Tower Switch-Off Embarrasses Electrosensitives 292
Sockatume writes "Residents in Craigavon, South Africa complained of '[h]eadaches, nausea, tinnitus, dry burning itchy skins, gastric imbalances and totally disrupted sleep patterns' after an iBurst communications tower was put up in a local park. Symptoms subsided when the residents left the area, often to stay with family and thus evade their suffering. At a public meeting with the afflicted locals, the tower's owners pledged to switch off the mast immediately to assess whether it was responsible for their ailments. One problem: the mast had already been switched off for six weeks. Lawyers representing the locals say their case against iBurst will continue on other grounds."
"The case will continue...." (Score:5, Funny)
Re:"The case will continue...." (Score:5, Funny)
It also proves that America doesn't have a monopoly on legal stupidity and that we still export something ;)
Re: (Score:2)
You're both correct.
Of course once it goes before a judge, and he reviews the evidence that the Tower was shutoff earlier, then the case will be dismissed because there's an obvious lack of causation.
The symptoms must be caused by something else.
Re: (Score:2)
Yeah, hypochondria and/or fraud. The defendant should countersue for lawyers fees for such a frivolous suit.
Re:"The case will continue...." (Score:5, Insightful)
I doubt they'd get anything for frivolity, as hypochondria is real and people may have sincerely believed they were being affected by the tower. Frivolous lawsuit laws are to protect against malicious litigation, and I doubt that's the case here.
That said, they're still a bunch of nutheads. To not have said "oh... it was OFF for the last month? hummm maybe it's just ME". But no, to persist saying the tower is causing their problems, indicates they have "other unresolved issues" besides hypochondria.
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Re:"The case will continue...." (Score:5, Funny)
This idiocy also extends to the mysterious malfunctioning of any electronic device in the radio-phobe's houses!
True Ham Radio story - my mentor told me when putting up an antenna at home, put up the mast and antenna but deliberately DON'T connect a feedline to it or use it for a week or two.
Sure enough, two of the neighbors on my block came to complain of TV and telephone interference. I casually handed them a binocular so they could notice there was no wire to the bottom of the antenna, yet.
They sheepshly apologized and went away... Unlike these idiots who are persisting in their delusion.
Re:"The case will continue...." (Score:4, Informative)
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
You can't cook an egg with 2 cellphones.
http://urbanlegends.about.com/library/bl_cook_egg_cell_phones.htm [about.com]
Re:"The case will continue...." (Score:4, Funny)
you can cook an egg with two cellphones
Step 1: fill 2-qt saucepan with water
Step 2: add 1 egg, 2 cellphones
Step 3: cover, turn on heat, and bring to a boil
Step 4: when water boils, turn off heat and let stand for 10 mins
Step 5: rinse egg and cellphones with cold water, remove shells, and eat
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
iBurst appointed an independent and accredited EIA consultant and that the correct procedures were followed - including notifying the adjacent property owners and publishing notices in the press and on the site itself. He added that he is confident that all processes and procedures were followed to the letter.
I figure that this is more like what happened. "Damn cell phones. The service sucks out here! I pay good money every month and I can hardly ever get a signal. I've been calling those lazy bastard to do something every week but those corporate fat cats are too busy counting their money. I swear some day I'm gona... what the. What are all those trucks and people doing there? Building a cell tower? I don't want a cell tower in our town. Those things cause cancer and other things. I don't want to l
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
The fact that the case still isn't dismissed apparently means the lobby of electrosensitives is rather strong there :(
Well it was the lawyer who said that the case would continue "on different grounds", not the court.
What that tells me is that this lawyer is not being paid on a contingency basis. :)
Re: (Score:2)
According to the article the lawsuit also alleges failure to follow certain environmental/legal procedures when building the tower. What does that have to do with "electrosensitives."
Re:"The case will continue...." (Score:4, Insightful)
They really really don't want this tower anywhere near them and now that the electrosensitivity excuse didn't work they're trying other approaches.
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Re: (Score:2)
I didn't know a colonic could cure stupid.
