Pre-Covid Anti-vax meme

[quick]

I've never seen this discussed before so I'm wondering if anyone else remembers this

In early-mid 2019 there was suddenly a meme trend out of nowhere centered around making fun of anti-vax parents & their children. Anti-vax in the pre-covid sense - parents who don't want to give their kids the standard assortment of childhood vaccines. At the time I had no strong feelings either way about it, but I remember being quite perplexed as to how this topic was suddenly a widespread meme. It wasn't exactly a commonly-known thing among "normies" before that. All the memes were very smugly anti-anti-vax, usually clever jokes about unvaxxed children being really unhealthy among vaxxed kids or dying in early childhood. At my work it suddenly became a daily joke among my coworkers during breaks - people that typically chatted about last night's hockey game were now making jokes about unvaxxed children and going on angry performative rants at head phantoms of stupid anti-vax parents. Speaking on a topic they just found out about with a smug I-know-better attitude and proudly educating their colleagues who weren't as exposed to memes

When covid vaccine rollouts kicked off in 2021 the term anti-vax very quickly became co-opted and aggressively used to refer to (denigrate) anyone who wasn't 100% dedicated to getting "the jab". Aside from the shock of that whole episode on its own, I was really annoyed to see the term "anti-vax" being used to refer to something completely different than its original usage. I was naïve about it and thought it was just journalists being stupid, so it took me a while before I made the connection to the pre-covid meme. Once I remembered, I checked the term on google trends to see if I was remembering it correctly:

https://trends.google.com/trends/explore?date=all&q=antivax (refresh a couple times if you get a 429 error, I don't know if google does this on purpose or if it's just classic google brokenness)

I knew I wasn't imagining it. Less than a year before covid world began, there was an unprecedented spike in usage & awareness of a term which would coincidentally go on to be a highly weaponized tool of psychological warfare during covid. Strange!

 

[bnuungus]

I'd be very interested in seeing what people find relating to this subject but unfortunately I can't really contribute because I didn't mess around with any sort of social media at all until 2020

 

[h00]

 

[W1NTER]

I've never seen this discussed before so I'm wondering if anyone else remembers this

In early-mid 2019 there was suddenly a meme trend out of nowhere centered around making fun of anti-vax parents & their children. Anti-vax in the pre-covid sense - parents who don't want to give their kids the standard assortment of childhood vaccines. At the time I had no strong feelings either way about it, but I remember being quite perplexed as to how this topic was suddenly a widespread meme. It wasn't exactly a commonly-known thing among "normies" before that. All the memes were very smugly anti-anti-vax, usually clever jokes about unvaxxed children being really unhealthy among vaxxed kids or dying in early childhood. At my work it suddenly became a daily joke among my coworkers during breaks - people that typically chatted about last night's hockey game were now making jokes about unvaxxed children and going on angry performative rants at head phantoms of stupid anti-vax parents. Speaking on a topic they just found out about with a smug I-know-better attitude and proudly educating their colleagues who weren't as exposed to memes

When covid vaccine rollouts kicked off in 2021 the term anti-vax very quickly became co-opted and aggressively used to refer to (denigrate) anyone who wasn't 100% dedicated to getting "the jab". Aside from the shock of that whole episode on its own, I was really annoyed to see the term "anti-vax" being used to refer to something completely different than its original usage. I was naïve about it and thought it was just journalists being stupid, so it took me a while before I made the connection to the pre-covid meme. Once I remembered, I checked the term on google trends to see if I was remembering it correctly:

https://trends.google.com/trends/explore?date=all&q=antivax (refresh a couple times if you get a 429 error, I don't know if google does this on purpose or if it's just classic google brokenness)

I knew I wasn't imagining it. Less than a year before covid world began, there was an unprecedented spike in usage & awareness of a term which would coincidentally go on to be a highly weaponized tool of psychological warfare during covid. Strange!

Im pretty sure the whole anti-vax vs vax debate/war was started quite a while ago on websites like >reddit and Twitter (5 or more year approx), as for it getting specifically popular right before Covid 19 I don't really know much about that, best case scenario it was a coincidence and the memes/movement just got natural traction online, worse case scenario its some sort psyop my multination medical businesses and governments

 

[SolidStateSurvivor]

I vaguely recall that trend as well. Was it spurred on by a Trump tweet then or something? I recall them digging up his old posts linking vaccines to autism at one point, was that during the same time the debate was reignited?

