There's mercury in the H1N1 flu shot, John Akpata said on his wall on Facebook. Mercury causes brain damage. There's no way he's getting the shot.
Goading him a little, I asked how he felt about fluoride in the drinking water. I knew what his answer would be, as I'd heard John rant about fluoride before. It was my hope he would start ranting about fluoridated water, and scare off people who might take him seriously about flu shots.
John didn't disappoint me.
Fluoride, John wrote, weakens your bones and makes your hair fall out. Toothpaste has warnings on the tube to contact poison control centres if you swallow the stuff. The KGB and Israel used fluoride against their enemies.
John told me to do a Google search on dentists against fluoride. Do a search on YouTube for fluoride.
Of course, if you do a Google search for "UFOs disguised as clouds", you'll find many videos and websites. Just saying.
As he talked about mercury and fluoride, John implied (but never stated outright) that there's some great big government conspiracy at work.
"If I was a first nations person, I would not accept free blankets from Geoffrey Amherst. If I was Jewish, I would not accept a tattoo from Goebbles. I would not accept a cigarette from the Marlborough man, nor a 40 oz from Jack Daniels himself, let alone a flu shot with mercury in it, that medical professionals are losing their jobs for refusing to take."
Equating the flu shot with Nazi tattoos and gifts of diseased blankets seemed to imply there's a conspiracy going on. Which sounds a little insane.
Okay, let's be honest -- it sounds VERY insane.
As I criticized John's position, he grew irritated. He said I was attacking him.
I replied that I wasn't attacking him, just questioning his beliefs.
And really, that's all there was to it. I respect John Akpata as a poet, a public speaker, a debater, and a free spirit. But when it comes to chemistry and health, I'm going to listen to the Canadian Dental Association and the Canadian Medical Association. I value their expertise a little more than John's. They do real research. John surfs Google.
Lately I find myself astounded at people's lack of faith in public institutions. Yes, there are examples of corruption and deceit and profiteering out there. On the whole, though, North American institutions have been fairly reliable. If the powers-that-be say a flu shot is safe and a good idea, they're probably right.
(Several people reading this, including John Akpata, just yelled at their monitors: "Oh my God, Nik, how can you be so naive?!")
Unfortunately for John, I have entered a new phase of my life. Once upon a time, a person would say something way "out there", and I would think:
"Well, could be. Who am I to question their beliefs? It's not like I know any better. Let's see where they go with this. Keep an open mind. Be polite."
Nowadays, my tolerance for "out there" is much lower. If someone says something that strikes me as crazy, I feel compelled to politely speak my mind.
That's why, when John told his friends on Facebook that the flu shot is hitleresque, I felt the need to speak for the other side of the debate.
In our discussion, John summed up what motivates his worldview: "It is not fear, Nik - it is dedication to knowledge."
But what kind of knowledge, exactly? John's study of these subjects seems to ignore the experts, seeking out the fringes. Why listen to crackpots and conspiracy theorists, and not the people who have done years and years of research?
David Suzuki sums it all up nicely. When he was asked if he was getting the flu shot, he replied:
"Yes. I'm just astounded at people. Do they think doctors, scientists and government are out to poison them or something?"
That appears to be exactly what some people are saying.
Wednesday, November 04, 2009
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I wrote a very fun little article recently entitled Summer of the Shark, wherein I pointed out that an American citizen is currently six times more likely to die falling off a ladder, thirty-six times more likely to die of a common flu strain, and may even have a statistically better chance of winning a million dollars in the lotto (depending where you get your figures) than to fall dead by the hand of this H1N1 shit.
I went on to suggest that anyone who's buying this phony, ratings-grabbing, snake-oil peddling, major-market-buyout bullshit without looking at the statistical realities of the thing, or who intends to profit by it, might want to try drinking something other than the fucking cool-aid for a while.
Actually I was much, much harsher than that in the article. I was absolutely giddy with hate! I hope the whole world will read it someday and realize that all their "experts" were just-plain full of shit. That they too were watching the news, and reading the paper, and regurgitating the swill of misinformation as was the wont of Rupert Murdoch and company. That the professional opinions regarding swine-flu were all well informed by that professional's desire to see their name in the paper; to drum up a little business for the industry; push a little product; and most laudably, to see their big dumb fucking grin staring back at them on the TV.
Still, I hadn't considered that there was anything more to H1N1 than the regular provocation of the popular mass's rubbernecking tendencies and expectations of global disaster, in the effort to make a quick dollar at a dimwits expense. But now that you mention it, perhaps there is something in the vaccine! That might help explain the zombie-like persistence of this trumped up, asshat story. Though I doubt what's in the vaccine is there to make people stupid. I mean, if you ran out and got injected with something just because Joe News-Anchor sat next to a guy in a white lab coat and told you to... how much more rube-ishly retarded could they expect you to become.
