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Comment Re:Sometimes there are reasons (Score 1) 1051

I am not saying you are. What I am pointing out is that the laws that would have to be made to accomplish what you advocate are inflexible things. It's either you comply with the law or you are violating the law. Fear of violating the law will bring about the unintended consequences I am talking about. It's not even law now and we faced physicians that either wouldn't see my children unless I followed the state recommendations to the letter, and others that demanded that we be isolated in a small room away from anyone else while on their premises.

Comment Re:Sometimes there are reasons (Score 1) 1051

I have concerns for medical reasons for delivery via egg protein because of serious allergy issues. My youngest son was moved to the specialized formula because my wife was down to eating Lamb, Apples, Rice and Peaches because that was all he didn't react to that we could find. My older son has been tested and is highly allergic to egg protein, soy, peanut, pea, avocados and bananas (that is not counting foods he never has eaten out of concern of allergies). So every vaccine that has that carrier causes them to react, and they have to go on a regiment of medicine to counter the side-effects.

I also have concerns for theological reasons regarding the vaccines derived from two fetuses aborted for medical reasons in the 60's. As I stated before, I accepted the vaccines because I feel at least then we are honoring the sacrifice.

The schedule that we are using is a vaccine a month as long as there is no serious reactions. Under the advisement of the physician, we delayed some vaccines in order to give time for their bodies to become stronger before administering them. Ultimately it is something that you need to discuss with their doctor's, and longer than the 15 seconds they usually want to give you. We are blessed by finding a great physician that has severe food allergies and understands the fears and concerns we have, and goes above the board in both educating and advocating for our children.

Comment Re:Sometimes there are reasons (Score 1) 1051

Just because the fetuses are over 40 years old doesn't make me feel better about the wrong done to them. We are going to probably disagree because for me this boils down to the question of when life begins and what I believe theologically. At the end of the day for me, those fetuses were people that had their life terminated by someone else.

I am not looking for a debate on the issue, it's far more complicated and messy than either of us with be able to sort out with a black and white answer. Again, I cannot imagine the mental anguish that would be brought upon facing such a choice or definitively answer how to deal with each situation that brings someone to face that decision. I ultimately fall on the view that giving someone almost no chance to survive is still better than not giving them that chance at all. I think we all should give pause to the fact that we benefit from someone given the later, if for anything to honor the sacrifice of their life.

What I can say is that I believe and practice a religion that teaches to choose "sacrifice" over "personal comfort". That the greatest thing to do is to lay down your own life for another. To treat others how you wish to be treated. Those commands of my faith are not easy to follow, most of us (including myself) fail daily because I still have a sinful nature. But it is still the standard I try to hold myself to. Again, I am not trying to pick fights but to give voice to where someone else is coming from.

Comment Re:Sometimes there are reasons (Score 1) 1051

And that is great when it is a recommended schedule and parents with their doctors can have flexibility to adjust based on medical need. It is an entire different conversation when that schedule has been enshrined in law and becomes inflexible, and doctors are scared to go against that law because of lawsuits. What if my child was unable to receive one of those vaccines (and again, my children are being vaccinated on a controlled modified schedule overseen by their physician)? There are here that advocate they not be allowed to participate in society just because they are unfortunate to be in the small percentage of the population that is incompatible with a vaccine due to an deadly allergy to the delivery agent (egg protein),

Comment Re:Sometimes there are reasons (Score 1) 1051

http://www2.aap.org/immunizati... (BTW, that would be the American Academy of Pediatrics site suggested by the CDC as a place to go for information on vaccines.

Q. Do vaccines contain fetal tissue?

A. No. A few vaccines involve growing the viruses in human cell culture. Two cell lines provide the cultures needed for producing vaccines. These lines were developed from two fetuses in the 1960s. The fetuses were aborted for medical reasons, not for the purpose of producing vaccines. These cell lines have an indefinite life span, meaning that no new aborted fetuses are ever used. No fetal tissue is included in the vaccines, either, so children are not injected with any part of an aborted fetus.