To be fair, I thought the original anti-vax movements against the tried and proven vaccines was always a bit silly, we've had something like the polio vaccine for years and have had a chance to vet any potential long term side effects. But covid is an entirely different beast given how expedited it was and the experimental nature of MRNA. At this point how can one not be skeptical of the for profit American healthcare system given how eager they are to fuck kids up with needless prescriptions?

Being lumped into the general anti vaxxer sentiment because I question the effectiveness of a vaccine that requires +4 boosters (without guaranteed protection) for something slightly worse than the common cold is a bit insulting.

Spoiler: Going full schizo

Not that I believe in what I'm about to say, but to merely entertain a similar conspiracy theory that such topics are brought up for public ridicule to preemptively ensure the narrative protection protocols are engrained into the public conscious, perhaps Alex Jones getting BTFO'd for alleging false flags now is a way to deter anyone in the future from merely suggesting the possibility. I don't believe Sandy Hook was a fake event, but when we consider things like the glowie backed Michigan governor kidnapping plot and the Fed's history of blackmailng (and perhaps killing?) MLK who even knows what's truly going on in the shadows anymore. It's not the fault of prominent schizos or skeptical members of the public that these types of conspiracy theories are catching on, it's years of well earned distrust in the elites/government system that has fermented this sentiment.

 

[Collision]

Im pretty sure the whole anti-vax vs vax debate/war was started quite a while ago

The "anti-vax" idea has existed since at least 1998 which is when the paper linking vaccines and autism was published. It probably existed before this too but certainly after 1998 the idea was in circulation.

In early-mid 2019 there was suddenly a meme trend out of nowhere centered around making fun of anti-vax parents & their children. Anti-vax in the pre-covid sense - parents who don't want to give their kids the standard assortment of childhood vaccines.

I don't know what exactly caused the spike you're seeing. Google's data suggests some strange things. For example, it seems like people in France and New Zealand are especially interested in "antivax" as a topic.

Here in California, around that time there was controversy over anti-vaccination movements because of parents refusing to give their children the MMR vaccine. As a result, there had been an outbreak of measles in Los Angeles. This isn't the first such outbreak here but the government had generally opposed coercive vaccination measures because it was extremely unpopular (at least with a niche group of parents who would go to Sacramento and throw a fit). This concern seems to have evaporated only a couple of years later now that vaccination is hip again. Even during peak COVID, the state government was threatening to investigate the safety of the "Trump Vaccine". It wasn't until Trump was out that they were totally on board with COVID vaccination.

Anyway, I think it's highly likely that the "antivax" searches in 2019 could be related to measles or some other outbreak. COVID wouldn't have been on enough people's radars at that point. I don't think it was some kind of conspiracy float the idea in preparation for it becoming a big deal. It's definitely a possibility that what you were experiencing was a local meme escaping its original context.

 

[W1NTER]

I vaguely recall that trend as well. Was it spurred on by a Trump tweet then or something? I recall them digging up his old posts linking vaccines to autism at one point, was that during the same time the debate was reignited?

To be fair, I thought the original anti-vax movements against the tried and proven vaccines was always a bit silly, we've had something like the polio vaccine for years and have had a chance to vet any potential long term side effects. But covid is an entirely different beast given how expedited it was and the experimental nature of MRNA. At this point how can one not be skeptical of the for profit American healthcare system given how eager they are to fuck kids up with needless prescriptions?

Being lumped into the general anti vaxxer sentiment because I question the effectiveness of a vaccine that requires +4 boosters (without guaranteed protection) for something slightly worse than the common cold is a bit insulting.

Spoiler: Going full schizo

Not that I believe in what I'm about to say, but to merely entertain a similar conspiracy theory that such topics are brought up for public ridicule to preemptively ensure the narrative protection protocols are engrained into the public conscious, perhaps Alex Jones getting BTFO'd for alleging false flags now is a way to deter anyone in the future from merely suggesting the possibility. I don't believe Sandy Hook was a fake event, but when we consider things like the glowie backed Michigan governor kidnapping plot and the Fed's history of blackmailng (and perhaps killing?) MLK who even knows what's truly going on in the shadows anymore. It's not the fault of prominent schizos or skeptical members of the public that these types of conspiracy theories are catching on, it's years of well earned distrust in the elites/government system that has fermented this sentiment.

