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He didn't lose his life because of a belief in the flat earth. He lost his life because he was a daredevil. His use of the flat earth meme for promotional pu

He didn't lose his life because of a belief in the flat earth. He lost his life because he was a daredevil. His use of the flat earth meme for promotional purposes is incidental to his death. Furthermore if a few nutjobs on the fringes of society believing silly shit is genuinely a threat to society, then society must be fragile beyond belief. I reject this.

ssklash 7y ago
There have been measles outbreaks and other outbreaks of essentially eradicated diseases because of anti-vaxers. They are no longer simply fringe, and they do pose a real threat to society. A rejection of science, facts, and reason that can be spread instantly over the Internet resulting in something like the possible compromise of herd immunity to solved diseases is a huge problem. How does society continue if it is not based on facts and reason? One person, sure, no big deal. But who would have guessed a hundred years ago people would seriously consider the earth was flat in the numbers that people seem to today?
- swamp40 7y ago
  100 years ago, we believed that people were only ignorant because of their lack of available access to information and knowledge. Now, of course, we know better...
- catalogia 7y ago
  If you need to jump through so many levels of indirection to explain why a silly daredevil is a threat to society, maybe you should ease the fuck up and stop celebrating the man's death. Mike Hughes' share of the blame for measles outbreaks is immeasurable small and indirect compared to people like Oprah.
  - stan_rogers 7y ago
    They're the same idiots. I can't stress that strongly enough. Spend some time actually watching what they're doing and learning who they are.
stan_rogers 7y ago
They're the same stock as anti-vaxxers, young Earth creationists and so forth; there's a lot of cross-pollenation. You're seeing perhaps the silliest blip on the radar, the most reflective peak, and ignoring the huge iceberg of harmful ignorance and reactionary anti-science it represents.
- ssklash 7y ago
  This. These people vote. If the people they want to elect share even a few of their anti-science, essentially anti-reality views, that affects us all negatively. Political party doesn't even come into it, since any politician not operating based on reality is a horrible outcome. Politics has enough theories and things reasonable people can disagree on without having to debate science from hundreds of years ago.
  - catalogia 7y ago
    There are no flat earth politicians getting elected. You are grossly exaggerating the harm a flat earther stuntman has caused by lumping him in with other people who believe and did other things. It's disgusting. What's next, blaming your neighborhood moon landing denialist for global warming? Get a grip.

ssklash 7y ago

There have been measles outbreaks and other outbreaks of essentially eradicated diseases because of anti-vaxers. They are no longer simply fringe, and they do pose a real threat to society. A rejection of science, facts, and reason that can be spread instantly over the Internet resulting in something like the possible compromise of herd immunity to solved diseases is a huge problem. How does society continue if it is not based on facts and reason? One person, sure, no big deal. But who would have guessed a hundred years ago people would seriously consider the earth was flat in the numbers that people seem to today?

swamp40 7y ago
100 years ago, we believed that people were only ignorant because of their lack of available access to information and knowledge. Now, of course, we know better...
catalogia 7y ago
If you need to jump through so many levels of indirection to explain why a silly daredevil is a threat to society, maybe you should ease the fuck up and stop celebrating the man's death. Mike Hughes' share of the blame for measles outbreaks is immeasurable small and indirect compared to people like Oprah.
- stan_rogers 7y ago
  They're the same idiots. I can't stress that strongly enough. Spend some time actually watching what they're doing and learning who they are.

stan_rogers 7y ago

They're the same stock as anti-vaxxers, young Earth creationists and so forth; there's a lot of cross-pollenation. You're seeing perhaps the silliest blip on the radar, the most reflective peak, and ignoring the huge iceberg of harmful ignorance and reactionary anti-science it represents.

ssklash 7y ago
This. These people vote. If the people they want to elect share even a few of their anti-science, essentially anti-reality views, that affects us all negatively. Political party doesn't even come into it, since any politician not operating based on reality is a horrible outcome. Politics has enough theories and things reasonable people can disagree on without having to debate science from hundreds of years ago.
- catalogia 7y ago
  There are no flat earth politicians getting elected. You are grossly exaggerating the harm a flat earther stuntman has caused by lumping him in with other people who believe and did other things. It's disgusting. What's next, blaming your neighborhood moon landing denialist for global warming? Get a grip.