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Or is it more about being corrupted by false information on social media? I know some anti vaxxers and it feels charitable to them to say its because they analy

Or is it more about being corrupted by false information on social media? I know some anti vaxxers and it feels charitable to them to say its because they analyzed and studied healthcare and therefore mistrust its vaccines. Rather, the occams razor is that they are just wrong and misled. They got into anti vax propaganda on FB or elsewhere, its straight misinformation, feeling of parental superiority, and conspiracy thinking. Given they hold numerous false views about vaccines like risks with autism and arsenic, its clearly bad information that is virally infecting people via social media. And downvoted for disagreeing civilly, have to love it, is this reddit?

dmix 7y ago
I find it weird how everyone wants to blame social media for all of our problems. Like there wasn't dumb pseudoscience and conspiracies being spread constantly and fringe political groups before Twitter. I have a feeling it's because it's an obvious change so everyone blames the surface level platforms (like they blamed TV and video games in the past). Which then offers them an easy "solution" to censor our way out of them as a panacea and then they can blame the tech companies and regulators and politicians for not “doing something” to make humans less dumb. Editorializing hundreds of millions of people’s daily thoughts and opinions on our way to utopia!
- JeanMarcS 7y ago
  I think it’s more about speed. The speed of spreading information, true or false, in social medias. And sadly my own experience suggests that false informations spread way faster.
wozniacki 7y ago
How would you then explain well-to-do parents -- not to mention with reputations to protect -- coming out in opposition to the way vaccines are administered and the current vaccine regime in general? [1] [2] What do they possibly have to gain from taking these adversarial positions in such hotly contested issues? Is it really possible that they are grossly misinformed too? These people have the net worth to wholly forsake raising their kids here and picking some foreign domicile that offers them choice in these vaccination issues. [1] Robert De Niro and RFK Jr. have joined forces to push vaccine nonsense https://www.vox.com/2017/2/15/14622632/robert-de-niro-rfk-jr-vaccine-press-conference https://www.vox.com/2017/2/15/14622632/robert-de-niro-rfk-jr... [2] Jessica Biel Weighs In on Vaccine Fight, Drawing Fierce Pushback https://www.nytimes.com/2019/06/13/us/jessica-biel-anti-vaxx-california.html https://www.nytimes.com/2019/06/13/us/jessica-biel-anti-vaxx...
- ianai 7y ago
  I was particularly annoyed when I found out vaccines sometimes use Aluminium to kick up the immune system. I don’t know how widespread the use was or is, but that certainly didn’t help. I don’t want a heavy metal added to my body...edit-see my comment below, this is false There’s a certain power and thus seduction to just claiming you know something other people don’t know. There will always be dissension for the sake of dissent.
  - hhas01 7y ago
    Aluminium is a “heavy metal”? Delete your account, you scientific illiterate.
  - ianai 7y ago
    Correction/TIL-per google, aluminum does eventually get removed from the body. Now I know.
    - arbitrary_name 7y ago
      Unfortunately, you didn’t check whether you opinion had any basis in fact prior to sharing it. That is part of the problem. At least you are willing to acknowledge it, but most aren’t. So here we are.
      - ianai 7y ago
        Please review the HN guidelines.
    - hhas01 7y ago
      Well isn’t that fortunate, seeing as aluminium is only the third most common element in the Earth’s crust and so everywhere you go you’re already exposed to it every day of your life; in the food you eat, in the dust you breathe, in the cuts on your knees from playing in the dirt like a regular child. And, just like every other element/compound (cyanide, lead, water, oxygen, and so on) which your body encounters, Al will have toxic effects at sufficiently high levels, so evolution has developed numerous mechanisms for excreting it before it ever reaches harmful levels. Ironically, Al is added to vaccines as an adjuvant, thus reducing the amount of antigens needed to provide an effective dose. And the quantity of Al used is tiny; less than what babby is already exposed to through the environment. So you’d think that “vaccine-concerned” parents would be all for something that actually reduces exposure to active ingredients. But as we’ve seen again and again, your average anti-vaxxer doesn’t know biochemistry, epidemiology, and risk-vs-benefit calculations from a kick to the head; though that’s hardly surprising for a bunch of malignant narcissists all pathologically incapable of counting beyond One.
spaginal 7y ago
Did social media cause the distrust, or did the distrust already exist and social media simply validated those concerns when they saw many others shared the same concerns? It is easy to blame this on Facebook or Twitter, it feels neat and concise. The reality is the concerns already existed outside social media, and the medical community and companies were not addressing these concerns adequately. Hence, we are where we are at now.
- base698 7y ago
  The medium is the message. TV news results in news becoming pageant hair, red dresses, and flag waving graphics. TV changed what it meant to be informed and the end state was what we have now. It's easy to see that the social medium will and did change the message. It also changes what it means to be informed, but in a different way than TV did. If we are the media does that mean it changes the form of what it means to be person and social life?

