Coronavirus
Coronavirus, COVID-19, is spreading exponentially. So far we have seen news reports from countries where there is an organised and rapid response to outbreaks. But what we are beginning to see now is it's rate of infection in countries without such preparedness. Italy and more worrying Iran. Italy is adopting a very strict strategy now, after being slow to tackle the infection. Whereas Iran is in denial, they are refusing to quarantine suspected cases. They have refused to lock down an important religious site which appears to be the epicentre of their outbreak. Also it has been spreading amongst the political class. There is talk of it's spreading rapidly throughout the Middle East.
What concerns me is that the chaos which will ensue in the Middle East, the virus will find a breeding ground and develop into a more deadly strain. Similarly to the way that Spanish Flu developed during the chaos of the First World War.
Should we be worried, or should we just wait until a vaccination is developed so that we can irradicate it through a vaccination programme?
Or is this the beginning of a deadly pandemic?
What concerns me is that the chaos which will ensue in the Middle East, the virus will find a breeding ground and develop into a more deadly strain. Similarly to the way that Spanish Flu developed during the chaos of the First World War.
Should we be worried, or should we just wait until a vaccination is developed so that we can irradicate it through a vaccination programme?
Or is this the beginning of a deadly pandemic?
Comments (8466)
Correct. But the original article that the Sun also refers to is from the Telegraph:
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2021/09/10/revealed-scientists-dismissed-wuhan-lab-theory-linked-chinese/
I do agree that the media tends to sensationalize news. However, the intelligence services have long been warning of growing Chinese influence on Western academics, which is not surprising if universities and research centers are co-funded by corporations with links to the Chinese state in the first place.
(y)
Quoting Isaac
?
Quoting jorndoe
Quoting Apollodorus
Not that it matters, but I'm no fan personally.
I agree. But the problem tends to be exacerbated by the issue of funding. As in any other field, whoever provides the cash gains the ability to exert influence. And when foreign powers get involved, things can go seriously wrong very fast ....
Take a look back at the number of wildly sensationalist pro-establishment articles you've posted, without a single complaint about their tone or use of rhetoric. One turns up questioning the scientific establishment and you're suddenly a deconstructionalist.
Now see if you can get the joke.
There's no obligation to take funding offers. I've turned down research opportunities because I didn't like the organisation funding them.
Which is absolutely right. Unfortunately, there is a growing tendency for universities and research centers to accept funding from Middle Eastern and other sources that are not always as reputable as they seem.
When it comes to Chinese organizations I have no idea why any Westerners would accept money from them. Unless they are naive enough to believe that the Chinese state is a force for progress .... :smile:
Quoting jorndoe
Quoting jorndoe
But you want to make it about me, ? Cool. :) (old comment)
Neither do I. I am saying that China is, though.
Stalinist Russia also had concentration camps. But it was not National Socialist, it was Marxist and its concentration camps were for political prisoners.
Nazi Germany's concentration camps were largely for ethnic minorities, as are China's.
Therefore China resembles Nazi Germany more that Marxist Russia, though there are of course similarities to Russia too.
China has put 2 million Uighurs in concentration camps, it has occupied Tibet, it is gradually replacing Tibetans with Chinese, and it has expansionist plans for Taiwan, India, and other parts of the world.
See also:
We hanged Uyghurs from ceilings and ordered their rape, says Chinese police whistleblower – The Telegraph
As I said to @Olivier5 above, the 'evidence on the ground' as you put it, the broad picture, is so utterly uninteresting entirely because it is so unarguably the case. COVID is a real pandemic, killing millions. The vaccine, lockdowns, masks and social distancing have all helped to bring down the numbers of people dying. All those techniques are generally safe and effective. No one in their right mind would argue against those positions, and, more importantly, no-one here has.
So the only interesting thing to discuss (for us laymen) is the response. The beliefs and tactics of the people - yourself being one of them - either advocating or dissenting from the set positions.
When you get down to it, I don't really care about what we call China. We deal with countries that do bad things all the time. We can't fix the world, although there is a faction that thinks we should try. It usually leads to disaster, e.g. Vietnam, Iraq, Chile, Libya...
Apparently you don't. Yes, an example of what "MY numbers" would be. You gave me statistics for lung cancer in smokers, divided into males and females.
So, I repeat: that's not what you were asking for. Thus, it's not an example of what you were asking for.
Quoting Isaac
No, but the 0.00015% still applies to you in the same way a roulette wheel does.
Quoting Isaac
Everything you've written over the last 200 pages is the problem? Care you summarize? Because the conversation started with you responding to me with this:
Quoting Xtrix
Quoting Isaac
Which is incoherent. Your decision can be risked based without having individualized numbers for yourself, which don't exist.
Quoting Xtrix
Quoting Isaac
That's not what I asked, as seen from the entirety of the quotation -- not the one taken out of context, as you tried to do. So the question stands: "Nobody is above average" in terms of what? There are many variables involved, and I named some myself.
Quoting Isaac
As I already made clear:
Quoting Xtrix
Which is exactly right. Plenty of subsets out there to look at if you choose to -- but even then you'll never get an N of 1 -- which is the standard you've set so you can go on justifying an anti-vax position. And again I repeat: have you been vaccinated or not? I assume the answer is no.
If you're looking for "your" specific numbers, whatever that may mean, then narrow down the data for your age, sex, family history, etc. Perfectly fine. We do this all the time. You can do this with the vaccine as well -- the data is out there. Compare the risk in your specific age and gender group, for example, to the risk of contracting the virus -- or the increased risk of spreading the disease, etc.
The discussion was about people refusing the vaccine out of fear of risks like stroke and death. Those risks are minuscule -- no matter how you slice the data. They remain so.
Absolutely. :100:
Thank you for writing this. It seems as though people just want to argue for argument's sake. That's fine -- but not when we have literally millions of people refusing vaccinations during a pandemic because of anti-vaxxer claims and massive amounts of misinformation/manufactured doubt.
Irresponsible indeed.
So you empathize more with anti-vaxxers and their concerns than those who are suffering and dying from COVID. Figured as much. Which is why you're a complete waste of time, and probably deserving of the contempt you so quickly project onto others while engaging in it yourself.
Ask yourself if that's really my position after writing this several posts earlier:
Quoting Xtrix
:chin:
Then narrow the data, restricting for your specific criteria -- your age, your ethnicity, your sex, etc. The data is available for this. But the national statistics are still important. If there are 150 strokes per 10 million cases, you can carve up the 150 into males and females, older and younger, etc. -- and I'm sure you'll get some variance (much more likely to occur in the 60 and older subset, for example). Does that really change the risk all that much? No, not at all. A basis point would be shocking to me. But you're still welcome to do so.
So let's return to the airplane analogy. You look at the overall statistics of crashes versus flights -- and that'll tell you a lot. Can you narrow it down? Of course you can, if you're interested. That will show you some variance as well. As you mentioned: the airline you choose to use, the time of day, the country of departure, the country of arrival, the length of the flight, age and make of the plane, etc. etc. Plenty of variables to control for.
You're welcome to do so. But to argue there can't be "risk analysis" without doing so is disingenuous at best.
Quoting Isaac
Right -- but let's do our best to give the impression that we are, because we're straight-shooting iconoclasts. Anything less is just "boring."
It does tend to lead to disaster when not Justice but hidden agendas or mere political expediency are the real motivation.
However, is the argument that the international community should do nothing under any circumstances, a better one?
There is one primary question - Does what the other country is doing affect the national security of the United States? If the answer is "no," then, generally, the US should not get involved. That may not always be true, but there would have to be extraordinary justification.
Now to get back to the specific question - China's role in the pandemic is definitely a matter of national security for the US, so it is reasonable for us to get involved. On the other hand, there is very little we can do that will force them to comply with what we think is the correct action. To somehow equate action against China as something of equal priority to actions to actually address the pandemic at home is very short-sighted.
The delta wave is waning. You probably only have a week's worth of mileage left.
'bout time. :clap: Only a week, tho'?
I think so. It was supposed to peak mid-October, but it's dropping off now. There's always the next variant, though. :sad:
What's happening with new variants? Haven't heard news of any for a while. The last VoC was Mu, but that one seems to have faded away (at least from the media).
I don't know of any. I hope we get a break from it now.
What we've got here is failure to communicate – and adequately educate! (Keith Devlin; MATH VALUES; Oct 1, 2021)
Unfortunately, "the distance" itself invites noise, distrust, ... I'm sure many here already know, but, anyway, here's Devlin.
So an example has to be exactly the thing itself? That's an unusual interpretation. I'll try to be more specific for you. Variables which we know to affect the risk from the virus (recall we're talking only about the risk of harming others - either by using up medical services or by transmitting the virus, or by contributing to one of the many social and economic consequences) are; Age, sex, obesity, comorbidities, social density, living arrangements, geographic location...and then there's all the variables which affect the social and economic consequences; trustworthiness of the corporations and institutions involved, stability of the economy involved, extent of foreign aid, the state of the virus, the infection rate in the rest of the world, the psychological effects of any course of action, the response of the media, the chaotic effects of mass rapid communication media like Twitter...These are the variables I'm talking about. all will affect the risk from any given course of action, some in known ways, others in unknown ways (but where the direction of change can be reliably predicted - ie reduce or increase the risk).
Quoting Xtrix
Quoting Xtrix
Quoting Xtrix
Quoting Xtrix
Quoting Xtrix
As I said to Tim on the other thread, I'm not conducting a poll. This is a discussion forum. You're not an expert on risk, so either you have a serious ego problem, or you need to support your assertions, repeating them contributes nothing to the discussion. If you think the national prevalence is still relevant to a risk-based decision even when we know that key variables affect the risk (variables we also know our values for), then you'll need to explain how. As it stands, risk analysis is not done using national prevalence figures, so if you think it ought to be, the onus is on you to explain how. Simply repeating the view over and over is not convincing.
Yes. In fact spreading manufactured doubt in such a time is criminal. It kills people, and I dare say our good friend @Isaac here is close to murder.
Of course it makes for more interesting conversations. I guess Russian roulette is more interesting than casino roulette too. Spices up the game...
:yawn:
Quoting Isaac
Understanding that 150 out of 10 million is a low risk doesn’t warrant the term “expert,” true.
Quoting Isaac
I have supported them with real data. I cited the study— and there are many more. The data is out there for anyone who wants to take a closer look. The risk is simply minuscule.
Exceptions exist? Of course— allergies, for example. There have always been exceptions with vaccines. The reason you and others continue on like this is because it’s been politicized.
Quoting Isaac
Again, the fact that you’re struggling with simple concepts (hence why I have to repeat myself) doesn’t make it unconvincing. You’re not listening.
Risk analysis is done using national figures all the time. I did it myself, for example. I know plenty of people who do as well. That’s for the group who even care— most just take the shot without knowing the numbers. But for others, seeing that the risk of death, or stroke, or some other such event is extremely low overall is enough to quell any fears. So national and international figures are relevant indeed.
Now, that may not be enough for everyone. Others want to narrow down the data to get closer to their situation — maybe by age or ethnicity or sex. That’s fine too. Those are subsets, much like demographics in polling. That will give a more accurate assessment of risk. If you find out that the odds are much better for you if you’re white, male, and under 30, then you factor that into your decision.
Maybe it goes slightly above or below overall numbers — but not by much. Why?
Because 150 strokes out of 10 million people, for example, is astronomically low. If it turns out that 90% of those 150 people were over 65, that’s important to know — no doubt (especially if you’re over 65). Does that significantly change the overall odds? As I mentioned before: no, it doesn’t. It simply means if you’re over 65, you have a slightly greater chance of having a stroke after taking the vaccine.
If that “slightly greater chance” matters to some people, great. To most people, it doesn’t. And it doesn’t change the odds much at all — perhaps by 0.00001% or something to that effect.
How do I support this claim? With mathematics — which can be checked by everyone.
Yeah, I find it very disingenuous to claim that it’s simply more fun to argue. I don’t see that done on less politicized issues. It’s always the politicized issues that we hear about how science gets things wrong, about how one should ignore or be suspicious of consensus, about how people should be free to ask questions, about healthy skepticism, about corporate power — all of which I generally agree with, when properly applied.
I don’t think it’s coincidence that these justifications get brought out by those who want to appear to be simply “questioning” things. We see it with climate “skeptics” for example, when it’s really denial motivated by other factors (usually money). We see it with creationists as well, who love to say they’re just “questioning” evolution as all good scientists should question things— totally disingenuous, as they are clearly motivated by proving their religious beliefs in a literal interpretation of the a Bible. Etc.
All just truth-seeking, genuine people with questions who are keeping authorities honest. A fine story— and complete bullshit.
Happens all the time. This is no different, really.
I would start by removing “the United States”. This is something that concerns the whole international community and I think we should take as broad a view of it as possible. We can narrow it down later on if need be.
As to the specific question, “equating action against China as something of equal priority to actions to actually address the pandemic at home” is something that I definitely do not do. Indeed, dealing with China may be even more important. This remains to be established through careful analysis of all known facts. (As a preliminary thought, what is worse, losing a few million people to Covid or losing everything to China?)
I would not say that there is little we can do, though. In military terms, the West can arm Japan, India, Taiwan, and even Russia against China without getting directly involved.
The military option may prove problematic though, as it tends to involve politics and other agendas that as we have seen tend to create a mess and generate new problems. So, personally, I would go for sanctions and other measures to destabilize the regime and encourage political opposition.
However, I think that one critical question would be, If China is exterminating Tibetans and Uighurs, on what grounds should we believe that it will treat Westerners any better?
Otherwise said, should Westerners wait to be put in concentration camps, or should we take preemptive action now, whilst we can?
Incidentally, it seems that new information is coming to light that may help getting a better picture of the facts.
Revealed: Wuhan and US scientists planned to create new coronaviruses - The Telegraph
Well, you caught me by surprise, the way you drove off the cliff like that. Earlier in the thread you sounded way to hawkish for my taste, but now you've moved over into Dr. Strangelove territory.
What would life be without surprises, huh.
Dr Strangelove? Produced by Hawk Films? I’m not into Soviet era propaganda movies (or movies in general) to be honest and I wasn’t even born at the time!
But I do appreciate your sense of humor …. :smile:
Are you not familiar with Dr. Strangelove? It is considered a great film. It is a dark comedy - very, very, very dark. It's not propaganda at all. It is a brutal satire of nuclear militarism.
I actually had to look it up on Wikipedia. If it's about "nuclear militarism" then it definitely sounds like propaganda to me. I'm not a movie person anyway. I prefer socializing or reading a good book when I have the time.
Plus, by action against China I meant economic sanctions not nuking them. It you could take out the evil leadership that'd be great but nuking the whole country, I don't think so.
But it is interesting to see that in the Telegraph article the WHO scientist says:
Revealed: Wuhan and US scientists planned to create new coronaviruses - The Telegraph
So, it seems that misinformation is being spread, not just via movies.
And if even the WHO is demanding more transparency from China, this seems to strengthen the suspicion that the regime has something to hide IMO. Time will tell ....
I’ve just read the whole Wikipedia article and to be quite honest, Kubrick sounds a bit dodgy to me.
For starters, he looks crazy. Just look at his eyes in those pictures.
Then he made a series of strange movies:
One about soldiers who tied this girl to a tree and then shot her dead.
One about an old professor and his 12-year old girlfriend ….
Stanley Kubrick – Wikipedia
It may be “black comedy” but personally I’m not into that kind of stuff ....
:lol:
That last one is based on a book, called "Lolita." All his movies were based on books -- none of them original to him.
Kubrick was fantastic. Kurosawa is better, however.
I think your political cultural views are a bit too much outside the pale for me. We can just stick to philosophy.
https://youtu.be/88iZVQGdKgg
That gave me the biggest laugh I have had in ages, thanks. You sound like a gauche country cousin who has just seen a sculpture by Michelangelo and is offended and confused by a marble penis.
Well, you guys gave me a big laugh too. :grin:
Of course there is nothing offensive about a marble statue. But I think the likes of Harvey Weinstein are a different story.
From the info available on movie directors and producers some seem to believe that they should have power over other people and the right to sexually abuse them. See Harvey Weinstein, Kevin Spacey, Roman Polanski, Klaus Kinsky, and many others.
Sexual abuse in the American film industry – Wikipedia
I can only guess that it was much worse in the 50's and 60's but fortunately times have changed since ...
You guys are obviously a different generation.
So, sorry to disappoint you, but Kubrick says nothing to me. I can only go by what I read in online sources like Wikipedia which, by the way is pretty mainstream.
It's hard to know who to believe these days, but something doesn't seem right there.
These are supposed to be "reputable" and "trustworthy" scientists and experts who know what they are talking about. So, why the contradictory statements, misinformation, and propaganda?
And now even the WHO is saying that China isn't being transparent on the true facts about the virus ....
