Another Year in Paradise

I like to observe that we are experiencing the worst case scenario feared by the smartest authorities for decades. A century from now, we'll be remembered with pity. And yet....here we still are, same as ever, albeit masked. This is the low point? This? Seriously? We've been bowling in an alley with raised gutters!

Inevitably, someone hears this and grows indignant, informing me that it's easy for me to gloat. I don't have covid. I'm not a healthcare worker, etc etc. The curse for those holding unconventional perspectives is that people assume we're failing to "get" the obvious. So I find myself lectured a lot about basic issues of the human experience. COVID's bad, mmkay? My odd-seeming gratitude and satisfaction could - and absolutely should - be constrained if I'm properly educated about how people are having very real problems out there.

To them, I say this:

Has there been a year of human history - a day, an hour, a moment - where multitudes weren't enduring difficulty? Is that what you're waiting for? Would that be the condition where you'd tolerate expression of joy and satisfaction? If so, geez, Louise, the perspective you've framed for yourself dooms you to misery. You've sealed your fate. Enjoy unmitigated suckiness.

The people bitterly complaining about 2020 - who are the same people who whined about 2019, 2018, 2017, etc. (an unbroken chain of unsatisfactory suboptimality) - are not the ones in ICUs with tubes down their throats, nor are they the health care workers bravely attending to them. Those folks are all busy. They have no time for whining on Facebook. People confronting actual problems don't reflect over their disappointment. Whining's the exclusive domain of the comfortable.

The aggrieved express their aggrievement on gleaming super-computers while ensconsed comfortably in comfortable homes, warm and well-fed, enjoying vastly more security, comfort, entertainment, and interconnectivity than their ancestors could have imagined. Those who are anxious to kick awful, awful 2020 in its ass live as aristocrats while framing themselves as oppressed and persecuted. Like princes and princesses for time immemorial, they are increasingly vexed by ever-diminishing mattress peas. And they sneer at those with the temerity to propose they be grateful and happy when it's not all precisely the way they like it.

In 2020 the worst thing (short of war) happened and here we are; with goofy masks, sure, but otherwise still us, still here, still doing our thing. Trump's circling the drain and we enjoy all human knowledge, entertainment, art, and communications on slabs of glass in our pockets. No lions or warlords have poised themselves for imminent attack. No death from infections from papercuts. We're free to lounge back in comfort and complain about our immense disappointment. It's fucking fantastic!


Here's how we expel ourselves from Paradise.

Viruses (e.g. COVID-19) and Sleep

I've had a long-time health trick. Whenever I have a lingering cold, virus, or bug of some sort that just won't go away, I cancel everything and plunge into what I call "malarial sleep mode", and I don't emerge until I'm absolutely 100%. I guess this is what parents of previous generations were trying to encourage when they made kids stay in bed. Of course, we'd only watch TV and play with toys and read. Nowadays, with our devices, no one sleeps, really, ever. We just mainline coffee.

Turns out we're starting to understand the connection between sleep and illness, and it's all about melatonin (note: don't just take melatonin pills, for reasons aluded to in the article). Sleep may affect how susceptible you are to COVID, how bad your symptoms get, how long they persist, and even how well the vaccine works for you. Read "The Mysterious Link Between COVID-19 and Sleep" in the new issue of The Atlantic.

I've tried to be diligent about sleep all along through this crisis. I've ratcheted up the priority of a full night's sleep; I won't blithely shrug it off and figure I'll catch up the next night. I've broken appointments (via email) at 3 am during insomnia periods. I've also worked on my falling-asleep skills.

Solid Clear Examples

...of perceptual framing.

Some readers complain that I keep touting the benefits of reframing without ever pinning down the actual phenomenon. But I've offered hundreds of examples. In fact, this entire Slog is nothing but reframings (that's my secret crappy little trick for coughing up fresh "takes" and surprising conclusions. I'm not particularly smart, but I reframe like a mo-fo). But, happy new year, I'll offer some rock solid examples of everyday reframing that anyone can relate to.

Bathroom Floor
I tore a ligament in my foot in June and, over these months, have had more ice on my foot than a glacier-preserved woolly mammoth. At first, I used a dish towel to separate my delicate flesh from the frigid ice, and would count the seconds. By September, I was slapping the ice bag directly over my foot and drowsing comfortably until the timer rang. And now, in December, when I venture barefoot into the perilous downstairs bathroom with the unbearably cold tiled floor, I stride in like it's absolutely nothing. It feels like strolling the beach on Maui. I can't imagine how it ever tormented me; I giggle at the memory of my suffering. My foot's the same foot, and the floor’s just as cold, but, mentally, I have reframed.


