sonia: Quilted wall-hanging (Default)
Sonia Connolly ([personal profile] sonia) wrote2021-09-13 03:46 pm

Look to the framing

I just read a post about someone who is unvaccinated making the claim that it's discrimination to ask about vaccination when seeing clients in person.

Obviously I disagree since I am doing exactly that.

Yes, boundaries discriminate in the original sense of discerning between things. Boundaries say, "Yes to this, no to that." But it is not discrimination in the legal, unfair sense, and framing it that way is confusing at best and disingenuous at worst.

Boundaries say, you can choose not to be vaccinated and not come into my vaccination-only space as a consequence. Even if remaining unvaccinated is a medical necessity rather than a free choice, that doesn't invalidate the boundary.

I recently had a conversation with my aunt where she wanted to "agree to disagree" about the fact that she's not vaccinated. I said no, I can't just skip over it, because it bothers me. I see it as a responsibility to the community to be vaccinated if at all possible. It's not an individual private choice that has to be respected. That's co-opting the language of tolerance and respect for behavior that directly harms the community.