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Culture War Roundup for the week of October 27, 2025

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He was appointed director of NIAID on November 2, 1984

Wrong.

Are you objecting to the date here, or some phrasing? The source cited gives 1984, and at least Wikipedia also gives November 2, 1984.

overseeing an expanding portfolio

Wrong

I don't really see how this is objectionable, though it would be nice for Grokipedia to list exactly what the expanded portfolio was. Or do you think NIAID kept a strictly static portfolio of projects during the HIV crisis?

with over 15,000 reported AIDS cases and more than 8,000 deaths in the U.S. by mid-1985

Wrong. Source says by September

Damnable.

ACT UP, who protested NIH policies for bureaucratic delays in drug testing and exclusion of patients from trials.

Wrong.

What exactly is your objection here?

In December 1988, activists stormed NIH buildings, targeting Fauci personally and chanting slogans accusing him of complicity in deaths due to slow approvals.

Wrong. Like seriously lala land wrong.

Grok got the date wrong --it was May 21, 1990--but I'm not sure why exactly you think that's lala land wrong. From https://www.actuporalhistory.org/actions/storm-the-nih :

On May 21, 1990, over 1,000 protestors stormed the campus of the National Institutes of Health in Bethesda, MD to demand that the NIH accelerate the pace of AIDS research, include AIDS activists and community members in the committees that oversaw AIDS research, to broaden its investigations beyond repetitive research on AZT and to include research on the diseases that affected Women and People of Color with AIDS.

Or are you making some tenuous claim that they just stormed the campus, not the buildings?

All that said, still far ahead of Wikipedia.

Are you objecting to the date here, or some phrasing? The source cited gives 1984, and at least Wikipedia also gives November 2, 1984.

Actually the date is correct, but zero of the cited sources mention the date. My bad. Yet Grok is already proven to fuck up dates in general.

I don't really see how this is objectionable, though it would be nice for Grokipedia to list exactly what the expanded portfolio was. Or do you think NIAID kept a strictly static portfolio of projects during the HIV crisis?

Actually it shrunk and became more focused on critical diseases such as aids /s

Damnable.

Yes, quite.

What exactly is your objection here?

They literally just...didn't...

Grok got the date wrong --it was May 21, 1990--but I'm not sure why exactly you think that's lala land wrong.

In December 1988,

Wrong date.

activists stormed NIH buildings,

Wrong. You admit yourself they just stormed the campus, not the buildings

targeting Fauci personally

Wrong. They targeted many people.

chanting slogans accusing him of complicity in deaths due to slow approvals.

Wrong. Those slogans never happened.

Responding to demands [--it was May 21, 1990--], Fauci advocated for the parallel track mechanism in 1989

Wow, if the date is wrong, then this is also wrong. How interesting...

targeting Fauci personally

Wrong. They targeted many people.

https://digitaleditions.walsworth.com/publication/?i=424950&article_id=2835575&view=articleBrowser

Fuck you, Fauci

Or, an image from the protest, featuring a banner targeting Fauci over a coffin, as well as a bloody decapitated head identified as Fauci:

Fauci Resign Now, Release Compound 0

I feel like here we're quibbling about subjective things: I'll say I'd feel personally targeted by these protestors, you'd say they were just symbolic attacks against the NIH as an institution. But is Grokipedia wildly off base here? No: although there's subjectivity involved, many people would feel like these are personal attacks. YMMV.

And, at core, I'm not sure we actually disagree that much on how much to trust Grokipedia. I was very careful in my first comment to say that I would always verify whatever Grokipedia says. My core point was that Grokipedia attempts, semi successfully, to represent what Fauci did during the 1980s. Wikipedia, by comparison, does not. We're not carefully parsing over exactly how Wikipedia characterizes Fauci's relationship with ACT-UP and cites its sources about that, because Wikipedia doesn't even mention ACT-UP. So, at least for this particular section of this particular topic, Grokipedia offers value over Wikipedia, though an actual history book would be superior to both.

And, at core, I'm not sure we actually disagree that much on how much to trust Grokipedia. ... My core point was that Grokipedia attempts, semi successfully, to represent what Fauci did during the 1980s. Wikipedia, by comparison, does not.

Ok rather than quibble over the details, I do also believe that the slop is trash and shit even at an overall idea level. The errors fundamentally change the meaning of the article even at a high level.

Consider just the error about the date of the protest - the AI creates an entire fictitious story arc:

  1. Pre-1988, Fauci was the big bad, related to delays and exclusions from trials (which didn't happen btw)
  2. In 1988, the protestors stormed the place targeting Fauci and accused him of being complicit in deaths.
  3. Fauci cucks to the protestors and gives them what they want, such as the "parallel track"
  4. Fauci becomes a big good in the eyes of the activists, putting them on committees, and being collaborative instead of confrontational.

This entire story arc is just plain wrong. The entire thing. There's no point in fact checking individual details, because the entire overall idea of the narrative is just made up.

The narrative here is more or less correct, though you're framing it in a pretty warped way. ACT-UP had a very hostile relationship with the NIH (and FDA). Their primary motivation was, in fact, to get drugs approved faster and to allow people to receive drugs even when enrolled in trials. From their list of demands from their first mass demonstration:

  1. Immediate release by the Federal Food & Drug Administration of drugs that might help save our lives.
  2. Immediate abolishment of cruel double-blind studies wherein some get the new drugs and some don't.

That is, they were literally demand number one and demand number two, ahead of things like public education campaigns and anti-discrimination laws.

The NIH, of which Fauci was the point person on AIDs, did initially oppose these things, partially from scientific principle, partially bureaucratic inertia. This extended from a period starting from the formation of ACT-UP through the end of the 80s.

Fauci had a surprisingly warm relationship with at least some ACT-UP leadership, and he was one of the people in the NIH eventually pushing for their goals (such as the parallel track), but publicly he was, in fact, the big bad, and the rhetoric around his role was extremely heated, including being complicit in their deaths.

Grokipedia gets this core narrative correct, while Wikipedia... Doesn't say anything at all about it.