To feel aggrieved that I've lost a friendship over anti vax

[VisaGeezer]

I've recently had a fall out with a friend of about 11 years due to not agreeing with/challenging her anti vax opinions

We don't see each other often these days and I wasn't aware of these opinions before. They include;

Covid vaccine is killing young people, who are dropping dead at rates never seen before.

It's causing miscarriages.

It's causing lots of health problems.

Pziser lied and said it prevented transmission. (I checked this and they actually didn't).

The World Economic Forum (?) is taking over.

MMR vaccine causes Autism.

The Anish community doesn't take MMR vaccine and had no autism.

Various stuff about Trans issues (kids being transed) which actually agreed with.

Pharmaceutical companies are all evil and have political, economic etc agendas.

COVID was created in a lab, initially in the US, moved to China due to safety issues etc.

Any data released by anyone refuting the claims about COVID has been bought, is false etc

Doctors who said unvaccinated ppl were more likely to end up in ICU were bought/under the thumb and lying.

The Member of palace staff (subsequently "retired") who questioned the black lady during the event there about her origins and moved/touche her hair was - due to age etc - not being racist or offensive ..... I said grabbing and moving her hair combined with the questioning about her origin, nationality etc was extremely intrusive. She said it wasn't, grabbing someone's crotch would be extremely intrusive, I said that would be sexual assault, not "extremely intrusive".

During this conversation my frustration, exasperation and lack of agreement became more and more obvious ....she told me I needed to read about things, do my research before dismissing these things etc etc . It escalated to me walking off.

I have since apologised for walking off, with no response. I feel the friendship is over.

An I right to feel aggrieved, should I have been more tactful? Would the friendship have blown up over stuff like this anyway?

Was thinking that myself.

I just felt such a strong urge to write obscenities in response to that, that I realise the friendship is definitely over even if she ever contacted me.

I suppose it's the mentality & personality behind the opinions that is the issue. That's not going to change.

She's always been "quirky" but she's an pretty intelligent professional .... Wft

Friendship, like all relationships, is a two-way street. Why should OP have to keep stum about important things like her concerns about her child so as not to upset the batshit one? Is that tact and selflessness likely to be reciprocated? Answer: no, from the sound of it.

Presumably when OP first knew this woman she was showing no signs of these batshit tendencies, or they wouldn't have become friends. Now she is. It won't do any good to try to show her with facts and evidence that she's wrong. She won't listen. She doesn't sound like somebody it would be enjoyable to spend time with now, so the friendship has run its course.

On t MMR causes autism. Thing ,my severely autistic child was diagnosed with autism BEFORE, he had his MMR,for various reasons he had it late ,he also has an underlying Chromosome deletion,thought to be the reason for his autism.

Maybe if the powers that be hadn't used such heavy-handed behavioural nudges and mandates, people wouldn't have become paranoid.

Cut her some slack, fgs, it's been a tough few years and some of that doesn't even sound that implausible to me, given that I'm in Scotland and watching gobsmacked at what is taking place in parliament today and thinking there's got to be some sort of power or agenda behind it, it just doesn't make sense otherwise.

YANBU. A woman I thought was a good friend up and ditched our whole friendship group during the second lockdown because she drank the anti-vax Kool-Aid.

We all thought "fair enough" when she told us she wasn't getting the Covid vaccine. She's been through years of health issues, and has had trouble getting doctors to take her seriously. And the side effect risk may well outweigh the benefits in her particular case. Of course.

But she ditched us all, no warning and no communication, because we expressed that we were looking forward to getting our vaccines. That we thought the risk was worth it, in our cases. That we were going to vaccinate our kids because we believed the benefits outweighed the risks in their cases.

Couldn't handle it. Pretty people on her Instagram feed are clearly smarter and know more than the world's best scientists. As are some of the mums at her kids' school, which has vaccine numbers so low there was an outbreak of German bloody measles before Covid kicked in. Our enthusiasm for the vaccine and getting the fuck out of lockdown alive was a threat to her somehow.

The day after she confirmed to some of our friends who checked in with her exactly why she wouldn't speak to us anymore, she posted one of those blithe affirmation cards on her own Instagram about outgrowing people and moving on.

It's crap. One of the women in our group was her maid of honour. She didn't value any of us and is living her best life with polished social media friends these days.

They type amongst us. Good grief.

I’ve just came on to quote a person who said can’t you just agree to disagree/not mention it etc, but decided to quote you as I was going to mention losing a friend over her abortion opinions. I managed to remain very good friends with someone for around 10 years until some of her vile thoughts spewed over into social media. I read a status she wrote one night about how anyone who had had an abortion should do themselves a favour and delete themselves from her friends list because they’re all utter scumbags who deserve to die. I did confront her in person as she knew I had had an abortion some years earlier. She just came back with ‘oh I didn’t mean you, I never mean for my posts to offend anyone’ 🙄

I forgot to mention that "Dr Fauci" is at the centre of everything, is evil and experimented on hiv/aids patients. He tried to treat them by giving them aids.

