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Tribeca Film Festival, Robert De Niro Pull Anti-Vaccination Film
theodp writes: USA Today reports that one day after defending the scheduled screening of a controversial documentary linking vaccinations to autism, Tribeca Film Festival co-founder Robert De Niro announced that the film is being pulled from the event. The film, Vaxxed: From Cover-Up to Catastrophe, was scheduled to debut April 24. It is directed by Andrew Wakefield, known to many as the father of the anti-vaccine movement. Wakefield authored a 1998 report on vaccinations and autism that was later retracted, He also had his medical license revoked. The decision to include the film in the festival resulted in outrage from many who are upset that the film's inclusion could offer legitimacy to a study debunked by leading scientists. "My intent in screening this film was to provide an opportunity for conversation around an issue that is deeply personal to me and my family," said De Niro, who has a child with autism. "But after reviewing it over the past few days with the Tribeca Film Festival team and others from the scientific community, we do not believe it contributes to or furthers the discussion I had hoped for."
So what's the take away here. Do I take health care advice from movie actors or not. If the answer is yes then what about clowns and mimes?
I have a better title for the summary:
Filmmaker Decides to Screen Film for Festival, then Changes Mind
T, FTFY.
What a non-story.
Even if you're correct: Does it matter? Does any of this change the fact that, in the end, he did the right thing?
Il n'y a pas de Planet B.
It's simple minded idiots like you that prevent this topic from having any constructive discussion. Go back and read what herd immunity is and maybe you can join the adult table again.
One would have to be certifiably insane to get a flu shot.
Yes, better to do the right thing in the end. Even better to do the right thing to begin with. It's a good reason to be leery of him.
"the father" is irrelevant. Anti-vax movement was born out of the need to blame someone for bad things. In this case, the evil vaccine overlords. That need is so compelling that the erroneous blame survives in the face of clear scientific evidence.
Locating by-State prevalence of autism stats over a decade ago, I started collecting by-State stats on hundreds of variables including vaccinations, mercury, diseases, econometerics, demographics, etc.
Three things stood out: 1) The best single-variable ecological correlation was mother's age at first live birth. 2) The best two-variable ecological correlation was Finnish ancestry and immigration from India. 3) Of all the variables, autism averaged the least powerful correlations with the wide range of by-State variables I had collected.
The mother's age at first live birth was a lower level of correlation than the 2-variable one, but it was more "robust" -- meaning that the scatter of points followed what you would expect from a "normal" distribution.
That was clear back in 2004.
I'm no pro, was not funded and didn't even have a relative with autism spectrum at that time (I do now). The fact that the CDC hasn't conducted an all-out statistical assault of like this at the county level given all the time, money and "big data" available is damning. They just don't care -- or don't want to know.
Seastead this.
Streisand Effect? of course. Nobody would have pressured for the removal of the film if it was about the Flat Earth Society.
"A Little Song, A Little Dance, A Little Seltzer Down your Pants" -Chuckles The Clown
I am surprised, and totally in joy that this film was pulled. Finally we are starting to see some common sense for proper science beating back hysteria and ideology.
"I'm going to tell these people they are stupid and type in all caps, that usually works pretty well."
I don't believe in the anti-vaxxer bullshit, but that doesn't mean we should block movies or discussion about it.
Not really. There is no winning move in this game -- either show it, and erode rationalism and empiricism just a little bit more, or don't show it, and allow it to die a martyrs death, which we all know only strengthens believers' faith.
Personally, my vote is for not showing, as it is one way to limit the amount of people exposed to the propaganda. Not by a significant factor, as people usually get misinformed about this topic through the internet, which is a more global medium than a film festival.
I thought this was supposed to be a tech news site....in the past weeks....since dice took over...it's only mainstream crap...and wasn't expecting this from timothy.... maybe from that manishs guy...
You're a few years late there, buddy.
"Set a man a fire, he'll be warm for the rest of the night. Set a man afire, he'll be warm for the rest of his life."
If dumb genes are killed off, why are there still so many stupid people around?
I don't think it works as easily as you would hope.
Evidently, fake internet points matter to you more than the "right thing."
You're that butthurt over the fact that I post at +1 that you have to make all manner of wild accusations--not to mention an implied threat--over it?
Maybe you should take a good, hard look in the mirror, buddy.
Il n'y a pas de Planet B.
They have a fall back position. They'll show films about the faked moon landing, and chemtrails.
The shepherds did so well protecting the flock that the sheep no longer believed that wolves existed.
"He took the time to press the shift key, Marge. I think he knows what he's talking about"
I assume the reason that you were modded up
You assume incorrectly.
If you click on "(Score:1)" in his comment, you'll find it's a link that pops up a window with a list of the moderation done on the comment. In this case, it will pop up a message that says "No comment history available" because it hasn't been modded at all (at least not at the time that I'm posting this comment).
If you're going to accuse someone of modding their own comments up, you should at least do it in response to a comment that's actually been modded up.
I thought this was supposed to be a tech news site....in the past weeks....since dice took over...it's only mainstream crap...and wasn't expecting this from timothy.... maybe from that manishs guy...
The anti-vaccine issue is about science. About how some idiots will reject it, and endanger their children's lives.
Anti-vaxxers are just one teeny little step away from being the people who refuse to give their diabetic children insulin on religious grounds.
The shepherds did so well protecting the flock that the sheep no longer believed that wolves existed.
Unfortunately the carriers of these "dumb genes" not only risk their childrens' lives, but also the herd immunity of the local community. Thereby putting the immune-compromised, newborns, and the unlucky for which the vaccine didn't take effect or are allergic. Darwinism is fine until it risks the lives of others. We don't implement speed limits and gun control to protect one from turning himself into red paste, we do it to protect others from the ignorant choices of the few. Want to play solo Russian roulette with a semi? Go right ahead, its only a crime if there are other participants (Manslaughter, natch).
