Makers of Anti-Vax Film Pulled from Tribeca Say They're Being Censored by Robert De Niro

It’s fascinating, too, that according to the statement, Florida Congressman Bill Posey evidently has De Niro’s ear. Posey has become a strong advocate for the baseless allegation that the Centers for Disease Control is covering up a link between the MMR vaccine and autism. Last June, during a speech from the House floor, he called for the Centers for Disease Control to be investigated. (Posey calls himself “resolutely pro-vaccine,” but also says he believes there may be a link between vaccines and autism. There is not.)

Since losing his medical license in 2010, Wakefield has built a career from claiming that he is the only person telling the truth about vaccines, and that his truth is being silenced by powerful corporate interests. He told me aboard the Conspira Sea that he is “never going to go away,” and that the corporate-owned media, meaning me and people like me, will never give him fair coverage.

“It’s never balanced,” he said. “I’ve been in this a long time, and he who pays the piper calls the tune.”

Tribeca has done Wakefield a huge favor here; by scheduling and then abruptly cancelling the film, the festival is giving the look of credence to the claim that the film is dangerous to Big Pharma and its Numerous Corporate Shills.

Just take a stroll through the #Vaxxed hashtag on Twitter, which is full of claims that the CDC/Tribeca/the government are trying to silence Wakefield’s truth. Several dodgy natural health blogs are even claiming that De Niro was openly threatened to keep the film from being shown.

Larry Cook, another anti-vaccine activist, has been circulating a meme that suggests Tribeca pulled the film because one of its major donors is the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation. The Sloan Foundation, along with the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, has donated money to the development of an AIDS vaccine. (In the anti-vaccination world, an AIDS vaccine is a bad thing.)

In short, Tribeca and De Niro have given Wakefield new publicity, a kind he could scarcely have dreamed of before this week. In turn, his claims have new credence among people already inclined to believe him.

“Wake up!” reads one of the dozens of emails I’ve gotten recently from anti-vaccination true believers. “Stop promoting genocide stop being a slave for profit!! Or quit your job because you arent [sic] even good at it!!” A petition calling for Tribeca to bring back the film—one Wakefield has signed and is promoting—claims that vaccines routinely cause both autism and death. It has been signed by nearly 21,000 people.

Showing Vaxxed at a major film festival would have given Wakefield’s claims a new patina of respectability. (The petition mentions Blackfish, the anti-Sea World documentary that first aired at Tribeca, and which shifted public opinion against the amusement park.) But its cancellation has wrought a different kind of damage, one that can’t easily be undone.