They are citing ONS figures of excess deaths as proof the vaccines are killing people. I tried to explain that not being able to get a doctor’s appointment, staying home and getting fat, etc explain the figures (official sources have said it too) but they said it’s “gaslighting” and then said their family doctor wouldn’t get the vaccine.
“If you think the world’s top scientists are trying to kill you, then why would you listen to any expert about anything? They’ll save you from yourself when you’re wrong anyway. Would you do the same for them? That’s why they’re trustworthy, and you and your sources are not.”
Seriously. Take your car to a baker next time you have trouble.
“Bye.”
Then leave and stay gone.
Not everything requires a response and at some point you have to pick your battles. They have revealed to you that they are an idiot. It is not your job to fix them.
Seriously, I’ve had multiple conversations with my BIL where he comes over to me and says something insane, and my response is just “huh okayyy…” and I walk away without saying anything else. I don’t care to be polite anymore.
Sometimes the best response is no response at all. Silence can be deafening.
Hypothetically speaking, how do you tell the difference between truth and propaganda here?
I’m often a dick. I probably wouldn’t say anything immediately, and then use that asinine opinion to dismiss anything else the person says later. Forever. They say something about <whatever topic>, “Yeah, but you also think vaccines kill people, so we already know you are an idiot.” Just on repeat on every opinion they voice, until they never want to say anything around me or talk to me.
Yup. This is the answer.
You can’t logic someone out of something they didn’t logic themselves into, and they definitely got emotionally attached to antivax before they found “statistics” to back shit up.
The exact same thing could be said about the other team too.
By definition it cannot.
Tell them that you’re a sheeple, and got the safe dose of the vaccine, since they want to keep the compliant people around. Tell them it’s too bad they’re on “the list” of bad people.
I generally reframe it from a perspective even they think they understand: Money.
Governments want their money. Less Population = Less Taxes for them to take, ergo, no government is trying to lower their population. And do they, the audience, think that the government is willing to have less money?
I don’t think so!
Maybe not the answer you’re looking for, but I have an uncle like that.
I suggest going no contact if you can.
Reason being, they don’t care about facts, nothing you say will convince them.
“How to speak to a vaccine sceptic: research reveals what works Hesitancy about vaccinations is on the rise, but studies show there are specific ways to address people’s questions.”
https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-025-01771-z
Optimistic, but a start maybe.
In summary of the nature article:
Listen and be interested in why they hold those opinions, use motivational interviewing techniques (I explain this as Inception, trying to get the patient to have the ideas) and provide solid evidence, be realistic about data and certainty, ie the MMR vaccine is safe (and doesn’t cause autism) the COVID vaccine has less data as it’s newer, but it is still safer for the vast majority of people than COVID.
Tell them that’s completely true, and that if they keeps spreading the truth the black vans will come for them, they know too much.
The birds have already heard the rumors, and the clock is ticking. They better do something and shut up before they end up in “the facility”.
You just stop talking to them entirely. Sorry.
“If that were true, I’d be trying even harder to make you take it.”
If you think they’d be open to it, try Bayes’ theorem. Ask them to give percent likelihoods for the following:
A. The odds that the government (or whoever) is trying to kill everyone, before taking the evidence of excess deaths into account
B. The odds of seeing excess deaths for any possible reason, not just their conspiracy hypothesis
C. The odds of seeing excess deaths if the conspiracy hypothesis were true.Then logically, the odds of the conspiracy being real given the excess deaths should be A*C/B. If you disagree with them on the outcome, you must disagree on one or more of the assumptions (probably A—if it’s B, you can find the objective odds by checking historical data).
If you still disagree on the prior assumption (A), you can set aside the excess deaths argument and ask what other evidence led them to form that prior assumption. Then you can repeat the process until you either reach agreement or they’re left with an assumption they have no evidence for.
…You are asking people who… willfully choose to be idiots to… do science?
I mean, you do you, but at the point someone is willing to believe “the top scientists in the world are trying to get you killed” you might as well consider them lost, as they are ignoring elementary-level statistics.
People are different and respond to the same message differently depending on the source. OP might have an in with their loved one and therefore a chance of changing their minds.
That’s a nice sentiment but no, it won’t work. If your family member rattles conspiranoia to your face, it means they already don’t care about you to enough a point to not only openly do that, but also they are probably unvaxxed and likely unmasked at the moment. Or every single time.
At that point, they don’t care for you. Period.
Or they care about you and want you to “see the light”. Most people drinking the conspiracy kool-aid aren’t evil, just gullible and ignorant.
You can’t use logic to talk someone out of a position they didn’t use logic to get into in the first place
Well, not with that attitude.
Don’t bother. Anything bad you say will be dismissed as a ‘smear’ campaign against that person because ‘they’ (big pharma, the millions of scientists who are all in on “it”) don’t want you to know and they’ll just shut off against you. Just take a step back from the dolt.