I thought this was supposed to be a tech news site....
It's "news for nerds," kid. That means the site is open to any story that a poster thinks might be interesting to its readers.
If dumb genes are killed off, why are there still so many stupid people around?
That's easy, because vaccines(among other forms of medicine) save stupid people and people with dumb genes that would contribute to their early deaths.
Om, nomnomnom...
could offer legitimacy to a study debunked
See, this is your problem right here. While I might think that the great space goat created heaven and earth, there is no evidence to support this and therefore I cannot claim it is legitimate or a "fact".
Seven puppies were harmed during the making of this post.
...Robert DeNiro expected more people to be on his side. He believes that horse-shit that Wakefield published in '98. He's just too much of a coward to admit it in the face of controversy, so rather than stick to his guns he's backpedalled hoping to save face...that and actually get someone talking about the Tribeca Film Festival, of course. No publicity is bad publicity.
To bad there's no modification for "inconsiderate a-hole". People who have kids with autism are devastated; it's an extremely difficult thing on the families who have to deal with it. It's emotionally and mentally draining as well as financially. There is nothing more challenging than a parent trying to figure out why their kid has an issue that makes them nearly non-functional in society.
He's not a scientist, he's just a guy who's struggling to understand what is going on with his kid like any parent who has a child with autism. In that case people search for answers. Sure they may latch on to a quack like Wakefield's research, but it's in their grief and struggle that they do. He's trying to keep the conversation going so answers may eventually come up. Instead of lambasting a grieving parent, maybe you should recognize that he stepped up to do the right thing despite his desperation.
Unless it's type-1 diabetes. Those inflicted tend to be the ones in need of insulin shots.
I think the mere fact that someone did anything to defend that charlatan demonstrates just how out of touch with reality the antivaxxers remain.
The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
Vaccines contain adjuvants and preservatives. The preservatives prevent bacterial growth, since you wouldn't want to inject a toxic bacterial culture (which happened before stuff like thimerosal was used). Adjuvants induce a localised inflammatory response to increase the effect of the immune system against the virus you're innoculating against. Without it, it would have reduced efficacy, or maybe no effect at all. So the reason for their presence is absolutely logical, and was determined by empirical testing to quantify exactly how much was needed, after it was determined that they *were* needed.
You're right that these aren't "nice" things. But they *are* necessary. Like everything there's a tradeoff. In this case, the toxicity of the preservatives and adjuvant against toxic bacterial growth and then benefit of the immunity to viral infection, respectively. Given the tiny amounts used, the negative effect is absolutely minor, and it will mostly get flushed out of the body within a short time. Note that they have not been shown to be harmful. Given that the tradeoff for some of these vaccines is chosing not to have brain damage, die, or suffer other long-term debilitating consequences, any negatives from the preservatives and adjuvants are greatly outweighed. Put it this way: if vaccines did cause autism as claimed by this fraud (which they don't, but let's pretend it's true), then it would *still be worth vaccinating everyone*. Why? Because the tiny chance you would get autism pales in comparison with the ~1/1000 chance of death from measles, and the still higher chance of long-term disability or serious complications. The numbers don't lie. Even if these charlatans were correct, vaccination would still be the correct choice every single time.
Do you really think that the people developing the vaccines would add this stuff for the hell of it, or not be fully aware of the risks involved? Thimerosal usage has been greatly reduced or dropped entirely in response to public hysteria. But it can only be done in the first world where you can manufacture and distribute the vaccine in bulk for immediate usage, since it can no longer be stored. In the third world, or for less commonly-used vaccines, it's still used. And that's still absolutely fine.
As for flu vaccines, like all vaccines they use dead or attenuated virus. Of course it makes you "sick"; having a mild infection (or at least the effects of an infection without actually being infected) and consequently developing an immune response to it is the *entire point* of the vaccine. The attenuation means it's not going to spread significantly in your body or to others, but it *is* sufficient to develop an immune response. Then you'll be protected when a real infection hits you.
The fact is that Wakefield's con cost lives. There have been a resurgence in childhood diseases that were all but gone when I was a kid. This isn't someone defending Bernie Madoff, this if someone offering aid and comfort to an individual who happily perpetuated a medical con that hurt and killed innocent children and still is doing so for his own material benefit.
At this point I honestly don't give a fuck about whether Wakefield's supporters are grieving parents or not. Grief is not a license for propagating a lie.
The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
No, it proves you don't know what the whole "free speech" thing is about. Take a quarter and go buy a clue, because you haven't got one at the moment. Now, you could just as easily say that news organizations stifle your free speech when you want to report that the sky is actually pink and paisley, but what they're really doing is simply saying "you're a fucking idiot, begone."
http://xkcd.com/1357/
Fascism: An authoritarian and nationalistic right-wing system of government and social organization. See also: NAZI's
Hint: A movement who's leading spokes-person is a vacuous Playboy Centerfold with no scientific knowledge should be a leading indicator that something is amiss. Huh. People will figure that out.
How's that working out so far? I think you have seriously underestimate how truly fucking stupid people are.
Fascism: An authoritarian and nationalistic right-wing system of government and social organization. See also: NAZI's
First there's Becky, then we get Rebecca, now there's a TRIbecca? What's next, Quadbecca?
I don't see the problem with showing the film in the first place. It would only bring attention to it so pointing to the fraud could be easily countered and illustrated when people start to fall for it.
Or is there a problem pointing to where it is wrong and illustrating that?
I thought this was supposed to be a tech news site....in the past weeks....since dice took over...it's only mainstream crap...and wasn't expecting this from timothy.... maybe from that manishs guy...
