Speaker 1: Welcome to Woke af with me Danielle Moodie. Every week
Speaker 1: on my Patreon, I have thoughtful and engaging conversations with
Speaker 1: expert guests about the latest headlines that are catching my attention.
Speaker 1: Every Wednesday, which I call Woke Wednesdays, I speak with
Speaker 1: doctor Jonathan Metzel, director of the Vanderbilt University Department of Medicine,
Speaker 1: Health and Society and author of Dying of Whiteness, how
Speaker 1: the politics of racial resentment is killing America's heartland. This week,
Speaker 1: I wanted to talk with Jonathan about the fact that
Speaker 1: not enough Americans are getting vaccinated and in order for
Speaker 1: us to hit the seventy percent threshold needed for her
Speaker 1: immunity in this country, everyone needs to get vaccinated. Our
Speaker 1: conversation turned into a spirited back and forth about why
Speaker 1: these people are refusing to get vaccinated and how we
Speaker 1: can convince them for the greater good of our public health.
Speaker 1: We wanted to share our entire half hour chat with you,
Speaker 1: unedited and unfiltered, to give you the full picture of
Speaker 1: the health crisis we are continuing to face in this moment.
Speaker 1: To hear more conversations like these every single week, five
Speaker 1: days a week, consider supporting me and woke AF daily
Speaker 1: on Patreon at patreon dot com slash woke AF. Folks,
Speaker 1: you know that when it is a Wednesday, I'm always
Speaker 1: so excited to be joined by our favorite doctor in
Speaker 1: the house, doctor Jonathan Metzel, to talk to us about
Speaker 1: the latest with the coronavirus, with gun violence, with dying
Speaker 1: of whiteness. You know him, you have read his book,
Speaker 1: which is pretty much our guide in this current apocalypse
Speaker 1: that we are living in. Jonathan news has been circulating.
Speaker 1: Headlines are all saying the same thing, America is not
Speaker 1: going to reach hard immunity, that our desire for the
Speaker 1: vaccine has reached a lateau where the people that have
Speaker 1: wanted to get the vaccine got it. This CDC is
Speaker 1: now opening, will excuse me, Fiser now has a vaccine
Speaker 1: that is going to be able to be distributed now
Speaker 1: for people from the ages of twelve to fifteen. My
Speaker 1: assumption one is that obviously they were looking for vaccination
Speaker 1: that was going to be safe for younger people, but
Speaker 1: two that if we can get that group vaccinated by
Speaker 1: the parents and caregivers that actually give a damn, then
Speaker 1: we will get closer and closer to that seventy percent,
Speaker 1: which will identify for us the area that we can
Speaker 1: say that we can reach hard immunity. Tell me what
Speaker 1: these headlines mean to you and what they are forecasting
Speaker 1: for the future of America and its battle with the
Speaker 1: COVID nineteen. Well, so many thoughts about this. I mean,
Speaker 1: it's such massive news. I guess a couple things. I mean,
Speaker 1: number one, let's just be clear, we have a vaccine
Speaker 1: that works. If everybody got vaccinated, we would add the pandemic.
Speaker 1: And so why didn't Why didn't we get that right?
Speaker 1: I mean, I think that there was so much hope
Speaker 1: leading up to the vaccine that like, oh, people are
Speaker 1: crazy about masks, then they're crazy about washing their hands.
Speaker 1: But when the vaccine comes out, everybody will kind of
Speaker 1: alining get the vaccine because of course we want to
Speaker 1: go back to normal. But we did. We did go
Speaker 1: back to normal. We going back to polarized normal. And
Speaker 1: so you know, I guess there's a couple ways to
Speaker 1: read this. And just to be clear, if people don't
Speaker 1: get vaccinated, then it makes us more susceptible to variants,
Speaker 1: It makes us more susceptible to the virus mutating. And
Speaker 1: this whole thing starting over. It makes us more susceptible
Speaker 1: to a brutal fourth wave on the fall. So there
Speaker 1: are real world implications to what we're seeing now, which
Speaker 1: is that we have more vaccines than we have people
Speaker 1: who are willing to get the vaccine, which is the
Speaker 1: opposite of the problem everywhe else in the world where
Speaker 1: people would like, you know, eat their lawnmower for a vaccine, right,
Speaker 1: but we don't have that. We have the opposite problem.
