# Anti-vaxxers are ignorant scumbags that kill children **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [September 1, 2016, 1:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anti-vaxxers-are-ignorant-scumbags-that-kill-children/764626 "2016-09-01T01:59:52Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 7
**Author:** ![Princhester](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/3e96dc/32.png) [@Princhester](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Princhester)\ **Post date:** [September 4, 2016, 1:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anti-vaxxers-are-ignorant-scumbags-that-kill-children/764626/121 "2016-09-04T01:01:50Z")
> [@Quartz](#): > > You asserted that the individual vaccinations became popular only after Wakefield was debunked. I have told you my own recollections that this is not correct, and given a link to an article about someone else’s memories which again demonstrate that you are not correct. No, go back and read what I said particularly in my second response to you. What I said is supported precisely by your cite. ---
**Author:** ![coremelt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/4491bb/32.png) [@coremelt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/coremelt)\ **Post date:** [September 4, 2016, 4:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anti-vaxxers-are-ignorant-scumbags-that-kill-children/764626/122 "2016-09-04T04:10:05Z")
> [@WhyNot](#): > > How do they make more money doing several vaccinations at one visit? I’ve seen anti-vaxxers argue at the same time that “big pharma” makes absurd profits on vaccines and that they take dangerous shortcuts to lower the price and save money :smack: They are also peddling absurd figures that the average cost of a vaccine is $300 and that it costs $57,000 for a lifetime course of vaccines. When I gave them the UNICEF / WHO statistics that show that most vaccines cost under a $1 per dose they ran away and had no reply. The irony is that the anti-vaxxers campaign against “mercury” in Vaccines has raised the cost of vaccines because they don’t use Thiomersal anymore, so it’s killing more children in developing countries because they can’t afford to cover as many people with the same budget. Brings me back to my original title, if you are against vaccines you are a selfish scumbag who kills children. (got the grammar right that time :D) ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [September 4, 2016, 4:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anti-vaxxers-are-ignorant-scumbags-that-kill-children/764626/123 "2016-09-04T04:51:28Z")
And since this is the pit, it has to be reminded to all that Donald Trump is this kind of scumbag, just the prospect of him using the biggest bully pulpit to “advise” all the the American people on vaccines; and giving him the power to appoint scumbags like him to be the director of the CDC, makes me not sleep at night comfortably. ---
**Author:** ![coremelt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/4491bb/32.png) [@coremelt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/coremelt)\ **Post date:** [September 4, 2016, 8:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anti-vaxxers-are-ignorant-scumbags-that-kill-children/764626/124 "2016-09-04T08:55:55Z")
Absolutely, He has tried to use Autism sufferers as a political prop with zero evidence. Here is an Autist calling him out on it: ( sorry if thats offensive to anyone I don’t know what the name autistic people call themselves is) > **[Donald Trump's conspiracy theories about autism are disgusting](https://www.independent.co.uk/voices/donald-trump-autism-vaccination-link-conspiracy-living-with-autism-a7027676.html)** > > Trump is a fan of conspiracies – his whole political campaign is founded on them. He uses autism sufferers as vulgar props to gain attention ---
**Author:** ![WhyNot](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/c77e96/32.png) [@WhyNot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WhyNot)\ **Post date:** [September 4, 2016, 10:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anti-vaxxers-are-ignorant-scumbags-that-kill-children/764626/125 "2016-09-04T10:52:55Z")
> [@coremelt](#): > > Absolutely, He has tried to use Autism sufferers as a political prop with zero evidence. Here is an Autist calling him out on it: ( sorry if thats offensive to anyone I don’t know what the name autistic people call themselves is) > > [Living with autism, I find Donald Trump's conspiracy theories about vaccination disgusting | The Independent | The Independent](http://www.independent.co.uk/voices/donald-trump-autism-vaccination-link-conspiracy-living-with-autism-a7027676.html) Usually Bob, Jim, or Sally. Something like that 😉 (Whatever the diagnosis, it’s usually safest and most respectful to say “person with \_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_”. That keeps the emphasis on their humanity, while also letting us know why their opinion might be relevant. “Here is a person with autism calling him out on it,” works just fine.) ---
