Online users aren’t exactly known for being very warm or welcoming towards people who passionately oppose childhood vaccinations, especially those who are more outspoken in their beliefs.
True to form, the people of the internet had some words for one woman who was pictured wearing a particularly outrageous shirt, and they definitely made their feelings about her fashion choices known.
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The woman was snapped proudly wearing a shirt that reads, “Spoiler Alert… Jesus Wasn’t Vaccinated”.
The pic was posted on the Twitter page Christian Nightmares . There isn’t much context for the photo of the unnamed woman, though it’s pretty clear she’s among those who are adamantly against vaccinating children.
But of course, people had some thoughts on this rather bold statement.
After all, this is the internet, and a shirt like that is just begging for people to share their opinions. And they were quick to voice those opinions in the best ways possible.
Some used history, others common sense, and plenty brought the enough sarcasm and wit to go around.
Actor and comedian Andy Richter decided to start us off strong and really get the ball rolling.
If you want to get Biblical in your anti-vaxx arguments, then people will come right back at you with some Biblical pro-vaxx counterpoints. And he makes a pretty good case for vaccines if we’re going off what we know about that guy Satan from the Bible.
Someone else pointed out a pretty big problem with whatever statement this shirt is trying to make.
If we’re operating under the assumption that Jesus wasn’t vaccinated, then this doesn’t exactly seem like the right PSA to support opting for no vaccines, right? Like, the guy died .
There are also those speculating that Jesus likely died from tetanus, another preventable disease we have vaccines to thank for.
Then there was this reply, which I’m just going to carefully place here and not give any opinion on.
Someone else brought some lighthearted humor into the mix and wrote that although Jesus wasn’t vaccinated, he still become “cross-contaminated”, prompting another person to cheekily respond, “Nailed it.”
This person offered up a bit of a history lesson as to just what life was like for people during Jesus-times.
So if she’s trying to say that people like Jesus who went unvaccinated back in the day were in any way better off than if there were vaccinations available, she may want to do a bit more research before printing something like that on a tee-shirt.
Stay in school, kids.
Another took this as an opportunity to suggest a different person this woman could praise via tee-shirt design.
Prior to Jonas Salk’s polio vaccine, the disease was considered to be one of the most frightening health epidemics plaguing the world. Most of its victims were children.
In 1952, just three years before his groundbreaking vaccine would be developed, the U.S. experienced its worst bout of polio in history, with 58,000 reported cases. Of that number, 3,145 people died and 21,269 were left with mild to disabling paralysis.
This person decided to take the woman’s tee-shirt message one step further.
They suggested that if Jesus is being held as the prime example of the perfect candidate to forgo vaccination, then only those who are exactly like Jesus should be considered exempt, as well.
To be fair, they’re really only following the criteria that this woman and her tee-shirt first laid out.
And then, of course, there were those people just trying to figure out what statement this woman was trying to make.
To be fair, that’s definitely one possible interpretation. She’s basically saying “If Jesus can do it, I can do it” which isn’t something anyone should ever really go around printing on a tee-shirt.
All joking aside, anti-vaxxers are posing a serious threat to our health and the health of our children.
So while it’s fun to joke about dumb shirt slogans, these passionate campaigners are still out there encouraging people to forgo live saving vaccinations, thus leaving children with compromised immune systems at serious risk of contracting otherwise preventable diseases.
It’s not like our fears of anti-vaxxers are unjustified, either.
The World Health Organization has reported a 30 percent increase in measles cases, and the disease is resurfacing in countries like America where it was once non-existent.
The scary reality is that these people and these tee-shirts are undermining the importance of keeping preventable diseases preventable. Which is definitely not O.K.
