Why Anger towards the Unvaccinated was Intentional Psychological Manipulation

March 2022, Naked Emperor took a look at a Yale study of ways to increase vaccine uptake.


The study began in July 2020 to explore “how persuasive messaging affects COVID-19 vaccine uptake intentions”. It wasn’t published until October 2021… after most people had been injected.

Quite revealing. Worth reading. But if you are short on time here’s a few takeawats:

The wording throughout this study is almost identical to that used over the last few years.

  • “Safe and effective”
  • “Getting vaccinated is the single best way to protect yourself”
  • “Reduces the risk that members of your family could get sick and die”
  • “How guilty would you feel?”
  • “How embarrassed and ashamed would you feel?”
  • “How angry would you be?”
  • “People who don’t get vaccinated aren’t brave but reckless”
  • “There is nothing attractive and independent minded about ignoring public health guidance”
  • “You risk the health of others”
  • “Trust the Science”
  • “People who reject vaccination are ignorant or confused about the science”
  • “Not getting vaccinated means you are probably the sort of person who doesn’t understand science”
  • “It reduces the chance of lockdowns”

How many times did you hear someone parrot one or more of the lines above almost word for word?

You may have naively believed that the fear, pressure and psychological toll of the pandemic caused your friends, family or colleagues to act in an unrecognisable way but it was all carefully planned. They conducted a study (and I’m sure this wasn’t the only one) to see which pressure points would work best on different parts of the population and then carefully released mountains of propaganda (funded by you) to turn your friends and family against you. This nudging was all done to get you to take a vaccine you decided you didn’t want.

Whether mass vaccination was the only way out of the pandemic or not, behaviourally nudging citizens to guilt each other into taking a novel treatment was not the way a civilised society should have acted.

They wanted you to get angry in order to get vaccinated but they failed. But they wanted you to get angry, so get angry. Get angry that the population was psychologically manipulated to turn on one another. Get angry that your friends and family were nudged into parroting the phrases used in the study to make you feel guilty, stupid or embarrassed. Get angry that you were socially ostracised and de-invited from events. Get angry that your colleagues made you lose your job. And if you were one of those who tried to convince someone to get vaccinated, get angry that you were so easily manipulated.

Naked Emperor