Many people responded to my open letter saying I would refuse to participate in my employer’s vaccine passport. I had sent it to over a hundred colleagues whom I knew personally, no matter where they sat either on the issue or on the company org chart.
Some responses were quite flattering.
You are awesome and brave.
Others, less.
Yikes. I share proof-of-vaccination of my kids for school. What's the difference?
Nearly all supported my speaking my mind, even if they disagreed on the issue. Words like integrity and courage, and expressions like principled stance and proud of you and in my prayers appeared often.
In our professional interactions—especially now that we all work remotely—it’s easy to forget our humanity. These emails were reminders that my coworkers are people and care. Some even offered to advocate my case to management or to write recommendations to my next employer.
Most who wrote, including several from other countries, shared my opposition to vaccine passports:
We are on a slippery slope and today filling out my form I felt like I was on the wrong side of history.
I don't feel the matter is in everybody's health care but in global influence and impact.
Who would have expected the US government to issue such a mandate?
I fall on the left in many of my political beliefs… In today’s climate it’s either you’re with us or you’re against us. Politics today are wrong… These mandates aren’t right.
I feel like you do regarding the overreach of government and [company name] rolling over and doing what is asked.
It seems like a nightmare or cunning scenario of some science fiction that has unfortunately come true.
I thought I was alone but have learned that many others are close to taking their own stands.
I am looking for another job which does not require unwanted medical procedures as a condition of employment.
If it comes to that in our country, however, I shall be following your lead.
I wish I would have read it before I submitted my info.
I wish I had more courage. Thank you for starting the stand.
Like you I would not be able to conscientiously comply.
Those are from five different individuals and just a sample.
Only one person was spiteful. He copied his response up the management chain. Using words like childish, selfish, and tantrum, and comparing covid-19 to National Socialism in World War II, he asserted that the federal government has been too patient, and the company too lenient. (At first I wondered at too lenient—does he want me pilloried before I’m fired?—but having heard him ridicule people of faith before, I think he was likely alluding to the exemption for religious objections.) He said I make him feel unsafe (from my desk at home?) invoking a favorite bugbear for corporate HR departments. One of the managers told him not to discuss the issue further on company email, and he promptly responded with a sequel, threatening to quit if the company didn’t deal with me firmly enough.
I don’t think he’s left yet. As I wrote earlier, we should be careful of empowering quidnuncs and martinets.
The three responses engaging me in friendly argument were more interesting.
One acknowledged the abrogation of human rights, but maintained that there is something unique and extraordinary about this disease, a state of emergency that calls for suspension of individual rights.
Shared resources need to be fairly managed for the health and happiness of all. That means that people living upriver don't necessarily get to do anything they want with the waterway… The fact that the shared resource in this case is comprised of all of us rather than something external to us, is at the core of the problem. It makes this crisis unique and more directly impinges on personal liberty than other shared resource issues.
Another focused on the moral obligation to care for others, the civic duty to participate in vaccine-tracking.
I do not want anybody to be put in danger by my actions, ever! I am willing to do everything to protect others, all I can.
There might be a little hyperbole there: I know the writer to be a father, a fine cook, and a gun aficionado who drives performance cars, all traits that expose others to at least some danger! But I’m glad that he perceives kindness, not fear or a faith in the wisdom of corporations or governments, to be his motivation.
As far as I can tell, all the people who disagreed with me have these qualities in common:
Morbid Arithmetic
They’re quicker than I am to base their moral decision-making on a potential mortality calculus. If Option A is predicted to lead to 100 deaths and Option B is predicted to lead to 99, then they conclude that Option B must always be preferable, no matter what other harm it does. Those who favor incursions on liberty often point to the large number of covid-19 deaths, but they also often go straight to the extreme: If we could save even just one life…No Action = Bad Action
They treat negligence as the moral equivalent of evil action. To my thinking, a murderer who plots to kill one victim does something worse than the politician who fails to fund maintenance on a dam, even after that dam collapses in a flood that kills 500. And to my thinking, it’s the flood, not the politician, that killed the 500. The law rightly punishes murder more harshly than negligent homicide.Requiring Papers Is Favoring Vaccination
They don’t acknowledge my distinction between opposing the vaccine passports and opposing vaccination. When they argue in favor of our company’s firing people who don’t sign up for the online compliance-tracking system, they emphasize the importance of covid-19 vaccination itself, not the importance of online tracking.They Just Don’t Feel It
They don’t express any angst or dismay or concern that they are giving up control over their own lives in ways that will extend beyond this specific moment. Maybe they really believe these vaccine passports will be limited to covid-19 and temporary, whereas I think the passports will expand to track all kinds of personal risk factors and will become a permanent part of life. Or maybe they’re just not bothered by giving up their autonomy. Some people just prefer safety to liberty—at least until the liberty’s gone.
I’m generalizing and might be mischaracterizing my colleagues’ opinions here. I’m eager to continue the debate.
After reading so many encouraging, benign, and civil responses, I’m optimistic we can.