What's hard to figure out? Whether the biomedical industry is covering up their latest invention? The industry that invented opioids? The medical industry is SICK.
Sure. But where does that leave China?
The CCP is composed of thugs that enslaves the population so it has cheap goods to export to the U.S. and elsewhere. Companies like Apple are knowing accomplices. Daszak, Fauci's cover-up buddy, works hand and hand with the CCP on gain of function "research". Clearly bio weapon research. There are some monstrous people running this world.
Correct. A lot of Chinese goods are made in prisons and concentration camps.
I've always wondered how anyone can trust a bloodthirsty dictatorship like China. Obviously, there are corrupt corporate interests making a lot of money from dealing with the regime. But for Westerners in general to be so naive as to believe that China is the benefactor of the world, seems incomprehensible to me.
Throughout history, beneficiaries of slave labor always found ways to justify it. People in the U.S. only care about the price of Apple's stock. People will sell their soul for very little.
Not effective are: stay at home orders in and of themselves, unless they cause less gatherings and limit movement.
Often, stay at home orders were last, while gatherings were already prohibited and commute movements at a much lower rate due to working remotely. Those countries that could support the latter and had a high voluntary uptake for working at home and who had prohibitions against gatherings in place saw little to no benefit for stay at home orders. So in that situation, stay at home orders were (close to) ineffective.
To the extent stay at home orders were necessary to avoid gatherings and limiting movements, they were effective.
Finally, some of the data was skewed due to protests against lock down measures, resulting in (super) spreading events.
Anything in here you think you can agree with it?
Are they?
Quoting Benkei
If these orders entail those things you say are “definitely effective” then why aren’t they associated with reduced mortality?
Yes. You're welcome to actually read the research and the caveats they offer if you don't believe me. This includes some of the stuff you shared by the way.
Quoting AJJ
If you have a country that goes from "open" to stay at home orders, such a lock down will be effective as the gatherings and limited movement will be a consequence of the stay at home order. If you have a country that already prohibits gatherings and with a lot of working remotely prior to the stay at home order, that stay at home order is not going to really help. This has been the case in most European countries.
That's why it's important to qualify what a "lock down" is.
Moreover, even with that caveat there are still papers that find a positive effect following stay at home orders so I'd say there's no definitive effect established but that's enough for me to assume it won't have a major effect.
Great. I’m totally happy to trawl through research papers every time you say something tendentious about them.
I had already linked you to several things that summarised and supported my view. You sulked and nagged me for direct links to research papers (in the expectation that I wouldn’t be able to find any?)
Basically, you lost an argument and have since had us play Study Wars in order to bury it in the mud.
:up:
Because I’m not the one advocating for restrictions and assumed obligations. I’m saying leave people alone because your claims are doubtful.
And I’m being derogatory.
Quoting AJJ
The Study Wars began after you refused to read what I’d shared with you.
Edit: why else do you think I noticed dead links and links to non-peer reviewed papers? Because I didn't read it?
Come on now:
Quoting AJJ
Quoting Benkei
EDIT: Also, as far as Sunetra is concerned, her whole paper was "guessing" as well, trying to see what models could fit the data, which in no way shape or form was a rejection of Neil Ferguson's model. That merely resulted from presenting the results as a dichotomy and the press ran with that. In reality the model has a 95% confidence interval that anywhere between 0.71% to 56% of people were infected as of March 2020 in the UK.
Remember?
I responded with information from an Oxford epidemiologist as well as relevant comments and observations from other professionals, including the Imperial College modellers themselves.
Your get-out has been to insist on other information that you can make assertions about; assertions that you expect me to verify for you.
I do and that reply is silly as can be. You apparently don't understand how stochastic modelling works.
Quoting AJJ
Quoting AJJ
Quoting Benkei
Well then.
So it appears you have to accept that according to their nature these models aren’t to be relied on.
To reiterate: this isn’t “I’m right” vs “No, you’re wrong”. It’s “I’m right” vs “We can reasonably doubt that you are, so stop bothering people”.
"Oh, look, a guy on the internet said that it's irrational not to get vaccinated! So let's just all get vaccinated!"
- said noone ever.
Can't you see that calling people "irrational" (etc.) is _not_ serving your purpose (which is to get them vaccinated)?
For the most part, I'm amazed at the uproductive strategies and tactics that the vocal pro-vaccers use, ostensibly to get people vaccinated. Why does someone insist on spitting into the well like that?!
Quoting Xtrix
You get an A+ for emotional reasoning, that's for sure.
But you see no fault in Westerners eagerly buying those goods?
Quoting Apollodorus
Greed can make people believe all kinds of crazy things.
Make no mistake: I despise China, but I find less fault with China than with the Westeners who in their greed gobble up whatever China throws at them.
So the Westerners cry foul now, with the coronavirus? Why didn't they cry foul when they eagerly imported from China anything from cheap plastic toys to computer chips??!
While I don't think China has leaked the coronavirous, I think they're laughing at the greedy Westerners for being such idiots to eagerly buy trash that even China's poor wouldn't gladly do so.
Some EU countries have been trying to scare people into getting vaccinated by making it a policy to publish the daily covid numbers (infected, hospitalized, dead) along with the percentage of the unvaccinated in those numbers.
Too bad that the percentage of the fully vaccinated who get infected, hospitalized, or who die keeps growing.
Just the other day on the Croatian news, the reporter said "Of today's 18 coronavirus deaths, as much as 13 were unvaccinated". No, adding that "as much as" doesn't make it more egregious, but it does make the other number more egregious.
Not just here at the forums. More importantly, it's being fed to us by the government. What is worse, we can not communicate with the government, the government does not discuss with us.
Actually, this is part of the standard problem of how statistical data based on large studies is presented by doctors to individual patients. It appears to be a "scientific" way to foster faith.
Quoting Olivier5
Riiight.
A brilliant attitude to have for the purpose of fostering trust and encouraging people to act in a way you want them to act. Really.
Except that you're not actually asking them why they refuse to get vaccinated.
Quoting Xtrix
Those minuscule risks don't simply translate into minuscule strokes or minuscule deaths.
For one, because your position lacks empathy. And while you eagerly claim to empathize with others, it clearly doesn't matter to you whether the person you're supposedly empathizing with experiences you as empathizing or not. You have demonstrated on several occasions that you don't care how you are perceived by others, you don't care about how they feel about you.
Which, at the very least, is a strange position to hold for someone who wants to affect others (ie. get them to get vaccinated).
For two, I myself am not out of the woods. With the Janssen scandal now, who knows what lies in wait for those of us who got vaccinated with it. Of course I'm scared. And what do you have to offer to me as consolation? Luck?!! That it might just be my bad luck that I will get a stroke or some other bad side effect? To say nothing of the repugnant prospect of getting sick and debilitated despite being vaccinated.
I expect the vocal pro-vaccers to offer something of substance that is relevant to people. Ie. that is assessed as relevant by the people, not merely by the vocal pro-vaccers. So far, your camp has offered nothing of this kind.
Only in the administrative sense in countries where there are mandatory covid passports, and being vaccinated makes some things easier as far as those passports are concerned. And in a social sense, insofar as one is trying to avoid being ostracized by one's pro-vaccer friends, family, and acquaintances.
But vaccination itself has no directly observable positive effects. One doesn't get a boost of energy from it; if one already has covid symptoms, getting vaccinated doesn't cure them.
Perhaps if some time after vaccination, one were to deliberately get exposed to the infection and then observe that one hasn't fallen sick, then that could bring added quality to one's life.
But beyond that, the added quality to one's life brought on by vaccination is symbolic and potential at best.
You need consolation for those people?
If governments are acting contrary to human rights, willfully misinforming their populations about the health risks, instating medical apartheid etc. the only people who are not on their hind legs drawing a line are the ones that love authority. If one doesn't draw the line here, I doubt one has a line at all, and will simply "follow orders" (aka the Nuremberg Defense) wherever they may lead.
Historically speaking, the authoritarians are almost always the majority. Why? Perhaps because being under authority provides a sense of safety and stability, and a sense one cannot be held accountable as long as the authorities are responsible. Perhaps it is a natural tendency of the powerless to want to follow authority - If they cannot be powerful themselves, at least they can comfort themselves they're rooting for the winning team, in an attempt to satiate their will to power through a surrogate.
Quoting Xtrix
The claim of yours I'm disputing is that national prevalence rates are used to assess individual risk even when there are known varibles. So I don't know why you're responding as if I'd questioned your knowledge of what the national prevalence rates are.
Quoting Xtrix
And the reason why you continue on like you do is because you've found a flag you can waive which makes you feel like the virtuous hero with absolutey no risk of ostracisation from your group identity. We could psychoanalyse each other, or we could talk charitably. I don't mind which.
Quoting Xtrix
I'm talking about proper risk analysis, not whatever you just did. My claim is that it's not actually risk-based. What you call it, or think it is, is irrelevant.
Quoting Xtrix
Show me the maths then. What is it about 150/10,000,000 as a prevalence rate which makes it impossible for any cohort to have a high risk. As far as I can see there's a potential cohort of 150 for whom the risk is 1.
Quoting Xtrix
That is changing the odds. It's literally what changing the odds is. You've taken one odds (the national prevalence), and you've changed them to get the risk for a 65 year old.
Quoting Xtrix
For some variables that may well be the case. For others we know it's much higher. Obesity, for example has an OR of over 13. Age above 65 even higher, making your estimate more than a thousand-fold out.
Quoting Xtrix
I've yet to see any mathematics, despite several requests.
Technically, I'm one of those, but my reason for doing so is that making covid vaccination into an actual law would require a thorough vetting process and a safety net provided for the case of negative side effects of the vaccine and its failure. Which seems to be the best guarantee possible.
Also, it is unfair and dangerous to place the whole burden of responsibility on the people. matters of public health are a complex and urgent matter and shouldn't be left to individuals to decide about.
As things stand, people have as much protection against the negative side effects of the covid vaccine as they have for drugs they'd buy on the street, and as much promise of success.
How noble.
Mankind can rest easy, knowing that stalwart proponents of their well-being such as yourself decided that the forced parting with perhaps the most fundamental of human rights, from which many other human rights flow forth, was deemed "in their best interest".
Glad we have folks like that around to tell us when it is time to rewind centuries of enlightened thought to keep us safe from what sensible countries are now treating as a severe flu.
Does the coronavirus want us to smoke and tolerate smokers?
My proposal sets the bar high, so high that few mandatory impingements on bodily autonomy measure up.
The right to bodily autonomy is much harder to consistently argue for than high standards.
(For example, it would not be acceptable for a person infected with rabies to be allowed to do as they please; the bodily autonomy of such a person needs to be compromised for the wellbeing of others. Similar with smallpox, tuberculosis, and some other highly infectuous diseases with high death or complication rates.)
Second comment that just underlines you don't know what stochastic models are and what you can and can't do with it. The model is fine and you can rely on the results. This one specifically just happens to have a large range of probabilities, making it difficult to base decisions on. That says nothing about the reliability of the model itself.
“Me smart, you dumb.”
We’ve established that your opinions are just that: opinions; not facts. Do you think people should be confined to their homes and coerced into receiving medical treatments on the basis of opinion? I don’t, you do. So we’ve reached our prejudices, and I find yours abhorrent.
:lol:
Quoting baker
Oh, so because I'm mean you feel it necessary to raise a stupid argument. Got it. Well done.
Quoting baker
No kidding.
Quoting baker
No, the probability of something happening to you, which is extremely low. The "consolation" you mention wasn't for you, anyway -- you asked for consolation for those who had strokes, to which I said I had no real consolation, other than that they made the right choice but were unlucky. I'm sorry you struggle with that.
Quoting baker
And you need consolation for the 150 stroke victims?
You're incredibly poor at argument.
Nah, not 1 beforehand.
Kids are an example of where an assessment has led to caution, hence ineligible (as of typing).
Whatever factors continue to be assessed; not just for COVID-19.
And whatever you think is "proper" or "actually" risk-based is irrelevant. There are many levels to assessing risk. Since you can always gather more information, by your definition nothing is risk-based.
Quoting Isaac
Is this a joke?
Quoting Isaac
Yes, I just said that...
Quoting Isaac
No, it isn't higher. Because what I was discussing was strokes -- whatever your discussing, I can only guess.
Quoting Isaac
Let me try one more time: 150/10,000,000 = 0.000015%. That's some pretty easy mathematics. Let's say everyone in that group was over 65 -- what would someone's, age 65 years or older, odds be of getting a stroke in that case?
So easy you got it wrong.
Risk is determined by variables. Assessing the impact of those variables is a risk-based decision. Ignoring them is not. It's nothing to do with always being able to get more data, it's about what we do with the data we've already got.
Quoting Xtrix
Why were you discussing only strokes? Did I imply the points I'm making applied only to strokes? I'm discussing the calculation of a variety of risks using known variables.
Quoting Xtrix
I'm asking how you get the risk from the prevalence. You've just divided the total cases by the total population of the sample. That gives the prevalence. I'm asking for the maths you're using to get from there to the risk.
Quoting Xtrix
It would depend on their measures for any known variables affecting the likelihood of strokes - high blood pressure, atrial fibrillation, smoking, drinking too much alcohol, poor diet, a close relative who has had a stroke, high cholesterol, diabetes, being overweight, sickle cell disease, frequency of migraine with aura. All of these factors have ORs, you multiply the prevalence by the combined ORs for the person (combined dependant on co-variant factors). That's the risk. If we don't know the ORs, then failing to take them into account is irrelevant since they could be anything. If we know the ORs but ignore them, you're not basing your decision on risk anymore.
Quoting baker
Yeah, something that's been consistently muddled here is the representation of data, via policy, and the actual data itself. It's true that a layman may not always be in a position to assess raw data (althought it's not impossible), but to infer data from policy requires a whole slew of assumptions about the institutions doing the policymaking, and we can't ask about those, nor about the degree of certainty.
If we imagine, hypothetically, a group of completely unbiased experts with no priors analysing the same corpus of evidence. If that corpus was 51% supportive of strategy x and 49% against, then every expert would support the strategy. Your poll of experts would come back with 100% support, but this is, obviously, a measure of the frequency of each binomial decision, not the frequency of different degrees of evidential support for it. If the corpus was 1% supportive of strategy x and 99% against, the poll of experts would come back exactly the same. In other words, the poll of experts clearly doesn't contain anywhere in it the data about certainty. For that you have to ask.
FYI, there's an important difference in saying people should get vaccines and mandating it and I think certain industries (healthcare, people working with the elderly) can be required to get a vaccine. You know, the type of vaccine mandates we've had for ages for various diseases. As to lock downs, I'm not in favour of stay at home orders but limiting movement (e.g. limiting traffic to and from hot spots) and prohibiting gatherings are definitely things I would support under circumstances where it's necessary to avoid an overload of the healthcare system.
Very convincing.
Coercion doesn’t require mandates.
Limiting movement and prohibiting gatherings constitute a stay at home order.
Your opinions are not facts. There are two prejudices in play: freedom in the face of uncertainty and confinement in the face of uncertainty. You have chosen the latter.
I see your point. However, China has been an evil dictatorship from the day the Maoists seized power in 1949.
So, I would say that China (i.e. the political system, not the Chinese people) is evil quite independently of the West.
It may, of course, be argued that Marxism-Leninism was introduced into China from Russia and into Russia from the West, which would make the West the ultimate source of China's evil.
And yes, it is Western corporations, governments, intergovernmental organizations like the World Bank, etc. in collaboration with Western manufacturers and consumers, that have facilitated China's rise to economic and military power.
And precisely because the West bears a large share of culpability, it also has the responsibility to do something about it. Economic sanctions, for example, would definitely be a step in the right direction.
As regards China leaking the virus, I don't think it would be entirely out of character. The regime clearly has global ambitions and a plan to realize those ambitions. It keeps the West under constant surveillance and it must have learned from past epidemics, their impact, and Western reactions to them.
China's rulers are not like our politicians whose main concern in life is to win elections for a few years. They have long-term plans, the resources to implement them, and no opposition to stop them.
BTW, research by the Lithuanian Defence Ministry's National Cyber Security Center has found that Chinese-made smart phones have in-built spying capabilities.
https://www.techradar.com/uk/news/users-urged-to-throw-away-chinese-smartphones-over-spying-fears
A few years ago, Krytpowire, a US mobile security firm, found that up to 700 million android devices had Chinese malware hidden as a preinstalled support app that had access to and sent information about users' text messages, contacts, calls, location, and other data to a server in Shanghai:
Secret Back Door in Some U.S. Phones Sent Data to China, Analysts Say - New York Times
I think China knows exactly what it is doing.
It's not like someone just came up with outbreak protocols last year.
There's precedence, long history, subject matter experts have a large body of material, ...
