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    "Bring back our #ChildhoodDiseases"

    Surprisingly, we don't seem to have had an "anti-vax" thread.

    This is from the wife of the White House Director of Communications (a former Fox News honcho)
    https://twitter.com/DarlaShine/status/1095679791154581506

    It is in response to coverage of this on-going outbreak of measles in Washington State, which has been tied to anti-vax parents in wealthy suburbs of Portland.

    More background on the worldwide toll of measles (and Shine's batshit crazy cancer claim) in this Washington Post piece.

    This is one of those situations where I wish that a Vengeful God really existed.






    #2
    Not about vaccinations, but somewhat related:

    https://twitter.com/atrupar/status/1094741186483548160

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      #3
      Bringing back the Plague to own the Libs.

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        #4
        The "Measles stops cancer" thing is a new one on me. Perhaps he just means that the more people who die young, the fewer will end up getting cancer?

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          #5
          "The Baby Boom" generation is less numerous than it might be because a fair number of them died of "childhood diseases" like polio. Of course a fair number of people these days think that might have been a good thing.

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            #6
            Although I’m on the side of the vaxers, this is another debate that’s become toxic and polarised. Questioning anything at all about vaccination and the role of Big Pharma gets you shouted down and ridiculed as a flat-earther.

            The “pro-science” (as though everyone else is anti-science and pro-woo and witchcraft) lot are often bullying, and emotive. That makes the anti-vax lot dig deeper.

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              #7
              I don’t get involved in the debate, occasionally I will post something from the WHO that’s pro-vax. I do have a friend who spends a lot of time ridiculing anti-vaxers and I can’t see that having any positive effect whatsoever.

              Not that anyone here is doing that, I just think it’s not helped matters.

              “I’m worried about having my child vaccinated.”
              ”WITCH!!!”

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                #8
                That's very true.

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                  #9
                  The nefarious motivations of Big Pharma have very little to do with Vaccinations. There's very little money to be made in Vaccinations.

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                    #10
                    Originally posted by The Awesome Berbaslug!!! View Post
                    The nefarious motivations of Big Pharma have very little to do with Vaccinations. There's very little money to be made in Vaccinations.
                    Yes, I've read estimates of less than 2% of total revenue.

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                      #11
                      I'm often concerned by the phrase "Big Pharma". It usually leads nowhere good. Of course there's a whole load of dodgy (and beyond dodgy) practices in the pharma industries. But inherent distrust of pharma companies means that people start avoiding all the actual, effective treatments that are being generated.

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                        #12
                        I wouldn't deny that that happens, but it certainly isn't necessarily true.

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                          #13
                          Perhaps, but the practice of adding 'Big...' to the category is certainly political in nature and intended to bias thought. 'Big Agriculture' = Monsanto, etc. As soon as I hear 'Big Pharma', I'm supposed to think 'yeah, they're up to something...and it ain't good'.

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                            #14
                            I’m not anti Big Pharna, one of my best friends worked for them for decades and feels much the same way as I do about the debate. Telling people they’re stupid when they’re scared isn’t kind or helpful. It’s probably given the anti vax movement a shot in the arm.

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                              #15
                              It's true no-one likes to hear that they are a murderously stupid, selfish cunt. Least of all murderously stupid selfish cunts.

                              It's hard to construct a case that anti-Vaxxers should be allowed keep their children.

                              I have a reduced immune system, I have a legitimate reason to be scared They're just fucking selfish stupid morons. Their inability to reason may kill me. If they have this sort of level of psychological problems they should deal with them directly.
                              Last edited by The Awesome Berbaslug!!!; 17-02-2019, 21:30.

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                                #16
                                Originally posted by MsD View Post
                                I’m not anti Big Pharna, one of my best friends worked for them for decades and feels much the same way as I do about the debate. Telling people they’re stupid when they’re scared isn’t kind or helpful. It’s probably given the anti vax movement a shot in the arm.
                                Very good.

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                                  #17
                                  I'm with TAB on this one.

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                                    #18
                                    Originally posted by The Awesome Berbaslug!!! View Post
                                    It's true no-one likes to hear that they are a murderously stupid, selfish cunt. Least of all murderously stupid selfish cunts.

                                    It's hard to construct a case that anti-Vaxxers should be allowed keep their children.

                                    I have a reduced immune system, I have a legitimate reason to be scared They're just fucking selfish stupid morons. Their inability to reason may kill me. If they have this sort of level of psychological problems they should deal with them directly.
                                    Is calling people stupid morons with psychological problems the way to get them to put themselves out on your behalf? Might they not see this as your being selfish? They didn’t cause your weakened immune system.

