Why I won't get the COVID-19 vaccine
August 20, 2021 - Personal
It is a shame that what should be a personal medical decision has become an extremely political one. We are inundated with ads, political messages, and news segments delivered in hushed tones about the imminent danger of COVID-19. We are made to feel that our own safety and everyone else’s safety is dependent on getting the vaccine. But, what are the facts?
The default position of any medication should be that you will not take it. You should use all the information at your disposal to determine whether the positives outweigh the negatives for you. A person with a terminal illness would be more than willing to try an experimental and possibly dangerous procedure, because they may soon die anyways. The cost-benefit calculation makes perfect sense. On the other hand, someone who is more than likely to recover through more conventional means would not try the same procedure, because the risk of the procedure probably outweights the benefit. You should be able to say beyond a reasonable doubt that any medication that you take is beneficial for you.
Over the past few weeks, I’ve seen many arguments for why I should get the vaccine. Let’s take a look at some of them, and why they don’t hold water.
It’s free, why don’t you just get it?
Anything provided through the government is not free. I pay taxes so that the government can light it on fire for all their pet projects, and then complain that they’re running a deficit. And of course, they absolutely need to raise the debt ceiling to keep critical government infrastructure running, like drone strikes on innocent people overseas no doubt (for your safety!).
Nothing’s going to happen! Just take it!
Your body can tolerate a lot of things, even many poisons. Just because your body can tolerate something, doesn’t mean it’s good for you. The idea that everyone should get a COVID-19 vaccination is dogmatic rather than scientific. The vast majority of young people for example, have very little risk for complications from COVID-19 unless they have preexisting conditions. Yet, the CDC recommends the vaccine for 12 year olds. At a peak in January 2021, there were 1.3 hospitalizations per million in the 5-17 age demographic. However, according to the CDC, there are 12.6 cases per million of myocarditis (slide 39) for the 12-39 age demographic after getting vaccinated.
Clearly, the CDC itself has not nailed down the correct dosing guidelines and age requirements. Why would I have confidence that they got everything else right? No agency or institution is foolproof. Make an informed decision, not a dogmatic one.
The CDC is one thing, but let’s not forget the companies that actually manufacture the vaccines. All businesses have a profit motive. They will most often only provide something that works well enough to not get sued bad enough that they turn a loss. Here’s a neat little table:
| Humble vaccine provider without any profit motive whatsoever | 2020 Total Revenue | Total Revenue Last 12 Months | Contracts received through Operation Warp Speed |
|---|---|---|---|
| Johnson & Johnson | $82.6 B | $89.2 B | $1 B |
| Moderna | $0.8 B | $2.7 B | $5.89 B |
| Pfizer | $41.9 B | $51.6 B | $5.97 B |
OMG, you’ll get COVID if you don’t!
Acting as if everyone will be infected is simply mass hysteria. I have never gotten a single flu shot, and yet have never been diagnosed with the flu. I think it’s safe to say that the chances of being exposed to COVID-19 are far less than 1. The chances of being exposed to vaccine side effects if I take the vaccine is 1. As I’ve said, even if I were to get COVID-19, the risks for most people are extremely low.
Take a few minutes to watch Dr. Dan Stock talk to a school board about why it’s unreasonable to have vaccine mandates.
It’s not just about you, you’ll spread COVID to other people!
Vaccines are not going to stop the spread of COVID-19. Israel, for example, despite it’s extremely high vaccination rates is still suffering a surge of new cases. What is Israel’s response to this, when they’ve already reached an astonishingly high rate of vaccination? More shots! That’s right, Israel is working to approve booster shots for a vaccine that has not actually slowed down the rate of COVID cases. And, it’s only natural to assume that the chances of severe side effects only increase with each new shot you receive. My own country, the United States is not too far behind. As they say, “the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results.”
They won’t end the lockdown unless you do.
This is of course the “carrot” that the governments and corporations are dangling in front of the populace. Power is wrested from the people when you give small concessions. The legal system just lazily uses the doctrine of precedent to shove ham-fisted legislation and restrictions through (sometimes even without precedent if you’re not paying attention). So, if we set the precedent that shutting down small businesses, and locking people in their homes is okay, the overreach will only continue.
The corporations of course love this state of affairs, since most of their local competitors have been blown out of the water. Shareholders could not be more thrilled with the recent numbers. These are the same corporations who fund your congressmen and senators. So, what’s the incentive to end this exactly? Me or you getting vaccinated certainly won’t end the madness. They will only end it when it’s convenient for them.
Unvaccinated people cause mutations, and will lead to new variants!
