Not In Their Minds: Denial in the Wind/Health Debate

By Sherri Lange — February 18, 2015
masterresource.org

“Facts are stubborn things; and whatever may be our wishes, our inclinations, or the dictates of our passions, they cannot alter the states of facts and evidence.” (John Adams, 1770)

“Facts are stupid….(laughter) stubborn things.” (Ronald Reagan, 1988)

When President Regan, in his address to the 1988 Republican National Convention, stumbled on the word “stubborn”–referencing the famous John Adams quote above–he might as well have been talking about the chasm between the facts of acoustic investigation of wind turbine installation, as reported by the victims, and the hyperbole and spin from the industry itself.

“Wind Facts” are openly portrayed by the industry as “stupidly obvious” things: green, clean and free. Complainers, aka victims, are dismissed as hyper sensitive if not hypochondriacs. Academic or government studies often portray such subjects as having a natural disposition for unhappiness and discomfort about things such as body type, with inferences of predilection for an anti-wind position and negative physical effects.

Perhaps, the wind intelligentsia says, the disgruntled are unhappy that they are not profiting from the wind turbine installations. Perhaps the subjects are just a bit crazy, even indulging in the so called, Nocebo effect, whereby negative anticipation of a project infects one with inordinate fear and possible physical reactions.
Reading victims’ statements on their experiences from around the world is like reading a very clear compendium of shared experiences: medical effects (tinnitus, pressure, dizziness, nausea as an example), including emotional impacts from sleeplessness, and not excluding effects of vibration shadow flicker, audible noise, and ILFN.

Add to this the stress of not being understood, not being taken seriously, even possibly by family physicians, in cases. The innuendo and propaganda machine has been working effectively, and it has not been easy for even medical professionals to immediately see the trees in the fog of “clean, green, free.”

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