jenny mccarthy wants your kid to get measles: autism, vaccines, and stupid idiots

almond butter is better anyway

if I can avoid being responsible for subjecting another human to trauma, illness, or in extreme cases death, by taking the easy step of omitting a substance from my kid's lunch, I see absolutely no reason in the world not to.

FREEEDOM! That's why. I'm picturing Alex in SF now as a one of those dudes carrying an AK around Wal Mart because fuck you, I have a right to.

http://blogs.dallasobserver.com/unfairpark/KoryWatkinsGrocery.jpg

I hope that dude is wearing flip flops.

pictures of people who are not gr8080.

Anti-vaxxers much closer to the WHY WON'T YOU THINK OF THESE POOR PEANUT AFFLICTED CHILDREN DON'T KILL THEM rather than this is overblown everyone should get a grip about this nut nonsense, but hey whatevs.

I'm just surprised that there's not a vigorous "vaccination causes peanut allergy" movement.

oh wait

http://www.thedoctorwithin.com/allergies/vaccines-and-the-peanut-allergy-epidemic/

The irony is that one of the leading peanut allergy theories is that we are actually too safe and careful with what we feed our kids!

I don't know man. This seems pretty level headed to me:

The school is saying that nuts (peanuts are legumes but whatever) are a threat to the safety of their students. That's an accurate assessment. Even if the threat is rare, the cost of eliminating that threat is a minor inconvenience, so there's no good reason to take the risk.

Loving nuts and nut butters so much that you don't care about the safety of your kid's classmates seems like the more overblown stance.

What makes you think that's an "accurate assessment"? Most of what I've read indicates it's not, but a hysterical overreaction.

How many kids do you think take a loaded gun to school in a given day, and how small a percentage of kids die in a given day because of a loaded gun that a kid brought to school? Very, very small. So I really don't get why it's such a big deal if I pack a gun in my kid's lunch.

You are an idiot.

But I think formally the issue is that there's a tradeoff of the form "minor inconvenience for many --> reduction/elimination of major harm to a very few." There are lots of tradeoffs like that and I don't think there's much rhyme or reason to which ones we think of as "obviously you accept the inconvenience" and which ones we think of as "it would be absurd to accept the inconvenience."

Like, if we all drove 5% less, or resolved never to drive when we were tired, or whatever, we would be taking on only a minor inconvenience, and fewer people would get killed under the wheels of our cars. But we don't really strive to do that.

I don't actually think vaccines fit that well, because the potential harm from a large unvaccinated segment of the population is a lot bigger than any possible harm from a world without peanut-free zones, unless I have misunderstood the numbers completely.

In the end there's probably no principled way to think about these questions, you just have to have some vague sense about how minor the minor inconvenience is and how major the major harm is and how few the very few are, and do your best.

xpost The thing is, it may be an overreaction in your estimation, but it's hardly hysterical. It's actually been a very gradual, very reasonable ramp-up.

BRB going to eat all the peanuts and peanut butter in the world to spare everyone this debate.

Fortunately for you, peanut butter in much of the world is considered kind of gross and weird.

Skippy for life.

I ate alone every single day of my education, sharing nothing. So, peanut butter.

xpost The thing is, it may be an overreaction in your estimation, but it's hardly hysterical. It's actually been a very gradual, very reasonable ramp-up.
--Josh in Chicago

I don't think the question of whether this is "hysterical" or "reasonable" are as cut and dried as your post implies. Also probably depends a lot on where you are.

Reminds me of the story my mom tells about her first few months in the States after emigrating from Cuba in '61. The refugee center gave everyone huge blocks of government cheese and tins of peanut butter. She and the family were like, "uhhh..." Not long after they made all kinds of shit: shakes, yogurt, ice cream. But never to spread on sandwiches.

It's also important to teach kids as early as possible to trust no one and nothing.

That's why my kid gets the gun in the lunchbox.

Peanut butter and bullets, fuckers.

http://www.womenshealthmag.com/files/images/0903-water-pistol-peanuts-300.jpg

man, this thread got derailed, didn't it?

in other news, i think i'm going to make a banana snake with some peanut butter.

shake, banana SHAKE.

What makes you think that's an "accurate assessment"? Most of what I've read indicates it's not, but a hysterical overreaction.

Links or STFU.

Here's the CDC: http://www.cdc.gov/HealthyYouth/foodallergies/
Here's a the Canadian society of allergy and immunology (pdf): http://www.anaphylaxis.ca/files/Anaphylaxis%20in%20Schools%203rd%20Edition2015.pdf

None of that reads like a hysterical overreaction to me.

