It was just another quiet day in the village — although the resident antivaxers had hoped otherwise. A paltry few were positioned with their yellow placards along the high street during the countryside version of morning rush-hour, expecting that, as motorists drove past, they would “honk for freedom” and agree with their question, “why vaccinate teens?”, which was also written on their placards. Silence. Tumbleweed. Hadn’t the antivaxers realised that their supporters are way too anti-establishment to be driving to work for the 9am clock-in? The feeble turnout and mute horns were seen as a vaxxers’ victory in a village that has come to be defined — and divided — by vaccine refusal.
When my family and I jumped aboard the move-to-the-countryside bandwagon last year, our new rural idyll was not a hotbed of antivaxers, because back then there was no Covid vaccine. We thought we knew what we were signing up for — a progressive village in the southwest of England that was unusually diverse for rural Britain (on politics, ethnicity, sexuality, socio-economics, education, ideology). Here, consumerism was seen as a necessary evil rather than a competitive sport, and there was evidently a strong will to address the big issues — climate change, waste, poverty etc — as a community (albeit with some crystal-worshipping on the side). We’d wanted to leave the city so that our three young boys could grow up closer to nature, and this felt like the perfect place to relocate.
A few months later, as the vaccination programme started to roll out, the antivax army mobilised immediately. We first discovered as much via the village’s Facebook community group, where pretty much all dramas are amplified into crisis status, to great comic effect. Suddenly, I had a ringside seat to the juiciest of arguments, and I realised that any innocent vaccine-related post — for example, the news that our local GP surgery had received vaccine supplies — was always going to descend into battle. Still now, shouty comments fly back and forth, “scientific papers” are cited and challenged, one-on-one breakout fights occur, and the same old line — “my body, my choice” — is rattled off.
It wasn’t long before we met them in real life. A casual conversation would inevitably be hijacked by an onslaught of pseudoscience, all tangled up in “mitochondrial” this and “cellular immune response” that. You know you’re up against a conspiracy theorist when they bamboozle you with impenetrable theoretical information — or the plain ridiculous. Since moving here I’ve heard it all, including a) Bill Gates is trying to establish a global surveillance system via our microchipped arms, b) Big Pharma is trying to give us cancer via the vaccines, because cancer is so profitable, c) the vaccine, combined with 5G masts, will make us magnetic, d) the vaccine will alter our DNA, etc, etc. And, predictably, they’re saying that Omicron’s arrival is only proof that the whole “plandemic” has been orchestrated by higher powers, this variant being their latest release. At least it makes the rush for boosters a little less crowded here.
Initially, I naively took on the pro-vaccine cause, politely attempting to disabuse them of such misinformation but, as so many will know, antivaxer zeal is not conducive to rational debate. It’s a bit like discussing whether God exists — if you believe in God, you’re not going to stop doing so based on what anyone else says. Their tunnel vision is their superpower, and enables them to ignore any sign of disbelief, disagreement or evidence to the contrary. Meanwhile, they were trying to convert us back, inviting us to talks, handing out leaflets to kids, and distributing copies of The Light, a printed “truthpaper” and the antivaxers’ only trusted news source.
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Lockdown was interesting. Viewing it as a gross violation of their civil liberties, the antivaxers instead assumed a Prohibition-era attitude, with indoor parties, supper clubs and farm raves (we made our excuses). Bonfire Night 2020, which happened to coincide with the start of the second lockdown, went ahead without restraint — never mind that a fireworks display might blow their cover. It felt political, in a way that sided with Guy Fawkes, not the Houses of Parliament. After wearing masks in shops was made mandatory, one neighbour quit his job at the village supermarket because he found the continual argy-bargy between the masked and the unmasked so stressful. There was even a wellness centre that stayed open throughout lockdown, the condensation of moist, viral breath conveniently veiling its floor-to-ceiling windows.
Some might wonder why on earth we’ve stuck around. That, admittedly, comes down in part to privilege — had my loved ones been lost to Covid, or their cancer treatment delayed, or hospital bed held up, I would surely have felt a lot more angry. I’ve had my wobbles, when I’ve questioned whether to stay — and I know people who have left in exasperation. I also know consultant doctors in neighbouring towns who are furious with our village’s antivaxers, labelling them “mentally unsound”, and I have friends who have cancelled our mutual antivaxer mates, calling them “more dangerous than fundamentalists”. And I know husbands who have secretly had the vaccine, and not told their antivaxer wives.
But I do feel a moral responsibility to attempt to undo some of the brainwashing. Quite often it’s my boys who raise the subject, casually asking people whether they’re “non-vaccinators”, and then we’re off, delicately picking through the thorns. Increasingly, I’ve ducked out of challenging the more anarchic conspiracy theorists — that, I’ve come to realise, is futile. The recent news stories of antivaxers begging for vaccines on their deathbeds, or the disproportionate numbers of antivaxers in intensive care, or the massive burden that they’re causing the NHS would just be dismissed as fake news. I’ve felt more optimistic about the milder antivaxer variety, whose resistance is due to the fear of pumping toxins into their bodies. Often dressed in homespun clothes the colour of soil, ochre and moss, often barefoot, sometimes breastfeeding school-age children, always allergic to hairbrushes, it feels like the vaccine is just too modern, too high-tech for their belief systems. Their usual response, said with impressive confidence, is that their immune system — combined with the support of all manner of homeopathic tinctures — will defend them from illness. Even here, though, I haven’t succeeded and, not wanting to fall out with them, have only pushed it so far before civilly agreeing to disagree.
I’ve noticed a third type, keen to declare to us vaxxers that they’re not antivaxers, they’re just not vaccinated. Surely an easy target, I’ve thought, as they mumble some excuse (one person said she hadn’t vaccinated because she “was too busy to cope with the side-effects”). Have these people succumbed to peer pressure? Did they feel they had no choice but to go along with the shoutier villagers? As, again, my attempts have failed, I’ve begun to wonder if the desire to belong somewhere — to a movement with a far louder, more defined identity than anything mainstream society has to offer — has a far stronger pull than the more abstract notion of doing the right thing for the greater good.
I do have compassion — even fondness — for my neighbours. We sometimes find ourselves in perfect alignment — if, for example, we’re discussing the insidious presence of VOCs (volatile organic compounds) in household cleaning products, or the toxic chemicals sprayed over new clothes, carpets, furniture etc, but then there’ll be a sudden conversational swerve on to, say, the “real” causes of autism, or the “50,000 children being held by the American Democrats for their sexual pleasure”. (I mean, there has at least been much to dine out on from moving here — albeit without so much actual dining out.) Many of the antivaxers seem to be carrying a lot of anger and anxiety. “It must be so stressful to be waging this imaginary war in your head,” I say to them. To which they return the pitying looks, as if to say, “You poor thing for being such a sheep and believing mainstream media.” There are admittedly grey areas, too. Pre-Covid, we were all more cynical about Big Pharma, then all of a sudden they became the heroes. And who can blame the antivaxers for being anti-establishment when, under Boris Johnson, the establishment has eroded so many people’s trust?
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The reality is there is so much more to the village than the antivaxers, and numerous other tribes to align with — whether you care about wildlife, beach clean-ups, zero waste or magic mushrooms. And once you do, this vocal minority suddenly doesn’t seem so potent. If you can strike a healthy balance, it’s a peaceful place where, to quote a cliché from the Facebook chat, “personal choice is respected” — at least outwardly. There are also plenty of us united in our pro-vaccine stance, WhatsApping each other photos of lone protesters standing miserably at the roadside, along with crying-with-laughter and exploding-rage emojis.