I get what you're after, though. The idea that the governments of the world are trying to poison their people, and that the majority health community hasn't noticed it and blown the whistle, smacks of a kind of fear-based hysteria. Of course, it's only half as fearful, and just one-fifth as hysterical as hundreds of millions of people standing in lines for the cure to a disease that only threatens .000003% of them to begin with.
I honestly feel betrayed that you would utter a word to support the propagation of this flavor of the week, bullshit story. I will get over it, but... fuck man!? H1N1 is nothing more than tabloid journalism. Don't feed the fucking beast!
The chances of you getting the flu and dying are slim. The chances of you getting the flu and being sick and miserable - slightly better. The chances of you getting the flu and spreading it around - also better.
The chances of you inadvertently passing the flu along in such a way that someone with a weakened immune system catches the flu and dies - also greater.
I don't get the flu shot because I think the flu will kill me. I get it because I hate being sick, and I don't want to spread disease and inadvertantly put someone else at risk.
Let me take a breath. Okay. We're both bringing false statements along with our hyperbole to the party here, but let's not linger.
The root of outrage is the fact that H1N1 has been a top story, daily-print article for two fucking months straight. And I seriously hope there is no one in the room who will try to justify that.
Because of the profit-drive going on here, and the public's disgusting willingness to swallow down anything spuriously labeled "news" - to follow sheepishly along behind anything the anchorman says, so long as he says it over and over and over, ad nauseum - millions have been vaccinated without any cause or benefit; schools and hospitals have been turned upside down with battles over new, ridiculous and unnecessary regulations; businesses are coming up with "contingency plans" in case EVERYONE in the company becomes sick with swine flu all at once; and governments are debating whether or not they should restrain public liberties.
This is mass-fucking-insanity! This is hysteria. These things aren't happening because swine flu is such an incredibly contagious and deadly disease - which it statistically is not but because the media is fucking you people in the brain. Wake up! WAKE UP!!!
Argue against that - I fucking dare you. I dare Noam-fucking-Chomsky to take the counterpoint on this, I'll still win. This is lunatic behavior and there's no justifying it. There's no justifying this!
Swine flu deserves the same amount of public attention and individual concern as the common flu... No! Scratch that. It deserves less.
Saying anything that further enables the psychotropic mania surrounding H1N1 is intellectual bukkake, and that's not a subjective statement. It's just god damned shameful.
I'm all in favour of staying healthy and not spreading around disease and making other people sick. I kind of work on that every day whether or not there's hysteria about any particular disease. I eat well, get plenty of exercise and fresh air, sleep the requisite 7-8 hours a night. I wash my hands regularly and don't touch my face unless my hands are clean. I stay home if I'm sick so I don't spread anything around. I'm not in a high risk category, so it will probably be a while before I'd even be allowed to get an H1N1 vaccine, so probably I won't get one. I've read the literature and I sort of have to agree with some of what Roy says. This is waaaaay out of hand. It's not even a pandemic and we're all acting like the Black Plague is about to descend.
Thanks Xup. Still, I was off the handle, here. Sorry if I got spittle on anyone during this latest tantrum.
This is man torn between fundamentals.
Yep! Because Doctors and scientists are saintly creatures - incapable of corruption and entirely free from the short-comings of human nature that the rest of us seemed plagued by. And, we all know that people in positions of influence never, ever conspire for nefarious purposes - that's just not human nature.
I mean, doctors and scientists would never dream of fudging data in order to protect profits, even though the product they represent is damaging to the public, right? If you believe they would, then you must be one of those kooks that believe all that nonsense about "Big Tobacco."
Rational people realize that doctors - at least in modern, western society - would never, ever do things like secretly inject pregnant mothers with highly toxic radioactive materials just to study the effects on the newborns. Or, subject unsuspecting civilians looking for treatment from illness to torturous "brain-washing" experiments that carry life-long, debilitating consequences, in order to research the potential viability and use of "mind control" Or, secretly withhold treatment for deadly diseases from people, while pretending to treat them, in order to study the effects of the disease. Or, release live virus into domestic, heavily populated urban areas in order to study how bio-warfare materials might propagate through populations, etc., etc.
...except that, oh yeah... all of those things actually happened.
So, sign me up for the flu-shot! I want one of the Baxter manufactured batch! You know? Baxter Pharmaceutical? The company that was caught shipping vaccines that contained live avian flu virus to 18 countries (even though the vaccine was manufactured under the standardized SL3 bio-safety protocol which makes such accidental contamination a virtual impossibility) - which, if not by pure chance wasn't caught in time, would have been injected into thousands upon thousands of people, where a recombination of the virus likely would have occurred and resulted in a new virus so deadly and contagious it would have made the 1918 pandemic look like the common cold. I want one of those ones!
Rampant paranoia and suspicion is the modern day equivalent of being an intellectual -- you know, without any of the hard thinking.
"Oh man, you TRUST the corporations? You are so goddamn naive. I saw a documentary once in which a corporation did something bad. So, you know, you're a tard for trusting them."
