16 ms·

How American conservatives turned against the vaccine

29 points by shankr 5y ago

commandlinefan 5y ago
Well, they spent a year telling us that no vaccine had ever been developed in less than 5 years and that Trump’s promises of a vaccine in less than a year were impossible. Then, within a month of the election, they said it had been developed and was perfectly safe. There’s some call for skepticism here.
- detaro 5y ago
  That's just bullshit framing. The vaccines did not suddenly appear out of nowhere after the election, and "it can't be done" was not a widespread opinion up until then.
- edmcnulty101 5y ago
  Not to mention the FDA fighting to releasing the data it used to authorize the vaccine. If that doesn't trigger a red flag then don't know what will.
  - tzs 5y ago
    They aren't fighting releasing the data. They are fighting spending the massive amount of money it would take to release it quicker than normal. The requested data includes a lot of protected patient medical information that must be redacted and that isn't even needed to independently check on the government's evaluation and decision making in approving the vaccines. Why would they have collected that information if it wasn't needed, you might wonder. Simple, it is information that is needed if something bad happens during the trial such as a lot of bad side effects. If the requestors limited their request to what they actually need for what they are claiming they want to do it would go a lot faster. Instead they are making a massively over broad request in bad faith.
jleyank 5y ago
Covid was not serious enough to trigger self-defence. Therefore, politics and economics overruled health. That or basic heartlessness.
- shankr 5y ago
  I just found the video itself quite high-quality. Even though it affirms lot of what we already know but in a more researched nuanced way. Also let's see how long it lasts here before getting flagged.
  - ZeroGravitas 5y ago
    The potholer54 channel on YouTube has a lot of content by a conservative science journalist, trying to get through to more science skeptical conservatives. He has a playlist on COVID. I watched more of his climate related stuff, but that was really good in terms of looking at the reality of things, reading citations on papers and such: https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PL82yk73N8eoWneZjR0wiidhGkAMOeIYAS https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PL82yk73N8eoWneZjR0wiidhGk... The final video in particular, titled "Do you get it now? Why scientific reality doesn't care about your politics" is a good summary.
- civilized 5y ago
  I think this is right. It can also be put in terms of near/far thinking systems [1]. If something isn't serious enough to make you worry about yourself, it fails to trigger your near mode of cognition, which considers evidence in a more contextually sensitive way and allows for the possibility of deviations from your prior expectations. This leaves the entire topic to the far mode, which relies more on broad themes and trends and is more concerned with social image. [1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Construal_level_theory https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Construal_level_theory
joelbondurant4 5y ago
h2odragon 5y ago
When the talking heads went from "the vaccines are rushed for political reasons" before the election, to "the vaccines are super effective, lets mandate their use" ... that showed pretty clearly that the politics were overriding any science. Changing the definitions of "vaccination" and "vaccine effectiveness" to keep the narrative going wasn't great for anyone's credibility either.
- melling 5y ago
  I suppose if people could provide actual quotes of people, rather than “let me tell you what people said”, we could have a better discussion. I’ve found that people tend to take comments completely out of context for political reasons.
- _23sd 5y ago
  As the video points out (7:50), 40% of conservatives were already saying they wouldn't get a hypothetical vaccine as early as May 2020, well before the election and before there was any certainty about effectiveness. Public health authorities have made a lot of bad mistakes in talking about vaccination but it seems to have only given people materials to build justification for their already-entrenched views.
- HWR_14 5y ago
  > When the talking heads went from "the vaccines are rushed for political reasons" before the election, to "the vaccines are super effective, lets mandate their use" That never happened. There were worries before the vaccine was released that it would be rushed for political reasons. That went away long before the election. > Changing the definitions of "vaccination" and "vaccine effectiveness" That never happened. Some right-wing "news" people said that they did. But they were paraphrasing and (mis)interpreting what people were saying specifically to pretend they were shifting definitions. (I used never, when I mean "no significant instances". I'm sure some random talking head in a third-tier market or maybe even an isolated case of someone with a national microphone said something dumb.)
  - systemvoltage 5y ago
joelbondurant0 5y ago
honkdaddy 5y ago