Speaker 1: And so what do you call that? You call that ignorance?
Speaker 1: Do you call that privilege? Do you call that whatever?
Speaker 1: Let's just be rhetorical here for a minute. Let's assume
Speaker 1: that people are rational actors, right, I mean, I know
Speaker 1: it's far fact, so I need to suspect, I need
Speaker 1: to suspend reality. Okay, let's let's do that. I mean,
Speaker 1: because this is a new virus and this is a
Speaker 1: new vaccine, and so how did we get to the
Speaker 1: point where like thirty or forty percent of people aren't
Speaker 1: going to get to the vaccine? You know, I think
Speaker 1: you could say there's the easy answer, which to me
Speaker 1: is ungratified, like, oh, they're dumb, or they're racist, or
Speaker 1: they're whatever, Like, you know, great, but let's assume that
Speaker 1: they're they're acting as part of a particular belief system. Right.
Speaker 1: That belief system is mistrust in science, mistrust in authority.
Speaker 1: Somebody's telling them not to do it. I think for me,
Speaker 1: the question is like, how do you address that belief
Speaker 1: system right in a way that you know that I
Speaker 1: don't know. I just feel frustration because on one hand,
Speaker 1: of course we want people to get the vaccine, but
Speaker 1: didn't we see from masks, for example, that there are massive,
Speaker 1: massive disinformation campaigns that try to foment polarization and benefit
Speaker 1: from it monetarily, right, And so with masks, for example,
Speaker 1: the whole Trim campaign was built on making people not
Speaker 1: wear masks and not believing it. And with vaccines it's
Speaker 1: even quadrupled. Right. There are huge, huge disinformation campaigns that
Speaker 1: are based on people making money by people not getting vaccinated, right,
Speaker 1: selling other kinds of concoctions that they have financial interests,
Speaker 1: or treatments that are crafted, or just keeping the pandemic
Speaker 1: going and making an endemic. So in a way, it
Speaker 1: wasn't just like, oh, hey, good citizens of America, here's
Speaker 1: the vaccine enlightenment. I mean, we would hope that's true,
Speaker 1: but if there wasn't also a strategy for disrupting the
Speaker 1: disinformation campaigns, then this is going to be the outcome
Speaker 1: in a particular way. And so I guess I mean,
Speaker 1: just to be clear, I hate this pandemic. It's ruined everything,
Speaker 1: and I wanted to be over and I want everybody
Speaker 1: to get vaccinated. But I also think that we get
Speaker 1: into this kind of virtue binary on our side of
Speaker 1: either you're on the side of knowledge or you're like
Speaker 1: a frigging dipshit who just loves the coronavirus. And that
Speaker 1: binary itself is something we should have strategies for. And
Speaker 1: so I believe me, I'm very critical. I mean, I
Speaker 1: just spent an hour doing a focus group trying to
Speaker 1: convince people what would it take for you to get
Speaker 1: the vaccine? I'm living this right now, So tell us, Jonathan.
Speaker 1: Because outside of the brilliant people that make time to
Speaker 1: come on Woke a f I don't really talk to
Speaker 1: a lot of regular people, right, So let me let
Speaker 1: me just be honest. I really don't. I don't spend
Speaker 1: a lot of time talking to like regular middle of
Speaker 1: the road Americans. I don't even know what that actually means.
Speaker 1: But the people that I talk to on a regular
Speaker 1: basis are highly educated, and so there is a ski
Speaker 1: that's there. What are folks saying because one of the
Speaker 1: I will say this, I saw a tweet go around
Speaker 1: yesterday that said one hundred and fifty million people have
Speaker 1: gotten the vaccine. Right, one hundred and fifty million Americans
Speaker 1: have gotten the vaccine. None of them have died. But
Speaker 1: five hundred and eighty seven thousand Americans caught the coronavirus
Speaker 1: and did in fact die. Right, that's our death toll,
Speaker 1: give or take. You know, it's still early in the
Speaker 1: morning where we are. What the fuck is the rationale
Speaker 1: right now? Where you can look at the vaccine and
Speaker 1: say millions, hundreds of millions of Americans have gotten it
Speaker 1: and no one's dead, No one's lost the limb, no
Speaker 1: one lost their eyesight, None of this bullshit that people
Speaker 1: are feeding to Americans has actually happened. But you know
Speaker 1: what has happened is that over half a million Americans
Speaker 1: are dead because of the coronavirus. So what is their rationale?
