And you think you know someone. Nice couple, very friendly, seemingly intelligent. My wife and I had noticed that their children are never in the nursery at church, but we didn’t think much of it. Honestly, they just seemed like good, regular people.
Now, they have revealed to us that they believe vaccinations may cause autism and they have not vaccinated their children.
What?
And “BAM!”, they seem like complete idiots to me. I don’t think I’ve ever experienced such a dramatic and sudden shift in my overall impression of someone. I don’t judge folks, usually. I can’t help it, though. They’re stupid.
And no, I didn’t engage them on the topic. I don’t have all the scientific evidence at hand and folks that believe things like this…well, they probably would not believe the evidence(or proof of lack of evidence for their view) even if presented it. I suppose I should try to help their children by convincing their parents. I just don’t know if I can handle the “battle”.
Next, they’ll probably reveal they don’t believe in the Moon-landing and that Obama was born in “one of them African countries”.
A friend of mine defriended me on Facebook recently. First it started with her husband’s anti-global warming posts, then in moved on to her anti-vaccination posts and the final straw was me referring to the Burzynski Cancer Clinic in Texas a hotbed of quackery when she complained that Texas and the FDA were on their back. Yeah, if you want to keep them as friends you better just keep your mouth shut.
If you can handle the idea of keeping them as friends, I’d engage them on the subject gently and mildly, and see how it goes. Maybe they just haven’t got enough information, and they’ve watched too many episodes of Oprah. I have a sister who tends to credulity, and she will take in new information if it is presented to her in a very non-threatening, non-confrontational way. Pick your moments - there may come a time when you can say something like, “Hey, did you hear that anti-vaccination doctor in Britain was barred from practicing medicine?”
I have two friends that are naturopathic doctors. Most of their practices are plant- and vitamin-based, and I don’t have any problems with that. But one of them is an anti-vaxer with a couple of conspiracy theories, such as that milk causes cancer. When they start with that, I just smile blankly and go somewhere else in my head. It’s worth it to me to overlook the whackiness because I do actually love these women. Their good parts outweigh their bad- if they didn’t, I’d not hesitate to dump them like hot potatoes.
I was having a conversation recently with a friend that I consider to be one of the smartest people I know. We were discussing which illnesses we had when we were kids and then she said, “My family didn’t do a lot of vaccines.”
I’ve never met her parents, but I definitely lost some respect for them.
Some people in our street are anti-vaxxers. They are nice and their toddler son has just the right age for our toddler to play with. I think their stance is silly, but it even more silly (as well as ineffective and impolite) to make an issue out of it. They know as well as I do what the media tells us about vaccines; it won’t matter much what I say.
Besides, if I make a point of it I might just lose my toddler a playmate. What good does that do to anyone?
I’m sure I have beleifs that are insane to others. The correct way to argue these is in arena’s expecially meant for arguing. Media, boards, discussions the other party started. You don’t start a fight over such matters while waiting together at school or dropping off a kid at each others house.
Test. Test, test, test before expecting parents get to KEEP the kids. By test, I mean, test the parents’ common sense. Honestly, keep the kids at a decent family’s house and have the real parents pay for them until they wise up, THEN the kids can go home with their newly enlightened parents. Are they tea party? Religious? Part of some “elitist” group? Ugh.
If you go to the school of Jenny McCarthy, you didn’t pass the class concerning suitable parents.
I had a friend that convinced his ailing father with cancer to reject traditional treatment because according to him the pharmaceutical industry is taking part of a wide conspiracy that have the cure for cancer, but just want to make money, money, money. So he did some “internet” doctoring and gave his father a list of herbs to take instead. This guy believed in every conspiracy out there.
I always thought his little conspiracies beliefs were harmless until I heard this one. It made me a little more than livid at the time. We are no longer friends.
Some members of my husband’s family are anti-vax, and one in particular posts ‘proof’ on Facebook. I do debate it with her, and for the most part, her and her husband are open to reading what I post. Doesn’t change their mind, however.
However, I have decided that if and when my husband and I have kids, our children are not allowed near their children until ours our vaccinated. We are considering a modified vaccination schedule, so it’ll be a few years, not a few months, before that family can spend much time with our kids.
One of my good friends is an anti-vaxxer, and her whole family has strange food ideas - they won’t eat this or that because they thing they’re allergic to it or it causes autoimmune diseases or whatever. I like her, and her family, so in general I just ignore it. But yeah, I sometimes find myself wondering how they can be so seemingly smart yet still believe all this goofy stuff.
That’s not how I thought the story would go, either. Part of the response to anti-vaxxers should be making them social pariahs to help break the chain of infection from the diseases they will pick up.
The medical community has developed their schedule for vaccinations for a reason; I assume you’re planning to modify it with your doctor’s input and blessing.
I have two acquaintances who are anti-vaxxers. Both of their oldest children were vaccinated and both have autism. Real science doesn’t have answers for them; the anti-vaccination crowd is giving them both the “reason” for their sons’ illnesses and the hope of a cure. Emotionally, I understand how they got to this point. They’re obviously wrong, but it’s not something I’m going to pick a fight over.
If I had children who had autism that appeared right after some vaccinations I wouldn’t take a chance on the next ones either even though I don’t really believe it’s caused by vaccines.
I know a family whose daughter had horrible, almost fatal, reactions to vaccines (not autism) and a lot of the cousins had reactions too so the next 3 kids didn’t get them.
