In which Facebook gets far too much of my good material, so I’m cross-posting some here as well.

My original post, on Trump’s appointments, and specifically about his meeting with Kennedy:

Now we’ve got anti-vaxxers, climate change denialists, a rich bitch who has a weird hatred for schools. Absolute opposite of ‘brain trust.’

It received several responses. In one, somebody (from Fairfield, naturally) tried to call me out, as it were, on labeling Kennedy (who still believes in the thoroughly-debunked Thimerosol-autism theory, fer Chrissake) as anti-vax, because nowadays they call themselves “pro-vaccine safety.”

My response:

My interest in “debating” so-called “vaccine safety” with anti-vaxxers is zero, because one cannot have meaningful exchanges with conspiracy theorists. But what the hell, once more into the breach!

Your posts are just like every other anti-vaxxer’s posts. I never claimed to be an expert. I never claimed to be an expert. I tell you three times: I never claimed to be an expert. I claimed to accept the consensus of current scientific knowledge, which tells us that vaccines are reasonably safe and effective and do not cause autism.

And no, there are not “plenty of experts who disagree”: there are a few persons (every single one making money off of their anti-vax fame in some way or another) and a few papers that have been (or will be) retracted, upon which your movement bases all of its provably and measurably harmful views.

In the real world, the preponderance of evidence and the majority of experts all say the same thing: vaccines are safe and effective and do not cause autism. Vaccines are safer than cars by orders of magnitude, and yet none of you are lobbying to have cars banned.

As for being invested emotionally: I don’t sell any product or service that claims to help the so-called victims of vaccines or persons with autism. As they say: follow the money. You’re the one with a horse in the race.

I’ve read your site. You claim that the glorified hammocks you manufacture and sell are nearly panacea. Your idea of “research” that “proves” that motion while sleeping has any measurable, non-placebo, non-subjective effects on any condition is weak, and utilized specifically to earn yourself income.

Your beds are cool, absolutely, but there is no proof they’re medicine. Implying otherwise makes you no better than the charlatans who sell chelation therapy or chemical castration to the parents of autistic children! (Therapies that are effectively abuse, I must add, as there is no evidence the theories behind them are at all relevant or sound.)

A big round bed is far less abusive to an individual than chemical castration, clearly, but you’re still at least attempting to accept money from people on false pretenses. You may have anecdotal stories from mums who say the beds eased symptoms; I have anecdotal stories from people who swear that Rescue Remedy cures their panic attacks. These claims don’t mean that Rescue Remedy isn’t just water, which it is, or that the results aren’t placebo, which they are. Placebo is profoundly powerful. As is the mind.

And as far as Kennedy: I mean, come on. Thimerosol! That horse has been dead for a decade now. Autism continued to happen after it was removed from vaccines. Ergo Thimerosol is not implicated in autism.

Finally, experts agree that the phrase “pro-vaccine safety,” in the mouths of persons who do not work in applicable fields, equals being anti-vax. Your movement thinks it sounds more reasonable and less crack-pot (now that so many people frown upon being “anti-vaccine”) to be “pro-vaccine safety.” But if you’re merely a layperson, the distinction is merely a semantic ruse and nothing more.

My only interest in the anti-vax movement is this: kids are getting sick and dying again. Diseases that were under control are resurfacing in the general population. I myself am aging, and will one day wake up as a member of a vulnerable population.

And if I die from something PREVENTABLE because of the ignorant, fact-denying, anti-vax hysteria of persons like yourself, I’m going to be seriously pissed off.

I won’t be reading any replies, because there’s no point in engaging. But damn, just… damn. Climate change is real, vaccines are safe and effective, Big Pharma not only bilks us all out of billions but also keeps countless persons alive every single day, and humans have walked on the moon!