I would likely assume such Antivax stuff came to light during the Trump presidency, it could entirely be an attempt by the Democrats to bunch the "anti-science anti-vaccine" folks with Republicans and right wingers as a publicity boost, personally I used to be very pro vax but the recent Covid vaccine stuff looked sketch as hell so ive now grown to be a little more skeptical than I would've been a couple years ago

 

[SolidStateSurvivor]

personally I used to be very pro vax but the recent Covid vaccine stuff looked sketch as hell so ive now grown to be a little more skeptical than I would've been a couple years ago

Same here, when you start to realize how modern academic studies/scientific journalism works behind the scenes then you start to realize blindly trusting "the experts" is not always in one's best intentions. It's not about purposing a hypothesis and testing it faithfully, it's about coming in with an un-yielding belief and doing your damnedest to ensure that favorable result is enshrined as fact. There are certain outcomes that can not possibly be accepted as scientific fact for they are either un-profitable, socially inconvenient truths, or politically correct.

 

[W1NTER]

Same here, when you start to realize how modern academic studies/scientific journalism works behind the scenes then you start to realize blindly trusting "the experts" is not always in one's best intentions. It's not about purposing a hypothesis and testing it faithfully, it's about coming in with an un-yielding belief and doing your damnedest to ensure that favorable result is enshrined as fact. There are certain outcomes that can not possibly be accepted as scientific fact for they are either un-profitable, socially inconvenient truths, or politically correct.

Precisely, and dont forget stuff about the replication crisis, Humanity is ridiculously good at separating fact from fiction but also fiction from fact, there are just some things the powers at be really want buried and some things that are false in every which way that are not only taken as truth but are enforced among the common people

 

[Collision]

Being lumped into the general anti vaxxer sentiment because I question the effectiveness of a vaccine that requires +4 boosters (without guaranteed protection) for something slightly worse than the common cold is a bit insulting.

Personally, I think there is a large contingent of people who are merely skeptical of the various COVID vaccines and not vaccination. At best, it's obvious that the COVID vaccinations available in the US are not as effective as older vaccines since they require constant booster shots and don't actually seem to prevent spreading an infection around. It's a totally different issue, in my opinion, than whether or not some preservative causes autism. The whole COVID experience was insulting though. It's nothing new of course. If you've ever cared about a topic that entered the public consciousness at all then you've probably experienced the same insulting bullshit. Most of the time, people have a totally superficial understanding of these topics that they've gleaned from broadcast television (or more recently from TikTok).

Same here, when you start to realize how modern academic studies/scientific journalism works behind the scenes then you start to realize blindly trusting "the experts" is not always in one's best intentions. It's not about purposing a hypothesis and testing it faithfully, it's about coming in with an un-yielding belief and doing your damnedest to ensure that favorable result is enshrined as fact. There are certain outcomes that can not possibly be accepted as scientific fact for they are either un-profitable, socially inconvenient truths, or politically correct.

Precisely, and dont forget stuff about the replication crisis, Humanity is ridiculously good at separating fact from fiction but also fiction from fact, there are just some things the powers at be really want buried and some things that are false in every which way that are not only taken as truth but are enforced among the common people

More people should get university-level educations in reading and writing. There is so much absolute junk published that it's impossible to ignore once you get access to it. Unfortunately, most people have very little exposure to actual scientific writing and don't really understand what peer-review is. I don't personally think this is an effort to enshrine anything as fact but simply an effort to get ever more citations (which prove your work is good and that you are very smart). I also don't think it's the case that "the powers that be" want to cover up that these studies are often unreplicated. Unfortunately, I think "the powers that be" are just as foolish as the average person. They just have a fancier title and more cash.

 

[W1NTER]

Personally, I think there is a large contingent of people who are merely skeptical of the various COVID vaccines and not vaccination. At best, it's obvious that the COVID vaccinations available in the US are not as effective as older vaccines since they require constant booster shots and don't actually seem to prevent spreading an infection around. It's a totally different issue, in my opinion, than whether or not some preservative causes autism. The whole COVID experience was insulting though. It's nothing new of course. If you've ever cared about a topic that entered the public consciousness at all then you've probably experienced the same insulting bullshit. Most of the time, people have a totally superficial understanding of these topics that they've gleaned from broadcast television (or more recently from TikTok).


