According to a recent report from the center for countering digital hate, the majority,
majority of COVID misinformation here in the United States has come from just 12 individuals,
12 people as they call the disinformation dozen are responsible for most of the
COVID misinformation, both about the disease and the vaccine here in the United States.
It's being shared on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, other social media platforms.
And here's just a taste of what's happening. On Facebook alone, the dozen are responsible
for 73% of all anti-vaccine content though the vaccines have been deemed safe and effective by
the US government and its regulatory agencies. And 95% of the COVID misinformation reported
on these platforms was not removed. So even though it was misinformation,
95% of it got to stay, and that kind of ties into what Joe Biden said this past weekend
about social media platforms being responsible for all this death.
And I'll get to that in just a little bit. But, but here's the thing
among the dozen are physicians that have embraced pseudoscience, a bodybuilder, a wellness blogger,
a religious zealot, and most notably Robert F. Kennedy Jr. the nephew of John F. Kennedy,
who also, I'm sure long-term Ring of Fire fans know used to be the co-host of Ring of Fire radio.
In fact, Bobby founded Ring of Fire with Mike Papantonio. I fundamentally, by the way, disagree
with Bobby's complete take on vaccines. You Know, I, I do not believe that any of the science is
actually out there to back these things up. This is something he and I have disagreed on many times
in the past. He is no longer affiliated, by the way, with Ring of Fire, he left us many years
ago. Hold no ill will towards him, but this is dangerous. I do believe what he is saying out
there is very dangerous. And I do believe based on the available evidence that it's also not true.
But back to the other point, right, Biden came out this past weekend, tells us that social media
platforms are out there actively killing people, effectively, by allowing this misinformation to
live out there. And then the administration, you know, Jen Psaki, I believe it was, you know, said,
maybe we gotta remove this. And that's, that's where things got a little iffy, right?
When the government is openly considering like maybe we need to crack down and force these
social media companies to remove these posts. That's the slippery slope, right? That's the
thing we have to avoid. No, the government cannot come in and tell these platforms,
you have to remove these posts. That's when you do get into the government censorship part of it.
But something also does have to be done.
So what's the solution here because we can't have the government censoring
social media platforms. We cannot. That is absolutely, that's not even a slippery slope.
That's a straight cliff that we would all be jumping off of if we allowed that to happen.
So that's not a viable option. That's a terrifying option that would result in mass censorship,
that would basically sway depending on which party controls the government.
So we can't have that, but at the same time, we can't have people like the disinformation dozen,
as the report calls them, out there spreading this kind of misinformation. All we can hope
is that these social media platforms can do the right thing and they take it upon themselves to
actually do the fact checking and remove the false information. This is a matter of public health
and people are dying because of this misinformation.
I've been fully vaccinated since March, since early March.
I do not have 5G radiating out of my body. The vaccine didn't give me autism.
The vaccine didn't make me magnetic. The second dose of it made me feel the next day,
like I had a hangover. Took a lot of fluids, some ibuprofen and I was fine.
And based on the anecdotal evidence I've seen from other people, that's pretty much the same
thing they experienced. Have there been people with underlying conditions that have had adverse
reactions? Sure. And that's why I'm going to say what I always say in these segments. If you have
questions about the safety, if you have questions about the efficacy, if you have questions about
any underlying conditions you may have and how the vaccine could affect them, talk to your doctor.
Don't listen to people on Facebook. Don't listen to people on Twitter who say, do or do not do
this. Talk to a medical professional, and then talk to a second medical professional if you
still have questions or want a second opinion. But this thing is far too serious to listen to people
on Facebook who read a little bit of propaganda at one point and can't get it out of their heads.
Talk to people who understand what's happening and make your decision based on that.