Speaker 1: And these focus groups for saying I am so afraid
Speaker 1: of this vaccine, I'm more afraid of what could possibly
Speaker 1: keep me and my family and my community safe than
Speaker 1: I am. The virus that I know for certain, over
Speaker 1: the last three hundred and sixty five fucking days has
Speaker 1: killed nearly a million Americans. Well, I love these conversations.
Speaker 1: This is the real conversation. But I would also say
Speaker 1: that even your question made an assumption that is potentially
Speaker 1: part of the problem. No, no, no, yes, you made
Speaker 1: an assumption that you speak to educated people, but everyday
Speaker 1: people aren't educated anyway. I know, I know that's not
Speaker 1: what you meant. No, it is like it actually is
Speaker 1: what I meant, because I believe that if you believe
Speaker 1: in facts and science, and doctor Faucci is not your enemy,
Speaker 1: and you believe in the people who have spent their
Speaker 1: careers in science, in development of vaccinations, in research and data,
Speaker 1: and you are not believing those people, but you are
Speaker 1: believing Tucker Carlson. Yes, I actually it was not an oversight.
Speaker 1: I meant what I said. So let me reframe that
Speaker 1: question in a way that I think is a different
Speaker 1: way to think about it. Right, Because I've interviewed lots
Speaker 1: of people who are very educated. I've interviewed people whose
Speaker 1: own parents ended up in the ICU from COVID and
Speaker 1: so there's something about this belief system. But let's think
Speaker 1: about this in a very different way. And again I realized,
Speaker 1: just to highlight what we're up against here, I think
Speaker 1: that's kind of my point. But imagine that you're trying
Speaker 1: to sell something to the country. Imagine you're trying to
Speaker 1: sell the vaccine, as one example, you get a dollar
Speaker 1: for every vaccine you get somebody to take. And what
Speaker 1: would your strategy be for reaching people right in a
Speaker 1: certain kind of way. And so there are certain people
Speaker 1: who are just going to You're going to get a
Speaker 1: dollar forever for them because they're going to run out
Speaker 1: and get the vaccine. But then there are other people
Speaker 1: bold who they're hearing all this other information, their idea
Speaker 1: of education is something different because the people around in
Speaker 1: their community is you know, their community is saying something.
Speaker 1: We know that vaccine hesitancy, for example, comes out of
Speaker 1: community and communities. And then there's also a competitor who
Speaker 1: wants that dollar from them to not get the vaccine.
Speaker 1: And that person is pumping like it's almost like the
Speaker 1: smell when you walk by subway and they pump out
Speaker 1: that bread smell that's fake. But that person is pumping
Speaker 1: out fake information the other way. So what would you
Speaker 1: do to address those people? If your goal is to
Speaker 1: get everybody vaccinated, you would try to say, well, what's
Speaker 1: their world view and how can I appeal to it
Speaker 1: in a particular way. How could I sell something to them?
Speaker 1: You kind of want to craft a message that works
Speaker 1: to them in a particular way, and then the next
Speaker 1: time that happens, you would do it in advance, before
Speaker 1: the disinformation machine has a right, has an ability to
Speaker 1: take it over. Now, I understand a lot of people
Speaker 1: are working. I get that, but I'm just saying that
Speaker 1: you have to recognize that in a way, it's not
Speaker 1: just about, oh, those people are uneducated. It's that there's
Speaker 1: a whole machine that's shaping their opinion in a way
Speaker 1: that we don't address in any way directly enough. I mean,
Speaker 1: I think we made this mistake very, very badly in
Speaker 1: the beginning of the pandemic, where we were like, of course,
Speaker 1: wear a mask because that's going to protect your family
Speaker 1: and your community and all that kind of stuff. But
Speaker 1: we didn't realize that there was a whole other, massive
Speaker 1: industry on their side that was saying that's you know,
Speaker 1: I mean basically there are two. It's not any mystery
Speaker 1: if you tell you know, conservative people in parts of
Speaker 1: the country, it's government overreach and it's taking away your liberty.
Speaker 1: Or black people are going to cut in front of
Speaker 1: you in line and get resources that are meant for you.
