"How Bad Should We Feel When the Willfully Unvaccinated Die?"

[kane_magus]

A post on Whatever dot Scalzi dot com.

I've already touched on this topic recently, at least tangentially, as well as one potential long-term solution, so for now I'll just leave it at that.

Comments

[owsf2000]

Briefly reading the post I think he's actually being a bit kinder than I would be.

1. The people who can't be vaccinated, yes, definitely are blameless for the most part. (Assuming they would have liked to get the vaccine if they could. If they would have refused it even if they could have gotten it well... at least they had a valid reason to avoid it. These are the only people that shouldn't be getting the vaccine however. And the reason we need everyone else to get it as much as possible for herd immunity. To protect these people, not the other two groups. I'd feel bad when people of this category get sick and potentially die.

2. The willfully led people I'll still blame, personally. To give them a free pass or feel sympathy for them is essentially justifying their refusal to think for themselves and to actually analyze the facts - to try to separate the fiction. I wouldn't feel bad at all for what happens to this crowd. Wouldn't feel good mind you, but I wouldn't feel bad.

3. The people actively spreading the lies, of course, are the worst of the bunch. There'd probably be a little bit of schadenfreudeness there, but I'd just think we're better off without them as a species to be honest. Otherwise, not a god damned tear will fall.

Now. This is my opinion for people not directly associated with me in my life of course. If a friend or co-worker or family member died as a result of #2 or #3 things could get a little more complicated. But then in the case of #3, I doubt they'd have stayed a friend long enough or been a co-worker I'd interact with any more than absolutely necessary to begin with. If it were a family member in #3, it would probably mean the final end of a long long argument over their bullshit, or I was already avoiding them to begin with. I doubt in either case some schadenfreudeness would result.

[kane_magus]

For group #2, the only reason I would maybe cut them some slack is if they were of the hypothetical subcategory of people who have never, once, had anyone tell them, either directly or indirectly, "Hey, you're being a dumbass and here is why." Like, say, they were living so cocooned in an echo chamber that they'd never even been exposed to the fact that what they believe is horseshit, enough so that they wouldn't even really know to have a reason to challenge what they believe in the first place (e.g. kids who grew up in a completely insular RWNJ household and didn't even know of the existence of anything other than Faux Noise or whatever, let alone ever watched it), then maybe I could be persuaded to feel the tiniest bit sorry for them, though I'd still be giving them the stink eye. If, however, they've seen/read/been told about/otherwise exposed to legitimate reasons as to why they're fucking wrong and why they are being goddamned morons, yet they still belligerently choose to believe the lies, then yeah, fuck 'em raw with a corn cob. I'd guess that the existence of such people would be extremely rare, though, as I'm sure most people in group #2 would have had someone, somewhere, tell them at least once in their pathetic lives that they're full of shit and why that's the case.

The absolute worst ones, for me, are ones Mr. Scalzi didn't mention because, technically, they aren't actually part of the unvaccinated and thus were outside the scope of his post. That would be the group of ones who have been vaccinated, yet still try to sell the dumbfuckery about vaccines being bad. Basically, they're the exact same as group #3, except they've hypocritically gotten the vaccine because they're too chickenshit to actually live by their supposed beliefs (like, say, Dumbfuck Trump and [probably] Fucker Carlson, among too many others). They're getting the benefit of having the vaccine[1], but they are also getting the benefit of spewing disinformation about the vaccines, via, for instance, whatever blood money they're getting from Faux Noise or Reichfart or whoever it is that's paying them to spew their dumbshit. (The ones paying them would also fall into this category, of course, assuming that they, too, have been vaccinated. Otherwise they'd be in group #3 directly.)

As for friends or family, in my case... As far as I'm aware, everyone in my immediate family has gotten the vaccine (even the ones who otherwise ran the risk of potentially having been swayed not to do so via the garbage "news" they consume and other asinine beliefs that they may hold as a result of that). And I don't have any friends (any more) who might be in category #2 or #3, so that's a moot point, for me.

[1] - Which, as far as I'm concerned, is good only insofar as it helps others not catch COVID-19, because I honestly wouldn't lose a wink of sleep if they themselves still somehow caught it and died of it[2] (or else got hit by a bus or whatever other horrific death one might blithely fantasize about them suffering).

[2] - The only reason I would be against that would be because their followers would then point to that and say "Look! See! They got the vaccine and they still died! The vaccine is totally ineffective/a hoax/whatever! Hargle bargle herpidy derpity!"