It’s a valid question, and a conundrum for friends and relatives of people with these positions. We have very close friends that are unvaccinated. He works for the US Government, but they told me they are unvaccinated at a recent outdoor coffee. I did not get into it with them, but I suspect their refusal is based on their faith. When I got home I had to research what their objection could be, and lo-and-behold, Catholics have some trouble with the vaccines. The church has come out and said they should get the vaccinations as a service to their family, church, and community. Even the Pope has said it’s OK to get the shot. Evidently, fetal tissue was used in the research for Pfizer and Moderna, but is not used in the manufacture of these. J&J, it is said, should be avoided by the faithful for some reason. Anyway, their strong objection to the whole fetal tissue thing is what was holding them back. Of course, dying from COVID19 will silence their voices on that issue, but hey, they have moral objections! SMH
I have a lot more sympathy with members of minority groups feeling resentment and distrust of the government because of the Tuskegee experiments and other discriminatory acts than with rabid QAnon types babbling about how Bill Gates is trying to microchip us all.
But no, I don’t really have empathy with anyone who’s content not to know or understand anything more about a vaccine for one of the most deadly diseases in recent history than that it’s “foreign shit” containing “who knows what”.
I know some (non-minority) people with similar attitudes too, and I don’t give them grief about their vaccine refusal because I don’t think it will change their minds or be helpful in any other way. But I do think that they are to some extent abdicating their responsibilities as citizens and human beings, and prioritizing their own emotional comfort level over the basic human duty of being willing to learn some shit when some new shit comes along that you don’t understand.
Sounds pretty foolish to me.
I guess that’s where I differ. I don’t believe there is any basic human duty. I mean, there’s things I’d like people to do and not do – I have my own ethos about how I should be and treat others and the world – but there is nothing I demand all people to do, nor think they are required to do. People are what they are, and I can’t make them what II want them to be. Perhaps I’m a bit nihilist or something. But it makes life a hell of a lot less stressful for me.
Yep, SMH in the end. My parents are unvaxxed, like I said before. I love 'em; I disagree with them about many things, but, like everyone, they are flawed individuals. They’ve never liked science (except when it saves their lives, of course), they think all sorts of crazy shit about all sorts of things. They’re human just like all the humans I know. Perfectly normal for 90% of stuff, then 10% batshit crazy. shrug If either of them get sick and/or die, it’ll suck, but, oh well. I’d love to keep them alive longer, but at this point there’s nothing I can do, and if they die, it will be unfortunate, but nothing that I’ll feel guilty about.
On the plus side, they stay inside for the most part, don’t go out except for running errands, wear masks and wash their hands when they do. But they do occasionally get visitors, so who knows who will pass what to whom.
Whatever works for you. Personally, I don’t find it particularly stressful to believe that human beings have fundamental responsibilities as well as fundamental rights.
It might be stressful if I got all angry about it all the time and went around hating people that I saw as failing in their basic human responsibilities and trying to coerce them into fulfilling them. But the mere possession of a moral compass per se isn’t a stressor IME.
The trouble there, of course, is that there is close to zero chance that you consider “not knowing a thing” to be a moral issue in the vast majority of circumstances. It’s just in this particular where the fundamental responsibility to be scientifically competent kicks in.
Unless, again, you think everyone who dies because they misunderstood a disease is similarly culpable, which is possible but I think unlikely. I suppose it’s a bit of a “where does Jesus send the foreign babies” situation.
WTF? Nonsense. “Not knowing a thing” is very often a moral issue, certainly where there are matters of life or death involved.
If you have a child, or even a pet, and don’t bother to find out the right way to feed it or care for it? Moral issue. If you drive a car, or shoot a gun, and don’t bother to learn the rules of its safe and legal operation? Moral issue. And so on and on and on and on. (Can’t believe I’m having to explain this to somebody on the SDMB, for Pete’s sake.)
Of course we all make mistakes and of course we all inevitably fail to be as informed as we ought to be about most things. But that doesn’t mean that our moral responsibility to be informed doesn’t exist.
You don’t have to be “scientifically competent” in order to follow the advice of your doctor, and the medical health professionals in your state.
It really does not take much book learnin’ to do this simple thing.
You know Jimmy, I objected above when you absolved the anti-vaxxers because you deemed them all stupid. And I stand by that - they’re not all stupid.
We can’t judge a whole group of people we have not met that way.
However, when a single person says so many stupid, stupid things, this gives us evidence for that particular person, so it’s OK to call them stupid.
You, Jimmy, are one stupid motherfucker.
I guess I deserve to die then!
Please don’t wish death on members of the SDMB. Thank you for your understanding.
Yeah, there’s a big difference between thinking that people have a moral responsibility to fight their ignorance (especially on grave matters of public health and safety) and believing that ignorant people—or even willfully ignorant people—deserve death. I already said back in post #235 that I’m opposed to wishing death on anyone, and that includes the willfully ignorant and stupid.
Personally I wish that when an antivaxxer gets covid and gets really sick, that they recover and then convince all of their friends and relatives to get vaccinated.
I’d also wish for a pony.
That gets back to the standard that ignorance is not a defense. It’s certainly not a legal one, in the sense that breaking a law in ignorance and breaking a law knowingly have no legal distinction. I don’t see how it makes much of a difference from a moral stance either. Most especially if that ignorance is willful.
I do not wish dead on those who refuse the vaccine, but I disagree that they are the same as any other dumb or misinformed person.
Your run of the mill idiot harms only himself, or even when harming others (for example by not using a seat belt and consuming resources in the hospital) he does so indirectly.
Covid Antivaxxers are helping a deadly virus spread, they are vectors for a disease, they could stop doing that at any point, but they don’t.
Given that is hard not to feel a certain shadenfreude when they get hit with the consequences of their (lack of) actions.
A person hears that floods are coming and he should evacuate. He says no, I believe in God and he will save me. The rains come and it floods.
He claims on to his room. A man in a boat comes by and offers to take him to safety. He says no, I believe in God and he will save me.
A helicopter comes by and lowers a rope and asks him to climb aboard. He says no, I believe in God and he will save me.
The man dies, and he goes up the pearly gates. And God says ‘You are an idiot’.
He claims on to his room
I think you mean he done clumb onto his ruf.
I still cannot type worth a dam.
The ending I’ve heard goes: “But God, I’ve been a good Christian and I prayed. Why didn’t you save me?” And God says: “I tried!! I sent a messenger, a boat, AND a helicopter!”
Tried that one on my parents.