More people should get university-level educations in reading and writing. There is so much absolute junk published that it's impossible to ignore once you get access to it. Unfortunately, most people have very little exposure to actual scientific writing and don't really understand what peer-review is. I don't personally think this is an effort to enshrine anything as fact but simply an effort to get ever more citations (which prove your work is good and that you are very smart). I also don't think it's the case that "the powers that be" want to cover up that these studies are often unreplicated. Unfortunately, I think "the powers that be" are just as foolish as the average person. They just have a fancier title and more cash.

Fair, most issues with the powers at be are usually out of touch incompetence but I do still believe a few of them due want to cause something malicious, likely greed is a pretty big motivator for the such few

 

[bnuungus]

I also don't think it's the case that "the powers that be" want to cover up that these studies are often unreplicated. Unfortunately, I think "the powers that be" are just as foolish as the average person. They just have a fancier title and more cash.

Nah it's more like who's going to fund a serious study into the effects of the covid vaccine? It's in the best interest of the powers that be to not shed any light into that subject so they just won't fund a scientific project like that and in my mind that's covering up info. I'm sick and tired of "muh science" normies not understanding the fact that true, unbiased scientific research for issues like pretty much never happens simply because of funding purposes. I'm not saying you buy into that I'm just expressing my frustration with people like that who blindly follow "the science" and yet have no concept of how scientific research is actually carried out.

 

[RisingThumb]

The original spike was spawned from the spurious claim that Vaccines cause Autism.

The 2nd spike was spawned from questioning of whether the Covid vaccines were actually good for the body, with the lack of long term side effects information.

They aren't alike, but it's easy to see why it was co-opted by >reddit as a blanket term for any opposition to any vaccination due to the common elements in the form of "against vaccination for X reason".

 

[Collision]

Nah it's more like who's going to fund a serious study into the effects of the covid vaccine? It's in the best interest of the powers that be to not shed any light into that subject so they just won't fund a scientific project like that and in my mind that's covering up info.

This is simply my personal opinion but I think there would be a lot of money in proving some long-term negative side-effect from any of the major COVID vaccines. Certainly, some amount of soft censorship occurs in how funds are allocated for various research grants but I don't think it's enough to totally cover up some kind of landmark discovery regarding mRNA vaccines or COVID.

I'm sick and tired of "muh science" normies not understanding the fact that true, unbiased scientific research for issues like pretty much never happens simply because of funding purposes.

As far as anything can be unbiased, I think plenty of good science is done everyday. Most of this work doesn't filter out of academic spaces because a lot of it is boring to the average infinite scrolls zombie but it's there if you go looking. In my personal experience (which has nothing to do with medicine), I don't find bias to be as big an issue as utter junk getting published.

I'm just expressing my frustration with people like that who blindly follow "the science" and yet have no concept of how scientific research is actually carried out.

Anyone who blindly follows "the science" clearly doesn't know how to carry out research. Nothing is more frustrating to me than when people say that, "the science is settled," as though a relatively new vaccine is the same as Newton's Laws of Motion. Science is, by its nature, open to discussion and to be useful has to hold up in the face of constant criticism.

To get back on topic, I think the English language Google results for "antivax" are pretty telling of what was going on in 2019. When I limit the time frame of results to just that year I get stuff like this:

Facts alone don't sway anti-vaxxers. So what does?

Vaccine hesitancy has been identified by the World Health Organization as one of the top ten global health threats of 2019.

www.usatoday.com

Measles Is Back. Blame The Anti-Vax Movement.

Measles cases have already reached their highest level since 2000, and it's only April. The anti-vax movement finally has what it wants: full-blown measles outbreaks spreading across the U.S. It's only a matter of time before children die as a result of this awful misinformation.

www.forbes.com

Anti-vax and anti-abortion movements are filled with misinformation

For example, the term pro-life assumes binary opinions and presumes anyone who does not prescribe is "anti-life."

thehill.com

which seem to be related to the measles outbreaks I mentioned before. Does anyone else get similar results? Maybe this is just being tailored to me geographically. It would also be interesting to look into why the term "antivax" is so popular in France.

