Freddie deBoer is an essential writer because he often writes about subjects that few others are willing to touch. Earlier this month, he wrote a piece motivated by a recent article in New York magazine claiming that the scale of illness related to the September 11 terrorist attacks is likely much greater than is currently recognized. He pointed out that the epidemiological evidence in the piece falls far short of the usual standards for such a prominent outlet reporting on a topic of such importance. Freddie’s piece is a good and necessary one and you should read it.
The fundamental problem is: nobody wants to tell people who are suffering that they might not be right about the source of their pain. Questioning someone’s explanation of their suffering feels like you are questioning the suffering itself. But if no one can speak honestly about an issue, then how are we supposed to make good policy and direct limited dollars for treatment and research in the right direction?
I believe many people working in health research have one or more conditions they avoid speaking about because the communities formed around them have developed such powerful norms around what can and cannot be questioned that they figure it simply isn’t worth the backlash.
And yet the truth is what we owe people in pain, as deBoer concludes his piece:
And what I’m asking you to consider is the possibility that true compassion for people in pain can only stem from telling the best, most rigorous version of the truth we possibly can.
Last week, Ezra Klein interviewed Abdul El-Sayed, the Democratic nominee for Senate in Michigan. In the interview, El-Sayed used a term that I think relates to the phenomenon deBoer is describing. Citing his experience in medical school, he calls it “speaking truth to pain”:
We talk a lot about truth to power, but I think it’s actually a lot harder to speak truth to pain. […] It’s one thing to look power in the eye and say: You’re wrong about this. But there’s a way in which pain is very difficult to reason with. Because when somebody is in their pain, they’re in their trauma. They see that pain, and they may not see what’s causing it.