Friday, July 23, 2021

Is Vaccine Hesitancy Driven by Bigotry?

 I may take some flack for this, but it's been on my mind for a while.

I wonder if some part of the vaccine reluctance among the conservative population--particularly the rabid Trump supporters--is that a significant number of the experts (both governmental and private) are people of color. The Surgeon General is of South Asian heritage, as are quite a few of the medical experts frequently interviewed on the TV news. Although she is not a person of color, the head of the CDC is a woman and Jewish.

Is that enough to make some portion of the right-wing populace discount what they say? These are people who disparaged a previous president simply for his family heritage and who consider the current vice-president illegitimate, in part because of her background and gender (not to mention their attitude toward the Congressional representatives they call "the Squad").

I fear it may be.


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