I really like the analogy to drunk driving and look forward to learning if it works. I will try it on some people too. I do think, however, there are non-verbal hammers that should be used, such as not allowing insurance companies to cover the cost of care for someone who contracts Covid who has not been vaccinated and raising insurance premiums and copay rates on people who have not been vaccinated.
You've identified the single most difficult task for all of us: "Browbeating and finger-wagging don’t work, instead making people double down and become defensive." We live in an era where the media - and yes, liberal media outlets are also guilty of this - encourage us to "browbeat" those who disagree with us. I have to confess to several comments on social media indicating my loss of patience with those who refuse to become vaccinated. Of course I can point out that I have science & logic on my side, but the anti-vaxxers remain firmly convinced that they do as well - and as you say, they're not easily swayed.
One thing that helps is the memory of my dear mother, who passed in 2012 from Alzheimer's Disease. Mom was an intelligent, caring soul, but like many in her generation (she was born nearly 100 years ago), she fell for the Rush Limbaugh, "stupid liberals" narrative. I can assure you if she were alive and reasonably lucid today she would be a Trump supporting vaccine opponent, and nothing anyone could say would be able to change her mind. Seeing others as being similar to my mother helps me to have a bit more compassion - at times.
Seat belt usage in the US didn't become a regular thing because they saved lives; they only became "normal" when they became mandatory. I am sure that mandatory Covid vaccines will have the same trajectory - unless SCOTUS and/or Republicans in Congress & state legislatures prevent it, of course. And if that does prove to be the case, we'll just have to witness more of our well-meaning but deluded friends & family members suffering unnecessary suffering & death as a result.
Meanwhile I always ask myself what I can do to be part of the solution. Reading your columns and trying to find common ground with my fellow Americans, it seems, helps in that regard.
People I still see refusing them are coming from the perspective of "my rights," "personal freedom" and "the government shouldn't force me to do this." It doesn't seem to matter to these people what anyone says. It doesn't matter to them that this is how it's always gone with vaccines. And as for their impact on others? "Everyone [in the US] who wants a shot has had the opportunity to get one, so why should it matter?" It seems impossible because I think for someone to get to this point, they don't care about the rationale. They care about not being told what to do. They care about being vigilant against "Big Brother." Oy...
As to Fox, Sleeping Gisnys has waged a years-long campaign to pressure Fox advertisers, with some success. The problem is that the vast majority of Fox' revenue comes from cable subscriptions themselves. Even if you never watch Fox, by using cable, you are subsiding Fox News. Just as the vast majority of people refuse to close their FB/Meta accounts to help protect our children and democracy, they refuse to cancel cable subscriptions that feed the Fox lethal disinformation empire. Re 'gentle persuasion ', you might influence a handful of people, but 60M have not, and will not, get the vaccine. That means the rest of us will need to navigate a world where Covid is a danger for at least a few more years.The GOP and S OTUS will fight mandates to the end. So, I see no way through other than private company mandates and hospital giving unvaccinated Covid patients (hospitalized for Covid illness) the lowest priority for treatment. It's absurd that elective surgeries are cancelled and ICUs filled with those who are reckless with their own lives and those of their communities. As David Frum notes, the unvaccinated are not victims, they are victimizers.
I think there are some softer responses, that might push people to reconsider getting vaccinated. Encourage businesses to post what percentage of their staff are vaccinated. As a senior I am more likely to go to businesses where all the staff are vaccinated. Encourage businesses to check vax of people coming in. Encourage everyone who has a service done in their home to ask if the person doing the work is vaxed and will be wearing a mask. The rights of people who could be exposed to the deadly virus to shop, get home services and generally feel safer about living their lives have been ignored in this whole process. Some quick public service announcements about this would be a relatively cheap and easy solution. Focus on businesses and organizations keeping their customers and clients safe and advertise the heck out of it.
