If they’re getting ready for book-burning parties, perhaps we should hurry up and purchase books as Christmas gifts…and New Year’s gifts .. and Valentine’s Day gifts.
Was George Orwell right AGAIN?
The attached Business Insider article, authored by Grace Dean, sure looks like it’s meant to set up even MORE censorship.https://www.businessinsider.com/amazon-anti-vaxx-books-vaccine-search-results-barnes-noble-covid-2020-12?op=1
We object to so many things in this article, we’re not even sure where to start.
1) Ms. Dean uses the pejorative “anti-vaxxer” without defining it. Does it refer to people who don’t want to get vaccines? Or to people who don’t want others to get vaccines? Or to people who have had terrible, catastrophic reactions to their vaccines?
Words matter. So do definitions.
2) We notice that this sentence in the Business Insider article contains 3 separate hyperlinks:
“During the pandemic, some groups have protested a potential COVID-19 vaccine, attempted to discredit scientists, and vowed they would not be vaccinated against the novel coronavirus.”
Ms. Dean must think this is important because the exact same sentence with the exact same hyperlinks appears in an article she published 4 days previously.
But we clicked on those hyperlinks, and we would argue that they do not support the claim.
Example A: Ms. hyperlinked an NBC news article about a lockdown protest in England to support her claim “some groups have protested a potential COVID-19 vaccine.” But go to the hyperlinked article AND THERE IS NO MENTION OF ANY GROUPS OR EVEN INDIVIDUALS PROTESTING ANY VACCINE.
Read it for yourself here: https://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/more-150-anti-lockdown-anti-vaccine-protesters-arrested-london-n1249261
See what she did there?
Example B: Ms. Dean claims that “some groups … attempted to discredit scientists,” and as purported proof, hyperlinks to a Guardian article that does claim that “anti-vaxxers seek to discredit Pfizer’s vaccine” BUT fails to provide a single case of someone actually doing that.
The ONE person quoted as a “discreditor,” Louise Creffield from Save Our Rights UK, states her concern that there was neither safety data available nor peer review done.
Hilariously, the Guardian’s “debunking” of her concern is to quote British Prime Minister Boris Johnson as “explicit in saying there was no safety data for the vaccine and it has not been peer-reviewed.”
Um. So, actually, he confirms the reasons for her concern.
Did Ms. Dean bother to read the source she was using to support her unfair attack?
She can read it here, and so can you: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/nov/10/coronavirus-anti-vaxxers-seek-to-discredit-pfizers-vaccine
Example C: Ms. Dean claims that “some groups … vowed they would not be vaccinated against a novel coronavirus.”
She never tells us which groups, nor does she give us an example of ANY group making such a vow.
She quotes 3 people; the first states he is concerned that the vaccine be “absolutely” tested, the second states that both her children had vaccine damage problems, and the third states he’s NOT anti-vaccine, but concerned about rushed production and the lack of a true placebo.
DO YOU SEE WHAT SHE DID THERE?
So already, that does not support Ms. Dean’s point. But to top it off, the ABC article quotes an INFECTIOUS DISEASE SPECIALIST who “confers with CDC on vaccine research” as saying “I HAVE THE SAME CONCERNS.” (caps ours)
Would someone please tell Ms. Dean that these are NOT examples of even a single group “vowing not to be vaccinated,” and that she (and you) can read her own source right here: https://abc7news.com/covid-vaccine-19-for-coronavirus-update/6366222/
3) We searched “vaccines” on Amazon and we had VERY different results than Ms. Dean did.
Perhaps it’s because Amazon’s search algorithms are similar to Google’s: the results depend on the individual user’s interests and cached history.
Or perhaps she did not give us the first 10, 20, or more books that popped up. Note her wording: “Amazon’s top search results include…”
We’ll say it again: Wording matters.
We see what she did there.
SO LET’S TRY AN EXPERIMENT!
Go to Amazon and search “vaccines,” and then come back here and post the first 10 results you get.
If you’ve already read any of them, feel free to offer a short review as well.
Here is the list of what came up for us, in order:
- The HPV Vaccine On Trial: Seeking Justice For A Generation Betrayed by Mary Holland , Kim Mack Rosenberg , Eileen Iorio
- The Vaccine-Friendly Plan: Dr. Paul’s Safe and Effective Approach to Immunity and Health-from Pregnancy Through Your Child’s Teen Years by Paul Thomas M.D. and Jennifer Margulis
- Vaccine Ingredients T-Shirt Mercury/Aluminum DNA Antivax [Hey! This isn’t even a book!]
- TrustWHO [a video]
- Miller’s Review of Critical Vaccine Studies: 400 Important Scientific Papers Summarized for Parents and Researchers
- Vaccine Epidemic: How Corporate Greed, Biased Science, and Coercive Government Threaten Our Human Rights, Our Health, and Our Children by Louise Kuo Habakus (editor), Kris Koscheski, et al.
- Dissolving Illusions by Suzanne Humphries and Roman Bystrianyk
- The Vaccines Project [a Prime Video]
- When This Virus is Over 2020 Humor Social Distancing Sarcastic Funny T Shirt [This is actually really funny and would make a great Christmas gift.]
- Vaccines, Autoimmunity, and the Changing Nature of Childhood Illness by Dr. Thomas Cowan MD and Sally Fallon Morell
We scrolled down 26 items before we saw one of the 2 books Ms. Dean noted (“Anyone Who Tells You…”), and “Jabbed” was the 82nd book.
How about you?