linked to my article as part of the proof that it is a huge stretch of the imagination to think that one earless rabbit constitutes a nuclear fallout catastrophy for our DNA.


From MSNBC, Nuclear Bunny? Now That's Too Big a Leap:


The YouTube clip has been viewed nearly 2 million times since it was uploaded two weeks ago, and it's sparking all sorts of speculation about the mutation risk to other living things due to the radiation leak. The problem is, you can't really tell anything about genetic risks from one mutant rabbit — particularly when the mutation has been seen lots of times before, without any connection to radiation exposure. There's this run-of-the-mill earless rabbit from Britain, for example. And this rabbit. And these rabbits. (LINK TO THIS VERY BLOG!) 


And ... well, we could pile on the cute bunny pictures all day. Rabbits have even been known to lose their ears due to overgrooming rather than genetic causes. So it's way too big a leap to blame this one on Fukushima's radiation leak, let alone suggest that humans might suffer a heightened incidence of birth defects.


That MSNBC has written about this problem and confirmed what I wrote over 10 days ago is quite satisfying as a blogger (being ten days ahead of mass media is cool!) It is even more satisfying for me when I consider that many punters criticized me and called me a "stooge for the nuclear industry."


I wish I were a stooge for the nuclear industry. I hear they pay well.


No, I am not a stooge and they don't pay me (wish they would). I just do a bit of research. That a major news outlet would link to my story and conclusion almost two weeks after I first wrote about it just goes to show that I do have a good idea as to what I am doing and that this blog has a healthy dose of skepticism for whatever the news whether that be left, right or center.


Neither pro nor anti any particular view, this blog will always be skeptical of what is printed in the mass media. That's why this blog kicks ass and good folks like you come to read it.


I promise to never let you down. If I do, I will be the first to admit it.