While I agree completely with your suggested approach to coaxing and dealing with vaccine resistors I despair that we have no reliable therapy for foolishness or irresponsibility. You justly point out the importance of us each having a shared responsibility for the well being and health of each other, I see many who do not share that ethic. There is no way to punish or hold accountable the irresponsible among us. However, we would be a safer and better society if there were an effective way to hold those encouraging that irresponsibility accountable. Perhaps the power of consumer pressure on companies providing economic support to those encouraging irresponsible behavior is a place to start? But I believe we need to and can do more. Even the right to free speech in our first amendment prohibits screaming “fire” in a crowded theater, inciting a riot, or causing deadly panic. Is that not analogous to deliberately and knowingly encouraging danger to public health? Is it yet time to consider using FCC regulatory powers on such threats to public health?
I admire your humanity and caring. Me? I have lost all empathy for those who are ignorantly avoiding the vaccine. They have no empathy or caring for others whom they might infect so why should I care about them? They care nothing about leaving their children as orphans with no caregivers. GoFundMe pages that their families are setting up will never provide for their children’s education or long term care. These are the people who rail against socialism and single payer healthcare, yet beg for money from friends the minute they run to the hospital to take up space that is needed for people who DO care about society.
To protect our society we SHOULD have mandatory vaccination and vaccine passports. Their freedumbs end when they are infecting other Americans and possibly creating an entire generation of children with no future. As one person said “Covid started as a virus and has mutated into an I.Q. test”.
We already require dogs to have a rabies vaccines, be on a leash and humans enrolled in school to get vaccinated. The covid vaccine should be no different. Simply, mandated. People are lazy, crazy, you name it. If it's not a mandate, people will make bad choices and they impact everyone. Just like you can no longer smoke in a bar, or drink and drive, or use your cell, while driving, drive your car without signalling turns, have emissions that surpass a level, go without car insurance, etc, drink on the job, walk around naked......the list goes on. Once it becomes a mandate, society accepts it. People are too complicated not to have societal rules, imho, and I've taught middle school for 34 years (which is no different).
I talked to one man about getting vaccinated after he saw me wearing a mask (he was unmasked). I asked him if he drove a car, and he said he did. I asked him if he thought it was a denial of his freedom that he had to have a license to drive. After we talked a bit, he said I asked good questions. I didn't challenge him about masks or vaccinations, but drew a parallel to other instances of government action he didn't object to.
What I find so frustrating about these people, particularly your male friends, is their insistence on no interference from the government concerning their bodies. Yet these same people are the first to argue that Roe vs Wade must be undone, thereby removing women’s autonomy over their own bodies. It is purely hypocritical as well as uninformed and dangerous to the public health. I saw one woman equating proof of vaccinations with Hitler’s SS demanding “show me your papers.” The level of ignorance and conspiracy theories is truly alarming. I applaud your patience with those people, but you just can’t fix stupid as in the case of the man that calls it a fraud, but admits that he was infected. What really sets me off is the people that claim to worry about their health as they’re standing next to a gas pump smoking a cigarette and drinking alcohol before noon. These people care nothing about their own health, so why should they care about the health of other people? I’m so frustrated by those people that smoke cigarettes and poison the air that I breathe while claiming their right to poison the air that I breathe with their Covid breath too. I’ve actually been attacked in the store by four people, young and old, male and female, that wanted to rip the mask from my face since they considered it purely a political statement that they disagree with. The level of violence from these ignorant people is what is truly alarming.
At this point, my son’s family and a few friends are so dug as anti-vax that it’s a waste of time to even discuss it with them further. It makes them mad and half of them have had Covid and think they have better immunity than me. Darwinian maybe? However, I think there’s a lot to learn about what’s going on in Florida. Oregon is number 14, but Florida is number one with a completely different approach. Follow the science?
