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The annals of “I’m not anti-vaccine,” part 8 (argumentum ad Nazium edition #3, 2011)

Anti-vaccine activists are constantly repeating the claim that they’re “not anti-vaccine” but rather are “pro-safe vaccine” or “vaccine safety activists.” Depending on the specific anti-vaccine activist, it’s either a lie or self-delusion, of course, although I suppose it’s good that anti-vaccine activists do have enough of a sense of shame to realize that being anti-vaccine is frowned upon by the sane parts of society. Still, it is amusing every so often to see the “vaccine safety activist” mask drop, as it did in the comments of the anti-vaccine crank blog Age of Autism earlier:

When the trains left for Auschwitz and Buchenwald many of the doomed passengers took suitcases with them surely expecting to return home from this “camp”. God knows what lies the Nazis told these poor people to get them on those trains. Same with the vaccines. We are repeatedly told they are safe when they are loaded with dangerous toxins. Our children are being poisoned right in front of our eyes and we’re being told that it’s all in our heads.

Yet another cringe-worthy Godwin! Because vaccination is just like being shipped to a Nazi extermination camp like Auschwitz or a Nazi concentration camp like Buchenwald. And, no, never, ever call AoA minions “anti-vaccine.” They’re not “anti-vaccine.” They just think that vaccines are comparable to Nazi gas chambers and concentration camps. That’s not anti-vaccine at all, is it? There’s totally a difference between the two, you dogmatic, brainwashed, pro-vaccine drones, you!

By Orac

Orac is the nom de blog of a humble surgeon/scientist who has an ego just big enough to delude himself that someone, somewhere might actually give a rodent's posterior about his copious verbal meanderings, but just barely small enough to admit to himself that few probably will. That surgeon is otherwise known as David Gorski.

That this particular surgeon has chosen his nom de blog based on a rather cranky and arrogant computer shaped like a clear box of blinking lights that he originally encountered when he became a fan of a 35 year old British SF television show whose special effects were renowned for their BBC/Doctor Who-style low budget look, but whose stories nonetheless resulted in some of the best, most innovative science fiction ever televised, should tell you nearly all that you need to know about Orac. (That, and the length of the preceding sentence.)

DISCLAIMER:: The various written meanderings here are the opinions of Orac and Orac alone, written on his own time. They should never be construed as representing the opinions of any other person or entity, especially Orac's cancer center, department of surgery, medical school, or university. Also note that Orac is nonpartisan; he is more than willing to criticize the statements of anyone, regardless of of political leanings, if that anyone advocates pseudoscience or quackery. Finally, medical commentary is not to be construed in any way as medical advice.

To contact Orac: [email protected]

53 replies on “The annals of “I’m not anti-vaccine,” part 8 (argumentum ad Nazium edition #3, 2011)”

What I love about being a minion: after assimilating endless dogma and experiencing unremitent brainwashing, you eventually transform into a propagandist yourself! Go Team!

Every time I think the anti-vax side cannot top themselves in over-the-top and utterly stupid comments, along comes another one.

I will admit, their ranting and raving is very humorous, in a twisted sort of way.

The only good thing I can see in this is that the more extreme and desperate their arguments become, the more likely tentative anti-vax supporters and fence sitters will quietly step away.

Ha, I thought they deleted it. What was I thinking?! It’s still there, but on page 2 of the comments.

Um, they weren’t passengers…unless you think that people herded aboard crowded cattle cars at gunpoint are “passengers”.

They were told to bring suitcases and those who survived the train trip had their suitcases taken from them. As soon as they were out of their homes, their homes were pillaged and suitcases at the camps were “inspected” for any valuables sewn into seams of clothing. The harvesting of dental gold from their mouths took place later…after death in the gas chambers.

Changing the documented history of the Holocaust and the concentration camps for their perverted cause of health freedom…shameful.

In Australia there was a legal dispute between two separated parents over whether to vaccinate their daughter. The judge found in favour of the father, who had wanted his daughter vaccinated. Meryl Dorey, who always insists she is “pro-choice” on vaccination, wrote the following on her AVN page when introducing a news article on the matter:

“Court orders rape of a child. Think this is an exaggeration? Think again. This is assault without consent and with full penetration too. If we as a society allow this crime to take place, we are every bit as guilty as the judge who made the order and the doctor who carries it out.”

