I met a real life full on anti vaxxer today

[shiningcuckoo]

And some of her opinions were so out there and aggressive I had to walk away. Apparently if we hadn't vaccinated against measles we'd all be ok because measles provides immunity. And actually measles never hurt anyone. And polio never hurt anyone either. People being seriously ill was a conspiracy designed to get us to accept vaccines back in the day, al" heading towards the greatest conspiracy of all and that is population control and the existence of Covid. She apparently knows loads of "elders" who nursed people through polio. Apparently it's very mild. I asked her to define "elders" and she talked about my generation. My generation were vaccinated. No one had polio, never mind nursed others. And there is no Covid in Africa. And no Covid in Nepal. She knows this because she once went on holiday to Nepal. And she is applying to remove her children from Steiner to homeschool them because vaccinated teachers (it's mandatory here) are a poor moral example. Either that or are being forced . When I said that I didn't know a single teacher who had been vaccinated against their will (and I know loads having been a teacher for 20 years) she said that was just my opinion and one opinion counted for nothing. I had to leave her company.

I have a friend who has shared anti vax videos on FB all through Covid and shared videos about good diet and not letting chemicals into your body. Her DH is currently ventilated with Covid and I have such a mixture of feelings as it was so avoidable but so sad for them both and family. How would you live with yourself after that.....or do you just rationalise it another way??

As to why the govt wanted to invent COVID-19..

Well, I'm of the opinion that it definitely came out of the Wuhan Lab. It makes no sense to think otherwise, when there was a BSL 4 lab right there in Wuhan. Other people cleverer than me have said the same.
I believe that they were working on gain of function on the virus.
I do not believe that it was deliberately released - but I might believe that there were plans to trial it in the open to see how it worked - and it got away from them. But I actually think it was accidental release.

Being incredibly cynical when it comes to some of the Big Pharma companies (and not just them!) I'd be more inclined to believe that the Plan might have been to have a vaccine ready to go, that would be effective against SARS-CoV-2 - so that when it was released, the demand for the vaccine would be huge and make tons of money for the company who owned it.
I think they'd already tried this with bird flu and swine flu - but they didn't take off as expected, so the demand for the vaccine (Tamiflu) was never realised.

Hence the possible "gain of function" work. Except it was TOO successful and they didn't have a vaccine ready to go, so it can't have been a deliberate release - makes no sense.

I realise this is definitely quite high on the "conspiracy theory" ratings - but I'm also of the opinion it's all quite possible.

As with everything - follow the money.

Thumbwitches Tamiflu wasn't a vaccine.

Are you in America? I have online arguments with AVXs and they are frankly, bonkers.

Just to say on the curriculum aspect as part of my GCSE History we studied the history of medicine - things like vaccination, cholera, developments in medicine due to the world wars etc. I’m in my 20s. Probably not in much scientific detail as you would in biology. I don’t know how widely this topic is chosen by schools though.

Can anyone explain WHY governments have invented covid? What is their motivation for this huge conspiracy? I've never heard an anti-vaxxer explain this.

One man told me it was because China wanted to take over the world, but then in the next breath he said it was just a cold so 🤷🏻‍♀️ As previous posters have said, logic isn’t their strong suit.

We have got to a point where a lot of people aren't old enough to witness the effects of serious illness because vaccinations (thankfully) have prevented this from happening.
They also normally won't witness children seriously ill with whooping cough etc . They fail to realise that their unvaxxed children are actually being protected by our vaccinated ones and it's the same with covid .

@AntisocialJusticeWarrior

Can anyone explain WHY governments have invented covid? What is their motivation for this huge conspiracy? I've never heard an anti-vaxxer explain this.

One man told me it was because China wanted to take over the world, but then in the next breath he said it was just a cold so 🤷🏻‍♀️ As previous posters have said, logic isn’t their strong suit.

I heard bill gates invented the vaccines so he could profit from them .... as if he needs more money so he invented a world wide pandemic to do it.

I know this one!

It's just to see how much control they have over us!

But no one can tell me WHY they need more control. Let's face it, pretty much all of us are controlled by our governments anyway. Isn't that how it works? We follow rules and live in a vaguely safe society, with roads and bin collections and streetlights.

They are so far gone they even refuse to accept the truth. Here is one of the world's leading anti-vaxxers commenting on the death of her husband from covid. Tragic on so many levels, you can view her testimony on the video in the link.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Judy_Mikovits

www.sorryantivaxxer.com/post/david-nolde-83-retired-doctor-husband-of-dr-judy-mikovitz-notorious-liar-dead-from-covid#viewer-8f62q

I've had measles, too, when I was five, as there wasn't a vaccine back then. Everyone in my class caught it. I've no idea if anyone had bad effects from it, I was too young to know, but I got over it OK. Wasn't pleasant, though.

Most of the anti vaxxers I have the misfortune to know think every measure is all about 'control' and a total over reaction to 'a cold or just the flu'.

I don't even engage any more. I remember reading somewhere (it might have been on here) arguing with anti vaxxer is like playing chess with a pigeon: they knock over all the pieces, shit all over the board then strut around claiming they've won...

The ones I know also have unvaccinated, unschooled children and freebirthed some of their kids deliberately at home.

Arrogant twats who think they know better.

