Science has nothing to do with opinions...
In the Scientific Method there is no place for opinions. In fact, the scientific method is designed as a tool to attempt to keep our own opinions and biases out of it. It was known by those that created the methodology that such things would corrupt any results.
Today if you speak against an opinion without evidence to back it up, or perhaps that has evidence against it which has not been explained there is a good chance you may be called "anti-science", "denier", or some other label used to indicate you are some kind of mentally unstable person that should be ignored.
That practice has nothing to do with science either. It may have something to do with what is often called "Political Science" but that subgenre of science is quite different from what the scientific method was conceived of to address.
If you see someone speak or write something that you disagree with is your go-to thought "Why are they allowed to say that?"
If it is then that would indicate that somewhere in time you have stopped believing in freedom of speech assuming you ever did.
The concept of freedom of speech has rarely been needed in history to protect and insure people can speak about the dominant and accepted public narratives. It has been a concept that enshrines the ability for people to speak things that are not the norm, are uncomfortable, are lies, are truths, etc.
The protection from what is being called "misinformation" at one point was simply using your own head, doing some research, and if need be countering it with your own words.
We are now in a society being rapidly destroyed by a mental laziness. Why should you do research, and defend your own beliefs/narratives if you can instead declare you are offended, or that it is hate speech, and demand some government authoritarian make it illegal for the thing you dislike to be spoken?
At least that seems to be the common idea that has a large impact on societies around the world at the moment.
I think Tom MacDonald has a line in the song Fake Woke that I found incredibly apt at explaining one very pervasive aspect of this today:
"There is a difference between hate speech and speech that you hate."
Why is this important? These days they call things hate speech simply because they HATE what was stated. The speech itself often has nothing to do with hate at all. The person that is outraged is the one expressing hate and demanding the speech be stopped.
It is also mental suicide of a sort...
If all a person need do is express offense and/or outrage to have something, or someone silenced by the laws how long do you think it will be before EVERYONE is silenced in one way or another?
Now the really important question...
Who benefits?
Who benefits from society fighting within and people madly swinging at the shadows in their mind as they attempt to censor anything that challenges their world view?
Who benefits while society is focused on words people said rather than paying attention to actions that happen around them?
Think about it...
Draw your own conclusions...
Maybe get actually scientific and try to apply the scientific method to your conclusions.
Oh and if you are calling people "deniers" and things like that.
Stop.
That is not science. It is more akin to religion and dogma as you simply choose a different word from "Blasphemer", "Heretic", "Witch", etc.
Electronic-terrorism, voice to skull and neuro monitoring on Hive and Steem. You can ignore this, but your going to wish you didnt soon. This is happening whether you believe it or not. https://ecency.com/fyrstikken/@fairandbalanced/i-am-the-only-motherfucker-on-the-internet-pointing-to-a-direct-source-for-voice-to-skull-electronic-terrorism
Electronic-terrorism, voice to skull and neuro monitoring on Hive and Steem. You can ignore this, but your going to wish you didnt soon. This is happening whether you believe it or not. https://ecency.com/fyrstikken/@fairandbalanced/i-am-the-only-motherfucker-on-the-internet-pointing-to-a-direct-source-for-voice-to-skull-electronic-terrorism
Good article ! There are two problems with the way "science" is being used at present.
The first is that science is absolute, but scientists can be bought. So you should always look at who is funding them, and consider whether dispassionate peer review has been blocked if it doesn't fit the agenda of the organisation writing the cheque.
The second issue, which ties in with your final point, is that science is never "settled". It should always be open to being challenged (on scientific, not political grounds) when new data emerges or if the old data benefits from re-interpretation. Without constant striving for scientific advancement, we'd still believe the world was flat, and Galileo would have lived a nice long life as a musician or doctor.
If they simply follow the scientific method it protects against the problems you describe. The problem is they stop following the scientific method but they still speak as though they are.
Science is never "settled" and in fact "Consensus" has nothing to do with it either. The model either best explains current observable data or it does not. Consensus is irrelevant.
The intelligentsia appears to have redefined the term "science" in the modern age. (NOTE, most philosophers trace the modern age to Kant).
The intelligentsia gains power through the process of redefining terms. Hegel used the term "sublation."
The scientfic method that I favor was based on classical logic. This old-style science starts by creating a logical model. The scientist then tests the model against observations of nature. If the model does not work, scientists rework the logical model.
Modern thinkers created a new style of new thinking in which rejects the very concept of truth. Rather than pursuing truth, modern thinkers try to reason from paradox. Modern thinkers hold that that the definition of a word changes with each use of the word.
The sad result is science based on modern logic starts resembling the religions that modern scientists openly despise.
I refuse to acknowledge their redefinition. They do it with a lot of words these days. I do not see my fellow humans having such authority that I should blindly follow it.
As to modern. Prior to say 9/11 you could ask questions about things without being called a "denier", "conspiracy theorist", "truther", etc.
They didn't view asking a question as an attack but simply a question.
It seems to have gone rapidly to this new hijacked word phase post 9/11 based upon what I have seen.
There likely was some of it before that but it was after 9/11 that it came at an increasingly accelerated pace.