You have to use a LOT of pressure...
Correlation != Causation (Score:5, Insightful)
There can well be something else that causes symptoms of area residents which is not related to microwave radiation. This may or may not be related to iBurst. For example, construction of the tower could have used toxic materials responsible for rashes, headaches and so on. The fact that symptoms appeared at the same time as the tower still bears investigation, but the world is full of coincidences.
Re:Correlation != Causation (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Correlation != Causation (Score:5, Funny)
meta, dude. very meta (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
The world is also full of hypochondriacs
And opportunists. Particularly of the unemployed kind, which I imagine most people claiming to be electrosensitive are.
Re: (Score:2)
Re:Correlation != Causation (Score:5, Insightful)
There can well be something else that causes symptoms of area residents which is not related to microwave radiation.
Sure, sure. The symptoms could be "real" (as in caused by a real external factor rather than hypochondria), and caused by something in the environment.
This is what the end result of the long-time theories that high tension transmission lines were causing cancer. The EM radiation was harmless as always, but the herbicides they used to clear the ground under the towers was not.
The question in my mind which TFA doesn't answer and could point out whether or not this is the case: When the company announced that they were turning off the tower, did the residents symptoms abate? If so, they're clearly mental in origin. If not, well, maybe they didn't believe the cell company, or maybe there's something in the environment that is actually harming them.
If their symptoms are real, an actual chemical being their cause makes so much more sense that it just boggles me that this isn't the first thing people choose to blame. But no, their insistence on it being due to EM actually gets in the way of the more straightforward investigation.
Re:Correlation != Causation (Score:4, Interesting)
If their symptoms are real, an actual chemical being their cause makes so much more sense that it just boggles me that this isn't the first thing people choose to blame. But no, their insistence on it being due to EM actually gets in the way of the more straightforward investigation.
I believe that the simple explanation for this is that the idea of chemicals around the tower didn't occur to them as being the cause; it was so much more obvioys for them to latch on to the idea of microwave "radiation" being the cause. After all, the first thing people generally think about in terms of these towers is the microwave transmission not little things like pesticides used to clear the land near the transmitter.
Re:Correlation != Causation (Score:5, Insightful)
They could also be caused by wanting to get money for nothing.
Re: (Score:3)
Re:Correlation != Causation (Score:4, Insightful)
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
they always claim their stupid metamoderation system is supposed to prevent this sort of thing, but it never has.
That is not true! If I had mod points, you be down to -1, Troll so fast!
Re:Correlation != Causation (Score:5, Funny)
Really? I thought all slashdot comments WERE just a variant on agreement or disagreement.
Interesting: Agree, and you have stated your opinion as "fact"
Overrated: Disagree, and you have stated your opinion as "fact"
Informative: Agree, and I didn't know that fact!
Insightful: Agree, and I DID know that fact!
Troll: Disagree, but it's the first time I have seen that argument
Redundant: Disagree, and I have already seen that argument
Offtopic: Disagree, and your point didn't really make much sense
Underrated: Agree, but your point didn't really make much sense
Flamebait: Disagree, and you stated your comment in a particularly offensive way
Funny: Agree, and you stated your comment in a particularly offensive way
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Ah, no. I disagree on both counts.
(1) You now have to go out of your way to turn the +1 bonus off. It's not something that you must turn on for each and every post. People just leave it on, and I don't expect otherwise.
(2) "Funny" doesn't give karma, but "Overrated" decreases karma. Instead of preventing someone from getting karma for their non-funny post, you're actually hurting their karma. That's why many here (not me) rate jokes as insightful instead (when they get modded down they will have neutra
Re: (Score:2)
I do not have much use for coincidence. On the other hand, I do not have much use for what passes as statistical reasoning. Given that the cell tower had been turned off for some time and the lawsuit is proceeding, I speculate that there is some evil involved on the part of the plaintiffs. I do like patterns. Here in the United States I would assume intentional and conscious anti-development ideology. This is almost a world-wide problem, but the particulars of a country still count for something
Re: (Score:2)
Ad hoc, ergo propter hoc.
