Neither the government nor the pharma industry has done much to maintain their credibility with the people. Drugs have side effects, literally every ad on any news channel will tell you so. Studies are fuzzed. Which is why its important to talk to multiple experts, and look at multiple studies. But for vaccines there have been plenty debunking the link between vaccines and autism.
Forced by the government should be pushed back but not by denying evidence.
"I don't trust the authorities, so I'm going to base all my health choices on this random hustler from YouTube and eat horse dewormer."
It's kind of the essence of populism. "I'm too smart to fall for the lies of the authorities, so ... here let me throw my brain totally out the window and follow pure charisma instead."
Some skepticism of the authorities is rational because of course governments are sometimes corrupt and more often incompetent. (Never attribute to malice what can be explained by laziness or stupidity.) Doing some of your own research is good. But why does critical thinking go totally out the window for so many people at that point? And why do people assume that just because someone is "alternative" rather than "mainstream" they have no profit motive? Do people not realize that alt-med and self-help and certain kinds of religious zealotry are all massive industries with their own profit motives just like "big pharma"?
