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Vaccine skepticism isn’t so much about vaccines per se, it’s following a small movement that grew organically and fanning the flames instead of letting it die in obscurity. The purpose here is using it as a vehicle for promoting skepticism of tried and true science.
What’s the greatest enemy of authority? Tried and true facts with no room for dispute. By effectively undermining vaccines, the way is paved to continue to sow doubt and skepticism for other science, making it easier to dispute facts that can and will undermine authority without thus skepticism.
Yes, the added benefit is population control and distraction. If people are sicker and more financially blown up by medical bills they’re far too busy and demoralized to engage in revolution. And there’s less of them due to death. Brain fog from long COVID is beneficial as well.
In addition, they can pocket the funding that would otherwise go to vaccine programs.
It’s perfect, from an authoritarian viewpoint.
The people I would fear the most would be those with nothing to lose.
Which is most of the population at this point. I think this will probably end up being a reminder of the old saying, "Don't count your chickens before they hatch."
That’s a fair point, but how many terminal cancer patients have you seen make headlines for Luigi style acts?
One of the more interesting points of that odd but good Stewart podcast in which he, a historian who studies revolutions, and the writer of Andor discussed re revolutions is how often things don’t happen even when all the formulaic boxes are checked. There is a list, a recipe, for revolution, but even when all the ingredients are there; it often fizzles.
Same thing regarding what you’re saying, I think.
100%.
It also is one of the conspiracy theories that cross party lines.
The youtuber/failed mythbuster Allen Pan did a video where he made a "vaccine gun" that turned into him being terrified of angering his black camera woman and it turning into a heartfelt video where they both go to "the rich white people CVS" to get their vaccines.
And ignoring that he is a piece of shit with borderline minstrel tendencies, it also kind of summed up a lot of what we saw in 2020/2021. We have a fucking miracle cure that can fix society! A bunch of idiots refuse to get vaccinated. So people decide to clown on them.
Oh shit! We are all racist assholes and the real villains because of the Tuskegee Experiment over 50 years ago! Okay, SOME people have very valid reasons for not getting vaccinated but only them. Fuck, Willowbrook back in the 60s? And Guatemala in the 40s?
Okay... people are allowed to not want to get vaccinated, I guess? And fuck anyone who is immunocompromised or otherwise at risk because they are also racists for caring about living?
And it also "helps" that it plays into the focused effort to vilify academics that we have seen, fairly globally, since the mid-late 20th century.
And, don't get me wrong, absolutely nobody deserves to be in an unethical human experimentation. But... if people actually research the history of medicine they would never want to let any doctor even look at them. Except... that isn't the case. Because, yeah, some REAL fucking evil happened and so has a lot of gross incompetence. Medicine learns from that and actually has philosophical discussions so that even borderline stuff never happens again.