The website “My OB said WHAT?” is supposed to highlight “stupid” things said by obstetricians. It is a slick, professionally designed smear campaign, clearly requiring a fair amount of money to create and maintain. Yet the owners feel that they have something to hide — their own identities.
According to the website:
Who are the people behind My OB said WHAT?!?
We are a group of birth care professionals who have worked around birthing women for many years, and felt that there needed to be a forum for people to share comments like those found on our blog.
English to English translation:
‘We are a group of professional natural childbirth advocates who want to make fun of obstetricians, but know that our personal reputations would suffer if we did so publicly. Our public efforts to discredit obstetricians are not gaining as much traction as we would like and we believe that a smear campaign might attract more attention than actual scientific evidence.’
Information about website ownership is supposed to be public. Indeed there is an internet database, Whois, maintained for the express purpose of making that information available. In order to hide their identity, the owners of “My OB Said WHAT?!?” pay a fee to Domains by Proxy, an organization that exists solely to hide the identity of website owners. If you are willing to pay money to hide your identity, you must really want to hide.
The fact that the owners are hiding reveals several things about them:
1. They know that their tactics are unprofessional.
2. They know that the scientific evidence is not on their side.
3. They know that their professional reputations lead most people to believe that they and their organizations are fringe groups that publicize ridiculous ideas about childbirth.
The amount of money involved and the desperate effort to conceal themselves suggest that “My OB Said What?!?” is run by a professional natural childbirth advocacy organization that has seen its previous efforts to control women’s childbirth choices fail dismally.
It may be entirely coincidental, but Lamaze has made no secret of their vigorous efforts to influence women’s childbirth choices. According to Sharon Dalrymple of Lamaze:
For the past 50 years Lamaze International has been promoting normal birth practices in North America and more recently worldwide. Despite these educational efforts women are being over-treated more now than they have been in over 30 years…
One of the reasons these educational efforts may not have been as effective as desired is that our conversations may not be persuasive enough or clear enough…
Lamaze International hired a public relations market research firm to conduct research and identify which messages are the most effective for persuading women to adopt normal birth practices…
As a result of these and other findings, Lamaze International updated our six evidence-based key practice papers in Fall 2009 to ensure women realize that these practices simplify the birth process with a natural approach that helps alleviate fears and manage pain, with the ultimate goal of keeping labor and birth as safe and healthy as possible for each individual woman…
And it may be entirely coincidental, but it was also in the Fall of 2009 that “My OB Said What” was registered and launched.
If “My Ob Said What” was funded, created and maintained by Lamaze International or its employees, that would be extremely damaging to its reputation. The owners of “My OB Said What?!?” should publicly identify themselves. Women deserve to know who is behind this professional smear campaign.
As a woman who submitted to their site? Fuck you. Your arrogant dismissal of such complaints even being POSSIBLY true is part of the culture of medical arrogance that allows that kind of bullshit to thrive. You’re so hell bent on denying the possibility of doctors being assholes and idiots that you help allow asshole idiot doctors to thrive.
Where did she dismiss anyone’s complaints? In fact, she says nothing about the people posting the site. She is talking about the gutless cowards that created the site.
If you are not one of the site creators, then this post is not talking about you.
Where in this article did you read that she was dismissing complaints of bad service by doctor? She is not denying that some Doctors can be assholes.
What she is saying is that making an anonymous internet blog to allow any and all to publicly say whatever they want is nothing more than a smear campaign. And she is right.
‘My OB said what?’ Is not actually helping anyone. No OB will ever be held responsible for whatever they might have done because of this site.
If the owners of this site really wanted to make a difference for victims of medical abuse or malpractice, they would have made their name public, they would have formed a real organization with a mix of different healthcare providers, lawyers etc to give those women the tools to make official complaints and help them through the process.
But they didn’t. They chose to hide in anonymity in order to say whatever they wanted without any accountability. That’s nothing more than a smear campaign.
I can say, because I witnessed it as a birth doula and childbirth educator, that pregnant women, breastfeeding women, and especially women in labor are told the most outlandish things by their doctors and L&D nurses that are not and can not be backed up by evidence. Mainly out of a need to have them go along with the program (policy) and/or out of ignorance. I could relay to you some first hand statements that would make your head spin!!!
Exactly. Hell I knew women who have literally DIED because of treatment like this, for any manner of stupid petty reasons.
Not all physicians are cut from the same cloth. I’ve heard complaints from patients about doctors in other fields as medicine, as well as dealt with some really rude ones on the floor. Some Physicians are awesome but some are not and have horrible bedside manner.
It sounds like you haven’t read “My OB Said What”… which isn’t surprising since the site seems to have died a year or two ago. I used to read it and it was full of ridiculous complaints–there were some legit problems being described, but much of the time the posts just showed that someone didn’t understand modern medicine, obstetrical risks and/or her own medical condition.
I mean, people would post snark about how their OB “played the dead baby card” to explain why they couldn’t try a VBAC without continuous electronic monitoring… and when I would post a comment along the lines of “ACOG recommends continuous monitoring because it’s the only reliable way to detect uterine rupture, which actually will kill your baby if it’s not detected in time, and the doctor’s insurance probably won’t cover him unless monitoring is done,” I would get jumped by a pack of NCB mean girls who were sure, absolutely SURE, that there was no good reason for an OB to recommend continuous monitoring during a VBAC.
Women are especially sensitive/emotional during pregnancy, due to all the hormonal changes. As a doctor, you should know that! And there’s a HUGE difference between a doctor being rude when someone goes in for something like a rash versus a miscarriage! The latter situation is far more delicate.