**Author:** ![coremelt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/4491bb/32.png) [@coremelt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/coremelt)\ **Post date:** [September 4, 2016, 11:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anti-vaxxers-are-ignorant-scumbags-that-kill-children/764626/126 "2016-09-04T11:43:23Z")
Thanks for that WhyNot and I’d upvote you if this board allowed it ! ---
**Author:** ![coremelt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/4491bb/32.png) [@coremelt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/coremelt)\ **Post date:** [September 4, 2016, 12:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anti-vaxxers-are-ignorant-scumbags-that-kill-children/764626/127 "2016-09-04T12:10:23Z")
And she’s back! Return of the anti-vaxxer on facebook this time using the “wake up sheeple” non-argument that we are all ignorant. The irony, it burns. Incidentally my iPhone auto corrects vaxxer to cancer which is quite appropriate since “vaxxer” is only ever used to refer to:D anti-vax ignorant people ---
**Author:** ![wonky](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wonky/32/393_2.png) [@wonky](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wonky)\ **Post date:** [September 4, 2016, 12:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anti-vaxxers-are-ignorant-scumbags-that-kill-children/764626/128 "2016-09-04T12:49:01Z")
> [@WhyNot](#): > > Usually Bob, Jim, or Sally. Something like that 😉 > > (Whatever the diagnosis, it’s usually safest and most respectful to say “person with \_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_”. That keeps the emphasis on their humanity, while also letting us know why their opinion might be relevant. “Here is a person with autism calling him out on it,” works just fine.) Hijack alert: It’s tricky because for some in the Autism and the Deaf communities, person-first language is not preferred. So it’s an interesting conundrum, though I think your advice is still sound. ---
**Author:** ![WhyNot](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/c77e96/32.png) [@WhyNot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WhyNot)\ **Post date:** [September 4, 2016, 1:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anti-vaxxers-are-ignorant-scumbags-that-kill-children/764626/129 "2016-09-04T13:01:59Z")
> [@jsgoddess](#): > > Hijack alert: It’s tricky because for some in the Autism and the Deaf communities, person-first language is not preferred. So it’s an interesting conundrum, though I think your advice is still sound. Yeah, hence the “usually” hedge. Can’t open your mouth without risking offense to someone, but you can play the odds. ---
**Author:** ![wonky](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wonky/32/393_2.png) [@wonky](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wonky)\ **Post date:** [September 4, 2016, 2:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anti-vaxxers-are-ignorant-scumbags-that-kill-children/764626/130 "2016-09-04T14:27:25Z")
> [@WhyNot](#): > > Yeah, hence the “usually” hedge. “Usually” is not accurate when it comes to autism, the specific population the poster was asking about. ---
**Author:** ![Jackmannii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jackmannii/32/311_2.png) [@Jackmannii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jackmannii)\ **Post date:** [September 4, 2016, 2:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anti-vaxxers-are-ignorant-scumbags-that-kill-children/764626/131 "2016-09-04T14:37:32Z")
> [@coremelt](#): > > I am dissapoint. No one is going to comment on my very harsh crtitiuque of the US for the blowback on vaccination by the methods used of the Osama Bin Laden raid. Sorry this is not something you can just ignore ith as a very serious price, eg taking 20 years more to eliminate Polio from the Planet. This meme ignores the fact that religious, superstitious and polically-based objections to vaccination existed in Third World countries long before the CIA’s infamous (and stupid) [project](http://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2014/05/20/314231260/cia-says-it-will-no-longer-use-vaccine-programs-as-cover) to track bin Laden. _“The CIA is not exclusively responsible for the problems we have in getting children vaccinated but it certainly didn’t make it anything easier,’ says Anthony Robbins, the co-editor of the Journal of Public Health Policy. Robbins wrote an editorial denouncing the CIA use of fake vaccination programs back in August of 2012. Even before bin Laden was killed in 2011, the Taliban had banned polio immunization in the parts of Pakistan it controls. The Taliban claimed the polio drops sterilize Pakistani children and vaccinators were American spies.”