Ah, yes, the latest attempt to demonise us for making a perfectly rational decision. The whole thing is suspect when the use language to create a negative impression. The use of the term anti-vax is designed to undermine anyone who is hesitant or has doubts.
It can’t be trusted. It might damage fertility – or unborn children. It’s been ‘rushed through’ and we’re all ‘human guinea-pigs’. Oh, and it’s ‘a plot to depopulate the Earth’. Sound familiar? All are baseless, yet well-worn claims made about the Covid vaccine.
But can those who hold such ill-informed – and in some instances extreme – opinions ever change their mind? A groundbreaking BBC documentary to be aired on Wednesday sets out to discover just that.
The show features a fascinating experiment in which seven anti-vax Britons spend five days living together in a house – where they are bombarded with myth-busting scientific evidence about the vaccine.
At the end of the week, they are taken to a vaccine clinic and offered a jab there and then. So would the plan be a success… or end in failure?
So they choose people with fringe beliefs and seek to paint us all with the same brush. Those I know who have declined have done so for pretty straightforward reasons – not because we are opposed to vaccines in principle.
These vaccines (and I use the term loosely) were new and untried on the human population prior to last year. There is no long term health data due to the short lead time to rollout. This is a simple fact. Such data won’t be available until next year. Whatever red tape they eliminated to get these vaccines onto the market, they cannot rush time itself.
We did not know at that point what the risks might be to taking such a new vaccine. Now, there is emerging evidence of some adverse effects. However, as time has gone on, there is also evidence that it really doesn’t make much difference to reduction of spread or severity of symptoms. In other words, it’s all a bit pointless at best and potentially harmful at worst. And for what? A disease that is unlikely to seriously harm or kill the vast majority of the population.
No, I don’t believe the microchip nonsense, nor am I convinced by the fertility argument, just as I roll my eyes at the depopulate the Earth line.
Before the experiment begins, Prof Fry seeks expert advice on how to tackle the group’s attitudes from Clarissa Simas, a psychologist with the Vaccine Confidence Project, an organisation that aims to combat jab hesitancy. ‘You have to try to understand where the hesitancy is coming from – get to the root cause,’ Clarissa says. And if conversations get heated, don’t give up. ‘If one person comes out of this with a more open mind, you’ll have made a positive impact.’
You can tell that psychologists are involved as they are gaslighting. If we dare to disagree, we don’t have an open mind. Only they have open minds.
Next, Prof Fry empties another bag of jelly beans, this time containing thousands of sweets. ‘Imagine I told you to pick out the one foul jelly bean out of 33,000,’ she says. This represents the tiny risk of developing myocarditis – inflammation of the heart, the most common of all the severe side effects after the vaccine. Prof Fry adds that the risk of other, serious side effects, such as heart attacks and blot clots, is far lower.
It’s a clever way of illustrating risk, but it’s too much for some of the anti-vaxxers. Hardliners Vicky and Nazarin accuse Prof Fry of making light of deadly complications. Vicky says: ‘It makes me angry that when I’m talking about people who are dying or seriously injured, I am going to entertain this discussion about jelly beans.’
I’m with Vicky on this. They are using trite examples to underplay a serious risk even if it is a relatively small risk. Given the ineffectiveness of the vaccine, why take even that risk? There’s no point.
And Nazarin is sceptical of Prof Fry’s calculations. ‘So why have I heard of a lot of people experiencing this? Am I just unlucky?’ Prof Fry says she is simply more likely to hear the most extreme stories because she is involved in the anti-vax community.
There is no anti-vax community. Twat.
Prof Fry had assumed that the experts’ testimonies would be a ‘persuasive argument in favour of the vaccine’. But she adds: ‘The hesitancy is rooted in emotion. They feel scared, vulnerable or misunderstood. That is something we can all relate to.’
Of course it is. Nothing to do with being able to recognise gaslighting and sophistry when we see it. I am not scared, emotional or misunderstood – I just recognise sophistry when it’s staring me in the face and I am able to make a sensible assessment of the relative risks.
Odd, isn’t it, that this piece of claptrap is being rolled out just as the sixth jibby jabby is being peddled to the over fifties. No, I won’t be having it, for the same reason that I declined the previous five. It is unnecessary for an illness that is highly unlikely to kill me. Same with the flu jab.
I’d like to watch it but there’s a rerun of Lewis on ITV3 at the same time so I’ll have to give it a miss
“…It’s been ‘rushed through’ and we’re all ‘human guinea-pigs…”
Well, it has been rushed through, hasn’t it?
The alternative is that all those medicines that have taken up to 10 years to bring to fruition have been delayed unnecessarily and treatment denied to seriously ill people. And that would be evil.
“It can’t be trusted. It might damage fertility – or unborn children. ”
So the evidence that it a) does affect menstruation and b) that birth rates have dropped catastrophically 9 months after countries started to vaccinate people of children bearing age has passed them by then?
