A new study out of the Harvard School of Medicine confirmed once again that accusing someone of being a pharma shill and then blocking or banning them from a page is still the best way to win an argument when online.
“We talked to several prominent anti-vaccine commenters and they all agreed with our findings,” said lead researcher Dr. Tom Vivaldi. “We spoke with people like AutismDadd, Tanners Dad and Anne Dachel. They all said that when faced with overwhelming scientific evidence that they are wrong about vaccines, the best thing to do is call the other person a shill and then either block or ban them (if on a page that one has admin privileges).”
Most anti-vaccers in online arguments will follow a standard protocol:
- Claim the study/report in question is funded by big pharma (no matter how far of a stretch it is). ALWAYS USE CAPS LOCK.
- Link to another “study” done by an anti-vaccine researcher which contradicts said study. This is usually an online survey or poorly done observational study which has not been accepted into any major publication.
- Keep sending links to anti-vaccine and conspiracy websites and urge others to “do your research”.
- Ignore all evidence presented by others.
- Claim they must be a shill for big pharma and paid to write comments. Block and Ignore.
This simple 5 step system has worked for the anti-vaccer for over ten years and is a tried and true method to tell yourself you have “won” the argument.
“As soon as you ask the pro-vaccer to provide evidence that is not linked to any pharma company, university, the CDC, FDA, any government agency or any research institute which has ever had an employee who has ever worked anywhere that has ever received any type of money from any organization or company we deem to be in the pockets of big pharma, they can never produce it,” explained Tanners dad Tim. “They just keep sending links to peer-reviewed studies and we keep fighting back with anecdotes and links to whale to and natural news. Once we start to lose the argument, that’s when you just call them a shill and move on victorious.”
The study was of course funded by big pharma, so anti-vaccers are on the fence about whether or not to believe the results.
“Yah this is a bit a unique situation,” said Tim. “The report is correct, but it was also funded by Harvard who has a chair in some department which was bestowed by a pharma company so my heart tells me I can’t believe any of it. I dunno what to do…shill.”
