Is the act of rejecting facts in favor of belief a kind of stupidity?

[♦ Fuego ♦]

I'm pondering the current political climate and watching as 120 former armed forces generals sign their names to a letter stating they believe the election was stolen, despite courts repeatedly rejecting the claims for lack of evidence. They believe that Marxism is taking over the United States (bear in mind these are people that have actively fought Communists), despite being able to buy and sell and promote their views without being imprisoned. I see the anti-vax folks believing all kinds of odd things about vaccines from making us into 5G antennas to track us to "shedding" the vaccine so others get vaccinated just by being near. I see the anti-mask folks saying they believe masks are a conspiracy to deprive us of oxygen and cause us to become sick.

 

Belief is critical to Christianity and other religions that make it the deciding factor in whether a person will be part of the chosen in-crowd or not, and the cults reward those that choose belief over facts and evidence. "We're fools for Christ!" "Faith is evidence for things not seen" Belief is therefore the most important aspect of something they think is critical for survival, and they get social rewards for that belief.

 

These are people that sometimes have a good education, have risen to top level strategic positions (though the military has its own kind of indoctrination), and yet belief trumps anything to the contrary, and their crowd, the chosen ones, gives them kudos for believing the secret/obvious knowledge and standing against the devil/Marx. 

 

So is it a form of stupidity (just bullheaded walking off a cliff), or a defect in human thinking that lets otherwise intelligent people get scammed and then promote the scam like their lives depended on it? We see it in quack cures (which are also promoted during this virus time), and one lieutenant general swears by the malaria drug for keeping free of COVID, though it does nothing in that regard. Are they all conditioned to religious thinking and that same format is being exploited? It feels like we need some kind of anti-malware installed to help sort this defect (meaning it isn't stupidity per se, but people get conditioned to behave in a way that ignores demonstrable reality). I suppose my underlying thought is that "you can't fix stupid", but perhaps the other has an off switch.

[Myrkhoos]

You put some questions here.

      Belief vs facts. The probl is, most of the time, ALL we have is belief. You BELIEVE the courts were right. You BELIEVE vaccines are safe. You BELIEVE masks are safe and eficient. You trust people who tried those cases, made that research, etc. You, personally, have no facts, no direct experienceor too lottle to make sweeping general statements. When you trust a doctor vs a shaman, you TRUST. Because you do not rrally have rhe education to really make an informed decision. This is very important as a starting point. Now, you choose who to trust based on different critarea. Like, you have a prior assumption that medical education is real while african shamanic education is not. ( Altought the latter can last as long and be as hard if not harder). That assumotion can be based on your exp, your prior ideological commitments, etc. 

        So the probl here is not facts vs belief , but WHO and WHY do you believe that who. 

      It's more of who do perceive as a reliable authority. 

      Now, how do come to view certain things as reliable vs unreliable authority can be a more complex. Sometimes it is just habituation. You were told that from a young age so you continue. Sometimes personal exp, strong and repeated. Sometimes paranoia. - I could see paranoia in those generals.

       But, if you want a more detailed answer about influence look up cult literature, Robert Cialdini, Jon Atack, Steve Hassan, Alexandra Stein, Janja Lalich, etc. The last name was a 30 year old Fullbright scholar with exp in living abroad the US when she got into a leftwing , marxist leninist cult ( and they were REALLY marxist leninist). Getting into authoritarian regimes has little do with what is normally considered intelligence. Many times, the most intelligent tend to gravitate more to these org, bk they are more prone seeing patterns where there are not and at rationalising.:). Plus cukts target well adjusted people to use, not weak ppl to carry as a burden.

      As a personal example,my reservation about the vaccine are mainly bk of the ideas of Geert van den Bosche, who seemed trustworthy. His arguments were not, per se, anti vax, they were anti mass vaccination during mass transmission, as this could, and seems to start to do, produce vaccine resistant variants(like the indian variant), and that young, healthy people are better off with their own immunity, and immuno compromomused as well bk they will not have vaccine resistant variants.Now, am I in a position to really evaluate his claims? No. But I trust him more than other people. The future will show more.

