sj_zero on Nostr: Some people are confused as to how anti-vax sentiment can be considered progressive, ...

Some people are confused as to how anti-vax sentiment can be considered progressive, since the dominant narrative has been that anti-vax is a right wing idea.

That only happened very recently. Prior to the pandemic, the largest constituency of anti-vaxxers were progressive women who were worried about the effects of vaccines on their children since they're drugs produced by big pharma who have several blockbuster examples of selling things that turned out to be horrible such as thalidomide. It appeals to the anti-corporate sector of progressivism, and there would be an element where instead of using big pharma chemicals they'd prefer to use more naturalistic methods to stay healthy such as diet, exercise, and herbal supplements.

There's data to back up the idea that anti-vaxxing is more of a left-wing idea, and that's the fact that many breakthrough cases of preventable diseases such as measles and mumps are in states such as California which have a lot more adherence to progressive ideology.

The right wing version of anti-vaxxing is actually a misnomer since it's typically only the one set of vaccines they're concerned about, and most right wing "anti-vaxxers" will fully vaccinate their kids except for the one. In reality it's more just linguistic propaganda being used to try to shame people into doing what they're told.

It's a simple logical argument: "Some As are B, which does not imply all As are B" some vaccines are effective and useful, but not all are. And some vaccines are particularly useful for some people at some times, but not as useful generally -- If you're bitten by a rabid dog, a rabies vaccine will save your life, but typically we don't blanket vaccinate people for rabies because the exposure to rabies is very low (most people will never be at risk), and the vaccine is highly effective after the initial bite if it's given quickly enough. Like many things, it's a decision relying on personal circumstances as well as blanket categorizations.

Some people go "But doctors said it was ok!" but doctors also prescribed thalidomide to pregnant women so let's chill out and accept that it's ok for people to use their brains and think for themselves even if they come to conclusions we don't agree with.

It is a first principle of medical interventions that every medical intervention has the potential to cause harm. Even something with no active medical ingredient such as sugar pill has recorded side effects due to placebo effect, and once you start injecting manufactured substances into the body the risk increases considerably. Therefore it's sensible to be careful about choosing medical interventions whose benefits outweigh the risks. That's true whatever your political ideology.