Dear Editor:
RE: “Fears for terminated staff” and “Applauding and praying,” Nov. 25.
I know we have been here before, and we are all heartily sick of letters about COVID-19, but I just cannot let these two letters go by unchallenged.
Joy Lippai essentially states, “The only people who need be concerned about the unvaccinated are the unvaccinated.” Nancy Seiling says “the facts are out there” without saying what she thinks those facts are, but suggesting that they support anti-vaxxers.
This deliberate ignorance or malicious misinterpretation of scientific facts is the sort of rationalization that has for so long been the hallmark of anti-vaxxers and sensationalists. It simply is not true.
By Lippai’s own numbers, 1,507 vaccinated people died, and I don’t care what percentage that represents, it is 1,507 bereaved families. And whether or not they were all infected by an unvaccinated is irrelevant; the chances are always there.
Similarly, why should any of us risk any sort of infection, regardless of whether it is a “severe breakthrough that led to hospitalization?” Is someone’s job really worth the suffering of others?
This thing is not just the flu, it is damnably dangerous to many of us. I would suggest the “societal invalidation” from job loss is a whole lot more acceptable than someone’s death, especially when the cause is deliberate avoidance of potential mitigation.
And can we please eliminate the other oft-used rationalization of anti-vaxxers by putting to bed the definitions of choice and consequence. We make choices every day, and every one has a consequence, good or bad. The fact that a consequence is bad does not turn it back into a choice. You choose to apply for a job without having the technical knowledge; the consequence is no job. The employer gave you no choice? Nonsense. You choose not to be vaccinated; the consequence is you cannot take part in some activities (like being with other people in a work environment). The employer is giving you no choice? Garbage. You are being asked to be responsible, avoiding so far as possible the chance of infecting others.
That choice is yours to make, but if you do not make it and you lose your job, the employer still gave you the choice, and they are not and should not be obliged to accommodate you. The consequences are entirely your own, and if your resistance/belief/denial is worth your job (or Lippai’s child feeding/mental illness/addiction etc. concerns), so be it.
And these people have not been disenfranchised. They have exercised their right to choose, and they have suffered the consequence. Likewise, their circumstances are irrelevant to the case; in this instance they are totally within the person’s own control.
If having people take the responsibility and consequences for their own actions is a sign of society’s descent I’ll take it. I wish it were true in many more areas.
Jim Taylor,
Fergus