10:23 Homeopathy Overdose 2011!!

I know what your thinking: Homeopa.... what??

Well, let me tell you:

Homeopathy is a form of alternative medicine in which practitioners treat patients using highly diluted preparations that are believed to cause healthy people to exhibit symptoms that are similar to those exhibited by the patient. The basic principle known as the law of similars is "let like be cured by like." Homeopathic “remedies” are prepared by serial dilution with shaking by forceful striking on an elastic body, which homeopaths term succussion. Each dilution followed by succussion is assumed to this increases the effectiveness.

Sounds like crap right? Well, who really knows, but today I decided to join a group of my fellow Kitsap County Skeptics in protest of their popularity. We set out to represent an ever growing, skeptical movement, the 10:23 Homeopathy Overdose 2011, to to educate the people, errr the masses, about the bogus-ness of these "natural" remedies. We came armed with informational fliers, current studies and information and best of all : we came with an actual concoction. An actual representation of exactly what a diluted, succussioned, homeopathic remedy would look like. We diluted a concentrated solution, exactly as you would a "remedy" including the "forceful striking on an elastic body" (we used a harry potter book).

An actual passerby-er reading our information!

To tell you the truth, it looked like water. It tasted like water. For all intents and purposes, it was water. Granted we used water as our dilutant, but all homeopathic remedies use SOMETHING benign to dilute. So we drank it - took it - in protest of its ineffective-ness.

The 10:23 Challenge is a follow-up to the 'overdose' protest staged by the 10:23 Campaign in 2010. International protesters from more than 10 countries, and more than 23 cities gathered for over the weekend of February 5-6 2011, to make the simple statement: Homeopathy - There's Nothing In It. We were the only representatives for the Pacific Northwest of the United States. But hey, you have to start somewhere.

My badge says "I OD'd @ 10:23"

If you want more information on the topic, here are a couple sites you can check out:

http://www.1023.org.uk/why-you-cant-trust-homeopathy.php
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Homeopathy
http://www.quackwatch.org/01QuackeryRelatedTopics/homeo.html

I feel so grown up, I've officially attended my first real protest for something I mostly believe in! YAY! Activism!!