I don’t think it is news to anyone that most anti-vaxxers are hateful, loathsome people. I’ve been swimming in their various cesspits for more than a few years now, but I saw something today that took my breath away. It started out as standard offensive, obnoxious anti-vax ‘fun’, but it wasn’t long before it went even further downhill and people’s true natures were on display. A friend of Meryl Dorey and well known supporter of the discredited Australian Vaccination Skeptics Network, Rixta Francis, (who can be seen here singing her anti-vaccine song to Australia’s health ministers), started a discussion about who would be deserving of a Joseph Goebbels award for spreading vaccine “propaganda”. To appreciate how offensive it is to suggest vaccine advocates be awarded something in the name of Joseph Goebbels, you can read about him here.
As a side note, (13/09/2015), to see how ironic it is that Meryl Dorey is so oblivious to deliberately ignores, and condones this kind of behaviour while simultaneously claiming it doesn’t happen, you can read this post, but here is a snippet from her post and evidence of her friendship with the vile Rita Francis.
“I can honestly say that I’d be shocked”
Friend of Meryl Dorey
Anyway, back to Rita and her idea of fun.
“Nominations for the Joseph Goebbels award”
People dutifully made their ‘nominations’. So far the ‘nominees’ are:
Reasonable Hank: 1 vote
Tony Abbot: 1 vote
Kidspot: 1 vote
Stop the Australian (anti) Vaccination Network: 1 vote
Bill Gates: 1 vote
Claire Harvey: 1 vote
Mia Freedman / Mamamia: 3 votes
Toni and Dave McCaffery: 1 vote
Light for Riley: 6 votes
Yes, you read that right, they ‘nominated’ 4 parents who had lost their babies to whooping cough, then devoted themselves to awareness campaigns in an effort to prevent other families suffering the same loss.
Now, if you think that it can’t get any worse than that, meet Angie White. She ‘nominated’ Light for Riley, I will let her nomination speak for itself because quite frankly I don’t have the words for this:
“Light for Riley. They went that one step further and scored a dead baby for their argument.”
“Light for Riley. They went that one step further and scored a dead baby for their argument.”
I thought I had seen all that the anti-vax movement had to offer. I thought I had seen these ghouls at their worst, I thought that as a seasoned observer of Meryl Dorey and the anti-vaccine movement, they couldn’t really impact me in such a way anymore, but right now I feel physically ill. As bad as it was that Ms White made such a heartless suggestion, three people: Temeaka Bianca Stuart, Debra LynCraft, and Elizabeth Summer Kaye came along and liked it. Even more disturbing is that of the 3000+ members of the group where this took place, not one person called them out for being so heartless. Not one. Not even two admins of the group, Courtney Hebberman and Luke E Lawless (otherwise known as Luke O’Hehir, owner of the Vaccine Free Australia website), who preferred to join in rather than put a stop to it. Anti-vaxxers routinely demand to be respected as loving parents who have done their due diligence by researching vaccines googling anti-vax nonsense that confirms their preconceived ideas. Sensible people routinely refuse to regard them as nothing more than scientifically illiterate google warriors or conspiracy theorists. Here we see another common trait of the anti-vaxxer; heartless cruelty to other human beings. I have witnessed this kind of behaviour from anti-vaxxers far to many times for it not to be considered the norm for these people. I didn’t think my opinion of them could sink any lower, but thanks to Angie White it just did. I include the ‘nominations’ for you to see. 
Edit: 4/8/2015
I was advised that a handful of people in the group that the above came from noticed this post and I’d like to congratulate the two people who condemned the cruel comments. Then along came Breana King (aka Breana Stanley) with the following comment. I’m sure she meant it with love and light, being a person who loves children and is the opposite of heartless. Even with her interesting choice of emoticon, perhaps her finger slipped and hit the gun instead of a heart one?
Edit: 12/8/2015
I keep being sent more screen captures of anti-vaxxers being cruel about Riley and his family. If I were to put them all here we would be here all day, but Reasonable Hank has a good collection you can look at too. I’m just publishing the worst of it, so, meet Anna Victoria Rodgers (AKA Miss Eco Glam) who recently saw fit to make the following comment about a bereaved mother who is devoting herself to trying to prevent other parents and babies suffering, then suggest that the baby she lost may not have even existed:
“wow riley’s mum is a fricken bitch- that is if Riley even existed”
Anna is the author of a book titled “Toxic World, Toxic People: The Essential Guide to Health, Happiness, Parenting and Conscious Living”. She might need to refer back to the section in her book about “improving our relationships with one another”. I don’t think her attitude, or behaviour here improves anything, except her heartless anti-vaxxer street cred.
Melissa Dunn agrees and wants to swear at the grieving mother because, (I can only assume from the ‘lol’), she thinks that would be funny. “Isn’t she I don’t care if I get blocked I wanna go on and tell her a big fat f u lol”
Some more gems from Anna Rodgers (she altered her social media name and pictures in an attempt to avoid the outrage directed at her for her vile comments, then played the victim).
Conspiracy theorising about the passing of Riley Hughes:
Trying to justify calling his mother a bitch: 
Lastly, blaming the mothers of dying babies for their tragedy, because, you know….. if those bad mothers had a c-section, got vaccinated or neglected to breastfeed, their babies must deserve to die.
The more I look, the worse it gets. Here she is sharing the disgusting anti-vax theory that Shaken Baby Syndrome and multiple broken bones in babies are actually caused by vaccines. In other words, defending baby abusers and killers.