Re:Correlation != Causation (Score:4, Interesting)
People claiming to be suffering from ill effects from power lines, radio towers and signals from the martians has been cause célèbre for several decades now. I frequently run across these groups as a communications consultant working with utilities. Sometimes what I want to say is "if you are so concerned about power lines why don't you disconnect the power to your house?".
Right now since you are sitting in front a computer to read this, you are exposed to a great deal more RF energy than a microwave dish that is 100 feet up in the air is putting out.
It is like the hysteria surrounding cadmium in children's toys that is also this weeks latest worry. People will cite cancer clusters and anecdotal evidence yet when confronted with the facts they will jump to some other reason. After going through a long process with community groups and concerned citizens it ended up being an issue about what color the antenna was.
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Wait, how do you compare something that has never been proven dangerous (power lines) to a manufacturing plant knowingly using a metal that is known to be both highly toxic and carcinogenic [cdc.gov] in children's toys?
Perhaps (Score:5, Insightful)
The issue that remains is if a company can be held responsible for the mental anguish that it indirectly caused. (I mention indirectly, because the act of constructing a tower isn't directly changing peoples mental condition, it's simply "turning on" something that may have been there)... Either way, it should be interesting to see how this pans out...
Re:Perhaps (Score:4, Insightful)
The issue that remains is if a company can be held responsible for the mental anguish that it indirectly caused.
In this legal climate, I'm sure at some point someone ill try to make them responsible for agitating someone's delusional phobias. Clearly they shouldn't be held responsible for "mental anguish" over "radiation" from a tower that WASN'T EVEN SWITCHED ON.
Re:Perhaps (Score:4, Insightful)
Can I sue you for putting a curse on me? I am firmly convinced that you are a witch.
Even if that is not actually the case, I mentally suffered while thinking so.
Faraday Cage (Score:5, Interesting)
The worst part was that he freely admitted that his wife was a loon.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
I'm not sure if this is brilliant or crazy. On the one hand, the resale value of his house just dropped 30% if that little fact is revealed before closing. OTOH, a house with no outside signals getting in sounds amazingly peaceful.
Re: (Score:2)
too bad a lot of modern cell phones receive email and texts via wifi
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
No, but usually you'd put your WiFi router inside your house. Hence, the house would work as a Faraday cage around the rest of the world, keeping all WiFi signals within the house (might be a good idea for tinfoil-hat wearers, btw)
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
" a house with no outside signals getting in sounds amazingly peaceful."
You must have big ears!
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Most peoples' houses these days are filled with electronic items, plus peoples' houses have had electric wires in the walls for nearly 100 years now, all giving off EM fields.
I think the family in your post had something else going on in their house, or maybe they were just highly susceptible to cancer by genetics. Did they do a radon test?
Also, what kind of cancer was it? All three were female, was it cervical cancer? That one is caused by a virus, HPV. Living in the same house (and the daughters being
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Aside from the obvious 'correlation does not equal causation' and the absence of a correlation between cancer and EMF fields over the century we've had our houses wired, there are two reasons not to assume that the cancer you saw in that house was due to EMF fields: first, susceptibility to cancer is heritable, so it's not that surprising for multiple family members to get cancer, especially the same kind; second, statistical clumping is a normal and expected effect of any phenomena like cancer, meaning tha
Re:Faraday Cage (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Faraday Cage (Score:4, Informative)
This isn't good for battery life; but it also doesn't do much to reduce your EM exposure.
If he doesn't mind the risk of spending a month of nights on the couch, he should tell her to use a bluetooth headset so that she can keep her dangerous cellphone's danger rays away from her brain. Hilarious, until she finds out that you've advised shoving an RF transceiver in your ear canal in order to reduce RF exposure, then things get ugly...
Re: (Score:2)
Of course grounded wire mesh wouldn't do much to reduce the very low frequency magnetic fields coming from power lines. I bet he knew that. I also bet he didn't tell his wife that.
