Stephen Thrasher's Defamation of a Journalist
Northwestern journalism professor Stephen Thrasher has called a journalist dangerous to the wellness of LGBTQ people in a smear thread. This article looks at the journalist's work and Thrasher's defamation of it.
Benjamin Ryan
🔬Health & science reporter | Contributor to: @NYTimes @NBCNews @Guardian @TRF | Other bylines: @WashingtonPost @TheAtlantic | Cancer Survivor | Columbia grad
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Northwestern journalism prof. Stephen Thrasher, calls me "dangerous to the wellness of LGBTQ people" in a smear thread. Notice what @thrasherxy does not provide: any examples of my work to support this defamation. It's all here: https://t.co/7xkPLh3jhO.https://t.co/c8czFMtVRP pic.twitter.com/pJz64ik0VM
— Benjamin Ryan (@benryanwriter) April 15, 2023 -
Here we have Thrasher taking seriously the moronic conspiracy theory about me that accused me of plagiarizing a typo in a conniving bid for fame and fortune last summer. This is a journalism professor, people. Taking seriously an absurd conspiracy theory.
— Benjamin Ryan (@benryanwriter) April 15, 2023
2/ pic.twitter.com/fqILPKv36o -
As I made clear to Jayne, by showing my fact checking email from 2016, she totally mischaracterized what happened. And Sarah Schulman? She flew into a rage after I accurately reported that she didn't fact check her history book about ACT UP and it was riddled with errors. 3/ pic.twitter.com/FLrKRsccW3
— Benjamin Ryan (@benryanwriter) April 15, 2023 -
I agree with Thrasher entirely and have in fact made it a point not to reverse engineer this article by interviewing as many people from as many different perspectives as possible. This weeks-long process cannot be encapsulated in a brief email looking for sources.@thrasherxy 4/ pic.twitter.com/Ku0GrNPdGV
— Benjamin Ryan (@benryanwriter) April 15, 2023 -
Regarding my mpox reporting: I stand by it. I was under immense pressure to keep quiet that the virus was sexually transmitted and was overwhelmingly transmitting among men who have sex with men. But it's my job to communicate the truth to people. https://t.co/Ogm5NK61fV
— Benjamin Ryan (@benryanwriter) April 15, 2023
5/ -
This inspired much rage. I stand by it. This was a public health emergency. It was reasonable to call for sexual behavior change in gays. And research shows they *did* change their behavior. There were many who did in fact practice abstinence. 6/https://t.co/FXmvAvh1Fv
— Benjamin Ryan (@benryanwriter) April 15, 2023 -
In sum, it's absurd that anyone could have actually read my work & come to the conclusion that I'm a danger to LGBTQ health. I have in fact devoted my career to promoting LGBTQ health. And 1 thing I'm most proud of in my career is that academics in the HIV field widely trust me.
— Benjamin Ryan (@benryanwriter) April 15, 2023 -
It's also worth noting that @thrasherxy started blocking me last year after I disagreed with something he said on Twitter. So I can't even directly respond to his defamatory attack on me, my work, and my overall character. This is a strange thing for a journalism prof to do.
— Benjamin Ryan (@benryanwriter) April 15, 2023