As an alternative they offer a train going to Hohwarts where if you just ‘detoxify’ deeply enough and ‘boost your immunity’ and balance your chakras’ and ‘restore balance’ no one ever gets sick. A wonderful land where communicable disease like smallpox and measles, and tetanus are either nonexistent or are shrugged off by children in a few hours of mild discomfort. A place where ‘pure’ ‘living’ food and ‘energized’ water, and a little organic oregano oil smeared over your children’s feet, wash away all need for science or any of that nasty, brutal western medicine. Awwwwww … look at the ponies.

Die-hard enemies of things usually dress up as ethicists and safety advocates. I learned this in a contemporary moral issues elective, in which the most unethical thing I saw was the deceitful behaviour of ignorant, bigoted “ethicists.”

If these people were really about safety, they’d have to actually know the science behind what they discuss, the list of valid medical exceptions for people too young to vaccinate or too immunocompromised, already in place, and would understand the basics of rare adverse events being preferrable to higher mortality and morbidity from the disease.

They do not. And instead of valid, scientically supported safety concerns and solutions, they teach people to seek out religious/ideological exemptions.

I call ethicist ignorant bigot.

“Court orders rape of a child. Think this is an exaggeration? Think again. This is assault without consent and with full penetration too. If we as a society allow this crime to take place, we are every bit as guilty as the judge who made the order and the doctor who carries it out.”

As much as I agree that it’s desirable to get as many people as possible vaccinated – I can understand this attitude, too. I guess it depends on the emotions you have about the situation, how you interpret things. People can think of getting vaccinated as just a slightly disagreeable but automatic procedure. Or they can think of it as a kind of rape. People can think of fluoridation in their water as a nice public service, or as forced medication by the government. It depends on how people have been traumatized and their attitude towards other people and the government.
It sounds like more psychological savvy is needed about vaccinations. More understanding about how to “sell” the idea of vaccination. Companies understand how to sell things. When it comes to vaccination, people just sit around and argue, like on this blog.

For example – people love free things. If vaccinations were free, it would help.
Maybe if they included some heroin with the vaccine 🙂 That would alleviate fears about it. If vaccines made you happy, people would love them!

JB must be so disappointed – just a few days ago, he was saying that his followers never ever call people names or use scare tactics, and now that 100% record of purity is tarnished.

“When it comes to vaccination, people just sit around and argue, like on this blog.” No, we don’t. We try to explain the science of immunology, the epidemiology of outbreaks of vaccine-preventable diseases and share information with other posters. We even “dumb down” the topics we discuss for the naysayers and the trolls.

“For example-people love free things. If vaccinations were free, it would help.” Childhood vaccines are free for parents who are insured in the United States. For children whose parents are uninsured or “under-insured”, vaccinations are “free.” Public tax dollars fund the VFC program so that every child has the opportunity to be fully immunized. I have provided this website before, but for the benefit of Laura, here it is again:

CDC Features-VFC Program

Laura

“When it comes to vaccination, people just sit around and argue, like on this blog.”

Lilady

No, we don’t.

HaHa. You even argue that you’re not arguing!

HaHa. You even argue that you’re not arguing!

Another priceless entry in the “things I shout at my date hand” category. Pretend it owes you money, Augustine.

@Laura

For example – people love free things. If vaccinations were free, it would help.

It would help, but free vaccines for children in the UK didn’t prevent the fall in vaccine uptake after Wakefield’s fraudulent study and the media panic-frenzy that followed. It is about managing fear, and the vast amounts of misinformation circulating, especially on line.

loaded with dangerous toxins

Some fun formaldehyde facts:

Commercial orange juice contains approximately 100 mg/liter methanol (mg/kg ≈ mg/liter). http://archive.food.gov.uk/maff/archive/food/infsheet/1993/no17/table1.htm
Often more, but I’ll stick with 100 mg/liter for now

Assume 1 liter of orange juice, and 100 mg methanol is consumed. Alcohols are very effectively absorbed into the blood and are broken down to aldehydes by alcohol dehydrogenase in the liver. In the case of methanol, it is broken down to formaldehyde.