I was totally nonplussed by that claim but said that whatever research has been done worldwide has led to medication that saves most people with hiv"s lives .... I just got looked at very oddly.

You're not wrong you're high as a kite, I'll give you that. You lot are just sounding more ridiculous by the day 😂

The ball is in your court though.
You were the one who walked away. Not her.

Yes it really is! You should be friends with people you disagree with!

DH is, much to my embarrassment, a believer in conspiracy theories. After we had a particular heated discussion in which he denied the rapes and killings in certain parts of Ukraine I told him to never bother me again with his disturbing and sick views on certain things. It has definitely affected our marriage. I also have taken distance from a friend who was insisting that I should have a natural birth because an epidural would harm my baby.

It’s ok to take distance from those who are trying to impose their views on you or hold views that makes you doubt they are mentally sane or have any morals at all. Just don’t go into discussion with them, it’s not worth your time or energy. Decide if your relationship with them is worthy enough to put up with censorship, as in not discussing certain issues to avoid conflicts or move on from them.

OP "I suppose it's the mentality & personality behind the opinions that is the issue. That's not going to change."

I think that's key. People can't agree with close ones 100%.

You're not wrong to feel aggrieved, but to be honest if I were you, I wouldn't be able to remain friends with someone so thick and deluded anyway.

MN truly is the home of people who like to post opinions without reading posts properly.

I lost my best friend of 37 years (since 4 years old) who was like a sister to this shit. She says she has not fallen out with me but cannot have interest in my life while I am 'burying my head in the sand'. Unfortunately she seems to be singling me out and I think it's because she thinks I'm weak. You cannot reason with stupid it seems.

I'm sorry, that must make your marriage very hard in some ways.

Do you think you'll stay with him long-term if he continues with the conspiracy theories?

This with bells on. Apparently I'm disrespecting her because I won't watch her research. Also in reply to someone saying agree to disagree she won't accept that either.

I'm Sorry.

That puts an 11 yr loose friendship into perspective.

I have a friend like this. She's super intelligent, in the top 1% professionally & highly respected, but on this issue is totally batshit. We avoid the subject.

When people become like this, they start to become impossible to engage with about anything. My youngest daughter's dad is like this. He thinks that our daughter's asthma is caused by radiation 🙄

You just have to let them go. If you see any of the documentaries about QAnon followers, this explains how these people become irrational.

Most of them have a tendency towards personality disorders like narcissism.

I have a friend who hasn't had her jabs and tended to believe Mike Yeadon's pronouncements during the pandemic. We skirt around the subject now.

You can't reason with most of these people OP so your friendship may be a bit of a lost cause if your morals mis align so much.

For reference the 'do your research ' is the single most common comeback from these types but I've yet to meet one yet who has shown credible sources for their claims and to them 'research' is YouTube videos and memes which are either created by people who don't specialise in the field, or are proven liars. The problem is, when these folk think this qualifies as 'research'then you can't win, because they're just a bit too stupid to reason with.

The Vax issue is a prime example - kids aren't dropping dead at ridiculously high rates, this is verifiable information - but the official sources are apparently all part of the lie, John who works down the road did a video which showed an empty school because all the kids are dead and it's much more believable that thousands of people are all conspiring to hide the truth than to believe he's wrong when he did a course ten years ago and got a certificate for counting kids in schools.

You can't argue with stupid I'm afraid.

You both sound very polarised. Both sides have valid points, but neither side is right. If neither of you can see that then the friendship won't work.

I don't agree with a lot of what my family say and they can be very narrow minded, base everything the think on right wing media (FWIW they arepro vaxx) but I love them and don't let myself get into why discussion with them (mainly because they can't see the big picture about anything and I want to smash my head against a wall when talking to them) I'm not an extreme lefty either, just believe in moderate common sense, but they can think what they want, even though it is damaging to their own life and they can't see it.

I've lost a friend to this

I got fed up of all her posts on Facebook at the start of the pandemic saying it was all a hoax and no one was going to die and if they did it would only be old and disabled people anyway

I pointed out, politely, that I was one of those disabled people and she told me it was my own fault I was disabled (born with a congenital abnormaliy) if I died it was because it was 'meant to be' and then she blocked me on social media and hasn't spoken to me since

I have friends I fundamentally disagree with on politics, religion etc but I can cope with that

But conspiracy theorists make it personal. Your child has autism because you did something wrong, it's your own fault you had a miscarriage, it's your own fault you got cancer. It's like it strips away all their empathy and compassion. And that's what I find so hard to deal with in a friend.