[roshin]

Everything is political if you expand the term "political" to the point of being useless. When people complain about the politicization of science they are talking about forced "broader impact statements" or refusing to peer review papers that provide evidence that climate change might not be _quite_ as bad as the consensus. And while not the fault of the scientists, but rather journalists, writing about how the science was settled and there is no possible reason to believe the lab leak theory, or how masks are important, until there is a shortage, and then masks are only good if you've been through a medical degree and know how to put them on. I don't know what the proper word is for describing those examples in the narrowest way possible, but I use the term politicization of science.

[shalmanese]

Saying something is apolitical is like saying someone is speaking with "unaccented English". It just means it contains the politics of the status quo.

Most of the time, the accent of the person speaking is irrelevant to the topic at hand but at the same time, denying that it exists is an act of obfuscation. We should all be able to recognize the politics that come embedded with our positions and talk about how those inflections affect how they color the topic.

[roenxi]

The problem with that simile is that to conduct science requires a commitment to an objective reality to guide progress. There is an ideal to strive towards. If English was something encoded into the very fabric of reality itself then there would be such a thing as unaccented English or at least objective standards of accent.

[drewcoo]

> don't know what the proper word is for describing those examples in the narrowest way possible, but I use the term politicization of science.

I think I prefer the term "public health policy," which, because it is policy, is also obviously political, multifaceted, and open to debate.