So, no, it's not just @Benkei-says-@AJJ-says. :roll:
“But textbooks and history! Subject matter and experts! Durrrrr!”
The data we've "got" can be filtered into many subsets and controlled for many variables indeed -- with nearly infinite variation. The choice of variables is up to the person assessing the data. In that case, there's always something ignored. If you're over 65, and want to see how the virus effects your age group -- you've chosen to leave out those under 65.
So yes, what we "do" with the data we have is always going to be a matter a selection, which is a matter of choice, which is a matter of our interests. You can get close to your specific situation if you wish, but things will always be left out, and data will always be incomplete. It's still risk analysis. Likewise, if you don't care to narrow down the data, that's also a choice -- and also risk analysis.
Quoting Isaac
That is one measure of the risk. If you want to get more specific, as I've said before, you could analyze that 150 and control for sex, age, etc. That's also a measure of risk -- only more specific to whatever you want to control for. To say the latter is risk but the former isn't is an absurdity. Why? Because specificity isn't what determines risk analysis. What you were asking for is a number spefici to you -- and that's not possible. You'll never get it. Therefore, if that's all that qualifies as risk analysis, then risk analysis doesn't exist. If that isn't what you're saying, fine -- then where is the line where it goes from non-risk analysis to risk analysis?
A 1 in 6 chance of dying from heart disease as an American shouldn't be included in risk analysis, according to you -- but knowing the fact that 82% of people who die of this are over 65 is risk analysis? At what point does the data on death from heart disease go from "prevalence" to "risk", exactly? As I said before, if you narrow the range it's still the prevelance -- just a more specific prevalence (like the prevalence of dying from heart disease for people over 65 and male versus overall prevalence).
Quoting Isaac
So you're only considering it risk if every possible variable is included in the assessment? If that's the case, that's impossible. You made a list of variables -- and I could come up with 100 more. We could come up with a 1000 more after that, and so on. But even if we exhausted the possibilities, which is an absurdity, you still won't have complete information -- as you mentioned. Thus, one could still say that you're only talking about prevalence -- just the prevalence of those with high cholesterol, diabetes, etc. A very specific group, no doubt -- but still just the prevalence within that narrowed group. I say, on the contrary, that you're talking about risk. I say that about overall prevalence as well. The difference is a matter of choice and how interested you are in restricting the data -- but you'll never get to an absolute number specific for you. You can come close, but you'll never get there, and there's nowhere along the line where we pass from non-risk to risk analysis. It's all risk analysis.
If there's a 50% chance of dying from x, that's quite scary. If, upon looking at the data, you find out that 97% of the deaths occurred in white males, then that's a different feeling entirely. I concede that. If we argue only the latter is risk analysis, then what about the following piece of information: white males all aged 35 (and you happen to be 35)? Is now the second range of data now NOT risk analysis either? And on and on we go...
True -- shouldn't have put the % sign.
The answer to your question is in the post. You even quoted it.
Quoting Isaac
Clearly I should have explained. If I know all the factors determining the fall of a coin, then the chance of it landing on either heads or tails is 1, I know it will land on tails because I know the starting state and all the variables determining its trajectory (assuming determinism - we can get into quantum fluctuations, but the definition doesn't require we do). It would no longer make sense for me to say the odds of this coin landing on heads is 50%, I know it's going to land on tails. The prevalence of coins landing on heads is still 50/100, that hasn't changed, but the odds have changed.
So the odds (chance/risk whatever term we use) are a measure of my uncertainty, whist the prevalence is a measure of the occurrence in a population.
You asked where we stop adding variables. Never. We include all variables. So what if there's an unknown variable? Well if, say, the starting position {S} (heads/tails) may affect the fall of a coin, but it's not a variable whose affect I know, then the chances of S(heads) making the coin more likely to land on heads is 50/50 (I don't know). The chances of S(tails) making the coin more likely to land on heads is also 50/50 (I don't know that either). I we multiply those two ORs by the un-affected prevalence, we still get 50% (0.5*0.5 - S(heads) + 0.5*0.5 - S(tails)). So we haven't ignored this unknown variable, it's just that its as likely to affect the result one way as it is another so including it doesn't affect the risk. If, however, we had a variable whose affect we did know but we excluded it, we're not doing risk assessment any more because we're not measuring our uncertainty, we're just talking about the frequency of some event within a population (prevalence).
No, they obviously don't. It's getting downright moronic now. Is closing down air traffic a stay at home order? Oops.
Err... right. I’ll just leave it with you.
And remember: your opinions are not facts.
That’s your opinion. Also not a fact.
Good one! Now try understanding the importance of that realisation (which you of course won’t).
Yes, and if we knew all the factors of anything we could also make predictions. But that’s a fantasy. As I said before. If that’s what’s are restricting “risk analysis” to, then it doesn’t exist. What you’re talking about in that case is certainly.
Quoting Isaac
They’re both odds. What’s the difference between one and the other? Specificity. Will we ever get to all the factors and variables of one specific person? Of course not.
So then it’s a matter of how much data we have and how much we’re interested in narrowing the range of that data.
Quoting Isaac
No. You cannot include all variables because, as I mentioned before, there is a nearly infinite range of variables we can control for. So at what point does it become, in your mind, risk analysis? Never.
Or put this way: what are “all” the variables? That’s like saying you’ve included all the numbers. Great — now add one.
The odds of a white male over 65 dying of COVID is the prevalence of death among that group. What about the INDIVIDUAL white male over 65? You know, the guy named Bob who’s got red hair and saw Star Wars in the theaters— all known variables. What about him? What’s HIS specific odds?
This entire line of argument is absurd. The odds of having a stroke from the COVID is roughly 150/10,000,000. That’s good enough for most of us — and it’s risk analysis.
getting killed by a "hoax", huh?[/i]
fuck 'em. :victory: :mask:
Where do I say the knowing all the variables is what we're restricting risk analysis to. Read more carefully.
Quoting Xtrix
No. Here's a primer on the differences. https://www.cdc.gov/csels/dsepd/ss1978/lesson3/section2.html
Quoting Xtrix
So? How does that affect the maths I provided? Each one of the infinite range of variables which we don't know about has an equal chance of increasing the risk as it does of decreasing the risk, so including them is a matter of multiplying each probability by the uncertainty (0.5*p + 0.5*p). I did write all this out in my reply, if you're not going to bother even reading it, there's no point in replying. We are including all the unknown variables in our measure of uncertainty (risk). What matters here is deliberately not including a known variable.
Quoting Xtrix
I went through this in my last response. His specific odds can be calculated by multiplying the ORs for any known variables by the unadjusted OR for the control. All the unknown variables are taken account of because being unknown they are just as likely to increase his risk as they are to decrease it and so they make no difference. The known variables are not just as likely to increase his risk as decrease it (that's what being known means, we know the effect they have), so ignoring them effects the risk. Ignoring the unknown variables doesn't affect the risk because, being unknown, their effect is p(0.5) one way and p(0.5) the other, the inclusion of which leaves the original OR the same. To use your example of {red hair} the OR for having red hair is unknown so it's a Gaussian distribution around a mean OR of 1, the sum of all the possible ORs is 1, we include the variable because we multiply the unadjusted control OR by the OR for the variable (it just happens to be 1 so it makes no difference). If we exclude it instead, it makes no difference to the risk. If, however, we exclude a known variable (say BMI) we will affect the risk because the OR is not 1.
If all you're going to do is bleat on about "we can't know all the variables" again, then don't bother replying, I've addressed that issue three times now and you've ignored it each time.
They’re both odds — namely your odds of getting a stroke or your odds of dying. That’s the risk — which you deny. Try reading that yourself— it’s an excellent primer indeed, and saying exactly what I’ve been saying the entire time. It also doesn’t once mention the “differences” you’re suggesting it does.
Quoting Isaac
Yes, take your own advice and try “bother reading.” If you try it, you’ll not once find that I say “unknown variables.” There’s an infinite number of KNOWN variables as well —or at the very least in the hundreds of millions of combinations for an individual. Since we’ll never get them all for YOU, your definition of what constitutes “risk analysis” is, I repeat, absurd.
The risk of dying of a heart attack in America is x. That number increases or decreases depending on many factors. That’s the general risk of the population of a country. If you’re American, that’s interesting.
Your risk of dying of a heart attack as a male of 71 years old can be calculated too. That’s y. If you’re a 71 year old male, that’s interesting.
X and y are both odds of dying of a heart attack. That’s risk — the same data, filtered in different ways depending on one’s interest.
It’s really that simple— whatever else you want to go on about is your business, but it’s delusional at best.
Where does it say that the prevalence and the risk are the same? Provide the quote that you think supports your view.
Quoting Xtrix
OK, so for a stroke, say, give me the first twenty or so, a list with the ORs for each.
Quoting Xtrix
You can't have two different odds of the same event.
Scrap my last response, I'm not interested. I've got a question I'm far more interested in, if you'll indulge me - What do you think is happening here? This conversation we're having. What do you imagine our roles are, what story have you put together that explains my posts in this educator/student story on statistical modelling? You've made clear what you imagine my politics and motives to be, but you've left out my education level, profession, age... I'm just intrigued as to how you're putting this all together.
Normally, I'd infer all this from your responses, but with you I'm absolutely stuck on how you're putting all this together into a coherent narrative. I thought I'd try just asking for a change.
Also, whilst I'm just asking, what's your role in this storyline? How do you see this ending, for example, what's the coup de grâce with which the hero slays the dragon here?
Incidence proportion -- which is nearly the same thing as prevalence, though not identical -- is stated as risk. This is what I was talking about. If we want to be precise. Here's the following from the source you apparently didn't read:
Notice the last line. Also recall my repeating the 150/10,000,000 as a measure of risk. This is saying exactly the same thing.
Quoting Isaac
No. The data is there -- look it up yourself.
Quoting Isaac
Of course you can. Winning the NBA Championship is an event. Lebron James' odds of doing so are much greater than mine, alas. Same event, different odds.
Again, this is dependent on the observer, their own characteristics, and their interests. The odds of you dying of a heart attack, as an American, is (I believe) about 1/6 or so. That's a measure of risk, controlling only for nationality. If we narrow it down a little: what are your odds as an American male? Then those odds are changed.
What are the odds of contracting ovarian cancer? That has a risk as well. In that case, however, it's important to note that your odds of contracting ovarian cancer are zero if you're male.
Quoting Isaac
What's happening is that you either have no idea what you're arguing about, or have been (deliberately or not) extremely poor in explaining what you're getting at. What is the ultimate thesis here? That you cannot measure the risk of COVID? That looking at the "prevalence" of a disease is unrelated to risk? I have no real idea, and if it's a technical point you're making it's entirely irrelevant.
Remember how this started:
Quoting Isaac
So I repeat what I did back then: if you want to narrow the data range, do so yourself -- it's out there. Or consult your doctor, who knows your family history, age, sex, ethnicity, etc -- variables that can give you a better (more specific) idea of your risk. Presuming he's up on the latest data.
Others who simply look at the data and say "a lot of people have gotten the vaccine, and there have been very few cases of strokes or deaths -- good enough for me" are also making a calculation of risk. In the case of strokes, it's 150/10 million. Very low, very rare. Most don't care if all 150 are black, or old, or female, or Seinfeld fans. It doesn't matter much, because either way the risk is extremely low. That's the level of calculation going on for a lot of people who are even remotely worried about the vaccines -- others don't think about it at all, they just do it.
If you can't agree with these points, you're missing the point.
Quoting Isaac
You've made your motives quite clear, so I don't have to guess. You said not long ago that discussing points of agreement is boring, and so you're attempting to either play Devil's advocate or identify some weaknesses in the logic or argumentation of those advocating vaccination. I think the way you've gone about it lacks clarity, is frequently disingenuous, and often shades into absurdity.
I have no clue about your age, education level, or profession. You seem to want to portray yourself as a statistician of some kind. If you are one, however, I'd be shocked.
Quoting Isaac
For my part, I have a bad habit of arguing with people until they see my point, give up, the conversation reduces to pettiness/insults, in which case I usually withdraw -- or there's a resolution of some kind.
In this case, either your case is truly ridiculous or I've misunderstood, in which case it's on you to explain yourself better. You've had multiple opportunities to do so, and have not succeeded. Rather than staying on point, you've repeatedly diverted the conversation from one thing to another, and even quoted something you apparently didn't read.
And we stand where we are.
No, you've not given the incidence rate there.
Quoting Xtrix
No. Someone winning the NBA and Lebron James winning the NBA are two different events, statistically.
Quoting Xtrix
Only important to note? So I should still take a few precautions against ovarian cancer because the overall prevalence is still relevant? Just a mere 'note' that my odds are actually zero because of a known variable?
Quoting Xtrix
You're claiming that there are "hundreds of millions" of known variables affecting stroke risk and you think it doesn't even need justification. Still, if you insist...
https://scholar.google.co.uk/scholar?hl=en&as_sdt=0%2C5&q=odds+ratio+factors+stroke+risk&btnG=
I count five on the first two pages, the rest seem to repeat that broad set. There's only a few thousand results in total, maybe less than fifty key papers, when do they start getting into the first million known variables?
Quoting Xtrix
Indeed. And yet vociferous disagreement nonetheless, against a position for which you have no idea what the argument is.
Anyway, the more interesting matter. Thanks for answering. One last question, how have you arrived at your beliefs on the matter? Let's just take the statistical disagreement about what constitutes risk. You're very sure of your position, you don't cite any external sources so where does your knowledge on the matter come from?
You don’t know what you’re talking about.
Quoting Isaac
You don’t know what you’re talking about.
Winning the NBA is an event. An event which numerous people have achieved. Ask Lebron’s teammates. Flipping a coin is also an event — an event for which there can be different odds, depending on the bet.
Quoting Isaac
Yeah— a relevant one, I’d say.
Quoting Isaac
So you’re arguing you can exhaust the known variables, and when you do — that’s risk analysis. Got it.
You’re wrong.
Quoting Isaac
Yes, disagreement about a string of absurd, vague, generally meaningless statements.
Normal for someone who’s happy to be “misunderstood” — since there’s no argument there to being with. If there were, it would have been stated by now. But keep playing this stupid game if you want to.
Quoting Isaac
There is no disagreement. It’s a fact. If you “disagree” with mathematics, that’s delusion. I can’t help that.
Quoting Isaac
Yes, I’m very sure about math and truism. Like the statement that 150/10 million is a low risk of having a stroke.
And I did cite that study. I also quoted the article you cited and didn’t read.
I've honestly never come across someone so completely self-assured as you. It's been an eye-opener reading your responses, but I think when we reach "I'm right", "I'm right", "I'm right", "I'm right", "I'm right", I've definitely milked that particular cow dry.
I'd say thanks, but I'm actually left feeling quite disturbed in the end and find myself in no mood for good terms. I wanted to get some first hand experience of how social media affected people's belief resilience, but it turns out I don't have the stomach for it.
Maybe a little prudence would have been in order, like not spreading artificial doubt and confusion in the midst of a crisis. That could be a useful lesson for the next end of the world.
:up: :100:
What are you saying? That, for example, people with transplanted organs (and who are on lifelong immunosuppresant therapy) should rightfully be categorized as having "failed to get vaccinated"?
Oh, and the West is heaven on earth, right.
If you look at the history of corporal punishment in Asian countries (not just China), for the past several hundred years, Westerners are fairly tame in comparison. Whatever ills Marxism etc. might have brought upon China, there was a fertile ground for them already there. If anything, it seems the Marxism etc. actually toned down the Asian propensity for, let's call that nicely, "ultimate competitivenes". No, I don't blame Marxism or Communism, the Asians can do all kinds of horrible things all on their own, without needing any tips from the outside, and they have done so for millennia.
So why not just, you know, stop importing low quality products from China?
I am quite sure the Chinese are perfectly able to live on their own, independent of exporting goods into the West. The Westerners can't say that about themselves.
If the Westerners are unable to control their own greed, their own lowly impulses, how on earth are they going to control the greed of others??
I never said it was.
Quoting baker
That's exactly what I'm saying. This would be part of the "economic measures" I am talking about.
Quoting baker
The world doesn't always work on Buddhist principles. If the West controlled Hitler and Stalin, why not Xi?
But sometimes it does? That's news to me.
Quoting Apollodorus
Absolutely.
Are you sure about the former, given the rise of rightwing politics?
As for Xi, the situation isn't the same, because the West apparently wants to benefit from China, wants to continue importing from it (there came a point from which on Westerners didn't want to do business with Hitler anymore).
The West trying to control China is like a drug addict trying to control his drug dealer, while continuing to obtain drugs from him. A desperate thing that a drug addict will attempt to do, but an endeavor that always ends with the drug addict losing out.
Isn't confidence grand! :fire:
A doctor's note is sufficient for exemption. Religious exemptions don't require any evidence. That's why it's become the strategy of choice.