Thing is, I could have done so without months of ice. All that's required is an imperceptible mental shift...and an infinity of shifts is available in every situation at any moment. We falsely assume the world forces our reactions, so our habitual responses feel predetermined. They're not. They're volitional. We're free.

Similarly, years ago when I'd get a parking ticket, I'd curse, have my day ruined, and send a check. Now that I'm no longer scraping pennies as a freelance musician, when I get parking tickets, I don't curse, I don't have my day ruined, and I send a check. Same outcome, less histrionic suffering...which, I now see, was always optional. My bank balance didn't relieve the suffering, my reframing did, and framing can shift in any direction at any time. The world can't trigger you. You're free. To recognize this is to experience the liberation folks used to whisper about in awestruck reverence.

Michael Jordan
In the great basketball documentary "The Last Dance" (watch on Netflix here), Michael Jordan is seen doing the same mental maneuver again and again. The film doesn't analyze it, but it's a constant throughout his extraordinary career. And one would be foolish to ignore it, as it's clearly Jordan's secret sauce:

Whenever an opposing player says something negative, or cocky, Jordan marinates in it. Stews in it. And draws from that gurgling pot whenever he finds himself up against that opponent.

You might say he "holds a grudge", but that's not quite it. It's not about the other guy, or the thing the other guy said. This is entirely propogated inside of Jordan's head. A shift of perspective. In fact, when Jordan didn't have anything to latch on to, he'd make up a story, and suck on that fiction like a nourishing lozenge.

There are many words one could assign to this maneuver. "Emotionality". "Psyching up". "Grudging". But no. What it is is reframing. Every other player would come to work and try to sink baskets. That's the universe they're in. Jordan is in another universe entirely; fighting holy wars and smiting evil. That explains how he played like someone in another universe  Reframing unlocks extraordinary results.


You needn't wait for the world to present an excuse. You can shift perspective at will, by simply remembering that you can. And once you do, you'll find yourself in a different universe, as Jordan did.

Most of us have shifted into a universe of grim wearisome flatness. That's where we stew and marinate; that's the lozenge we suck. It's clearly not productive, but we assume the world has forced this perspective upon us. Uh-uh. That's backwards. By relinquishing our shift-ability, we allow perspective to freeze - and a monochromatic world of drudging boredom ensues. This is especially common in a wealthy, comfortable, non-perilous society, where shifts are rarely compelled by existential threats. Here in paradise, we must reclaim our natural shifting litheness or else be lost to depression.

Pancakes, Divorce, Pancakes
There was a great (but inconsistent) TV series a couple of years ago on Comedy Central called "Review". The show's host, Forrest MacNeil, (played by comedian Andy Daly) would review "real life experiences" - whatever the audience threw at him. Problem: his quietly sadistic producer (played, naturally, by James Urbaniak) used the opportunity to torture MacNeil.

And Forrest MacNeil was really really really committed to earnestly going through with each and every challenge. In fact, the show was a satire about the perils of over-commitment.

Yes, one of the prime tenets of this Slog is that loopy mega-commitment is responsible for all transcendence. It's the thing that separates us from livestock. But, duh, you mustn't commit mindlessly. Capriciously, yes. Playfully, sure. But never mindlessly. Mindless commitment is what makes people count every Toyota they ever pass, which isn't actually good for anything.

Anyhoo...

The third show of season one was "Pancakes, Divorce, Pancakes", and it's a great work of art (watch for free here if you subscribe to AppleTV, or scroll down this page and buy the episode from Amazon for $1.99, or watch for free online by signing in with your cable provider). It clearly and persuasively illustrates the power of shifted perspective (i.e. reframing).

In the show's first segment, MacNeil is asked to review the experience of eating 15 pancakes. He groans and whines and slogs through the task and vomits in the parking lot. It's an ordeal.

In the second segment, MacNeil is asked to review the experience of divorce. With great trepidation, he goes home and informs his beloved wife that her services are no longer required. It doesn't go well.

The third segment starts with MacNeil prone on the studio floor, cursing himself for actually consenting to divorce his wife just for a stupid TV show. Then, for his third challenge, MacNeil is asked (because his producer is a dick) to review the experience of eating 30 pancakes.