Comparing people who refuse this particular vaccine to drunk drivers is missing the point of why many people who have read the facts and then decide not to vaccinate. Many are in healthcare and are scientists and know how to read studies. Many have read the information, discussed it with people who would actually listen, take many health measure, are not republicans, have never watched FOX anything, and are not against vaccines in general. Some have had past vaccine injuries and carefully look at what they are putting into their bodies. There are a host of people who have listened to various ways to approach this virus without a leaky vaccine that does not stop the virus or transmission, but instead they comply with the distancing/masking indoors along with boosting their immune system via food, supplements, exercise, etc. Then, if they get the virus they rely on early treatment which has been explored by other countries and in our country. This early treatment approach has been censured and maligned, doctors are losing their licenses for prescribing these meds. Why? The pharmacological industry backed by political and mainstream media have totally backed this "vaccines will save us" fallacy and all other approaches are ridiculed. What kind of public health policy tells you to vaccinate continually with a leaky vaccine and that is all? Instead of public debate, there is divisiveness. Just as with this article - I was hoping for better from you Mr. Kristof, as I have read you for a long time. Will you not even give an ear to people who have had vaccine injuries? Vaccine deaths? See good health in a different way? Do not buy into a system which says "buy our product, we have safe medicine, we tested it ourselves and you will keep needing us." There is hate of those who decide not to vaccinate, but the condescension is really unbelievable.
Vaccine mandates are Ok for small pox and other severely deadly diseases. Covid does not fall into this category, many people have light symptoms, some more severe, few end up in the ICU and/or die. Those in the last category have overwhelmingly pre-existing conditions, are older, or are unlucky. They should get vaccinated to increase their chances of survival but it is up to them. If they don't we should wish them good luck and let them pay/contribute for/to their medical bills.
Also, all European countries consider those who had and survived Covid as fully vaccinated, here in the US we don't and this is plainly stupid. If you had Covid, you are probably better protected against a new infection than if you are fully vaccinated.
And yes, I am fully vaccinated and got the booster shot.
Unfortunately, it's no longer 'e pluribus unum', it's 'you can't tell me what to do'. Anything that comes across this way will get pushback, just as drunken driving laws and social security and, well, anything, including abolishing slavery, did back when they were introduced.
I really like the analogy to drunk driving and look forward to learning if it works. I will try it on some people too. I do think, however, there are non-verbal hammers that should be used, such as not allowing insurance companies to cover the cost of care for someone who contracts Covid who has not been vaccinated and raising insurance premiums and copay rates on people who have not been vaccinated.
To those who say that getting the vaccine will change their DNA-- they should see this as an opportunity!
You've identified the single most difficult task for all of us: "Browbeating and finger-wagging don’t work, instead making people double down and become defensive." We live in an era where the media - and yes, liberal media outlets are also guilty of this - encourage us to "browbeat" those who disagree with us. I have to confess to several comments on social media indicating my loss of patience with those who refuse to become vaccinated. Of course I can point out that I have science & logic on my side, but the anti-vaxxers remain firmly convinced that they do as well - and as you say, they're not easily swayed.
One thing that helps is the memory of my dear mother, who passed in 2012 from Alzheimer's Disease. Mom was an intelligent, caring soul, but like many in her generation (she was born nearly 100 years ago), she fell for the Rush Limbaugh, "stupid liberals" narrative. I can assure you if she were alive and reasonably lucid today she would be a Trump supporting vaccine opponent, and nothing anyone could say would be able to change her mind. Seeing others as being similar to my mother helps me to have a bit more compassion - at times.
Seat belt usage in the US didn't become a regular thing because they saved lives; they only became "normal" when they became mandatory. I am sure that mandatory Covid vaccines will have the same trajectory - unless SCOTUS and/or Republicans in Congress & state legislatures prevent it, of course. And if that does prove to be the case, we'll just have to witness more of our well-meaning but deluded friends & family members suffering unnecessary suffering & death as a result.
Meanwhile I always ask myself what I can do to be part of the solution. Reading your columns and trying to find common ground with my fellow Americans, it seems, helps in that regard.
