Fears at the Fringe

I am a progressive in a progressive place. I hold that science is our most reliable discourse. I try to be brave. I live in North County. Our most progressive voters reside in West County, where some live lives of fear. 

Many are afraid of food. For starters, they fear wheat, the staff of life. Nationally 1.5% of the country is allergic to gluten, but in West County the perceived  figure is closer to 40%. Some of my friends fear the elected government every bit as much as the Tea Party does. They fear that the President is a Fascist. One town recently banned SmartMeters, so the utility company has stopped all work there. The ban exposes the city to lawsuits. 

Yes, some progressives in West County fear electricity. They remind me of my great-grandmother, Mary Berry, who came over on the boat. She feared telephones. As someone else pointed out, West County has banned  SmartMeters but has yet to ban routers, laptops,  TVs, iPads and Kindles, nor have they taken down the transmitting cell towers. Only a few have turned off the lights. 

Fluoridation, as you might expect, terrifies the fringe. The fact that most of the nation has been drinking fluoridated water for 70 years and nothing bad has happened is overruled by this: if you feed a rat nothing but fluoride and chicken fat, it will not prosper. And to hell with the poor kids who parents don't provide fluoridated toothpaste. Let their teeth rot. The fringe fear flu shots, of course, and all inoculations. The way they see it, if everyone else gets a flu shot, they won't need one.