So you are correct in that while they do not contain fetal tissue, they are derived from aborted fetuses. As I said, personally I look at it as two who were considered "inconvenient" for reasons I do not know and really never wish upon anyone to decide, at least good has come from their existence in providing life for so many.

Comment Re:Sometimes there are reasons (Score 1) 1051

http://vec.chop.edu/service/va...

Do vaccines contain fetal tissues?
Varicella (chickenpox), rubella, hepatitis A, shingles and one preparation of rabies vaccine are all made in fetal embryo fibroblast cells. These cells were first obtained from elective termination of two pregnancies in the early 1960s. These same embryonic cells obtained from the early 1960s have continued to grow in the laboratory and are used to make vaccines today. No further sources of fetal cells are needed to make these vaccines. Fibroblast cells are the cells needed to hold skin and other connective tissue together.

The reasons that fetal cells were originally used included:
Viruses need cells to grow and tend to grow better in cells from humans than animals (because they infect humans).
Almost all cells die after they have divided a certain number of times; scientifically, this number is known as the Hayflick limit, and for most cell lines it is around 50 divisions; however, fetal cells can go through many more divisions before dying.
So, as scientists studied these viruses in the lab, they found that the best cells to use were the fetal cells mentioned above. When it was time to make a vaccine, they continued growing the viruses in the cells that worked best during these earlier studies.

Reviewed by: Paul A. Offit, MD
Date: April 2013

Comment Sometimes there are reasons (Score -1, Troll) 1051

With a child with allergies (including an egg allergy) and another that requires specialized formula because of allergies, vaccines are a touchy subject for me. I don't mind vaccines, but I do have issues with the rate and ingredients of the vaccines that our state requires us to give our children. We were fortunate to find a doctor's office that was willing to work with us and use a modified schedule (there are many practices that will not even see your child or believe it's okay to treat my child like a pariah when visiting for care) versus the multiple vaccines at a time schedule our state wants to force on everyone. That is a big deal, because any of those vaccines can cause an allergic reaction and most cause both of my sons problems that can last up to a week.

I also have sympathy for those that do have philosophical objections to vaccines. It does greatly bother me that the source of some vaccines are aborted fetuses. Now I will never know the events that led to nor can I fully comprehend the difficulty of such a decision that led to them becoming aborted fetuses, but that is still a life lost in my eyes and I am not comfortable in benefiting from it. The only way I came to terms with that fact is that at least those unfortunate souls that were considered as little more than an inconvenience to others have been able to do great good in spite of the horrible wrong done to them. And this is something that I don't ever want to treat lightly of flippantly. I think how we as a society deal with these issues speaks volumes about who we are collectively.

So please try to remember this as you comment. It isn't a lack of knowledge necessarily, and in at least my case it was a decision that me and my wife still struggle with as we see it effect our children everytime they get a shot.

Comment Here's an easy fix (Score 1) 553

There is a reason that our family is going back to the Charlotte Mason method of teaching for our home schooling. The Charlotte Mason method is based on Charlotte’s firm belief that the child is a person and we must educate that whole person, not just his mind. So a Charlotte Mason education is three-pronged: in her words, “Education is an Atmosphere, a Discipline, a Life.” The home environment is a contributor to a third of a child's education. The ideas that rule your life as a parent will be absorbed by them. Discipline, as in cultivating good habits, will make up another third of their education. Life, or giving kids living thoughts and ideas and not dry facts, makes up the final third of their education.

The problem is that modern education wants to proclaim that the home environment doesn't matter, the state can provide everything. That money, connections, and results matter; and discipline, integrity, and hard work doesn't. We also stress comfort over adversity (can't let them fail), so that when adversity inevitably enters their life they don't know what to do. And all we need to do is fill them up with useless facts without letting learn how to apply them.