Its very interesting at the moment, all the scientific research that is being done, papers being written, data analysis etc etc is all pointing in one direction – the vaccines do not protect you, in fact in anything other than the very short term they increase your chances of infection and death from covid. And not only that they cause all manner of significant side effects on people’s health, including death. There is literally nothing coming out that backs up the ‘safe and effective’ line that the Establishment are hanging on to for dear life. There is a slow but steady void appearing between ‘the science’ and the governing class. My question is how wide will it have to get before people notice (and by people I mean ordinary people, not the likes of us vaxx deplorables) and the pressure on the governing class to accept reality becomes irresistible?
Okay, so anecdotal, but I am seeing more scepticism among those who aren’t political nerds and general awkward squad members. I think people are noticing. “But I had three jabs and I still got it,” eventually seeps into the consciousness.
I do my bit – I drop little anti-vaxx factoids into conversations when covid and vaccines come up, just trying to make people think. And I’m not getting as much blow back as I used to – I think people are more coming round to the idea that the anti-vaxxers were, if not right, maybe onto something. They want answers to their questions, and I try to provide some avenues for them to explore, that they probably haven’t been exposed to before. I make a joke of it, call myself the mad conspiracy theorist, make fun of myself, but make sure the ideas get out there, and hopefully sow the seed of doubt. Maybe they’ll start noticing the array of ‘coincidences’ that just happen to correlate with vaxx roll-outs. Maybe they’ll notice the number of friends, family and work colleagues having medical emergencies or weird ailments, and ask ‘I wonder if they were vaxxed?’ And if they do start questioning, I’ll have done my job………..
But they’re still wedded to the idea that covid would have been worse had they not been vaccinated.
I could be wrong but I think that it’s one of life’s unknowables that it would have been worse.
Regarding the drop in birth rates. Me, having a mind that works in an oblique way would have thought that standing people down from work, forcing them to stay in the house and with nothing to do other than watch daytime TV, that as a natural consequence of human nature the birth rate nine months later would be higher.
There is only so much daytime TV you can watch before boredom sets in and as we all know, boredom leads to bedroom.
As they say “Change my mind”.
I took the first two, didn’t bother with any boosters. Yet my colleagues who did are now dropping like flies with it.
I also took the first two. I have a compromised immune system so I was one of the first to be offered it and at the time, the best information I could find was that the “vaccine” was effective and that two doses would let us all get back to normal. Now they’re peddling boosters that are so ineffective you have to have three or four a year. No thanks.
I’m happier day by day that we no longer have a TV licence.
My friends son was rushed into hospital, they thought he was having a heart attack. He’s fit, works out in a gym all the time, in his early 30s. He had inflammation of the heart and was told it was caused by having had covid, not the injections. So who are we to believe.
Funny innit, at work the few natives, including me, who didn’t get any jabs and didn’t wander round like the piggin Lone Ranger or Dick Turpin, nor spent hours wiping everything down and making their hands sore with gawd knows what chemicals, are the ones who arn’t on the sick every few weeks.
The believers who couldn’t get stabbed quickly enough are requently testing positive or supposedly ill.
Won’t be watching this bbc propaganda broadcast nor any other from any of the sources, gave up the idiot box licence and won’t be having another, ever.
We were going to try a new Italian restaurant out next weekend only to find they’re shut for Covid, groan.
I’ve changed my mind on this issue. I initially had the jabs because, as a T2 diabetic, I am said to have a compromised immune system. Having researched that further it transpires that well managed diabetes does not cause problems with immunity. The need for constant boosters is an issue. What is the evidence that the figures given for the jelly bean demonstration are correct? Even if they are correct, taking five or more jelly beans starts to shorten the odds. On the fertility issue, if that turns out to be true there is no possible way that the government and the media will be able to hide it, they won’t be able to lie their way out of that one.
“No, I don’t believe the microchip nonsense”
I don’t go for the microchip nonsense either, but it is well known that one of the ingredients is graphene oxide. This substance is used in electronics and fairly recent, so being an electronics nerd since the 1970s I tried to find out what I could about it. One fact worthy of note is that graphene oxide forms a conductive crystalline substance when exposed to high frequency radio signals (that could explain the panic among some about 5G, though personally I don’t buy into 5G harming anyone naturally. It is well documented that some people who live in a strong magnetic field such as near high voltage power cables suffer from insomnia and headaches). From here on, everything is speculation as to what effects G.O may have in the blood but it does make me wonder if this could be the base cause of blood clots in many vaxxed people.
“nor am I convinced by the fertility argument”
I don’t know about the fertility issue, but according to orgs like the ONS there has been a very sharp rise in miscarriages since the vaxx introduction.
“just as I roll my eyes at the depopulate the Earth line.”
This one I have bought into. For the past century there has been a eugenics movement, Bill Gates is one, as was his father. Klaus Schwab and Stanley Johnson are also eugenicists. It is (was) also written in stone, on the Georgia Guidestones that the world population should be maintained at 500 million, until someone blew them up last week. One very interesting thing of note about that event is the sheer speed at which the authorities demolished the remains. Despite being surrounded by surveillance cameras, no evidence exists on the perp who set the explosive charge. Some say that it was a lightning strike but the surveillance video shows only an explosion. Within 5 hours of the event the site was cleared without the collection of any evidence.
