I recently wrote about how Robert Kennedy Jr. is gutless (I’m an autism parent. No way I will vote for Robert Kennedy Jr.. He’s gutless).  Over the past few decades, Mr. Kennedy has spoken at many events where fake, even abusive, therapies are promoted to autism parents for use on their disabled children. As a keynote speaker, Mr. Kennedy could have either refused to attend or used his platform to distance himself from these charlatans. To my knowledge, he never has.

So I was a little surprised to read that Mr. Kennedy had pulled out of recent convention (Not Even RFK Jr. Wanted to Come to This Vegas Convention of Anti-Vaxxers and ‘Free Speech’ Brands). The Rolling Stone article states:

The result was more anemic than cohesive, however, in part because scheduled keynote speaker Robert F. Kennedy Jr. had pulled out following a February article from Mother Jones. The piece noted that another RePlatform speaker, Lonnie Passoff, president of financial services providers Green.Money and GabPay, the latter being the payment system of the far-right social media network Gab, had endorsed antisemitic comments on a prominent conspiracist’s streaming show. 

Good for you, Mr. Kennedy. Good for you. A speaker at the convention had endorsed antisemitic comments so you decided to not show up.

But this begs the question, why were you willing to speak when charlatans are preying on the families of disabled children? The example I gave in my previous piece was that of chemical castration. For those who didn’t read the piece, I’m not making this up or exaggerating.

Let me bring up another example. Bleach enemas. Charlatans sold (and still sell) chlorine dioxide (a bleach) as enemas and drinks to cure autism. Parents would give their kids bleach enemas, the kids would pass the lining of their intestines and people would say, “look, we got rid of the parasites that cause autism!” No, I’m not making this one up either. I wrote about it many times.

The main proponent of this “therapy” in the autism communities was/is a woman named Kerri Riviera. One of the times she spoke was at a parent convention called AutismOne in 2013. The keynote speaker that year was Robert Kennedy.

Mr. Kennedy could have refused to speak. He could have spoken at the time that he disapproves of these therapies. He could have spoken out since then, demonstrating regret for lending his name and credibility to charlatans such as these.

To my knowledge, he never has.

That would have taken courage. And the ability to discern junk science. These are traits I have not seen Mr. Kennedy show often.

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By Matt Carey