this post was submitted on 17 Dec 2024
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[–] Allonzee@lemmy.world 121 points 6 days ago* (last edited 6 days ago) (10 children)

Maybe we're going about this the wrong way. We know what kind of country we live in, a nation of proud, almost patriotic willful ignorance. By design. An laborer ignorant to who is fucking them is a dependable laborer, after all.

So in the spirit of playing to the audience we have, have we tried rebranding the "vaccines" as, and I'm just spitballing here, Freedom Blessings, Robert E Lee Juice, The Joe Rogan Vein Experience, or the Prove You Hate Commies Test?

[–] monotremata@lemmy.ca 48 points 6 days ago (2 children)

I had a thought along the same lines. I was thinking we should coin the term "immunition," and tell people it was a way to arm your immune system to defend itself. It's not even all that misleading.

[–] Cosmonauticus@lemmy.world 10 points 6 days ago (4 children)

I think it has more to do with an authority figure telling them to do something. I think we'd have to distract them like we do children getting a shot. Instead of a toy beer we could use a talking revolver?

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[–] UncleGrandPa@lemmy.world 107 points 6 days ago (2 children)

In 1955... Most people personally knew someone aflicted with polio. They knew how bad it was

[–] SOB_Van_Owen@lemm.ee 56 points 6 days ago (3 children)

In Appalachia, it was unlikely to not know someone on a vent or dead from Covid, yet...

[–] hperrin@lemmy.ca 42 points 6 days ago (14 children)

Fox News tells you not to believe your eyes, and conservatives trust Fox News more than their own eyes.

[–] hume_lemmy@lemmy.ca 23 points 6 days ago

Their final, most essential command.

[–] Notyou@sopuli.xyz 5 points 6 days ago

Why wouldn't they trust Fox News over their own eyes? Fox News is the most trusted name in news. At least that's what the viewers get told when they come back from commercial breaks. It's not like Fox would lie to them. They are the most trusted name in news after all.....

Circular logic at its finest.

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[–] OmegaLemmy@discuss.online 10 points 6 days ago (2 children)

I knew three people who died from COVID and another after they recovered from COVID, unfortunately unless it's their direct family they would just assume 'theyre just making it all out to be covid'

I assume most people would blame social media for this, but here's my c/unpopularopinions take, it's inevitable with a profit oriented news platform, where they try to scaremonger in both 'we are all going to die' and 'government is putting chips in our bloodstream' directions

In other nations, unless a blunder by government policy, they werent as affected by the anti vaccine shenanigans, even though they were as affected by social media and such

[–] Fredselfish@lemmy.world 8 points 6 days ago

Dude my grandmother died of Covid in August pf 2020, and yet my father and his sister who is a nurse and gave her the dease arge to this day weather covid is bullshit or not. AT HER funeral they argued about mask mandates. Maga brains will watch millions die from covid, and polio and still call it fake news.

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[–] GiddyGap@lemm.ee 92 points 6 days ago (2 children)

Quite the difference from how half the US population reacted to a Covid vaccine. The power of political propaganda and social media conspiracy theories.

[–] ThePowerOfGeek@lemmy.world 62 points 6 days ago (3 children)

And how those same people are cheering about Captain Brainworm's intentions to discontinue the polio vaccine.

Behold the power of mass lead poisoning. We truly live in the most stupid timeline.

[–] tempest@lemmy.ca 25 points 6 days ago (2 children)

I think this is just the US returning to its pre super power roots. More and more it seems like the last 80 years were seen exception and now they are returning back to where they were before the world wars.

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[–] tempest@lemmy.ca 17 points 6 days ago (3 children)

I think if COVID was leaving people paralyzed it would never have been what it became. The fallout from COVID was bad but maybe not bad enough.

[–] Maggoty@lemmy.world 21 points 6 days ago* (last edited 6 days ago) (1 children)

I remember semi trailers being used as morgue extensions at hospitals. Every ventilator in the nation being claimed. People rasping out a good bye over FaceTime before going on a ventilator to probably die. It claimed a million people and the only reason that isn't the official number is because Trump and the GOP refused to count the bodies.

It was absolutely bad enough. But humans are capable of great self deception.

[–] schizo@forum.uncomfortable.business 14 points 6 days ago (4 children)

The problem was it was too quick: if you died of COVID, you were dead. You could be memory-holed and everyone would simply forget you and move on.

If you had Polio, though, you were paralyzed and stuck in a metal tube and kept alive.

Can't forget your not-dead kid who lives in a tube, and thus it was treated as more of a thing that should be fought because there was a clear and visible reminder of what this disease was doing to everyone's kids.

If COVID left a couple million people living in tubes, then we absolutely would have treated it differently, but it didn't.

(Alternately, if COVID had killed 10 or 20 million people, we would have also treated it seriously: it just wasn't sufficiently deadly OR left a wake of broken, but living, people.)

