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Fundie anti-vaxxers expose religious right's moral bankruptcy
cross-posted at dKos
Last week, I discovered that one of the leading religious right groups in California, the Campaign for Children and Families/SaveCalifornia.com, wanted to derail a bill that would abolish the "personal belief" exemption to the childhood vaccination requirement. SaveCalifornia.com's action alert on this bill was chock-full of anti-vaxxer hoakum. And apparently Pat Robertson found it important enough to have CBN News highlight it. It isn't clear from this whether Robertson has joined the anti-vaxxer flock, or is just willing to give succor to any group willing to fight for "parental rights," no matter how loony they sound. But one thing is clear beyond all doubt. Those on the religious right who embrace anti-vaxxer hoakum have inadvertently exposed their movement's moral bankruptcy for all to see. Think about it. They wring their hands about gay marriage possibly destroying the fabric of our society, but they're perfectly OK with a practice that has been proven several times over to be a threat to public health. They talk so much about the sanctity of human life, but appear to be deliberately ignorant about putting other people's children and those with weak immune systems in danger. |
While the religious right's vocal support of "creation science" and "intelligent design" gets a lot of ink, the apparent embrace of anti-vaxxerism by some elements of it is much, much more dangerous. While pushing for creationism to be taught in science classes is merely ignorant and stupid, not getting your kids vaccinated can actually get innocent people killed. Somehow, we need to put our heads together and find out just how far this claptrap has spread--and if any religious right leaders actually subscribe to it, they need to be called out, loudly. |
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