The Unfortunate Stubbornness of Most Anti-Vaxxers .
I recently wrote a post about the anti-vaccine movement. Shortly after writing that post I wanted to also explain that not all anti-vaxxers are terrible people. Some are loving parents that have gone above and beyond for their children. Some have experienced unfortunate hardships and are not intentionally seeking harm; they’ve only been dangerously misled. And too often, their misunderstanding leads to inappropriate stubbornness.
COVID vaccine disclaimer as of 2/22/22:
I feel it necessary to say that the Anti-Vaxxers and Anti-Vaccine Movement that I am referencing in this article have nothing to do with the more recent COVID-19 vaccine and its proponents and/or opponents. I generally try to avoid inserting my political views on this blog so I will just say this: In general, I am for the COVID-19 vaccine and I recommend it for anyone it’s available to. However, I personally do not consider those hesitant of or against the COVID-19 vaccine the same as traditional Anti-Vaxxers. If you would like to know my personal opinions regarding COVID-19 vaccine hesitancy and such, let’s eat a meal and hang out in person. 🙂
An Experience
Imagine this: you and your spouse are finally having a child! Y’all would do anything for your child. You are going the extra mile to make sure they have everything they need and more. They are doing great! At 12 months your pediatrician, who you trust, recommends a vaccine to nearly guarantee your child does not get certain life threatening diseases. So you vaccinate your child. It’s cheap and easy, a no brainer.
In the following months, you begin to notice that there’s something unique happening with your child. They aren’t progressing quite as fast as they were previously. They’re no longer reaching all the developmental milestone markers at the appropriate times. It’s not that everything is off, just the sense that maybe they are missing or struggling with certain things. It’s not a big deal though; every child is unique, and yours has everything they need to excel.
Fast-forward 1-2 years, and this trend seems to have continued. You keep expecting them to catch up to their peers. But they don’t. Eventually, your pediatrician officially diagnoses them with autism. This is so helpful! You have begun to understand more and more about your child, and you now have some concrete ideas of how to best care for them. But you start to wonder.
Was there anything you could have done differently or better? As you think back you realize that things began to change soon after you had your child vaccinated with the MMR vaccine. Prior to that there was no evidence of any issue. A quick internet search shows that you’re not the only parent with this experience. In fact, many people say that the MMR vaccine is dangerous for your child.
Then the guilt sets in.
You trusted your pediatrician. You agreed to have your child vaccinated. You were so careful about everything. If only you had known. If only you had researched this as much as you did other things. If only…
You love your child. It’s not that they have autism; it’s that you did something that caused it. You wanted to give them the best life possible. That’s still totally possible, only they may have a few more challenges than the average joe along the way. You feel responsible because you believe those challenges could have been avoided.
A Reasonable Response
The more you search online for answers the more concerned you become about not only the MMR vaccine, but all the other vaccines we stab our children with. There’s a lot of “evidence” that these vaccines are not as safe for our children as you were told. Especially when their bodies can gain immunity naturally anyway (explained in this post). You’re not sure who to trust. But you definitely will not be giving vaccines to your next child. In fact, everyone should be warned against the dangers of vaccinations! Someone needs to speak up for our children about this.
You’re joining the Anti-Vaccine Movement.
The Problem
Up until this point, I have no issue with the person in the example above. This person clearly cares for and loves their child. Who could fault them? Many of these parents unfortunately jump off the deep end here. Without much discernment, they listen to unreliable sources and decide that vaccines are dangerous. Therefore, they seek further information to confirm their conclusion. This is a bad way to seek the truth and leads further down the anti-vaccine conspiracy rabbit hole. The problem is that this has dangerous real world implications.
Reliable science is done by trying to prove yourself wrong, not trying to prove yourself right.
We do this with a little thing called “The Null Hypothesis.”
Searching for more evidence that we are correct sets us up for being biased towards evidence that confirms our suspicion. This is something called “confirmation bias,” and it’s something to avoid if you’re looking for the truth.
The problem with anti-vaxxers is that they embrace confirmation bias. They continue to seek out information to confirm their theories, but ignore or discount any evidence that proves them wrong. If you are unwilling to try to prove your theory wrong, that makes for a pretty weak argument.
Those in the anti-vaccine movement do not try to prove themselves wrong. In contrast, the pro-vaccine community has tried hard to prove itself wrong and has failed over and over again. That makes for a strong pro-vaccine argument.
If the pro-vaccine community is correct (or cannot be proven wrong), then that’s a BIG DEAL. It means that the anti-vaccine movement is much more dangerous than a simple disagreement.
Why we’re “harsh” toward anti-vaxxers
To be clear, I think most anti-vaxxers really do love their children. They truly care about doing what’s best not only for their child, but for everyone’s children. Unfortunately they have been misled and misinformed. That’s not their fault, but again that’s not the problem. The problem is that often they become unwilling to change their mind, be proven wrong, or consider the truth when they find it. The more rational the rest of the world is, and the more hard evidence showing the safety of vaccines, the more volatile, irrational, and rude anti-vaxxers become. Presumably because there’s no reliable evidence to support their claims, they must resort to a yelling match.
I’m going to give them the benefit of the doubt that they become so angry because they truly care about and want what’s best for our children and not because of a personal ego problem or a need to have something to blame. Whatever the case, they are objectively wrong, and unfortunately support the harming of many children rather than helping them. Just because I think the earth is flat, and even have some evidence of such, does not make it true.
The anti-vaccine movement harms children. There’s no rational way to deny that. And that is why it’s a problem. Despite attempts to discuss and think rationally about the question at hand, many anti-vaxxers make it clear that they are unwilling to consider that they may be wrong. Being unwilling to try and prove yourself wrong makes for a tough sell when we are looking for the truth.
Remember that many anti-vaxxers are parents that love their children dearly and are possibly dealing with, or have dealt with, very difficult situations. Wherever and whenever we can, we should to assist them, bear their burdens, and treat them with grace and sympathy. I’m just afraid they have chosen to stop looking for the correct answer when it comes to vaccines, and there’s nothing more we can do to help with that. That’s why we’ve moved on. We simply can’t support a lie that will only result in harming more people. Anti-vaxxers have made clear that they are not interested in the truth, only in fake science that unfortunately hurts children.
P.S. In this post I use the word “prove” a few times. If we are being technical, that word is usually avoided in science. Even if I’m 99.9999% confident of something, that doesn’t prove it to be true. So if anyone with a scientific background is reading this and the word “prove” makes you twitch a little, I understand. 🤓
Learn more, stay humble.
TL;DR: Many anti-vaxxers are loving parents that have unfortunately experienced many hardships. However, they are often close-minded, unwilling to consider that they may be wrong, and choose to ignore the truth that vaccines are undeniably safe.
