Liza Featherstone on the anti-vaccination crowd
featherstone/shotdown/> Shot Down
by Liza Featherstone Baby-proofed and bathed in natural light, the apartment had a lovely = view of the Hudson River. The playgroup hostess had thoughtfully = provided a packet of organic applesauce for each baby. The talk = quickly turned, as it often does with new parents in the same = neighborhood, to pediatricians. One mom had found one she liked =97 not = easy in this era of managed care and brusque manners. “But what is = her stance on vaccinations?” our hostess inquired anxiously. “Uh, = she’s all for them,” the first mother replied cautiously. After an = uncomfortable silence, the hostess revealed that her sister had “a = lot of education” about vaccines, and she herself was not planning to = inject her child with any of that poison. “What about when she goes = to school?” we asked, trying not to sound judgmental. Our hostess was = unruffled. By that time, she asserted, so many people will be = refusing vaccines, that the state laws =97 which currently require = children attending public school or licensed daycare to have up-to- = date shots =97 will have to be changed. “People,” she explained, “are = beginning to wake up.” People who don’t vaccinate their kids tend to talk in these terms. = They used to be passive “sheeple,” doing what the doctors and the = experts told them. Once they informed themselves, they realized the = full horror of injecting helpless infants full of toxins. […]