Vaxxed and relaxed
Being cockily dismissive about conspiracy theories is almost as weird as believing in them. (Warning: contains John Le Carré)
I just had my second vaccination and I want to say a few things:
1. I am so grateful for the NHS
2. Bill Gates is such a great guy
3. Is it me or has 5G service REALLY improved lately?
Conspiracy theories around vaccines are dangerous and generally stupid. But vaccines are a bit like Tool. The band is pretty great, but the fans are SO annoying.
It’s a generalisation, obviously, but I think it stacks up.
The backlash to dangerous conspiracy theories (particularly the one that suggests some vaccines cause autism) has been understandable and arguably necessary. If a significant core of people refuse immunisation, the whole of society is put at risk. The fact that we don’t have plague and polio running rampant in most cities is because governments and populations recognised the dangers of epidemics and decided to do the smart thing. And the loaded lies and fear mongering around autism particularly are unhelpful in so many ways.
So you can understand the response of calling people ignorant or insane for being antivaxxers.
But.
You have to admit there is a shadowy cabal of bankers and paedophiles that are… JK. Just wanted to see if you were paying attention. The ‘But’ is not to posit a conspiracy theory. It is to make two points: First – there is a kind of conspiracy theory scepticism that I honestly find more irritating than the theories themselves. And second, conspiracies do exist, as does injustice without the need for conspiracy.
And since evangelical Christians are more likely to believe in conspiracy theories than other groups, it’s probably worth discussing this here. Particularly when it comes to the attitude with which we express our conspiracy scepticism.
“Do your research!” could be the rallying cry of both sides. Research methodology seems to be what’s in question. Epistemology, even. And while I am firmly in the pro-vax camp, I do find some of the attitude of ‘my people’ Tool-fan-ish. That is to say: going on and on about something that really need not be laboured, in a far more aggressive way than is necessary (maybe it’s not fair to Tool fans. People could say it about me and anti-capitalism, or anyone who likes Rick and Morty. Or Hamilton.) Because the criticism that anti-vaxxers are easily duped by ridiculous paranoid delusions generally comes from a place of privilege.
[Is he… is he going to make this about capitalism? No. Mostly. Maybe a little.]
Health authorities are still authorities. And just like middle class white men feel like the police are probably decent people generally because most of their experiences with cops have been non-abusive, so other authorities create different reactions and levels of trust. If you feel like you’ve been let down by institutions and authorities, if the structures of the world have failed to give you a sense of protection, then why would you trust them when it comes to medicine.
Postmodernism’s incredulity towards metanarratives, and the relativisation of both truth claims and hierarchies is also at play here. If you are not a scientist but always appeal to the argument ‘I trust science’, what you’re really saying is ‘I trust what I am told science says’. And that is fine. Necessary, even, if we are going to work as a society. But when you elevate that faith in science itself to the level of a moral rallying cry and intellectual distinctive, you’re really just saying: ‘I’m smart because I listen to what Dad tells me.” And there’s nothing wrong with that, but it doesn’t make you better than anyone really. And it certainly doesn’t make the people you’re shouting at the overly credulous ones. You trust authority. They trust suspicion and exciting narratives.
The problem is that the elevation of suspicion to a virtue is super unhelpful. In politics you see this all the time with the ‘they’re all as bad as each other’ narrative. The fact is they aren’t. However awful the current Parliamentary Labour Party establishment in the UK is (and good Lord they are some vapid, centrist liberals with no desire to see significant change despite the suffering around them), the Tories are the perfect example of anti-grace, privileged maintenance of injustice and selfishness presented as rationality. They are worse. And pretending they aren’t, pretending there is no difference, is exactly what they and the other exponents of maintaining the unjust status quo want. Similarly, if you refuse to trust any authority on scientific matters, instinctively and reflexively rejecting consensus on science as yet another example of the powerful harming ordinary people for their own ends, you are not helping the situation, even though you’re not entirely wrong.
Because they are not.
Big Pharma is an industry that has done a lot of harm to the world and has demonstrated that ordinary people’s lives are not as important as their bottom line because OF COURSE. THAT IS WHAT CAPITALISM DOES. That is what corporations have to do. Seek maximum benefit to shareholders. It’s actually the law. And a law that obviously need to be radically rethought.
