Study: You Can't Change an Anti-Vaxxer's Mind

[daredtowork]

3. This is because it's attached to a larger world view

If you want to get children vaccinated, you have to lay off calling anti-vaxxers stupid, conspiracy nuts, or whatever you call them. This is attached to a larger distrust of Big Pharma, and beneath that a distrust of government, a fear of the ineptitude of big science (and perhaps even the collusion of big science with schemes of the 1%- i.e. the conspiracy theories. And of course behind all this lay the radical wealth inequality that disempowers people and makes them fear the extreme power of a very few to exert control - even deadly control - over great masses.

These fears have some valid roots, and you can't brush them away with some pointers about how science works.

Scientists don't want to hear this, but the trust in science will come with greater trust in fellow man, and that will only come if we can work out the terms of a more equitable society.