Yes. I haven't talked to him at length about it, but I will do my best to ensure that he is able to make an informed decision. It seems so painfully obvious for everyone that has been consuming a steady diet of alt tech/media from the start, but the nonstop barrage of propaganda is difficult to overcome. Keep in mind, social psychologist…
Yes. I haven't talked to him at length about it, but I will do my best to ensure that he is able to make an informed decision. It seems so painfully obvious for everyone that has been consuming a steady diet of alt tech/media from the start, but the nonstop barrage of propaganda is difficult to overcome. Keep in mind, social psychologists had a hand in deliberately designing this campaign to leverage every known cognitive bias to maximize vaccine uptake. That science has come a long way in the last 15-20 years and it has been startlingly effective.
please continue. what are some examples of public health/media/CDC/etc leveraging known cognitive biases to convince people to be jabbed?
I don't know the field, but it seems to be that "social proof" and "appeals to authority" are being leveraged very heavily by the media and government.
In my opinion, the most powerful technique used has been the leveraging of descriptive norms. In social influence, what you should do doesn't motivate behavior nearly as much as what people around you ARE doing. This is the reason high vaccination rates are continually highlighted. The other place this is prominent in the current environment is with polling. You would think they would be worried about their lack of accuracy, but that isn't the point anymore. You're absolutely right that appeals to authority were deliberately targeted. For a comprehensive overview of the strategy from the perspective of the enemy, the brief that the Social Science in Humanitarian Action Platform (SSHAP) constructed on COVID-19 vaccine hesitancy and how to combat it/increase uptake (for the greater good of course) in informative: https://www.socialscienceinaction.org/resources/rapid-review-vaccine-hesitancy-and-building-confidence-in-covid-19-vaccination/
Thanks. I never knew about that briefing from all the way back in Nov 2020. It covers a lot of ground. I thought I would be rolling my eyes as I read through it, but I gotta give these social scientists a lot of credit for broadly understanding and accurately predicting the public's reaction to the vaccine rollout before it even happened.
Although the briefing was written to help governments convince the public to be Covid 19 jabbed and rests on the strong assumption that these jabs would be safe and effective (which many of us doubt), much of the briefing's advice seems reasonable.
e.g. Here are two sound pieces of advice from the briefing, which, unfortunately, were not taken seriously by the powers that be in the US:
"Exercise transparency as far as possible in trial processes. Clearly communicate information and data in accessible formats. Share trial protocols and results where possible (including explanations when adverse medical events occur). Share what vaccines are made of, and how they should work."
"Avoid coercive strategies as this can backfire by damaging trust, inducing hesitancy and entrenching resolve against vaccination."
If only the Biden administration, Pfizer, state governments, corporations and universities had heeded this advice!
Yes, a lot of it is legitimate advice, but when it is predicated on the assumption that the vaccines would be safe and effective before this could've even been reasonably established, the concomitant recommendations to control the spread of mis and disinformation puts a nefarious twist on the whole endeavor.
Thanks for the link. It’s an objective and well written brief. Due to my background in the pharmaceutical sector, I was very sceptical of the mass deployment of a brand new type of biological therapy which (a) had been poorly tested and (b) had an equally poor record on efficiency (for example, Moderna had never been successful in launching any gene therapy before covid hit). So, naturally, I decided to wait. By the time they became mandated and the VAERS numbers and the scientific rationale behind some AEs, that’s when it was very clear that there was no way this thing will be injected in this guy. As the brief notes, the coercive actions of private and public actors has now made me officially “hesitant” about vaccination in general (in addition to developing total mistrust in government)
I think he is bewildered by it, but doesn't want to be maligned as conspiracy theorists for asking obvious questions. I can't know for sure until I get a chance to talk to him about it in more detail. I try to keep in mind that the dominant narrative was that if you promoted vaccine hesitancy of any kind you were essentially conspiring to murder people. I think we're approaching an inflection point beyond which the moral opprobrium of discussing vaccine injuries vanishes, but until then there will be people who are afraid to even talk about their own vaccine injuries.
