Vaccine Mandates

The Public Square
81

Maybe it is the nature of written communication but it is not my intent to mischaracterize you. Even after the quotes you just shared I am still confused as to exactly what your position is. Why? Because when I asked you if I had a moral duty to submit to vaccine mandates you answer was something like submitting is best. Your quotes simply say you don’t think they should mandate it. It doesn’t speak to my duty if they do.

Would you help me out and make it abundantly clear to me. Can you give a simple yes or no. Do I have a moral duty to submit to a covid vaccine mandate?

I am not asking if I may submit to it but if I must.

82

A mandate from whom? For what reason? For what disease? In what circumstance? Are you a minor?

Pretending like there are simple universal answers to these “simple questions” is a big part of the problem.

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83

Well we are talking about Covid Vaccines. I am not a minor. I am an adult. The disease would be covid. The civil government.

84

The president saying “everybody should get vaccinated”? Former president Trump telling people to get vaccinated? The surgeon general saying “everybody should get vaccinated”? A judge telling you as a condition of your parole that you need to get vaccinated? A law passed by Congress? Does it include exceptions? If so, do you meet any of those exceptions? A law passed by your state legislature? Exceptions? Meet them? A mandate by your governor? What state do you live in and what does the law say about whether he has that power?

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85

Yes I get that there might be different forms it might take. I am trying though to get to a broader principle. Does the civil magistrate have the God-given jurisdiction to mandate a person to inject a chemical into their body?

87

In answer to your question, yes. I believe in chemical castration for rapists, for example.

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89

With all due respect I didn’t say the vaccine was a lie, just the justification for mandates.

And…I seem to remember the claim that those who say the vaccine is compromised by HEK293 are lying because the origin is not conclusively from a voluntary aborted fetus. If that’s the standard, then it’s not a stretch to say they are lying.

90

Ok. Thank you for that answer. I don’t believe chemical castration is a just punishment. Rapists should be put to death. But thats beside the point.

I still think you are obfuscating. You know we are not talking about civil punishment but about commanding an otherwise lawbiding citizen to inject a chemical into their body. And to be clear I am not asking whether the civil government ought to command it but if i have the moral duty to obey it if they do.

91

Pastor Spurgeon,

Can you help me understand “tyranny” as a Biblical category, particularly as it relates to which of the king’s commands we can/should obey?

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92

I’m not obfuscating, but I’m trying to point out that you can’t just deal in categoricals like you seem to want. Regardless, I have an answer for the specific question you are asking. I’ll just need a bit more time to get it written.

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93

So you mean that the public health authorities knew that vaccination had no effect at reducing contagion to other people but nonetheless said it did in order to justify vaccination mandates?

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94

Ok Joseph. Looking forward to it.

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95

Reading the discussions here and reflecting on democracy, I sense that most of politics can be thought of as a battle over personal preferences. One faction feels inconvenienced by masks or vaccines. Another feels jeopardized by co-workers or shoppers coming in sick. The loudest or most persuasive side wins. I was reminded of the story of Athens as told in this podcast series. The Athenian people were persuaded by an influential speaker, like The Music Man, to send 100 ships to defend the Ionians from the Persians. According to the podcast, this was like Latvia deciding to go to war with Russia. Because of the ill-advised popular vote, the Athenians brought all of Greece to the attention of the Persian version of the Eye of Sauron. The point of this illustration is to question why each member of a democracy should feel the need to be an expect in everything from foreign policy to epidemiology. Are we qualified to make such decisions, and if so, are were prepared to suffer the consequences if we are wrong?

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96

I’m saying that their whole argument for mandates is that nonvaccinated citizens are going to cause the virus to continue and worse yet to mutate into more variants. That was based on the assumption that the vaccine would if mandated stop the virus and prevent variants, without knowing whether it would.

Even when there was evidence that they were wrong about the benefits of the vaccines they doubled down. But with current numbers looking quite similar to the second wave (at around mid-November), and hospitals again overwhelmed, how can they seriously argue that vaccinating over half the country resulted in any significant difference, when we faired about the same without it.

And before we start boasting of lower death rates, and attribute it to the vaccine, remember, this round of COVID is a variant and was already suggested to be less lethal than the first, though more transmissible. Which sounds suspiciously like the flu.

And now Pfizer is talking about drug resistant strains of the virus. Like the flu? Well of course they are. And I’m sure that’s the fault of those without vaccinations too.

Again, I’m not arguing against whether an individual ought or ought not get the vaccine, I’m merely hesitant. But I am arguing that in the debate of mandating the jab, we are all being manipulated, by the very people who failed to respond appropriately for the first two waves more lethal waves and cost us many lives with their bad and wrong messaging.

Added for context:

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image4032×3024 2.78 MB

WITHOUT VACCINE
New cases: 7 day average 45.8 cases per 100,000 population per day for a seven day total of 151,016 cases

WITH VACCINE

image
image4032×3024 2.56 MB

New cases: 7 day average 46.3 cases per 100,000 population per day for a seven day total 152,480.

At the peak on January 8th the seven day average 76.2 cases per 100,000 population per day for a seven day total 251,084.

So we are already at 60% of the worst day in modern epidemic history and we haven’t even hit the holidays.

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97

I agree. At the bottom of this is a factual dispute. Will widespread vaccination reduce contagion and mutation of the virus? Perhaps there is not enough data available so far to decisively resolve this. Then it becomes a policy question. Is it better to mandate vaccination in the hope that contagion and mutation will be reduced? Or is it better not to mandate vaccination when it public health benefit is in question?

Calling the other side liars and manipulators is not helpful for inducing them to reconsider their position. And it makes one appear like an unhinged crank to neutral parties. It is useful for riling up one’s own side, and that could increase the turnout in an election to overturn policy. But what has been accomplished then? It is not a victory won by having better policy arguments. Instead it is a victory won by teaching people to despise authority.

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98

"Why isn’t this a matter of personal choice and conviction? The answer is that it is not a matter of personal choice because everyone else is involved…

The claim I am making here is very limited. If a person has decided personal convictions about the contagious disease he is carrying, the society in which he lives has an equal right to have decided and contrary convictions about that same contagious disease he has. And if there is an outbreak of such a disease, and the government quarantines everyone who is not vaccinated, requiring them to stay at home, the name for this is prudence, not tyranny."

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99

Looking at the comments, this was discovered by very few folks since Covid. I wonder if Doug is even aware of it? How did you find it?

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100

I remember it because a militantly antivaxx homeschool friend shared it in disgust, at the time. To him, it meant that Doug could never be trusted.

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101

A friend who’s a deacon at, of all things, a CREC church in Texas pointed it out.

File it under things that didn’t age well.

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102

In answer to your other question, yeah I’m sure he’s aware of this post. But “prudence” doesn’t sell as well in his circles anymore