I'd like to file a bug report. This post appears to have come from September 2012, not 2016. Not only has Dice not taken over Slashdot but offloaded it, but also anti-vax movement has been widely discussed since 2012.
Slashdot please fix your database so these posts from the past don't make some people look like they don't know what they are talking about.
What if he is? It doesn't change what he said. The spam catch was put in purposely to foil automated email harvesting and the person replying purposely and with intent stripped that out for no good reason. If the op needed to be referenced the moniker used to post under is not only sufficient but more accurate because he could hide his email and most people don't bother linking posts to email addresses.
I'll give the parents who fall for this crap a little leeway. Being personally effected by something like this is emotionally rough on people and they want to find answers to why it happened, a possible cure to make it better, or even just some kind of better understanding.
People like Wakefield (and the other snake oil peddlers like faith healers, psychic surgeons, etc.) take advantage and prey on those emotions in order to prevent people from thinking rationally. Being able to look past your emotions and realize that even though something might make you feel better, doesn't mean that it actually helps you at all takes character in its own right.
Perhaps you've gone your whole life without being wrong and then getting pigheaded about it because you were emotionally invested in an answer, but I doubt it. Those that tend to believe that they have are usually the ones who are horribly wrong about something, but absolutely refuse to admit it and will just bury their heads in the sand even deeper no matter how much evidence you show them.
I think there's a meaningful difference between being "silenced", i.e. not allowed to speak at all, and what is happening here: having an organization decide, however clumsily, that that organization does not want to give yet another platform for a discredited opinion piece that is a public health danger. Were this issue truly "silenced", we would not be allowed to have this discussion. There's no part of "free speech" that guarantees that you or I must publish something we do not want to. I'd argue that part of my free speech is the right not to promulgate the anti-vaxxer nonsense. It is free speech that they have the right to try to find platforms and publishers. I would not want them silenced. They get free speech too. They have the right to talk to anyone who will listen. But I won't offer them a platform.
Don't step on the baby.
F Di Niro!
Why is he supressing an anti-VAX film?
Leave our PDP-11s alone!
> refuse to give their diabetic children insulin on religious grounds.
I'd not realized there were real cases of this: there apparently have been. I'm shocked: giving insulin to a Type 1 diabetic is as clear a case of lifesaving medicine as putting a tourniquet on a severed limb. It's one of the few cases where a state or community, aware of a family refusal to treat the condition, would be on solid legal grounds to override the family and insist on treatment. And diagnosis is pretty easy: the excessive urination and sweet smell, and taste if you're willing to taste, of the urine have been well documented since ancient Greek times.
Some years ago, I actually got exhausted with an acquaintance who kept worrying about their risk of diabetes and kept failing to make it to a doctor's appointment. I eventually got fed up with them, picked up a glucometer at the local drug store for them, and got a diabetic at work to sit down with us and walk us through some quick tests. A few tests before and after lunch for my worried friend verified that they were probably borderline diabetic, and we got on the phone with their doctor's office to get them in two days, with a glucose tolerance test scheduled the next morning. It was us or the company nurse, and they _did not_ want to deal with the company nurse.
Thanks for demonstrating my point.
I, personally, think the anti-vaxxers are idiots. However, my own personal opinion of them should not drive an attempt to force them out of every venue and censor them using any means necessary. Their hypotheses have been shown to be flawed and this is backed up with science - backed up via reasoned thought and the scientific method.
What you're doing is evaluating what the SJW / popular opinion hivemind would think about anti-vaxxers - that they're whackjobs (which I happen to agree with) - and immediately rushing to try to exclude them from everything and censor them up to and possibly including government stepping in to censor them. "It's not free speech if I disagree with their opinion and they need to be stopped / banned / arrested" is the rallying cry of your particular brand of idiocy.
I invite you to fuck off, because we already have enough censor-happy SJW idiots oozing around the internet.
Proper science doesn't censor incorrect results, it lets them speak for themselves.
If you're honestly asking the question, I can only presume you missed out on all of the statistics and biology classes you were ever required to take.
But in case you needed a reminder:
1) "Getting sick" does not necessarily mean "becoming infected with influenza." Many common colds manifest symptoms that are very similar to influenza. It's possible your coworkers mis-diagnosed themselves.
2) The flu vaccine developed each flu season is based on the expected mutations of the virus for the upcoming season. Since mutations are less predictable, the vaccine has a chance to match the season's flu strains poorly, well, or somewhere in the middle. If it matches poorly, more people get infected with influenza.
3) Looking at a small sample size - your coworkers - is a poor indication of the population-level efficacy of the vaccine. Influenza can be deadly to elderly, infants, and immuno-compromised individuals. If the influenza vaccine lowers the overall number of deaths each season by a statistically significant number, it is successful - regardless of whether your local pocket of coworkers were all infected or not.
De Niro was perfectly free to show the bloody film at Tribeca. It would have discredited his film festival, and damaged him pretty badly in the process.
Freedom of expression is not freedom from consequences. If you want to show a film defending a man whose self-serving actions has lead to harm and death, then go to it. But you'll be rightfully condemned for it, and may even suffer damage to your own reputation.
The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
His study was a joke, so bad that even a fifth grader could see it was designed to prove him the answer he wanted.
But oh no, it's all Big Pharma...
The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
First of all, demonstrate your claim. Produce the numbers,
Otherwise it's just an anonymous guy on the Internet making claims with absolutely no evidence.
The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
At least the anti-vaxxers can take credit for resurrecting diseases we thought had been eradicated.
That's right, thanks to the anti-vaxxer idiots, Measles, Mumps, Whooping Cough, and Chicken Pox are showing up once again.
Thanks, anti-vaxxer fuckheads, thanks a lot for your stupid anti-science delusions which now put everyone's children at risk.
Just cruising through this digital world at 33 1/3 rpm...
