There are some antivax conclusions (and arguments leading to those antivax conclusions) that I come across that are so stupid that I feel as though I’ve lost brain cells after reading them.
This time around, they come from Toby Rogers, who the other day posted an article to his Substack entitled, Many of the central tenets of progressivism are actually autistic traits. I bet you can see where his argument leads, given that he also accepts the standard antivax pseudoscience claiming that vaccines cause autism. Yes, Toby proceeds to argue that vaccines cause autism and that the personality traits associated with which result in people embracing the “tenets of progressivism,” which, to him, are “actually autistic traits.” His argument, as you might imagine, misrepresents what both progressivism and autism are, because of course it does
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Let’s just summarize thus far, though, the three main parts of Rogers’ “argument,” such as it is:
- Many of the central tenets of progressivism are actually autistic traits. This is, at best, highly arguable, but really just plain false.
- Vaccines cause autism. This is also just plain false.
- Therefore, vaccines cause progressivism, which leads to more vaccination, which circles us back to #1. This is sort of true in that progressives do support vaccination and public health measures, but the part of circling back to #1 is pure, unadulterated bullshit.
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Perhaps the funniest part of Rogers’ whole post is when he turns his attention to Republicans and supporters of former President Donald Trump, trying to tie their damaging beliefs to vaccine-caused autism as well.
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In a way, I marvel at Rogers’ ability to blame vaccines for everything he dislikes in American politics, both on the left and the right. Truly, to him vaccines are the all-purpose cause of everything dysfunctional in our government and politics, no matter how much he has to do a Humpty Dumpty on words like “autism,” “progressivism,” and the like to make his argument.