     Again, this not about facts vs belief, but more on reliable vs unreliable authority and methods of discerning it.

[TheRedneckProfessor]

I believed the guy when he said that the engine had been rebuilt but he had lost the paperwork.  Because I really liked that truck.  Shiny, candy apple red, 4-wheel drive.  I knew somewhere deep down inside that it was a scam; but I really wanted that truck, or, at least,  what I thought my false image of that truck would represent.  Drove home in it, too; blowing smoke and pissing gasoline the entire time.  Luckily I came to my senses about halfway to the house and got my money back the next day.

 

I think there is something innate in humanity that wants to believe what is convenient, or feels good, or whatever.  Even if a part of us knows it's bullshit.  Some folks are probably more susceptible than others; and some piles of bullshit are larger than others.  Still, getting taken for a ride is embarrassing,whether it's a truck, a fuck, or a stroke of "luck;" and most people would rather continue in the delusion than admit the truth.

[WalterP]

12 hours ago, Fuego said:

I'm pondering the current political climate and watching as 120 former armed forces generals sign their names to a letter stating they believe the election was stolen, despite courts repeatedly rejecting the claims for lack of evidence. They believe that Marxism is taking over the United States (bear in mind these are people that have actively fought Communists), despite being able to buy and sell and promote their views without being imprisoned. I see the anti-vax folks believing all kinds of odd things about vaccines from making us into 5G antennas to track us to "shedding" the vaccine so others get vaccinated just by being near. I see the anti-mask folks saying they believe masks are a conspiracy to deprive us of oxygen and cause us to become sick.

 

Belief is critical to Christianity and other religions that make it the deciding factor in whether a person will be part of the chosen in-crowd or not, and the cults reward those that choose belief over facts and evidence. "We're fools for Christ!" "Faith is evidence for things not seen" Belief is therefore the most important aspect of something they think is critical for survival, and they get social rewards for that belief.

 

These are people that sometimes have a good education, have risen to top level strategic positions (though the military has its own kind of indoctrination), and yet belief trumps anything to the contrary, and their crowd, the chosen ones, gives them kudos for believing the secret/obvious knowledge and standing against the devil/Marx. 

 

So is it a form of stupidity (just bullheaded walking off a cliff), or a defect in human thinking that lets otherwise intelligent people get scammed and then promote the scam like their lives depended on it? We see it in quack cures (which are also promoted during this virus time), and one lieutenant general swears by the malaria drug for keeping free of COVID, though it does nothing in that regard. Are they all conditioned to religious thinking and that same format is being exploited? It feels like we need some kind of anti-malware installed to help sort this defect (meaning it isn't stupidity per se, but people get conditioned to behave in a way that ignores demonstrable reality). I suppose my underlying thought is that "you can't fix stupid", but perhaps the other has an off switch.

 

Fuego,

 

I have no definitive answers to your very good questions.  But how about this?  As Myrkhoos has correctly pointed out, when it comes to things we cannot immediately see or hear, we have no choice but to believe.  At the moment I'm sitting in my home and I can't directly see the traffic on the main road, which is several hundred yards away.  Is the road busy or is it empty of cars?  I don't know.  But I could find out by leaving where I am and going to find out for myself.

 

And this is the nub of the question of belief.

 

What are we to believe is the truth when there is no possibility of discovering it for ourselves?  Surely we must delegate the responsibility to authority figures whom we are emotionally disposed to trust.  It seems to me that this behaviour is just an extension of the way we are raised by our parents.  They were the trustworthy authority figures we relied upon when we were too young to comprehend the world properly.  I think its possible that when we become adults we unconsciously defer to authority figures that emotionally resonate with our childhood memories of our parents.

 

If we move on to the issues you've raised Fuego, I don't think that this is a function of intelligence per se, because even highly intelligent people can believe outrageously implausible things.  No.  Instead I reckon that belief stems from and is rooted in the emotions, not the intellect.  If a clever person is emotionally needy then perhaps they will accept or reject facts on an emotional basis, even though they possess the intelligence to understand all of the facts?

