We’ve all known them—bullies who push people around, doing their best to make life miserable and difficult for someone they’ve targeted. They go after their victims with zeal, tormenting them and doing their best to get others to do the same.
Over the years, bullying has been a hot topic for middle and junior high schools across the nation. But what happens when adult bullies are allowed control over major oversight committees, medical boards, and media outlets?
That’s what happened to Dr. Mark Geier, a doctor, and researcher who had his medical license suspended seven years ago by the Maryland Board of Physicians. The board’s complaints against Dr. Geier varied, but the trouble started early in his career when he suggested changes to childhood immunizations in order to make them safer. His work to change the DTP vaccine to include acellular pertussis rather than whole-cell led to the old formula being changed out with DTaP, a much safer vaccine that has fewer side effects and is just as effective as the original.
Despite the fact that the new formula is inarguably an improvement, Dr. Geier gained the attention of Medical Board Bullies simply by pointing out that improvements to vaccines can (and should!) be made. The situation grew worse when Geier began to speak out against mercury in vaccines, suggesting that there is a connection between mercury and autism, learning disabilities and other neurological disorders that have been on the rise.
The fact that thimerosal, the mercury-containing ingredient that concerned Dr. Geier, was indeed found to be harmful and was eliminated from most childhood vaccines (without eliminating the vaccines themselves) was conveniently ignored as the bullies raged that Dr. Geier was an anti-vaxxer and a quack. His subsequent work trying to reverse the effects of mercury and bring healing to those with autism evoked an increasingly hostile response from the bullies, which led to his license to practice medicine being suspended.
This sort of bullying by medical boards, Big Pharma, the CDC and the FDA are common occurrences and anyone who raises concerns about vaccines is an instant target. Typically, the character defamation, legal action, and harassment are allowed to go unchecked—hundreds of doctors, scientists, and whistleblowers have had their careers and lives destroyed by those who fear the voice of reason when it comes to vaccine safety.
This time, however, the bullies went too far. The Board of Physicians decided that sanctions and character defamation were not enough and, in what a judge would later call a “significant breach of medical privacy” they published specifics about medications Dr. Geier and his family were taking. As soon as the information was published, a storm of venomous personal attacks hit Geier’s family full-force. This act of retaliation crossed a line that the courts couldn’t ignore, and a suit was brought up against the board.
For once, the bullies did not win. Dr. Geier and his family were awarded 2.5 million dollars for the humiliation and public defamation of character they suffered due to the board’s distasteful actions. Not only that, but 14 members of the board, the board’s attorney, and lead investigator were all were ordered to personally pay for half the damages awarded—between $10,000 and $200,000 each.
The Geier’s struggle is not unique. Those who speak up for vaccine safety are often faced with a barrage of bad press, vindictive legal action, and slander. Their careers are often ruined, their credibility stripped, and their names tagged with words like “quack” and “flat earther” despite their having well-researched concerns backed by well-vetted scientific studies. The backlash that those who question vaccines face is simply out of control—and the Geier case is one of just a handful in which justice prevails.
Like schoolyard bullies, those who attack safe vaccine advocates are operating out of guilt and shame. According to TeenSafe, and anti-bullying website, out of all the responses that people have to shame, “People who bully use the most destructive shame response: they attack others. The ‘attack other’ response to shame occurs when a person feels psychologically endangered and incompetent.” (Understanding the Psychology of a Bully with Dr. Mary C. Lamia, TeenSafe 2015)
The attacks on those who stand for vaccine safety are a classic bully response. The shame and guilt associated with standing for a product that has harmed countless children and may be responsible for an unprecedented epidemic of neurological damage so severe that many who’ve been affected will never be able to live on their own must be staggering. Rather than face and address the root of the problem, these bullies are taking it out on those who do have the courage to speak up.
The decision in favor of Dr. Geier is a step in the right direction, and will hopefully lead to more of the same. If common decency is not enough to prevent personal attacks like the ones Dr. Geier suffered, then maybe the threat of having to personally pay for the damages they cause will make bullies like the Maryland Board of Physicians think twice before personally and viciously attacking professionals with whom they disagree.