My perception, as someone with a fair amount of southern, conservative friends, is that the American progressive left absolutely did this to themselves. I distinctly remember many of my progressive friends urging others to never take the “Trump Vaccine”. Wildly, 6 months later when it was actually available, it became the Fauci vaccine and those same people said anyone who wasn’t getting it was a racist or a nazi. If you were vaccine hesitant going into it, this profound and entirely political change of heart from across the aisle probably just solidified your sneaking suspicion that there was something “they” weren’t telling you.
- giraffe_lady 5y ago
  - honkdaddy 5y ago
    I'm not sure who you think you're talking about, giraffe_lady. I'm not a "personality responsibility fetishist" whatever that might be. That's the type of language that does well on reddit, but people here don't love those kind of flamebaity remarks. I'm a liberal centrist Canadian who has the privilege to observe American politics from afar without getting too invested. I just call it as I see it.
    - giraffe_lady 5y ago
      No, you are advancing a right wing position while trying to distance yourself from the political alignment that represents and got mad I called you on it. The reasons for the quick and pervasive spread of anti-vax positions on the right are complex and nuanced but "it's just a reasonable response to things progressive say" is so insufficient an explanation it's comical. Like it doesn't hold up to even a couple seconds of scrutiny, so there must be some other reason you're presenting it?
- shankr 5y ago
  > My perception, as someone with a fair amount of southern, conservative friends, is that the American progressive left absolutely did this to themselves. I mean reading the facebook posts of your conservative friends will definitely affirm that fact. Even conservatives in this video admitted "algorithm" influenced their decision making. So many data and evidence in the video talks about how the conservatives were highly skeptical of hypothetical vaccine. This was also due to the kind of media they consume(d). After ignoring all that evidence, you direct all the blame on progressive left. Don't you see the pattern?
blibble 5y ago
extremely pleased this didn't happen in the UK our ruling right wing party (arguably to the left of the Democrats) have been heavily pushing for everyone to get their 3rd jab now for months the universal trust of the state run NHS ("socialised medicine") also having a vast, vast impact (certainly more than the politicians)
- lern_too_spel 5y ago
  Meanwhile, the intellectuals of America's right wing party are calling people who encourage others to get vaccinated government propagandists[1] and shilling cryptocurrencies[2]. This guy studied at Princeton and Harvard. He knows what he is doing. [1] https://mobile.twitter.com/tedcruz/status/1457108504498642953 https://mobile.twitter.com/tedcruz/status/145710850449864295... [2] https://mobile.twitter.com/tedcruz/status/1497031845984227328 https://mobile.twitter.com/tedcruz/status/149703184598422732...
civilized 5y ago
It's really interesting to me how so many people, including in these comments, instantly decided that the vaccine was untrustworthy based on politics, and just... left it at that. Even though their own lives were on the line in many cases. Why would you let blind trust or distrust in some political talking heads determine whether you, yourself, live or die? ... Why not check out the evidence for yourself, or talk to your doctor? Even after watching people die terrible deaths regretting their choice not to get the vaccine, they're still rationalizing this choice based on politics. I guess if the Red Tribe says something is bad, one must believe it as a matter of identity in the Red Tribe? Even at the cost of one's own life? Maybe the trust in the tribe's information sources is so absolute that it would never occur to a member to seek out potentially contrary sources? This is definitely not just a Red Tribe problem, but it's one of the most tragic and pathetic manifestations I've ever seen. For more information on this phenomenon, I highly recommend this introduction to "coalitional instincts" https://www.edge.org/response-detail/27168 https://www.edge.org/response-detail/27168
- ZeroGravitas 5y ago
  There was a recent story that detailed red areas needing to provide places where people could be vaccinated in private so other people couldn't see them 'breaking' the tribes rules. Similar to that joke about taking two Baptists fishing, because if you only take one, they'll drink all your beer. There was also the weird finding that the better educated a Republican was about climate change, the more their opinion diverged from the science. The conclusion was that just as a nerdy religious person might know all the obscure rules better than an average person, scientifically literate Republicans could list all the correct talking points better because they understood them more.
  - civilized 5y ago
    It all makes me wonder, what is to be done? Is there any way to cut through this instinct to believe tribal bullshit? Are there examples of people doing it successfully in the past? What was their playbook? Can the same tricks work in today's information environment?
edmcnulty101 5y ago
They should change the word conservative to the phrase "people who look at statistics". For most age groups dying in a car accident is a bigger risk than COVID. Trusting ones immune system over a novel substance with unknown long term effect is a reasonable position. What's really odd is that the FDA is fighting to release the data they used to authorize the vaccine.
- joelbondurant3 5y ago
joelbondurant3 5y ago

