I still am having a hard time wrapping my head around the fact that people can be opposed to vaccines and pasteurization, maybe two of the leading causes of children growing up.
Seriously, is this what happens when a couple of generations are spared the horrific child mortality that's been the norm for thousands of years? Nowadays people in the imperial core can be pretty sure that their kids are going to grow into adulthood, and that's thanks to vaccines and making sure our food & drink aren't full of microbes & whatnot trying to kill us.
The maddening part is also the fact that there are people outside of the core that cannot receive the basic vaccinations for one and seeing stuff like this just makes me speechless.
That's exactly it. A decent chunk of the people in the imperial core are just so insulated from these types of hardships that are commonplace in too many places. People hike for days to bring their children to vaccine clinics because they know what happens if you leave your child open to preventable infections.
And then dipshits in the imperial core who don't know anyone who's lost a kid to measles don't vaccinate their kids because they heard that vaccines cause autism.
My father still tells me about his aunt that was an anti-vaxer back in the day. Then she lost her baby son because she chose not to vaccinate him. It was her biggest regret that haunted her till the day she died. Every other child she had was vaccinated and they all grew up happy & healthy.
I used to work at a nonprofit that helped refugees find housing in the US in an area where the early anti-vax movement really started taking off. I remember the refugees being fucking ASTOUNDED that Americans were refusing to vaccinate their kids against diseases that were still a dangerous threat in their home country
It's what happens when a couple generations are spared the historical ratio of "bury 1.5 children for every 1 that survives past 12" and a group of deliberate assholes decides to make money off the phenomenon by spreading disinformation.
All these things like bird flu in the raw milk, resurgence of shit like rubella, the millions dead because of COVID denialism etc. All of them made a small number of rotten people very wealthy. In a just world they'd have their assets seized and they'd be locked in an iron box for social murder.
On a slightly less jocular note, I think it's also what happens when you use late capitalism to morph psyches into that of Homo Economicus, and the brain pedestal of hyper-individualism that gets erected to create The Consumer. "My dollar my choice" has knock-on effects, not the least being the eroding of a social framework that might have held some of this shit to account.
I still am having a hard time wrapping my head around the fact that people can be opposed to vaccines and pasteurization, maybe two of the leading causes of children growing up.
Seriously, is this what happens when a couple of generations are spared the horrific child mortality that's been the norm for thousands of years? Nowadays people in the imperial core can be pretty sure that their kids are going to grow into adulthood, and that's thanks to vaccines and making sure our food & drink aren't full of microbes & whatnot trying to kill us.
The maddening part is also the fact that there are people outside of the core that cannot receive the basic vaccinations for one and seeing stuff like this just makes me speechless.
That's exactly it. A decent chunk of the people in the imperial core are just so insulated from these types of hardships that are commonplace in too many places. People hike for days to bring their children to vaccine clinics because they know what happens if you leave your child open to preventable infections.
And then dipshits in the imperial core who don't know anyone who's lost a kid to measles don't vaccinate their kids because they heard that vaccines cause autism.
My father still tells me about his aunt that was an anti-vaxer back in the day. Then she lost her baby son because she chose not to vaccinate him. It was her biggest regret that haunted her till the day she died. Every other child she had was vaccinated and they all grew up happy & healthy.
I used to work at a nonprofit that helped refugees find housing in the US in an area where the early anti-vax movement really started taking off. I remember the refugees being fucking ASTOUNDED that Americans were refusing to vaccinate their kids against diseases that were still a dangerous threat in their home country
It's what happens when a couple generations are spared the historical ratio of "bury 1.5 children for every 1 that survives past 12" and a group of deliberate assholes decides to make money off the phenomenon by spreading disinformation.
All these things like bird flu in the raw milk, resurgence of shit like rubella, the millions dead because of COVID denialism etc. All of them made a small number of rotten people very wealthy. In a just world they'd have their assets seized and they'd be locked in an iron box for social murder.
On a slightly less jocular note, I think it's also what happens when you use late capitalism to morph psyches into that of Homo Economicus, and the brain pedestal of hyper-individualism that gets erected to create The Consumer. "My dollar my choice" has knock-on effects, not the least being the eroding of a social framework that might have held some of this shit to account.