People I still see refusing them are coming from the perspective of "my rights," "personal freedom" and "the government shouldn't force me to do this." It doesn't seem to matter to these people what anyone says. It doesn't matter to them that this is how it's always gone with vaccines. And as for their impact on others? "Everyone [in the US] who wants a shot has had the opportunity to get one, so why should it matter?" It seems impossible because I think for someone to get to this point, they don't care about the rationale. They care about not being told what to do. They care about being vigilant against "Big Brother." Oy...
As to Fox, Sleeping Gisnys has waged a years-long campaign to pressure Fox advertisers, with some success. The problem is that the vast majority of Fox' revenue comes from cable subscriptions themselves. Even if you never watch Fox, by using cable, you are subsiding Fox News. Just as the vast majority of people refuse to close their FB/Meta accounts to help protect our children and democracy, they refuse to cancel cable subscriptions that feed the Fox lethal disinformation empire. Re 'gentle persuasion ', you might influence a handful of people, but 60M have not, and will not, get the vaccine. That means the rest of us will need to navigate a world where Covid is a danger for at least a few more years.The GOP and S OTUS will fight mandates to the end. So, I see no way through other than private company mandates and hospital giving unvaccinated Covid patients (hospitalized for Covid illness) the lowest priority for treatment. It's absurd that elective surgeries are cancelled and ICUs filled with those who are reckless with their own lives and those of their communities. As David Frum notes, the unvaccinated are not victims, they are victimizers.
I think there are some softer responses, that might push people to reconsider getting vaccinated. Encourage businesses to post what percentage of their staff are vaccinated. As a senior I am more likely to go to businesses where all the staff are vaccinated. Encourage businesses to check vax of people coming in. Encourage everyone who has a service done in their home to ask if the person doing the work is vaxed and will be wearing a mask. The rights of people who could be exposed to the deadly virus to shop, get home services and generally feel safer about living their lives have been ignored in this whole process. Some quick public service announcements about this would be a relatively cheap and easy solution. Focus on businesses and organizations keeping their customers and clients safe and advertise the heck out of it.
While I agree completely with your suggested approach to coaxing and dealing with vaccine resistors I despair that we have no reliable therapy for foolishness or irresponsibility. You justly point out the importance of us each having a shared responsibility for the well being and health of each other, I see many who do not share that ethic. There is no way to punish or hold accountable the irresponsible among us. However, we would be a safer and better society if there were an effective way to hold those encouraging that irresponsibility accountable. Perhaps the power of consumer pressure on companies providing economic support to those encouraging irresponsible behavior is a place to start? But I believe we need to and can do more. Even the right to free speech in our first amendment prohibits screaming “fire” in a crowded theater, inciting a riot, or causing deadly panic. Is that not analogous to deliberately and knowingly encouraging danger to public health? Is it yet time to consider using FCC regulatory powers on such threats to public health?
Thank you for your newsletter today. It's well written and full of good ideas. I hope your campaign in Oregon goes well.
I admire your humanity and caring. Me? I have lost all empathy for those who are ignorantly avoiding the vaccine. They have no empathy or caring for others whom they might infect so why should I care about them? They care nothing about leaving their children as orphans with no caregivers. GoFundMe pages that their families are setting up will never provide for their children’s education or long term care. These are the people who rail against socialism and single payer healthcare, yet beg for money from friends the minute they run to the hospital to take up space that is needed for people who DO care about society.
To protect our society we SHOULD have mandatory vaccination and vaccine passports. Their freedumbs end when they are infecting other Americans and possibly creating an entire generation of children with no future. As one person said “Covid started as a virus and has mutated into an I.Q. test”.
We already require dogs to have a rabies vaccines, be on a leash and humans enrolled in school to get vaccinated. The covid vaccine should be no different. Simply, mandated. People are lazy, crazy, you name it. If it's not a mandate, people will make bad choices and they impact everyone. Just like you can no longer smoke in a bar, or drink and drive, or use your cell, while driving, drive your car without signalling turns, have emissions that surpass a level, go without car insurance, etc, drink on the job, walk around naked......the list goes on. Once it becomes a mandate, society accepts it. People are too complicated not to have societal rules, imho, and I've taught middle school for 34 years (which is no different).
