The might, the intellect and the ridicule of Dr Zubin Damania (ZDoggMD)
Credit: Video Capture ZDoggMD
Full disclosure here, I am not yet a parent, but I must admit, I know where I stand on the vaccination thing – I am strongly pro.
Having a clinical practice right in the middle of a hot bed of alternative health practices, quacks, scam artists, multilevel marketers (some of them all of the above) and the lowest vaccine uptake community in all of New Zealand (thought to be at around 45%) has taught me that these people genuinely have fears about the information that they have gathered when they “Done my research”.
I would say it has me agreeing that those who push these topics for profit (e.g. Tay’s Way) do most definitely deserve ridicule, mockery and shaming, but some others are only doing the best they can with their limited understanding, a fear of doing wrong by their children and a large dose of societal pressure that makes them feel that if something were to go wrong it would be “all their fault” and not just a rare medical side effect.
(Not being able to understand the real science behind vaccines still doesn’t mean you shouldn’t vaccinate your kids – now, go vaccinate your kids).
What happened today?
So while the world is caught between; not caring enough about COVID-19 & Freakin’ out completely and buying enough toilet paper to eat for 6 months…… a video of ZDogg and Tom reviewing a YouTube video by Jubilee, called Middle Ground appeared on my FaceBook feed. The video was entitled “Pro-Vaccine vs Anti-Vaccine: Should Your Kids Get Vaccinated?” and can be viewed here.
While he and Tom were pretty rough in their mockery of antivaxxers (I have not linked their video here as mockery is not my M.O.) there were a few great moments in this video that I wanted to share with you all today.
To start with, a great illustration of one of the major issues with the anti-vaxxer position, and a empathetic response from ZDogg. The following two quotes are from an anti-vax mother discussing her own perceived experience with vaccines and Dr Damania’s response:
Anti-Vaccination Mother:
“I was vaccinated as a child, but my last vaccination was about 15 years ago when I returned to college and I had a severe reaction in that I became arthritic in my hands. I went to many, many doctors and nobody knew what was going on, why it was happening and just shrugged “It doesn’t make sense you’re too young to have arthritis.” And it wasn’t until having kids and sort of digging into my own research for them that a lot of answers started coming out and I think it is unfortunate that a lot of it IS overlooked.”
Dr Damania’s responce:
“The correlation between having a disease and being vaccinated is something that anti-vaxxers confuse all the time with causation. And again, again, this is all, like, data. The emotional truth of it is; she is just simply wrong, and it is sad, and now she is harming her children because of a misconception that she has, trying to explain something that maybe wasn’t super easy to explain.”
Image Credit – Twitter
Now, this is going to sound a little soft and airy-fairy for me, but I genuinely felt sad that, as an uneducated mother, she had the onset of symptoms after she had a vaccination and that it became her belief that she was “vaccine injured”. It is a great example of the post hoc ergo propter hoc fallacy, where we, quite naturally, assume that because one thing happens after another that the first event was the cause of the second. I really can’t help but wonder if this was all explained to her by her physicians at the time. Perhaps she was unable to hear it as she needed (psychologically) to have someone or something else to blame, but either way, whether it was explained or not, she lives in the belief that her arthritic condition was caused by the vaccination.
(If you watch the original Middle Ground video which I linked above, later on the same mother advises that her child has autoimmune issues which might indicate a genetic component, but there simply is not enough information to know).
Dr Damania’s review of the video
In order to cut the mockery and jokes out of the message, I have collated the next few quotes to give you an idea of the take away messages from the Middle Ground video. (don’t worry, I will be touching on the rougher side of the recommendations too).
What ZDogg went on to say
“…what is not bad, and I think I got out of this debate, is the emotional resonance with the anti-vax crowd. They really feel like they have been harmed and they really feel like this is the reason for their suffering and they really feel like telling the world about it….”
“…ok I understand that, like, I see you as a human being, yes, but we’re going to have to do better to figure out how to counter this.”
“But, should we be able to sit and talk about; well ok, your child had a bad reaction, here is one that had the bad reaction, lets talk about it and why I would still vaccinate my child, but I also witness and appreciate the suffering that your family went through.”
“That’s something doctors are unwilling to do, to a large extent, because we are pretty dogmatic, we are pretty conditioned and we are worried it is going to set a bad example.”
I think it is important to recognise these fears and discuss them. They are VERY real for some parents today. Until people learn to trust their physicians again it is going to be very difficult to rid the world of these ill-informed and uneducated opinions.
I am happy to admit, I am pretty short with most anti-vax promoters – given the harm that is being caused, and I do agree that where uneducated opinions are promoted and sold, ridicule and shaming have a role to play.
Personally, I prefer to illicit conversations with questions that point to the lack of knowledge and understanding within the group, and hope that is enough to put some others off or at least encourage them to find a physician that they trust and get some better information.
I need to declare here – I do not work with the suffering and fallout caused by the decrease in vaccine uptake, but I do understand where these next quotes come from.
ZDogg opens the can
“The reason there is hostility, at least, you know, on my platform is, we think that this is a life and death issue for children.”
“Now, the question is, is it shaming and ridicule? Because she feels ostracised already? I think we need to dial it up to 30. I think in society there should be no quarter for running into a theatre and yelling “Fire!”. Which is what these guys are doing, they are professional activists.”
I hope if anything we can appreciate here that we now have diseases coming back and killing hundreds of children, when we thought we had almost rid ourselves of them.
Compassion is important, and trying to talk to people on the other side of this argument is vital to changing the vaccine uptake rates, however, we need to be careful, in my humble opinion, that we don’t tack in the ad hominem approach, just to try and get some extra points on the score board.
The take homes
- Vaccinate your child to protect them and others in your community.
- If you are concerned about vaccine side effects/injury – talk to your doctor about these and then vaccinate your child to protect them and others in your community.
- If your child is one of the unlucky few to suffer from vaccine side effects, let your doctor know and see what options you can explore to protect them and others in your community.
- Some people are anti-vaxxers because they are getting paid to not be well educated in this field.
- Some people are doing the best they can with the knowledge, information and understanding that they have in a society where they feel pressured and judged. They need your support, compassion and empathy to change.
- Always remember, before you get personal, some people’s views are best considered with Hanlon’s razor…..
As far as COVID-19 is concerned…… virology is really not my strong suit, so I am going to keep quiet! Keep washing your hands, stop buying shopping trolleys full of toilet paper and stay well.
Fitness & Health
Az