The biggest damage anti-vaxxers have done (apart from to our group immunity) is to give Pharmaceutical companies an incredible weapon against any criticism of them. Thanks to anti-vaxxers, even mentioning Big Pharma can get you written off as a kook. It’s maddening. I imagine those working to expose cover-ups of paedophile rings must feel the same about the QAnon idiocy.
But let’s remember:
· The grim history of Pharmaceutical companies testing drugs on Africans, which was masterfully fictionalised by a very angry John Le Carré in The Constant Gardener
· The fact that far more resources are poured into fighting diseases that are profitable to treat and that affect the wealthy than those affecting the poor, and that Big Pharma perpetuate myths to protect their profit margins
· The CIA’s fake vaccination campaign that secretly harvested DNA from unsuspecting people in Pakistan as part of the malignant ‘war on terror’
· The respected BBC reporter who lost his mind after a yellow fever vaccination
· The fact that medical science simply makes mistakes sometimes. Whether it’s the friends of mine who suffered unnecessary pain and the severe brain damage of their baby because of negligence, or the tragic cases of Thalidomide babies and the cover up that followed
I know what you’re thinking. This sounds like an anti-vax website. Am I really suggesting we can’t trust the science or the medical/pharmaceutical establishment because of this? No. But neither do I think they deserve our blind faith.
Would I rule out the possibility that the Covid crisis might be used to further an unholy agenda? No. Am I convinced I’ve had a tracking device placed in me? Also no. Though I would like very much for MI6 to text me next time I forget to put a new address in my Sat Nav and blithely head off to the place I needed to be three weeks ago instead of today’s pressing destination. Thankyouplease.
So basically…
Conspiracies happen. Governments do undertake surveillance of harmless people going about their business. Profit motivates people to do unthinkable things to groups they don’t believe matter. But scientists have also made huge strides in helping us and we all have a duty to be good immunity citizens. So, we are in the unenviable position of trying to sort competing truth claims in an age where authority means very little. We are all of us doing our best.
And while we need to shift the balance towards reasonable scepticism rather than blanket hostility to science (something that the Church has been far too complicit in because of bad theology), we are not going to do that by mocking people because they don’t trust Daddy as much as we do.
Right. I’m off to stand on my roof and receive my next instructions from the Gates Foundation.
Boop beep.
Riots in South Africa
You may have heard that there has been rioting in response to the jailing of former President Jacob Zuma in South Africa. The rioting is, as rioting always is, more complicated than that. I thank my good friend Christine for posting this excellent bit of analysis from the South African social justice site New Frame.
The article, Durban food riots turn the wheel of history, says that “South Africa’s social crisis has erupted as the people Cyril Ramaphosa and Jacob Zuma deem expendable, those who bear the brunt of the past and of the social costs of Covid-19, appropriate the bread of life.” It’s a really good analysis, and one I read with all the more interest because Durban is where my brother lives.
I commend the article to you.
On the podcast
Okay, so we recorded the other day, and it was really good, but I have not had a chance to edit yet. It’s coming soon, but that will depend on whether I get as sick after dose #2 as I did after '#1. The episode will feature two interviews about resistance, protest and breaking the law, which I recorded for an article I wrote for Christianity magazine — I think I told you about it. You can read it here:
Direct Action: Is it Ever Okay for Christians to Break the Law?
And the podcast will be out soon.
New Old Music
Click the play button and see what happens.
SO I did another episode of this rather ridiculous little music show on Spotify, but I do think the tunes are good. The episode is called Too Much, and in it you can hear a dramatic reading of a Carly Rae Jepsen song by yours truly. This is what the world needed. It was an homage to this beauty:
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Anyway
Ohai! Thanks for reading all the way to the end. You are, in fact, a delight to me. I have no idea if this issue of the newsletter will make people mad or (worse) make them go: ‘meh’. But it felt like it needed to be said, and I needed to say it before I got sick. So, apologies if it’s all a bit off the cuff. Or cough. Because Covid. get it?
Sorry.
Anyway, I’ve had a really nice week, hanging out with the wife, making friends with some neighbours and working on what I laughingly call my novel. I also edited a poem I started months ago, and I think it turned out rather well. A friend commented: “Yyeeeeeesh that’s intense. Fucked up. Well done.” so I take that as a good sign :D
I hope you’re doing okay and that you are safe, and taking moments to enjoy the time God has given us. It’s too short, hey. We should be kind and do things we like, if we have that privilege. And ideally give more people the chance to do the same. Byeeee.