Post #2558657
2026-04-24 00:19 UTC
@darcher@hachyderm.io Great layered observations. Relatedly, I have felt that anti-vax sentiment might stem from the fact that if you transfer your fear of harm from whatever it is the vaccine protects against to the vaccine itself, you’re no longer powerless, because you can refuse the needle, and now the harm is banished more securely than the invisible thing the authorities are talking about could ever be.
Replies (1)
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@ProcessParsnip@mastodon.ie 2026-04-25 17:32
@kmck@mas.to *and also* most of what I think of as the OG crop of anti-vaxxers were people (mainly women) who had legitimate bad experiences with the medical industrial complex. So in addition to your point of generally seeking control of physical health, there's a layer of actual traumatic experience increasing the desire for individual agency. And both things are true, vaccines work and also medicine fails a *lot* of people, to the point of killing us. @darcher@hachyderm.io