Tennessee GOP goes anti-vax

[tabibito]

Nice try.

But in reality, Trump loyalists like Sean Hannity have been very pro-vax, while stats show that the most vax-hesitant groups are blacks and Hispanics, who, according to libtard stereotypes at least, hate the Bad Orange Man.

Meanwhile, experts like Dr. Risch have shown that it's a myth that "new cases [are] overwhelmingly concentrated among the unvaccinated; it only appears so because the CDC stopped counting "breakthrough cases" that don't lead to hospitalization or death. That's why stats in England and Israel, where counting is done differently, show high incidence of infection among those already vaxed.

It would be interesting to see the comparison rates for people who have been vaccinated against those who haven't.

Percentage of vaccinated people contracting the virus who need hospitalisation or die.
compared with
Percentage of unvaccinated people contracting the virus who need hospitalisation or die.

If vaccination has any beneficial effect, the vaccinated group should be showing much lower percentages.

[NorrinRadd]

It’s a loyalty thing.

Nice try.

But in reality, Trump loyalists like Sean Hannity have been very pro-vax, while stats show that the most vax-hesitant groups are blacks and Hispanics, who, according to libtard stereotypes at least, hate the Bad Orange Man.

Meanwhile, experts like Dr. Risch have shown that it's a myth that "new cases [are] overwhelmingly concentrated among the unvaccinated; it only appears so because the CDC stopped counting "breakthrough cases" that don't lead to hospitalization or death. That's why stats in England and Israel, where counting is done differently, show high incidence of infection among those already vaxed.

[Mountain Man]

Sorry moron man, if you can't offer any defense for your position that's understandable.

If you could accurately describe my position then we might have something worth discussing.

[Starlight]

I'm going to give you the benefit of the doubt that even you recognize just how flimsy this straw man really is.

Sorry moron man, if you can't offer any defense for your position that's understandable.

[firstfloor]

It was only a matter of time until Donald Trump converted the debate over covid-19 vaccines into an occasion for his supporters to show their loyalty to him — and even worse, to the “big lie” that his 2020 loss was illegitimate.

“People are refusing to take the Vaccine because they don’t trust his Administration,” the former president said in a statement Sunday, referring to President Biden. “They don’t trust the Election results, and they certainly don’t trust the Fake News.”

There you have it: Trump is telling his supporters that they are correct not to trust the federal government on vaccines, because this sentiment should flow naturally from their suspicion that the election was stolen from him. Expressing the former has been magically transformed into a way to show fealty to the latter.

This suggests the anti-vaccine mania on the right may only get worse, at exactly the moment that we need it to get better. This vile new Trump claim hints at how this is likely to happen, with the complicity of even relatively responsible Republicans.

We’re seeing a new surge in coronavirus cases due to the delta variant and the lag in vaccinations, with new cases overwhelmingly concentrated among the unvaccinated. Both trends — surging cases and lagging vaccinations — are unfolding primarily in red states.

It’s bad enough that Trump has now recast the question of whether to trust the federal government on vaccines as a proxy for whether the election was stolen from him. What makes this worse is that other Republicans are playing a version of this game.

It’s a loyalty thing.

[One Bad Pig]

After intense pressure from GOP lawmakers, the Tennessee Department of Health has now said it will:
- Hold no vaccination events of any kind in schools.
- Send no reminders about, or material on, vaccines to teenagers.

This does not simply include Covid vaccines (Covid is currently surging in Tennessee), but includes flu, measles, meningitis, polio etc. It also includes sending no follow-up reminders about the second covid vaccine for anyone who has already had their first shot.

GOP lawmakers floated the idea of abolishing the whole Tennessee Department of Health if it didn't stop encouraging teenagers to get vaccinated. The head of the department's vaccination programs was subsequently fired.

This has been labelled the GOP's 'make polio great again' initiative, or 'killing the kids to own the libs'.

Teenagers don't need flu vaccines. Measles and polio vaccines are given to small children, not teenagers. Pediatricians should be on top of sending reminders about meningitis booster shots, the only thing I see on that list relevant for teenagers.

[Mountain Man]

More troubling is your enthusiasm about having the freedom to kill others, and wanting the government to let you.

I'm going to give you the benefit of the doubt that even you recognize just how flimsy this straw man really is.

[Starlight]

SO you're a hypocrite and don't want to admit it. Got it.

If you want to be honest for a moment, please stop and think about the fact that if it's true I value the things I listed (which may be totally different to the things you value), then there's a significant difference between fetuses and adults with regard to those.

It might blow your mind that someone else values different things to what you value, but try and get your head around the fact that given those values, the rational outworking of my position with regard to abortion is going to be very different to yours, and that hence there is zero hypocrisy involved in my seeing a vast difference between fetuses and adults with regard to the things I value.

[Gondwanaland]

I don't regard fetuses as a 'person' yet, due to their lack of brain development meaning they lack the higher mental functions (goals, language, abstract thought, sense of self, memory, reasoning, senses of meaning and purpose, etc) associated with personhood. I regard the killing of a being possessing those qualities as qualitatively different to the killing of a being who does not, so I don't regard abortion as at all comparable in any interesting way, and regard it more like killing a plant or insect.

Let's not derail this thread onto abortion please.

SO you're a hypocrite and don't want to admit it. Got it.

[Cow Poke]

I don't regard fetuses as a 'person' yet, due to their lack of brain development meaning they lack the higher mental functions (goals, language, abstract thought, sense of self, memory, reasoning, senses of meaning and purpose, etc) associated with personhood.....

For the sarcastically impaired the following is said in jest

Kinda like Democrats.

[Starlight]

So you support banning abortion then?

I don't regard fetuses as a 'person' yet, due to their lack of brain development meaning they lack the higher mental functions (goals, language, abstract thought, sense of self, memory, reasoning, senses of meaning and purpose, etc) associated with personhood. I regard the killing of a being possessing those qualities as qualitatively different to the killing of a being who does not, so I don't regard abortion as at all comparable in any interesting way, and regard it more like killing a plant or insect.

Let's not derail this thread onto abortion please.

[Cow Poke]

As I said, one's vaccination status is between you and your doctor, and the government should keeps its nose out of our personal affairs.

And my doctor has told me 'no'.

[Starlight]

This is another one of those statements that causes me to wonder what personal freedoms the government couldn't deny based on similar logic.

Even more troubling is how easily statements like this roll off the tongues of liberals.

More troubling is your enthusiasm about having the freedom to kill others, and wanting the government to let you.

[CivilDiscourse]

So you support banning abortion then?

I remember the oft-used example for bodily integrity:

If you were on trial and found guilty of injuring someone, and that someone NEEDS a kidney, and you were a perfect match, the court STILL couldn't force you to give that person a kidney.

[Gondwanaland]

It's not your personal affair because it affects others.

If, through your negligence in willfully not getting vaccinated, you get the virus and transfer it to someone and they die from it, that is morally equivalent to manslaughter / negligent homicide on your part.

Just as the government has every right and duty to intervene if you cause the death of someone else, the same applies with vaccines.

Just as the government has an interest in requiring that your car be sufficiently safe to drive on the road so you don't kill others through mechanical failure, so they have an interest in requiring your body be sufficiently safe to be around others so you don't kill others through the spread of preventable disease.

So you support banning abortion then?