 

Which brings me on to this possibility.

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Motivated_reasoning

 

As stated above, neuroscience research suggests that "motivated reasoning is qualitatively distinct from reasoning when people do not have a strong emotional stake in the conclusions reached." However, if there is a strong emotion attached during their previous round of motivated reasoning and that emotion is again present when the individual's conclusion is reached, a strong emotional stake is then attached to the conclusion. Any new information in regards to that conclusion will cause motivated reasoning to reoccur. This can create pathways within the neural network that further ingrains the reasoned beliefs of that individual along similar neural networks where logical reasoning occurs. This causes the strong emotion to reoccur when confronted with contradictory information, time and time again. This is what is referred to by Lodge and Taber as the affective contagion. But instead of "infecting" other individuals, the emotion "infects" the individuals reasoning pathways and conclusions.

 

Perhaps what we are seeing in the political and religious arenas are examples of emotionally motivated reasoning?

 

Thank you.

 

Walter.

 

 

[midniterider]

14 hours ago, Fuego said:

I'm pondering the current political climate and watching as 120 former armed forces generals sign their names to a letter stating they believe the election was stolen, despite courts repeatedly rejecting the claims for lack of evidence. They believe that Marxism is taking over the United States (bear in mind these are people that have actively fought Communists), despite being able to buy and sell and promote their views without being imprisoned. I see the anti-vax folks believing all kinds of odd things about vaccines from making us into 5G antennas to track us to "shedding" the vaccine so others get vaccinated just by being near. I see the anti-mask folks saying they believe masks are a conspiracy to deprive us of oxygen and cause us to become sick.

 

Belief is critical to Christianity and other religions that make it the deciding factor in whether a person will be part of the chosen in-crowd or not, and the cults reward those that choose belief over facts and evidence. "We're fools for Christ!" "Faith is evidence for things not seen" Belief is therefore the most important aspect of something they think is critical for survival, and they get social rewards for that belief.

 

These are people that sometimes have a good education, have risen to top level strategic positions (though the military has its own kind of indoctrination), and yet belief trumps anything to the contrary, and their crowd, the chosen ones, gives them kudos for believing the secret/obvious knowledge and standing against the devil/Marx. 

 

So is it a form of stupidity (just bullheaded walking off a cliff), or a defect in human thinking that lets otherwise intelligent people get scammed and then promote the scam like their lives depended on it? We see it in quack cures (which are also promoted during this virus time), and one lieutenant general swears by the malaria drug for keeping free of COVID, though it does nothing in that regard. Are they all conditioned to religious thinking and that same format is being exploited? It feels like we need some kind of anti-malware installed to help sort this defect (meaning it isn't stupidity per se, but people get conditioned to behave in a way that ignores demonstrable reality). I suppose my underlying thought is that "you can't fix stupid", but perhaps the other has an off switch.

 

After repeating a feel-good lie enough , certain types of people (as we have seen in this past election) who want something soooooooo bad to be true , start believing it is. Does this mean they are stupid. I dont think so. The problem might be that they over-invested themselves emotionally in a certain outcome. 

 

In 2016, Hillary lost. I hate the outdated electoral college bullshit..but according to the rules in place, she fucking lost. I dont remember what happened after she lost. There were probably some recounts and lawsuits. I didnt think much of them because I KNEW she lost.  I was not thrilled that the other person won but I didnt hold onto some false hope that SOMEHOW she would eventually be sworn in to office. I just accepted the fact she lost. This might be because I did not put her up on a pedestal like Jesus Christ. I think it is important to NOT worship people or the cheese may start sliding off your cracker. 

 

edit: Some people metaphorically wrap their lips in a tight manner around their hero's member. I just dont understand it. I voted. End of story. I have no illusion America will become rainbows and unicorns because of any elected official. We've left religion because we discovered it was bullshit. Dont let politics become your new fairy tale fantasy. Be skeptical. /edit

 

One thing that kind of makes me laugh (and angry too) is when I hear someone make fun of the participation trophy because it doesnt allow kids to learn that sometimes you lose. Of course the equally absurd mindset is the people that just claim they won and were defrauded or cheated. 