Speaker 1: Those two narratives you can get people to do pretty
Speaker 1: much anything. So the question is if we know that,
Speaker 1: what are we going to do to disrupt that narrative? Right?
Speaker 1: It can't be telling people that they're uneducated. That can't
Speaker 1: be the answer. No, And let me tell you that
Speaker 1: would probably a reason why I am not a spokesperson
Speaker 1: for anybody other than wok F Nation, But I think
Speaker 1: that in order to sell right, you have to know
Speaker 1: what is most appealing to people. So for me, I
Speaker 1: would take a page out of Oh, I don't know
Speaker 1: every single friggin Instagram, ad pusher, Facebook ad pusher, used
Speaker 1: car salesman, what have you, which is appealing to nostalgia right?
Speaker 1: For me? Do you know what I think would get
Speaker 1: people back are commercials of showing them the pictures of
Speaker 1: their old life, right, pictures of you being able to
Speaker 1: just you know, go to the grocery store, pick up
Speaker 1: your kid from school, attend a game, hug your friends,
Speaker 1: like just a montage and say we are on our
Speaker 1: way back to we are only halfway there, like this
Speaker 1: is what we need to get you all the way there.
Speaker 1: And I would pump those out in every single type
Speaker 1: of commercial, Instagram, social media advertisement that appeals to people
Speaker 1: for thirty five to sixty seconds, right with songs that
Speaker 1: hit from each generation about like reconnecting with community and
Speaker 1: re emerging from lockdown. Right. But the problem here is
Speaker 1: that you have states like Florida, Texas, Tennessee and others
Speaker 1: that never fully went down into lockdown and now they're
Speaker 1: just going but gangbusters. And I want to know your
Speaker 1: thought to Jonathan on where New York is and what
Speaker 1: New York is getting ready to do in the next
Speaker 1: two weeks on May nineteenth, with everything one hundred percent open,
Speaker 1: and tell me you're feeling about that. But that is
Speaker 1: how I believe that if I were in charge, how
Speaker 1: I would start selling the vaccine. Okay, well, that's a
Speaker 1: great answer. That's a beginning of an answer, because what
Speaker 1: you're doing is you're putting yourself in the position out
Speaker 1: of the seller, but of the consumer. Right in a
Speaker 1: certain kind of way, which public health doesn't do. That's
Speaker 1: my point here. Public health never does this. So you
Speaker 1: just vaccinated half the resistant people because they looked and
Speaker 1: they watched you know, the beach boys, and they got
Speaker 1: it all nostalgic. And then the other half of the
Speaker 1: people you have to actually understand what drives them. And
Speaker 1: I have no expertise there. I'm just I've studied guns
Speaker 1: for fifteen years and I've seen the gun control movement
Speaker 1: below this point. That's why this is where my opinions
Speaker 1: are coming from. But the other half of the people,
Speaker 1: you've got to understand their catchwords. And maybe there's no
Speaker 1: right answer here, but catchwords like liberty and freedom, and
Speaker 1: so if it was me, it's part of it is
Speaker 1: community and getting back to life. You'll get half the
Speaker 1: people that way, but the other half, why don't you
Speaker 1: take the liberty What about the vaccine liberty movement or
Speaker 1: the vaccine freedom movement? You know, getting vaccinated is a
Speaker 1: form of liberty. It's a way of sticking it to
Speaker 1: the government. You can, you know, all these kinds of things.
Speaker 1: So one of the words co opt their narrative and
Speaker 1: then feed it back to them in a way that
Speaker 1: serves your own goal. If your own goal is getting
Speaker 1: everybody vaccinated, take their narrative and flip it back to them.
Speaker 1: And I'll tell you who does this really well, it's
Speaker 1: the NRA, right, The NRA is now selling guns, calling
Speaker 1: themselves a civil rights movement. You know, their ads now
Speaker 1: are like, the police aren't going to protect you, buy
Speaker 1: a gun because they're going to protect you. So they
Speaker 1: take they take the tensions of the other side, they
Speaker 1: identify them, and they flip them for their own purposes.
Speaker 1: And it just frustrates me, Like, you know, didn't we
Speaker 1: learn from mask that just appealing to public health and
Speaker 1: you know, it just it just it doesn't work for
Speaker 1: half of people. And if our goal is to get
Speaker 1: everybody involved, we should be taking the themes of the
Speaker 1: other side and then flipping them for our own purposes.