... this if someone offering aid and comfort to an individual who happily perpetuated a medical con that hurt and killed innocent children and still is doing so for his own material benefit
And he caused something that's even incrementally worse than the suffering and deaths of innocent children because their parents fell for the con: The suffering and death of innocent children whose parents DIDN'T fall for the con - but were nevertheless infected by those who did fall for it.
Immunizations aren't anywhere near 100% effective. So a substantial number of people, even though immunized, are still susceptible to the disease. They are dependent on "herd immunity" to keep their chances of exposure low. Creating a population of unimmunized offspring of suckers, large enough to switch the contagion exponential from decaying to expanding, creates the exposures that sicken and kill these innocent victims.
Then there are those who are exposed before the can be immunized, or before the immunity can build, or after it decays, or who can't be immunized for other reasons (such as a deathly allergy to a component of the available formulas), or who are immune compromized for any of a number of reasons, ...
So seeing through the fraud and doing the right thing is STILL not enough to avoid the risk of disease and death created by this jolly psychopath.
Bantam Dominique roosters crow a four-note song. Once you've heard it as "Happy BIRTHday" you can't NOT hear it that way
How about: The Disneyland outbreak was in fact localized in the unvaccinated (or those whose status was undocumented.)
"Among the 110 California patients, 49 (45%) were unvaccinated; five (5%) had 1 dose of measles-containing vaccine, seven (6%) had 2 doses, one (1%) had 3 doses, 47 (43%) had unknown or undocumented vaccination status, and one (1%) had immunoglobulin G seropositivity documented, which indicates prior vaccination or measles infection at an undetermined time.
"Twelve of the unvaccinated patients were infants too young to be vaccinated. Among the 37 remaining vaccine-eligible patients, 28 (67%) were intentionally unvaccinated because of personal beliefs, and one was on an alternative plan for vaccination.
"Among the 28 intentionally unvaccinated patients, 18 were children (aged http://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/previe...
"Ruthlessly pursuing the idea that the accordion is just another instrument."
Or is there a problem pointing to where it is wrong and illustrating that?
Yes, there is a very big problem with that. People pay attention to slick films peddling easy and absolute answers. They don't pay near as much attention to cautionary statements about a lack of correlation in articles published in boring scientific journals.
Lies have a big advantage over the truth. They can be simple, clean, and confident, and concise enough to fit on a bumper sticker or a tweet. The truth is always messy, complicated, and couched in doubt. After all, we can't prove that vaccines don't cause autism, the best we can do is say that there is no evidence for that.
Broke my link, sorry:
http://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/previe...
"Ruthlessly pursuing the idea that the accordion is just another instrument."
Unfortunately the carriers of these "dumb genes" not only risk their childrens' lives, but also the herd immunity of the local community. Thereby putting the immune-compromised, newborns, and the unlucky for which the vaccine didn't take effect or are allergic.
Also: By providing a large enough pool of unimmunized to create repeated mini-epidemics and constant risk of exposure (especially in the case of human-host-only diseases that can be ELIMINATED), the anti-vaxxers "use up" the herd-immunity benefits, especially the available number of susceptible individuals that can be supported before additional measures need to be taken.
With effective herd immunity, the number and/or strength of immunizations can be lower than with a constant threat of exposure from mini-epidemics. There are legitimate risks associated with additional immunizations, so the smart move is to stop when the risks of the immunizations approach or exceed the risks they mitigate. With a large population of anti-vaxer
Bantam Dominique roosters crow a four-note song. Once you've heard it as "Happy BIRTHday" you can't NOT hear it that way
(Lenovo's hypersensitive touchpad strikes again. Finishing the last paragraph.)
With effective herd immunity, the number and/or strength of immunizations can be lower than with a constant threat of exposure from mini-epidemics. There are legitimate risks associated with additional immunizations, so the smart move is to stop when the risks of the immunizations approach or exceed the risks they mitigate. With a large population of anti-vaxser victims, the risks from disease are higher and the crossover is pushed out.
The anti-vaxxers are creating extra risk from immunizations for the rest of us. Thanks for the self-fulfilling prophecy, guys!
Bantam Dominique roosters crow a four-note song. Once you've heard it as "Happy BIRTHday" you can't NOT hear it that way
Simply put people are not taking this opportunity to hone their debate skills.
They are taking this opportunity to affirm their own self-perception of being in line with "the smart people in society".
You and your dipshit friend below are too stupid to understand a cartoon i see. Not surprising, given the bent of your whining. Idiocracy wasn't a comedy, it was a documentary... one that you to inbreds are living up to.
Fascism: An authoritarian and nationalistic right-wing system of government and social organization. See also: NAZI's
It's all part of a government conspiracy. Follow the money it's all there. Big Pharma doesn't make anything off preventing a disease in the first place let alone curing it. It's all a cabal of 435 powerful individuals in Washington. They funded it, they're pushing it! And their shadow agenda? A healthier populace that can work and pay more in taxes!
[P]ut all the anti vaxxers in their own tribe behind an extension of trumps wall - if they survive then they should develop immunity to all those illnesses, have lower levels of autism etc. and also prove evolution.
That experiment has already been run:
- Many tribes of the American Indians had substantial public works infrastructure, medical procedures, and cultural biases (like hygiene) that helped protect them from disease.
- The Europeans went through a thousand years of "Dark Ages" when "mortifying the flesh" was a way of life, baths were exceptional occurrences for much of the population, and waves of plagues decimated the population repeatedly.
So when the Europeans arrived, they brought with them some pretty severe diseases which most of them could survive and to which the American Indians were substantially more susceptible and more likely to find fatal. Several major civilizations were wiped out and their populations knocked down to minor handfuls. (And some tribes that had been relatively minor, but had access to early Smallpox immunizations, became major powers in the next decades.)
