ACTION ALERT! Stop Times Square Anti-Vax Ads
UPDATE: I’ve added new email addresses for executives at CBS Outdoor. If you’ve already sent an email, you can send another one to these addresses.
Now through April 28. Times Square. Mercola and the National Vaccine Information Center are running an anti-vaccine “PSA” on CBS Outdoor’s JumboTron on 42nd street. And the ad will be seen by hundreds of thousands of people.
Mercola and the NVIC are determined to convince Americans that vaccines are dangerous and optional, that more harm is done by administering vaccines than by letting infectious disease ravage a population.
And that message needs to be stopped. Especially right now.
Right now:
- A measles outbreak has hospitalized up to a half dozen young children in Minnesota. This outbreak is directly linked to Andrew Wakefield’s hoax of an anti-MMR study.
- Blue Mountain School (PreK – 8 ) in Roanoke, Va, which does not require it’s students to be vaccinated, is closed due to a whooping cough outbreak. The small school of 45 students has at least 30 confirmed cases between students and staff.
- Thirty unvaccinated high school students and two pregnant faculty members have been removed from a school in Utah after one unvaccinated teen contracted measles, putting the school’s population at risk.
- Over the past four years, almost 77,000 people have been infected and 710 have died from vaccine-preventable diseases.
Right now we need to be promoting vaccines. Right now real people are at risk because of unfounded vaccine fears. Right now measles should be eradicated in the US.
Right now this ad could cost people their lives.
I’ve attempted to contact CBS myself. They have not yet responded. (They have, however, emailed me the opportunity to take a survey to win an iPad. Not kidding. )
Now it’s your turn. You need to contact CBS; you need to ask them to refuse to run this ad.
Please sign this petition at Change.org.
If you are feeling especially ambitious, sign the petition and email CBS Outdoor Customer Relations and CBS Outdoor Communications VP and the Boards of Directors for both CBS and CBS Outdoor to let them know how you feel.
And Tweet @CBSOutdoor and use #VaxCBS to tell them that these ads are unacceptable.
Hopefully, CBS will understand that encouraging the spread of deadly diseases is at least as embarrassing as employing a self-professed Fucking Rock Star From Mars with tiger blood.
11670
7195
4771
27 Comments
lexicakes
04.08.2011
While we’re at it, maybe we can get CBS News to fire Sharyl Attkisson?
scribe999
04.08.2011
awwwww crap…I walk by it every day
mrmisconception
04.08.2011
We may also “target” selected actors on their top rated shows to ask for help. I’m sure we can find out which ones are woo and which one’s aren’t.
Top rated CBS shows are;
NCIS
NCIS: Los Angeles
The Mentalist
Criminal Minds
CSI
Two and a Half MenBig Bang Theory
60 Minutes
Survivor
Blue Bloods
The Good Wife
and
Undercover Boss
All in the top 20 shows this season
Also the news division and any of their big name reporters.
Also top stars in their sports department.
Also late night shows.
CBS also owns Showtime, some of their biggest shows are; Dexter, Weeds, Californication, Nurse Jackie, The Big C, Episodes, and Penn & Teller: Bullshit! just finished it’s run on Showtime and P&T have had at least one Showtime special since.
I suggest we find skeptically friendly folk amongst these shows and inform them of the situation, we may be able to marshall some support beyond just us.
Nobody may want to help us, but when I tweeted Roger Ebert when we targeted AMC it got retweeted and that could lead somewhere, plus you never know.
Elyse
04.08.2011
@mrmisconception:
How does something so informative and awesome become distractingly hilarious with one strikethrough?
mrmisconception
04.08.2011
@Elyse
It’s all in the tiger blood.
Scopes Monkey Matt
04.08.2011
Thanks, Elyse. NYC Skeptics mobilizing as I type….
Bubba
04.08.2011
Sorry I can’t sign the petition. The dumbfucks consider IE8 to be IE6 and won’t allow access.
