I want to say straight away this is a meta entry, so for those looking for a lot of original content, this isn't it.
A week ago, I published a diary that I at first resisted writing. A few friends had begun talking about how to deal with anti-vaxxers, when a friend pointed out the entry to Roald Dahl's loss of a child. I commented back and Jennifer Hayden (Scout Finch) prompted me by saying: you really should do a diary about this.
A week later, more than 323 THOUSAND facebook shares, and I'm told tens of millions of impressions later, a little diary I resisted is still getting comments and shares.. and also some pushback. You can see the original here: http://www.dailykos.com/...
It really isn't that hard to track me down. tmservo433 has been my moniker for so long that it is easy pickings. I'm tmservo433 on twitter, tmservo433 at gmail, tmservo on facebook, etc. So, I'm unbelievably easy to find, and more than once I've referenced my real name. Before I realized this diary would blow up the way it did, I also commented on a story via LinkedIn which of course again connected to my personal email address and contact info. That is generally OK, most of the content I receive is positive.. but the last two weeks, I've had some doozies - both good and bad. I'm going to start with the negative.
The first email I received on the subject went like this:
I've read your thoughts on Vaccines, and you should be ashamed of yourself. You minimize what autism is like for parents it is not about a sleepless night, you idiot it is about having your life ruined and watching your child turned from a beautiful baby to a victim of big pharma.
People like you are why America keeps going down hill. You've bought into the corporate lies or you're taking money from them and so in the face of overwhelming facts you keep peddling poison.
Someday you will regret the kind of harm you've done to children.
When I first received this I thought: well, OK. It's just one email, after all.. and that's fine - they don't like it. I poked fun at it on facebook as well. Some of the email was just nonsense.
You do know that vaccines kill way more kids than measles ever did, or are you stupid?
Ok then. Let me just leave this here:
http://www.snopes.com/...
Read up, fool. Ever visit NVIC.Org ? They know more about vaccines then you. Parasite.
Alright. I am interested to learn they are entirely donor funded. I wonder how their donations are doing at the moment?
By Monday night, I was getting bombarded with messages in my "Other" box on facebook from anti-vaccine crusaders who in some weird way thought what I wrote was either some huge attack on their existence or their child.
The way you speak about autism tells me you know nothing about it. People like you make me sick. If you knew what it really was, you wouldn't be so dismissive of why we avoid the vaccines that absolutely DO cause autism
All told, more than 60 emails, about 15 facebook messages and they all boil down to the same thing: In some weird way my noting that vaccines are unquestionably safer than risking a child getting measles was taken the same way as though I had thrown water on the wicked witch of the west.
For all the negative, though, there have been some pretty surprising upsides. The story was picked up by people like CNN, MSNBC, Yahoo News, and elsewhere. And while not everyone referenced DailyKos - some did.
Pediatricians linked directly to the original diary, and several had very positive words: http://seattlemamadoc.seattlechildrens.org/...
Doctors and practitioners reached out to me privately also through email, and while they weren't as virulent as the anti-vaxxers, all who responded, especially via twitter and email cut straight to the chase. A large number of private messages that basically boiled down to "thank you".
In the last two days, though, I was informed through connections that the Dahl family had read what I had written and appreciated getting the chance to take their story to the press, now that the press sought them out.
Here, Lucy Dahl spoke to CBS News about why it was important to get this story out now:
https://www.facebook.com/...
Ophelia Dahl did an interview with Katie Couric about the story going viral:
http://news.yahoo.com/...
And members of the Dahl family and friends sent me nice notes, including one of those things that I will treasure, as a friend of the Dahl family sent me this:
Frankly, I'm just glad that I could help. But it was this email I received Thursday night that made it all worthwhile:
I wanted to let you know I've been trying to convince my sister in law to vaccinate my nephews for some time. Your story and thoughts on autism were enough to help change her mind. Thank you, thank you from my family.
What I've learned is that while frankly I'm receiving far more negative commentary - and FYI, that original diary which started out with such great comments ended up with far too many trolls as time wore on ;( - it is the positive commentary and the response that has really made the experience worthwhile. I'm glad that at least one person had their mind changed as that was definitely a goal. I do want to respond to the most frequently claim I received in my negative email, messages etc..
How much are you getting paid to write this?
Short answer to those who read and are still chasing around for negatives: Zero. I am not paid in any way to write my thoughts, not by big pharma especially. My thoughts are my own and in this case, I wrote them because I believed in the idea presented.