I think places like China, Pakistan, Afghanistan, Iran, Turkey are definitely far-right.
The picture in the West is a bit more complex. BLM, Extinction Rebellion, Environmentalism, and many other movements that are on the rise here are not far-right. I think what is really happening is that Western society is undergoing a process of fragmentation, cultural and economic decline, and rising politization and polarization, probably exacerbated by the pandemic.
Quoting baker
This isn't entirely true. The West could start buying goods from Japan, Russia, India, Latin America, Africa, Turkey, and other places. Some industries may take time to relocate but it can be done if there is a political will to do so. In fact, with China becoming more and more oppressive at home and militaristic and expansionist abroad, I think this is what is going to happen in the near future.
By the way, you seem to look a bit worried of late. Are you OK? :smile:
Religion is great strategy. I have also heard of unvaccinated people who identify as a person who is vaccinated. Where will it end?
They would have to provide proof to avoid being fired.
It is the case with other madatory vaccines. For every other mandatory vaccine, there is a safety net for the case that something goes wrong, but not for the covid vaccines.
That's not quite accurate.
Canada: Vaccine Injury Support Program (VISP) (modeled after a compensation scheme available in Quebec since the late 1980s)
Israel: Vaccine injury compensation: the Israeli case
UK: Vaccine Damage Payment
USA: Countermeasures Injury Compensation Program (CICP)
In July 2021, Tommie Crum, Kirsten Mooney, and Birendra R Tiwari apparently identified 17 countries operating well-established vaccine injury compensation programs.
WHO: No-fault compensation programme for COVID-19 vaccines is a world first
Still, the EU country I live has no compensation for damage due to covid vaccines.
He is being jokingly cynical; taking a shot at those who, for example, identify as another gender, or as aboriginal although they are only one sixteenth or whatever. No one ever asks such people to prove it, because to do so is seen as racist.
Compared to the Maoists, yes.
List the famines that have happened because of "the West's" capitalist policies...compared to the 15 to 55 million dead in the famines caused by the "The Great Leap Forward" or the 1 to 20 million killed by the "Cultural Revolution". Capitalism may suck, but socialism kills. A lot of people.
Marxist Leninism and Maoism have killed far more millions than you could sum up in the wars the US and it's allies have fought. And still, I truly like that there exists a South Korea than there is a "North Korea" allover the Korean Peninsula, which has seen widespread famines during our lifetime. Yet, if it wasn't for the US, nobody would have cared about the Koreans. Americans did.
He said, "But coronavirus is just the common cold, isn't it?". I explained further, and he said "I've just heard so many different things."
So of course I went out and made fun of him. Later a nurse told me she had spent more time with him, explaining it, and he was starting to understand.
So he just really didn't understand. There was nothing political about it. There's just a community that's soaked in misinformation.
Yes,
But this is probably a different GlaxoSmithKline so great news!
In other news Lockheed Martin have come up with a brilliant strategy for dealing with some of the world's most troubled war zones, and McDonalds have been consulted about a promising line of products to alleviate famine, so finger's crossed on those too!
Now that I think of it, my wife cheated on me once. Gonna throw her under the bus right now!
Did I say the vaccine wouldn't be useful? That we're relying on a criminal profiteer for the health of a continent's children is not 'Great News' it's a fucking lamentable tragedy.
The point is that 'attention' paid to it by a bunch of criminal profiteers is not really 'welcome' so much as begrudgingly accepted as the least worst option currently available. Without a shadow of a doubt it will have ruled out any less profitable option, regardless of the benefit to the population concerned. With research funding streams as they currently are we'll likely never know what we need to know about this horrific disease because the options explored for it's eradication and management are pre-filtered to only those which can turn a profit. Even if this were the best option, supply will be restricted and potentially contaminated/altered because of the choice of supplier.
All of which will never change so long as people continue to support the blackmail of "don't criticise the pharmaceuticals, people might stop taking medicines!".
Never heard that line. There's no taboo that i know of on criticizing big pharma.
The whole body of pro-vaccine responses on this thread (and the other) has been predicated entirely on that premise. You've said almost exactly that yourself only a few posts ago, about...
Quoting Olivier5
Or did you think the COVID vaccines have been developed and tested by some system other than the one there's apparently no taboo against criticising?
Another point is, you think the stuff you get in your feed and you spread here comes from nowhere? You think nobody profit from it? Think again. Profiteers are everywhere, including I suspect on 'your side'.
Right. So when you said...
Quoting Olivier5
...you meant "everything is fine and any doubt about that is artificial and manufactured"? Or you were perhaps referring only to the whole capitalist enterprise apart from the bit that made the COVID vaccine because that's perfectly flawless for some reason you've yet to divulge?
Quoting Olivier5
This kind of smearing of your interlocutors is beneath contempt. What part of my posting history, fully sourced from reputable medical journals and peer reviewed papers gives you the slightest justification for the suggestion that I get my information from some 'feed'.
Honestly if you can't even bring yourself to treat the people you speak to with the bare minimum of respect you can fuck off.
I've come across similar stories. It's not unique.
With online filtering, raging discussions about censoring versus free speech, all that, sites like bitchute·com, banned·video, rumble·com, orwell·city have become popular homes for "the real unfiltered news" — read: pseudo-information — presented like whatever "mainstream media" you might come across.
It's on a scale.
Publishers like The Epoch Times blends subtle suggestions, select styles of loaded verbiage, misrepresentations, pseudoscience, hasty generalizations, conspiracy theories, unsubstantiated accusations, and less biased, more straight material, and they have a few subscribers. They're just one stop over from pseudo-information sites like those above.
Because of the amount of crud available from several sources, people sometimes tend to pick whatever confirms existing beliefs or biases, regardless of accuracy (or much else), altogether readily giving multiple vectors of propagation, forming an ad hoc polluted landscape peppered with destabilizing ulterior motives or what-have-you.
If rejecting "mainstream media" means turning to garbage, then it's neither smart nor doing the right thing, and that's apparently (happily and ragingly) happening — fertile grounds for bullshit, dis/mal/misinformation, and propaganda. And so it goes, systemic unreliability.
What's regular (perhaps unsuspecting) fella' to do?
Stick to reading reputable journals and expert opinion. What's so difficult about that?
Newspapers are meant to be biased, it's their modus operandi, why anyone would expect unbiased opinion from them is beyond me.
And I think a big difference between now and the 1918 epidemic is that most people don't see how bad the disease can be. We don't have corpses laying in the streets like they did. People hear about it from news sources they already don't trust.
So the guy I mentioned may have lost loved ones to covid, but he didn't see them die. When he gets sick, he does the best he can with the info he has. Plus covid causes brain fog. That doesn't help.
Unlikely. The death rate is about one in one thousand of the population. Most people's social groups are a little under 100 people, so 90% of the population will likely not know anyone who's died from it. If a person's social group is mainly young and healthy, or if they live rurally, the chances of them knowing anyone who died from it are potentially orders of magnitude smaller. Even if the bodies were on the street I doubt I'd have seen one where I live.
When the newspapers report people dying from malaria do people in the West doubt it's true because they don't see it? No. The doubt has nothing to do with a lack of visual confirmation, it's a lack of trust in media, government and academic institutions whose appalling behaviour unfortunately utterly deserves such rejection.
The more of them the better, giving more weight, and history, context, ability to spot apparent anomalies/outliers, overview. I just don't think everyone has time (or knowledge/skills/inclination) to do that, not if we're talking technical papers anyway (many wouldn't know where to look).
Quoting jorndoe
Reuters and Associated Press, for example, seem good. Or just good enough perhaps?
Quoting frank
There sure are plenty of sources around. Distrust can also be fed by questionable sources. :meh:
(Wasn't there a song called "'round and 'round we go" (kid's song)...? 1980s maybe?) :)
https://www.washingtonpost.com/health/interactive/2021/1-in-500-covid-deaths/
Well, yes. We've been through this before, so I'll just refer you to my previous argument. Once you stratify a population by some variable (expertise here) that variable ceases to exert the same influence within that cohort. So yes to context, and overview, no to spotting anomalies/outliers that status is largely irrelevant.
Quoting jorndoe
Yeah, that's true, but then one can always withhold judgement when one is without good sources. It's not necessary to have a violently strong opinion on everything. I think most medical journals are making their covid coverage available for free online (much to my wife's annoyance who pays for the subscriptions!)
Quoting jorndoe
I think they work differently to actual newspapers don't they? Such that they're systematically less likely to exhibit bias. Good sources, I certainly trust Reuters more than other news sources, whether that's justified or not, I'm not sure.
Okay so it's fine to doubt big pharma and the government but not you, for some reason.
• 12 prominent people opposed to vaccines are responsible for two-thirds of anti-vaccine content online: report | The Disinformation Dozen (Mar 24, 2021)
• Joe Mercola: An antivaccine quack tycoon pivots effortlessly to profit from spreading COVID-19 misinformation (Jul 26, 2021)
• CNN tracked down a super-spreader of Covid-19 misinformation. See how he reacted (Aug 5, 2021)
• This Woman Secretly Runs One of the World's Biggest Anti-Vax Websites From Her House (Aug 12, 2021)
• Anti-vaccine chiropractors rising force of misinformation (Oct 8, 2021)
Don't think they've done anything illegal, but "we know where you live". ;)
Yes, that's right. The clue being...
Quoting Olivier5
You do realise you just followed a post about the questionable trustworthiness of mass media by citing six articles from mass media outlets as evidence of some relevant phenomena? Are you playing some complex psychological game?
'Now saying'? Either quote me ever saying that spreading unfounded doubts was not problematic, or argue like a grown up. If you can't support your arguments without slandering your opponents then you should seriously question the quality of your argument.
Have you now stopped beating your wife?
Quoting Isaac
Inflated or blanket distrust can be wacky just the same. Perhaps even paranoid? Not everything and everyone's McDoucheCanoe, and not all reports are technical journal papers.
You're free to check up on the creepy dozen, Mercola, and Willner yourself of course.
In fact, I say expose them. (As was done, to an extent.) Why not?
In what way is that exchange interpretable as my condoning the spread of unfounded doubt?
Just explain the thinking. I'm suggesting that the pro-vaccine arguments have been that we should not criticise the pharmaceutical industry, I cited your claim that I should not be "spreading artificial doubt and confusion in the midst of a crisis."...where next? How exactly do you get from that point in the discussion to a claim that I support the spread of unfounded doubt?
Well yes, but demonstrating the existence of a scale doesn't act as evidence of the position on it of any given piece. Just because not all mainstream media reports are bullshit, doesn't mean you should expect people to simply believe the ones you pick are examples of such 'non-bullshit' reports, does it?
So...unless your post was a throwaway piece of virtuous flag-waiving, let's assume it had a point. That point was presumably that misinformation is being spread by a few key players. OK. Where does that take the discussion? Have the BMJ been duped by these key players? Has Reuters? Has the medRxiv? Because at the moment I'm the only voice opposing the unwavering march of total vaccination here and those are my sources.
So explain, so as we can follow the line of argument, how the mainstream media's view of a few Facebook whackos has anything at all to do with what we're discussing here. Because without explanation it sounds a lot like you're just trying to besmirch any opposition by pointing to some looneys and with some copious hand-waiving hoping that a "they're all like that" taint will stick. As opposed to, you know, actually mounting a serious counter-argument using your own words.
Sorry if I appear to trust doctors and my government(s) more than I trust you. I have what I believe are good reasons to trust doctors. For one, my sister is a medical doctor and I don't see that she is controlled by Satan. For two, them doctors saved my life twice.
But I have no reason whatsoever to trust you. Some of the things you write seem to come directly from Trump, so in fact I have reasons to mistrust you, as somebody who's thinking has been potentially tainted or parazited by post-truth BS.
Call it snide all you want. It's only snide when others do it to you, right?
Quote me doing so then. That way we can discuss actual comments rather than your strawman version of them - "wholesale condemnations" is the claim here, so I expect quotes to that effect.
Quoting Olivier5
So you think the stuff I posted about GlaxoSmithKline is not real? Are the reports of contamination, false representation, hiding safety data and bribery all lies? Again, if you want to argue with some made-up version of what I'm saying do so in private, otherwise quote the claim of mine you think is unfounded and we can discuss it.
Quoting Olivier5
Where has there been a conflict between what your doctor says and what I've said? Once more, the quote function is your friend here. Quote the claim I've made which your doctor disputes and we can discuss it, otherwise please leave me out of this fantasy discussion you're having.
Quoting Olivier5
Good. Do you trust them to fix your car? No. So when we're discussing issues of risk, trust, and corporate influence, what has the opinion of your doctor got to do with it?
Quoting Olivier5
We're having an internet discussion, I'm not doing brain surgery on you. Normal charitable conversation requires that you have a reason not to trust me, rather than that you don't trust me unless given some reason to. You must live a pretty impoverished life if your default position is not to trust anyone who isn't related to you or hasn't saved your life at least twice.
Quoting Olivier5
Quote them then.
Quoting Olivier5
No. It's snide when you impute my position to right-wing tabloid sources despite clearly being able to see that I've cited no such source but have almost exclusively referred to medical journals, technical papers and reputable news sources. It's snide when you refuse to actually quote anything but rather respond to some fabricated grotesquery of what you'd like me to have said because it makes your counter argument easier. Constant deflection into impugning false assumptions and unrelated truisms is snide, calling them out is not.
The argument here (at this point). Is that the pharmaceutical industry has behaved reprehensibly and that this gives good cause to not trust them. If you have any counter argument to that, I'll hear it. Otherwise maybe you could keep your little role-playing session private and reserve this space for discussing the things that real interlocutors have actually said.
I have neither the time nor the appetite to dig through the whole stack but this is the kind of heavily paranoid stuff I am talking about:
Quoting Isaac
And where does this reference to natural immunity supposed to ultimately grace us all come from? Did you read this in a medical journal? I seriously doubt it.
So that's saying that the pharmaceutical companies have behaved reprehensibly and so solutions developed by them should be used sparingly and begrudgingly, not freely and with fanfare.
Now find me the quote from Trump saying the same thing with which you support your claim that my statements come "directly from Trump" and we can discuss any overlap.
Quoting Olivier5
Here
https://www.nih.gov/news-events/nih-research-matters/lasting-immunity-found-after-recovery-covid-19
Or here
https://www.bmj.com/content/374/bmj.n2101
Or is having the NIH and BMJ in my 'feed' too much right wing brainwashing for you?
The way I read it, you painted a whole lot of people as criminals.
Quoting Isaac
Nothing in this article says anything about "all of us becoming immune naturally", which is a trope from Trump, Bolsenaro and co.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2020/12/08/trump-cant-kick-his-coronavirus-herd-immunity-kick/
They are criminals, they've been convicted of criminal offences, it's literally the definition of a criminal. Regardless, you're changing the subject. The accusation was that this position came "directly from Trump". Where's the Trump quote to that effect?
Quoting Olivier5
"Durable memories up to 8 month" <> everybody becoming immune.
The Trump trope is precisely in this 'herd immunity' bs.
Quoting Isaac
Who is 'they' in that sentence?
In what way does a durable memory in the immune system not mean 'becoming immune'. What would 'becoming immune' mean if not a durable memory in the immune system and can you provide an example of it being used that way in the medical literature? That way we're discussing actual facts, not your imagination, yes?
Quoting Olivier5
The pharmaceutical corporations in question.
In many ways, one of which is the constant emergence of new variants, another the finding is limited to period of 8 months after infection. Yet another the difficulty to extrapolate from in vitro findings to in vivo response.
Quoting Isaac
So how many people are we talking about?
And from the medical literature...? We're looking for the term 'becoming immune' being restricted to uses where immunity has been proven ex vitro to last beyond 8 months without chance of variants.
So the vaccines don't provide immunity either. They suffer from precisely the same issues "the constant emergence of new variants, ... the finding ... limited to period of 8 months after infection. ...the difficulty to extrapolate from in vitro findings to in vivo response." What name should we give to that which they provide?
Quoting Olivier5
Corporations are legal entities. Individuals are rarely prosecuted, although I did provide an example where one was. What has the number of people got to do with the argument?
'We all becoming immune' means what it means: that at some point in the future we will all be immune to covid. Aka herd immunity. But your article makes a much weaker claim.
Quoting Isaac
It has to do with my dislike of sweeping criminal accusations addressed at untold numbers of semi-mysterious folks.
How so? The articles I cited both refer to 'lasting immunity' arising from naturally acquired infection. If you think that's inappropriate then it's on you to provide some citation to that effect. I'm not going to just take your word for it.
I asked you what it had to do with the argument. You can chat about your personal likes and dislikes with someone who gives a shit.
I'm perfectly happy with the meaning and my understanding of the articles. It's your claim that they're substantially dissimilar, why would I go and ask someone to verify a claim you made?