 

[bnuungus]

As far as anything can be unbiased, I think plenty of good science is done everyday. Most of this work doesn't filter out of academic spaces because a lot of it is boring to the average infinite scrolls zombie but it's there if you go looking. In my personal experience (which has nothing to do with medicine), I don't find bias to be as big an issue as utter junk getting published.

Yeah maybe I'm just being a bit jaded but to me there's very clearly better discoveries that could get grants but stupid shit like figuring out that rats like to play hide and seek (I have to admit it's pretty cute) gets research money over other things that matter a lot more. I'm not saying that when research is done it's done in a biased manner (like skewing the data, although that sometimes does happen) I'm just saying that the people who fund the research are biased and therefore we follow that portion of discovery but maybe stay in the dark to another part of the story. Idk I guess I don't really have anything concrete to back this up so I could be completely wrong.

Does anyone else get similar results? Maybe this is just being tailored to me geographically.

I searched in that time frame and I get some articles about measles but most of the headline's I'm seeing is various celebrities pushing anti-vax movements as well as WHO calling anti-vaxxers a threat to society with some Trump criticism thrown in there

 

[RisingThumb]

This is simply my personal opinion but I think there would be a lot of money in proving some long-term negative side-effect from any of the major COVID vaccines. Certainly, some amount of soft censorship occurs in how funds are allocated for various research grants but I don't think it's enough to totally cover up some kind of landmark discovery regarding mRNA vaccines or COVID.

As far as anything can be unbiased, I think plenty of good science is done everyday. Most of this work doesn't filter out of academic spaces because a lot of it is boring to the average infinite scrolls zombie but it's there if you go looking. In my personal experience (which has nothing to do with medicine), I don't find bias to be as big an issue as utter junk getting published.

Anyone who blindly follows "the science" clearly doesn't know how to carry out research. Nothing is more frustrating to me than when people say that, "the science is settled," as though a relatively new vaccine is the same as Newton's Laws of Motion. Science is, by its nature, open to discussion and to be useful has to hold up in the face of constant criticism.

To get back on topic, I think the English language Google results for "antivax" are pretty telling of what was going on in 2019. When I limit the time frame of results to just that year I get stuff like this:

Facts alone don't sway anti-vaxxers. So what does?

Vaccine hesitancy has been identified by the World Health Organization as one of the top ten global health threats of 2019.

www.usatoday.com

Measles Is Back. Blame The Anti-Vax Movement.

Measles cases have already reached their highest level since 2000, and it's only April. The anti-vax movement finally has what it wants: full-blown measles outbreaks spreading across the U.S. It's only a matter of time before children die as a result of this awful misinformation.

www.forbes.com

Anti-vax and anti-abortion movements are filled with misinformation

For example, the term pro-life assumes binary opinions and presumes anyone who does not prescribe is "anti-life."

thehill.com

which seem to be related to the measles outbreaks I mentioned before. Does anyone else get similar results? Maybe this is just being tailored to me geographically. It would also be interesting to look into why the term "antivax" is so popular in France.

The soyence is settled

 

[handoferis]

I made a dumb post about this in another thread about the covid vaccine but I can probably give some insight.

I have undulated from pro- to anti- to pro- when it comes to vaccines a bunch. I was pro during the whole "muh autism" phase of the anti-vax movement, but I was specifically anti-vax during the last pandemic (swine flu). Swine flu was a pissy little disease, absolutely irrelevant on the scale of things - they rushed out a vaccine, I was like "nah cuz this is rushed, and for what" and lol, it caused narcolepsy in a bunch of people. No big surprise there. This is pretty much my default take on vaccines for the most part, I'm fine to have them if the risk factors are known *and* I think I need them. Swine flu vaccine scored really low in both those columns. I had a "Fight the Jab" poster in my room in 2009, I was pretty serious about it for a teenager.

Covid though? I've had glass lung pneumonia before and it fucking sucks. I had pneumonia a bunch as a kid, and the last bout I had was glass-lung (and weirdly similar to reported covid symptoms, but in 2011) and it was brutal, I pretty much spent two weeks screaming in pain every time I took a breath and they didn't give me fucking shit to deal with it.