Update 24/8/2015 I just can’t fathom this kind of cruelty. I really can’t, yet it continues. On August 19th Anna made a public announcement on her Facebook page about the attention she had received on social media for the comments outlined above. She starts our accusing people who were outraged by her cruelty of being “professional trolls who want to hurt her”. Sorry Anna, you aren’t that interesting or important. We are just people who thought your comments were out of order.
She moves on to pretend that her awful comment were really ok, because they were confined to a group of 3000 fellow anti-vaxxers that is known to leak like a sieve. Then a garden variety anti-vaccine rant with little, actually no, basis in reality and more accusations about the family of little Riley Hughes and the circumstances surrounding his passing. Seriously Anna, DIG UP! Your every utterance is making you look more and more like a heartless ghoul.
Then the commenters came along in loud support and reinforced the anti-vaccine nonsense, go read it all for yourself if you can take it. Just nauseating. I’ll just post one of Anna’s stand out comments here for those who can’t stomach reading through the whole post.
Update 27/10/2015
In yet another cruel discussion about the life of Riley Hughes, his family and their motivations which Reasonable Hank has documented here Anna Rodgers raises her ugly head, yet again claiming to be the victim of ‘trolling’ when people objected to her heartless and cruel comments. She then indicates that she does not regret her cruel comments and speculates further about Riley’s death.
She even rolls out the tired old line about people dying after vaccines. Anti-vaxxers often make this claim, yet they have never been able to produce a single case. Never. If they want sympathy for such things, they need to prove that it happens, yet they can’t because it just doesn’t happen. All these “deaths from vaccines” are pure fantasy and its time anti-vaxxers either put up, or shut up. This is the kind of wild claim that keeps them on the fringes of society, regarded as village idiots.
The View From The Hills 
Luke O’Hehir made veiled threats to hurt my young children, in the very same Facebook group, in response to me “attacking” (exposing and challenging) antivaxxers. Charming guy, not. https://www.dropbox.com/s/v06e91a57io5d9i/veiled%20threat.png?dl=0
I had no idea that there was this relatively new controversy and astonishing amount of misinformation and hatred being spread about vaccination. I had taken it for granted that people were vaccinated in the first world in gratefulness that they no longer had to fight diseases that killed our ancestors, and as their contribution to a civil society. Seek and promote the truth and keep shining!
Very sickening. Its incredible that these people want the rest of the world to think they are ‘educated’, ‘respectful’, and should be given ‘respect’ for their misinformed stance on vaccination.
I wonder if they realise that providing malicious posts such as this and nominating parents whose children have died thanks to a vaccine preventable disease makes them look all the more like gormless idiots…much like the mugshot of the one who suggested ‘Light for Riley’? Probably not as they think in their tiny minds that they are pure genius for dreaming up such a ‘game’.
I feel for the parents who lost a child due to a VPD and just want to prevent other deaths, and they have have deal with that level of hate.
Antivaxxers are horrid. They’re obviously Autism Phobic. I’ve seen lots of unspeakable things. A few nights ago they were laughing at a parent who posted on another site for occasional babysitter fully vaccinated preferably older with no kids to keep away germs as best as possible because their child has CF. Tonight they were bullying a provaxxer, laughing about the provaxxers lack of funds. Talking about calling cps, etc. They have bullied a child doxxed people, cyberstalking, saying racist remarks, anti semantic, degrading the disabled. Here’s an article with an example http://jezebel.com/meet-the-new-dangerous-fringe-of-the-anti-vaccination-1713438567
Courtney Hebberman aka Foolan Devi is sick and deranged. She constantly talks about “cunt” too. I blocked her ages ago. Just another “leader” in the anti-vax movement.
Shared on my FB. This is disgusting.
A fundamental property of denialism is that these people simply cannot and will not accept the fact that they are wrong under any circumstances, regardless of how overwhelming the evidence to the contrary may be. They invest the entirety of their self-view in their cognitive dissidence. this is a fundamental failure of their education, wherever it came from, because they simply don’t place any value on the idea that changing your views in the light of new and better evidence is a GOOD thing, indeed a noble thing to do. Their illiteracy in science and reasoning is a reflection of the direct failure of their schools and their parents, and their parents failure is due to the failures in their own education. And the more you invest in your cognitive dissidence, the further lengths you’ll go to in order to protect it, even to the point where it harms others, as the antivax movement so clearly does. Society needs to start placing value upon, and emphasizing the nobility of changing your viewpoint and ways in the light of new and better evidence.
Pingback: What happens when you have an anti vaxer with a guitar… – Anti Vax Wall of Shame
These people have spent so long lurking down the rabbit hole that they have totally lost all ability to be rational. They truly, genuinely believe their views are morally correct, but it goes furhter – they also exhibit levels of hate speech that would make a KKK member blush with embarrasment.
What vile disgusting human beings. These people are a different breed. Great piece; exposing these horrible people.
I can’t wrap my mind around how terrible some people are. I just can’t.
Unspeakably evil.
Pingback: Anti-vaccinationists attack the parents and the memorial page of a baby boy | reasonablehank
Pingback: Sydney antivaxer attacks Young Australian of the Year (WA) nominee Cath Hughes | reasonablehank
Pingback: The despicable cruelty of the awful anti-vaccination movement | reasonablehank
Pingback: Anti-vaccinationists attack the parents and the memorial page of a baby boy | reasonable hank