Despite the knee jerk libertarianism itt, there are no laws or even regulations making schools peanut free. It's just much easier to manage the problem at the door, by excluding peanuts altogether, than manage a series of close calls and potentially dangerous situations after the fact.

Alex, this is a serious and non-confrontational question: is this hypothetical for you or do you have a kid in a peanut-free school?

I have a kid but she's 14 months old so it's not something I have to worry about now (so far she's not allergic to any food, either), so my stance is largely hypothetical for me at this point. Just more of a "If confronted with this situation it's what i would do."

My kid is in a nut free school. He's also four though.

I think the CDC recommendations are all sensible. I also don't think they are recommending a blanket ban on nuts.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wEb5a-I0kyg

shake, banana SHAKE.

― I dunno. (amateurist), Tuesday, February 3, 2015 10:47 AM (20 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Man, early Lush song demos were weird.

Carl, Plasmon, et al OTM. I love peanuts to death and am grateful not to be allergic to them, but there are a couple of foods I am mildly allergic to, and totally see the sense in managing the problem at the door.

Alex in SF doing the school run:

http://www.thehistoryblog.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/12/Mr.-Peanut-Goes-to-War-1943.jpg

nuts (peanuts are legumes but whatever)

The pedant in me lolled the day I bought 1x packet of peanuts which all have to say "contains nuts" (1. yes it does, that's why I bought it; 2. in fact it doesn't even contain nuts, they are legumes!) and 1x packet of mixed almonds and brazil nuts which instead said "may contain traces of nuts", I guess because it didn't contain peanuts, which are not even nuts, etc

For some reason I find peanut/legume pedantry acceptable but if someone starts on "technically blackberries, raspberries and strawberries are not berries but bananas and oranges are" I will get all "if botanists think the word 'berry' doesn't apply to fruit we have been calling berries since the 1300s but to various completely different fruit then it would seem they are using the word wrong and should find a different one"

sorry, this did not add anything to the raging debate

Whoa, didn't know that about bananas.

i thought bananas were a herb or some such bollocks

I am dying to have one of these rn:

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/0/00/LD_Nutty_Bars.JPG

my... my god

http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/thom-tillis-washing-hands-toilet

Wrapping up the Q&A, the moderator joked to Tillis, "I'm not sure I'm gonna shake your hand."

I have wondered if nut allergies were on the rise over the last 20 years or what cuz I don't remember any of this shit when I was a kid, but now that I'm involved in the school system it seems fairly common. My daughter's elementary school is not nut-free, but her preschool was. It wasn't a big deal, we just made her almond butter-and jelly sandwiches instead. More annoyingly, her preschool was also mustard-free - and mustard is in fucking EVERYTHING.

What on EARTH is mustard in?

sorry, not trying to be all like that, but I mean, I like to think of myself as the kind of guy who reads his ingredient labels.

mayonnaise, lunchmeats of all kinds (salami, etc.), crackers, bread, tomato sauce I could go on and on

(mustard seed incl in definition of mustard here)

http://splitsider.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/04/vaunnies_mustardayonnaise.jpg

ok, I don't think I've ever seen mustard in bread or crackers (but wondering now if it's just included under "spices"), but I can understand the other ones you listed.

xp lol

truly, the kingdom of god

Things we have had to be wary of (at least), if not had outright forbidden: peanuts, tree nuts, gluten (for celiacs), strawberries, mangos, mushrooms, milk (allergies, not just lactose intolerant). Per the anecdotes, I don't know a single adult with any serious food allergies (save maybe a scattered shellfish allergy here or there, which in a couple of cases have come and gone). Same with bee allergies. But there a bunch of kids I know with at least minor issues with some of the above, sometimes life-threatening issues. Sometimes multiple issues. And yeah we're not talking dozens of kids, just a few here and there. The only time it has been a real bummer is when I want Chinese food and certain friends can't come along. Also, gluten free is a real buzzkill, but the two parents I know with celiacs kid (which has also steadily been on the rise, fyi) never complain and always send along gluten free snacks, pizzas, treats and whatnot to parties or whatever.

I know three kids with type 1 diabetes, too, and that seems like another thing on the rise, mysteriously, especially in kids. And that shit is super serious 24/7. And don't get me started on how the drug companies fuck these poor kids and families over, making them pay more in this country than they do on other countries, and devising these stupid vertically integrated systems where if one component is changed, then everything has to be changed. And so on. I don't have any anti-vax friends, but when your kid is suddenly diagnosed with an incurable chronic illness, the conspiracies start to come out. It's in the food, it's in the environment ...