_ From [a 2009 paper](http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2727330/): _“Religious opposition by Muslim fundamentalists is a major factor in the failure of immunization programs against polio in Nigeria (2), Pakistan (3) and Afghanistan (4). This religious conflict in the tribal areas of Pakistan is one of the biggest hindrances to effective polio vaccination. Epidemiologists have detected transmission of wild poliovirus from polio-endemic districts in Afghanistan, most of which are located in the southern region of this country bordering Pakistan, to tribal areas of Pakistan (4). This transmission has resulted in new cases of polio in previously polio-free districts. The local Taliban have issued fatwas denouncing vaccination as an American ploy to sterilize Muslim populations. Another common superstition spread by extremists is that vaccination is an attempt to avert the will of Allah. The Taliban have assassinated vaccination officials, including Abdul Ghani Marwat, who was the head of the government’s vaccination campaign in Bajaur Agency in the Pakistani tribal areas, on his way back from meeting a religious cleric (5). Over the past year, several kidnappings and beatings of vaccinators have been reported. Vaccination campaigns in Nigeria and Afghanistan have also been hampered by Islamic extremists, especially in the Nigerian province of Kano in 2003, which has resulted in the infection returning to 8 previously polio-free countries in Africa.”_ We can laugh or shake our heads in disgust at such beliefs, but when well-off and supposedly educated Westerners concoct and promulgate equally fact-deficient antivax arguments, it’s clear we still have work to do at home. ---
**Author:** ![coremelt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/4491bb/32.png) [@coremelt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/coremelt)\ **Post date:** [September 4, 2016, 3:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anti-vaxxers-are-ignorant-scumbags-that-kill-children/764626/132 "2016-09-04T15:58:53Z")
> [@Jackmannii](#): > > We can laugh or shake our heads in disgust at such beliefs, but when well-off and supposedly educated Westerners concoct and promulgate equally fact-deficient antivax arguments, it’s clear we still have work to do at home. None of what you quoted changes the fact that some very educated local bureau chief or possibly intelligence agency chief made a conscious decision to use a vaccination worker as an intelligence asset. Sorry that’s evil and wrong and the price we have paid does not justify the payoff. ---
**Author:** ![Jackmannii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jackmannii/32/311_2.png) [@Jackmannii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jackmannii)\ **Post date:** [September 4, 2016, 5:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anti-vaxxers-are-ignorant-scumbags-that-kill-children/764626/133 "2016-09-04T17:23:29Z")
> [@coremelt](#): > > None of what you quoted changes the fact that some very educated local bureau chief or possibly intelligence agency chief made a conscious decision to use a vaccination worker as an intelligence asset. Sorry that’s evil and wrong and the price we have paid does not justify the payoff. Make another attempt to understand the point. The CIA’s action, while deplorable, is not responsible for a large undercurrent of antivax superstition and religious/politically-based opposition in the Muslim world that existed well before the bin Laden operation. It didn’t help matters, but it didn’t create the situation either. ---
**Author:** ![WhyNot](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/c77e96/32.png) [@WhyNot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WhyNot)\ **Post date:** [September 4, 2016, 5:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anti-vaxxers-are-ignorant-scumbags-that-kill-children/764626/134 "2016-09-04T17:40:49Z")
> [@jsgoddess](#): > > “Usually” is not accurate when it comes to autism, the specific population the poster was asking about. I disagree. I’ve been doing some searching since your post to try and better educate myself, and I’m getting a lot that go both ways. The consensus seems to be that there is no consensus, and it’s best to politely ask the person you’re talking about what they prefer. ---
**Author:** ![wonky](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wonky/32/393_2.png) [@wonky](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wonky)\ **Post date:** [September 4, 2016, 7:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anti-vaxxers-are-ignorant-scumbags-that-kill-children/764626/135 "2016-09-04T19:46:49Z")
> [@WhyNot](#): > > I disagree. I’ve been doing some searching since your post to try and better educate myself, and I’m getting a lot that go both ways. The consensus seems to be that there is no consensus, and it’s best to politely ask the person you’re talking about what they prefer. Well, precisely, which means it’s not “usually.” ---
