Terminal gullibility at the New Zealand Listener

- 1 November 1991

A breathless story about a Tibetan who supposedly cures brain tumours prompted the Skeptics to give their annual Bent Spoon award to the New Zealand Listener.

“On the topic of alternative medicine, the Listener suffers from terminal gullibility,” said Skeptics spokesperson, Dr Denis Dutton. The Listener received a Bent Spoon once before in 1987 for promoting quack AIDS cures.

“Now it has carried an article expecting us to take seriously that a Tibetan healer can sniff your urine, pat you on the wrist, and cure an inoperable brain tumour.”

The listener published a personal account by a businessman who had been given a 20% chance to live five years. He blamed his “callous” British doctor for what he described as his death sentence.” In desperation, he travelled to India to be treated by a Tibetan healer.

“The article gave no evidence that the treatment had any medical effect,” Dr Dutton said “We have only the optimistic testimony of the patient that he felt much better in the few weeks since he returned from India.”

“While we all wish this man good luck in his battle with cancer, the Skeptics think it’s disgraceful that the Listener would so uncritically accept that he may have been cured by a “Tibetan urine sniffer.”

“The Listener pretends to provide us with clever and sophisticated advice on politics, fashion, finance, race relations and cuisine. How can it expect to sustain any editorial credibility with such sad, gullible stories as this? The article is an intellectual embarrassment.”

Rhys Mathias of the Waikato Times received the Skeptics’ top award for journalistic excellence for his exposé of the Hamilton Restart scheme that funded a project to study ghosts.

“Mr Mathias not only uncovered the most entertaining paranormal story of the year, he kept a step ahead of the competition at every turn of the investigation. His ghostbusters story is a splendid example of the kind of hard-nosed investigative journalism New Zealand needs.”

Canterbury University journalism student Keith Lyons was praised for an article critical of a magnetic healer, Nikki Singer.

“Mr Singer is a frequent visitor to newspaper offices in New Zealand. With his entertainingly nonsensical theories and astounding cures, he’s obtained more than his share of bemused press coverage,” Dr Dutton said.

“Keith Lyons managed in his Canta article to weigh Singer’s miracle therapy claims against some hard facts. In Singer’s case, such critical scrutiny is overdue.”