Mother Jones article "Immune to Reason"

[A&A]

There is a very pro-vax article in this month's issue of Mother Jones magazine. Yep, you heard right, Mother Jones. The place where you usually hear the radical, alternative voice.

The article isn't online (not for free, anyway), but I'd be more than happy to mail a copy to anyone who wants one (just PM me)--if you'll write them a letter with me.

I'll quote a short paragraph from the article:


"Right now, in many states, all it takes to get an exemption from vaccine requirements is signing a form. Some, including a group of doctors at John Hopkins University, have proposed making it harder--allowing a philosophical exemption only after parents demonstrate a good-faith effort to educate themselves."



Like, um, we haven't "educated" ourselves in the first place???

It also mentions that highly educated areas of the country--like Boulder--have higher rates of exemptions. Um, doesn't that tell you something?

Anyway, this is just really disappointing to me. My dh has subscribed to this magazine for over a decade, and we usually really enjoy reading it. I mean, this is exactly why I don't subscribe to mainstream mags, you know?

[A&A]

37 views and no comments? Really?

[loveyourohana]

Originally Posted by A&A

37 views and no comments? Really?

I am surprised there haven't been comments to this yet>>>>

I think if that seriously goes through... its frightening... we are the ones needing the education.. it seems Docs and med. professionals are! Not to mention the fact that choice is choice, I don't need to take a class before I decide not to have corrective eye sight surgery... It should be the other way around.

It should be a class of information for those deciding to vaccinate. Show the real statisitics, and see who actually decides to do it?

[mamabadger]

The Mother Jones article is not available online, as you said, but this is another one by the same author.

http://www.washingtonindependent.com/view/celebrity-mommy-wars

I think the reason "alternative" sources like Mother Jones are taking this view is that they see anti-vaxers as some kind of fundamentalist anti-science faction, like people who refuse to believe in dinosaurs. I hear terms like "vaccine deniers" being used (in the same sense as HIV deniers or, I suppose, Holocaust deniers) to describe people who question vaccine safety. To its credit, Mother Jones has a reputation for trying to take the side of reason against prejudice and superstition, and I suppose they feel this is another example of such a conflict. The title, "Immune to Reason," implies the same thing.

[mama2landon]

Originally Posted by A&A

"Right now, in many states, all it takes to get an exemption from vaccine requirements is signing a form. Some, including a group of doctors at John Hopkins University, have proposed making it harder--allowing a philosophical exemption only after parents demonstrate a good-faith effort to educate themselves."

If anybody has to demonstrate an effort to educate themselves, shouldn't it be people who go through medical procedures? That is essentially what a vaccination is, and I don't see any proposals requiring that parents educate themselves with pros, cons, statistics, etc before they submit their children to vaxes. Preaching to the choir, I know. I am surprised to hear that this comes out of Mother Jones. Seems like an article like that wouldn't go over too well with their core demographic. Too bad they didn't put it online- probably knew they'd be overwhelmed with responses from all those unreasonable, uneducated non-vaxers.

[mamadelbosque]

We just got our issue today too and I was pretty surprised. I'm definetly planning on writing a letter

[A&A]

Originally Posted by mamadelbosque

We just got our issue today too and I was pretty surprised. I'm definetly planning on writing a letter

good!

[A&A]

Originally Posted by mama2landon

If anybody has to demonstrate an effort to educate themselves, shouldn't it be people who go through medical procedures? That is essentially what a vaccination is, and I don't see any proposals requiring that parents educate themselves with pros, cons, statistics, etc before they submit their children to vaxes.

Good point!

[A&A]

Well, I sent them a letter. Hopefully other people will, too.

[`guest`]

I glanced at their webpage and saw loads of stuff re pharma being a profit driven machine. It's interesting that they jump basically on the pharma bandwagon re vaxes. Have you ever seen such an excellent marketing strategy as vaxes.

Also interesting there's some stuff on non fact based/faith based medicine. The western medical take on things is being threatened right now by holistic medicine which actually works better than allopathic medicine on many cdx, pretty much everything aside from the traumatic injury department, which allopathy works on.

The whole model of attack disease by breaking the person down will change. Interesting this is a base for say, military...you break the soldier down, build him up. Same for children, you break their spirit to make them strong...I think our paradigm is shifting. Now we believe we enforce our children, and must learn this in our own body instead of attacking, attacking all the time.

I am very disappointed in Mother Jones yet not surprised in a sense. I believe they wish to distance themselves from anything non evidentiary/double blind study based. Which is actually like grasping at straws, unless we were machines of course. In a couple hundred yrs our current medical model will seem as outdated as they were a century ago.

[Mary-Beth]

That's too bad that they didn't offer another perspective to go along.

Maybe one of you can offer a response for them to publish.