ZenMonkey
04.08.2011
Thanks for alerting us to this. I have signed, tweeted, and (politely) emailed. Hoping they change their minds like AMC sorta did.
gregladen
04.08.2011
signed, tweeted, facebooked.
rlquinn1980
04.08.2011
Didn’t / Aren’t Penn&Teller leave/ing Showtime?
Gabrielbrawley
04.08.2011
Signed
Skeptiverse
04.09.2011
Isn’t NECSS on this weekend might be a good group to mobilize
Elyse
04.09.2011
@Skeptiverse:
Who could I contact that would be a big name at NECSS? Are any of those skeptic ladies from that one blog there?
Buzz Parsec
04.09.2011
@Elyse: I’m not a very good organizer, but I thought for a while I had a few takers on going over to Time Sq and trashing the place, but everyone I asked said they weren’t quite drunk enough. Maybe tomorrow when we’re all sober.
jaspen
04.09.2011
OMG! All the Times Square Ad says is “Know The Risks” and that you have a choice. I have to question the judgement of anyone who as a problem with that.
Skeptiverse
04.09.2011
@Elyse I believe that George Hrab is the MC (I have tweeted him the link) and shouldn’t a certain @RebeccaWatson be there along with her podcasting buddies ( I won’t as traveling from Australia while fun is not cost effective
)
Skeptiverse
04.09.2011
Wow that went a bit over my head didn’t it (looks around sheepishly) especially seeing as though Rebecca has the post just below this one saying she is at NECSS
VentureFree
04.09.2011
I don’t think you all understand what’s at stake here. We’re talking about autism here, guys. Autism! I think 710 people dying of a demonstrably preventable disease is worth the possibility that there might be the hint of a chance of maybe preventing one case of autism, right? I mean, get your priorities in order, people.
Kaloikagathoi
04.10.2011
@VentureFree: I think a lot of people would rather 710 strangers died before their own child had to suffer. People might not want to admit it, and would try to come up with some “evidence” to obfuscate this fact. But if someone convinced you that you could keep your next child from becoming autistic, wouldn’t you want to try it?
michigandawn
04.10.2011
The video isn’t that bad, but the problem would be that people will actually contact Mercola and NVIC thinking they are getting valid information instead of crap. If the CDC or Every Child by 2 were up there as contacts for info, I would have no problem with it.
Science Mom
04.11.2011
The advert itself appears innocuous enough but NVIC’s and Mercola’s websites are clearly displayed. They are inarguably anti-vaccine and spread ridiculous disinformation.
Alterjess
04.11.2011
“Know the risks” is a weasel-word phrase equivalent to “strengths and weaknesses [of evolution]” from the creationists. It doesn’t mean “talk to your doctor before the flu shot if your child has an egg allergy” – it means “BIG PHARMA IS TRYING TO POISON YOUR ADORABLE BABY.” It’s a dangerous lie couched in warm fuzzy language and I’m practically having a rage blackout just thinking about it.
Elyse
04.11.2011
Thanks, everyone!
FYI, I’ve added new email addresses to contact. I now have the addresses for more CBS execs and the board of directors for CBS Outdoor.
Keep kicking ass!
LarianLeQuella
04.11.2011
Is there any chance that we can prosecute all the anti-vax pro-disease nutters for involuntary manslaughter every time someone dies from a preventable disease?
Kimbo Jones
04.11.2011
@jaspen: By pointing out “risk”, they make it very clear what “choice” they want people to make. Mercola and NVIC are not good sources of information and this ad may point people in their direction for a veritable cornucopia of dangerous nonsense.
mandydax
04.11.2011
I signed it, but just to let you know, there’s an error in the letter: pertussis is a bacterial infection, not viral.
I hope they pull these ads soon. I love to see it when corporations act in the interest of humanity instead of their profit margin.
mofmars333
04.19.2011
This is pathetic & ridiculous.
It’s interesting how pharma can advertise on TV even during children’s programming, desensitizing the viewers (Including children) with the facts of “it can cause, death, cancer, this ailment, that etc..) yet a message of informing individuals they can have a choice in regards to their healthcare is such a threat.
There are no trackbacks to display at this time.