It's pretty awful that vaccinations are becoming a partisan political issue.

Until this week, the Republicans could say that vaccinations is a scientific issue where Democrats were worse than Republicans on average and I'd generally agree.

On what grounds? I've never heard the ACLU view "unvaccinated" as a protected class.

 

They'll show that the requirement dropped the number of minority visitors by X% so, racism. I'm half-kidding here, but it wouldn't shock me if that would turn into a "Disney just wants suburban white people" in their parks argument.

They'll show that the requirement dropped the number of minority visitors by X% so, racism. I'm half-kidding here, but it wouldn't shock me if that would turn into a "Disney just wants suburban white people" in their parks argument.

I'm pretty sure "keeping out the unvaccinated" = "Disney is refusing to admit suburban white people".

http://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevo...accination.html

 

What's the phrase about the amoutn of effort to refute bulls*** is exponentially more than it takes to create it?

They'll show that the requirement dropped the number of minority visitors by X% so, racism. I'm half-kidding here, but it wouldn't shock me if that would turn into a "Disney just wants suburban white people" in their parks argument.

 

Suburban white people are the ones leading the anti-vax movement.

Suburban white people are the ones leading the anti-vax movement.

 

Shh, they need to fill their anti-anti-racism snark quota.

Suburban white people are the ones leading the anti-vax movement.

 

An extremely small group of mostly upper class white suburban folk. Let's not spread this insanity farther than that.

An extremely small group of mostly upper class white suburban folk. Let's not spread this insanity farther than that.

But an extremely small group of upper class white folks represents ALL white folks! (This despite the fact that they tend to be Democratic leaning and coming from the redneck hotbed of California...)

Who gives a fudge what political party they are in. This is party-agnostic ignorance and stupidity. Whether it's far-right paranoids or far-left snobs, it's equally idiotic. Seriously, for once, let's forget the party affiliation here because it isn't even relevant.

 

To be honest I'm not sure if it's extremely small. Because of the clusters, it's fair to say that on average the US is close to the threshold of full immunity, but there are clusters of high immunity and then towns of people at 50% where these will be huge.

 

Now, California is a very populated state, so even if we isolate it to there that would be a huge public health hazard.

An extremely small group of mostly upper class white suburban folk. Let's not spread this insanity farther than that.

It's becoming larger every day, and in some areas it's over 50% non-vaccinated.

 

I think we all agree that we don't want this stupidity spread and farther. Unfortunately, you can't vaccinate against stupid.

But an extremely small group of upper class white folks represents ALL white folks! (This despite the fact that they tend to be Democratic leaning and coming from the redneck hotbed of California...)

I have no idea what the green is even supposed to be in reference to (who has said anything about white people in general here?), but as far as the political breakdown, it's actually about even if slightly more conservative in the most recent surveys.

Who gives a fudge what political party they are in. This is party-agnostic ignorance and stupidity. Whether it's far-right paranoids or far-left snobs, it's equally idiotic. Seriously, for once, let's forget the party affiliation here because it isn't even relevant.

 

It is always political. Always.

It is always political. Always.

I will complain as vehemently, perhaps more so, when a democratic presidential candidate does the anti-vax thing that we've seen twice in 2 days. Hell, you know what, I'll pledge right here any Democrat does the anti-Vax thing I will vote against him or her and strongly consider giving money to opponent. Who's in with me?

Absolutely. I wish you still lived in Cali though to put your money where your mouth is.

I will complain as vehemently, perhaps more so, when a democratic presidential candidate does the anti-vax thing. Hell, you know what, I'll pledge right here any Democrat does the anti-Vax thing I will vote against him or her and strongly consider giving money to opponent. Who's in with me?

 

There are wishy-washy quotes from both Obama and Clinton from the 2008 campaign on vaccines and autism.

 

For the handful of Republicans who have come out against mandatory vaccination and in favor of "both sides," there have been just as many if not more who have come out very strongly in favor of vaccination.

In related anti-medical science woo, New York Attorney General Targets Supplements at Major Retailers

 

The authorities said they had conducted tests on top-selling store brands of herbal supplements at four national retailers — GNC, Target, Walgreens and Walmart — and found that four out of five of the products did not contain any of the herbs on their labels. The tests showed that pills labeled medicinal herbs often contained little more than cheap fillers like powdered rice, asparagus and houseplants, and in some cases substances that could be dangerous to those with allergies.

There are wishy-washy quotes from both Obama and Clinton from the 2008 campaign on vaccines and autism.

 

For the handful of Republicans who have come out against mandatory vaccination and in favor of "both sides," there have been just as many if not more who have come out very strongly in favor of vaccination.

The Obama one was a quote-mine that was taken out of context. It read "this person" as referring to himself but he was actually responding to a person in the crowd. As of 2008 I think pretty much his statement is accurate. The NYT ran with it and issued a correction after looking at the video.

I don't think the autism-vaccine science was all that inconclusive in 2008, though. People knew Andrew Wakefield was a fraud pretty much right away.

I don't think the autism-vaccine science was all that inconclusive in 2008, though. People knew Andrew Wakefield was a fraud pretty much right away.

It was known that vaccines did not cause autism at the time, but it was not understood what caused autism. We're still not all the way there but we're getting better ideas that it relates to things that happen during infant development. Stating "we need to do better research on the causes of autism, but it's not related to vaccines" was a totally appropriate response in the mid-oughts. After the wakefield fraud, as scientists do, they jumped in worldwide to do better versions of that study and evaluate it. By ~2000 it was pretty clear that there were some inaccuracies, within a couple years it had been outright blown away.

I will complain as vehemently, perhaps more so, when a democratic presidential candidate does the anti-vax thing that we've seen twice in 2 days. Hell, you know what, I'll pledge right here any Democrat does the anti-Vax thing I will vote against him or her and strongly consider giving money to opponent. Who's in with me?

I've already said, I'm not even thinking about Christie cause of his dumb comments. Same for Paul. Idiotic.

I've already said, I'm not even thinking about Christie cause of his dumb comments. Same for Paul. Idiotic.

(applauds)

Study: You Can't Change an Anti-Vaxxer's Mind

 

 

Study: You Can't Change an Anti-Vaxxer's Mind

 

Persuasion research is hard to do - at least, if you hope to ever find that someone changed their mind. So, I will say that 1. research will usually underestimate the effectiveness of a persuasive message. But, 2. Research does show pretty convincingly that people with strong opinions about something rarely change their mind, if ever. The goal of someone wishing to persuade is to reach people with unformed or weakly held opinions on a given subject. If you back off of those with strong convictions, you hope that they eventually fall into the weakly held opinion group over the years since they haven't had to defend their stupid ideas in so long.

Didn't I post an article on that study? Did I get balta'd?