MacNeil heads back to the diner under this voiceover:

"It would be challenging to find meaning in any life experience, now that my life had no meaning. The idea of eating twice the number of pancakes that laid me so low last time should have filled me with a sense of dread or fear. But I felt nothing. I greeted the prospect of all this pan-fried dough with only a vast empty numbness."

He sits down in the diner booth, and, with nothing left to live for, numbly and mechanically rams down all 30 without pausing.

Framing!

The Astronaut
I linked to this excerpt from a not-great movie a bunch of times before I went on my tear about perceptual framing. I didn't have words at the time to explain the move being described, but it was a sort of mental judo I'd been using all my life in order to cope, to advance, to conjure creativity and epiphany, and to escape from sticky wickets of every type. And more!

People hate this damned video. The woman's sappy and annoying, and the vibe is a nauseating amalgam of smugness and potpourri. Yet what she's saying is the key to life. It's Truth. And I'm not surprised it irritates people, because if humans were attracted to Truth (or even just slightly less repulsed by it), this would be a very different world. So try to overcome your aversion and check it out.

It describes the only bona fide magic trick in this world, and nearly everyone's missed it in plain sight. Reframing cures depression, unfickles the muses of inspiration, and helps you recognize you're residing in Heaven.

---

When I was a freshman in college, I discovered (via the metaphor of ironing) that dicking around with the universe isn't worth much, but full-out flips can transform. You can't do much to change the world, but you can always shift your perspective. And from reclaiming that pliancy, anything's possible. It's backwards to wait for the world to coax a shift. You’re the shifter. You frame the world, not the other way around, though few of us ever notice (even the incomparable Michael Jordan needlessly rooted around for external snippets to prompt internal shifts of framing).

Jordan was "something else". An astronaut could go from torture chamber to bliss in the blink of an eye. A cold tile floor feels like a tropical beach. And Forrest MacNeil effortlessly gobbles up 30 pancakes. It's all about how you frame things.

When Monsters Flee

What is different is these are NOT the Never Trumper types. These are people who have fully thrown their lot in with Trump but are legitimately worried about his receptivity to Flynn and Powell’s ideas and conspiracy theories. One month seems like an eternity in this context. https://t.co/7t5oWkg1ht

— Jonathan Swan (@jonathanvswan) December 19, 2020

As a leader sinks deeper and deeper into tyranny, fantasy, and fuckery, the "opposition" comes to include an increasing number of bona fide extremists who won't go THAT extreme.

Michael Cohen is not a great guy. John Bolton is not a great guy. Georgia governor Kemp is as Trumpy as Desantis. I welcome them all to the fight without reservation (we've begged insiders to "speak up" for years, so we mustn't rebuff those who do), but it's a fantastic study in relativism.

We talk about the "lobster boil" effect: if you raise water temperature gradually enough, lobsters never realize they're being cooked. We are adaptable creatures, which is a blessing and a curse. It can be hard to gauge where we’re at.

But here's the yardstick: gauge by the awfulness of the characters peeling off and saying “enough”. When monsters flee in disgust - when even a Bill Barr gets fed up - that’s a problem.


And, again, let's welcome the monsters back to civilization. Monster repatriation is a wonderful saving grace of this sort of crisis. Monsters gaining perspective is even better than monsters shunned and shamed.

The Pitfall of Arrogance

The worst downside of arrogance is that it compels a person to sneer at that which they can't comprehend. This compulsion fortifies comfort zones, constraining growth, learning, and the ability to shift perspective. And those constrains, in turn, lead to depression. Depression's a punishment for arrogance.

Those who eagerly learn, grow, and shift don't get stuck. But the arrogant, steeply invested in their current position, are cursed to remain entrenched in their status quo, however miserable and unsatisfactory.


Not quite the same point, but the main cause for serious depression is the world's knack for offering an increasing load of evidence that you are not the hero you'd immaturely imagined yourself to be. Depression is all about over-rumination, and that is the most common rumination ("If I can't be the hero of this story, then screw it, I'm out").

LEFFtovers: The Murky Distinction between OCD and Giving a Crap

Egg white omelet with sliced grape tomatoes. Sautéed baby asparagus. Reheated garlic knot.

This was one of the easiest "9"s (re: my surprisingly non-ditzy system for rating foods from one to ten) ever evoked. And, as any chef will tell you, it's devilishly hard to deliver impressive results with unadorned simple fixings (much less LEFFtovers).

Let's focus on the reheating of that garlic knot.