You're dodging again. If we're not to use the expression 'becoming immune' to cover the action of either vaccination or naturally acquired 'immunity' then what term should we be using? Simply replace that corrected term in my statement and then explain how it alters the argument in any way whatsoever (wherein the expression 'while we all become naturally immune' plays a completely irrelevant role).
Still unanswered is the original claim, which you keep dodging. I've argued that the pharmaceutical companies have behaved reprehensibly and so solutions developed by them should be used sparingly and begrudgingly, not freely and with fanfare. You claimed this was "directly from Trump". I've asked three times for your supporting evidence for this claim and each time you've sidetracked into some unrelated triviality.
Quote me saying 'untold numbers' or 'semi-mysterious'. I won't defend your fantasy version of what I'm saying.
Because you don't want to take my word for it. What else could you possibly do to verify the claim? Ask me to write more and more stuff that you will quietly dismiss until i'm blue in the face? I don't see the point. It would not work in any case. There's none deafer than he who doesn't want to hear.
Better still...
Sanofi - charged with manslaughter https://www.business-humanrights.org/it/ultime-notizie/france-sanofi-charged-with-manslaughter-in-criminal-case-over-birth-defects-linked-to-epilepsy-medication/
Pfizer - fined for illegal marketing https://archives.fbi.gov/archives/news/stories/2009/september/pfizer_settlement_090209
Merck - fraudulent price reporting and kickbacks https://www.justice.gov/archive/opa/pr/2008/February/08_civ_094.html.
Johnson & Johnson - Off-label Marketing and Kickbacks https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/johnson-johnson-pay-more-22-billion-resolve-criminal-and-civil-investigations
AstraZeneca - Illegal marketing https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/pharmaceutical-giant-astrazeneca-pay-520-million-label-drug-marketing
GlaxoSmithKline - Fraud https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/glaxosmithkline-plead-guilty-and-pay-3-billion-resolve-fraud-allegations-and-failure-report
Bristol-Myers Squibb - illegal marketing https://www.justice.gov/archive/opa/pr/2007/September/07_civ_782.html
7
There. Named and enumerated, no longer mysterious and untold of number. So could we discuss the actual argument now?
No. Just a citation from the medical literature. It shouldn't be that hard, here...
https://medical-dictionary.thefreedictionary.com/immunity
https://www.cdc.gov/vaccines/vac-gen/immunity-types.htm
Here's an article using the exact term 'become immune'. https://patient.info/news-and-features/coronavirus-how-do-we-become-immune-to-diseases-like-covid-19
I just want you to do the same for your claim that memory in the immune system is not 'becoming immune'. If that's too much to ask you're on the wrong site, this isn't Twitter.
And yet...
Quoting Olivier5
...except the one you keep repeating.
I've already explained it to you. Bis repetitas: 1) variants are a big factor. This thing keeps mutating and one may develop an immunity for one variant one has been exposed to but not to another; this is why we are not all immune to the flue as that bug too constantly mutates. 2) the article was based on blood samples taken from 50 individuals, 40 of whom had had covid. Results from blood analysis show that: " 95% of the people [38 people out of 40 if my math is correct] had at least 3 out of 5 immune-system components that could recognize SARS-CoV-2 up to 8 months after infection." It says nothing about their actual in vivo immune response, and extrapolating from 38 people to billions would be a bit iffy and so they don't do it either. 3) the finding is limited to this 8 month period and says nothing about what happens later.
These are verifiable facts. Just read the bloody article.
It's fine to quote articles but to call untold numbers of semi-mysterious people criminals is not.
No you asserted it. What is it with you people and your egos? You're not my teacher, you've made no claim of expert knowledge. You just saying something you 'reckon' is not an explanation, it's a repeat of the matter at issue.
Besides which, none of what you've said addresses the appropriate term to use, which us the only thing you're questioning. I used the term 'become immune' you pointing out issues with immunity doesn't negate the use of the term.
Notwithstanding all that, you've not addressed the actual argument, within which the term in question was almost completely irrelevant.
I've literally just named and enumerated them.
I already did.
You then claimed that it doesn't mean the same and I asked you to support that claim. Are we just going to do the whole thing again?
The article describes a physiological state, that most people will enter into on contact with COVID, the other articles I've cited describe this state as 'becoming immune'. Therefore it's correct to say that most people will become immune.
The details on the exact nature and duration of that state are irrelevant because I've made no claim about that.
We're not talking about folks, we're talking about corporations. Legal entities capable of criminal activities.
We were just chatting about regular fellows becoming infected with virulent pseudo-information, and sure enough, a bunch of influential creeps are doing just that: polluting "the airways". (Did you check yet?)
I suppose that can happen when "mainstream media" is replaced with garbage, and the regular fella' doesn't read Nature journal papers — and really shouldn't have to.
Keep exposing creeps. Not a "psychological game", "hand-waiving", ... It's part of the pandemic story. You're free to comment on how to improve the situation. Or, is that impossible?
Quoting Isaac
By all means, keep it up. And do get vaccinated. ;)
Have I become a new expletive?
Quoting jorndoe
Indeed, I don't even feel the need to check it sounds perfectly plausible.
Quoting jorndoe
It is. So's disposing of used swabs but no one posts about it. I wasn't questioning the truth of what you're highlighting, I was questioning your reason for highlighting it. What point does it make here? That there are wackos on Facebook who have a huge following? I don't think anyone was in any doubt about that. At issue (at least as far as I see it), is which is the tail and which the dog. Do people believe internet nutjobs because they've lost faith in mainstream media, or have people lost faith in mainstream media because of internet nutjobs?
Quoting jorndoe
Ban Facebook, ban Twitter, ban Instagram. That'd be a start. The damage they've done is beyond reckoning.
Or neither, as seemed to have been the case with the example patient mentioned earlier?
Quoting Isaac
:gasp:
In my corner of the Earth, though, the mostly-vaccinated populace still shuffles around with their masks and vaccination papers. Government subsidies are winding down, and all of those who required the handouts to remain afloat during forced lockdowns are doomed to find out what happens when their tax-payer dollars are redistributed elsewhere, and at the whims of careerist politicians. The money used to fund rent, wage, and income subsidies will now focus on programs that “incentivize work”, as if government incentives weren’t the problem to begin with.
In any case, the state regimentation of our lives and livelihoods has been extended.
Is this the one where Tina Turner was in charge? Don't spoil it, I haven't seen it.
Well that's just great.
I thought that was the US.
But it's about 14K per 100K where I am, and that's low for the US. I think we're worse.
Maybe for the region or something? Not in the world.
I checked again: they said the highest daily incidence per million. I'm still looking for a reference and exact number, cumulative statistics take a while.
You may be right. The delta variant wave is calming down here. I am seeing a lot of unboostered people getting sick, but so far, not very sick.
COVID's endgame: Scientists have a clue about where SARS-CoV-2 is headed (Oct 29, 2021)
I suppose this is as well, except in a different way, the way that makes you shake your head:
Big Bird got 'vaccinated' against COVID-19, drawing outrage from Republicans (Nov 8, 2021)
Apparently, leaked emails between EcoHealth Alliance and US government funders show that viral samples of high-risk bat species living in Laos - the country where the closest relative to Covid-19 has been found - were sent to a Wuhan lab from where the virus escaped (or was released?) and caused the pandemic.
New documents back theory that Covid outbreak started in Wuhan lab – The Telegraph
Well that's just great.
https://nypost.com/2021/10/21/nih-admits-us-funded-gain-of-function-in-wuhan-despite-faucis-repeated-denials/
1. It still seems to amount to evidence that research on bat viruses was done at the Wuhan lab.
2. The Laos virus may not be "close enough" in its natural variant, but with some minor lab modifications it may be a different story ....
For Austria it’s another lockdown and the harshest vaccine-mandate in the western world. Inject these chemicals or face a fine. Inject these chemicals or you are not allowed to leave your house. And all this after the citizens were promised that lockdowns were a thing of the past. Without irony, Germany might follow.
In Ireland, with one of the highest vaccination rates in Europe, new curfews in pubs and clubs.
In the Netherlands it’s another lockdown. Encouraging signs of civil disobedience now fill the streets.
Almost invariably, the reasoning for more restrictions is to protect the state healthcare system. No one is surprised that rather than strengthen their precious systems, the politicians would rather control the lives their citizens.
It continues because not vaxxed, not masked, not boostered, not locked-down. It would be long-gone if only masked and distanced. But no. Too many freedom-lovers. :roll:
I can't imagine how much worse it would have been (and probably will be) if no one vaxxed, no one masked, no one boosted, no one distanced.
That’s right, you can only imagine. Perhaps those that require a politician to tell them how to protect themselves are the problem to begin with.
Meh. Your side requires a politician to tell you how to protect yourself; it's just a different politician. My politicians listen to science. Your politicians just hate my politicians; that's all they are running with because they have no science on their side.
As usual, those who stepped up and answered the call are the defenders of freedom. The rest sit back and demand it. The former know that that freedom isn't free. The latter haven't figured that out yet. They don't have to figure it out because, as usual, someone else is carrying their freight for them. They are freeloaders, not freedom lovers.
All this science on your side and look how well you’ve done. Mass death, the denial of fundamental liberties, medical discrimination, huge transfers of wealth, police states, rampant authoritarianism. Defenders of freedom? More like defenders of regimented societies, segregation, state control, censorship.
Nice prose. So a good government treats everyone equally instead of trying to make everyone equal. I have a problem with that.
Yeah, it's amazing how emasculated science and civics can be, especially when faced by selfish, inconsiderate, disrespectful, greedy individuals who insist on their freedoms at everyone else's expense. It's kind of like the mask/distance/boost/vax thing: Imagine where we'd be as a society if more people stood up and fought for freedom, instead of sitting around with the "I got mine" or the "I hope to get some so I'll suck the dick of those who took theirs" attitudes.
Oh well, history is one long proof of the irrefutable fact that the left has to drag the right, kicking and screaming, into a future they will then love and try to hang on to as the march of progress continues against their will. It's that slow, gentle arc of history.
I see nothing political in it. Reactionary right and left wing politicians have brought upon us this Covid fascism. There’s no escape into blame-games for this one. You’re either for freedom and fundamental human rights or you’re for Covid fascism, discrimination, and state power. Which is it?
What problem do you have with it?
I suppose that's what you get from reading the Telegraph. :vomit:
Quoting NOS4A2
Then you say:
Quoting NOS4A2
:rofl:
Anyway, let me help you:
Covid 19 brought upon us this Covid 19. Some people decided to give aid and comfort to a virus. There’s no escape into blame-games for this one. You’re either for science and freedom and fundamental human rights or you’re for the Covid virus, illness and death and Faux News. Which is it?
Your help is not required. Your political distinctions are meaningless here, but you cannot help to evoke them, for whatever reason. I’m not sure how stating that fact is risible.
You just made no sense. Congratulations. :rofl:
"Required" has nothing to do with it. My political distinctions are the same ones you made, yet denied to exist. I evoked them to agree with your regarding that which you said existed after denying that they did. I did it to try and educate you. What you said was indeed funny. Stating that you stated it is not. Never said it was.
That’s a lie. I never denied political distinctions didn’t exist. I was merely stating that all political distinctions employ Covid fascism, and your attempt to make it a left vs. right thing is stupid. Yet here you go.
You said:
Quoting NOS4A2
Then you said:
Quoting NOS4A2
I'll just let the record speak for itself.
Quoting NOS4A2
It's not stupid. It is a political thing. It's just that my politicians have science and you're do not.
I’m not sure how “I see nothing political in it” means “political distinctions don’t exist”, but doublethink is rife in clownworld. What’s left but to make things up?
Of course you are not sure. You don't see anything political in right and left wing politicians having brought fascism upon us. That's okay. We're used to it.
For example, rich people can afford better lawyers. That means they have better access to justice. The same principles applies to diet, healthcare, education, and influence.
Treating everyone the same isn't fair
It’s the opposite. Treating people differently isn’t fair.
Quoting NOS4A2
If it was a true example of state control and censorship, the Covid-19 outbreak would be over already...
They also have better access to injustice. :wink:
Quoting NOS4A2
Two ships, passing in the night.
Suppose when you were in school you had trouble learning to read. Would it be unfair to the better students if you received tutoring?
Countless prisons have had massive outbreaks, so I’m not sure a “true example of state control” would help any.
I don’t think that it is unfair so long as others can receive tutoring. Do you think it is fair that I should be the only one allowed to receive tutoring?
It is only fair if the child who wants or needs the tutoring is required to pay for it. Otherwise, how are they going to learn about bootstrapping self-sufficiency? If their parents or society pay for it, then the kid is going to grow up as a self-entitled little communist socialist.
I'm sure that if the parents, or others who care actually care, they can find a position in a factory or somewhere the indentured obligation can be worked off.
Emphasis added. Meaning all the other hyperbolic examples are not true examples of state control. They're just examples of rhetorical whining about a non-issue ginned up by Faux News, et al.
It’s like the no true Scotsman fallacy. The trick to refuting my examples of state control is to assert that it is not true state control.
You mean like you did when you said the state prisons don't even count as state control?
I never said that. No, I’m speaking of the one you fell for.
I didn't fall for anything, least of all the hole you keep digging for yourself. In response to john27, you said:
Quoting NOS4A2
I refuted your example of state control (you know, the ones you keep complaining about as an infringement of your freedom), true or otherwise, by showing the state has been unable to control Covid due to those who fail to mask, distance, vax and boost.
That’s just false. The failure of state control is no refutation of the existence of state control. First a no true Scotsman then a non sequitor. It’s just getting weird at this point.
If state control is a failure, then what the hell are you whining about? You aren't even in prison, and yet you complain as if the Covid response is a dystopian hellscape of lock-downs; and cowboys roping, throwing, and branding with the vax. The mask police are out to get you! :rofl: All your misuse of Scotsman, and trying to hide your own inconsistent statements, with false accusations in Latin, are not going to get you out of the hole you keep digging.
I already taught you that if the state has failed, it's because of those who refuse to distance, mask, vax and boost. The fact that state has NOT forced you to do anything is proof there is no state control, failed or otherwise. DOH!
I’ve already stated my problems with state control. Its tendency to fail is just another problem with state control.
I think the only hole I’ve dug myself into is this conversation. So let’s just leave it at that.
So far, all the state has been doing is asking. So, if as you say, the state tendency to fail is a problem, then you should distance, mask, vax, boost, and encourage others to do likewise. Otherwise, the state may have to succeed where you have failed. You wouldn't like that. The state fails because a minority of petulant, obstinate people won't do as they are asked. It would certainly add a gleam to the eye of those cowboys who otherwise really wouldn't have one.
The better students don't need tutoring, so they won't receive it.
I think it's fair that only you receive it because you're the one who needs it. Do you disagree with that?
I do disagree with that because it is unfair to deny people access to tutoring because you believe they do not need it. it is also unfair to the lesser student because you don't consider whether he wants it.
I was kind of hoping you would say that because it allows me to demonstrate one of the major liberal problematics (or one facet of the problematic).
If you look around, you'll find that most people disagree with you and on this point, so if the issue was put to a vote, the result would undoubtedly be that Unfairness (from your point of view) would win.
The only way to achieve the good (from your point of view) is a strong authoritarian state, one that is able to resist the common will. And this is exactly what early neoliberal theory advised
:fire:
:100: Exactly. A state that fails to control should be celebrated for failing to control; unless one champions success in state control. An alternative is for the state to channel the common will and ask politely. But some see that as a sign of weakness and tell the state to fuck off. Tough guys gotta flex. :roll:
I don’t see how my point of view leads to an authoritarian state, one that is able to resist the common will. It does not follow that my view of proper government precludes others erecting a different system. And the idea that we can “achieve the good” (whatever that means) through statist tinkering seems to me absurd. Maybe some more demonstration is in order.
But to link us back to the title of this thread:
"Emergencies' have always been the pretext on which the safeguards of individual liberty have been eroded.". -- Hayek
:razz:
Good quote. But it doesn’t sum up Hayek’s view on emergency powers.
The patriot act, the war on drugs, the war on terror, anti-communism, the pandemic—no shortage of state aggrandizement exists. It reminds me of Madison’s quote from a letter he wrote to Jefferson, “you understand the game behind the Curtain too well not to perceive the old trick of turning every contingency into a resource for accumulating force in the Government”. I fear we see that here.
In response to crisis, yes. Humans collectivize in the face of danger to the community. Probably evolved that way.
By true I didn't mean perfect. I meant it even being a hint of what your trying to describe.
:lol:
:strong:
Human population growth.
Your claim that the Covid-19 outbreak would be over already if there was censorship and state control is nonsense. Not only is it counterfactual, but manifestly untrue. States worldwide have shut down entire industries, travel, religion, and most gatherings, and the pandemic continues.