dmix 7y ago

I find it weird how everyone wants to blame social media for all of our problems. Like there wasn't dumb pseudoscience and conspiracies being spread constantly and fringe political groups before Twitter. I have a feeling it's because it's an obvious change so everyone blames the surface level platforms (like they blamed TV and video games in the past). Which then offers them an easy "solution" to censor our way out of them as a panacea and then they can blame the tech companies and regulators and politicians for not “doing something” to make humans less dumb. Editorializing hundreds of millions of people’s daily thoughts and opinions on our way to utopia!

JeanMarcS 7y ago
I think it’s more about speed. The speed of spreading information, true or false, in social medias. And sadly my own experience suggests that false informations spread way faster.

wozniacki 7y ago

How would you then explain well-to-do parents -- not to mention with reputations to protect -- coming out in opposition to the way vaccines are administered and the current vaccine regime in general? [1] [2] What do they possibly have to gain from taking these adversarial positions in such hotly contested issues? Is it really possible that they are grossly misinformed too? These people have the net worth to wholly forsake raising their kids here and picking some foreign domicile that offers them choice in these vaccination issues. [1] Robert De Niro and RFK Jr. have joined forces to push vaccine nonsense https://www.vox.com/2017/2/15/14622632/robert-de-niro-rfk-jr-vaccine-press-conference https://www.vox.com/2017/2/15/14622632/robert-de-niro-rfk-jr... [2] Jessica Biel Weighs In on Vaccine Fight, Drawing Fierce Pushback https://www.nytimes.com/2019/06/13/us/jessica-biel-anti-vaxx-california.html https://www.nytimes.com/2019/06/13/us/jessica-biel-anti-vaxx...

ianai 7y ago
I was particularly annoyed when I found out vaccines sometimes use Aluminium to kick up the immune system. I don’t know how widespread the use was or is, but that certainly didn’t help. I don’t want a heavy metal added to my body...edit-see my comment below, this is false There’s a certain power and thus seduction to just claiming you know something other people don’t know. There will always be dissension for the sake of dissent.
- hhas01 7y ago
  Aluminium is a “heavy metal”? Delete your account, you scientific illiterate.
- ianai 7y ago
  Correction/TIL-per google, aluminum does eventually get removed from the body. Now I know.
  - arbitrary_name 7y ago
    Unfortunately, you didn’t check whether you opinion had any basis in fact prior to sharing it. That is part of the problem. At least you are willing to acknowledge it, but most aren’t. So here we are.
    - ianai 7y ago
      Please review the HN guidelines.
  - hhas01 7y ago
    Well isn’t that fortunate, seeing as aluminium is only the third most common element in the Earth’s crust and so everywhere you go you’re already exposed to it every day of your life; in the food you eat, in the dust you breathe, in the cuts on your knees from playing in the dirt like a regular child. And, just like every other element/compound (cyanide, lead, water, oxygen, and so on) which your body encounters, Al will have toxic effects at sufficiently high levels, so evolution has developed numerous mechanisms for excreting it before it ever reaches harmful levels. Ironically, Al is added to vaccines as an adjuvant, thus reducing the amount of antigens needed to provide an effective dose. And the quantity of Al used is tiny; less than what babby is already exposed to through the environment. So you’d think that “vaccine-concerned” parents would be all for something that actually reduces exposure to active ingredients. But as we’ve seen again and again, your average anti-vaxxer doesn’t know biochemistry, epidemiology, and risk-vs-benefit calculations from a kick to the head; though that’s hardly surprising for a bunch of malignant narcissists all pathologically incapable of counting beyond One.

spaginal 7y ago

Did social media cause the distrust, or did the distrust already exist and social media simply validated those concerns when they saw many others shared the same concerns? It is easy to blame this on Facebook or Twitter, it feels neat and concise. The reality is the concerns already existed outside social media, and the medical community and companies were not addressing these concerns adequately. Hence, we are where we are at now.

base698 7y ago
The medium is the message. TV news results in news becoming pageant hair, red dresses, and flag waving graphics. TV changed what it meant to be informed and the end state was what we have now. It's easy to see that the social medium will and did change the message. It also changes what it means to be informed, but in a different way than TV did. If we are the media does that mean it changes the form of what it means to be person and social life?