Friday, March 28, 2008

Beyond 1984: My Free Country es su Free Country?

Barbara Loe Fisher, founder and head of the National Vaccine Information Center, has once again done our homework for us:

The discrimination begins, always, with the majority in a society pointing the finger at a minority for somehow endangering the public health and welfare. Individuals in the minority group are singled out as different - ethnically, biologically, spiritually, morally - from the majority. The human impulse to fear, judge, marginalize or eliminate those different from the rest has left a blood soaked trail winding throughout the entire history of man from the Great Inquisition to the Holocaust; from the killing fields of Cambodia to Rwanda, Serbia and Tibet; while the persecution of those with leprosy, TB, AIDS, mental illness, and handicaps continues in every society.It was with a heavy heart that I read the March 21 New York Times article, "Public Health Risk Seen as Parents Reject Vaccines." Then I waded through the venomous comments posted on the NY Times website attacking parents of vaccine injured autistic children and those supporting informed consent to vaccination, specifically legal exemptions.

The letters she quotes are truly bizarre in their invective. My reaction is that it must be wonderful to be able to sit in judgment of one's fellow human without having to wear that person's shoes.

No comments:

Post a Comment

Comments signed Anonymous will not be published.