You probably can’t convert the idiot, but there are almost always other people listening. An anti-vaxxer could post some links and talk about how dangerous vaccines are and could maybe sound somewhat reasonable to someone who doesn’t know much about the issue. Maybe the bystander will listen to the anti-vaxxer, or maybe they’ll adopt what they see as a middle ground and get their kids some though not all of the vaccines, and maybe on a delayed schedule.
However, if an anti-vaxxer posted about how vaccines are dangerous, but then several other people replied back about vaccines aren’t dangerous, and how it’s much more dangerous not to get vaccines, and how evidence for this can be found at all these links, then maybe the bystander might not be swayed to the anti-vax side.
Sigh. I responded – not with all of the good stuff in this thread, but with a few well-reasoned points - and I’m busy at work and don’t have a lot of time - and she responded with some more inanity. When I have more time I’ll write more, but the thing that irked me the most is another comment to her, “I wish I had your time and patience.” As in, time and patience to deal with ME, as if THEY are the ones with any scientific high ground and I am the one who needs to be gently shown the error of my ways. Grrr. She did say something about, “THAT’S not the conversation I want to have.” In other words, the conversation where I lose and I’m an idiot because my position is indefensible - I don’t want to have that one. I want to have this one over here, this one in Fairyland, where up is down and down is up, and right is wrong. Or is that the rabbit hole. Anyway, I know this post contains no substance itself, but I wanted to vent. Argh.
I really wish a few anti-vaxers would get measles like I did back in the tenth grade. I got over it in a week and I guess there were no lasting effects, but in 53 years, I have never felt so miserable and close to death as I did that week.
I haven’t studied them much but I know anti-vaccination types get a lot out of believing as they do. Even the ones that aren’t celebrities hawking books or whatever. Problem is, that it comes at a tremendous risk to the health of their children. (ETA: and the rest of us!)
The only mode of argument I’d think could be quickly effective (without major epidemics) on those who reject the science would be one attacking those benefits (such as, the tight-knit community of anti-vaxers, the rush of possessing secret knowledge outside of the mainstream, the aesthetics of “being natural,” etc.) If those perceived benefits are fractured, then people might be more willing to open their eyes and see the mountain of scientific evidence before them.
Apart from keeping your debate skills limber, about the only benefit to engaging hard-core antivaxers is to see what new garbage they might come up with, so it can be checked and swatted down efficiently whenever a new Gish Gallop of inanity presents itself.
I am occasionally surprised to be presented with sources of woo that I’d never heard of, or the odd journal article by someone outside the usual small circle of antivax pseudoscientists. The antivax crowd tends to swarm around certain memes for short periods of time (there hasn’t been much new in the pseudoscience department lately, so the current meme is that disagreeing with antivax woo constitutes “bullying”, “harassment” and/or “hate speech”. If the OP persists in arguing with the Anointed Ones, accusations of being a Meanie/Nazi are bound to follow.
…One of these things is not like the other, one of these things just doesn’t belong…
Like, I wouldn’t put it past some of the scientifically illiterate, but doesn’t everyone know by now that Herpes is not a disease you get and “get over”? :smack:
Wait, anti-vaxers deliberately expose their children to diseases to get the “natural immunity”? It seems to me that the response is obvious. They want to use a particularly mild form of the disease for this, right? And they want good, reliable suppliers for their diseases, don’t they? Leading them down this road should get to a good destination: If it makes them happier, just drop the word “vaccine”, and say that what they’re getting is “safe, reliable natural mild disease exposure”.
I think its technically “inoculation” if you use the virus itself to get immunity.
But I’m kinda curious if there have been studies of this “natural immunity” thing. IIRC back when they used it to prevent smallpox, it carried a certain non-trivial chance of just giving subject the disease it was meant to prevent. Is this actually a widespread practice amongst anti-vaxxers? Has anyone studied the outcomes? Maybe someone should let the Surgeon General know?
It’s also supposedly what many anti-vaccine advocates want. You know, the whole “we’re not antivax, we’re pro-safe-vax”. Which is, of course, utterly ignorant of science, but still…
They want the full-blown illnesses, all of which they consider mild/inconsequential (as opposed to consequences of the Evil Vaccines). See, if the kiddies get sick “naturally”, they just have to stay in bed for a few days while their mommies hover over them, tucking them in, giving them chicken soup and taking advantage of the additional bonding opportunities illness provides.* Then the children all get all better thanks to their superior immune systems and expert mommy care, and never have to worry about those diseases ever again because they were “naturally” exposed. Another benefit is avoiding Toxins like the ones in the Evil Vaccines, because pathogenic microorganisms never ever produce Toxins, or if they do they are “natural” Toxins and thus what Nature intended.
I hope this is clear now.
*if you think I’m being facetious, I have seen this exact justification in an article by an antivaxer, who bemoaned the fact that kids don’t get sick as much nowadays, limiting bonding opportunities with Mommy. It’s pretty much all about Mommy for some of these people.
Well, they do have a point there … the Libertarian philosophy surely would be that the only authentic way to get immunity is get a full blown infection from the disease … and survive.
Bugger the weak, other people’s kids welfare and the 3rd world where the WHO estimates 500,000 died from measles in 2000 for the want of cheap, safe 1st world cure. Or estimates of 250 million people dying from measles since the American Civil War.
I believe the headline of the original article was being sarcastic about lasagna and lattes, but there are reports of various other tainted items like clothes and rags being traded.
In looking for cites, I ran across an article from Parents Magazine and just had to read the comments section. There’s a new angle from the anti-vaxxers, they WANT children to get chicken pox because being around children with chicken pox helps boost the parents’ immune systems against shingles.