Estimates of the indigenous American population's reduction due to imported European diseases run as high as 90-95%
Bantam Dominique roosters crow a four-note song. Once you've heard it as "Happy BIRTHday" you can't NOT hear it that way
Proper science doesn't censor incorrect results, it lets them speak for themselves.
Proper science is conducted in scientific journals, not through bad propaganda films.
As I once told our old friend APK, "I've seen scarier shit than you as the toy surprise in my breakfast cereal". So, no, not in the least bit intimidated. Just slightly taken aback that a simple question would elicit such a nasty response which I utterly fail to see any rationale for.
Anyhow, enough with the meta-bullshit, back to the question: FWIW, yes, I know that intentions and history do matter. Yes, it would have been better that a public figure had not lent any recognition to idiocy to begin with. But I can't go back and change the past, and neither can you, and neither can Robert DeNiro.
I was merely curious as to what others might think, and I honestly didn't know about DeNiro's involvement in the anti-vaccine nuttiness before seeing this story a few minutes ago. (I left the States at the turn of the century, and haven't paid that much attention to American media since then.)
Il n'y a pas de Planet B.
It's a function of people always having to have someone to blame for misfortune. It's a failing of current human society, whether general loss of religious faith (it's God's will") or the inability to accept the basic laws of statistics, everything that goes wrong has to be attributable to something you can go after. For vaccines, it's seen more that way, because they come from a big, supposedly evil and self-serving, faceless corporation.
Because vaccination has been so successful, people have lost their fear of the original diseases. I can remember a time when if some kid got the sniffles in June, there was a realistic chance that he was going to end up living in an iron lung the rest of his life.
While I'm not a virologist, I did do my PhD in an immunology lab and am fairly well grounded in how the immune system works. So it's not really "opinion", it's current scientific understanding (well, reasonably current, I've been working in another field the last four years). And it's not like the facts are not readily available. You can read about all this stuff with minimal effort. The basics are high school science (second year for me...); the more advanced stuff is in any immunology text, you can get a second hand copy of one for almost nothing, or you can look it all up online.
Regarding the outbreak, I'll defer to the other comment here regarding the numbers. However, I'll just add this: being vaccinated *does not mean you won't get infected*. It *does* mean that the body is prepared to mount a rapid secondary immune response when infection does occur. Unlike a primary immune response, which occurs on the first infection (or when mimicked with a vaccine) and takes days or weeks to elicit a response, the secondary response is much quicker since you already have the necessary memory cells waiting to be called into action, and it's also much more effective for various reasons (e.g. affinity maturation and isotype switching). You'll get over the infection quickly, and you'll likely not be as infectious to others, but you'll still have an infection for a brief period and you're still at risk of complications, though significantly reduced from an unvaccinated individual. Example: I had measles twice as a child, despite being vaccinated; the difference was it was a few days with spots feeling slightly miserable, rather than spending a fortnight seriously ill getting long term organ damage. Seriously, look up and read about herd immunity. Loss of that is a risk to the entire population, but most especially to the children of uninformed idiots who opted out of getting vaccinated. Vaccination prevents the spread of serious diseases through the population, and the stuff we vaccinate against *is* serious; don't forget that before vaccination programmes, these were routinely killing and maiming hundreds of thousands every year and child mortality was common, rather than an exception. I.e. worrying about a one in a million chance of autism when there's a one in a thousand chance of death or an even higher chance of brain or other organ damage is totally illogical.
Immunology is a fascinating field; there's a huge amount being discovered all the time, but this stuff has been well understood for many decades. There's not any doubt about any of the above, it's been studied extensively by many hundreds of thousands of researchers and medics around the world. We continue to discover new cell subsets which add extra details to the picture, and which expand our understanding of specific diseases and autoimmune conditions, but the basics were nailed down comprehensively a long while back. It's not like vaccines are new or that the way they work isn't understood. We understand how the whole lots works at the molecular level, from all the components of a virus, to how it controls the cellular machinery, to antigen presentation and detection and the selection and expansion of the immune cells to counter it, including how T and B cells vary at the genetic level, even by single base pairs, to do the affinity maturation and isotype switching I mentioned above.
What I do find incredible is that people are totally uninformed about what vaccines are, how they work, and why they are important. Not only because it's taught to everyone (it certainly is in the UK), so you don't have an excuse not to know, but also because it's trivial to *get* informed. As the comment I originally replied to showed, there's a lot of misinformed opinions flying around, partly due to irrational fear, partly due to media attention despite there being zero evidence for any problems, and partly due to irrational nutjobs. Whatever the reasons, it's takes very little effort to educate yourself about the *reality* of how this stuff works should you choose to do so, and given that the "debate" over this stuff is without any merit whatsoever, it's clear that education to get people informed is definitely needed.
What happens when they perfect the artificial womb? Science will show how it's 1000 times safer for the woman and the child. What's wrong with a more natural/primitive lifestyle? It's a choice. You sure of your answer? Next will be natural sex vs doctor insemination in order to eliminate VD and other biological contaminants. Then reduced sodium and no beef. And finally we have the world in the Silvester Stallone Judge Dredd movie. It's quality of life and happiness issues. People should be able to live how they wish and take risks and choose what and how they invest their risks. Everything is belief including science.
Only religions try to dictate how people should live.
Correct. But proper science also doesn't censor bad propaganda films.
No, I don't agree with the anti-vaxxers and I think they're positively delusional.
However, take a moment to consider what you've done. You've called me "an inbred" for daring to argue against censoring them for their views. Let's not mince words here either, this is censorship based on the fear that allowing 'incorrect opinions' in this film festival will lead to backlash from the hivemind. Censorship can be practiced by entities other than the government, and it's just as damaging when society tries to silence people at the behest of the hivemind of correct opinions.