29 points by shankr 5y ago

Well, they spent a year telling us that no vaccine had ever been developed in less than 5 years and that Trump’s promises of a vaccine in less than a year were impossible. Then, within a month of the election, they said it had been developed and was perfectly safe. There’s some call for skepticism here.

detaro 5y ago
That's just bullshit framing. The vaccines did not suddenly appear out of nowhere after the election, and "it can't be done" was not a widespread opinion up until then.
edmcnulty101 5y ago
Not to mention the FDA fighting to releasing the data it used to authorize the vaccine. If that doesn't trigger a red flag then don't know what will.
- tzs 5y ago
  They aren't fighting releasing the data. They are fighting spending the massive amount of money it would take to release it quicker than normal. The requested data includes a lot of protected patient medical information that must be redacted and that isn't even needed to independently check on the government's evaluation and decision making in approving the vaccines. Why would they have collected that information if it wasn't needed, you might wonder. Simple, it is information that is needed if something bad happens during the trial such as a lot of bad side effects. If the requestors limited their request to what they actually need for what they are claiming they want to do it would go a lot faster. Instead they are making a massively over broad request in bad faith.

jleyank 5y ago

Covid was not serious enough to trigger self-defence. Therefore, politics and economics overruled health. That or basic heartlessness.

shankr 5y ago
I just found the video itself quite high-quality. Even though it affirms lot of what we already know but in a more researched nuanced way. Also let's see how long it lasts here before getting flagged.
- ZeroGravitas 5y ago
  The potholer54 channel on YouTube has a lot of content by a conservative science journalist, trying to get through to more science skeptical conservatives. He has a playlist on COVID. I watched more of his climate related stuff, but that was really good in terms of looking at the reality of things, reading citations on papers and such: https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PL82yk73N8eoWneZjR0wiidhGkAMOeIYAS https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PL82yk73N8eoWneZjR0wiidhGk... The final video in particular, titled "Do you get it now? Why scientific reality doesn't care about your politics" is a good summary.
civilized 5y ago
I think this is right. It can also be put in terms of near/far thinking systems [1]. If something isn't serious enough to make you worry about yourself, it fails to trigger your near mode of cognition, which considers evidence in a more contextually sensitive way and allows for the possibility of deviations from your prior expectations. This leaves the entire topic to the far mode, which relies more on broad themes and trends and is more concerned with social image. [1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Construal_level_theory https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Construal_level_theory

joelbondurant4 5y ago

h2odragon 5y ago

When the talking heads went from "the vaccines are rushed for political reasons" before the election, to "the vaccines are super effective, lets mandate their use" ... that showed pretty clearly that the politics were overriding any science. Changing the definitions of "vaccination" and "vaccine effectiveness" to keep the narrative going wasn't great for anyone's credibility either.

melling 5y ago
I suppose if people could provide actual quotes of people, rather than “let me tell you what people said”, we could have a better discussion. I’ve found that people tend to take comments completely out of context for political reasons.
_23sd 5y ago
As the video points out (7:50), 40% of conservatives were already saying they wouldn't get a hypothetical vaccine as early as May 2020, well before the election and before there was any certainty about effectiveness. Public health authorities have made a lot of bad mistakes in talking about vaccination but it seems to have only given people materials to build justification for their already-entrenched views.
HWR_14 5y ago
> When the talking heads went from "the vaccines are rushed for political reasons" before the election, to "the vaccines are super effective, lets mandate their use" That never happened. There were worries before the vaccine was released that it would be rushed for political reasons. That went away long before the election. > Changing the definitions of "vaccination" and "vaccine effectiveness" That never happened. Some right-wing "news" people said that they did. But they were paraphrasing and (mis)interpreting what people were saying specifically to pretend they were shifting definitions. (I used never, when I mean "no significant instances". I'm sure some random talking head in a third-tier market or maybe even an isolated case of someone with a national microphone said something dumb.)
- systemvoltage 5y ago

joelbondurant0 5y ago

honkdaddy 5y ago

My perception, as someone with a fair amount of southern, conservative friends, is that the American progressive left absolutely did this to themselves. I distinctly remember many of my progressive friends urging others to never take the “Trump Vaccine”. Wildly, 6 months later when it was actually available, it became the Fauci vaccine and those same people said anyone who wasn’t getting it was a racist or a nazi. If you were vaccine hesitant going into it, this profound and entirely political change of heart from across the aisle probably just solidified your sneaking suspicion that there was something “they” weren’t telling you.