It should work quite well on external low frequency signals (depending on how grounded it really is). Internal 60 Hz is a different story though. The stuff that gets through the best would have a smaller wavelength the mesh spacing.
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
The frequency of the alternating current transmitted on high tension lines is the same as the frequency of the alternating current you get in your house. Usually, either 50 Hz or 60 Hz. [kropla.com] Grounded chicken wire will block nearly all the radiation from a power line. Unless South Africa has some mondo chickens.
Re:Faraday Cage (Score:4, Insightful)
The worst part was that he freely admitted that his wife was a loon.
It's not the worst part - to be honest that is just how it is - if it made her happy and comfortable living there then he did what he needed to.
the worst part is - he isn't alone - the rest of us poor suckers would do it too.
Re: (Score:2)
Install a wire cage in exchange for getting my leg over?
Yeah, I'd do it.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
The worst part was that he freely admitted that his wife was a loon.
Don't most people freely admit that there wife is a loon?
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Looks both ways.
Yes.
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Looks both ways.
It's ok, you wife either doesn't read slashdot, or already knows she is a loon.
it's peanut allergy waves (Score:4, Funny)
see my gorgeous little child was at a restaurant and a heartless cruel waitress walked by with a thai peanut sauce dish and well my child got a good whiff of it. and now as a result every day for the last 3 months his intellectual development and emotional focus has been totally off. the swine flu shots have only made it worse, i swear he is borderline autistic now
i've gone to the principle of his school and insisted that all children's bags be searched and sniffer dogs bought in for the sake of peanuts destroying our children, but he babbled something about correlation and causation- completely uncaring and unsupportive!
to make matters worse afterwards i went to mcdonalds and ordered a big mac and felt nauseous a few weeks later. i didn't know what it was until a friend of mine told me there is a bad case of celiac disease going around. environment destroying corporations just don't care that they give people celiac disease and warm the atmosphere with cell phone waves. now i have to be on a gluten free diet for the rest of my life!
Re: (Score:2)
I just met a woman like that yesterday. I asked her a couple questions about, "How do you know peanuts are at fault for your illness?" hoping she'd provide some evidence to back-up her claims, butshe refused to answer. She just saying she "knows" it's the peanuts, and I some stop asking annoying quesions.
She had no reasoning ability whatsoever.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
As an allergy sufferer, I can tell you that she is tired of armchair doctors telling her she is wrong when she has done 100 times as much research on the subject as you ever will.
If you just met her, I almost guarantee that's the case. I only discuss my allergies with people that care about me and actually want to have an honest conversation (see, Slashdot, I love you). Arguing with you about it is a massive waste of time that she has been through dozens of times already only to be told she's a loon job f
i like to slip a few niacin pills in their food (Score:3, Funny)
you know, like 4 of those 500 gram ones. odorless, tasteless, and colorless, but boy oh boy!: sure to bring on a huge case of the niacin flush and those itchy eye watering hives all over the body and the nausea. since they don't know what is going on, i tell them i poisoned them and they have 30 minutes to live and so they better tell me the truth about my ex or where the money is, etc. i got a few to admit some really hilarious felonies in that condition
it backfired once where the guy picked up the steak k
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
There's a difference between "sensitivity" and "allergy". Celiac disease is a real thing, and can be confirmed by tests of the intestinal lining, but lots of people have gluten sensitivity and don't have Celiac's.
My wife is gluten-intolerant. She can only eat a tiny bit at a time (like a bite or two of bread), or she gets migraines. Why? I have no idea, but migraines aren't imagined, and the correlation seems to be real--as long as she avoids gluten and wheat, she's OK. She had migraines for many years
Re: (Score:2)
Nice rant, btw. Hits entirely too close to home for me.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Dude! Stop making fun of my mom! :(
oh, put your head in the oven (Score:4, Funny)
spray a giant amount of oven cleaner in the oven, and, most importantly, because this is what makes it work: put the magnetic bands on your wrists immediately. stick your head in the oven and take a few deep centering breaths while chanting the sacred mantras. i find myself going on deeply spiritual vision quests for a few minutes. i wake up on the floor and i can feel the magnetic bands vibrating in the negative chi energy dimension aligning with the crystals
please mod parent up! (Score:2)
hilarious dead on troll or hilarious WHOOOSH! over the head, either way its funny
Why is this in Idle? (Score:5, Insightful)
Why is this in Idle? It's a real issue, not because the electrosensitives are right, but because they cause real trouble. Good evidence against them is valuable.