[La Sombra]

Originally Posted by mamabadger

I think the reason "alternative" sources like Mother Jones are taking this view is that they see anti-vaxers as some kind of fundamentalist anti-science faction, like people who refuse to believe in dinosaurs. I hear terms like "vaccine deniers" being used (in the same sense as HIV deniers or, I suppose, Holocaust deniers) to describe people who question vaccine safety. To its credit, Mother Jones has a reputation for trying to take the side of reason against prejudice and superstition, and I suppose they feel this is another example of such a conflict. The title, "Immune to Reason," implies the same thing.

I think Mamabadger is right about the perspective that Mother Jones is looking at this issue from. But many of us know that not all parents who choose not to vaccinate their children are such anti-science fundamentalists--quite the opposite--we are in fact educated enough to question the medical paradigm with ITS blind faith in vaccines, to question their safety and efficacy based on the sound scientific evidence in which we immerse ourselves.

It will be very interesting to see how many (printed) responses the publication receives in response to the article. Moms like A&A whose family's have subscriptions, how about keeping us all updated on the response that the magazine gets next month?

If you still keep your subscription, that is!

[guest^]

Originally Posted by mamabadger

The Mother Jones article is not available online, as you said, but this is another one by the same author.

http://www.washingtonindependent.com/view/celebrity-mommy-wars

I think the reason "alternative" sources like Mother Jones are taking this view is that they see anti-vaxers as some kind of fundamentalist anti-science faction, like people who refuse to believe in dinosaurs.

I agree with this. When our state was under attack re hsing, ALL but ONE person wrote in to our paper,saying how we were a bunch of ignorant freaks,only teaching our DC from the Bible. The ONE guy who wrote in, said to give us hser's a break,as many are educated,down to earth folks,trying to step outside the box.

It just bothers me that people have to stick labels on anything that is different to them.

[xmasbaby7]

Authur Allen writes about this topic frequently, and he is part of circle of writers that Mother Jones would pick from, not because Mother Jones is "pro-vax".

Haven't seen the article yet, but will get it.

I can tell you that thoughtful letters explaining the angle you wish they would have taken as leaders in investigative journalism will get read and thought about. An angry letter will not do much but make you feel better. If enough people give real direction on stories to report to Mother Jones, they will possibly follow up with it.

If everyone writes in saying they are canceling their subscriptions it just makes the editors less likely to cover that topic again. Instead, they should be encouraged to offer fair representation of controversial topic.

The sad things about this is that the editor who assigned the article is possibly a new mom who just took her baby to get her 4 month shots and found comfort in reading Arthur Allen's stance on vaccines. The media is made up of people with their own personal experiences shaping public opinion.

Any article on the topic is generating lots of readers, so it is a smart topic to cover for a magazine like Mother Jones.

[A&A]

Originally Posted by DianeAK

It will be very interesting to see how many (printed) responses the publication receives in response to the article. Moms like A&A whose family's have subscriptions, how about keeping us all updated on the response that the magazine gets next month?

If you still keep your subscription, that is!

This is the Sept/Oct. issue, so it will be two months before another issue comes out. But I'll report back if I see any letters in the next issue.

[janellesmommy]

I'd give Mother Jones the benefit of the doubt. They just need to be educated on the topic, although you'd think they would have already educated themselves. But I guess nobody and no magazine is perfect.

[MCsMom]

I am suprised. Please update on any letters that they publish next issue.

[JSerene]

This was such a poor article it made me wonder if it was published just to get a reaction & lots of letters. I don't have it in front of me, but here are 2 points that were particularly bad:
-Even if vaccines cause autism, parents should do the altruistic thing and vaccinate anyway to provide herd immunity thus protecting babies, the elderly, and cancer patients.
-He would rather trust doctors than famous people like Jim Carrey.

Sheesh.

[Mommymama]

I haven't read the article yet but I know that all vaccination studies use a "bogus" placebo control group of individuals vaccinated against something else other than the vaccine being tested. In essence it's considered unethical to use completely unvaxed individuals in a study because of denying them "life-saving medications" or something to that extension. So much for calling intelligent people vax deniers! On the other hand, there is the very famous article about the Amish that reported only two cases of autism in their unvaxed community and one of the autistic kids was vaccinated! I believe that if real placebo control groups of completely unvaxed individuals were used in vaccination studies then vaccines would go down in history together with blood letting and other bogus medical procedures.

[waiflywaif]

It also mentions that highly educated areas of the country--like Boulder--have higher rates of exemptions. Um, doesn't that tell you something?

Slightly off-topic, but I don't think this tells you anything about the validity of vaccinating. I think it tells you that highly educated people are more likely to feel comfortable going against a doctor's advice. They feel more equal in status, whereas poor and less-educated people do not.