Speaker 1: And you know, again, I just think that that's better
Speaker 1: than telling people like what the hell's wrong with you
Speaker 1: or something? If our goal, again, our goal is strategically
Speaker 1: to get everybody vaccinated. And so you know, again, I've
Speaker 1: been thinking about this a lot because I study guns, right,
Speaker 1: and the whole gun control movement is based on people
Speaker 1: are dying, damn it. And it's true, people really really
Speaker 1: are dying. But we've went hook like in line and
Speaker 1: sinker for the public health model. But the people who
Speaker 1: are selling guns, it's all about liberty and freedom and autonomy.
Speaker 1: And so how come we can't take that and say
Speaker 1: guns aren't liberty, you're chained to the gun industry or
Speaker 1: something like that, like something that actually takes their theme
Speaker 1: and flips it. But when we're just saying, oh, it's
Speaker 1: a public health model, I just feel like it lets
Speaker 1: the other side politicize science. And I guess the reason
Speaker 1: I'm telling you this is because I see us doing
Speaker 1: exactly the same thing here, you know, and there are
Speaker 1: people way smarter than me doing this. But I will say,
Speaker 1: having done a lot of focus groups, I just feel
Speaker 1: like we're not speaking the language that people understand enough.
Speaker 1: And really, what it does is it gives people like
Speaker 1: the Santas and people like that total free reign to
Speaker 1: never have to answer to their own people, right, So
Speaker 1: that miss those descantists and Trump people are not looking
Speaker 1: to They don't ask any questions, do you know what
Speaker 1: I'm saying? Like, I think, to me, what is the
Speaker 1: scariest point of where we are is that those people
Speaker 1: don't ask questions. They are just blind followers. Right. So
Speaker 1: the Tucker Carlson's and the Trumps and the Descantists and
Speaker 1: all of those people, they got vaccinated, right, Like, let's
Speaker 1: all be one hundred percent clear that they all got vaccinated,
Speaker 1: but are willingly telling their people not to. Right. But
Speaker 1: the question is what price do they pay for them?
Speaker 1: Right now, we make I mean, they don't pay any
Speaker 1: price for them. And that's part of the issue, right,
Speaker 1: there's no price. It's only benefit for them. They they've
Speaker 1: monetized conflict, they've monetized polarization, they've monetized hate. So they
Speaker 1: actually get rewarded, financially rewarded for positions that rip our
Speaker 1: country in half. And the question is where is the
Speaker 1: place where they pay a price for it? Right? Certainly
Speaker 1: are I can see, oh that they pay a price
Speaker 1: for it, But where are there certain other words, This
Speaker 1: is just a totally cress stupid example. But vaccines, vaccine liberty,
Speaker 1: vaccine freedom. Why is Tucker Carlson blocking your vaccine freedom?
Speaker 1: You know, something like that, like make him answer to
Speaker 1: his base in the language that he's using. But just
Speaker 1: flip it on its head. Again, this is just a
Speaker 1: theory on my part, having studied you know what, I
Speaker 1: feel like our unnecessary tensions between public health and popular opinion.
Speaker 1: But I feel like we haven't done enough to counter
Speaker 1: politicize public health in ways that answers this. So, how
Speaker 1: come Tucker Carlson doesn't have to answer for blocking people's
Speaker 1: vaccine freedom? You know something like that, you know, make
Speaker 1: him answer, why are you blocking our American god given
Speaker 1: liberty and chance to expand Medicaid? That's part of what
Speaker 1: it means to be an American. You're blocking our healthcare freedom,
Speaker 1: you know, stuff like that. And I don't understand a
Speaker 1: lot of people are working on this, but I'm just
Speaker 1: saying that it's easy to fall into the trap of
Speaker 1: like we're smart and they're dumb, because you know, who
Speaker 1: wouldn't get a vaccine for everything we've seen, right, it
Speaker 1: seems so compensible. But I also think it's important to
Speaker 1: disrupt these very racializing narratives in ways that make people
Speaker 1: on the defensive, make them answer to their own constituencis.
Speaker 1: I feel like we never do. I like this. I'm
Speaker 1: also on the hook for writing an op ed, and
Speaker 1: I'm just like, oh, maybe I go after Tucker Carlson,
Speaker 1: which I haven't done for years. Part of the problem
Speaker 1: I think that we're experiencing, particularly with this administration, is
Speaker 1: that sometimes when you were steeped in too much goodness,
Speaker 1: too much belief, that the American people are inherently good, right,
Speaker 1: and that they just got distracted by the bad man Trump.