You said:
Quoting john27
I know you don't see how you just stuck your foot in your mouth, but I'm sure everyone else does. We have taught you two things: 1. The state control that you fear does not exist; 2. Even if it did, Covid would overcome it with the aiding, comforting and abetting of people who agree with you. But you have not learned. That inability to learn lessons is precisely why science and the state has not defeated Covid.
I don’t see it because you cannot show it. You’ve taught nothing. You’ve only asserted without evidence. Is compulsory vaccination not state control? Is the limitations on travel and gathering not state control? Is the mandates and lockdowns not state control? Continue your lessons.
Are you vaccinated?
Proofs in the pudding.
I've shown it but you cannot see.
Quoting NOS4A2
I have taught but you have not learned.
Quoting NOS4A2
This thread is full of evidence.
Quoting NOS4A2
Compulsory vaccination is when the state tracks you down, hog ties you, or runs you through a squeeze chute and vaccinates you. Not when someone puts up a sign that says "No shoes, no shirts, no service." Remember when I taught you about your hyperbole? No? Didn't think so. Oh, wait, I forgot about the Karen Amendment, allowing you to go shirtless and shoeless while still demanding service. Sorry.
Quoting NOS4A2
No, it is not. There is, at least in the U.S., a Constitutional Right to travel. But you may have to walk if you don't want to get a driver's license and if you want to use our roads. See the difference? No? I didn't think so.
Quoting NOS4A2
No. They are not. They are the state depriving you of access to state services. You can carry on in your libertarian Eden. You just can't avail yourself of our stuff.
Quoting NOS4A2
Seems rather futile, but if you insist.
P.S. Have you provided us with an analysis of infection/hospitalization/death rate comparisons between jurisdictions? I know the U.S. is one of the most lenient countries, but we've had over 750k deaths. Who spun up the variants? The state?
Why would you want to know someone’s private health details?
Earlier I was speaking about the compulsory vaccination in Austria.
Austria plans compulsory Covid vaccination for all
I guess it was in one ear and out the other. So much for your lessons.
Your evidence for state control not existing is to list evidence of state control. Brilliant.
:lol:
Can’t answer or refuse to answer?
Quoting NOS4A2
:ok:
1. Large population [math]\rightarrow[/math]Overcrowding [math]\rightarrow[/math] Pandemic
2. Large poulation [math]\rightarrow[/math] High demand for energy [math]\rightarrow[/math] Fossil fuel consumption + Deforestation [math]\rightarrow[/math] Climate change.
Double trouble! :up:
Apparently that has not happened yet. It was just one of your parade of horribles that I warned you about. That is what could happen if people don't step up. It's like a draft. If you won't help us fight an enemy virus, we may (but have not yet) make you. Coming to a theater near you if you don't step up.
Quoting NOS4A2
The evidence of state control does not yet exist. Do you even see how you are doing this to yourself? :rofl:
How are compulsory vaccinations, lockdowns, limitations on travel, gatherings, not state control?
If he's anything like every single person who works at Fox News, or Donald Trump, then I'm sure he's vaxxed.
They are,if there were any. But you don't have to get vaxxed, you don't have to stay home, you can still gather. That is why we haven't defeated Covid. DOH!
I remember early on when the scientists said that it won't do any good if the first world beats this thing without vaxxing the third world. As long as antivaxxers, antimaskers, antidistancers are still out and about, it will continue to spread and morph. So we ask you nicely and you refuse. Then you whine when Austria, et al, start doing what you say is happening but which is not (yet).
So, if and when your dystopian state nightmare actually does come into existence, you will have brought it on yourself. So far though, the state is still just asking.
But lockdowns, limitations on travel, gatherings, industry, trade, have and are occurring worldwide. All I can say is that it is weird that you pretend they don’t exist, even as an exercise in casuistry.
I tried to teach you about privileges vs. rights. That was the driving example. You don't have any rights to access privilege. None. So get over your sense of entitlement. Thus, there is no state limitation of rights. Shoes, shirt, service, etc.
As to world-wide, outside my little U.S., again, do those with more stringent limitations have lower or higher rates of infection/hospitalization/death? And why? Because of state failure to be strict enough? Because if that is the case, then you have not been held down and vaxxed, or locked up. And besides, how would any of that matter as long as people who think like you are left to spread their disease all over hell and gone?
Also remember what I taught you: Freedom isn't free. People have to pay for it. Doctors, nurses, essential workers, your fellow citizens, stepping up and fighting a virus. While some kids resist. Oh, what rebels! :roll:
As a side note of curiosity, just how involved in human rights to freedom are you, when it comes to these foreign lands on non-Covid issues? I'll be you were a real trooper for freedom in Xland back in the day. :roll:
You tried, I guess, but the teaching is so authoritarian and statist that I cannot help to reject it. The parallels between your beliefs and that of fascism are frighteningly similar, I’m afraid, that my revulsion is visceral. So it goes, I guess.
Yeah, I guess basic civics is authoritarian and statist and fascist. So it goes.
Basic civics according to Mussolini.
Jackboots, brown shirts, service.
I didn't read that because I don't take my definitions or leadership from fascists. Here's something you could try outside your fascist bubble:
"Examples of civic responsibility include voting in elections, signing up for the military, volunteering in the community, participating in government politics, and holding public office." Here's a link: https://study.com/academy/lesson/civic-duty-definition-examples.html Go educate yourself.
Small Pox, Chicken Pox, and a bunch of other viruses were eradicated by civic mindedness.
P.S. Every single solitary thing that you love or like, and which you currently enjoy (beyond the non-human natural environment), was brought to you by the left, by society, by civic minded people. Was greed part of it? Yes, but greed was harnessed and put to work by us to deliver what you enjoy. Get used to it. Don't be ungrateful. Don't be a parasite.
"Basic civics" now becomes "civic duty", as if the two were the same. The former is the study of citizenship while the other is a collectivist dogma. Your example speaks of Mohammed Ali being jailed because he refused the draft. I'll pass.
What of that which I enjoy has the left, society, and civic-minded people brought to me?
Manifestly sweeping statement ignores context.
Say, once the virus has already spread wide, containment has already taken a turn for the worse.
Unfortunately, spread is often learned post-factum.
Say, the wider spread, the more likelihood of mutations.
Hopefully less transmissible/dangerous mutations, but it's kind of hard to say in advance (post-factum again).
Containment can be involved, and it's a team effort.
Presumably we agree on limiting the virus replicating, propagating, mutating?
What do you enjoy in life that was not brought to you by the non-human natural environment? That.
Anyway, some on TPF argue about the way things should be. I'm not going to argue that, because I will stipulate that we should have that Libertarian Eden, with all rights and no responsibilities. No, what I am going to do is tell you the way things are, whether you like or not:
Groups of people cannot be expected to sit idly by, while individuals move through the group, killing or injuring other members. Anticipatorily, or responsively, the group can do nothing, all the way up to and including public torture and execution of the individual. Where on that continuum a group falls, depends upon the type of group. When I look at the world today, I see all groups erring on the side of leniency; some even bending over backwards to accommodate the individual, so he might continue moving through the group, availing himself of all the benefits of the group, without killing or injuring anyone.
But the group may or may not ramp up the response, depending solely upon the actions of the individual. If the individual stomps his little feet and cries, and refuses to avail himself of the opportunity to avoid killing or injuring others, whilst availing himself of all the privileges, then he can expect to be sent to his room without his supper. If he continues to be a selfish, inconsiderate, disrespectful, petulant, obstinate little baby, then he can expect a spanking (vax). He will have brought it upon himself. But so far, all I'm seeing is a threat of "time out." Maybe being sent to his room without supper.
I know Libertarians, who fancy themselves as adults, simply and absolutely HATE the parental/state example because the see it as being so accurate. But again, we aren't talking about the way things should be. We are talking about the way things are. So if you don't want to be treated like a little baby, then you must quit acting like one. You might think the state is a big meanie. :cry: Okay. So stipulated. The state is a big meanie. :roll: But remember, if the state has failed to stop Covid, it's only because the state is not as mean as you make it out to be. And if it is incompetent, it's only because it's giving you a "time out" and not spanking you. Maybe Austria is thinking it's time for a spanking. Time out didn't work.
That is your lesson for the day.
I know you will pass. That is the difference between you and Mohammed Ali and you and Socrates. But hey, you can always emulate Rand Paul.
Your description of the state as an overbearing parent is quite apt, so I can appreciate the analogy. But the fact you see it as your daddy does not entail that everyone else should or does. I don’t think you’re telling me how it is; I think you’re describing how you rationalize its behavior.
And it’s not a good rationalization in my opinion. The problem, as it has always been, is confusing the unvaccinated with the infected, giving yourself licence to call former murderers and treat them as undesirables even if they are unable to infect anyone, let alone kill them. But your murderers exist among the vaccinated as well. In truth, without antibody and other testing you do not know who is murderer, who is not. Of course, not knowing is ignorance, and discrimination premised on ignorance is folly.
So it’s a fictional tale, but worse, one that leads to discrimination and vilification of others. Without irony the same people decried as murderers in this story are also the greatest victims of this disease, yet the so-called civic duty is to force them like pariahs to the margins of society, only to embolden their hesitancy into outright refusal. We’ll lament them taking up precious space in hospitals, while saying nothing of the state’s failure to provide it, and this in countries with so-called “universal healthcare”. And while governments force private citizens to apply their discrimination policies, thereby making them unpaid state enforcers, they let the infected right through the door. What a sham this daddy of yours is.
We agree that we should limit the spread of the virus, but perhaps we do not agree that you can control a virus by controlling the citizenry.
Covid-19 was a masterclass in government failure, whether it was the suppression of those who rang the alarm in Wuhan, the failure of global health officials to warn in time, the failure of adequate testing, the failure to prepare, the failure to procure PPE, the failure of health systems, the releasing of patients into care homes, the weak vaccines, the failure to work with their peoples. We can add the rise in extreme poverty, mental illness, economic uncertainty, the loss of education, all of which are a direct result of their policies. Not only that, if certain theories prove to be true, it was their stupidity that created and released this scourge in the first place.
We can only imagine what might have happened had officialdom stayed out of the whole thing, but I bet we would have faired better without it.
Don’t bother asking what the alternative is.
It's apt because it is not an overbearing parent, but a loving parent trying to err on the side of leniency; bending over backwards to accommodate the child, so he might continue living in the family, availing himself of all the benefits of the family, without killing or injuring anyone.
One thing your lack of analytic reading skills had you miss was the word "Anticipatorily" when I said:
Quoting James Riley
Anticipatory action is like "no shoes, no shirts, no service." And speed limits, drinking age limitations and countless other laws that you obey without question. It's government giving you the opportunity to not kill or harm others.
However, your use of terms like "overbearing" when it comes to polite requests to mask, distance and vax, sounds suspiciously paranoid, like Q and other insecure, scared, paranoid individuals who think government is out to get them. It's sad, really. It would be funny but who would think what the government has requested is some how too much? To continue the family analogy, the sad part of this is not that you are like the child calling child services on their parents, because the child isn't getting their way. But, rather, the child actually thinks that mom and dad are abusing him by making him eat his vegetables. That's some Q level paranoia right there. So the child should not be surprised when child services rolls it's eyes. :roll:
Do you have any evidence of that? You know, like a country that accommodated every whim of the children? If no country did that, are you saying the whole world is wrong and you are right? On the other hand, the guy who just ran over 50 people and killed 5 really only killed the old folks. So, by Q analysis, it must be okay.
You what now
"Here is a shiny car and ten different brands of shampoo. Now go fight those colored people in a desert on the other side of the world."
We do not. Let it run. ALL of our attempts to control it thus far have resulted in epic failure, for the very simple reason that it cannot be limited, it may be slowed, momentarily, but it will resurge again, until, eventually, it has hit everyone a few times, snuffed the snuffable, and the rest that are left have relative immunity. So it goes. Welcome to a new virus. It was going to happen eventually eh.
So we will never defeat Covid unless 100% of the world's population is vaccinated? Then Covid will never be defeated because you will never reach 100% world vaccination.
Not getting the vaccine because someone told you to is just as illogical as getting the vaccine because someone told you to. You can't control what others do, so it is incumbent upon the individual to weigh the evidence and the risks to your own self when leaving your house every day. Having the vaccine protects you against even the unvaccinated, so those that are vaccinated shouldn't be concerned about anyone else's private health status. I've been vaccinated, but I'm neither pro-vaccine or anti-vax. I'm anti-mandates because it's just a matter of when, not if, a mandate is imposed that you don't like and think has gone to far, but by that time it will have gone too far to do anything about it. Give the government an inch and they take a mile.
Collectivism is not about government handouts. It's where the health of the community is valued above that of individuals.
So like, if you're aware that there is a risk to being vaccinated, but you do it to help others, you have a collectivist spirit.
If you prize your own health so much you're willing to see the community laid low, you're a liberal (sorry, "left" and 'right" just cause confusion. It's collectivist and liberal.)
You are only seeing things in black and white. There is a middle ground - which is Libertarianism. Libertarianism is for limited government, not no government. But as a Libertarian, I recognize that unfettered power in any form, not just government (which is a form of power and control), is a threat to individual liberty. Corporations should have their powers checked as much as the governments. Monopolies need to be broken up and competition promoted.
Libertarians are the true liberals, and promoting the idea to abolish political parties, while at the same time imposing term limits, banning polls, and creating a fair playing field for all candidates would be "progressive". As such, I am a progressive liberal. The media and most other people are using the term, "progressive liberal" in the wrong way, referring to authoritarian socialists which would is the antithesis of Progressive Liberalism.
That's laughable. My employer's "polite" request was "Get the vaccine or get fired, and fuck all the times you had our back." Getting fired means no income, because the employer is the entire province, so no job, no house, no pension, and I would have to move. All in, it would have cost me about 2.7 million to stand on my ethics and refuse the injection. SO yeah, in light of losing everything I have spent the last 30 years working for if I said no, I got the injection. It won't do shit anyway, but I get to keep working. Only now I have less respect for my employer, and I would love to park my truck on the CEO's face.
And that is company morale there.
30 years of "Do not discriminate" messaging and programs and the government puts in the mother of all discrimination programs. I hope Covid gets them all, short sighted bastards.
Yep. They just want handouts.
Indeed. Much like in my example, it is about coercion, bribery and indoctrination.
Quoting frank
I prefer the term "authoritarianism", for which collectivism is a euphemism. If 'liberal' means freedom-loving, then by all means I am a liberal.
Collectivism definitely has a dark side, but at base, it's a natural feature of the human potential.
Quoting Tzeentch
No, there's authoritarian liberalism. A collective can be democratic in theory. You'd just need citizens who aren't selfish pricks (and I mean that affectionately).
Let SARS-CoV-2 replicate propagate mutate unchecked with no containment efforts, leaving whatever in its wake?
Quoting Book273
:D So you got the jab and are still around to whine about it huh huh...
Did you grow an extra arm yet? (pix or dint happen)
That seems like an oxymoron to me. I think someone who is considered an authoritarian liberal is in fact just simply an authoritarian.
Quoting frank
And democracies can be authoritarian or tyrannical, if the system or the majority has rotten enough.
Hayek said he favored authoritarian liberalism in some circumstances, but he thought democracy should always be tempered because it's too easy to subvert. When a democracy has been taken over completely by one faction in society, he calls that totalitarian.
Quoting Tzeentch
Exactly.
Look into polio, small pox, etc.
Only because too many people refused to mask and distance when politely asked. It will step up from here, and really get draconian if people don't accept polite requests. It already has. Some people have died, while others are incapacitated.
Quoting Book273
Good. Now mask and distance. You can still catch and spread even though you are vaxxed. It's not 100%.
If government governs ineffectively, it is incompetent.
If government does not govern at all, it is incompetent.
If government is obstructed by individuals, it is oppressive and incompetent.
It reminds me again, of children (and some of the arguments made on TPF) who hate their parents for bringing them into this world, against their will, without any choice, and then believe their parents thus owe them for the rest of their lives. The parents can't teach those kids anything, once they become adults. It is always some other person that teaches them. And it's usually the hard way.
Government is just a big meanie. :cry:
What do you mean by "we" and "our"?
"Our" epic failure is because "we" didn't do shit. "We" sat around and complained and didn't do anything until someone threatened "our" privilege, and even then "we" reluctantly went out and got a vax. But "we" are probably still not masking or distancing because "we" are sticking it to the man.
Polio, Small Pox, etc. Not so much. That was "we" and "our". There is no "we" or "our" any more. "We" are now all rebels without a cause.
^ I think this is a home run. The same people who use “fascism” as a catch-all term for everything bad have straightforwardly adopted it as their politics.
To add, a while ago I read The Anatomy of Fascism by Robert Paxton; I remember he emphasises in fascism the role of war-waging as way of giving the chosen collective its purpose, and how it uses the fervency war generates as fuel for the fascist program. And what is the popular analogy for this situation we’re in? We’re fighting, so we’re told, a war...
