Aparna Nair

a tux cat logging onto my laptop

never stops being weird how much people will deduce about you from a single post they didn’t even read correctly. anyways, thanks for all the kind words friends. i appreciate it, and so does ms. perfect princess.

I really don't like posting about this stuff so often and I hesitated when I saw this earlier this evening. The timing of this isn't a coincidence. Our PM was clearly stung that people have said this week that he lacks principles. That's what this is.

Yes. We run the very real risk of intensifying the problem if we don’t meet people where they are. Yes, its infuriating. Yes, its a violation of the social contract. Yes, it endangers all of us. AND there are many people who are moveable on this issue. AND we can be a part of helping to move them.

Mohammed Jamil huddling beside a tent in Gaza

Mohammed Jamil and his children standing in front of tents in Gaza

URGENT
We are so cold 🥶💔
We are so cold 🥶💔
We are so cold 🥶💔
Our children are soaked, blankets are wet, and nights are freezing.
No income… donations have stopped 😢
I urgently need €150 for a tent 🙏
Any help could save my children 💔
Verified: @mommunism.bsky.social
chuffed.org/project/1565...

'We are so cold 💔😭
We are so cold 💔😭
We are so cold 💔😭
I need 150$ to buy a tent for my family 💔
Any donation, no matter how small, could save a life my family 🙏💔
@mommunism.bsky.social'

Baraa has lost two little daughters to Israel's genocide. Please help her keep her remaining son Ibrahim alive. Bluesky keeps deleting & suspending her so she's been unable to post for herself. Gaza is completely cut off again, & they urgently need help:

Jamal's parents are desperate for help, & donations are v slow. Jamal has asthma and diabetes, & is in critical condition. He desperately needs treatment, & his family can't afford it. They need your help, & are being blocked by both the admin & users of the site. Please help them survive genocide:

Dear @mommunism.bsky.social @dgmeek92.bsky.social @disabilitystor1.bsky.social Mohammed has asked for a share if you have time. Thank you so much.

Waylon Jennings-Yutani: Like, you know what happened last time right? We just ordered the morons to get their kids vaccinated. We didn’t win the hearts and minds of the world’s shittiest idiots. Waylon Jennings-Yutani: what is the ‘history’ of vaccination? O brilliant historian?

The rage and fear people feel about vaccines and public health might be better directed at the powerful who let this happen, not random people on the internet (me, etc) who made the mistake of trying to explain that telling all anti-vax people they’re stupid and evil isn’t a winning strategy.

Okay. I’m sure that will work as a public health comms approach, and is not actually contradictory to everything we know from decades of research. Your personal feelings about those parents are really not material here. Or mine.

Vaccination has always been a very intimate physical thing, it’s about anxieties about that intimacy with a stranger (often experienced as a violation of bodily autonomy), fears of sharp things, and all that follows. In the US, anti-vax ideas based around distrust of the state are deeply entrenched

This is an unbelievably bad faith (borderline illiterate) read of this thread that betrays a deep lack of understanding of the public health space & science communication broadly.

A buck wild character attack on someone who continues to be strong ph advocate.

FOH

Signed,

An epidemiologist

Acknowledging that people are going to have a question and answering that with grace and understanding (even if you don't think they deserve it!) is more likely to get a positive response than a lecture.

Recognizing a negative reality is not the same as approving of it. That's how a child thinks.

The official position of government health services cannot be “you’re a fucking idiot for being anti vax” even if they believe it (they do). They need to be the place confused parents go for reliable info after *we* say “you’re a fucking idiot for being anti vax, look at this website”

The only way to break through these cultural and information bubbles is through personal relationships and (I recommend @katharinehayhoe.com's Saving Us as a starting point)

You just can't scold people into changing their minds in climate or public health. Threatening people is unsustainable either

Decades of research by @yaleclimatecomm.bsky.social shows that there are at most one-tenth of Americans that are dismissive of climate change science or. There are roughly a third of folks who are doubtful or disengaged though. That's the difference between a supermajority for the issue or a wash.

To quote the very wise person who once gave @kendrawrites.com advice, "would you rather be right, or effective?"

Climate and public health communicators like myself and @publichealthguy1.bsky.social understand that the knowledge deficit model (aka telling people more facts) does not change minds.

There are too many people who cosplay the worst in situations they’re not in. Are there people who think there are poisons in vaccines, yes. Are there many more people who go down dangerous rabbit holes who just need reassurance? Yes.

Just sorry it turned out like this; it’s clear some people are too angry to be able to understand the nuance of what you were trying to say.

whew someone doesn’t know about theories of behavior change or motivational interviewing and IT SHOWS

"it is easy to see why parents can be fooled--"
OH SO YOU THINK IT'S OKAY TO BE FOOLED?? CURIOUS. THAT IS BASICALLY SAYING YOU'RE ANTI VAX YOURSELF 😠😤

also: the pressure to 'not be a bad mom' to the extent that someone raising the question of potential harm --along with someone else's enrichment (Pharma?!) --might give a parent pause about vax. ableism, and the sense of 'ownership' folks feel about their kids, appears to be a part of that too.

This

“These people are so stupid! Why don’t they just listen to doctors?!”

Doctors trained in public health and patient education carefully explain why and how to address the problem

“Whatever! They clearly suck, that’s why!”

im going to have a stroke at this rate

Also, what do you mean, :"The sooner it will be over"??

Like again, it's really easy to come here on this internet and dunk on people and yell at people. But that is not going to solve anything. And apparently the answer here for this person is to just give up and let people die. Thank goodness for public health people who keep on trying.

This is such short-sighted thinking. What about the babies who are too young to get vaccinated? The immunocompromised for whom vaccines are less effective? Breakthrough cases of vaccinated people. Public Health officials cannot give up so easily on trying to educate people as this person can.

i should have just done this today

“I think you mean…”

Homie let me stop you right there for this block.

Watching Murder, She Wrote and Jessica is getting an honorary degree. This episode, a man is fighting to be "assistant department head" of the English department. He's being denied the "promotion" because he hasn't published enough.