He'd been in the press with his earlier personal story blogs too though. He was then promoting other views based on his personal story.
I was never interested enough to read his earlier blogs. But I did get the impression that he was jumping around ideas looking for the latest thing - perhaps its a good thing he didn't see stuff on spinal surgery.
trying to be understanding of before making personal criticisms of him
To me its about making professional criticism not personal - and I guess some of this comes as to whether he is speaking as Paul from Liverpool or Prof Garner - But Paul from Liverpool doesn't get to write BMJ blogs and appear on newsnight.
I think he's behaved in some unreasonable ways but I can see why from his perspective a lot of ME/CFS 'advocacy' could now seem like a poisonous and destructive movement that needs to be fought against.
We should remember what his is doing is advocay and patients see it as poisonous as there is an underlying message in what he says that people could recover if they tried (and a message that when he says it as a medical professor seems to carry more weight).
I think this is a problem as stories and prejudice have build up over the years. One tactic is to be quiter and perhaps more directive in advocay but I don't think that works given the disperate nature of the community. A different one is to be seen to have a voice but to try to keep criticism polite and to the points of the argument - and this is what I would favour - not all criticism will follow this but if a reasonable amout of it is perhaps it reduces more personal comments. Attacking peoples arguments, can ofcourse, be taken very personally but if the arguments aren't strong then they are open to attack.This is something that some others in science also believe, and it has an important impact on our lives. It's easy to point to examples of misinformation and prejudice that encourage this narrative but and I also think it's worth reflecting on what we could do to lessen that concern, and what patients can do to play into it.
I the end I suspect the other scientists who talk about attacks and believe it aren't going to suddenly work on ME - I think it reflects a long term prejudice. The problem is how big this group seem to be an that they hold positions of power. Perhaps the other question is how can we stop younger scientists developing the same prejudice.