Anti Federalist
Member
- Joined
- Aug 31, 2007
- Messages
- 117,557
Seems like she'd be in favor of summary executions.
Treat anti-vaxxers like the dangerous conspiracy theorists they are
https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/...e-the-dangerous-conspiracy-theorists-they-are
by Tiana Lowe
January 29, 2019 05:19 PM
Smallpox, an ancient airborne disease with a terrifying 30 percent fatality rate, afflicted more than 50 million new victims per year in the 1950s. By 1979, smallpox became the first human disease in history to be effectively eradicated. Polio, yaws, and malaria have been eliminated across vast swaths of the globe, as have measles, mumps, and rubella in the developed world.
The sole reason for these victories is vaccination, the single most effective public health campaign in history.
The thing about science in the real world, as opposed to "SCIENCE" in the imagination of liberal blog commenters, is that it tends to not be conclusive. Falsifiable hypotheses are difficult to test, and in cases where a theory is all but confirmed, such as anthropogenic climate change due to the greenhouse effect, the modeling is flawed or contested.
Vaccination is different. It's unique in the sense that we have conclusive proof of its efficacy, with tens of millions of data points studied in meta-analyses proving not only that vaccines save nearly 3 million lives per year, but also that they definitively do not cause autism.
That hasn't stopped a growing number of Americans from becoming anti-vaxxers.
Thanks to the measles vaccine, the World Health Organization declared in 2016 that the Americas became the first region of the world to eradicate measles, a disease so contagious that you can contract it just by being in the same room as an infected person. The Centers for Disease Control found that these vaccinations saved 20 million lives globally since 2000. But now that a movement has grown, arguing against vaccinating children from a life-threatening and fully preventable illness, and the cases of the disease have reappeared in the country by the hundreds.
Washington Gov. Jay Inslee declared a state of emergency after 36 new cases were reported in the Pacific Northwest. In Oregon, where 8 percent of children aren't vaccinated, 31 of 35 new measles cases emerged in unvaccinated people.
There's no scientific basis to this position. Anti-vaxxing is a conspiracy tantamount to 9/11 trutherism and "Pizzagate."
Health officials have sounded the alarm on anti-vaxxing for years now, to no avail. Growing droves of dupes have chosen to listen to an ex-Playboy model and her Hollywood cronies instead of a century of scientific research, and now people are dying.
Before you conclude that we ought to let natural selection do its thing, keep in mind refusing to vaccinate your children isn't a self-affecting action. Before you make a libertarian argument for total freedom of vaccination, realize that refusal to vaccinate violates the nonaggression principle — the notion that you can wave your hand in the air so long as you don't slap anyone in the face.
Because kids with autoimmune disorders or cancer can't get vaccinated and vaccines themselves don't provide 100 percent defense from disease, everyone who can get vaccinated must do so to ensure herd immunity. When people don't, Washington State happens, and four people with smart parents fall victim to the actions of 31 sets of fools.
To much conservative mockery, socialist Sean McElwee tweeted earlier this month that leftists can beat Republicans by "attaching social stigma" to the political affiliation. The notion was received with more humor than fear not only because attaching a stigma to half the country is a tall order no one seems too keen to fill, but also because our nation was built on political dissent. Reasonable people debate about politics, religion, lifestyle choices, and ethics all the time without resorting to shame or violence. But this isn't a 100-percent rule. As a society, we don't entertain oppressive cults like Scientology or conspiracy theories like the Illuminati as within the bounds of permissible dissent. If we want to refute propositions like McElwee's effectively, we need to make sure we actually do exclude true idiocy.
Anti-vaxxers have more than crossed the line. Anti-vaxxers, responsible for a 30 percent uptick in totally preventable diseases in the world, have blood on their hands. They shouldn't be considered civilized members of society. If they refuse to listen to a century of scientific studies confirming time and time again that vaccination is an unquestionable good for humanity, then it's time for us to start treating anti-vaxxers as what they are: dangerous and worthy of shame and condemnation. If we can't convince anti-vaxxers to change their minds, we must attach enough social stigma to the delusion that agnostics cease to join them.
Sending your children to parochial school is a parental choice. Raising your children on a vegan diet is a parental choice. Refusing to vaccinate your children for nonmedical reasons is an act of biological warfare, a decision that could end in literal death.
Eighteen states allow nonmedical vaccine exemptions. This means that in 18 states, you could be sending your children to school with kids who secretly are putting them at risk of contracting a life-threatening illness. That number should be zero. Until then, the media needs to start doing its job and stop catering to conspiracy-minded celebrities.
No, USA Today should not frame Kailyn Lowry defending putting thousands of children at risk for fatal diseases by not vaccinating her son as a " clap back." It's a heinous, immoral decision driven by a willful embrace of a conspiracy theory, and the media must treat it as such.
No, CNBC should not be granting softball sit-downs with Jenny McCarthy just to paint her as an "advocate for children with autism" when her most significant contribution to society is mainstreaming the murderous lie of anti-vaxxing.
No, Yahoo! Finance absolutely should not equate Kat Von D's anti-vaxxing with "embracing the all-natural mama lifestyle."