Speaker 1: But as soon as the good people come in, then
Speaker 1: they'll come back to their senses. And that I believe
Speaker 1: is honestly the belief of this administration. Like, oh, they
Speaker 1: you know, they're right now out there in the streets
Speaker 1: talking about how America is not a racist country, and
Speaker 1: I'm like, we don't get anywhere by continuing to lie.
Speaker 1: We don't advance, we don't develop, we don't grow by
Speaker 1: continuing a narrative that is a lie, right, And so
Speaker 1: I believe that inherently they think that Americans, you know,
Speaker 1: are this good, loving people, and so we're going to
Speaker 1: use this a one size fits all type of strategy,
Speaker 1: which is just about love of country, love of community,
Speaker 1: love of self. And that's why you're getting the vaccine,
Speaker 1: And isn't that why everybody's getting the vaccine? And the
Speaker 1: reality is that, no, you have a group of people
Speaker 1: who believe like wholeheartedly in science and that is what
Speaker 1: has dictated their movements. Then you have people that are
Speaker 1: just like, oooh, I'm on the fence, I'm getting misinformation.
Speaker 1: I don't really know who to trust, and isn't the
Speaker 1: healthcare industrial complex like all about money anyway? And what
Speaker 1: is this really going to do for me? And then
Speaker 1: you have other people that are just like, fuck this.
Speaker 1: I'm an American. You don't get to tell me what
Speaker 1: to do. So in a two year old tantrum, I'm
Speaker 1: going to say, I'm not getting the vaccine because you
Speaker 1: want me to get the vaccine and I don't like you.
Speaker 1: So that's what I'm going to do. Listen. I mean,
Speaker 1: I'm feeling very I'm feeling very counterpointy today, so I'm
Speaker 1: going to push back on that, and I like counterpoint Jonathan.
Speaker 1: And let me just say this. Imagine that our goal
Speaker 1: is to get everybody vaccinated. That's our goal. Our goal
Speaker 1: is not to say we're on the good side and
Speaker 1: they're on the bad side. Our goal is to get
Speaker 1: everybody vaccinated. How are you going to do that? Right?
Speaker 1: Fox News figured this out and I figured this out
Speaker 1: in the opposite But for our side, what's the best
Speaker 1: way to get people to do that. It's not telling
Speaker 1: people that they're dumb, are uneducated. That's not going to work.
Speaker 1: It's just going to reinforce their idea that we're a
Speaker 1: bunch of elites and they're a bunch of like everyday people.
Speaker 1: So how can you use the material we have? I mean,
Speaker 1: I personally feel like a minute we're arguing about whether
Speaker 1: America is racist or not, if we're on that terrain,
Speaker 1: we've already lost. We're lost because it's like it's like, great,
Speaker 1: let's have that argument for the next nine thousand years. Uh.
Speaker 1: And it's just you know, when we're on that battlefield,
Speaker 1: it's the long battlefield for us. So there are ways
Speaker 1: we can manipulate the system toward our own goals. We
Speaker 1: just don't do it. I mean, if you want everybody
Speaker 1: in the South to get vaccinated, go down there and
Speaker 1: say you're just going to vaccinate black people. You know,
Speaker 1: as one example, like oh my god, Like I say,
Speaker 1: we have this great new vaccine, it's it's liberty and freedom,
Speaker 1: but only black people can get it. Um, trust me,
Speaker 1: you would solve the anti vax problem in fifteen minutes.
Speaker 1: You know, something like that. So in other words, it's
Speaker 1: it's kind of like you're not paying attention to the
Speaker 1: tensions of the other side, right, Yeah, in a way,
Speaker 1: it's more like, oh, I'm good and I'm smart and
Speaker 1: you're bad. Who wouldn't want it? And you know, it
Speaker 1: does seem that way from from where we sit. But
Speaker 1: I would also say that you're not you're not addressing
Speaker 1: or entering or in some cases manipulating the system, and
Speaker 1: it just opens the door for the kind of counter
Speaker 1: manipulations that we see. I mean, Kentucky is a great example.
