Tag Archives: fascism

History vs Now

At a low but consistent frequency, I see a remark on Twitter or Facebook like: “So, where were all yahoos objecting to the Polio vaccine??!!11!!?? That is a disease we wiped out with a vaccine, that could not have happened if antivax existed then!”

This would be a reasonable lament were it true. I recently read, in Chernov’s Washington: A Life, that George Washington was anti-vax, before he changed his mind based on evidence made clear to him, and then became pro-vax. That was in relation to smallpox, and the “vaccine” was actually “variolation,” which is to modern vaccines what a camel is to a modern RV. Same idea, different technology. Continue reading History vs Now

Netzwerkdurchsetzungsgesetz punches the Nazi

I remember learning a long time ago that in places like Germany, places that had recently been ravaged, nearly totally destroyed, with much death and misery, by Nazis and other fascists, it was illegal to do things like display a swastika. This is the kind of thing that makes many Americans throw a conniption. Continue reading Netzwerkdurchsetzungsgesetz punches the Nazi