Anti-vaxxers are a threat to public safety. It's time to start treating them as such.
Treat anti-vaxxers like the dangerous conspiracy theorists they are
https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/...e-the-dangerous-conspiracy-theorists-they-are
by Tiana Lowe
January 29, 2019 05:19 PM
Smallpox, an ancient airborne disease with a terrifying 30 percent fatality rate, afflicted more than 50 million new victims per year in the 1950s. By 1979, smallpox became the first human disease in history to be effectively eradicated. Polio, yaws, and malaria have been eliminated across vast swaths of the globe, as have measles, mumps, and rubella in the developed world.
The sole reason for these victories is vaccination, the single most effective public health campaign in history.
The thing about science in the real world, as opposed to "SCIENCE" in the imagination of liberal blog commenters, is that it tends to not be conclusive. Falsifiable hypotheses are difficult to test, and in cases where a theory is all but confirmed, such as anthropogenic climate change due to the greenhouse effect, the modeling is flawed or contested.
Vaccination is different. It's unique in the sense that we have conclusive proof of its efficacy, with tens of millions of data points studied in meta-analyses proving not only that vaccines save nearly 3 million lives per year, but also that they definitively do not cause autism.
That hasn't stopped a growing number of Americans from becoming anti-vaxxers.
Thanks to the measles vaccine, the World Health Organization declared in 2016 that the Americas became the first region of the world to eradicate measles, a disease so contagious that you can contract it just by being in the same room as an infected person. The Centers for Disease Control found that these vaccinations saved 20 million lives globally since 2000. But now that a movement has grown, arguing against vaccinating children from a life-threatening and fully preventable illness, and the cases of the disease have reappeared in the country by the hundreds.
Washington Gov. Jay Inslee declared a state of emergency after 36 new cases were reported in the Pacific Northwest. In Oregon, where 8 percent of children aren't vaccinated, 31 of 35 new measles cases emerged in unvaccinated people.
There's no scientific basis to this position. Anti-vaxxing is a conspiracy tantamount to 9/11 trutherism and "Pizzagate."
Health officials have sounded the alarm on anti-vaxxing for years now, to no avail. Growing droves of dupes have chosen to listen to an ex-Playboy model and her Hollywood cronies instead of a century of scientific research, and now people are dying.
Before you conclude that we ought to let natural selection do its thing, keep in mind refusing to vaccinate your children isn't a self-affecting action. Before you make a libertarian argument for total freedom of vaccination, realize that refusal to vaccinate violates the nonaggression principle — the notion that you can wave your hand in the air so long as you don't slap anyone in the face.
Because kids with autoimmune disorders or cancer can't get vaccinated and vaccines themselves don't provide 100 percent defense from disease, everyone who can get vaccinated must do so to ensure herd immunity. When people don't, Washington State happens, and four people with smart parents fall victim to the actions of 31 sets of fools.
To much conservative mockery, socialist Sean McElwee tweeted earlier this month that leftists can beat Republicans by "attaching social stigma" to the political affiliation. The notion was received with more humor than fear not only because attaching a stigma to half the country is a tall order no one seems too keen to fill, but also because our nation was built on political dissent. Reasonable people debate about politics, religion, lifestyle choices, and ethics all the time without resorting to shame or violence. But this isn't a 100-percent rule. As a society, we don't entertain oppressive cults like Scientology or conspiracy theories like the Illuminati as within the bounds of permissible dissent. If we want to refute propositions like McElwee's effectively, we need to make sure we actually do exclude true idiocy.
Anti-vaxxers have more than crossed the line. Anti-vaxxers, responsible for a 30 percent uptick in totally preventable diseases in the world, have blood on their hands. They shouldn't be considered civilized members of society. If they refuse to listen to a century of scientific studies confirming time and time again that vaccination is an unquestionable good for humanity, then it's time for us to start treating anti-vaxxers as what they are: dangerous and worthy of shame and condemnation. If we can't convince anti-vaxxers to change their minds, we must attach enough social stigma to the delusion that agnostics cease to join them.
Sending your children to parochial school is a parental choice. Raising your children on a vegan diet is a parental choice. Refusing to vaccinate your children for nonmedical reasons is an act of biological warfare, a decision that could end in literal death.
Eighteen states allow nonmedical vaccine exemptions. This means that in 18 states, you could be sending your children to school with kids who secretly are putting them at risk of contracting a life-threatening illness. That number should be zero. Until then, the media needs to start doing its job and stop catering to conspiracy-minded celebrities.
No, USA Today should not frame Kailyn Lowry defending putting thousands of children at risk for fatal diseases by not vaccinating her son as a " clap back." It's a heinous, immoral decision driven by a willful embrace of a conspiracy theory, and the media must treat it as such.
No, CNBC should not be granting softball sit-downs with Jenny McCarthy just to paint her as an "advocate for children with autism" when her most significant contribution to society is mainstreaming the murderous lie of anti-vaxxing.
No, Yahoo! Finance absolutely should not equate Kat Von D's anti-vaxxing with "embracing the all-natural mama lifestyle."
Anti-vaxxers are a threat to public safety. It's time to start treating them as such.
