I’m a “self-promoting,” “emotionally-driven” advocate, & my educated, science-backed opinions don’t carry the same weight as opinions of scientists & doctors, so I should keep them to myself (so say the cyber-bullies)!

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For those new to this website:

Tamara Rubin is a multiple-federal-award-winning independent advocate for childhood Lead poisoning prevention and consumer goods safety, and a documentary filmmaker. She is also a mother of Lead-poisoned children (two of her sons were acutely Lead-poisoned in 2005). Since 2009, Tamara has been using XRF technology (a scientific method used by the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission) to test consumer goods for toxicants (specifically heavy metals — including Lead, Cadmium, Mercury, Antimony, and Arsenic). Tamara’s work was featured in Consumer Reports Magazine in February 2023 (March 2023 print edition).

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Apparently, I am a “self-promoting,” “emotionally-driven,” mere advocate and “blogger” — and so my (educated, science-backed) opinions (based on nearly 16 years immersed in the issue of childhood Lead poisoning prevention) don’t carry the same weight as opinions of scientists and doctors — so I should just keep them to myself (according to some [older/ white/ male] cyber-bullies)!

Thursday — May 6, 2021

I was barely awake this morning when the cyberbullying started (as I checked my e-mail on my phone before I got out of bed). Given the specific community and individuals involved in this particular incident, I thought twice about sharing it here on my website (it wasn’t like the overt public spamming from cyberbullies that I have experienced on the Lead Safe Mama Facebook page before, but was more subtle and specific — within a small segment of the professional Lead poisoning prevention advocacy community).

After some thought, I realized that NOT sharing the incident (and not sharing about the culture in which it happened) would just keep this behavior behind a veil, allowing it to continue. So I have decided to share it here — as it unfolded. Hopefully, exposing it for what it is will prevent it from happening to others at the hands of the same perpetrators and in the same way.

First, some background:

For those who are already aware of some of what happened today, I wanted to give you the full thread in the timeline as it unfolded for me, from my perspective. For those who are not aware of what transpired, the screenshots and narrative below were an exchange on a national bulletin board for professionals in fields related to childhood Lead poisoning prevention. I have decided to keep the names and businesses of each of the commenters anonymous but felt it was important to share what went down.

Most importantly: At the end of all of this, the main “perpetrator” (perpetrator of toxic masculinity and cyberbullying) DID issue an apology to me — but he did it privately, NOT in the public forum in which the exchange started; it is primarily his decision to issue this apology in private (and to not put himself on the line in any way by doing so publicly) that spurred me to write this exchange in an article format here on the site. 

The mere act of him apologizing in a private little e-note really constitutes yet another act of micro-aggression in a history of subtle smug passive-aggressive comments he has made to me personally over the years — publicly or in private messages (a history of behavior which, in the bigger picture,  embodies a lack of respect for women and for parent advocates in general). Apologies mean almost nothing if they are not public (especially when the original offense was made in a public forum).

And with that, grab the popcorn (as they say)! Each of the screenshots below is a clickable image. Clicking on the image will show you it in full size (so it may be easier to read!).

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#1) The first email of the exchange: May 5, 2021 — 3:04 p.m.
This email is from someone who works with a public agency, and they posted looking for advice:

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#2) The second relevant email of the exchange: May 5, 2021 — 3:29 p.m.
My response to the above email

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#3) The third email of the exchange: May 6, 2021 — 5:33 a.m.
This is when things went off the rails. This was one man’s response to my email above. The response is written by a professional in the environmental health field.

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#4) The fourth email of the exchange: May 6, 2021 — 7:37 a.m.
The e-mail below is my response to the above e-mail.

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#5) The fifth email of the exchange: May 6, 2021 — 8:45 a.m.
This email is a response from another person who is an environmental professional. In this email, he states that he agrees with the author of email #3 above.

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#6) The sixth email of the exchange: May 6, 2021 — 8:53 a.m.
A response to email #5 above, sent in by a third male professional in the industry, stating he agrees with the authors of emails 3 and 5 above.