Yeah, against a virus. And we're losing because so many people support the virus. Good thing we won the war against polio, small pox etc. Or did we? Hmmmm.
You’re a fascist, Harry.
Fascism, like white supremacy and Covid, was not wiped out in WWII and the Civil War and now. So yeah, now we have to keep dealing with the variants: Neo-Nazis, White Power and Delta. There's a lesson in there somewhere, but since we are human, there's no sense hoping we'd learn.
Now it’s you. Read the Mussolini quote; read Robert Paxton’s book; your politics appear unambiguously to be fascist.
By his definition, all states are fascist. What's next, no true Scotsman? What's you're recommendation? No state?
They are now, because they offered it to us and you accepted.
You have to put your comments in context or they cannot be understood. Who is doing what now, because they offered what to us and I accepted what? I thought we were talking about a Mussolini quote?
Since the vaccines don't prevent transmission of the virus, I'm not sure if they reduce the risk of mutations.
On the one hand, yes, people who have been vaccinated get infected at lower rates. On the other hand, evidence from livestock shows that partial immunizations that reduce the severity of a disease but still allow transmission between the immunized tends to make diseases more lethal. Variants that would otherwise die out due to killing their hosts too quickly are allowed to proliferate.
Marek's disease is a classic example. Through the 1950s it rarely killed chickens. Industrial scale vaccination allowed highly lethal variants to survive. The result is that the mortality rate for MDV climbed from less than 1% to virtually 100% in unvaccinated birds over 70 years.
COVID is somewhat similar in that countries with very high rates of inoculation are now seeing the highest spread of the disease.
So, the risk in the long term would be that you turn a not particularly lethal disease that overwhelmingly effected the elderly significantly into a more generally lethal disease. However, the cat is already out of the bag on immunizations so the best option would be to develop a vaccine that actually prevents transmission and holds up longer than a few months. And it's worth noting that chickens don't die off from waves of MDV, they just have to be vaccinated. But it does create a problem where disruptions in vaccine supply chains that weren't a major problem before can become dire.
The Mussolini quote describes your own view. Paxton’s book emphasises a feature of fascism that we’re finding in rhetoric such as yours.
Agreed. As a more recent example, too much ink was spilled about the rise in authoritarianism in the lead up to the pandemic, how it was such a threat to liberal democracy. But they were wrong about where it would come from. They never predicted that it would come from the institutions of liberal democracies themselves.
Like I said, the Mussolini quote is so broad as to be meaningless, hence the "no true Scotsman" reference. I suppose you would want a state to destroy itself on the whims of an individual? Oh, wait, that's what Mussolini and Hitler did. So I guess you were wrong. The fact I use seat belts, don't speed, get a small pox and polio vax makes me a fascist? :roll:
They were right. It didn't.
It’s not that broad.
The quote is that broad. Individualism = good but individualism can't threaten collective. That is literally every single group on earth. If you want to walk into a bar in Wyoming, you mind your manners.
Liberty and individual growth in behalf of the state. Freedom a concession of the state. A “Fascist concept of liberty”. It isn’t that broad.
What part of "allowed to" did you not understand?
And:
Quoting NOS4A2
We are experiencing this, now:
Quoting NOS4A2
But it's the 1% and the Libertarians that are the parasites. Can you say Trump?
Quoting AJJ
Again, you are free to walk into a bar in Wyoming, but the freedom to do so is a concession of the owners and the local yokals. You mind your fucking manners or you'll get your ass beat. Don't like it? Feel free to exercise your freedom to stay out and go somewhere like Somalia or Afghanistan where the evil state doesn't exist.
You’re agreeing with and providing support for rhetoric spoken by Mussolini.
:rofl: And you are agreeing with and providing support for the state which abides the rhetoric spoken by Mussolini. Does that make you a hypocrite? Or did the evil state deprive you of the choice to leave?
Well, I'm going to leave you rebels alone for a spell, while I go into the big city and enjoy all that society dun brung me.
You be you.
Exactly the alternative I mentioned. "Free markets" and "competition" is the answer. Which has been a complete failure on every level except one -- namely, the level of plutocrats. Libertarianism is just another cover for plutocracy. Capitalism through and through.
A nice story, though.
Mother nature is sick! She has a fever! (Climate change!)
COVID-19 is part of nature's immune system response.
Yes, when it closed the borders, it did.
However, I ascribe to the same theory as Von icarus, our lame ass vaccination process will result in this annoying virus mutating into something highly lethal, and as I watch the results of that ripping through the population I will munch on popcorn and snicker. Our governments reacted in fear, and are still doing so, it will be fun watching them get torn down by their peoples.
It takes a thief to catch a thief. :lol:
Like hookers and Blow? or concrete and pollution? Noise and light pollution? I am actually ok with the hookers, they need to make a living somehow.
Ok.
Meh. A true rebel wouldn't let a little thing like a border stop him. :wink:
Yeah, like that. When told me "You be you" I wondered "Who am I?" So I jumped in my car and drove 125 mph to town without my drivers license (I ran a person off the road; hope it wasn't AJJs loved one, but I know he'd understand). I walked into the store, no shoes, no shirts, no pants, with my M-4 slung over my shoulder and demanded service. I then went to a restaurant and blew cigar smoke into the lungs of all the other patrons. When confronted, I just schooled them about some tobacco company scientist who said it's harmless. "Do your research!"
The damn hooker wanted to see my vax card and I flew off the handle. I told her that the slippery slope of state oppression started when they wouldn't let me in school without a polio vax and now look where we are! Soon we will be on the trains to the camps! By GUM!
Some asshole told me I had to get six feet away from his hot girlfriend. I can't believe I can't even snuggle with strangers. WTF? But the final straw was the guy who asked me to put a 1 ounce piece of cloth over my face. Sure, I pack a 39 ounce gun, but that is my choice. A piece of cloth is the final straw.
I got tired of all the Mussolini, jack-booted, brown shirt shit and came home. I never should have left. But I know if I got Covid, I can always go the hospital and get a bed.
Don't tread on me!
Well, it isn’t my fault that papers choose to employ laymen to write articles.
Besides, it isn’t just the Telegraph, there are lots of other sources like the BBC and the Guardian that have the same or similar stories.
Covid: Biden orders investigation into virus origin as lab leak theory debated – BBC
Joe Biden orders US intelligence to intensify efforts to study Covid’s origins – The Guardian
The fact is the Biden administration has conceded that the intelligence community is split on Covid-19's origins.
Biden said the majority of the intelligence community had "coalesced" around two scenarios - human contact with an infected animal or laboratory accident - but "do not believe there is sufficient information to assess one to be more likely than the other".
Fauci himself has said “I think we should continue to investigate what went on in China until we continue to find out to the best of our ability what happened”.
If intelligence agencies and scientists are in two minds about the possibility that China has something to do with the pandemic, there is no reason why we should rule it out.
How ironic that of all the patent holders of the different covid vaccines, we're nearing the monopoly of one of them.
So what is it that you're really concerned about? That covid is China's biochemical warfare in an effort to take over the world?
There is the possibility we will never know.
They significantly reduce transmission.
Quoting Count Timothy von Icarus
You have one example from livestock, and it doesn't look like what we are seeing with COVID. This virus has produced more transmissible variants, but there is no evidence so far that it is becoming more lethal. The general trend with infectious diseases is to become less lethal over time: there is no evolutionary advantage for an infection in killing off its vector.
https://www.bbc.com/news/health-59418127
You obviously don't know what Libertarianism means.
Strange. No Libertarians in power yet this is the government we are faced with and can be defined as a plutocracy/oligarchy. Libertarians didn't do that. If this is what you think is the case, then voting for one of the two parties which have been in power for a hundred years or more, is voting for more of the same. How's that working out for you? Why you still vote for the same people that have been in power for 50 years and expect things to be different?
Apples and oranges.
An analogy, by definition, is not the thing itself. It is no argument to simply point that out. Rather, it is incumbent upon those who wish to defeat it to draw a distinction with a relevant difference. The point is, no successful vaccine ever relied upon 100% inoculation to be effective. So, I say again, look into polio, small pox, etc. Only this time, don't come back with an "Apples and oranges" drive by. Look into how those vaccines succeeded without 100% of the population of the Earth having to take them. That was the original point to which I was responding.
... for which there is not a shred of circumstantial evidence presented on any (world-class) infectious disease institute's or medical school's website. "Lab leak" is pure fact-free media speculation (hype) to date – yeah, "possible" but also, to date, laughably improbable according to science reporting in the US-Canada, E. Asia (discounting China) & the EU. I'd appreciate being shown that I'm wrong about this.
My concern is establishing the truth.
When a person is acting suspiciously, it is the duty of the police to investigate them and the same applies to state actors: the international community must investigate suspicious state activities for its own security.
In China’s case, no proper investigation has been conducted. So, pressure must be put on Western governments to take appropriate action.
The Telegraph may not be perfect, but I doubt that Nature is much better.
The truth can only be discovered if there is an ongoing inquiry into the facts.
Given that China looks like a ruthless dictatorship, I think we need more critical articles not less.
As far as I know, it's not a classic example, but the only example. Do you have another?
:rofl:
Quoting Book273
yet
Quoting Book273
Odd.
Libertarianism is a cover for plutocracy. Most are just corporatists. All are capitalists through and through.
But if you want to go on believing the standard lines about “freedom,” you’re welcome.
Quoting Harry Hindu
You mean capitalists? You’re right— libertarians are a far more extreme version of capitalism.
It's been almost two years with this thing already. We may have another interesting year next year.
Time flies...
No doubt you mean 'libertarian capitalists' (in contrast to 'libertarian socialists'), right?
I hope so too. COVID-19 might become just like the common cold virus - the worst that can happen is a few days in bed and that's it.
From what I could gather, the Omicron variant has multiple mutations and these seem to be random. Maybe, just maybe, these increase infectivity but decrease lethality. Let's keep our fingers crossed and hope, like you do, that the die will roll in our favor! Fortune is fickle, we know, but what we lack in determination and intelligence, we make up for in our love of gambling...with our lives. :grin:
Right. It's about the money. A powerful motive for blaming.
As long as people can blame others, their egos are satisfied.
But why doesn't anyone blame the US for leaking the 1918 influenza pandemic?
Quoting Apollodorus
The desire to blame someone is strong. These days, China is the usual suspect for everything bad, so let's blame China ...
It's hard not to blame an ultra-covert, Orwellian government in the CCP.
:chin: never heard that phrase before...
And it was the Muricans who started the 1918 influenza pandemic and let the damn thing spread.
Sounds like you'd enjoy a social credit score, and learning to love Big Brother.
The whole world should be rioting against the growing insidious influence of the CCP.
Well, that's the issue - the West doesn't know enough about them.
Quoting baker
Maybe you should try living in both? Compare and contrast?
:chin:
While the West is too amoebic to be known.
Too small a sample for analysis.
What do you mean by this? Lol
Fix the problem, not the blame.
:up: Thanks.
Very interesting and useful. Thanks.
An amoeba (/??mi?b?/; less commonly spelled ameba or amœba; plural am(o)ebas or am(o)ebae /??mi?bi/),[1] often called an amoeboid, is a type of cell or unicellular organism which has the ability to alter its shape, primarily by extending and retracting pseudopods.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amoeba
https://thezvi.substack.com/p/omicron-variant-post-1-were-fed-its
Stable viruses.
Corona virus 19 (and variants)
Unstable virus.
Vaccine for stable virus: effective.
Vaccine for unstable virus: Watch the news for efficacy. Also see: Optics; the importance of being seen to be doing something. Also consider: Chanting, Covering one's face in cloth, Cleansing with smoke, and other faith-based treatments.
Again, you missed the point of the analogy. The stable/unstable distinction does not address the purpose for which the analogy was proffered. Specifically, there was a claim that if there was a failure to have 100% vaccination rates, the vax would fail. That is simply not true. It is not true of stable or unstable viruses. You do not need 100% vaccination rates for either. Hope that helps.
On another tangent, I read somewhere that POTUS was trying to get the rest of the world to go along with freeing up the patents on the vaccines so they would become ubiquitous. I don't know if that is true, but for the life of me, I can't figure out why, back when this all started, we were trying to block other countries from access to data. I would have thought that the Chinese, Russians, et al would not need to engage in pharma espionage to steel the vax data. I would have thought everyone everywhere was working hard to stop this shit.
Damn, I'm naïve sometimes. Hell, I thought people would mask, distance and vax. I thought Uncle Sugar was funding all this, directly, or with subsidy, or through universities, etc. I thought states would encourage, and feel free to share information about infections, without fear of travel restrictions that weren't applicable to all states.
I guess the whole thing is not that big of a deal. Only millions dead, and packing long-haul symptoms. And most of them are useless members of society, who don't do the Plutocracy any good anyway. Thinning the heard, I guess.
Hopefully it's not a dry run for some worse, airborne, highly contagious thing that kills after 30 days of incubation. Humanity has proven itself unworthy. On the other hand, wildlife and wildlands will have a party.
Sure, but A) they had no idea what it was, and B) no idea of how to stop it, also, as it was over 100 years ago, maybe we cut them some slack eh, not go for reparations or anything. Interestingly, no one that died of the flu in those years had a confirming PCR test, so, as per current standards, we don't KNOW they died of the flu. Actually, since things are only true if confirmed by laboratory testing, no one ever died of anything prior to the creation of modern lab testing. The things you learn online eh! Wow.
About damn time you got the real picture. Welcome to the club eh. Wednesday night is wing night and the jackets are on order.
Oh I've always been on board for a reset. I've just got an ingrained opposition to those who I perceive as bullies, conservatives, Trumpers, Republicans. If it just about bringing us back to the Pleistocene, I'm all in.
Well, that's a bit of a relief. Now we have to hope poorer countries get enough vaccines so as to stop new variants from arising.
:up: Yeah, it's harder to de-globalize than it is to vax.
Quoting Apollodorus
You should put that in your profile.
I want to know the role of the placebo effect in all this.
Also, I want to know inhowfar people end up with more severe symptoms, depending on their psychological state and philosophical outlook on life.
When I hear "I want to know" coming from someone who doesn't really want to know, because he/she is not in a lab coat trying to figure it out, then I figure they are with the virus. If they are searching the internet for their information, then they are part of the problem.
Anyone who sincerely wants to know will pay attention in science class next time.
Don't think they capture "their psychological state and philosophical outlook" though.
Both Robert David Steele (denier, QAnon'er) and Irfan Halim (active medical doctor), for example, died due to the virus.
Quoting jorndoe
Ideally, they should be, yes, provided enough test subjects and time.
Surely a person's psychological state and philosophical outlook factors in how strong the placebo or nocebo effects will be for said person.
Given that this covid situation has become so drawn out and cannot be termed an emergency anymore, I think a new, more long-term approach is needed. It would be really helpful if it would be possible to induce and even increase the placebo effect deliberately.
I expected this level of response when Ebola was moving out of Africa. It did not happen, despite the 70% death rate. Now, despite the under 1% death rate, we have this monster response. The math does not add up. However, as long as we are comfortable ignoring bad math...Carry on!
Great point. It is very interesting how frenetic the mind can become. It is unfortunate that neuroscience and psychology are confined to a deterministic/mechanistic model of how it works, and have severely insufficient data concerning how the mind can, both individually and collectively, shape reality. I have a hunch that the power of the mind would be better understood through the lense of quantum mechanics. But I could be wrong, it's a terrible tragedy.
It's irrational, but at the same time, it could make the difference between life and death. Possibly, it has made that difference many times already.
The facility seems a frightening place, to me, especially for children. No visitors, no toys, no care-packages, round the clock confinement, and an ever-present police force—one wonders the point of it all if it is not an exercise in totalitarianism. According to Washington Post correspondent, Robyn Dixon, who was forced to stay there, "the feeling is part trailer camp, part hospital, part prison". At least the good officials there provide propaganda on how to maintain insanity during your internment:
No wonder they escaped. According to Obergruppenführer Michael Gunner, “all of them had tested negative for Covid the day before”. So why not just let them go? They had yet to finish their arbitrary sentence. And the threat was so grave that officials determined a police manhunt was required. They set up police checkpoints, checked registrations and car trunks, and scoured the areas until the young people were found.
The penalty is likely to be severe them. Prisoners are subject to fines and extended quarantines if they flout the rules, and all of it "at your own expense".
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/australasia/australia-covid-quarantine-howard-springs-b1967561.html?amp
Damn! Now everyone has to suffer! Even those who did everything right. Blame the gubmn't, and give a pass to all those who insisted on doing things their own way. Because, you know, research. And freedum. And resistance to distance, masks, and free vax. Here comes the parade of horribles, the slippery slope. The trains to the camps and the ovens.
