Surely statistics are the thing none of us believe? Every scientist (or at least any mathematically trained one) is aware that statistics can be easily distorted accidentally and every cynic knows they can be easily distorted on purpose!

More precisely, statistics has as its purpose throwing away irrelevant data and retaining the relevant. That's hard. Not only that, it involves value judgements all along the way about what is and what is not relevant. Often these judgements are hidden under the shroud of the mathematical process itself, but they are still there.