If we're living in Idiocracy, you'd be one of the people sitting around the table yelling that plants just need Brawndo and trying to silence anyone who suggested otherwise.
I don't see the problem with showing the film in the first place. It would only bring attention to it so pointing to the fraud could be easily countered and illustrated when people start to fall for it.
Or is there a problem pointing to where it is wrong and illustrating that?
Yeah, I'm a little leery of censorship. I know how gullible people can sometimes be, yet ideas should be able to live or die on their own. I'm not sure how I feel about this. It seems a bit paternalistic, an implicit assumption that people won't be able to think for themselves. It certainly bothers me when people with unpopular ideas are prevented from speaking on college campuses. I'm not sure this is any different.
-- sudon't
Air-ride Equipped
Hint: A movement who's leading spokes-person is a vacuous Playboy Centerfold with no scientific knowledge should be a leading indicator that something is amiss. Huh. People will figure that out.
How's that working out so far? I think you have seriously underestimated how truly fucking stupid people are.
Ha! Wait till he finds out about religion!
-- sudon't
Air-ride Equipped
I realize what you're saying and that you support vaccination, but the phrasing here made me cringe. Its the kind of thing anti-vaxxers jump on, along the lines of "Even supporters agree that they're nowhere near 100% effective."
Most vaccines are in the nineties when it comes to percent effectiveness, and some of them do near 100% effectiveness. I'd call even 90% effective "nearly all" because, with sufficient portions of the populated being vaccinated, an infection is not likely to get very far.
You can never go home again... but I guess you can shop there.
The problem with this comparison is that the merits of Guantanamo Bay can be debated. There is no merit or truth to the anti-vaxxer position.
Well, I'm going to make a guess and assume you are talking about our border with Mexico. Guess you don't know or care to know that Mexico follows the CDC guidelines for vaccinations. They give free vaccinations to all children.
So really what we're basically dealing with here is stupidity. Unfortunately for you there is no vaccination for that.
Are you fucking retarded?
Are you an idiot? Do you know why people post NOSPAM-munged email addresses, and do you know why other people post un-mangled versions of those in the comments? The latter do it solely to be dicks. Is this something you deny?
So, you're a secret Fascist?
The truth fears no investigation.
Unfortunately we've seen over and over again, as Johnnie Cochran pointed out, it doesn't matter who has the best facts on his side, what matters most is who has a compelling and interesting story.
Yeah, I'm a little leery of censorship.
This is NOT censorship. The vaxers have a right to speak. They do NOT have a right to be given a forum at a private event. You are not being censored if I refuse to promote your cause.
The fact is that Wakefield's con cost lives
Wakefield's con cost lives, so let's be a complete asshole to anyone who might have bought his con for a few days before looking into it and finding he might have been wrong.
I'm with you on this one. Like you said, he can't go back and undo what he already said and did. And while it's possible the change of mind might just be to save face, no one knows that for sure. So if you take their statement about it not contributing to the discussion at face value, then yeah I'd say it's a net positive. A big public showing is something the anti vax crowd would have loved; they would probably interpret it as giving them legitimacy. So regardless of the true intentions of those who pulled it, the end result is still a net win, IMO.
You show some serious lack of understanding about what influenza actually is.
The grandparent just explained it to you, and you just showed that what he said went in one ear and out the other.
And yet ironically, the concept of the Devil was born, and managed to stick around.
I don't know that that is irony. It's more another example of what the parent post said -- when we don't immediately see the source of "bad things that happen," we invent it to band together against it. Human society has always favored uniting against an adversary over just accepting that "Shit happens."
Thank you. I am continually amazed at the number of people who think not being able to be part of a private event equates to censorship. I mean is it really so hard top understand that it's government who is supposed to be forbidden from censorship. It's not a difficult concept, but people fail to comprehend it all the time.
Most vaccines are in the nineties when it comes to percent effectiveness, and some of them do near 100% effectiveness. I'd call even 90% effective "nearly all" because, with sufficient portions of the populated being vaccinated, an infection is not likely to get very far./
Let's give them the benefit of the doubt and call them 95% effective.
Now apply them to the population of the US - cal it 300 million. (Just the states were 308 as of the last census.) That's 5 million susceptible people due to vaccine failure.
Consider only the age 5-20 school-age cohort: Cut it to 20% of that (20.6% by the same census). You're still talking over a million susceptible individuals.
For epidemiology the NON-susceptible are background noise: A disease only spreads among those who can catch it, so only that population counts. Others might as well be furniture.
Even spread out among the whole country (but then re-concentrated in classrooms, school events, and schoolkid hangouts), that many human culture media are making the "herd immunity" thing a little iffy. Throw in another couple million unimmunized due to this health fraud, though, and it's a whole different ballgame.
I'm not going to shut up for fear that an anti-vaxxer might use excerpts from my (pseudonymous) rantings in their propaganda. The antidote for a lie is truth, and the main way these frauds succeed is by spreading faster than the truth can catch up with them - so shutting up makes it worse. If parts of the truth are inconvenient, that's tough.
Meanwhile, if they're fool enough to quote me, that just means more people will be led by search engines to my actual statements.
Bantam Dominique roosters crow a four-note song. Once you've heard it as "Happy BIRTHday" you can't NOT hear it that way
Mexico may follow CDC guidelines, the problem is Mexico takes in more illegal immigrants than the US does by itself where Mexico is a huge transition point from South America, Central America and the Caribbeans, to the US, where people are from countries that don't have effective means of dealing with diseases.
The illegal immigration into Mexico just completely pales in comparison to the US and it's why Mexico is all too happy to help them get into the US with whatever means possible, because that means Mexico doesn't have to take care of them.
