when you don’t have anything nice to say…

We're told to be civil and careful when addressing anti-vaccines activists. But the anti-vaxxers seldom share the same view of dealing with experts and critics.

Illustration by Erik Anderson

You know you live in a slightly schizophrenic culture when after watching hours of pundits yelling at each other or news channels trying their hardest to stir up confrontation and controversy, you immediately get messages about the values of being nice, calm and civil. If you only formed your opinion of Americans from watching TV, you’d probably think that we’re either in dire need of anger management or shy little milquetoasts with nothing in between the two extremes. In reality, sometimes you have to be nice and accommodating. In other cases, a dive into the crossfire with guns blazing is fully warranted, as it is with anti-vaxers who spread dangerous and pseudoscientific rumors and concoct elaborate conspiracy theories about routine vaccination programs.

This is why I was rather confused by Annette Cardwell’s column about deciding to have her kids undergo the full regimen of vaccinations after reading Wired’s long overdue rebuttal to the dangerously misguided anti- vaccine hysterics of Generation Rescue and autism quacks. But it’s not her internal debate that struck me as odd because I’m well aware of how many parents are worried about the health of their kids. It was her review of the article’s tone accented with an appeal to civility in a field where there’s seldom any to be found…

The story also shows that the problem with the anti-vaccine message is that it’s not just about skepticism, which is of course healthy; it’s really about fear of what might do your child harm versus what actually will. It says that we’re letting that fear of being bad parents overtake what we should really fear: the diseases themselves. […] Obviously, this story treads into extremely controversial territory with guns blazing. And maybe that aggressive, often-belligerent tone was what I needed to take a close[er] look at my own beliefs. I realized that a lot of my concern over vaccines was based on others telling me what I should think.

She hits the issue right on the head. Vaccines have been studied for almost a century and the one in a million risk of a potential reaction to a vaccines (which has also been well studied and can be handled by experts) is far lower and far less dangerous than what could happen should your child contract polio, diphtheria, mumps, or measles. Let’s remember who the real villains are here. It’s the diseases themselves and if someone tells you that they pose no threat, they’re either lying to you or have no clue what they’re talking about. I’m happy I got my vaccinations including one for smallpox and I don’t want to hear anything from the anti-vaxers about how it could’ve killed me or crippled me for life. Most of them are not doctors and those who are, are raking in piles of cash promising fake cures for autism and “vaccine injuries” in spite of giant volumes of studies saying they’re wrong in their approach, diagnosis and treatment.

And yes, I’m writing this in an angry, possibly belligerent tone. But why should I be nice to ignoramuses who’s blind faith in conspiracy theories, or total lack of medical knowledge, or just plain old greed, put lives at risk? You wouldn’t be nice to someone who advocates drunk driving, would you? And lest we forget the reaction of the anti-vaxers to the article in question. Raw, blistering fury, complete with disgusting misogyny from one of the leaders of the anti-vax movement, a nasty piece of work named J.B. Handley. I know people like Handley very well. They’re businessmen who rather than realizing their talents as strategists and managers, consider themselves to be geniuses and when alerted to the fact that they’ve started poking into an area they know very little about, they respond with bragging and brazen anti-intellectualism. In fact, here’s a quote of his to David Gorski, an actual, trained doctor who speaks about the vaccine manufactroversy from years of experience and study. Those of you who looking for civility in discourse, look away now…

You’re right, I’m very envious of your position as Assistant Professor, I have always aspired to be an “Assistant” anything. Is that North of piss boy?

There’s a number of words for people like J.B. and knowledgeable, reasonable or civil are not the ones which come to mind. Did he finish medical school? Is he a scientist? No. He has nothing but contempt for them as elitists and intellectual bullies, and exhibits the kind of cartoonish attitude towards academia you expect from right wing talk show hosts. But hey, he made some money as a businessman so this must make him better. And we’re supposed to be nice to someone like this when he declares a holy war on modern medicine? He’s basically the medical world’s version of Ken Ham and his chest pounding about being a great businessman with lots of street smarts doesn’t magically give him the knowledge scientists need years to master. It makes him an angry ignoramus prone to temper tantrums and with an inferiority complex he shields with his rage.