Nailed it. It’s less like not wearing a seatbelt and more like drink driving.Vaccines absolutely work to eradicate disease, provided a very high percentage (around 95% of the population - and that means children too) can be vaccinated.
Unfortunately we've had several problems with COVID-19. Vaccine hesitancy (the general rise of the anti-vax movement, right wing politicians in the US and elsewhere promoting vaccine skepticism), our inability to vaccinate children yet, and as a result the rise of variants.
So eradication probably isn't possible now, at least for the foreseeable future. But the more of us who are vaccinated, the easier it will be to live with this virus.
IMO, we all have/had a duty to society to get vaccinated. How much COVID-19 impacts our lives is purely determined on our collective response. This is truly a case where 'we're all in this together'. Like it or not. You want a relatively normal life for all of us? Get yourself vaccinated.
This is not as simple as 'I choose not to get vaccinated, so that's a personal choice that only affects me.' Unfortunately, it doesn't. It's not like choosing to not wear a bike helmet or a seat belt, or eat junk food, or go free climbing or BASE jumping.
Choosing not to get vaccinated is putting your thoughts and feelings ahead of your duty to everyone else in society. We get vaccinated, and wear masks, not really for ourselves, but for all of us. You getting vaccinated helps me. Me getting vaccinated helps you. Choosing not to is the very definition of selfishness.
Liam Jones seems like a decent person, but there's a lot of decent people who buy into anti-vax nonsense. But I really don't understand the attitude of 'good on him for sticking to his guns/holding to his convictions/'. Do we really admire selfishness and toxic individualism as a character trait?
I 100% will defend someone’s right to choose but given the choice here quite literally endangers the entire community there needs to be consequences. Every choice has consequences, it seems the position of those not getting vaccinated is they want choice without consequence, that’s not freedom, that’s power.
I can’t understand the mindset of “my right to choose is more important than everyone else’s right to live” but that genuinely seems to be the point many have arrived at. It’s unethical, immoral and not what anyone should want for society.





