My grandchild was born a month ago. My son met an older man in the cafeteria and they were chatting. This gentleman congratulated my son and asked him to promise to always protect his son. My son, thinking of how kind this person was did promise to always protect his son. This individual followed with a bunch of anti-vaxx s#*t. My son said no, vaxs were #1 in protection.
RFK, Jr. is a damn liar. It is precisely why he was hired by the Regime. Please make sure your vaccinations are up to date and those of your children. Why would anyone risk the life of their very child by the "say so" of a political hack?
We are not standing on the precipice of the twins, prejudice and fear; we are wading in their dark muck. Something “lower,” but quite brilliantly reptilian as evolution tells it, moves our frightened limbs towards dry land, or a distant shore — “telling” us that shore must be “there.” The lizard urge towards something stable under our feet becomes true north.
After all, that is how we emerged from the waters anciently. Tiktaalik of Ellesmere.
“Nothing holds at the center.” In, and at, our center, there is nothing — perhaps a hint of dark matter? Certainly no pointer, no compass, only many voices clamoring to be heard. None dare listen, the din is too loud. A collective, loud unconscious of the confused, with none to gavel down the hoarse, yelled cacophony.
In our household, we have cancer. We walk in “Cancer Land,” as one oncohealer calls it. And that is our “it.” A compass, and a matrix. When someone dressed in a lab coat tells you, “You have cancer,” things change at slow, lightning speed. You/we no longer have time for BS.
Our compass is a tumor whose “center” seeks a symmetry that may never come as it — devoid of limiting signal — crashes and rushes ahead to grow, grow, grow, with no orient, no true north — no nothing.
And this greed to grow leaves death in its hungry wake. Is nature, as James Jones wrote, at war with itself, madly gnawing away at its entrails? How lights the dark parasite of evil on our souls, sucking dry the marrow of a better remembrance, a better vision of what we might have been as a race?
If we had no will, no intention towards anything, would the jagged toothed leach still need to grab hold of us? Would it still crave our fear, would it still crouch and wait for us every moment?
What is the name of this parasite: that we may know it and mock it, as it mocks and sneers at us? Or is it a constant changeling walking behind us, a protean intelligence that, facing us, makes fun and bullies, whilst behind us it speaks in dulcet, silvery tones to conflict and confuse what sensibility we have left to us? Is two, or one?
Is its face the Dunwich horror, or the Venus de Milo? Or both?
Or are we — all of us, for all time — looking only in a mirror whence our reflection is that of a collective Dorian Gray?
Did something crawl out of an ancient (now Arctic) ocean for us only to see forlorn wisps of what we might have become?
What do we know? Can we truly know, can we truly give, compassion and love?
What benefit is all the death and destruction we see nowadays, whom or what does it benefit? Whom does the death of elders and children benefit, when we have the means to take care of them?
What is that, slouching towards Bethlehem? Did Yeats know, did he care, or did he write merely because of the lilt of the words said together?
When I read that bit about Samoa I Googled the population. 82 dead kids would be a lot in a country with the population of Canada. The population of Samoa is just over 200,000...
One of the safest choices drivers and passengers can make is to buckle up. Many Americans understand the lifesaving value of the seat belt – the national use rate was at 91.2% in 2024. Seat belt use in passenger vehicles saved an estimated 14,955 lives in 2017. Understand the potentially fatal consequences of not wearing a seat belt and learn what you can do to make sure you and your family are properly buckled up every time.
NTSB
A major landmark study to be published by The Lancet reveals that global immunization efforts have saved an estimated 154 million lives – or the equivalent of 6 lives every minute of every year – over the past 50 years. The vast majority of lives saved – 101 million – were those of infants.
A study, led by the World Health Organization (WHO), shows that immunization is the single greatest contribution of any health intervention to ensuring babies not only see their first birthdays but continue leading healthy lives into adulthood. WHO
Of course, the comparison is intended as a percentage of per-user protection. Vaccinations are ubiquitous; seatbelts only pertain to motor vehicles transportation.
I did not think that this clarification was necessary at first. Sometimes writers use false comparisons for ironic effect. That is a device used here for brevity. I see that it’s not helpful for all readers.
I was conceived via donor due to mumps sterilization. Hope the people not giving their kids MMR vaccines are not planning to be grandparents. I guess people don’t realize it’s not just a sore throat.
I wonder how many vaccine sceptics also believe that criticism of the State of Israel and the genocide it is presently committing is antisemitism. Or maybe it is that when we are fed such lies as that, it becomes more easy to be sceptical of vaccines.
Seniors make up a large portion of the medical system. If their population decreases due to death, could this be a way of saving the dollars for the medical system?
I agree with personal responsibility as long as it is in line with your beliefs----if you do not want/believe prevention strategies using scientific and medical expertise, then don't expect/use medical treatment/medical expertise when you have the results of your choice.