giraffe_lady 5y ago
- honkdaddy 5y ago
  I'm not sure who you think you're talking about, giraffe_lady. I'm not a "personality responsibility fetishist" whatever that might be. That's the type of language that does well on reddit, but people here don't love those kind of flamebaity remarks. I'm a liberal centrist Canadian who has the privilege to observe American politics from afar without getting too invested. I just call it as I see it.
  - giraffe_lady 5y ago
    No, you are advancing a right wing position while trying to distance yourself from the political alignment that represents and got mad I called you on it. The reasons for the quick and pervasive spread of anti-vax positions on the right are complex and nuanced but "it's just a reasonable response to things progressive say" is so insufficient an explanation it's comical. Like it doesn't hold up to even a couple seconds of scrutiny, so there must be some other reason you're presenting it?
shankr 5y ago
> My perception, as someone with a fair amount of southern, conservative friends, is that the American progressive left absolutely did this to themselves. I mean reading the facebook posts of your conservative friends will definitely affirm that fact. Even conservatives in this video admitted "algorithm" influenced their decision making. So many data and evidence in the video talks about how the conservatives were highly skeptical of hypothetical vaccine. This was also due to the kind of media they consume(d). After ignoring all that evidence, you direct all the blame on progressive left. Don't you see the pattern?

blibble 5y ago

extremely pleased this didn't happen in the UK our ruling right wing party (arguably to the left of the Democrats) have been heavily pushing for everyone to get their 3rd jab now for months the universal trust of the state run NHS ("socialised medicine") also having a vast, vast impact (certainly more than the politicians)

lern_too_spel 5y ago
Meanwhile, the intellectuals of America's right wing party are calling people who encourage others to get vaccinated government propagandists[1] and shilling cryptocurrencies[2]. This guy studied at Princeton and Harvard. He knows what he is doing. [1] https://mobile.twitter.com/tedcruz/status/1457108504498642953 https://mobile.twitter.com/tedcruz/status/145710850449864295... [2] https://mobile.twitter.com/tedcruz/status/1497031845984227328 https://mobile.twitter.com/tedcruz/status/149703184598422732...

civilized 5y ago

It's really interesting to me how so many people, including in these comments, instantly decided that the vaccine was untrustworthy based on politics, and just... left it at that. Even though their own lives were on the line in many cases. Why would you let blind trust or distrust in some political talking heads determine whether you, yourself, live or die? ... Why not check out the evidence for yourself, or talk to your doctor? Even after watching people die terrible deaths regretting their choice not to get the vaccine, they're still rationalizing this choice based on politics. I guess if the Red Tribe says something is bad, one must believe it as a matter of identity in the Red Tribe? Even at the cost of one's own life? Maybe the trust in the tribe's information sources is so absolute that it would never occur to a member to seek out potentially contrary sources? This is definitely not just a Red Tribe problem, but it's one of the most tragic and pathetic manifestations I've ever seen. For more information on this phenomenon, I highly recommend this introduction to "coalitional instincts" https://www.edge.org/response-detail/27168 https://www.edge.org/response-detail/27168

ZeroGravitas 5y ago
There was a recent story that detailed red areas needing to provide places where people could be vaccinated in private so other people couldn't see them 'breaking' the tribes rules. Similar to that joke about taking two Baptists fishing, because if you only take one, they'll drink all your beer. There was also the weird finding that the better educated a Republican was about climate change, the more their opinion diverged from the science. The conclusion was that just as a nerdy religious person might know all the obscure rules better than an average person, scientifically literate Republicans could list all the correct talking points better because they understood them more.
- civilized 5y ago
  It all makes me wonder, what is to be done? Is there any way to cut through this instinct to believe tribal bullshit? Are there examples of people doing it successfully in the past? What was their playbook? Can the same tricks work in today's information environment?

edmcnulty101 5y ago

They should change the word conservative to the phrase "people who look at statistics". For most age groups dying in a car accident is a bigger risk than COVID. Trusting ones immune system over a novel substance with unknown long term effect is a reasonable position. What's really odd is that the FDA is fighting to release the data they used to authorize the vaccine.

joelbondurant3 5y ago

joelbondurant3 5y ago