Hey, anti-vaxxers, since you’re all about freedom, try this on for size: Try spending your life with chronic bronchitis, recurring asthma, and occasional bouts of pneumonia? Imagine for just a moment that the chance you’ll die by drowning in your own body fluids is a good deal higher than it is for most people. How’s that for freedom?

Now spend a couple of minutes thinking about what that would feel like. Struggling to do one of those things we take for granted: taking a simple breath. Gasping desperately for air. Being hooked up to a CPAP machine because, if you aren’t, you might forget to breathe and die in your sleep. Or lying in a hospital bed with a tube stuck down your throat. I saw my father die like that.

I’m not there myself. Yet.

But because of your supposed “freedom” not to take a vaccine that’s been proven safe and effective, I could wind up there. So could a lot of other people. That’s not even counting patients with other life-threatening diseases who can’t get in to see doctors or find a hospital bed because medical providers are booked full up dealing with your largely preventable cases of COVID.

Maybe if you’d taken your medicine, this disease wouldn’t have mutated into Delta, then Omicron. Maybe we’d already all be a whole lot safer.

Jesus didn’t spread leprosy

But, no. All you care about are your precious “freedom” to place other people at risk, and you have the audacity to use your religion as a phony pretext for doing so. I guess you’ve forgotten that Jesus healed the blind, he didn’t go around pounding nails into their eyes. He healed lepers, too. He didn’t infect them with leprosy because he had the “freedom” to do so.

Want to talk about freedom? Surely, someone you worship as the Son of God ought to have a lot more freedom (not to mention understanding and discretion) in making such decisions than you do. Or do you suddenly think you’re omniscient? If so, I invite you to provide a cure for cancer. Oh, that’s right: You’re about making people sick, not better. Or tell me how many stars there are in the universe. Is that a problem for you, humble sinner?

Sorry, I misspoke. You’re not so humble at all, are you? You think your freedom is worth more than my life. Humility isn’t one of the seven holy virtues you practice. Remember, though: Pride goeth before a fall, but I’ll be damned if you’re going to pull me down with you into your raging COVID hell. (I’ll give you credit for one of those seven virtues: diligence. Except in your case, I prefer to call it stubbornness or pig-headedness.)

Don’t compare your “religious freedom” to infect others with a deadly disease with the desire of conscientious objectors to avoid military service. You may think they’re cowards who are abusing the system in the name of religion, but even if they are, what does that say about you? They don’t want to kill people. You don’t give a damn if you do.

I’m talking to you, Aaron Rodgers and Kyrie Irving, and Novak Djokovic.

And don’t try to tell me it’s a private decision, either. A lot of you people don’t even believe in a right to privacy. If you did, you wouldn’t be so obsessed with telling same-sex couples who they can sleep with, would you?

Howard Stern had this to say about Djokovic, the tennis player: “[Djokovic’s] statement was, ‘Getting vaccinated is a private decision and it shouldn’t be mandated.’ Well, stay away from other people. That’s like saying smoking is a private decision. Well, that’s true. But don’t smoke in my face, fucknut.”

Don’t blow COVID in my face, either, dumbass.

Affirmation is overrated

I’ve heard psychologists say we should be nice to anti-vaxxers. We should supposedly “validate whatever truth is in their arguments.”

Excuse me, but that’s just nuts. In today’s combative culture, you simple-minded dolts will take any validation (including ridiculous conspiracy theories) as permission to keep on doing exactly what they’re doing. Besides, it’s just not relevant to serve them up some milquetoast drivel like, “We’re all concerned about we put in our bodies.” Seriously? In a society that consumes Big Macs and Caramel Frappuccinos like they’re going out of style? Come on, now.

Do you think you have a medical condition that would make taking the vaccine dangerous? First off, you probably don’t: There are no known medical conditions that would absolutely prevent you from getting a COVID vaccine. But even if there were, why not just get a note from your doctor — and stay the hell away from me?

The pathetic irony of these anti-vax freedom mongers is that some of them say things like, “We all have to go some time,” and “It’s in God’s hands.” If that’s so, why are you so afraid of getting a shot? Even if, as you seem to (falsely) believe, the vaccine could kill you, what do you care? That’s in God’s hands, too. And if you’ve “got to go sometime” what’s the issue?

You think the vaccine is a bigger threat to you than the disease?

The math says otherwise. Definitively.

Place your bets

Out of the first 187 million people to take the vaccine, a grand total of three died — all from treatable blood clots. Compare that to the 5.5 million people who’ve died of COVID as of January 13, 2022, more than 866,000 of them in the United States. The last time I loved, 5.5 million was just a tad larger than 3. But who am I to judge?

Maybe some of you anti-vaxxers are betting people. Would you rather buy a lottery ticket or bet on a sure thing? Some people might choose the lottery ticket, because the payoff is a lot higher. But imagine for a moment that the payoff was the same. Now which one would you choose? You’d have to be brain dead to pick the lottery ticket, but that’s exactly what you’re doing. The payoff is the same: your life. But you’d still rather buy that lottery ticket by refusing the vaccine.

Are you batshit crazy?

Don’t answer that. It’s a rhetorical question, and the answer is self-evident.

The problem is, you’re not just taking a risk with your own life, you’re putting mine and millions of others at risk, too. When people die, that blood is on your hands. Maybe it’s manslaughter. Maybe it’s gross negligence. Dead people don’t care what you call it. They’re dead. And you can blame Dr. Fauci or the CDC all you want. The plain truth is, this is YOUR fault.

What I’m saying is that you can take that precious “freedom” of yours and shove it up your ass. I and millions of others have the freedom to LIVE. If you can’t respect that, I can’t respect you.