 

Maybe 120 former US military generals need to understand that sometimes you lose. Maybe they need to cut back on the hero worship. And stop with the feel-good lie self-programming.

 

The other problem is a deeply held fear that party X will DESTROY AMERICA! People need to come back to reality.

[TheRedneckProfessor]

1 hour ago, midniterider said:

This might be because I did not put her up on a pedestal like Jesus Christ.

I don't think jesus christ put her up on a pedestal, either.

[midniterider]

7 minutes ago, TheRedneckProfessor said:

I don't think jesus christ put her up on a pedestal, either.

 

Smarty pants!

[florduh]

Perhaps we're talking about a supposed difference between willful ignorance as opposed to simple lack of thinking ability or low IQ. I would say that deliberately remaining ignorant and wrong in the face of available, overwhelming evidence is in fact stupid. It doesn't matter if there is a "good reason" for choosing wrong thinking; peer pressure, political/religious indoctrination/tradition. Stupid is as stupid does.

[WalterP]

19 minutes ago, florduh said:

Perhaps we're talking about a supposed difference between willful ignorance as opposed to simple lack of thinking ability or low IQ. I would say that deliberately remaining ignorant and wrong in the face of available, overwhelming evidence is in fact stupid. It doesn't matter if there is a "good reason" for choosing wrong thinking; peer pressure, political/religious indoctrination/tradition. Stupid is as stupid does.

 

Florduh,

 

With all due respect, how does a child indoctrinated by their parents into a religion do any choosing of their wrong thinking?

 

Thank you.

 

Walter.

[florduh]

57 minutes ago, WalterP said:

 

Florduh,

 

With all due respect, how does a child indoctrinated by their parents into a religion do any choosing of their wrong thinking?

 

Thank you.

 

Walter.

 

Well, with all due respect, that doesn't really relate to anything I said.

 

In response, though, I would say that children do grow up and stop believing that Santa comes down the chimney, the tooth fairy leaves money under their pillow, and Scruffy went away to live happily on a farm somewhere. As adults, however, should they insist that the world is flat, demons are responsible for illness or windmills cause cancer, then they are willfully ignorant of the available facts and are therefore behaving stupidly. 

[♦ Fuego ♦]

Thank you all! Those are some great insights. I'm going to try and summarize below. Let me know if you'd clarify or change what I got from your answers.

 

1. We all have to believe at some level since we can't verify each and every fact, especially when the facts are outside of our field of expertise. But we can look for peer review, whether an authority is speaking from science and expertise, or whether there is something else motivating the claims. An informed decision is based on trusted sources, and the trust comes from the sources being vetted as authorities. However, if a person has already built up belief in sources that are viewed as authorities but are not really, the belief can be very powerful but misguided. And there can be legitimate disagreement between vetted authorities, as well as understanding that vetted authorities can often have side agendas especially if they are paid to represent a position. 

 

2. Sometimes belief begins with a strong motivation, perhaps always. Most religious conversion does not come about by examining history and fact, but by an emotional appeal to cosmic love, eternal life in paradise vs icky damnation, salvation from troubles (overeating, alcohol, monsters in the closet). Often there is social reinforcement of the decision when other believers celebrate the decision. Emotional motivation will carry people through all kinds of contrary evidence, sometimes even pretending to "expose the lies" of unbelievers. Any little thing can be interpreted as validation and reinforcement of the belief, "God helped me find my car keys! Glory!" and major misses are chalked up to silent divine will or ignored for the sake of fitting in with the other believers. We see this all the time in financial scams online or over the phone, and the popular multilevel marketing pyramid schemes. Add to this the natural embarrassment of realizing I was gullible, and I will tend to keep on believing against my better judgment because otherwise I have to admit to being fooled. And that magic prize looks so enticing... So belief is often rooted firmly in emotions rather than any kind of verifiable facts.

