It has been a rough few years for the academics and professionals collectively known as “The Experts.” For as long as I can remember, “experts say” was a phrase used by newscasters to discuss a topic without the viewer being able to challenge the authority of whatever they were about to report. “The Experts” was a catch-all for a group of unnamed people who know more about a topic than you do. Why should you try a new diet? Experts say it can lower your cholesterol. Why should you invest with this particular strategy? Experts told you to do so. How should you organize your daily schedule? Trust The Experts.
And 30 years ago, that made sense. The Experts gave very sound advice that sounded right, and even if the advice ended up being wrong, it was not a major problem or inconvenience. “Wearing a helmet while riding a bike saves lives,” The Experts told us. “Sure,” we said. What’s the worst that could happen? We spend an extra $15 on a helmet (or however much a bike helmet cost in 1996)? If it protects my head, it’s worth it. “Seatbelts in cars save lives!” The Experts shouted. “Of course they do,” we responded, and we dutifully strapped in when riding in the car. That costs us nothing. The seatbelt is already in the car.
But all The Experts got arrogant. They thought that as long as they kept feeding us information under the guise of “The Experts,” we would dutifully follow their lead. This façade started to crack for the Public Health sector in 2020, when The Experts came out with their safety guidelines. “Stay six feet apart from each other,” warned The Experts. “Okay…” we said. “This vaccine will help prevent the spread of COVID,” shouted The Experts, and we waited in line to get jabbed.
In 2024, Anthony Fauci testified in front of Congress that the six-foot rule “sort of just appeared,” and “wasn’t based on data.” In 2024, the NIH released a study that showed that “there is no convincing evidence that the COVID-19 vaccination significantly reduces the risk to transmit SARS-CoV-2 to others.”
But it was not just Public Health Experts who lost credibility around that time. Social Experts also began to lose credibility. Who can forget the Harvard Professor, Roland Fryer, who, in 2017, published an empirical study that showed that there is no significant difference in police use of deadly force on individuals based on race? This was a professor trying to be a good Expert.
However, following the intense backlash of his findings, Fryer was forced to tell us that his data did not, in fact, show us that there was no correlation between police brutality and race. He disavowed his research because of pressure from his colleagues. No scientific reasoning was ever given for why the study was not showing what it was, in fact, showing. We were just told that his research was not showing what we all knew it was. In fact, I used the Fryer study as a basis for an article back in 2017, for which I was excoriated on a particular Facebook group due to the fact that the author had retracted the study’s findings. It wasn’t until 2022 when Fryer felt that it was safe enough to tell the world that The Experts made him disavow his research for no reason other than it didn’t fit with their narrative.
Race wasn’t the only area of social expertise that took a blow in the late 2010s. There was the Grievance Studies Affair, wherein a group of authors fabricated social experiments to show how ridiculous the so-called scientific community had become. The group submitted numerous bogus papers to academic journals that seemed to prove The Experts’ predetermined social beliefs. The topics ranged from critical race theory to gender to obesity, and many areas in between, with various levels of ridiculousness. Of the 20 “research” papers they wrote, four were published in scientific journals, three were accepted, and seven were still under review. My personal favorite was the chapter of Mein Kampf rewritten using feminist language entitled Our Struggle is My Struggle, and it was published in the Social Work journal, Affilia. The Experts were taking it on the chin.
Well, last month, we were informed of a topic where The Experts were exposed to have fabricated what is potentially the most egregious example of Experts telling us something based on, at best, faulty science, and, at worst, the intentional omission of data points on the basis of pushing a narrative. In 2020, Brad Greenwood published a study in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS), one of the world’s most prestigious scientific journals. As reported by the Daily Caller, this study “concluded that the gap in mortality rates between Black newborns and White newborns declines by 58% if the Black newborns are under the care of Black physicians.” The narrative being pushed was that there was unconscious bias exhibited by White physicians to the point that they more than doubled the infant mortality rates of Black babies in their care.
This argument was so powerful that Supreme Court Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson cited it in her dissent in a 2023 SCOTUS decision revolving around affirmative action in college admissions. In short, this was a perfect study for race hustlers. It showed that even the most educated among us fell prey to unconscious bias, which the activists were (and still are) desperate to prove is real. Too bad the results, like unconscious bias itself, were bogus.
An attempted replication of the study pointed out that the original work failed to control for low birth weight among infants, which would have completely cancelled any difference among the race of the doctors. Additionally, an original version of the study asserted that White babies were 22% more likely to die in the care of Black physicians than White physicians. But Greenwood left a comment opting to omit this data point, since it “undermines the narrative.”
“Undermines the narrative” is not the type of language one should expect from a scientist. It is more likely to be used by an activist. But with that one comment, Greenwood showed the world that today, there isn’t much of a difference between the two. We are constantly being told to “trust the science.” But if “the science” is being curated by The Experts to tell us a particular narrative that they want us to know, and leave out the parts that don’t fit with the story they are telling, how do we know if the scientist behind the study is leaving anything out?
The Experts have destroyed their own credibility. And then they have the audacity to wonder why the general population is so skeptical of their work? It’s because of them! They chose to invent social distancing rules. They chose to fabricate the efficacy of vaccines. They chose to quash any actual studies that went against the narrative. And they chose to pick and choose data that would indict an entire industry of medical professionals, and by extension, the rest of humanity, as racists.
Wait, I’m sorry, not the rest of the world. Only the White people. The Experts can’t have us thinking that unconscious bias goes both ways. Only White doctors are racists. Well, the Expert class is going to keep driving themselves into oblivion with this kind of narrative, and if you are skeptical about them, they will continue to beat you over the head with the “trust the science” argument, and if you even question them based on years of lies and deception, you will be labeled a “science denier.” And the Experts can’t have that happen.
Izzo Zwiren is the former host of the Jewish Living Podcast. Follow him and his brothers on their health journey on their YouTube Channel, Brotherly Lovehandles. Izzo lives on Long Island with his wife and three adorable, hilarious children.