And then there's the government.
And then there's special interest groups.
And then there's the media.
And then there's "scientists".
And then there's whatever else you want to look at with one raised eyebrow while pretending to have some profound insight that everyone else somehow missed out on.
"You believe your wife when she says she loves you? Don't you realize that romance is a social construct invented by monks in 14th century Italy? Oh my god, man. Seriously? SERIOUSLY? You're falling for that? Man. I thought you knew better."
Yes. Until there's actually a reason to be suspicious and fearful, I'm not going to be suspicious and fearful. Fuck all that chicken little bullshit everyone is engaging in. Fuck it in its little chicken egg hole, until all the eggs inside are scrambled, and coming shooting out in a frothy yellow spray. Fuck it.
There's also the small fact that according to the British Medical Journal - one of the most prestigious, peer-reviewed medical journals on the planet:
"In children under 2 years inactivated [influenza] vaccines had the same field efficacy as placebo, and in healthy people under 65 vaccination did not affect hospital stay, time off work, or death from influenza and its complications"
http://bmjcom.highwire.org/cgi/content/full/333/7574/912
The paper attempts to posit why such vaccines are so rigorously pushed while the available evidence points to nothing but their almost total inefficacy. It says:
"The optimistic and confident tone of some predictions of viral circulation and of the impact of inactivated vaccines, which are at odds with the evidence, is striking. The reasons are probably complex and may involve "a messy blend of truth conflicts and conflicts of interest making it difficult to separate factual disputes from value disputes"22 or a manifestation of optimism bias (an unwarranted belief in the efficacy of interventions).23"
That's not mindless paranoia - that's our best, peer-reviewed, independently verifiable science.
I don't think you should be suspicious and fearful. I think you should be skeptical, and recognize no boundaries of discrimination in your skepticism. It's my opinion that to a fully reasonable person, consensus opinion among any group doesn't warrant the abandonment of skepticism - no individual or group is more or less deserving of it than another.
"Oh man, you TRUST the corporations? You are so goddamn naive. I saw a documentary once in "which a corporation did something bad. So, you know, you're a tard for trusting them."
And then there's the government.
And then there's special interest groups.
And then there's the media.
And then there's "scientists"."
Well... yeah... you ARE kind of a tard for trusting them. All of those groups you mention are made up of people. Many people have agendas. And, many people will engage in in less than moral behavior in order to further those agendas. The greater the position of power and influence people attain, the greater the temptation becomes to exploit those positions. And, the greater the potential in reach, scope and effect those exploitations carry. I'm afraid that if you don't understand that, then you just don't understand people. But, I'm guessing you do understand that quite well.
So, to be wary isn't mindless paranoia - it's rationality. Mindlessness is being unquestioning while knowing how people tend to behave and how the world has always worked - generally, people are not good to one another. Often they are, but more often they're not. So, on which side does wisdom lay its trust by default?
Personally, I don't trust anyone, or anything, that I don't have direct, personal experience acting as evidence to tell me that the person or thing in question is deserving of my trust. You might think that makes me a person ravaged by paranoia. I'd disagree, and substitute the word "paranoia" for "sensibility" in that statement.
""You believe your wife when she says she loves you? Don't you realize that romance is a social construct invented by monks in 14th century Italy? Oh my god, man. Seriously? SERIOUSLY? You're falling for that? Man. I thought you knew better.""
Your above example doesn't apply here. It's apples and oranges. I have a multitude of personal experience acting as direct evidence that leads me to a conclusion regarding my Wife's feelings for me. Whether romance was a construct of whoever, whenever, is entirely irrelevant.
However, I have no such evidence regarding the particular character or intentions of actors involved in the scenario we're discussing. What I do have as evidence is prior history - and that evidence tells me to be very skeptical.
I know of the multitude of atrocities that governments, and men of medicine and science have committed in the past. To not be highly skeptical of such people and institutions would be nothing short of lunacy, in my opinion.
Oh, you can't trust people. You can't. They have impure motives and are crazy and do terrible things. I've seen it. I know it.
But not me. I'm rational.
What? It's true. I can tell. I can see the inside of my head. My motives are clear. I am objective and shine like a penny. Oh, I know what you're thinking. That I'm deluded. 99.9% is nuts, and I'm not?
But it's true. I am that 0.1% you can trust.
It's true that, if you ask them, the crazy ones -- if you pluck one of them out of the crowd and ask them the same thing, they'll say exactly what I say. They'll claim to be a 0.1% like me. But they lie. They all lie.
They'll say that too, of course. That's the funny thing.
But I know I'm rational. I know it. I deduced it with my own logic! Oh, sure, a broken tool measuring a broken tool says it's all working fine. But I can assure you I am the sane and rational one.
If only everyone were like me. Oh, I know they appear to be exactly like me, the phonies. But they're not. In some indefinable, inexplicable way, I am sane and logical and rational and reasonable. And they are all crazy.
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