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#7) The seventh email of the exchange: May 6, 2021 — 8:55 a.m.
My response to email #5 and #6 above:

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#8) Email from me, in follow-up to #7: May 6, 2021 — 8:59 a.m.

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#9) Email from the guy who wrote email #6, a follow-up to my email in #7: May 6, 2021 — 9:03 a.m.

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#10) Response to the email thread from a fourth guy (following email #9), May 6, 2021 — 9:20 a.m.
(I personally thought this was hysterical)

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#11) My email to the administrator of the list serve: 10:07 a.m.

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#12) Response from the administrator to the group (not in response to my email, specifically): 10:08 a.m.

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Concurrent with the above, there was also a flurry of supportive emails:

In addition to quite a few supportive “off-list” emails to me personally (during what was happening above) there were also two emails to the list that, frankly, brought me to (happy) tears! I was thankful to see people coming forward as they also understood the significant slight made by the initial offensive comment (even though it was made in very few words!). (Since I was in Yosemite Valley (!) — an area with spotty internet — I received each of these emails after I sent my email (above) to the list administrator.)

Supportive comment #1 — posted on 5/6/2021, 10:02 a.m.

Supportive comment #2 — posted on 5/6/2021, 9:59 a.m.

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And then I got the “apology” email

I put “apology” in quotes because (again) it was sent off-list, which I feel was not an appropriate apology. If you diss someone in a public forum and you determine that your diss requires an apology, then the apology should be made in the public forum, too.

As I expect, the person who started with the offensive and inappropriate comment may read this article, I also wanted to share the following: “Just being an advocate” and “not being a scientist or medical professional” have no bearing on whether or not I know what I am talking about.

Not that I really need to defend myself to this guy… but:

I don’t know if he realizes that I have done many (many, many) presentations (including presentations sponsored by universities and state health departments) where medical professionals, scientists, educators, and others get CONTINUING EDUCATION CREDITS for coming to my presentations and participating in the conversation.

What this means (in a simplified explanation), is that EVEN THOUGH I am “just” an advocate, public agencies who have had me do these CEU presentations acknowledge how I possess a unique depth and breadth of knowledge (on the subject of childhood Lead poisoning), which goes beyond the scope and context of Lead poisoning prevention information currently known by many scientists and other professionals. That, in fact, those professionals HAVE SOMETHING LEGITIMATE TO LEARN from my 16 years of experience entrenched in the issue (as a parent of Lead-poisoned children and as an activist/ advocate).

Beyond my work, all parent-advocates deserve respect and should be given every chance to be heard. Advocates everywhere are normally people who have “boots on the ground,” valuable experience that should never be summarily dismissed by policy wonks and others.

The apology — sent at 12:41 p.m.

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There is a lot more to unpack in the above exchange, but I don’t want to spend too much more of my time on this. One thing specifically I will say is that this man shares blog posts on the list serve and I share blog posts on the list serve — yet I (the woman, and yes, without a degree in science, so in the consideration of some, “less educated”) am “branded” a “blogger” in a way intended to be derogatory.

This “gentleman” also recently had an exchange with another person on the list serve where — in my opinion — his responses were also similarly dismissive and demonstrated that he is not a good listener when it comes to appreciating and understanding the nuances of written language. Perhaps, it’s just this one person who is completely tone deaf, but I really think it is systemic within the public health world. It seems (as within the political arena) like the current national movements toward professional, financial, and social equity (for gender, race, sexual orientation, etc.) have not yet crossed the public health administration and environment health profession barriers (glass ceilings?).

As always, thank you for reading and for sharing these articles. Thank you to each of you for being continually supportive of my work. I cannot tell you how much I appreciate it — especially in times like this. I really cannot articulate my appreciation… your support literally keeps me going (especially in the face of criticism by “established industry professionals”).

Tamara Rubin
#LeadSafeMama