As sometimes SO rudely called and treated as Over the Hill SENIORS,, I guess one would have to have been born when we were to appreciate the Value and Importance of the years that we ACTUALLY lived through. We could certainly teach these idiots, (who are down playing the necessity of immunization and the fundamentals of preventative health care), a thing or two about communicable diseases! We could teach them from our own experiences as Primary Heath Care Workers just how stupid and irresponsible they truly are! WHAT part of Preventative Medicine do they not understand? Just what wonderful plans do they have when a colossal out break of unimaginable diseases presents themselves? With this Global Warming that We are now experiencing, do they not understand that We could be dealing with the issues of formidable revived diseases on top of those we can already control ? Some of us Seniors may be past our prime, and vastly reaching our expiration date, but we certainly can be proud to have been a small part of the results of todays' wondrous cures and enhancers of modern medicines! To these idiots, I say,, shame on you and your kind for depriving people of healthy living ,all because of the almighty dollar!!
At 74, I respect your experiences and support your opinion. Personal choice or religious orientation cannot put the general society at risk. The idiots should go live an island, alone.
We need a vaccine against social media which is a huge driver of vaccine misinformation. We also need to understand that personal freedom to choose does not outweigh our responsibility as citizens to the well being of others and our society as a whole. I think social media often messages that personal freedom is more important.
How quickly Alberta has forgotten the beginning of the Pandemic, before the vaccine was available. The deaths, the lineups in hospital corridors awaiting beds in the ICU, often these became available too late. We are just getting into summer and a new Covid mutation. How many Albertans will be unable to pay for the vaccine, or simply think it can’t be all that important if the government isn’t willing to pay for it. Doesn’t Daniele Smith recognize how much more it will cost her government in healthcare if there is an outbreak in people not vaccinated. I am happy to be in BC where every 6 months I get a Text message advising me that a vaccine is available at several pharmacies in my area and to choose one and book my vaccine.
Smith does not care how much the medical care for infected people would cost. It is all taxpayer $$ of which there is a seemingly endless supply. All she needs to do is satisfy her "Take Back Alberta" right wing base, and it's all good.
In the US where medicine is big business, it is hardly surprising that there are rampant conspiracy theories and "alternative" cures for everything. "Big Pharma" is perceived to be the enemy - and the alternatives are offered (by equally egregious hucksters) as cheaper, "natural" cures. Rampant corruption on both sides - and the insurance companies cashing in as well...YIKES.
My grandchild was born a month ago. My son met an older man in the cafeteria and they were chatting. This gentleman congratulated my son and asked him to promise to always protect his son. My son, thinking of how kind this person was did promise to always protect his son. This individual followed with a bunch of anti-vaxx s#*t. My son said no, vaxs were #1 in protection.
RFK, Jr. is a damn liar. It is precisely why he was hired by the Regime. Please make sure your vaccinations are up to date and those of your children. Why would anyone risk the life of their very child by the "say so" of a political hack?
We are not standing on the precipice of the twins, prejudice and fear; we are wading in their dark muck. Something “lower,” but quite brilliantly reptilian as evolution tells it, moves our frightened limbs towards dry land, or a distant shore — “telling” us that shore must be “there.” The lizard urge towards something stable under our feet becomes true north.
After all, that is how we emerged from the waters anciently. Tiktaalik of Ellesmere.
“Nothing holds at the center.” In, and at, our center, there is nothing — perhaps a hint of dark matter? Certainly no pointer, no compass, only many voices clamoring to be heard. None dare listen, the din is too loud. A collective, loud unconscious of the confused, with none to gavel down the hoarse, yelled cacophony.
In our household, we have cancer. We walk in “Cancer Land,” as one oncohealer calls it. And that is our “it.” A compass, and a matrix. When someone dressed in a lab coat tells you, “You have cancer,” things change at slow, lightning speed. You/we no longer have time for BS.
Our compass is a tumor whose “center” seeks a symmetry that may never come as it — devoid of limiting signal — crashes and rushes ahead to grow, grow, grow, with no orient, no true north — no nothing.
And this greed to grow leaves death in its hungry wake. Is nature, as James Jones wrote, at war with itself, madly gnawing away at its entrails? How lights the dark parasite of evil on our souls, sucking dry the marrow of a better remembrance, a better vision of what we might have been as a race?
If we had no will, no intention towards anything, would the jagged toothed leach still need to grab hold of us? Would it still crave our fear, would it still crouch and wait for us every moment?
What is the name of this parasite: that we may know it and mock it, as it mocks and sneers at us? Or is it a constant changeling walking behind us, a protean intelligence that, facing us, makes fun and bullies, whilst behind us it speaks in dulcet, silvery tones to conflict and confuse what sensibility we have left to us? Is two, or one?
Is its face the Dunwich horror, or the Venus de Milo? Or both?
Or are we — all of us, for all time — looking only in a mirror whence our reflection is that of a collective Dorian Gray?
Did something crawl out of an ancient (now Arctic) ocean for us only to see forlorn wisps of what we might have become?
What do we know? Can we truly know, can we truly give, compassion and love?
What benefit is all the death and destruction we see nowadays, whom or what does it benefit? Whom does the death of elders and children benefit, when we have the means to take care of them?
What is that, slouching towards Bethlehem? Did Yeats know, did he care, or did he write merely because of the lilt of the words said together?