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[–] Reygle@lemmy.world 62 points 6 days ago (2 children)

"We're not gonna make it, are we? Humans I mean" -John Connor- Terminator 2

[–] hangman@lemm.ee 43 points 6 days ago

“It’s in your nature to destroy yourselves”

-the terminator

[–] orbitz@lemmy.ca 13 points 6 days ago (2 children)

I could feel my dread go as I heard that lines over the years, as a young teen? Of course we will we always have, we endure. As a middle aged adult? I'm not so sure we aren't going to shove ourselves back to the cave man era and not enough people will listen to anyone with survival knowledge for the species to survive.

Then I think about how many species that must have and will happen to in this vast universe, so we'll probably be an average result heh in the grand scheme of things that is.

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[–] arc@lemm.ee 60 points 6 days ago* (last edited 6 days ago) (1 children)

RFK jr is going to kill and cripple a lot more kids if he gets the chance to. He'll make pretend polio / measles is eradicated and then somebody will get on a plane where there are cases, and it will spread amongst the unvaxxed and kids will die. When this happens he should be charged with negligent homicide but I doubt that will happen.

[–] Carighan@lemmy.world 20 points 6 days ago

But he don't care, because:

  • It mostly kills poor people
  • He is vaccinated
  • His kids are vaccinated
  • He couldn't give any less fucks about people if you paid him for it. And he is being paid to not give a fuck about people's lives.
[–] vrighter@discuss.tchncs.de 25 points 6 days ago

5G hadn't been invented yet. They had nothing to worry about back then.

/s

[–] makyo@lemmy.world 9 points 5 days ago

And then we ingested a bunch of lead through our lungs

[–] KingThrillgore@lemmy.ml 23 points 6 days ago (5 children)

We are entering a stupid age, for which we may never recover.

[–] Allonzee@lemmy.world 14 points 6 days ago* (last edited 6 days ago)

I'd argue we ushered in the Stupid Age in November of 1980.

I agree though, we never recovered.

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[–] FlyingSquid@lemmy.world 21 points 6 days ago (3 children)

On the other hand, half a century earlier-

So I guess the stupid waxes and wanes?

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[–] john89@lemmy.ca 8 points 5 days ago

If anything, this should tell us the trolls won.

Or at least have been more successful then they ever should have been.

[–] GrammarPolice@lemmy.world 18 points 6 days ago (3 children)

Oh how humanity hath fallen

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[–] DarkThoughts@fedia.io 14 points 6 days ago (9 children)

I think social media algorithms have fried people's brains. Imagine we'd ban them, go back to content being kinda diverse and random, without adversaries able to game the system and push massive swaths of propaganda to people. The fact alone that most youths get their news from freaking TicTok of all places...

[–] Pacattack57@lemmy.world 7 points 6 days ago* (last edited 6 days ago) (4 children)

You know your local news network has a TikTok right? There’s nothing wrong with news from social media. The problem is that media is unregulated and people are allowed to lie and pass off that information factual.

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[–] AmidFuror@fedia.io 14 points 6 days ago

Can anyone find independent reports of this massive celebration for the announcement of the results of the Francis Field Trial in 1955?

Edit: Found a Wiki summary

[–] Kolanaki@yiffit.net 11 points 6 days ago (5 children)

Stark contrast to the reaction most people had to the invention of seatbelts in cars.

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[–] yarr@feddit.nl 10 points 6 days ago (1 children)

If the polio vaccine happened today:

"Salk's Menace" Vaccine Spreads Fear

As the nation's newly adopted vaccine against poliomyelitis, the inactivated poliovirus (IPV) shot, began to circulate, reports of its alleged dangers were already being touted by concerned citizens.

"This is just another example of Big Pharma trying to control our bodies," declared Agnes Johnson, a local mother of five, who claimed she had "lived" with the symptoms of the vaccine. "I've been hearing stories from friends and family of children who suffered from 'long-term' effects" from receiving the shot.

At a recent public health meeting in Brooklyn, Dr. John Smith, a prominent anti-vaxxer, presented his research on what he called "the true story" behind the IPV. He alleged that Salk had "tainted" the vaccine with experimental ingredients, and that the vaccine was being aggressively pushed by government agencies to cover up its supposedly disastrous effects.

"I've seen patients come in with symptoms that were clearly caused by the 'new' shot," Dr. Smith said, his voice filled with conviction. "We're being told it's just a minor risk, but I'm telling you, this is not safe."

As the vaccine continued to gain acceptance across the country, another vocal critic, Rev. John Williams, took to the pulpit to warn of the alleged dangers of mass vaccination. "We are being herded onto the 'tragedy' of the Salk shot," he declared to a packed church. "We must stand up against this medical monolith and reject the experimental treatments."

Meanwhile, health officials were left scrambling to address the growing public outcry, as reported cases of vaccine-induced illness began to rise. As the nation's top medical leaders struggled to counter the growing misinformation, Dr. Salk himself was quick to respond. "The science is on our side," he said in a recent press conference. "We are confident that our vaccine will do more good than harm."

Despite this reassurance, anti-vaxxers remained resolute in their claims of a government-led conspiracy, citing the supposedly "mysterious" circumstances surrounding the vaccine's development and distribution.

As the debate over the new vaccine continues to rage, one thing is certain: the battle over public health will not be won by the voices of reason, but by the loudest and most fervent of critics. The true story of Salk's menance is just beginning to emerge – stay tuned for further updates.

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