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by native_samples 1648 days ago
That's just another empty insult. Anyway, consider that half of the reason people debate or take positions on forums isn't to directly convince just the person they're talking to, it's to convince people who are watching. Right now you aren't convincing people who are watching.

Also, really, I should be convincible. A few years ago I was quite like you. I even occasionally used anti-vaxx as a slur, a shorthand for crazy illogical conspiracy theorist, although I'm now ashamed to admit it. I didn't ever review their arguments because I already "knew" they were wrong. Well, and because it was irrelevant as there were no vaccines I was being asked to take. Things changed a lot in just two years.

Moreover, like many people on this forum, I'm a specialist who owes my position and status in society to expertise. I don't like the idea that huge numbers of specialized experts appear to be in the grip of some sort of mass hysteria or collectivist ideology in which the downsides of massive social interventions are simply taboo to discuss. That degrades respect for all kinds of specialism and expertise, in all fields, even if not equally.

Really the most concerning and effective anti-vaxx propaganda, as you put it, is exactly the sort of responses you're posting now. Not "here's evidence that point X is wrong" but rather, almost boastful proclamations that they aren't going to engage in the discussion at all because they are too intellectually pure to do so. It looks and sounds like a sort of fanaticism.