**Author:** ![coremelt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/4491bb/32.png) [@coremelt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/coremelt)\ **Post date:** [September 4, 2016, 8:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anti-vaxxers-are-ignorant-scumbags-that-kill-children/764626/136 "2016-09-04T20:25:28Z")
> [@Jackmannii](#): > > The CIA’s action, while deplorable, is not responsible for a large undercurrent of antivax superstition and religious/politically-based opposition in the Muslim world that existed well before the bin Laden operation. It didn’t help matters, but it didn’t create the situation either. No it didn’t create the suspicion but it made it lots lots worse not just a little bit. Read the articles I linked. The use of a vaccination worker to try and get the intelligence on Osama Bin Laden has of course been widely reported through out the region. Local residents now have a justified reason to be suspicious of vaccination aid workers while really they didn’t before. Overall it has had a huge impact and I stand by my claim that this single action has probably put back the eradication of Polio by 10-20 years. ---
**Author:** ![Jackmannii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jackmannii/32/311_2.png) [@Jackmannii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jackmannii)\ **Post date:** [September 4, 2016, 8:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anti-vaxxers-are-ignorant-scumbags-that-kill-children/764626/137 "2016-09-04T20:58:23Z")
I am “dissapoint”. :(:D:smack: ---
**Author:** ![vivalostwages](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/d07c76/32.png) [@vivalostwages](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/vivalostwages)\ **Post date:** [September 4, 2016, 10:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anti-vaxxers-are-ignorant-scumbags-that-kill-children/764626/138 "2016-09-04T22:14:05Z")
> [@Lobot](#): > > I had all my shots as a kid, except one: whooping cough–the specialists believed it was risky due to my condition. I also had respiratory problems, and if I caught whooping cough from an unvaccinated child, I probably wasn’t going to be long for this world. So I had to rely on everyone else to be responsible members of the community. > > This Wakefield bullshit has set things up so that everyone thinks they get to have an opinion. It’s not about individual rights–it’s about the social contract. If you want the goodies that come with being in a society, you have to hold up your end of the bargain. It’s basically on the same level as tax evasion. So how do I convince my older niece, who thinks vaccination should be a choice, not a mandate, because there is a “risk” involved --to stop quoting Wakefield on FB and to start thinking about her kids and others? ---
**Author:** ![Broomstick](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/broomstick/32/246_2.png) [@Broomstick](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Broomstick)\ **Post date:** [September 4, 2016, 10:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anti-vaxxers-are-ignorant-scumbags-that-kill-children/764626/139 "2016-09-04T22:18:39Z")
Tell her that a wise person makes good choices based on sound, rational facts. And the facts are that even today a child is FAR less likely to suffer and adverse event from a vaccine than from the disease the vaccine prevents. Urge her to choose vaccination. ---
**Author:** ![Lobot](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/ce7236/32.png) [@Lobot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lobot)\ **Post date:** [September 4, 2016, 10:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anti-vaxxers-are-ignorant-scumbags-that-kill-children/764626/140 "2016-09-04T22:50:52Z")
1. Yes, there is risk, but there is a greater risk that comes with not vaccinating. 2. Due to herd immunity, one person choosing not to vaccinate will not really make much difference. But that’s the free rider problem, and it effectively flags you as a parasite if you’re reaping the benefits of everyone else’s actions. Furthermore, if enough people individually make that choice, the effects become very noticeable very quickly, and it’s exactly because of Wakefield’s recklessness that it’s more crucial today to vaccinate than it was 30 years ago. 3. By not vaccinating, you are creating a dangerous threat for those most vulnerable. It’s a particularly repugnant kind of selfishness. Of course, anyone quoting Wakefield is impervious to reason. Such people are essentially domestic terrorists, endangering many in the service of their own delusions. They cannot be convinced. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anti-vaxxers-are-ignorant-scumbags-that-kill-children/764626.md?page=6) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anti-vaxxers-are-ignorant-scumbags-that-kill-children/764626.md?page=8)