 

3. In the case of the 120 US Generals signing their names to a letter endorsing fallacious conspiracies, they could have a certain degree of paranoia from years of fighting enemy ideas and are looking for enemies where there are none. And they have likely never lost a war, so losing an election that they backed strongly may be causing them distressing emotional dissonance and claiming that there was cheating and fraud is a way to feel like they are still being champions of the American cause. 

 

4. In a mature person, when belief becomes willful ignorance that excludes evidence either by not looking it or by pushing it away, it becomes stupidity. Whatever the motivation is that drives the ongoing decision to believe, there really is a dividing line between confirmation bias and actually weighing evidence to find truth, even if it is uncomfortable. 

[florduh]

18 minutes ago, Fuego said:

4. In a mature person, when belief becomes willful ignorance that excludes evidence either by not looking it or by pushing it away, it becomes stupidity. Whatever the motivation is that drives the ongoing decision to believe, there really is a dividing line between confirmation bias and actually weighing evidence to find truth, even if it is uncomfortable. 

I thought that's what we were discussing here; "rejecting facts in favor of belief." Obviously we all believe certain things, not all those beliefs can have ironclad proof. But this was about actually rejecting facts in order to hold on to some wrong belief. Did I miss something? Are we considering that there could be good reasons to reject the facts? If so, I would say no, ignoring facts is stupid.

[TheRedneckProfessor]

57 minutes ago, florduh said:

ignoring facts is stupid.

I'm not sure it's black and white like that.  It is a fact that fossil fuels are not a sustainable energy source.  A fact I conveniently ignore every time I fill up my gas tank at the Try'n'Save.  

[florduh]

10 minutes ago, TheRedneckProfessor said:

I'm not sure it's black and white like that.  It is a fact that fossil fuels are not a sustainable energy source.  A fact I conveniently ignore every time I fill up my gas tank at the Try'n'Save.  

It's hard keeping this one on track!

[WalterP]

Perhaps it would help to investigate what we mean by the word 'fact'?

 

For most of human history it was a 'fact' that the world was flat.

 

There was no need to invoke gods to account for what our eyes were telling us.

 

If facts are evidence based upon what our senses tell us, then yes, it was a fact that the world was flat.

 

But, it isn't.

 

Which means that over time the meaning of the word fact has changed.

 

I therefore submit that it would help for us to define what we mean by that word.

 

Thank you.

 

Walter.

 

 

[♦ Fuego ♦]

My questions have been answered to my satisfaction. 

So much of the issue has to do with how average humans interpret reality and the many emotional motivations we have to settle for a quick answer. In an optical illusion (see example), the apparent evidence seems to point to a clear conclusion, but our senses are not developed sharply enough to discern reality without help (science, math, and tools we make). Not many humans are motivated to question our senses, our culture, our upbringing, our social circle, our patriotism, or anything else that shapes our beliefs. Much of stage magic is based on exploiting these tendencies and imperfections in our senses.

 

The attached picture seems to show swirls of green and blue divided by rose. But the green and blue are identical colors. Our senses say that is crazy, they are obviously different. But the actual difference is the smaller counter swirls of orange or rose which are not actually continuous. The surrounding color or orange or rose influences how we see the green or blue (which on its own seems between the two apparent colors). By using a graphics program, one can zoom in and do a color comparison. At that point fact is shown by a tool even though our senses still see two colors. I used an image format called PNG that preserves this effect. Saving as a JPG destroys the integrity of the illusion because it approximates the colors to save file size. 

[pantheory]

On 5/23/2021 at 7:20 PM, Fuego said:

I'm pondering the current political climate and watching as 120 former armed forces generals sign their names to a letter stating they believe the election was stolen, despite courts repeatedly rejecting the claims for lack of evidence. They believe that Marxism is taking over the United States (bear in mind these are people that have actively fought Communists), despite being able to buy and sell and promote their views without being imprisoned. I see the anti-vax folks believing all kinds of odd things about vaccines from making us into 5G antennas to track us to "shedding" the vaccine so others get vaccinated just by being near. I see the anti-mask folks saying they believe masks are a conspiracy to deprive us of oxygen and cause us to become sick.