I talked to one man about getting vaccinated after he saw me wearing a mask (he was unmasked). I asked him if he drove a car, and he said he did. I asked him if he thought it was a denial of his freedom that he had to have a license to drive. After we talked a bit, he said I asked good questions. I didn't challenge him about masks or vaccinations, but drew a parallel to other instances of government action he didn't object to.
What I find so frustrating about these people, particularly your male friends, is their insistence on no interference from the government concerning their bodies. Yet these same people are the first to argue that Roe vs Wade must be undone, thereby removing women’s autonomy over their own bodies. It is purely hypocritical as well as uninformed and dangerous to the public health. I saw one woman equating proof of vaccinations with Hitler’s SS demanding “show me your papers.” The level of ignorance and conspiracy theories is truly alarming. I applaud your patience with those people, but you just can’t fix stupid as in the case of the man that calls it a fraud, but admits that he was infected. What really sets me off is the people that claim to worry about their health as they’re standing next to a gas pump smoking a cigarette and drinking alcohol before noon. These people care nothing about their own health, so why should they care about the health of other people? I’m so frustrated by those people that smoke cigarettes and poison the air that I breathe while claiming their right to poison the air that I breathe with their Covid breath too. I’ve actually been attacked in the store by four people, young and old, male and female, that wanted to rip the mask from my face since they considered it purely a political statement that they disagree with. The level of violence from these ignorant people is what is truly alarming.
At this point, my son’s family and a few friends are so dug as anti-vax that it’s a waste of time to even discuss it with them further. It makes them mad and half of them have had Covid and think they have better immunity than me. Darwinian maybe? However, I think there’s a lot to learn about what’s going on in Florida. Oregon is number 14, but Florida is number one with a completely different approach. Follow the science?
Comparing people who refuse this particular vaccine to drunk drivers is missing the point of why many people who have read the facts and then decide not to vaccinate. Many are in healthcare and are scientists and know how to read studies. Many have read the information, discussed it with people who would actually listen, take many health measure, are not republicans, have never watched FOX anything, and are not against vaccines in general. Some have had past vaccine injuries and carefully look at what they are putting into their bodies. There are a host of people who have listened to various ways to approach this virus without a leaky vaccine that does not stop the virus or transmission, but instead they comply with the distancing/masking indoors along with boosting their immune system via food, supplements, exercise, etc. Then, if they get the virus they rely on early treatment which has been explored by other countries and in our country. This early treatment approach has been censured and maligned, doctors are losing their licenses for prescribing these meds. Why? The pharmacological industry backed by political and mainstream media have totally backed this "vaccines will save us" fallacy and all other approaches are ridiculed. What kind of public health policy tells you to vaccinate continually with a leaky vaccine and that is all? Instead of public debate, there is divisiveness. Just as with this article - I was hoping for better from you Mr. Kristof, as I have read you for a long time. Will you not even give an ear to people who have had vaccine injuries? Vaccine deaths? See good health in a different way? Do not buy into a system which says "buy our product, we have safe medicine, we tested it ourselves and you will keep needing us." There is hate of those who decide not to vaccinate, but the condescension is really unbelievable.
Vaccine mandates are Ok for small pox and other severely deadly diseases. Covid does not fall into this category, many people have light symptoms, some more severe, few end up in the ICU and/or die. Those in the last category have overwhelmingly pre-existing conditions, are older, or are unlucky. They should get vaccinated to increase their chances of survival but it is up to them. If they don't we should wish them good luck and let them pay/contribute for/to their medical bills.
Also, all European countries consider those who had and survived Covid as fully vaccinated, here in the US we don't and this is plainly stupid. If you had Covid, you are probably better protected against a new infection than if you are fully vaccinated.
And yes, I am fully vaccinated and got the booster shot.
Unfortunately, it's no longer 'e pluribus unum', it's 'you can't tell me what to do'. Anything that comes across this way will get pushback, just as drunken driving laws and social security and, well, anything, including abolishing slavery, did back when they were introduced.