Re:Why is this in Idle? (Score:4, Insightful)
It's a real issue, not because the electrosensitives are right, but because they cause real trouble. Good evidence against them is valuable.
All the evidence is against them as it is. That hasn't stopped the damage they cause. There needs to be large, punitive punishments against people who use pseudoscience judicially. But this country won't do it for the same reason this country allows people to kill their children over their religious beliefs and kids who have never read a book wear that fact like a badge of pride in many schools.
I'm sorry to say... but maybe vigilante justice might be a better solution -- they'll worry less about their EM poisoning if they're being chased by heavily-armed scientists.
There is only ONE explanation... (Score:2, Funny)
Well.. (Score:3, Interesting)
Perhaps they've been coached into doing this? Like a conspiracy of some kind? Perhaps by lawyers?
Re:Well.. (Score:4, Insightful)
Withdrawal (Score:5, Funny)
Clearly they are suffering not from the effects of radiomagnetic radiation, but from withdrawal! Quick, turn it back on!
This is why Africa can't have nice things. (Score:5, Informative)
Real problem in the US (Score:4, Insightful)
This limits the construction of any EMF emitting source including things like cell phone towers and power lines. There is enough belief in the idea that EMF causes medical problems that companies are pretty much unable to push construction projects ahead in the face of opposition.
The result of this is that building a new transmission line in a new area is pretty much off limits unless it winds around to avoid existing structures by miles and miles. If someone can see it, they can use this as an argument to prevent (or at least delay) construction. I have seen this happen in Illinois.
Anyone thinking that we are going to get all sorts of new "green" superconducting transmission lines for wind and solar power needs to understand the seriously wacked out nature of these protesters. Until these issues are really put to rest, they will prevent progress on many fronts.
Think the cell phone brain cancer rumors are over? This is the same people, and it keeps coming up every few years.
Re:Real problem in the US (Score:5, Interesting)
The result of this is that building a new transmission line in a new area is pretty much off limits unless it winds around to avoid existing structures by miles and miles
My dad was the engineer who planned the route for a new transmission line to a community which was growing very quickly. When the town locals heard about the route, they demanded that they bury the line (there was no alternate route) and they demanded the electric company pay the extra cost.
The company wasn't going to pay for burying the line, so it resulted in a game chicken. Turns out people stop pulling out these bullshit theories when they start suffering from blackouts.
You mean they can be embarrassed? (Score:3)
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
People claim to be Democrats all the time... what's the difference?
ham operators (Score:5, Interesting)
When ham radio operators erect a new mast in their backyard, they often leave it unconnected for a month or two. When the inevitable complaints of baby monitors malfunctioning, televisions going crazy, and other non-sense crap from their neighbors blamed on the mast gets reported to the FCC or the police,
the ham radio operator calmly leads them outside and shows them the disconnected cable that goes nowhere and does nothing.
Perhaps commercial entities should take note of this, given our remarkable slide into the cesspool of stupidity where we believe in 9/11 conspiracy theories, vaccinations causing brains to turn into jello and yellow smoke to pour out, and how we're being poisoned by EM waves, and a particle accelerator's going to cause the world to end.
Seriously... There should be an idiot tax on court filings.
Flu vaccine (Score:3, Funny)
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Great... first they put tracking RFIDs in the vaccines, now mercury?
Hey, the placebo effect is very real! (Score:3, Insightful)
Re: (Score:2)
The placebo effect is mitigated by information. The only way to "treat" the hypochondriacs was to tell them after the fact that their symptoms had been caused by a completely inert tower.