I’m not sure that vaxxes are the way to depopulate but they could certainly be one, in conjunction with other methods such as ‘pro choice’ abortionists, wars or deliberate catastrophes like famines and supply chain blocking. There’s been fires/explosions at almost every major food processing plant in the USA, and two that I know of in the UK, both in April of this year – a sausage factory in Harlow, Essex and an animal feed plant in Burton on Trent, Staffordshire. In Holland there’s a massive farmer protest because their government wants to take their land.
The reason I don’t buy into the depopulation line is the same reason that I don’t buy into any conspiracy theory – never ascribe malice where it is more likely to be incompetence. Conspiracies require competence and secrecy. I’m not seeing either here.
Occam’s razor suggests that what we are seeing is precisely what it says on the tin. These idiots fell for the vaccine idea and are now digging in as it is becoming apparent that it was a massive waste of our money and is ineffective at best, harmful at worst.
Stonyground,
As a T1 diabetic I took particular interest in the line pushed that we diabetics are at particular risk.
This seems to be predicted on the initial wave of hospitalisations and deaths, where ~25% were diabetic (the vast majority T2 I’m assuming but the stats aren’t broken down that far).
Sounds scary, but when you look at the demographics of those affected, it’s mostly the elderly. A quick cross check of diabetes prevelance in the over 75’s – about 25% – led me to believe that this was pure correlation and I had nothing to worry about.
I refused all vaccines on the basis that they are largely untested and T1 diabetes is essentially and autoimmune disease that is not well understood, and very easy to upset.
My mother has had ongoing problems with her eyes for about 20 years now.
When she had the job, they got much worse. The eye specialists said it was the jab and told her not to have any of the boosters.
And I’ve heard far too many similar stories from people to be convinced it’s anywhere near as safe as they’re making out.
“…never ascribe malice where it is more likely to be incompetence.”
Agreed, however the article referred to in the OP is being deliberately dishonest and misleading. The BBC are broadcasting deliberate lies to anyone who is still prepared to listen. Why?
Pretty much for the reasons mentioned above. They have been so invested in the narrative that now it is falling apart they have two options, recognise that they got it wrong or double down. As they are in the denial stage of grief here, they are doubling down.
THEY MAY BE INJECTIONS BUT THEY ARE NOT VACCINES so stop your lying and get a real job.
This is getting very boring now.
There was NEVER a case for those young (say <70) without comorbidities to get vaccinated EVEN IF there were ZERO side effects. The disease simply was never (in any variant) dangerous enough.
The argument that you should get vaccinated to generate herd immunity never really made sense, since that would only be useful if the vaccine didn't provide protection against the disease. It also assumes that the virus can be stopped in its tracks since otherwise it would simply evade the vaccine, as has happened.
Although I too am not an 'anti-vaxxer' as such, this episode has made me more cautious about them. I won't take the flu vaccine any more and I'll have to research any others that I might 'need'.
By ‘cautious about them’ I mean vaccines, not anti-vaxxers.
What’s new and different about these vaccines is that – as far as I understand it, and someone please correct me if this is wrong – they are mRNA injections that, by various means, get RNA into (some of) your cells so they start to manufacture the actual vaccine. This apparently makes them much quicker to develop than previous methods. So having now ‘proven the concept’ it’s quite likely the new, quick method will start to be used for other diseases. So yes, it makes a lot of sense to start being more cautious about vaccines generally.
@Phil B
Personally I think the best anti conceptive ever is to be stuck with a school age child 24 hours a day.
On the subject of the vaccines surely Astra Zeneca must be safe otherwise Macron would have told us and said. “Lots of people will die because of the British vaccine.”
He would be so happy doing that.
@barbarus
Yes you are right.
During a conversation with some friends down the pub (most of us drinking Tongham Tea, if you’re interested), the topic of the vaccines causing sterility in males and miscarriages in women was discussed. During this, one person, not considered a conspiracy theorist, referred to the, alleged, aim of Islam to take over the world, and wondered how many Muslims, men and women, were taking these jabs and boosters, and would have their children vaccinated? An interesting point, I would have thought.
Funny how they’re not including actual scientists who are vaccine sceptics….
How easy to subject several lay people to a barrage of lies and made up statistics, who won’t be told the whole story and make them look like fools? The bbc is disgusting and should be burned to the ground.
Funny how they’re not including actual scientists who are vaccine sceptics….
And under which bridge would you find one?
Did you have a Polio vaccine, years ago?
Or Diphtheria?
Or Smallpox
Come on Vaccines WORK
A mild case of C-19 is a lot better than dying of it
I had a mild case of it. No vaccine needed. No one is dying from it. Like influenza it finishes off those who are already knocking on death’s door.
Given the fact that we do not have long term data, the appropriate scientific response should be scepticism.
@G,
For the hard of understanding, I was referring to covid injections (it’s not really a vaccine) in the context of this post. As Longrider has often said, being anti-covid 19 injection is not being anti-vaccine in general.
Every village has its useful idiot, I guess.