Comment Re:Yeah, but they are their own problem. (Score 1) 482

I understand the definition of the word, but it is ceases to be the definition of the word you chose when they no longer fully predict what the results of their "practicing", or experimenting if you prefer, will reasonably be. They decided to inject a modified version of the vaccine into millions of people in the name of efficiency (and doubtlessly I would guess there is a corporate profit somewhere in there) with no way of knowing or predicting that 12 years down the line that it would cause this.

Most doctors these days unfortunately don't and only blindly follow what the latest salespeople tell them to do (based on profit margins) or what the government prescribes based on short term studies (that have no way of predicting the long term ramifications of their decisions). How many medical class-action suits have there been over bad medication (and vaccines) prescribed before we wake up and realize that the system we blindly believe is protecting us is failing in it's mission (or that's it's mission has changed without our knowledge)?

Where we used to have conversations with doctor's and had a say in our actual care we instead are treated to a factory style healthcare that operates and treats people like a machine.

Comment Re:Yeah, but they are their own problem. (Score 1) 482

It was not just that article, but many others that pointed out that the issue came about most likely because they decided to tweak the vaccine in question (using parts of the virus instead of a single whole and dead version. The New Yorker version was just the first of the stories in a list of them.

Comment Yeah, but they are their own problem. (Score 1, Interesting) 482

They claim the skeptics are just crazy, but then things like this (http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/elements/2014/02/the-return-of-whooping-cough.html ) happen.

I am not anti-vaccine, but I am cautious around people profess to "practice" on me and think everything can be solved with a pill or needle. For example, I think there is a problem with our healthcare system when we end up as a nation (USA) consuming 80% of all painkillers prescribed worldwide.

Comment Re:Some possible ways (Score 2) 745

Yeah, there is also that part where we are told that "All mankind are sinners and guilty before God" and from the start Adam and Eve are told that the penalty rebellion against God (sin) was death too. So all you are stating is that God exercised His divine right to pass a holy and just judgement on guilty people instead of extending further grace (not getting what you deserve) to them. So technically God is free to do the exact same thing to us, as everyone on earth stands before God guilty.

Hence why the life Christ lived and the substitute death/resurrection of the cross are such big deals in Christianity. Christianity's foundation is that you are saved not because of what you did or do, but because of what Christ already has done for you.

Granted, that part tends to be unfortunately buried in all the 3 step sermons on "Health, Wealth, and Prosperity" that seem to be preached abundantly in churches (and oddly contradictory to Christ's own words).

Submission + - Slashdot's new interface could kill what keeps Slashdot relevant (arstechnica.com)

An anonymous reader writes: Technology Lab / Information Technology
Slashdot’s new interface could kill what keeps Slashdot relevant
Flashy revamp seeks to draw new faces to the community—at the cost of the old.

by Lee Hutchinson — Feb 12 2014, 6:55pm E

        Web Culture

131

In the modern responsive Web Three Point Oh Internet, Slashdot stands like a thing frozen in time—it's a coelacanth stuck incongruously in an aquarium full of more colorful fish. The technology news aggregator site has been around since 1997, making it positively ancient as websites are reckoned. More importantly, Slashdot's long focus on open source technology news and topics has caused it to accrete a user base that tends to be extremely technical, extremely skilled, and extremely opinionated.

That user base is itself the main reason why Slashdot continues to thrive, even as its throwback interface makes it look to untrained eyes like a dated relic. Though the site is frequently a source of deep and rich commentary on topics, the barrier for new users to engage in the site's discussions is relatively high—certainly higher than, say, reddit (or even Ars). This doesn't cause much concern to the average Slashdot user, but tech job listing site Dice.com (which bought Slashdot in September 2012, along with Sourceforge and a number of other digital properties) appears to have decided it's time to drag Slashdot's interface into the 21st century in order to make things comfortable for everyone—old and new users alike.

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