{"id":3200,"date":"2012-08-22T02:00:52","date_gmt":"2012-08-22T06:00:52","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/rachelmariestone\/?p=3200"},"modified":"2012-08-22T02:00:52","modified_gmt":"2012-08-22T06:00:52","slug":"the-university-of-google","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/rachelmariestone\/2012\/08\/22\/the-university-of-google\/","title":{"rendered":"The University of Google"},"content":{"rendered":"<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC \"-\/\/W3C\/\/DTD HTML 4.0 Transitional\/\/EN\" \"http:\/\/www.w3.org\/TR\/REC-html40\/loose.dtd\">\n<html><head><meta http-equiv=\"content-type\" content=\"text\/html; charset=utf-8\"><meta http-equiv=\"content-type\" content=\"text\/html; charset=utf-8\"><\/head><body><p>It\u2019s been an interesting couple of days for me. Truthfully I hadn\u2019t realized that there were a host of people who were linking their decisions <strong>not<\/strong> to vaccinate to their Christian faith:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>because some vaccines may have been developed using fetal cell lines (from several decades ago)<\/li>\n<li>because we should trust God\u2013not medicine<\/li>\n<li>because the greatest good for the greatest number is \u201csocialism\u201d\u2013not Christianity<\/li>\n<li>and, of course, because of the plethora of internet articles denying vaccine\u2019s safety and efficacy<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>As I type this, I have a sore arm from (yet another) vaccine in preparation for our <a title=\"Joining God\u2019s Mission in\u00a0Malawi\" href=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/rachelmariestone\/2012\/08\/01\/joining-gods-mission-malawi\/\" class=\" decorated-link\" target=\"_blank\">move to Malawi<\/a>, I am grateful for the advances of medical science that have made the US so safe from many infectious diseases.<\/p>\n<p><em>In other words, I am grateful for vaccines.<\/em><\/p>\n<p>At the same time, I\u2019m sad because I do think the anti-vaccine movement has gotten out of hand. (And, yes, I probably have already seen x, y, or z website\u2019s argument for why vaccines actually cause everything bad; please don\u2019t send me any more!) I\u2019m no worshiper of science and medicine\u2013they are flawed human endeavors, too!\u2013but I still maintain that vaccines have helped more than they\u2019ve harmed.<\/p>\n<figure id=\"attachment_3201\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-3201\" style=\"width: 300px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><a href=\"https:\/\/wp-media.patheos.com\/blogs\/sites\/484\/2012\/08\/anne-hutchinson.jpg\" class=\" decorated-link\" target=\"_blank\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-3201\" title=\"Anne-Hutchinson\" src=\"https:\/\/wp-media.patheos.com\/blogs\/sites\/484\/2012\/08\/anne-hutchinson.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"300\" height=\"272\"><\/a><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-3201\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Anne Hutchinson.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>I\u2019m also sad because good people like Paul Offit\u2013a researcher, professor, and physician at Children\u2019s Hospital of Philadelphia\u2013have received awful threats and slander for his good work advocating vaccines and even developing them. (You can see his books <a href=\"http:\/\/www.amazon.com\/s\/ref=nb_sb_noss?url=search-alias%3Daps&amp;field-keywords=paul+offit\" class=\" decorated-link\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow\">here.<\/a>)<\/p>\n<p>While we all have a responsibility to make good choices, I do think the anti-vaccine movement, in the main, has generated a lot of self-proclaimed graduates from the University of Google, and, by proliferating \u201carticles\u201d that \u201cexpose\u201d supposed lies and conspiracies of the CDC and whomever else, muddied the conversation and made it hard for ordinary folks to distinguish between <strong>rigorous, responsible research<\/strong> and <strong>accumulated anecdote<\/strong>\u00a0(these things are not. the. same.)<\/p>\n<figure id=\"attachment_3202\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-3202\" style=\"width: 692px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><a href=\"https:\/\/wp-media.patheos.com\/blogs\/sites\/484\/2012\/08\/darthvaderhouse.jpg\" class=\" decorated-link\" target=\"_blank\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-3202\" title=\"darthvaderhouse\" src=\"https:\/\/wp-media.patheos.com\/blogs\/sites\/484\/2012\/08\/darthvaderhouse.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"692\" height=\"540\"><\/a><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-3202\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Yes, this is for random amusement. My son Graeme (4) was looking at the house across the street and gasped \u201cthat house! Darth Vader\u2019s mouth!\u201d Comparative photographic evidence.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>One final thing. I keep seeing references to \u201cBig Pharma\u201d and the attendant insinuations that these woefully ineffective and downright dangerous drugs continue to be required for school entry simply because the companies that produce them make a lot of money on them. I don\u2019t want an answer\u2013comments will be closed on this one, as I think I\u2019m tired of \u201cdiscussing\u201d this for the moment, at least in this format\u2013but let me ask this:<\/p>\n<p>If we can acknowledge (as I think we can) that self-interest and greed influence, to some extent, much of what people do (you\u2019d have to be pretty greedy &amp; selfish to give children dangerous shots that do no good just so you can make money) don\u2019t we also have to acknowledge that those opposing vaccines (loudly) probably (definitely) have some self-interest in it, too? <a href=\"http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Andrew_Wakefield\" class=\" decorated-link\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow\">Andrew Wakefield<\/a> certainly did.<\/p>\n<p>And yes, I have already seen the \u201carticles\u201d exonerating him and restoring his \u201cgood name.\u201d Have you seen <a href=\"http:\/\/www.guardian.co.uk\/lifeandstyle\/2010\/oct\/11\/vaccination-fears-developing-world-deaths\" class=\" decorated-link\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow\">this article, <\/a>showing how anti-vaccine suspicion is spilling over into South Africa and creating public health crises?<\/p>\n<p><em>\u201c\u2026In South Africa, concerns about <a title=\"MMR\" href=\"http:\/\/www.nhs.uk\/Conditions\/MMR\/Pages\/Introduction.aspx\" class=\" decorated-link\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow\">MMR<\/a>, generated by coverage in the rest of the English-speaking world \u2013 including the UK \u2013 have led to an unwillingness to receive the vaccine, and there has been an outbreak of nearly 7,000 cases of measles. For children with poor health and limited access to medical services, this decision has been disastrous. There have already been hundreds of deaths.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n<p>But the scare tactics are powerful\u2013<\/p>\n<p><em>\u201c\u2026just five minutes spent looking at websites critical of vaccines increases your perceptions of the risks, and reduces the perceptions of the risks of not being inoculated, according to a recent paper from a German group published in the Journal of Health Psychology. \u201d<\/em><\/p>\n<p><\/p>\n<p>Is self-interest, greed, deception, and suspicion part of human nature? I suppose so. But so are altruism, honesty, generosity and trust.<\/p>\n<p>May God grant us <em>all <\/em>the wisdom and grace to move into that better side of our natures.<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>It\u2019s been an interesting couple of days for me. Truthfully I hadn\u2019t realized that there were a host of people who were linking their decisions not to vaccinate to their Christian faith: because some vaccines may have been developed using fetal cell lines (from several decades ago) because we should trust God\u2013not medicine because the [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2070,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3200","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v21.1 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>The University of Google<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"It&#039;s been an interesting couple of days for me. 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