Re:Hey, the placebo effect is very real! (Score:5, Insightful)
Comment removed (Score:3, Insightful)
The Fringe Tower...... (Score:3, Funny)
Reminds of the Radio tower in Fringe last night that was being used to mess with people's senses to make ugly mutants look normal. Maybe the answer lies in Mutating the residents so they HAVE to live under it otherwise they will be shunned as weird looking mutants......
Just coz they're crazy doesn't mean... (Score:4, Interesting)
Look, these residents may be complete fucking loons but...
According to TFA, iBurst furnished technical reports proving the tower was turned off in early October.
In other news, British American Tobacco furnished reports showing that cigarettes have no negative health effects.
In other news, Exxon furnished reports showing that increases in CO2 are likely to transform the world into a tropical paradise.
In other news, CIA medical officers report that water-boarding releases calming endorphins in detainees.
I'm just saying...
I Moved Away from a Tower (Score:3, Interesting)
I recently moved away from a cell antenna site that was placed within 100 feet of my kids' bedrooms (by literal distance, not just horizontal). When the site was proposed, I googled the research and then I spoke with the scientists regarding possible dangers. They were more than happy to speak with me over the phone. The advice was that there are no longitudinal studies, so they can't say what might happen when growing up so close to a site. That is, they need 10-30 years to actually conduct these longitudinal studies. They said "no problem" regarding the older analog stuff, but they said that there are stats that can't yet be explained. That is, there is a correlation for problems, but they can't figure out the causation when it comes to this multiplexing digital stuff. The ongoing research efforts seem to stress DNA replication (mitosis) errors and later meiosis. So, this would be of particular concern to kids and young adults where you have lots of both going on in particularly interesting parts of the body, like the three B's (brain, bones, balls).
The really cool thing is that the scientists were more than happy to speak with me. I do the same thing in my line of work. When an interested person calls, I geek-out and am more than happy to take the call and spend the time.
Re:Ha! FAIL! (Score:5, Funny)
as it turns out, these dudes have egg allergies so being proved wrong is causing more symptoms.
Re:Ha. (Score:5, Insightful)
Wtiches. That's al these lunatics are, the modern day equivalent of people who think they're being cursed by witches.
Re:Ha. (Score:5, Informative)
Accidentally, many places in Africa (so South Africa too, probably, especially with their number of immigrants from across the continent) still experience hunts for supposed witches .
Or "witchcraft" generally, for that matter.
Re:Ha. (Score:5, Funny)
Incidentally! Incidentally! Incidentally! Incidentally!
Re: (Score:2)
Sorry, EN is my 3rd language, and with this you sometimes get such linguistic atrocities...
Re:Ha. (Score:5, Funny)
Sorry, EN is my 3rd language, and with this you sometimes get such linguistic atrocities...
No worries - incidents happen.
Re:Ha. (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Ha. (Score:5, Funny)
I thought it would be
Nobody inspects the African Acquisition!
Re:Ha. (Score:5, Funny)
There's a place where it IS a good idea?
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Salem Witch trials. Not that hard to imagine at all really. These people are the modern day equivalent of those who think they're persecuted by witches.
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Except now it's pedophiles and radio towers.
It's gonna be a fun decade for child care workers and HAM radio operators.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:LOL, ROFLMAO, ha-ha, but... (Score:5, Informative)
It's more likely just a kind of group psychology phenomenon (I'm sure someone with more knowledge of the terms involved will chime in eventually). A group of people convinced themselves that this was happening, and with more and more talking about it and believing it even more people believe they're sick from evil towers as well.
Hell, there were stories a few months back about men in other parts of Africa killing supposed witches, blaming them for shrinking genitals. These men actually believed they had the shrunk junk and killed for it. Not trying to pick on Africa in particular here, just the first story I recalled.
Come to think of it, I've heard of this exact same scenario played out somewhere in the US--A community complained of these symptoms only to find that the tower in question wasn't even finished and had never been turned on.
Re: (Score:2, Interesting)
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
" a lot of folk religion and superstition there, and they don't really understand how technology works"
TFA proves that this is the same everywhere, just superstitions are different.