We use awfully sappy language to account for the conjuring of quality. With food, the cliché is to say it's "cooked with love", evoking Valentine cards and wooly sweater cat lady hugs. Let's expunge the corny language and examine how I crushed the garlic knot reheat.

I thought about how I'd go about this, off and on, all morning. Finally, I had a clear picture in my head. And once a clear picture has appeared - which means all obstructions have been worked out - there's an insatiable drive to proceed. So I strode into my kitchen with the studly brio of a pole vaulter stepping up to the medalist's podium.

Here was the plan. I'd pop it in a toaster oven, with a square of foil perched precariously atop to protect it from burning, but leaving the sides fully exposed so they'd heat thoroughly. I also needed the heat to dry it out after 24 hours spent sliming in its oily juices in the fridge. The moment the knot looked non-slimy (and not a moment later, because it would need more oven time and I didn't want it to dry out; I needed to preserve the chewy/fluffy/crusty), I'd snatch away the foil, turn down the heat a bit, and watch like a hawk for the moment when the knot browned into exactly the Object of My Deepest Desires (the harnessing of minute care with visceral desire stokes deep creative powers). As with my bagel toasting manifesto, I'd watch like a scientist observes a crucial experiment. Mere seconds matter.

I'd prioritized my two main concerns: heat and moisture, and in a very particular manner. Cooking teachers don't frame it this way, but I bear in mind that I'm always working on a continuum, rather than toward some finish line. The garlic knot shouldn't be cold, nor nuclear hot. I didn't want it slimy, but I didn't want to dry it out.

Cooking is a matter of midpoints, not endpoints. There's no endpoint in cooking, only a "click" of the camera - i.e. plating/serving at a certain point in an unending procession of possibilities. It's like writing - one could keep editing forever, but the supposed final version is just the capture of a certain arbitrary moment. "Process", not "arrival points". Always!

If you're absorbed in nano-moments, you can choose between billions of them, each conveying a different slant of deliciousness. There is vanishingly scant middle ground between under and over, or between slimy and dry, but if you're slicing finely enough (i.e. paying extremely close attention), you have myriad choices in choosing a particular slice to capture. The choosing is an exercise of playful caprice amid deadly seriousness - an amalgamation few people can manage, which explains why food (even from highly-trained chefs) is so seldom delicious.

I've just devoted 500 words to reheating a garlic knot...after spending my entire morning thinking through the process. To most people, this would seem stark raving bonkers. I could, however, justify it by calling it an expression of love. Hey, that garlic knot was for my beloved. Nothing's too good for my darling Linda. Or Vanessa. Or whomever. Swap in a random name, and you're good to go. Suddenly, the caring seems more beautiful than bonkers. Love justifies the caring.

At least it did until a generation ago. Yesterday's "love" is today's "OCD", and I'm not being cute; it's true. "OCD" is now applied, willy-nilly, to any instance of deep caring. Einstein working on Relativity? Beethoven composing in a diaper? Ugh. OCD, man. Take a chill pill. Find yourself some life/work balance.

OCD is a mental health problem where care is lavished where it doesn't matter. Cooking and other matters of actual utility and/or creativity do matter, always. "Obsessing" over your work - whether you're a choreographer, a barrista, or a mechanic - is what elevates us from livestock. It's sacred.

Martin Luther King skewed it as more of an ego appeal, but conveyed the basic gist:

“If a man is called to be a street sweeper, he should sweep streets even as a Michaelangelo painted, or Beethoven composed music or Shakespeare wrote poetry. He should sweep streets so well that all the hosts of heaven and earth will pause to say, 'Here lived a great street sweeper who did his job well.”

Obsessing over your stuff is a lesser mission. Obsessing over Linda or Vanessa used to be beautiful, though it lately seems "unbalanced". But obsessing about counting every single Toyota you ever pass makes you OCD. No bueno.

Lavishing your deepest attention on your garlic knot - or whatever else you're productively working on - is the opposite of OCD, which is the trivialization of one's limited time on Earth. It's true that a garlic knot - which pops in your mouth and is gone moments later - sits on the very brink of triviality. But the garlic knot in the photo, above, was as good as it looked. Two hours later, I'm still aglow. That's proof that it wasn't trivial; that it deserved my attention; that this was no kooky waste of Earth time, but more of a legit holy mission (even if it's not as "serious" seeming a pursuit as selling your car or endlessly mentally replaying the hurtful thing your old boss said).

