Since the subreddit’s creation in September 2020, it’s expanded to more than 375,000 members, with the top posts garnering thousands of user interactions.
“It really hits home when you literally see yourself in these people,” said Sarah Ostrowski, who was convinced she should get vaccinated after spending time on the subreddit.
Sarah Ostrowski was convinced to finally get vaccinated after reading numerous stories on Reddit’s r/HermanCainAward of unvaccinated people dying from Covid-19.
Sarah Ostrowski was convinced to finally get vaccinated after reading numerous stories on Reddit’s r/HermanCainAward of unvaccinated people dying from Covid-19.
Courtesy of Sarah Ostrowski
For most of the pandemic, Sarah Ostrowski went to her full-time gas station job in Indiana, accepting the risk of being unvaccinated. Many times a day she interacted with customers and even cleaned up the public bathroom with no protection beyond her mask.
Ostrowski doesn’t believe Covid-19 is a hoax. She takes it seriously. But she had reasons for not getting the shot.
She was concerned about the Johnson & Johnson vaccine causing blood clots, as had been reported in a few recipients. She was hesitant about the mRNA technology used to develop the Moderna and Pfizer vaccines. She also worried about potential side effects forcing her to take time off work.
And then there were her parents, who were constantly spouting anti-vaccine rhetoric, warning her that she would die if she got the shot.
“You care about what your parents think of you and whether or not they think that you’re making a good decision or the right decision,” Ostrowski said. “It’s almost like a groupthink kind of thing. Even though you know the answer is wrong you’re still going to say it just to fit in or conform.”
That all changed last month. Ostrowski, who regularly scrolls through her feed on social media site Reddit, stumbled upon the forum r/HermanCainAward. It’s a grim section of the app dedicated to showing visitors the real-life consequences of being unvaccinated and catching the coronavirus.
Reddit users upload screenshots multiple times a day of people who previously posted anti-vaccine comments and content on Facebook only to end up getting sick with Covid-19 before dying. The name of the subreddit refers to former Republican presidential candidate Herman Cain, who died from Covid-19 in July 2020, after refusing to re-election.
“Nominees have made public declaration of their anti-mask, anti-vax, or Covid-hoax views, followed by admission to hospital for Covid,” the page description reads. “The Award is granted upon the nominee’s release from their Earthly shackles.”
Since the subreddit’s creation in September 2020, it’s expanded to more than 375,000 members, with the top posts garnering thousands of user interactions. The forum has been the 10th fastest-growing subreddit over the past 30 days, according to FrontPageMetrics.com, which tracks Reddit usage.
An entry this week included a screenshot of an Aug. 12 post from a man who put a meme out to his followers: “I heard the government is putting chips inside of people. I hope I get Doritos.”
A friend of the man later wrote on his feed that he was asking for prayers because the man and his wife had both been hospitalized with Covid-19. The wife had to have an emergency C-section to deliver their baby over 10 weeks early.
A following post came from the man’s wife: “The world lost an amazing daddy, husband, brother, son, and friend today. My heart is in a million pieces.”
‘I was done playing’
Ostrowki said she’d eventually seen enough. On Sept. 12, she got her first shot.
“If dad thinks I’m an idiot because I fell for the government and I’m a sheep, so be it,” Ostrowski said. “I clean a public restroom for Christ’s sake. I deal with some really gross stuff. So no, I was done playing.”
During the pandemic, social media sites turned into a haven for misinformation and conspiracy theories, whether related to masks, the vaccines or advice from public health experts. Facebook, in particular, has struggled to weed out false content, with users sharing misinformation even in the comments section of posts from authoritative sources, according to internal company documents reviewed last month by the Wall Street Journal.
With multiple vaccines having been available for months for anyone 12 or older, vaccine resistance has become the central challenge to ending Covid-19. President Joe Biden said as recently as last month, “This is a continuing pandemic of the unvaccinated.”
Only 57% of the country has been vaccinated, based on data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and 22% of Americans self-identify as anti-vaxxers, according to an academic study published in May. Experts, including White House coronavirus advisor Dr. Anthony Fauci, have said the U.S. will need as much as 90% of the population to get vaccinated in order to reach herd immunity.