Speaker 1: Kentucky early in the pandemic and a mark of genius
Speaker 1: said we're going to use the pandemic to give health
Speaker 1: insurance to every black citizen of our state. All of
Speaker 1: a sudden, all these white people are like, wait, I
Speaker 1: want I want health insurance. Also give me some health insurance.
Speaker 1: Because what they recognize is like it's a it's a
Speaker 1: zero sum kind of thing and you know that kind
Speaker 1: of thing. And so what it is to recognize the
Speaker 1: tension and instead of debating is Kentucky racist or not? Yeah,
Speaker 1: Kentucky's racist, it said let's let's you know, let's take
Speaker 1: this and figure out what end point we want if
Speaker 1: our endpoint is everybody getting health insurance, and I feel
Speaker 1: like we don't do that with the vaccine. It's you know,
Speaker 1: and things like that. And so in a way, what
Speaker 1: it does is it opens us up for this kind
Speaker 1: of binary of either you're on the side of public
Speaker 1: health or there's something wrong with you. And again, I
Speaker 1: feel like we do the same thing with guns, with
Speaker 1: everything else like that. It's kind of like wet it's
Speaker 1: too we let the other side too easily manipulate the
Speaker 1: distrust of science and authority, and then we just end
Speaker 1: up having debates about well, of course doctor Fauci is
Speaker 1: smart and all this kind of stuff. Like the matter
Speaker 1: we're having those arguments were toats. We should be yep,
Speaker 1: to be counterattacking in ways that are much more aggressive
Speaker 1: and put the other side back on the heels. I
Speaker 1: agree one hundred percent, Jonathan, and I think that understanding
Speaker 1: where people are coming from and understanding who people really
Speaker 1: are is the key to winning this. To your point,
Speaker 1: you're absolutely right. If we had opened rolled out the
Speaker 1: vaccination campaign with saying that the only people that we're
Speaker 1: going to get vaccinated in the beginning, we're black and
Speaker 1: brown people, my God, by the time that it had
Speaker 1: gotten to the second tier. You're one hundred percent right.
Speaker 1: They would have been with the pitchforks and all of
Speaker 1: the ship that they had for the insurrection outside of
Speaker 1: your local CBS and Walgreens in order to get the
Speaker 1: vaccine that they thought was only going to be given
Speaker 1: to black or brown people. And the problem here is
Speaker 1: that we don't manipulate people in the right way because
Speaker 1: that is part of our virtue of being democrats and
Speaker 1: thinking that like you're going to you're going to have
Speaker 1: this one size fits all approach and not admitting to
Speaker 1: the fact that, yeah, in order to use that strategy,
Speaker 1: you would have to understand and believe white people in
Speaker 1: some respects in some areas that the country are inherently racist. Right,
Speaker 1: So appeal to that also, that they're actors acting on
Speaker 1: a certain set of belief systems that are different from
Speaker 1: our own belief systems. Right. In other words, we often
Speaker 1: assume that they are irrational actors, and they're not. They're
Speaker 1: acting based on a set of beliefs they happen to
Speaker 1: not be the ones we believe in. Right, we're not racist,
Speaker 1: but it's not like they're acting randomly, right. I think
Speaker 1: that's that's also part of the issue. So you know,
Speaker 1: before I was we should have the vaccine ad be um.
Speaker 1: If you have a four hour erection from the vaccine,
Speaker 1: see your doctor immediately. That would get a lot of
Speaker 1: people to get the vaccine. But I just think, you
Speaker 1: know what I mean, we're not strategic enough about like
Speaker 1: tapping into people's beliefs, anxieties, concerns, while the other side
Speaker 1: is doing that as right, and so it's not let's
Speaker 1: just be clear, I'm not saying the other side is evil.
Speaker 1: I'm saying that people are acting based on belief systems
Speaker 1: and we don't take that into account when it's just like,
Speaker 1: oh damn it, Jim, I'm a scientist, you know that
Speaker 1: kind of thing. That's our side, and so we never
Speaker 1: we never put people like Tucker Carlson on their heels.