@NandorTheRelentless lovely, milk no sugar please 😁

@GingerbreadandJellytots

I've spent a lot of my life ill and had post viral issues previously, so covid and long covid surprise me. I've got autoimmune conditions so I know my immune system doesn't always work in my interests, so I won't just trust my immune system. I do take my vitamins, before and since covid, to support my body which often fails me in little ways. But I can see that for people who mostly are well, who don't experiences illnesses like these in themselves or people close to them, who don't see the evidence of pre vaccination illnesses like polio around them anymore, that it would be more reassuring to believe that covid doesn't exist or if it doesn't Exist it can't hurt them than to believe the truth. Vaccinations are painful and come with side effects, I can see why people would rather find reasons not to get vaccinated. I can see why people might become anti vaxxers. I can see, also, that for people who have never had any health fear, who have always felt strong and healthy it seems impossible that something they can't even see could hurt them or kill them. We mostly over inflate our own senses of importance, because we see things from inside ourselves looking out. We think that our impact of greater than it is. If we realise just how inconsequential and tiny we are it can drive us mad. People who get to go to space often look down and can't believe how small it all is. A lot of people can't cope with that. They would rather think that the world is flat and they are at its centre than that it is spherical and that it's centre is something they cannot see. Some people would rather believe that the bomb was never dropped on Hiroshima than that life is so fragile. They would rather believe the US government blew up the twin towers intentionally than that they fell down due to such a 'small' impact. What is more human than trying to find some design to the chaos? What is more reassuring than to find a design and other people who believe in that design too and huddle together and wait the storm out together? The religious and non religious alike want to believe that they are not alone and that they have an impact. Everyone in the mainstream want to believe that wearing our masks and getting our jabs and doing our hand washing and social distancing and social isolating and LFD tests and PCR tests and home working is going to make an impact too. We huddle together under the umbrella of science and public interest and wait the storm out together too. We are all looking at some hope to cling to in the face of uncertainty. We all over inflate our own sense of importance and our place in it all, because very few people can face up to the reality of being just a speck on a sphere spinning in space with no control over invisible forces which can kill us in an instant, and that there is nobody controlling it and no way of stopping it. How terrifying is that? We are all sheep in the end, just sheep in different herds, who huddle together and whistle in the fake hoping that the wolf doesn't pick us off one at a time (in this case a wolf we cannot see and which some choose to pretend does not exist).

👏

I know two full-on anti-vaxxers in the leafy south of England.

Both privileged, educated, healthy women, who have a bit too much faith in their own intellect.

[quote Cindie943811A]@SunflowersintheShade
I sincerely think that the school curriculum should include the history of public health and the conditions for ordinary people before modern medicine and the NHS. One of the problems as PPs have posted is that so many people are ignorant of how precarious life was before antiseptics, antibiotics and vaccines and, of course, access to free medical care.
If children were made aware also of the strange theories people believed in the past maybe they’d be more sceptical about these crazy conspiracy theories[/quote]
It does - my dd has studied that both at KS3 and for GCSE history.

@MilesJuppIsMyBitch

I know two full-on anti-vaxxers in the leafy south of England.

Both privileged, educated, healthy women, who have a bit too much faith in their own intellect.

I'm using that!

@ThumbWitchesAbroad

As to why the govt wanted to invent COVID-19..

Well, I'm of the opinion that it definitely came out of the Wuhan Lab. It makes no sense to think otherwise, when there was a BSL 4 lab right there in Wuhan. Other people cleverer than me have said the same.
I believe that they were working on gain of function on the virus.
I do not believe that it was deliberately released - but I might believe that there were plans to trial it in the open to see how it worked - and it got away from them. But I actually think it was accidental release.

Being incredibly cynical when it comes to some of the Big Pharma companies (and not just them!) I'd be more inclined to believe that the Plan might have been to have a vaccine ready to go, that would be effective against SARS-CoV-2 - so that when it was released, the demand for the vaccine would be huge and make tons of money for the company who owned it.
I think they'd already tried this with bird flu and swine flu - but they didn't take off as expected, so the demand for the vaccine (Tamiflu) was never realised.

Hence the possible "gain of function" work. Except it was TOO successful and they didn't have a vaccine ready to go, so it can't have been a deliberate release - makes no sense.

I realise this is definitely quite high on the "conspiracy theory" ratings - but I'm also of the opinion it's all quite possible.

As with everything - follow the money.

I think Tamiflu was an anti viral, not a vaccine.

Yes, my mistake. My meno brain forgot that tamiflu was a treatment, not a preventive, and I failed to google check it.

I'd say that Tamiflu was also the start of the development of better antiviral drugs, some of which are currently being used to treat COVID.

@MilesJuppIsMyBitch

I know two full-on anti-vaxxers in the leafy south of England.

Both privileged, educated, healthy women, who have a bit too much faith in their own intellect.

There's a term in psychology for this:

Dunning–Kruger effect

It's a cognitive bias that causes people with a very superficial understanding of a topic to wildly overestimate their competence and ability to draw conclusions about it. It often comes across with a sort of an "anything I don't understand must be simple" attitude. Picture a bloke who spends an hour reading about climate change on Wikipedia and then starts Twitter wars with people who have doctorates in atmospheric chemistry.

I find this bias to be very common among anti-vaxxers.

It's like saying I don't believe in seat belts, they are just a way for manufacturers to make money, so I'm just going to ignore them. My kids will be fine in the car as I'm such a great driver. Then you dig out an article where someone died because they had their seat belt done up. I just can't understand how people can totally ignore the body of statistical evidence for one random example and a load of made up s**t.

You can't argue with stupid