Tuesday, January 13

Idiots

I'm minding my own business slicing today, right.  Just like I do once a week, every week at my job.  I'm slicing, ho hum, dum dee dum, do d'lee doo, and then this story comes on This American Life about not immunizing your kids.
Stupid.  What kind of self-absorbed person do you have to be to think that you have some say in whether you immunize your child?  Is there no greater good?  Are you that person that I smile at and you just walk by like I'm transparent?  Did object permanence never really kick in, and you think that when you shut your eyes everyone else goes away?  Well, you can close your eyes all you want, but it will just make it that much easier for me to hit you.
As I listened to the story it became abundantly clear that these people's ideas had no practical basis in a functioning society.  They talked about not feeding their child hormone infused milk and meat.  They talked about organic foods, which can mean several things, and working at Whole Foods I know this.  They even mentioned Whole Foods, and I almost started yelling at the person being interviewed, as if my headphone acted as a microphone as well, and they would hear me.  And then I caught myself and realized that would be about as stupid as these people.
Apparently, a year or so ago, there was an outbreak of measles.  Awesome.  And sure, there are outbreaks of diseases all the time.  It's just that measles kill if left untreated.  The flu doesn't.  A cold doesn't.  Chicken pox doesn't.  And this family got it by taking their kid to Switzerland on a trip.  One of these idiot families that doesn't believe in immunization.  When Andrew Speaker boarded a plane with drug resistant tuberculosis the nation was enraged.  The CDC got reamed for how they handled the situation.  And yet, children can go overseas and pick up diseases and bring them back here, and no one steps up and says boo?  What?  There are people that can't get these immunizations.  Children under 1 year of age, for instance, cannot get the measles immunization.  Their little systems can't handle it.  Like honey.  But, these anti-immunization parents don't really care about your newborn.  They'd just as soon see their child live with a horrible, and easily maintained disease before they see your weak baby live.  This is one of those instances where Darwin was wrong.  The adapted species did not win out.  The stronger did not conquer.
Let's hope when we are able to manage diseases such as AIDS and cancer, these parents step up and say, "No.  We will die happily knowing our bodies are chemical free.  Give us chemotherapy and radiation, but I'll be damned if I'm going to take a shot that will keep me from getting the disease altogether."  Let's join hands and work to decrease the population of idiots.

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