People with OCD needn't change their drives; just channel those drives to something productive. As with depression, OCD's a dead end where, as perspective constricts and freezes, wheels spin impotently. A depressive spins creative wheels, over-building pointless internal towers of brooding discontent. An obsessive-compulsive spins activity wheels, pointlessly over-processing some constricted slice of the world.

Those who build useful towers or execute useful actions - who power their wheels with verve, transforming solid traction into bona fide landspeed - are using those faculties in their intended manner.


I'm describing, fwiw, karma yoga. Anyone great at anything - whether they realize it or not - is a karma yogi.

See also "Explaining Steve Jobs", "Unhinged" and "Cousin Libby's Yellow Rice".

Vaccination Roll-Out

If this country had any remaining creativity, boldness, vision, and/or leadership, we'd gather all living presidents, Rush Limbaugh, Bernie Sanders, LeBron James, Fauci, Captain Sullenberger, and all the pharma CEOs onstage (or, at least, a Zoom chat), and vaccinate them all at the same time. Then have Beyonce sing a tune, for max attention.

This is how 1940s America or 1960s America and probably even 1990s America would have done it.


In case you missed it, I published, yesterday, "The Expert Skinny on COVID Vaccine"

Empathy Framed as Concession

This nugget got buried in a posting from last weekend.

The single most dangerous psychological tendency of our era is the deep-seated feeling that empathy implies sympathy and support. These days, to say "I understand..." absolutely conveys, to the listener, some degree of approval. Understanding is a gift one grants on the merits. It's a concession. A kiss.

This represents the very seed of evil and brutality (though it has not yet fully germinated), and I'd gladly use up a genie wish to see it go away.

Really, I believe this will be our undoing. Aliens observing from Rigel-32n will point to this subtle shift of language. It may appear to be a quirky little linguistical thing, but it's really not. This is a ticking bomb; as insidious and alarming as a whiff of gas in one's kitchen.

When did this happen? You can't deny that it has; roll the phrase "I understand him" (or "I understand where he's coming from") around in your mouth and see. How did understanding become approval? How can we possibly live on a planet like that?


Update: I just got off the phone with a 92 year old friend. I asked him "If someone during the time of the McCarthy hearings were to say 'I understand McCarthy', would that have made people assume he was sympathetic?" He answered, with great agitation, "Absolutely! Why would you want to understand somebody like that?"

So this correlation is not, as I suspected, something new. It is, however, horrendously awful (no offense to my friend, of course).

Tearing Down

If you're determined to seem great at all costs, but are unsuited to creating or fixing, you have only one possible course of action: tear stuff down.

The Expert Skinny on COVID Vaccine

Here's a free-wheeling vaccine discussion with the Slog's longtime technical advisor, who prefers not to attach his name, because, I suspect, he was writing off the cuff (as a scientist, he feels obliged to be more rigorous publicly than in informal conversations with friends).

His words weren't chosen with weighty care, and his conclusions were cheekily stated, so this might not pass muster for publication by a scientific journal. But in terms of useful savvy - a well-informed expert laying out what's really going on, in (more or less) plain language - you couldn't ask for better. It's a great read.


Me: Would you chance an airline flight post-vaccination? Or does 90% effectiveness plus undetermined length of immunity leave too much uncertainty?

Technical Advisor: Of course. Apart from the fact that I hate flying, of course.

90% efficiency is the lowball number for the leading candidates. It means that some people will still get infected, but so far none of the tens of thousands in the trials developed a serious (ICU-grade) disease. In fact one of the vaccines (don't remember which) shows so far a 100% efficiency against even moderate infection. There will be a few cases that slip through, eventually, but the probability will be far lower than slipping in the bathtub.

Length of immunity looks good so far, and will likely get better with later versions. In any case, booster shots can always be given regularly, and they use lower doses, thus minimizing side effects even further. If the virus continues to circulate, boosters may not even be necessary, as asymptomatic re-infection would self-boost the system.


Me: How does noncompliance affect this? I know we expect a certain amount, and there’s slack (especially given the surprisingly high effectiveness). But what if compliance is surprisingly low?

Technical Advisor: What kind of noncompliance, though?

Not getting the vaccine is, well, not getting the vaccine. Lots of people choose to smoke, and they die.

Not getting the second shot could be deleterious for the two US ones (so they claim, but perhaps they are just covering their asses), but it appears that the Oxford one may be able to provide most of the immunity with just the first dose (although perhaps not as robust, so more -- albeit less severe -- infections would be expected.) It's all conjectural at this point, naturally, only time will tell.

