MeAsLeS iSn'T eVeN dAnGeRoUs - And Other Ridiculousness of 2019

I've been reading anti-vax arguments now for about 15 years.

There has been nothing new in that time, only more outlandish theories, if anything.

I mean, I've heard most of the arguments so often I could recite them by rote, by now.

For a long, long time I tried (as I often do) to understand the anti-vaccination crowd. I told myself that these were people who, just like me, wanted the best for their children and were merely misinformed. I wanted to believe the best of them. I wanted to sympathize. I wanted some common ground. Deep down I still do believe that those people are the majority, but I'm increasingly unsure.

What changed my mind? Maybe the argument with a woman who told me that if my son were "more autistic" I wouldn't value him anymore and I'd agree he would be better off dead than autistic. Maybe the one who, when backed into a corner with evidence, finally shot back that she didn't care about other people's children and that she owed nobody herd immunity. Or the people who have the luxury of believing that preventable diseases "aren't that bad." Maybe just the people who, no matter how stupid they sound, just never shut up and it's like playing chess with a pigeon, cause no matter how good you are at the game the pigeon is gonna shit on the board and strut around like it won anyway.

Now, as I watch measles outbreaks happen and as the issue is brought to the forefront, the arguments get more outlandish and asinine...

...lets just say I have little sympathy left. Little understanding. Little WANT to understand. I feel that anti-vaxxers are woefully ignorant at best, and at worst, selfish, arrogant, self-centered, pompous and not remotely as smart as they convince themselves they are.

"Read the inserts!" they cry. "Do your research!" "Wake up!"

The thing is, I'm not a doctor. I'm not a scientist. I don't work in a lab and I'm not trained to. But I'm smart enough to know when something isn't my expertise and smart enough to defer to the people who are the real experts. Perhaps I just lack the unearned smugness required to truly be a great anti-vaxxer, because I understand exactly how much a fool a person looks like when they presume knowledge they don't have.

There's this martyr complex going on, where some believe that the more people are against them, the more right they are. Cause they're special, you see, they're *woke*. They don't believe things just because trained professionals tell them facts, no no. Anecdotal evidence is the only way to the truth. The crazier it sounds, the less basis in reality, the better.

Let's cherrypick some.

Let's say modern medicine (and technology) is the cause of, not the cure to what ails us. We need to go traditional. How far back do we say? Hmm. Far enough back that vaccines don't exist, but not so far back that doctors don't know to wash their hands between digging in cadavers and delivering babies. After all, handwashing is what saved us from polio, not vaccines.

Do we still want antibiotics or pain relievers that aren't opium? "Big Pharma" controls those too. Might as well do away with eyeglasses, those are just a crutch - our bodies know how to heal themselves after all. We'll have to remember to have as many babies as possible since only a third of them will live anyway. Good idea to have some spares.

Anesthesia? You could have some whiskey, how about? Let's hope you don't need surgery.

You're going to have to be pretty wealthy to afford the balanced diet you're gonna need in order to emulate all those little vitamin tablets that no lab has made for you. Scratch that, the shipping is impossible. Eat what you grow.

Kind of starting to sound like simply travelling to the third world. Except third world populations would be thrilled to be vaccinated.

The absolute reek of privilege here - of having things, medical marvels and preventative measures and treatment - and turning up our noses at it. Pretending to know better.

Andrew Wakefield is a disgraced former doctor who has made millions off of the gullible. Same goes for people like David "Trendy Vegetable" Wolfe, Mercola, any other vitamin or natural remedy shills. They prey on people who think that "Big Pharma" is only out for their money, and laugh all the way to the bank when those same people funnel money to them instead - for untested, unregulated, unproductive "cures." They have a vested interest in the public distrusting medicine. They're not trying to inform the uninformed, they're trying to con the gullible, and they're succeeding.

Recent measles outbreaks? Almost entirely the unvaccinated that are affected. Those ones must have forgotten to wash their hands and I guess it's just coincidence that they are unvaccinated AND have terrible hygiene. I guess their parents just didn't care to spare them one way or the other.

You can't appeal to people who have had their heads so far up their own asses for so long that they don't even know the smell of fresh air anymore. You can't convince people who have dug in so deep that they'd be embarrassed to have to admit how wrong they've been. You can't sling facts at people who don't care about facts. That's really what the findings have been, it's all about cognitive bias and skewed thinking.

Number of articles explaining scientific process and language - many.
Number of articles explaining what these diseases really can do - many.
Number of articles pointing out that there has never been a legitimate link shown between vaccines and autism - many.
Number of articles pointing out how obnoxious it is, even based on a faulty premise, to assume that it's better to risk being crippled or dead than to have autism - many.
Number of articles explaining herd immunity - many.

Number of self-satisfied dumbass anti-vaxxers convinced? I'm going to guess a percentage in the single digits.

Well-sourced facts don't sway people who feel superior in their ignorance. Maybe we should instead be appealing to feelings. Okay, maybe these will just be hurt feelings, but whatever.

Here we go:

You're not smart.
You're not informed.
Your "evidence" is feeble.
Anecdotes don't count as statistics.
Your arrogance hurts the entire community.
You're a terrible person.
Rethink your priorities.
I hope your virus-haven of a child doesn't kill a medically vulnerable person.

Stop pretending that watching a few biased youtubes and reading articles with urls that include things like "natural" or "mommy" in them is "research." Stop pretending that you understand everything you're reading when you're a layperson. Stick to the things you actually do know. Understand that opinions are not facts and facts are not opinions.

...and...

VACCINATE YOUR CHILDREN.