                                    I sympathise, but you’re yelling at people to have stuff injected into them that is shown to be almost always safe, but which occasionally causes harm. It’s quite rational to be somewhat wary of that occasional harm, and it’s human nature to think “fuck you” when someone yells at you and calls you stupid. So when the anti-vax movement tells them their wariness is not only natural, but actually here’s some data that shows you may be intuiting something, it’s going to hit a chord.

                                    I’m all for pharma in general, but then: The Pill. I swear that motherfucker nearly killed me and the brand I was pushed into taking (and ignoring the side effects), has been long withdrawn after women were having strokes all over the place. Many women my age report the same, that their fears and scary symptoms were brushed aside by doctors.

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                                      #19
                                      I'm with MsD. I think the modern style of arguing "Science. I'm right, you're wrong, cunt." could be improved with just a tiny pinch of empathy. Consider it inoculating yourself against becoming the evil you seek to destroy in the world. This style of discourse drove people to vote Trump and since nothing's changed in 3 years people are going to be apoplectic and shocked shitless in 2020 when he gets in again.

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                                        #20
                                        Thing is plenty of people have tried being nice to anti-vaxxers for 20 years now. That didn't work either.

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                                          #21
                                          Originally posted by Max Payne View Post
                                          I think the modern style of arguing "Science. I'm right, you're wrong, cunt." could be improved with just a tiny pinch of empathy.
                                          They willingly increase the chance that they themselves and people around them (some of whom have no choice, as TAB's case illustrates) come down with an easily preventable disease that killed 136,000 people worldwide in 2017. This is so far beyond the pale that they are not going to get any empathy from me.

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                                            #22
                                            From facebook
                                            Because we know that sometimes, an essential oil is better than science.

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                                              #23
                                              I sympathise, but you’re yelling at people to have stuff injected into them that is shown to be almost always safe, but which occasionally causes harm. It’s quite rational to be somewhat wary of that occasional harm, and it’s human nature to think “fuck you” when someone yells at you and calls you stupid. So when the anti-vax movement tells them their wariness is not only natural, but actually here’s some data that shows you may be intuiting something, it’s going to hit a chord.

                                              Whatever it is, it isn't rational. It's definitely not rational. It's mathematically illiterate, but the big problem is that it is solipsistic bollocks. It's a clear case of someone's inability to assess risk because their ability to make decisions in the presence of emotions to do with themselves is severely impaired. Essentially if you get your child immunized, you a) protect them against getting a potentially fatal childhood disease b) you contribute to herd immunity which are passive protections. However there is a statistically tiny chance that your child has an adverse reaction, like one of the lowest for any form of medical intervention. And you have placed the tiny chance that your action will lead to a negative outcome far above the guaranteed passive protection that you get by immunization because "I'd never forgive myself." The Issue here isn't that there's something wrong with vaccines, there's something wrong with you, and now your child, and the rest of society are now at risk.

                                              This is the problem. The evidence on Vaccines is in. We've been doing it for a long time, we've done it to billions of people, we've seen the results. The results are more robust than literally anything else. If you have a problem with this you have taken a decision somewhere along the line to ignore literally the surest thing in medicine for some reason. I spend a lot of my time trying to see things from the other person's position, and this is the best that I can come up with. It's not a lack of interest, because you're interested enough in this sort of thing to read stupid dangerous things. All that leaves is Solipsism and Narcissism, and those things are really common and appear in all sorts of bad decisions in a wide variety of fields.

                                              Nobody wants to hear that they're doing something dangerous and stupid, because they're selfish and poor at making important decisions because they have issues they need to deal with. But here we are. there's no way to sugar coat this.

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                                                #24
                                                I don't even understand what the process is when I'm meant to be more empathetic towards anti-vaxxers. Am I meant to say something like "Oh, I understand you're scared of vaccines, and it's entirely reasonable that you put other people's lives at risk because of that. Let's agree to disagree. We have to look at this from both sides..."? Maybe we could do with fewer tiresome Facebook memes about it, but that's true about absolutely everything. But in terms of actual discourse, it's hard to see how I should be empathising.

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                                                  #25
                                                  A friend-of-friend's is an anti-vaxxer (they are a satellite wing of a regular play date my wife takes kid 2 to). As I understand it their infant was sick and the doctor suggested antibiotics for a sickness she had, to which they were also resistant.

                                                  Ended up with their kid struggling to breathe, in an ambulance and in the ICU.

                                                  The mother suggested this was a "Mom-fail", which I would typically reserve for more rudimentary taking your eye off a kid and they fall off a wall kind of stuff. Not the "my terrible decision making nearly killed my child".

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