1 mol methanol = 32.4 grams
1 mol formaldehyde = 30.03 grams
1 mol methanol is broken down to 1 mol formaldehyde

100 mg methanol is broken down to 93 mg formaldehyde (100*32.4/30.03)
Therefore 1 liter of orange juice generates 93 mg of formaldehyde in the body.

Maximum amount of formaldehyde in a single vaccine is 0.1 mg.
http://www.medscape.com/viewarticle/516045_5

Therefore we are exposed to more than 900 times more formaldehyde by drinking a liter of orange juice than from a single vaccine.

I cannot see anyway to understand a comparison of rape to vaccination. It is an outrageous statement, and a stunning minimisation of the trauma suffered by a child who is sexually assualted.
Meryl Dorey sounds like a sociopath everytime she makes such ludicrous claims.

sharon @16

Meryl Dorey sounds like a sociopath everytime she makes such ludicrous claims.

Perhaps this is because she is a sociopath.

If I recall correctly, Ms Dorey’s organisation had its funding source cut off in October last year by the New South Wales government (something about fibbing over the charitable nature of their work, acting against the public interest, and improper administration), so there’s a piece of good news.

(also; hi everybody; been reading Orac’s stuff for a while, but this is my first time posting. I come here to read intelligent discussion on the internet.)

I have a baby girl (who is fully vaccinated for her age). I’m really sick of having to ask parents if their children are vaccinated before socializing with them. At least half of the playgroups/families around here (who I share other similarities with) are anti-vax.

Sorry, but I’m not going to put my Little One at risk because you got sucked in by the anti-vax lies.

On the other hand, I now have a very diverse group. Most of the immigrants and first generation Americans fully vaccinate their children because they know the first hand horrors of the diseases.

Mehgan

I have a baby girl (who is fully vaccinated for her age). I’m really sick of having to ask parents if their children are vaccinated before socializing with them.

What’s sad is you have to live in fear because of websites that make you think disease will strike and kill your child at any moment. You’re even vaccinated which is designed to ease your fear. But you can’t even get that.

You are absolutely a victim of fear mongering. It’s all in your head. Or… you’re probably right. Your vaccine won’t save you. You wasted govn’t and insurance money on a defective product. That’s not very evidence based.

Hi Meghan: Welcome aboard. You of course know, that your little girl is well-protected against vaccine-preventable diseases. I used to work in public health…retired now… and I remember how grateful our immigrant parents were to have complete health care available in the United States.

Not to stereotype…but foreign borne parents are super attentive moms and dads. Yes, as you stated they know only too well the senseless loss of infants and children due to lack of access to health care.

And, just ignore the trolls.

Lilady

and I remember how grateful our immigrant parents were to have complete health care available in the United States.

Because our trusted pharmaceutical companies and their friends within the United states health authorities take so much genuine interest in their well being.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/42930015/ns/health-health_care/

“Drug makers seeking global guinea pigs
‘Offshoring’ of clinical trials to cut costs raise concerns over reliability, safety of data from testing in other countries”

@ technically impartial_ well, I hope that you’re not impartial to reason and evidence! There is indeed “intelligent discussion” here and , er, other stuff. Wheat and chaff.

What’s actually hilarious is that certain commenters do not realise that amongst us are people *uniquely qualified* ( whistles) to assess education and skills based on what is written as well as those who have studied a particular subject and can spot a pretender or novice easly. When I hear a woo-meister tell me that he can “repair DNA” through green juices or can “cure” serious mental illness with B vites, I usually laugh first, critique later.

So, jump right in and hang with us! After all, it’s better than hanging separately!**

**( my apologies to Mr Franklin)

Hi, Meghan!

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/18406862
This is the abstract of a Lancet article from April 2008, discussing the 24% drop in childhood mortality in Tanzania between 2000-2004. This drop is attributed to increasing access to local health services, primarily immunization, with another decrease forecasted since pneumonia vaccination became part of their childhood vaccination schedule.