Charles Darwin theorized that the finches on Galapagos Island would have varying beak sizes generation to generation depending on the types of nuts and berries available for consumption. In essence, the population was adapting to a change in the environment. Would it not be the case that a pharmaceutical with a novel mechanism of delivery (mRNA or adenovirus), would be a significant change in the environment? Far more so, than a natural human immune response? There is in fact, research indicating that pathogens can evolve in response to a vaccine. There is still no definitive conclusion for the COVID-19 vaccines, but there is certainly evidence for concern.
To be perfectly clear, these are not your grandma and grandpa’s vaccines. “Old-style” vaccines would use a deactivated or attenuated version of the pathogen in question to drive an immune response, like the widely available polio vaccines. The Moderna and Pfizer mRNA vaccines actually deliver mRNA that then instruct your own cells to produce spike proteins which trigger the production of antibodies by your immune system. Similarly, the Johnson & Johnson vaccine produces spike proteins by delivering DNA using an adenovirus.
The fact that mRNA vaccines have never been on the market before, let alone at the current massive scale, should at least give you some doubt. The same is true for adenovirus-based vaccines. Do the scientists even understand how the virus will change and react? These are not the same as the old polio and smallpox vaccines. In fact, it may not even be correct to refer to these pharmaceuticals as vaccines. Luckily, Merriam-Webster has helpfully cleared up the definition for us!
This is completely uncharted territory, and it was rolled out at “warp speed.”
But, 160 million people already took it.
If you had Grandmaster Garry Kasparov playing a game of chess against 160 million people voting on the best move, who would you bet your money on? Now, I’m not saying all 160 million people are stupid. They made the choice they made with the information they had. Not everyone is a virologist, nor do they have the free time to research everything. As parents used to say “if everyone jumped off a cliff, would you jump too?” Think for yourself.
All the experts say you should take it. Do you think you know more than them?
I may not know more than them, but have you considered that perhaps the “experts” don’t have your best intentions in mind? Have you considered that perhaps the “experts” are not well-meaning nerds, but actually just politicians. This is the longest section of my post purely because these “experts” are the reason that there’s such a push for the vaccines.
Let’s take everyone’s favorite YouTube podcast guest, Anthony Fauci. Dr. Fauci is a guy who’s been the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) since 1984 (37 years!), and recently has also become the “Chief Medical Advisor to the President”. He is breathlessly cited as the nation’s “expert” on COVID-19. Nevermind the fact that he oversaw funding for the Wuhan Institute of Virology, from where the COVID-19 virus was leaked (investigated by Vanity Fair of all places). The Vanity Fair article does a good job of summarizing the intellectual dishonesty of many of these “experts.” These people that could have investigated the actual origin, and figured out how to stop it early, were too busy covering their own asses by calling anyone who doubted them racists and conspiracy theorists.
As the Vanity Fair article hilariously notes, the only reason these people were willing to now consider the lab-leak theory was because “[with] President Trump out of office, it should be possible to reject his xenophobic agenda and still ask why, in all places in the world, did the oubreak begin in the city with a laboratory housing one of the world’s most extensive collection of bat viruses, doing some of the most aggressive research?” Translated from journo-speak: “we can investigate the truth now that people won’t think we’re proving the orange man right.” In case you thought the “experts” were the only morally corrupt people in this story, the journalists have been playing this game even longer!
Even Fauci, as an “expert,” is not above being publicly shamed for wrongthink. As this Variety article incredibly notes at the end, “The U.K. recently became the first country in the world to approve a COVID-19 vaccine. The speed at which the vaccine was approved was questioned by some, including U.S. infectious disease expert Dr. Anthony Fauci. He has since apologized” (emphasis mine). It was obvious he would apologize though, for a politician is nothing if not an expert at deflecting blame.
At least ask the question, “why is there so much vitriol about people not getting this vaccine?” For example, here’s a helpful little infographic from the Center for Countering Digital Hate. Apparently questioning the vaccine is considered hate now (lol).
Parting thoughts
In conclusion, if by your free will, after assessing all the risks and benefits, you want to get the COVID-19 vaccine, then by all means, please do so. But, don’t force it on everyone else. This is not a fallacious slippery slope argument. We are careening to the bottom of the gorge at breakneck speed as it is. The punitive bureaucrats of the past have learned from their mistakes, and have instead offloaded their dirty work to the corporations.
“If you don’t like it, just go somewhere else! The Constitution doesn’t require a private business to serve you.” See you at the Snopes Misinformation Reeducation CampTM comrade.
Let me know what you think about this article by leaving a comment below, reaching out to me on Twitter or sending me an email at pkukkapalli@gmail.com