Yes. I haven't talked to him at length about it, but I will do my best to ensure that he is able to make an informed decision. It seems so painfully obvious for everyone that has been consuming a steady diet of alt tech/media from the start, but the nonstop barrage of propaganda is difficult to overcome. Keep in mind, social psychologists had a hand in deliberately designing this campaign to leverage every known cognitive bias to maximize vaccine uptake. That science has come a long way in the last 15-20 years and it has been startlingly effective.
Meanwhile in Canada our own military were using psy ops on us
https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/psychological-warfare-influence-campaign-canadian-armed-forces-1.6079084
please continue. what are some examples of public health/media/CDC/etc leveraging known cognitive biases to convince people to be jabbed?
I don't know the field, but it seems to be that "social proof" and "appeals to authority" are being leveraged very heavily by the media and government.
In my opinion, the most powerful technique used has been the leveraging of descriptive norms. In social influence, what you should do doesn't motivate behavior nearly as much as what people around you ARE doing. This is the reason high vaccination rates are continually highlighted. The other place this is prominent in the current environment is with polling. You would think they would be worried about their lack of accuracy, but that isn't the point anymore. You're absolutely right that appeals to authority were deliberately targeted. For a comprehensive overview of the strategy from the perspective of the enemy, the brief that the Social Science in Humanitarian Action Platform (SSHAP) constructed on COVID-19 vaccine hesitancy and how to combat it/increase uptake (for the greater good of course) in informative: https://www.socialscienceinaction.org/resources/rapid-review-vaccine-hesitancy-and-building-confidence-in-covid-19-vaccination/
Thanks. I never knew about that briefing from all the way back in Nov 2020. It covers a lot of ground. I thought I would be rolling my eyes as I read through it, but I gotta give these social scientists a lot of credit for broadly understanding and accurately predicting the public's reaction to the vaccine rollout before it even happened.
Although the briefing was written to help governments convince the public to be Covid 19 jabbed and rests on the strong assumption that these jabs would be safe and effective (which many of us doubt), much of the briefing's advice seems reasonable.
e.g. Here are two sound pieces of advice from the briefing, which, unfortunately, were not taken seriously by the powers that be in the US:
"Exercise transparency as far as possible in trial processes. Clearly communicate information and data in accessible formats. Share trial protocols and results where possible (including explanations when adverse medical events occur). Share what vaccines are made of, and how they should work."
"Avoid coercive strategies as this can backfire by damaging trust, inducing hesitancy and entrenching resolve against vaccination."
If only the Biden administration, Pfizer, state governments, corporations and universities had heeded this advice!
Yes, a lot of it is legitimate advice, but when it is predicated on the assumption that the vaccines would be safe and effective before this could've even been reasonably established, the concomitant recommendations to control the spread of mis and disinformation puts a nefarious twist on the whole endeavor.
Thanks for the link. It’s an objective and well written brief. Due to my background in the pharmaceutical sector, I was very sceptical of the mass deployment of a brand new type of biological therapy which (a) had been poorly tested and (b) had an equally poor record on efficiency (for example, Moderna had never been successful in launching any gene therapy before covid hit). So, naturally, I decided to wait. By the time they became mandated and the VAERS numbers and the scientific rationale behind some AEs, that’s when it was very clear that there was no way this thing will be injected in this guy. As the brief notes, the coercive actions of private and public actors has now made me officially “hesitant” about vaccination in general (in addition to developing total mistrust in government)
I think he is bewildered by it, but doesn't want to be maligned as conspiracy theorists for asking obvious questions. I can't know for sure until I get a chance to talk to him about it in more detail. I try to keep in mind that the dominant narrative was that if you promoted vaccine hesitancy of any kind you were essentially conspiring to murder people. I think we're approaching an inflection point beyond which the moral opprobrium of discussing vaccine injuries vanishes, but until then there will be people who are afraid to even talk about their own vaccine injuries.