In the meantime, anti-vax idiots here in the US are busily working to disimprove US childhood mortality, which already ranks way too low among equivalently developed countries.

Seriously, Augustine – from my position as a primary care provider, I see a heck of a lot more requests for antibiotics or other pharmaceutical treatments from people who DON’T vaccinate themselves or their children than from those who DO. So, who is putting too much faith in the drug companies?

@ Meaghan & dusonfnp: (Internet Rule #14-Don’t Feed the Trolls)

Some trolls always interject extraneous subjects into the discussion about immunology, vaccines, infectious diseases and their epidemiology…things that they know absolutely nothing about.

The most ignorant and nasty trolls, who have no education, no gainful employment and who have “imaginary children” sometimes target a particular poster…New Rule of the Internet, just wait for the Ugh troll to do a follow-up nasty, dumb posting.

The problem with the OMG, BIG PHARMA GETTING RICH OFF OF VACCINES is that it doesn’t pass basic arithmetic.

Take all the gross, not net, but gross profit accrued by “big pharma” from vaccines.

Compare that number to the *net* profit from the *really* expensive drugs that would be required to treat all the diseases and all the complications vaccines prevent.

If that’s how “big pharma” is getting rich, they’re pretty fucking stupid about it, and need better accountants. Eliminating smallpox alone has cost them billions.

If you noticed a bad food produce and reported it, what’s the normal process which follows. I’m sure you all know.

If you didn’t agree that the food was bad for whatever reason, would you label the initial accusers as anti-food activists.

Another trivial rant with no real aid to anyone

If you compared bad bananas to the Holocaust, I think it would be fair to call you an anti-banana activists, and an idiot.

Of course, if you made a habit of going around shops pointing to perfectly okay food and reporting it as ‘bad’ because it contains tomatos and you can’t stand tomatos, you can bet everyone in ‘profit protection’ for your local shopping area will eventually get to know you by sight.

You can also bet what they ‘know’ about you won’t be all that flattering.

@Dedj
Don’t underestimate the dangers of tomatoes. A large tomato contains 172 mls of water. If you consumed 900 times as much water as there is in one tomato, which is 155 liters, you would die. You could drown in that much water.

Where are all the websites warning of the dangers of tomatoes?

John Welsh

Eliminating smallpox alone has cost them billions.

The profession of Medicine makes no delusions that it is trying to shrink itself.

So boring troll, explain to us again why disease eradication is bad?

I enjoy how augustine never addresses the topic of any post that Orac makes, instead going on his/her/its own tangent.

My guess is that augie tacitly agrees with the nazi analogy, but is too much of a wuss to admit it publicly

I take it you have repeatedly invoked Godwin’s law afainst those here who talk about catastrophic global warming “deniers”.

No? Gosh, hypocrisy from an acknowledged totally dishonest ecofascist charlatan posing as a defender of science> Who woulda thunk it.

Neil – other than being a complete tool, what exactly are you bringing to the conversation? Your ad hominem insults aren’t exactly the best representation of real evidence & I’ve yet to see anyone here lay out what could be considered “catastrophic” anything, other than following the logical threads of real evidence that global climate change has the potential for some real negative impacts on a global scale.

It may be that Neil Craig is not getting many visitors at his own blog so he comes here looking for company.

I take it you have repeatedly invoked Godwin’s law afainst those here who talk about catastrophic global warming “deniers”.

Can you link to a comment from anyone at RI or Orac himself comparing AGW deniers to Nazis? No? Then Godwin’s Law doesn’t apply. Do you even understand Godwin’s Law?

@ herr doktor bimler:

I took a peek at NC’s site and gather that he isn’t exactly thrilled with the Left/ liberalism/ Labour- I wonder if he supposes RI to a circle of “L”** where he can thus find an argument easily?

** While that’s only partly true about RI, “logic” also starts with “l”.

I think I get it. Using the term “denialism” to indicate willfully disagreeing with the obvious truth = calling people nazis and bad.

But calling people fascists because you disagree with them is perfectly reasonable.

Jackass.

