Anti-Vaccine Activist Assaults State Senator Who Authored California Vaccine Law: Sacramento Police

KTLA ^ | 08/21/2019

[BenLurkin]

Kenneth Austin Bennett, 54, livestreamed the confrontation on his Facebook, which shows him shoving state Sen. Richard Pan on the sidewalk near the Capitol. Bennett has unsuccessfully attempted to recall Pan and filed paperwork to run against him last year, though he never appeared on the ballot.

The video shows him running into Pan on the sidewalk and confronting Pan about his position on vaccines. Pan briefly engages Bennett while he continues to walk.

"Maybe you should study public health," Pan says at one point.

The video then shows Bennett reaching out and shoving Pan in the back after Pan laughs, launching the lawmaker several feet forward.

"I pushed you," Bennett says several times, before walking away and saying into the camera, "I probably shouldn't have done that."

Pan, a Sacramento Democrat, has authored several bills that limit exemptions for child vaccinations that have made him a target of anti-vaccine activists online and at the Capitol, where hundreds have flocked to protest Pan's efforts. He authored a bill several years ago that prohibits any vaccinations other than from a doctor, meaning religious or personal exemptions are not allowed.

[Artemis Webb]

Like the man said, he probably shouldn’t have done that.

[Yaelle]

I hate Pan but that is not the answer.

[Meatspace]

They need to give Kenneth Austin Bennett a shot to calm him down.

[Lurkina.n.Learnin]

livestreaming takes the heat of the moment excuse off the table.

[spudville]

Well, that is what the Democrats have taught people. If you disagree with someone: Get violent.
Chickens coming home to roost?

[AppyPappy]

Lunatics do lunacy.

[Mr Ramsbotham]

Well, I know how he feels.

[BuffaloJack]

I grew up back when the only vaccine available was for smallpox.
We’d get whooping cough, measles, mumps, rubella, scarlet fever, polio, rheumatic fever, influenze and lots of other nasty illnesses.
I think I was 9 when the polio vaccine came out. This was great, because 2 kids in my class got polio the year before and wound up with leg braces. I remember waiting in line for the shot.

[Buckeye McFrog]

As you can tell by my tagline I would not be a fan of this legislation.

But I don’t believe in assaulting people either.

[L,TOWM]

The whole dammed country needs to calm down before a lot of folks start giving and receiving “shots”.

[jonascord]

The school would herd us kids to the high school auditorium, and spray our teeth with floride. Foulest tasting stuff, EVER! We did that a couple of times.

Another trip it was pink tinted sugar cubes. (Sabin vaccine)

Was taken to a kid's house once, didn't know him, for a "play date". He had a good LEGOs collection, but just sat wrapped in a blanket, on the couch. Came down with chicken pox a few days later. Gave it to my dad. HE was sick as all hell. Me? Meh...

Good times...

[Meatspace]

‘The whole dammed country needs to calm down before a lot of folks start giving and receiving “shots”.’

Had Kenneth Bennet not shoved a person walking down the street, there would be no need to give him a shot.

I understand that a shot of Thorazine is not technically a vaccine, but Mr. Bennett needs a shot of Thorazine

[ozarkgirl]

I know there are alot of anti-vaxxers here but I would approach that type of thinking very carefully. Go to a cemetary and look at the headstones, prior to the 50’s or 60’s alot of kids died of diseases for which we now have a vaccines.

[Okeydoker]

Vaccines have saved millions of lives from death and crippling disease. Only the ignorant and the foolish refuse to vaccinate their kids.

[L,TOWM]

I get that, but this entire country seems to be in a rage frenzy that keeps feeding on itself. How much longer do we have until screaming and shoving a duly elected political leader (even one like Pan) gives way to simply pulling a trigger?

[Meatspace]

“How much longer do we have until screaming and shoving a duly elected political leader (even one like Pan) gives way to simply pulling a trigger?”

April of 1865?

[L,TOWM]

I love optimists.

Sometimes, I even wish I was one.

[43north]

“Mr. Bennett needs a shot of Thorazine.”

Thorazine is sooo old school. Geodon is where its at for calming beastly humans. We even have a phrase for people who really, really need it: “Geodonemia”. Works on crazed meth heads in addition to run-of-the-mill anarchists.

[chrisser]

I haven't delved into the whole thing in much detail (we don't have kids so it doesn't really affect us), but from what I've gathered, very few of the "anti-vaxxers" I've talked to doubt the efficacy of vaccination.

Most seem to believe that something in the production process or the carrier fluids has, or did have, adverse effects on a small subset of the population. Frankly, that doesn't seem totally unreasonable to me, and if I suspected the same and had my suspicions shouted down with purposely irrelevant and peripheral appeals to "science" that ignored my actual concerns, then my logical reaction would likely be to avoid the vaccines for my kids as well.