Mass Formation-> Mass Psychosis-> Mass Delusion -> Mass Atrocities
The pro-vaxx must be reminded everywhere, every day that this is abnormal and that there are strong opposing voices. For their own good. And ours.
We all know Mattias Desmet and his presentation of the Mass Formation theory. If not, listen to this recent interview with the true Canadian heroine Julie Ponesse. In it, Desmet explains one very important thing. Namely, what we should be doing to prevent the mass formation crowd, in their exalted, hypnotized state, from stepping off the ledge and descending into atrocities on the dissenters:
In a nutshell, we usually cannot persuade the “lemmings” that they are wrong. Büt (sic!), the dissenting voices nevertheless need to be loud and always present, in order to constantly disturb the narrative of the mass leaders and to prevent the hypnotized masses from descending into the destruction of the ones that do not go along with their chosen narrative.
They, and especially the ones instigating, enabling, and carrying out this “vaccination” programme, like our dear elected and unelected officials, backed by the police, courts, and the medical establishment, should always feel our presence and our vehement disagreement with what they are up to.
In order to do it well, we need to have the answers handy to the most often used cliches promulgated among the pro-vaxx crowd and in the fact-checked media. And the answers that will expose all the absurdity of the premises on which their narrative hinges.
In this post, I propose a few such cliches, taken directly from Twitter, and will ask you, dear readers, to come up with convincing rebuttals in the comments below. Also, please add more stark cliches to this short list of mine. The next post will sum up your inputs.
Without further ado:
You should wear masks to protect the vulnerable; wearing masks better be mandatory(https://twitter.com/search?q=people%20not%20wearing%20masks&src=typed_query):
Unvaccinated have no right to infect others, we have a [constitutional] right to savety from being infected by the unvaccinated(https://twitter.com/search?q=no%20right%20to%20infect%20others&src=typed_query):
Therefore, vaccines should be mandatory to protect others; in a pandemic, it’s not about the personal choice any more (or, as Arnold Schwarzenegger famously put it, “screw your freedoms”)(https://twitter.com/search?q=vaccines%20mandatory%20protect%20others
Children and even babies should be vaccinated as well, to protect the vulnerable among them, and us(https://twitter.com/search?q=childern%20should%20be%20vaccinated%20&src=typed_query):
Unvaccinated can be made to pay the price for their personal choice and have no “right” to work where vaccines are mandated, or shop, or travel. Discriminating against the unvaccinated is fair play(https://twitter.com/search?q=unvaccinated%20no%20right%20to%20work&src=typed_query
Please let me know what you would say to them to expose the absurdity of these (or other prevailing) premises but, as Desmet points out, also avoiding unnecessary destructive polarization:
Looking forward to your feedback!
A good way to begin (which works at least half the time) is to start your rebuttal with.....
"I think we can all agree that....." and then say something which sounds very supportive or empathetic or comforting.
and then interject some dissonance into the conversation.
The recent interviewer who was at the Roe V Wade protests and was asking the protestors about "my body my choice" and bodily autonomy used this technique, and then he hit them with, "so you are (understandably) for bodily autonomy.... how about the right to choose not to get the COVID vaccine?" and it flummoxed quite a few of them.
I think the idea here is not so much a rebuttal, as injecting dissonance into their thought process, in as gentle a way as possible so they at least taste the pill, even if they don't swallow it.
Meet them where they ARE, and then get them to wake up ever so slightly as to where they might actually BE.
Thanks for this post and invitation. We need to keep in mind that a lot of these Twitter posts are likely bots. I don't have pat or pithy answers, but maybe we can generate some together. I find that questions have worked well, because normally people haven't done complete research and it shows up in their answers.
1) when people say the vax should be mandatory, I would say "when people are afraid they suggest very extreme things. We don't know the long-term effects of this injection, so I can't imagine anything more stupid than to have every single person on the earth take it. If it does have bad long-term effects, we are all screwed! Don't you think that's stupid to inject everyone with one product that we don't know the long-term effect of? I know that scares people if they think their vaccine doesn't protect them, and they sometimes react with extreme divisive and cruel suggestions about who should participate in society or not".
2) when people say that unvaxxed are transmitting more, I'd ask in an open way, "how do you know that? Where do you get that impression?" Then as a follow-up I could say either a) "the picture totally changed with the Delta and then omicron. It reminds me of the early days of aids, where people thought it could be transmitted through personal contact and there were calls for AIDS victims to be isolated from others, put on an island. It ended up not being true." Or b) "I know that the pharmaceutical industry sure wants that to be true cuz they are making billions. So they're doing all they can to make it seem that way."
3) when people say that it's mostly unvaccinated dying, I'd ask the same question in an open friendly way, "how do you know that?" And then ask follow up questions about their answer, like what hospitals do they know where full, and for how long. Then I'd say "the picture seems to be more complex than that. The continent that's been kicking covid's butt better than any other is africa, and it's also the continent with the lowest vaccination rate. I'd also cite Vermont in September of 2021, we're 76% of the people hospitalized and killed were vaccinated. Hospitals know how to triage, I trust them to do it"
4) when people talk about masks, I would again ask how they know that. I would say "there's been so many studies coming out on each side of the issue that we don't know yet. But we do know that masks aren't neutral, they limit the amount of oxygen a person takes in and the person breathes in their own CO2 and bacteria. This in addition to the virus being smaller than the holes in a surgical mask, is probably why so many studies are coming out on both side of the issue. All I know is I want to breathe all the oxygen I can, it's good for everyone's health."
5) for immunocompromised people, I would say "I'm so sorry about your grandma, I hope she gets better soon. I know as my grandma got older she was not in the greatest health, but would never have wanted our family or other people to restrict their lives for her. She took responsibility for herself, and wished others to live the fullest lives they could. She was very loving and generous that way."
6) when people say on vaccinated people have no right to work, or be in public spaces, I would say "this reminds me of the early days of the AIDS epidemic where people wanted to cut them out of society. That's what the movie Philadelphia with Tom Hanks was about".
7) when they talk about unvaccinated people should not be allowed to fly, I would say "interesting, I think it's the other way around; the unvaccinated people need to be protected from the vaccinated people, and vaccinated people should NOT be allowed to fly". This puts a mirror up to their extremism.
8) re protecting disabled people, I would say "most disabled people don't want others to their restrict their lives for them."
9) regarding unvaccinated people being a danger in any way, I could say "there's evidence that this vaccine is damaging people's immune systems. If a lot of vaccinated people are getting repeated infections because their immune system isn't working properly, will vaccinated people remove themselves from others so they don't infect them?"