I like to think that Neil Craig is being facetious when he calls Orac and RI’s readership “fascists”, in the same comment as complaining about being called a “denialist” with the implicit comparison to holocaust deniers. The only alternative, after all, is an absence of insight that one seldom encounters outside of the head-injury ward.

Here’s a hint, Neil: no-one is calling you a Nazi (and the Godwin’s Law argument does not apply), because not all holocaust deniers are Nazis. Some of them are just very very stupid and some of them are mentally ill.

Yes, it is an interesting style of rhetoric:

Categorical Assertion: “No independent scientists accept the consensus on anthropogenic climate change.”
Falsification: “Lovelock is one independent scientist who accepts the consensus on anthropogenic climate change.”
Good-faith acceptance of error: “I’ve been VINDICATED!! And my opponent is a hypocritical disgusting, wholly corrupt, child murdering Nazi animal!!”

I’m not entirely sure whom this line of argument is intended to convince, except possibly Neil Craig himself.

I’m not entirely sure whom this line of argument is intended to convince, except possibly Neil Craig himself.

Perhaps it is intended to convince the voices in his head.

@44 & 45 – While I maintain that Neil (Underpants on the Head) Craig has somewhat exaggerated my numerous defects of character, I will confess to being the sort of asshole who makes fun of (some) mentally ill people on the internet.

Arguments using other events in history can be interesting and vivid and this argument is certainly that.

I have seen people use arguments to the extent that link autism to having a cup of coffee, the sun rising or going to work in a car.

These are just plain stupid.

The Jews to some degree were hoodwinked and as a person in France the French gendarmes also told tales to those displaced and then effectively shot any who tried to escape.

No photographs exist of this event of the Rafle of French Jews and no proper explanation has been given.

The same mentality is fixed into human beings and as the French and German conned the Jews many years ago we are continually being conned today.

Charles Richet proved anaphylaxis 100 years ago;

Professor G Stewart proved permanent brain damage after vaccines over 30 years ago.

Today we still believe that no government will hurt us.

I have followed scientists who have gone against the establishment for more than 50 years and like Merck they are ALL searched out and destroyed.

Vaccines do work and we do need them but how many are happy to give dozens to their babies while giving none to themselves?

France 2009 when over 95 per cent of adults refused one measly H1N1 vaccine that the Minister of Health took in full view of the French public.

Result 100 million cheap vaccines for sale IMPOSSIBLE to dispose of unless injected into pregnant mums and the like as it is TOO TOXIC.

After Chernobyl the people were also told to pack up things for a few days away. 25 years later they are not back and a rising population in a vast country is a falling population but nobody has left that country as people move in to help the problems of health there.

Being taken for fools is NORMAL

Fukushima is the present it all right folks syndrome.

First the explosion was called a fire.

A red burning flame was called hydrogen burning but it is plutonium not hydrogen that burns red.

On Friday 13th May the plant was still churning out a mix of radioactive chemicals but the EPA has just shut up shop on monitoring the fallout.

In Europe we have radiation coming over the Pacific and American mainland and being negligible here. So how can it be negligible 10 000 Km closer to Fukushima as well?

Has no one heard of the inverse square law?

And of course the classic comment years ago on the Japon Nuclear Sites; DONT THEY KNOW THEY ARE IN AN EARTHQUAKE ZONE.

How many of these since the BIG EVENT.

Take a guess?

10

100

or

1000?

While we debate about injecting seizures into are children we may need in 30 years time work out how to SURVIVE ourselves in a Nuclear Polluted, GMO, Carcinogens are good for us, and shoot us up with “toxic free” thimerosal.

We just like to deny anything bad and have this lemming like facility that we can take a fukushima every day and a dozen mercury injections before bed and nothing will happen to us or that tiny baby but watch out for those dangerous vitamins and quirky bio freaks and their organic food.

Mr. Fryer, it is evident that you are in need of some serious help with your age related issues. Please contact a family member and have them help you get the help you need.

Does anyone understand what the heck john fryer chemist is trying to say?

It looks like total BS to me. Just to expand on the Chernobyl reference, yes the exclusion zone is still closed. But, in a 25th anniversity group of photos, I saw several people who refused to leave and are still raising animals and farming 25 years later.

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