If you only read the biased blurb posing as a post, you would imagine that the movie is about Dr. Andrew Wakefield. Follow the link to the movie's website, and you will find that it focuses on Dr. William Thompson, CDC Senior Scientist & Whistleblower.
A case of fraud has been uncovered in the CDC data linking vaccination to Autism. This data seems to contradict the 'Nail in the Coffin' cohort longitudinal study (a study is not an experiment) that practically nobody who claims to have an opinion actually read.
Instead of focusing on the individual, focus on the facts. You can read Wakefield's own words regarding his research. You can call Wakefield names, but keep in mind that history is littered with scientists who were vilified and ultimately vindicated. For instance, Nobel Laureate Dr. Barry Marshall for suggesting that H Pylori could live within the acidic environment of the stomach.
Personally, I trust that science will ultimately prevail in due time. I also recognize that there is a genetic link, and there may be other environmental factors that have not been thoroughly researched, such as diet, antibiotics, plastics, etc. Finally, I would be willing to accept that even if a link between Autism and vaccination is ultimately proven, the vaccination campaign may still doing more good than harm to society.
The bottom line is that a mob, such as this, grabs their pitchforks without thinking. The many responses on this and similar Slashdot posts do not further knowledge. They only spread FUD.
http://howdovaccinescauseautis...
Silence is a state of mime.
The answer is in the article you linked:
"Influenza A virus was isolated from seven of 11 nasal swab specimens selected for viral culture. These seven specimens had HA1 protein sequences that were identical to each other and differed from the 2013–14 influenza A (H3N2) A/Texas/50/2012 vaccine strain by 5 amino acid substitutions (N128A, R142G, N145S, P198S, and V347K)."
These people got a flu shot, but the flu shot didn't cover the strain they were infected with.
You're confusing "censorship" with "first amendment violation." This is not the latter, but it most certainly is the former. A private party is not required to allow the airing of an idea--I think we can all agree that there is no problem with that. But the case we're talking about is specifically banning a movie based on the fact that many people find the point it makes to be objectionable. This is the very definition of censorship.
What part of "shall not be infringed" is so hard to understand?
I mean is it really so hard top understand that it's government who is supposed to be forbidden from censorship. It's not a difficult concept, but people fail to comprehend it all the time.
The thing people fail to comprehend all the time is the idea that only the government is prevented from allowing you to exercise your right of free speech. In this instance, the event is censoring this film, because of public backlash against the idea. They're perfectly free to censor the film, of course, and I fully support their right to do so, but just because it's a private venue doesn't magically make it "not censorship."
What part of "shall not be infringed" is so hard to understand?
Or is there a problem pointing to where it is wrong and illustrating that?
Yes, there is a very big problem with that. People pay attention to slick films peddling easy and absolute answers. They don't pay near as much attention to cautionary statements about a lack of correlation in articles published in boring scientific journals.
Oh. So you mean like "An Inconvenient Truth"? You mean like that? Of course you do. Sure.
Lies have a big advantage over the truth. They can be simple, clean, and confident, and concise enough to fit on a bumper sticker or a tweet. The truth is always messy, complicated, and couched in doubt.
Oh. So you mean like Climategate? You mean like that? Like East Anglia and all that they did? Like that? Of course you do. Sure.
The problem is that until we have a published cause of autism there is a vacuum to be filled. That it has reached virtually epidemic levels (save the diagnosis discussion for another time) and with a sample size of nearly 1/50 boys we don't even have public speculation of causes...anywhere.
When you lament lives lost by disease you're also essentially ignoring the lives lost in a mental cage to autism as well, which leaves virtually all "greater good" discussions with nothing more than a basis of pointing fingers and fear.
We have a million causes for cancer announced and promoted weekly it seems. We have not one, single, solitary cause for autism published or promoted. That is a huge vacuum.
That vacuum gets more complicated when mob rule that could even suggest there may be a link attacks every discussion on the matter. The MIT research linking round up to aluminum intake was the most intriguing thing I've seen that has potentially to be viable...but here's the kicker - aluminum is in vaccines (along with a lot of other things). Even if we are saying that round up is the cause, that minor connection gives credence to a whole lot of people.
In this case, it will pop up a message that says "No comment history available" because it hasn't been modded at all (at least not at the time that I'm posting this comment).
Is that true? It wasn't more than a few weeks ago that clicking on the score got you a table of the score modifiers, even when a post had not been moderated. It showed the base score (+1 for logged in users), and the +1 Karma Bonus (if applicable) on a second line. "No comment history available" looks like a recently introduced bug, to me. What does history have to do with anything?
Wrong. Even lies are protected speech.
Il n'y a pas de Planet B.
Correct. But proper science also doesn't censor bad propaganda films.
Incorrect. Bad propaganda films that lead to behavior that is at best contributory negligence and at worst involuntary manslaughter definitely should be censored, with the scientific evidence that proves that the behavior is negligence or manslaughter.
Censorship is not universally bad. It is entirely reasonable for a society to decide as a whole that something is so terrible that it needs to be suppressed. Flat Earthers are mocked and derided and no one anywhere thinks they deserve to present their case in an hour and a half long video at a major film festival, despite the fact their delusions don't tend to kill anybody. That general opinion is censorship in action. It's such an all-pervasive and well-accepted censorship that you may not actually think of it as such, but it is. Antivaxxers deserve all that censorship and more because their delusions do maim and kill people.
I will revise my initial statement a little. Not all forms of censorship are universally bad. Antivaxxers don't deserve to be maimed or killed for their delusions, despite the fact that their delusions are maiming and killing other people. However they should not be given a bully pulpit, they should not be given worldwide publicity, they should not be given the slightest shred of avoidable exposure, and they should not be tolerated in polite company, precisely because their delusions are so dangerous.