Not getting later boosters (if recommended) may vary enormously depending on the type of vaccine; long-term immunity has nothing to do with antibody persistence (which is easy to measure), it's all about memory cells (and that's rather hard to measure since it requires lengthy cell cultures, at best).

A memory cells is like a stem cell specific for one antibody; if it encounters the antigen (bug or vaccine) for which it carries the antibody instruction, it is stimulated to start dividing and differentiating into all the different types of antibody-producing cells (IgG, IgM, IgA mostly) as well as some ancillary ones, all directed against that particular antigen. In Theory, as long as there is just one memory cell left over from the vaccination, challenge with the antigen will produce a rapid response.

Boosters are more often effective than re-infection, because the adjuvants cause a non-specific stimulation of the immune system, so the vaccine is more effective than the virus (alive or dead). Still, re-tickling once in a while the memory cells by the virus will wake them up and revive that cell line.

The response speed that the memory cells afford is important, because it shortens the non-specific (interferon) immunity, which can degenerate into a massive cytokin storm, which appears to be a major morbidity factor. The faster antibodies are produced, the faster the cytokin response shuts down. Let go of the chainsaw once you've found your nail clipper.


Me: I’ll try to clarify my question. If a large segment of population doesn’t vaccinate at all, how would that affect the situation? Is vaccine-immunized herd immunity in jeopardy if compliance is even more disappointing than expected by authorities?

Technical Advisor: Oh, that. Vaccinated people are protected, unvaccinated ones take their chances. In the US, people are allowed to make their own decisions and take their lumps. We still get cases of polio, measles, etc; their choices, their lumps. And if the children die, jail the parents. (This is not specifically an American problem, BTW, over 50% of the French say they will refuse the vaccine, and nearly as many of the Swedes.) Once the vaccine is here, it's back to a matter of choice; you choose protection or you don't. If you don't, it's like smoking or not using your seat belt.

Herd immunity is a lagniappe once vaccination is available; I firmly believe that it cannot and should not be made into a major player the way it would be without a vaccine. Encourage people to vaccinate, muzzle RFK Jr and Gwynneth Paltrow, by all means, but as long as YOU get your vaccine, you're OK, and let the others deal with their choices, however stupid they are. Even Socialstyrelsen, which delights in telling Swedes how many slices of bread they must eat, is shying away from compulsory vaccination.

Note that Technical Advisor knows this because he, naturally, follows the Swedish press. In Swedish. When not translating novels into Esperanto.

Me: Going back to fundamentals, what’s the difference between Covid vaccine and polio, measles, etc, where the unvaccinated DO imperil the rest of us?

Technical Advisor: No difference. The unvaccinated polio or measles carriers do not imperil the vaccinated, they only imperil the other unvaccinated. Once you're vaccinated (and get boosters wherever appropriate) you are taken out of the pool of potential victims. It's them but not us.

Depending on the exact circumstances, there may be a small amount of (usually benign) leakage, since immunity persistence is not a precisely determined effect, but by and large, that's it. Measles epidemics happen among the unvaccinated only, which does include a lot of small children, but this virus is fortunately not targeting the very young, so that's out of the way.


Me: Huh. So the non-civic-mindedness angle on anti-Vaxxers is misplaced. I’d bet 90% believe they’re endangering the public. 

Though on second thought, I suppose it’s right because they’re essentially creating safe harbors for pathogens that otherwise might be eliminated.

Technical Advisor:

I’d bet 90% believe they’re endangering the public.

They are endangering the unvaccinated public, which does include a small number who aren't unvaccinated by choice but by necessity: people with severe immune deficiencies or on immunosuppressants in particular.

However in this particular case the two traditional major classes of undervaccinations are not relevant: the elderly, because it seems that the vaccines do work on even the very old (Queen Elizabeth and Prince Philip are scheduled to be among the first to set the example in Britain), and the babies are anyway not a target for the virus.

The only really problematic cohort is the transplant recipients, who already know they must be extra careful in any case, because any infection will be more severe for them no matter what. Even then, it's quite possible that some vaccines may work on them, depending on their profile of action (and here I'm totally in the dark, the intricacies of immune response are way beyond my ken).

They’re essentially creating safe harbors for pathogens that otherwise might be eliminated. 

Yes, but only for those pathogens without non-human hosts. Smallpox could be wiped out, polio should be soon, but influenza and corona viruses have huge wild animal reservoir hosts, so they will never be eliminated. 

Great short explanation by a doctor of how the vaccine works

Same doctor explains why the vaccine will work even with mutated version of COVID virus