 

Belief is critical to Christianity and other religions that make it the deciding factor in whether a person will be part of the chosen in-crowd or not, and the cults reward those that choose belief over facts and evidence. "We're fools for Christ!" "Faith is evidence for things not seen" Belief is therefore the most important aspect of something they think is critical for survival, and they get social rewards for that belief.

 

These are people that sometimes have a good education, have risen to top level strategic positions (though the military has its own kind of indoctrination), and yet belief trumps anything to the contrary, and their crowd, the chosen ones, gives them kudos for believing the secret/obvious knowledge and standing against the devil/Marx. 

 

So is it a form of stupidity (just bullheaded walking off a cliff), or a defect in human thinking that lets otherwise intelligent people get scammed and then promote the scam like their lives depended on it? We see it in quack cures (which are also promoted during this virus time), and one lieutenant general swears by the malaria drug for keeping free of COVID, though it does nothing in that regard. Are they all conditioned to religious thinking and that same format is being exploited? It feels like we need some kind of anti-malware installed to help sort this defect (meaning it isn't stupidity per se, but people get conditioned to behave in a way that ignores demonstrable reality). I suppose my underlying thought is that "you can't fix stupid", but perhaps the other has an off switch.

 

Yeah, It's certainly not a sign of independent thinking. Of course election fraud could and has happened in the recent past, but such fraud could not conceivably extend nationwide IMO.

 

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/monkey-cage/wp/2017/08/08/heres-a-voter-fraud-myth-richard-daley-stole-illinois-for-john-kennedy-in-the-1960-election/

 

It was well known that in 1960 the Democratic political machine organized political fraud in Chicago. Some have asserted that that was enough to put Kennedy over the top in Illinois. Even if true, it would not have been enough for him to win the election without all the other states.

 

The same thing applies to Trump. So far, there has been no evidence that voter fraud was enough to overturn the election in any particular state, but even if there was, it would not have been enough to have overturned the election.

 

Most of the kinds of people who believe such things are more easily bent by conspiracy theorists  IMO

 

As to religion, most of such ridiculous beliefs relate to one's parents and what religion the believer was raised in. Some of the most intelligent people look for ways to justify their beliefs. sometimes in light of overwhelming evidence against them -- where other equally intelligent but wiser people start questioning their beliefs in light of the same overwhelming evidence.

 

Stupidity is a nebulous word. It can imply a lack of intelligence, or it could characterize a foolish behavior, such as "stupid is as stupid does "

 

 

[Myrkhoos]

22 hours ago, florduh said:

Perhaps we're talking about a supposed difference between willful ignorance as opposed to simple lack of thinking ability or low IQ. I would say that deliberately remaining ignorant and wrong in the face of available, overwhelming evidence is in fact stupid. It doesn't matter if there is a "good reason" for choosing wrong thinking; peer pressure, political/religious indoctrination/tradition. Stupid is as stupid does.

Hmm, are you saying that the behaviour is stupid or the people doing it are stupid? Because I think we can all agree tgat even highly intelligebt people sometimes engage in stupid behaviour. I understood the OP as asking if people were stupid, not behaviour.

[florduh]

3 hours ago, Myrkhoos said:

Hmm, are you saying that the behaviour is stupid or the people doing it are stupid? Because I think we can all agree tgat even highly intelligebt people sometimes engage in stupid behaviour. I understood the OP as asking if people were stupid, not behaviour.

This is getting way too complicated. Yes, intelligent people make mistakes and engage in self destructive behaviors at times. Smoking, drugs and drinking are common examples as is thrill seeking adrenaline sports; you can know and accept the facts that point to abstaining but elect to engage anyway because you want to. That is far different than holding a wrong belief when the facts are available.

[TheRedneckProfessor]

Oh, look at me!  I'm @florduh!  I posted an opinion on the interwebs and now everybody thinks I'm wrong.   