When I read that bit about Samoa I Googled the population. 82 dead kids would be a lot in a country with the population of Canada. The population of Samoa is just over 200,000...
This is so concerning.
Dr. Salk was/ is a national hero
Vaccines are no more effective than seatbelts.
Until you go crashing through the windshield and die like my childhood friend did or you die of Covid the way my brother-in-law did two years ago.
Don't be obtuse.
Can you consider re-reading the comment, or jumping to the TL-DR SECTION?
Seatbelts save lives!
For those who wish clarification.
One of the safest choices drivers and passengers can make is to buckle up. Many Americans understand the lifesaving value of the seat belt – the national use rate was at 91.2% in 2024. Seat belt use in passenger vehicles saved an estimated 14,955 lives in 2017. Understand the potentially fatal consequences of not wearing a seat belt and learn what you can do to make sure you and your family are properly buckled up every time.
NTSB
A major landmark study to be published by The Lancet reveals that global immunization efforts have saved an estimated 154 million lives – or the equivalent of 6 lives every minute of every year – over the past 50 years. The vast majority of lives saved – 101 million – were those of infants.
A study, led by the World Health Organization (WHO), shows that immunization is the single greatest contribution of any health intervention to ensuring babies not only see their first birthdays but continue leading healthy lives into adulthood. WHO
Of course, the comparison is intended as a percentage of per-user protection. Vaccinations are ubiquitous; seatbelts only pertain to motor vehicles transportation.
I did not think that this clarification was necessary at first. Sometimes writers use false comparisons for ironic effect. That is a device used here for brevity. I see that it’s not helpful for all readers.
Idiot. Go back to your cave
Hasty man! Think when you read.
I was conceived via donor due to mumps sterilization. Hope the people not giving their kids MMR vaccines are not planning to be grandparents. I guess people don’t realize it’s not just a sore throat.
My brother (b 1955) had mumps when he was 12 or 13 years old. He was rendered sterile, but of course didn't find out until later. Much later.
Quackery is simply medicine driven by public opinion.
I wonder how many vaccine sceptics also believe that criticism of the State of Israel and the genocide it is presently committing is antisemitism. Or maybe it is that when we are fed such lies as that, it becomes more easy to be sceptical of vaccines.
Seniors make up a large portion of the medical system. If their population decreases due to death, could this be a way of saving the dollars for the medical system?
I agree with personal responsibility as long as it is in line with your beliefs----if you do not want/believe prevention strategies using scientific and medical expertise, then don't expect/use medical treatment/medical expertise when you have the results of your choice.
We have always had free choice here in Canada ! Discrimination for either choice should not be based on financial ability !
Idiot comment
Which part do you fear the most?
As sometimes SO rudely called and treated as Over the Hill SENIORS,, I guess one would have to have been born when we were to appreciate the Value and Importance of the years that we ACTUALLY lived through. We could certainly teach these idiots, (who are down playing the necessity of immunization and the fundamentals of preventative health care), a thing or two about communicable diseases! We could teach them from our own experiences as Primary Heath Care Workers just how stupid and irresponsible they truly are! WHAT part of Preventative Medicine do they not understand? Just what wonderful plans do they have when a colossal out break of unimaginable diseases presents themselves? With this Global Warming that We are now experiencing, do they not understand that We could be dealing with the issues of formidable revived diseases on top of those we can already control ? Some of us Seniors may be past our prime, and vastly reaching our expiration date, but we certainly can be proud to have been a small part of the results of todays' wondrous cures and enhancers of modern medicines! To these idiots, I say,, shame on you and your kind for depriving people of healthy living ,all because of the almighty dollar!!
At 74, I respect your experiences and support your opinion. Personal choice or religious orientation cannot put the general society at risk. The idiots should go live an island, alone.
At age 2 in 1953 I was vaccinated against Polio in a Trial. Still here all these years later.
We need a vaccine against social media which is a huge driver of vaccine misinformation. We also need to understand that personal freedom to choose does not outweigh our responsibility as citizens to the well being of others and our society as a whole. I think social media often messages that personal freedom is more important.
How quickly Alberta has forgotten the beginning of the Pandemic, before the vaccine was available. The deaths, the lineups in hospital corridors awaiting beds in the ICU, often these became available too late. We are just getting into summer and a new Covid mutation. How many Albertans will be unable to pay for the vaccine, or simply think it can’t be all that important if the government isn’t willing to pay for it. Doesn’t Daniele Smith recognize how much more it will cost her government in healthcare if there is an outbreak in people not vaccinated. I am happy to be in BC where every 6 months I get a Text message advising me that a vaccine is available at several pharmacies in my area and to choose one and book my vaccine.
Smith does not care how much the medical care for infected people would cost. It is all taxpayer $$ of which there is a seemingly endless supply. All she needs to do is satisfy her "Take Back Alberta" right wing base, and it's all good.
In the US where medicine is big business, it is hardly surprising that there are rampant conspiracy theories and "alternative" cures for everything. "Big Pharma" is perceived to be the enemy - and the alternatives are offered (by equally egregious hucksters) as cheaper, "natural" cures. Rampant corruption on both sides - and the insurance companies cashing in as well...YIKES.