Speaker 1: They never have to answer for how come they're getting
Speaker 1: the vaccine and we're not, like, we never do that,
Speaker 1: and so in a way, we never turn those belief
Speaker 1: systems into liabilities for the other side, which is what
Speaker 1: I think we should be doing more. You know, Jonathan,
Speaker 1: as always, you have given us a lot to think
Speaker 1: about today. So we navigate where we're headed. If we're
Speaker 1: just going to live with the coronavirus for the rest
Speaker 1: of our lives because of the population is in a
Speaker 1: place of refusal, and then what does that mean? What
Speaker 1: does that mean for the UK variant, the India variants,
Speaker 1: is South African variant, the New York variant, the California
Speaker 1: But what does that mean? And for me, actually, the
Speaker 1: last thing that I do want to ask you because
Speaker 1: I think that it's important because of where we are.
Speaker 1: You and I in New York. What are your thoughts
Speaker 1: on the May nineteenth, New York City is back and
Speaker 1: it's summer in New York and everything is open. I
Speaker 1: think this is a move to try to save the economy,
Speaker 1: you know, I need just to be honest. I think
Speaker 1: that what we're seeing is way too many businesses going
Speaker 1: out of business, So many restaurants are closing, and so
Speaker 1: I think right now, I still think it's important to
Speaker 1: keep the message as much as we can. The vaccinations
Speaker 1: and social distancing and doing things outside whenever you can,
Speaker 1: and washing your hands, those things are still really important.
Speaker 1: But without tourism, New York is in big trouble, right,
Speaker 1: stuff like that, and so in a way. I just
Speaker 1: think it's an acknowledgement that there's a lot of tourism
Speaker 1: in Texas and Florida and our economy is really going
Speaker 1: to be in big trouble if we don't catch it up.
Speaker 1: But I still think that as much as New York
Speaker 1: can continue with and social distancing matters and eat outside
Speaker 1: whenever you possibly can, and wash your hands and all
Speaker 1: these kind of things, those things are still really important.
Speaker 1: And so if we can demonstrate a kind of socially
Speaker 1: responsible reopening, I mean, I realized that's a big thing,
Speaker 1: and not a reopening that then people turn and say,
Speaker 1: and therefore, what do I care about? Public health? Then
Speaker 1: will be okay. Now the issue is, of course, the coronavirus,
Speaker 1: among other things, is obviously very seasonal, and so the
Speaker 1: summer should be okay depending on how this goes. But
Speaker 1: in the fall and the winter, what I'm saying the
Speaker 1: key is getting as many people baccinated as possible. That's
Speaker 1: really the key right now, because when the thing starts
Speaker 1: on the fall, the more people vaccinated, the better off,
Speaker 1: the better off we're going to be. And so you know,
Speaker 1: I understand it's a balance. It's not like, oh, public
Speaker 1: health of monthside and the economy on the other. They're related,
Speaker 1: and I get that. So I hope that people in
Speaker 1: New York also remember that all the other stuff is
Speaker 1: still true. And if you don't believe that, just turn
Speaker 1: on the news any night. So it's it's got to
Speaker 1: be all of those things. But again, I just think
Speaker 1: that you know, you just you know, it's a balance
Speaker 1: of the pandemic and the economy in our system. Jonathan,
Speaker 1: as always, thank you so much for a robust conversation.
Speaker 1: I liked our tit for tat today. This is actually
Speaker 1: very helpful. Well, and again we have to remember our goal.
Speaker 1: It's not to virtue signal. Our goal is to get
Speaker 1: as many people to get the vaccine as humanly possible.
Speaker 1: And to do that, imagine you're a salesperson. I mean,
Speaker 1: that's really that's what I tell people when I speak
Speaker 1: to public health audiences. Don't think about it as just yours.
Speaker 1: You You have brilliant, world changing science on your side,
Speaker 1: but that's not enough. Imagine you're a salesperson. What are
Speaker 1: you going to do? Yeah? Until next week, Jonathan, stay safe,
Speaker 1: stay healthy. If you want to share your thoughts about
Speaker 1: my conversation, with Jonathan or have your own perspective on
Speaker 1: the fight to get Americans vaccinated. Get at me on
Speaker 1: Twitter at D two cents d e E two c
Speaker 1: e nts, and once again, if you want to hear
Speaker 1: more in depth conversations five days a week every week,
Speaker 1: you can join the Woke a F Nation on Patreon
Speaker 1: at patreon dot com slash woke af. I would love
Speaker 1: to see you in the comments over there as well.
Speaker 1: Power to the people and to all the people. Power,
Speaker 1: get woke and stay woke as fuck.