 

 

[WalterP]

1 hour ago, florduh said:

This is getting way too complicated. Yes, intelligent people make mistakes and engage in self destructive behaviors at times. Smoking, drugs and drinking are common examples as is thrill seeking adrenaline sports; you can know and accept the facts that point to abstaining but elect to engage anyway because you want to. That is far different than holding a wrong belief when the facts are available.

 

Available, Florduh?

 

The facts about what the conditions are like 20 miles under our feet are directly unavailable to anyone.  What we say are the facts about this region are actually inferences made from seismology, geology and other earth sciences.  If you or I were to cite these facts we'd actually be expressing our confidence in the work of the scientists who did the research for us.  Neither you nor I went and found out the facts about the inner earth for ourselves.  We've delegated that responsibility to others.  

 

I'd go so far to say that almost everything that's blithely termed 'factual' depends upon us deferring to the work of others.  

 

The availability of facts depends upon believing in the integrity, honesty and reliability of others.

 

Thank you.

 

Walter.

[florduh]

I give up. There are no facts, proven methodologies or observable phenomena. Believe anything you feel like making up. Better?

[WalterP]

6 hours ago, florduh said:

I give up. There are no facts, proven methodologies or observable phenomena. Believe anything you feel like making up. Better?

 

It's not as black and white as you've suggested, Florduh.

 

But seeing as you've given up, isn't that tantamount to closing your mind to the possibility of it being changed by the facts?

 

Which seems to be just what you claim others do, even when the facts are freely available to them.

 

Anyway, seeing as you've given up, so shall I.

 

Goodbye and thank you.

 

Walter.

[florduh]

4 hours ago, WalterP said:

But seeing as you've given up, isn't that tantamount to closing your mind to the possibility of it being changed by the facts?

 

I've given up weighing in on a topic that refuses to stay on point and where there is deliberate misunderstanding of posts. Continuing a pointless exercise would be stupid.

[☆ DarkBishop ☆]

I think all the questions in your original post boil down to trust. A lot of people do not trust the media, the government, or the experts the media promotes. 

 

My brother is an employee at a radio station on the outskirts of Atlanta. He interviewed some local doctors about the vaccine and asked if they were taking it. Their answer was no. They felt that the vaccine was rushed. They know how long a vaccine usually takes to be thoroughly tested. They were waiting, basically, to see if there were any adverse side effects before they take it.

 

my opinion is that we may not know the full scope of any side effects for years to come. I had the virus last year and have been exposed OHHHH so many times since and have not been able to catch it again. Im not saying I'm immune or anything because I dont know. Maybe I'm just lucky. But I'm waiting like those doctors. 

 

It doesn't help that they had to recall the Johnson and Johnson vaccine already. And I have an uncle in Texas, age 48, not overweight. He took the vaccine and had a stroke. Are the two connected?  I don't know. Maybe. Like I said before. It is way to early to know how these vaccines will affect everyone. They were only tested for a matter of months when any other vaccine would take years before it is used on a human. 

 

Americans in general really try to force their opinions on everyone. The left does it, the right does it, and neither likes it when they feel they are being forced to do something. If a person wants the vaccine then great .  According to the experts the vaccine is almost 100 percent effective. That means it doesn't make a damn whether I get the vaccine or not. The person that gets it is supposedly safe from infection. I'm the one taking the risk. It is my body and my choice. And if I want to risk dying. Well thats one less conservative leaning libertarian the left has to worry about. 

 

I honestly don't think opinions would be any better if trump were pushing the vaccine. Everyone I know that is saying no to the vaccine now was saying no when he was still in office as well.

 

As far as the generals. Thats the first I've heard about it. Didnt catch that one. But if that many highly recognized and educated generals are doing that......... eh...... maybe there is something there. I think we would be making a mistake to divide ourselves anymore than we already are. We need to watch this situation with Russia very closely. We could be drug into another war and I doubt anybody really wants that war.

 

I'm just saying. There is more important shit to worry about than who is or isn't taking a vaccine. 

 

DB