Didn't fancy being in that situation again. Took both AstraZeneca shots when it came available to me, before they announced the blood clots in under-40s thing, spent 10 weeks worrying I was gonna drop dead randomly - nothing happened. I went and took one booster of Moderna after that cause the protection figures of that particular combination looked better than anything else in the studies. Still haven't had covid, but I don't really think that's down to the vaccine so much as it is to me not socializing stupidly. I really, really don't like getting sick.

Would I have another booster? Fuck no. I've yet to see any benefit to putting even more of that shit in me. Would I take a proper, sterilizing vaccine that had been tested at a normal pace? Hell yes. Do I feel any affinity to the current crop of 'anti-vaxxers' having been one in the past? No fucking way, the difference between the movement in 2009 and 2020-22 is insane. The proportion of people spouting single-digit IQ shit is way higher and the caliber of people behind it now is abysmal compared to the swine flu days.

I still think taking untested vaccines is typically a dumb idea (the other column gotta be pretty high to negate that), but I sure as hell wouldn't talk about it in public because I don't want to be associated with some of the frankly unhinged posting I've read online from the current anti-vax crowd. People have every right to be suspicious of medical establishment groupthink, but some of the shit I've seen is denying shit like germ theory. Pushing a pre-Victorian mindset is bonkers.

 

[quick]

The original spike was spawned from the spurious claim that Vaccines cause Autism.

The 2nd spike was spawned from questioning of whether the Covid vaccines were actually good for the body, with the lack of long term side effects information.

They aren't alike, but it's easy to see why it was co-opted by >reddit as a blanket term for any opposition to any vaccination due to the common elements in the form of "against vaccination for X reason".

I know what both spikes are for, I'm implying a suspicion that the first spike may have been manufactured to prime the general public for usage of the term, the difference in context between the spikes is not really the point.

Also multiple people have stated that the anti-vax movement existed long before all this, I don't really understand what that is in response to, maybe you're skimming over the OP and not understanding it

Google's data suggests some strange things. For example, it seems like people in France and New Zealand are especially interested in "antivax" as a topic.

Yeah, the term has varying popularity in different countries. What does that have to do with anything

 

[SolidStateSurvivor]

Do I feel any affinity to the current crop of 'anti-vaxxers' having been one in the past? No fucking way, the difference between the movement in 2009 and 2020-22 is insane. The proportion of people spouting single-digit IQ shit is way higher and the caliber of people behind it now is abysmal compared to the swine flu days.

Unfortunately that's pretty much any topic on the Internet these days. Those tweens who grew up on Tumblr in the early 2010s are now young adults old enough to vote

but I sure as hell wouldn't talk about it in public because I don't want to be associated with some of the frankly unhinged posting I've read online from the current anti-vax crowd

Where have you been reading the unhinged stuff? I've certainly seen my fair share in the wild through fringe sites, but I feel like the media goes out of it's way to cherry pick/amplify lunacy in order to ridicule anyone who slightly opposes all the mandates.
But I feel you on the last part, irl I don't really bring up my vax status, because to me what's the point anyways? Going around bragging about not being jabbed is just as irritating as constantly hearing about someone else discuss how special they are because of sexuality/gender bullshit. I really don't care either way if someone has it or not. It's a "you do you" kinda thing, but unfortunately it seems no one wants to leave it at that.

This is simply my personal opinion but I think there would be a lot of money in proving some long-term negative side-effect from any of the major COVID vaccines. Certainly, some amount of soft censorship occurs in how funds are allocated for various research grants but I don't think it's enough to totally cover up some kind of landmark discovery regarding mRNA vaccines or COVID.

I think that there's a lot more money to be made keeping any sort of large scale damning information confidential, and big pharma has a team of lawyers ready to destroy anyone who would dare stand in their way. I'm not going to claim the studies conducted showing the covid vaccines may have harmful side effects were all done in good faith, but I have seen how hard anyone in the field who suggests this is immediately ostracized or has their careers come to an end.
Epstein's case really black pilled me in this regard.

 

[RisingThumb]

I know what both spikes are for, I'm implying a suspicion that the first spike may have been manufactured to prime the general public for usage of the term, the difference in context between the spikes is not really the point.

Also multiple people have stated that the anti-vax movement existed long before all this, I don't really understand what that is in response to, maybe you're skimming over the OP and not understanding it



Yeah, the term has varying popularity in different countries. What does that have to do with anything

Have you tried reaching out to the guy who wrote the original paper on Vaccines causing Autism?