You may want to clarify your response a bit, because it doesn't make any sense in the context of what you're replying to. I agree with you that if the government were censoring this, it would be a first amendment violation (i.e. "protected speech") but we're talking about a private venue which has every right to prevent whatever they want from being screened there.
What part of "shall not be infringed" is so hard to understand?
I thought it was self-evident that the notion of "protected speech" has no application in a private venue.
Il n'y a pas de Planet B.
Wrong. Even lies are protected speech. But this has no bearing on speech in a private venue, of course.
TFTFM. (Nod to Zak3056.)
Il n'y a pas de Planet B.
And diagnosis is pretty easy: the excessive urination and sweet smell, and taste if you're willing to taste, of the urine have been well documented since ancient Greek times.
Sadly, that doesn't always mean much. My sister ended up being a juvenile diabetic(at the age of 4, this is going back ~30+ years now), and none of those methods actually showed anything. She even showed normal glucose levels and didn't show the usual indicators of ketones in her urine. The doctor and diagnostic testing didn't show it. Even my grandmother who was a head nurse, couldn't figure it out until she had a low blood sugar reaction. Then it all clicked for her. It was close, she spent 6mo in ICU after that first low blood sugar reaction.
Om, nomnomnom...
I understand the problem. You were replying to someone who replied to me. Their post was below my threshold, and yours looked like a direct response to my post. Sorry for the confusion.
What part of "shall not be infringed" is so hard to understand?
Are you saying I'm racist because I acknowledged the existence of a black man?
Even if you're correct: Does it matter? Does any of this change the fact that, in the end, he did the right thing?
Who is the "he" being referred to?
Leslie Satenstein Montreal Quebec Canada
My children and I received anti-measles, anti-tuberculosis, anti-polio and a cocktail vaccine for these and other ailments. I had measles and will be taking the vaccine for anti-shingles. My brother-in-law lost the vision in one eye from shingles. Will I listen to that stupid man rant against vaccines?
Leslie Satenstein Montreal Quebec Canada
If this film had been shown, the quack who lost his medical license and directed this "documentary" would have been able to say "See the documentary shown at the Tribeca Film Festival about how vaccines cause autism!" and use that implicit endorsement to gain more attention for his cause.
So if the guy who Kickstarted a movie about paint drying applied to have it shown at Tribeca and they decline to show it, they're censoring him? I wouldn't call it that -- I would call it choosing to show movies they believe are of greater entertainment, educational, or artistic value.
You can't use logic to change an opinion that isn't based on logic
Vaccines probably increase cancer incidence. They enable people to live longer, and people who live longer are more likely to have cancer.
"When you have eliminated the unacceptable, whatever is left, however improbable, must be the truthiness" - Holmes
Nobody's talking about preventing the dangerous idiots from speaking. We're talking about not giving them a good forum.
Are you suggesting that we allow all films into a given venue, or that we select them randomly? If not, why can't we have criteria? Can one of the criteria be whether the film promulgates dangerous lies, or do we have to place falsehood on the same footing as truth?
"When you have eliminated the unacceptable, whatever is left, however improbable, must be the truthiness" - Holmes
Freedom of speech does mean freedom to be stupid and potentially endanger others. I can say stupid things that might cause deaths down the line. What I can't do is demand any particular podium be used to support my idiocy. Anti-vaxxers have no right to have their lies shown in a particular film festival. There are plenty of places they can spread their lies, but they have no right to anything that looks like endorsement from other people.
"When you have eliminated the unacceptable, whatever is left, however improbable, must be the truthiness" - Holmes
Would you care to show when badthink has actually been censored in the US? Anti-vaxxers are free to socialize with anyone who will socialize with them, go to tech conferences that don't bar dangerous propaganda, submit films to film festivals (although not to require they be included), and have their own gatherings to which they can invite people. Regrettably, they do.
Are you saying that no web forum, no film festival, no conference, should have people allowed to use judgment about what to include, particularly when they have limited resources?
"When you have eliminated the unacceptable, whatever is left, however improbable, must be the truthiness" - Holmes
No comment history available has been around at least 5 years. It is what shows when no moderation (or karma bonus) has occurred.
APK likes to ask for responses to the same things over and over. Maybe he just likes the responses?
If you subscribe to the greater good theory, Guantanamo was perfectly acceptable, while anti-vaxxers are flat out evil.
APK likes to ask for responses to the same things over and over. Maybe he just likes the responses?
Just like Mein Kampf should be available in libraries, films like this should be shown. Ignoring stuff never helps.
"If support freedom of speech for people you disagree with, you may suffer damage to your reputation."
Good to know your stance on the topic. I hear there's a hivemind sync scheduled in 25 minutes, make sure your brain has enough room for today's new correct opinions.
Sure, and that's the way it should be. You can blather on about "hiveminds" like you had some sort of point, but promoting every viewpoint as if it was as equally valid as every other is hardly the path to enlightenment.
Except that the "'herd immunity' thing" isn't iffy at those levels, as we've seen over the last several decades. Locations that maintain high vaccination rates show very low or zero breakout frequency, and locations with low vaccination levels are far more likely to have breakouts.
You're also crediting anti-vaxxers with a lot more integrity than they often have. They won't quote you specifically. They'll say that they read some vaccination supporter admit that the vaccines are nowhere near 100% effective. Those who are curious won't be able to tie it back to you to see that you actually support vaccination.
You can never go home again... but I guess you can shop there.
No effect? They caught Bin Laden, what more effect did you want?
Just because the US government doesn't tell you every little thing they do, doesn't mean that nothing happened. Why would they tell you all the bomb makers caught because of intel from Guantanamo, or other things like that? It is all kept top secret to prevent the source from being exposed.
APK likes to ask for responses to the same things over and over. Maybe he just likes the responses?