The epidemiological relevance of the COVID-19-vaccinated population is increasing
If an unvaccinated person with no covid and a vaccinated person with covid show up at busy pub, who gets let in?
The Covid-19 pandemic is in full swing. The most effective strategy is not to cure it (given the givens) but to prevent it. Close the stable door after the horse has bolted. :chin:
Hehe. This wouldn't have happened if...
You obviously don't need to commit a crime to be sequestered. We also lock up crazy people when they haven't committed a crime. And in this case, being in close contact with a covid-positive person means you can become a vector for transmission as it takes time before viral load is sufficient to be picked up by a PCR test. About 24 hours before a PCR test is positive, you can transmit the virus. In Australia they've opted to quarantaine such people in separate facilities to ensure the disease doesn't spread any further. By comparison, in the Netherlands you're supposed to self-quarantine for five days after the last close contact with a Covid-positive person.
Quoting NOS4A2
A frightening place? Sure. That's because you're apparently a pussy and your confirmation bias doesn't allow you to quote the upside of the experience. So let me:
Quoting NOS4A2
Kids under 12 do not have to quarantaine, so the "no toys" doesn't seem like a huge problem but is in any case not true because only balls, skateboards and swimming and playing in drains during rain are prohibited.
And some rules are not representative for all the quarantine facilities in Australia:
But as usual, you're not saying anything just trolling for a reaction. What should people do when they've been in close contact with a Covid-positive person according to you?
You’re either a “vector of transmission” or not. You don’t jail people who cannot spread the virus. If you don’t know whether they can spread the virus or not, you figure it out.
Aah yes, hearing birds and smelling eucalyptus trees are the upsides to being interned in a camp, confined to a small building. Are you serious?
The following are not permitted in either quarantine facility;
Toys or recreational items such as swimming pools (plastic or inflatable), scooters, skateboards, bikes, balls and roller blades. These will be stored until your exit.
Quoting NOS4A2
This is plain wrong. First, there's a probability of being a vector from the moment you've been in contact as you might develop the disease. Since you can be infectious before it shows up on the PCR test or before you show symptoms, you take precautions to go into quarantine.
Second, people aren't jailed, they're put into quarantine.
If you don't know whether they can spread the virus because the tests available aren't sensitive enough from the earliest onset of being infectious, it's totally reasonable to take precautionary measures. Much like wearing a seatbelt is a precautionary measure as there's a possibility you cause an accident.
Quoting NOS4A2
The writer certainly was. You just went out of your way to highlight everything you find disagreeable with it, misrepresenting both the tone and conclusion of it to suit your own agenda.
Quoting NOS4A2
As I said. All the outdoorsy stuff for obvious reasons. You're not supposed to leave the veranda or room. But your Nintendo Switch, books, puzzles, etc. are all ok. Also if you quote, it's common decency to attribute it to the source.
To repeat: What should people do when they've been in close contact with a Covid-positive person according to you?
As usual you're just acting like a whiny little bitch without providing solutions.
Denying fundamental rights on a hunch is ludicrous. The just and ethical thing to do would be to fix the testing, not toss them in an internment camp just in case.
Sure, the fact that someone can hear birds and see the sun is nice, but it isn’t much a consolation when you are confined against your will.
As for the toys, fair enough—even though it says toys are prohibited, gaming systems, puzzles and cellphones could be considered toys—but that wasn’t the only thing I listed.
I already did link to the Centre for National Resilience in my first post. It was my mistake to think you had read it.
If people are in contact with a Covid-positive person they should isolate, stay away from others, and get tested as much as possible.
It's not a hunch. You already stated people should isolate and get tested regularly. The kids escaping is an obvious example that quarantine centers are a good idea. If they flaunt the rules to escape, you know they would flaunt the rules if they weren't enforced as well. So their escape is actually proof of the necessity to have mandatory quarantine. And the second sentence is idiotic on so many levels. You're incapable in weighing interests, apparently burdened by absolutism in every area. It's precisely because individuals have proven to be irresponsible with regard to health guidelines that stricter measures became necessary.
Quoting NOS4A2
Unlike you, most people are perfectly capable of realising what they are doing is to protect others and, despite not liking quarantine itself, are happy to make that sacrifice. Their experience will therefore be different than for immoral egoist like you.
Quoting NOS4A2
Yeah, the no visitors was gold. Even in your own answer people should isolate, which means no visitors. So exactly zero change from what you think people should do. Care packages is quarantine location dependent as is alcohol, although it is generally limited. Such limitations seem for obvious reasons.
Quoting NOS4A2
Hey Sherlock, one guess as to how I know you were literally quoting? Idiot. But it's typical of your low brow morality to not properly attribute quotes (or even put it in quotation marks) or to selectively quote to suit your narrow worldview. It's a rather Orwellian turn to read only negativity in an article that is predominantly positive about the quarantine experience.
Quoting NOS4A2
Yes they should. And since too many people don't do that apparently it has to be enforced to protect other people.
I have similar problems with the so-called 2g policy, which in the Netherlands means you can only get access to all sorts of places if you have been vaccinated or recently recovered from Covid. That's effectively indirect coercion on people to get vaccinated.
Let's hope the Omicron version is as light as it seems and darwinism will have done its job by developing a highly infectious but non-lethal strain which is a win - win for both the virus and us.
Seat belts and helmets are not 100% effective. In fact, they can actually result in worse harm, and death, depending upon the physics of an accident. Nevertheless, if one chooses to exercise the privilege of driving on society's streets in some jurisdictions, they must wear a seat belt and/or a helmet. This is done simply to keep insurance premiums down. The vaccine is intended to save lives.
Here is why the vaccine is so important: The burden of proof in an allegation of negligent homicide or reckless endangerment is upon the state or the plaintiff. If a person gets Covid 19 and gets sick or dies, it is *almost* impossible to prove that any particular person was the source of their illness or death. Individuals who refuse to take steps to prevent harming others are relying upon this burden to remain step-free.
If, in a utopian dream world, we could prove that X was the source, then we have protocols in place to stop the spread. People who harm or kill others can be sued until they are destitute, leaving themselves and their families penniless because they refused to take reasonable steps to protect others. Or, they could be imprisoned. But we don't live in utopia, so the the state kindly asks people to distance, mask and vax. The requests and the impositions continue to ratchet-up as time goes on and people refuse.
Individuals want to place the burden of proof where it already lies: "Prove it was me or I'm not going to refrain from exercising privilege." However, because it is a privilege, and not a right, the state is on sound moral ground in denying access to privilege to any who don't want to wear the seat belt, helmet, or vax. This has been argued and litigated for a hundred years and found lawful and moral. The state is NOT forcing anyone to vax. It's just that you can't use our toys on our field if you won't play by our rules.
I'm not a scientist, so I'm not going down the rabbit hole of arguing efficacy. I'm just arguing that the state is on sound legal and moral grounds taking the least-intrusive route available in pursuit of a compelling state interest to protect the health and welfare of it's citizens.
That's neither here nor there because it doesn't affect bodily integrity.
Sure it does. If your neck breaks in a car accident, I'd say your bodily integrity had been ruined. A needle in the arm, not so much.
I already taught you that I have a right to not have my bodily integrity violated by your disease. I taught you that a burden which is upon me cannot be proven. I taught you that society has thus shifted that burden to you. But nice try, arguing that I don't know about human rights when it is human rights the state is trying to protect, in accord with it's very reason for being. I think you need to go back to school and learn about human rights.
Your irrelevant and artificial distinction between "in" and "on" is, as you would say, "neither here nor there." If I punch you in the face I have not pierced your precious skin, but I have indeed violated your bodily integrity. So too the seat belt or helmet that breaks your neck because it does not meet your arbitrary and capricious 100% standard.
Look at the fantasies you have to tell yourself to justify all this. “You know these kids would flaunt the rules! Their escape is proof of the necessity of mandatory quarantine! The kids escaping is an obvious example that quarantine centers are a good idea!” You present a counterfactual and use weasel words to prove the necessity of authoritarian measures. No concern, no pros and cons, no rights-based approach, just counterfactuals and weasel words.
You say there is no effective difference between my normative claim “people should isolate” and “the government shouldn’t put people in internment camps”, as if people are unable to isolate and stay away from others without government internment. I’m some sort of hypocrite for making too big a fuss because government internment is no different than staying home.
No matter. Just as the Centre for National Resilience let’s us know that people should not look at their confinement like prison, but as a moment to reflect and learn about themselves, Benkei says we should look at it like a sacrifice and pat ourselves on the back for being good team players.
What is this but the most laughable, slimiest sort of propaganda?
It's still permissible to mandate less than safe medications, under the proviso that the situation is so dire that it warrants such a measure. Of course then the government would need to be consistent, and declare a state of emergency, enforce martial law and a lockdown that would epidemiologically actually be effective (unlike the ones we've had so far).
So why doesn't the government do that?
For one, as long as it can blame the lack of efficacy of the vaccines and their dangerous side effects on people, there is no incentive to stop. And they sure can blame the people.
Of course they are.
Moreover, there is pressure from employers -- "Come to work, or go to quarantine and lose your job!"
The assumption that no individuals privately and voluntarily respond to risks is the greatest friend to authoritarianism during the pandemic. One wonders if they factored individual risk-mitigation into any of their models at all.
I think people are perfectly capable of isolating and staying away from others without government internment.
The problem is those who don't do what they are capable of doing.
Rather than blame those who refuse to do what they are capable of doing, we blame government for internment in response to the failure of some to do what they are capable of doing. Even those who do isolate and stay away from others get rolled up because of those who don't. Not because of government, but because of those who don't do what they are capable of doing.
While government actions may become more draconian over time, just imagine what will happen if government fails: How about the people start holding a blanket party for those who bring the shit down on everyone else? I don't ascribe to that, early on, but it can be an inevitable result.
Where government has this impossible task of protecting individual liberties while protecting the health and welfare of individuals so they can exercise their individual liberties, groups of individuals may step in to get the job done. At that point, internments camps will look like a welcome alternative.
I can't overstate the leniency this all started out with. Is there a progression to harsher and harsher measures? Yes. But we have met the enemy and he is us. (Pogo?). We bring this upon ourselves and government is the least of our worries. Collective, non-governmental action is the worst case scenario. And guess what? You still have that "collective" that is the enemy of individualism. Personally, I'd rather have government hang me after due process of law than a bunch of assholes do it without any process at all. You might argue that it doesn't matter, because you are still hung. But the fact we have civil society demonstrates the difference. If it wasn't a good thing, we would have purged it long ago.
Government should be held to a higher standard. And it is.
I think the usual suspect for everything bad these days is the West. Slavery, genocide, global warming, you name it, it's all the fault of the West.
Like the original sin of the Bible, being a Westerner is bad by definition. Tainted, marked, and damned for ever ....
But I didn't know that subscribing to Buddhism entails standing up for the Chinese Communist Party.
Would you stand up for Putin, too? Or only for Xi?
And what about Tibet?
I don’t see how I can blame someone else for the actions of some government official. The people who have shuttered my livelihood, restricted my movement, banned friends and family from society, banned funerals, weddings, and religious gatherings, are not those who flout state-sanctioned medical advise.
But that’s the way collectivism works in a nutshell. The actions of one individual makes the rest guilty by association. Rather than consider things on a case-by-case, individual basis, lazy collectivist solutions come to the fore. This is not because they are right or more just, but because they are easier and involve less effort.
Principles like due process were devised to protect the individual from the state. It is because of the state’s malfeasances that it exists. It wouldn’t exist, in the Magna Carta or the American constitution, for example, if the state had its way. The protections of these individual rights are the proper sphere of government, in my opinion, but beyond that it should not go. But, as you mention, they have taken on collectivist tasks like providing health and welfare, so rights be damned.
The right based approach is something we already went over when I quoted the typically accepted limitations to human rights. The general welfare of society is a permitted ground to limit individual right and the weighing of interests is performed at that stage. The fact they escaped quarantine certainly is adequate indication that they would flaunt mere guidelines. Only an idiot cannot add two and two together.
Quoting NOS4A2
I didn't say any such thing, I said complaining about no visitors when you think they shouldn't have any visitors is an idiotic argument to make.
Here's another question for you, since it's clear not enough people will distance our take a vaccination, how do you propose to deal with the fall out that causes? Eg. overrun healthcare systems.
Maybe cite some actual case law proving my opinion is worthless.
P.S. Belay my last. Better yet, prove you can think on your own two feet.
So if a cop pulls you over for going 70 in a 30 you blame the cop instead of all the individuals who gave rise to the 30?
Quoting NOS4A2
Indeed. When individuals fail to regulate themselves, the collective will do that for them.
Quoting NOS4A2
We actually do that in criminal law. But individuals deprive the state of the ability to consider typhoid Mary's on a case-by-case basis.
Quoting NOS4A2
Bingo! Easier and less effort is what individualist fund the state for.
Quoting NOS4A2
Bingo!
Quoting NOS4A2
Wrong. That is the state.
Quoting NOS4A2
The state IS protecting individual rights when it protects the right of individuals to be free from the imposition of other individuals.
Quoting NOS4A2
Those collectivists task or protecting the health and welfare (also in the organic documents that you exalt for protecting individual liberties) are specifically designed to protect individual liberties.
Luckily I don't care for access but you are absolutely right. I can't stand de Jong making his propaganda for the vaccine. Dansen na Jansen... The vaccine is quite unnatural stuff (based not on a weakened variant but on a spike of the original), and it appears now that a lot of vaxed people still get sick. Will vaccination truly reduce the number of viruses? Won't the immune system feel fooled by a single spike? Why shouldn't I be able to trust on my own defense system. Okay, the sick people occupy hospital beds. But if the vaccinated are so sure the vaccine protects, why pushing others to be vaccinated too? Vaccines ruin your own defense. At least, the unnatural ones. They might just stimulate it but if you trick it, who knows what happens? Maybe you get less defense for other diseases. On top, even if I get COVID19, I won't ask for a hospital bed.
Simmer down please.
Roger that.
Our current justice system sometimes allows for the guilty to go free and sometimes convicts the innocent. These are simply unavoidable evils, and in lieu of a more practical alternative, is something we just have to accept. And the same is true of our COVID regulations.
Not sure where this is coming from.
Or this.
Oh, come on. What's the matter?
I don't think of myself as a Buddhist, and I have many problems with Buddhism. But maybe you guys will actually make me into one.
Yes. The current numbers for Slovenia are:
40 % of those hospitalized for covid are vaccinated
20 % of those needing intensive care are vaccinated
Sure, but then the government rhetoric should reflect this harsh reality. Although it's not actually harsh, it's the reality of living on this planet.
And the public discourse should reflect this as well.
The government is a repressive institution that is at least nominally interested in the wellbeing of the state, and for this it is willing, ready, and able to sacrifice the lives of some of its citizens, and citizens need to be aware of this, rather than thinking of the government as some kind of friend, older brother, or parent.
I would not propose any government solution beyond the ones I have always stipulated: the protection of human rights. As for dealing with the potential of disease and infection, I deal with it by protecting myself.
It seems to me that the solution to overrun healthcare systems are better healthcare systems. This is especially true of so-called "universal" systems, where everyone is assured healthcare. The people pay for universal healthcare and they are owed universal healthcare. If a government has to restrict and confine people because of their failure to uphold their end of the bargain, then they are the problem. But if the lockdowns are any indication, the government would rather violate the most basic of human rights to skirt that responsibility.
I cannot see it like you because I’m left wondering how someone like you or me “gives rise” to a 30 zone, as if I had any hand in legislation. Do I give rise to a 70 zone if I drive too slow?
As for rights, I speak only of the negative rights, not the positive privileges.
You and me give rise to a 30 by driving irresponsibly (too fast) in that zone, and killing or injuring others and depriving them of their rights.
Quoting NOS4A2
You do if it's been proven to be too slow. We have zones in the U.S. with minimums for that very reason.
Quoting NOS4A2
Help me out here, with an example.
But what if the overwhelming majority who do not kill or injure others? What do they give rise to?
Positive rights confer a duty to act upon another person. So if you believe in positive rights such as the right to healthcare, welfare, employment, you also believe in the duty to provide them. Negative rights confer a duty to refrain from acting upon another person. So if you believe in the right to free speech, conscience, liberty, you also believe in the duty to refrain from suppressing them.
It's up to the people as to whether they want to impose upon their government the burden of screening each and every individual, and then providing the responsible one's with a florescent orange car, so the cops know those people are responsible drivers and to not bother pulling them over, just to have others cry out about unequal treatment of the laws, and how they did their own research, and how they know that a faster rate of speed can safely be sustained on that road.
The people have decided not to do that. They decided instead to have a driver's license vetting process that teaches people what signs mean and how to read them. They decided to have the state hire experts, engineers and scientist who run calculations that are beyond guys like me to discern the nature and radius of the curve ahead, the slope of the road, the width, the number of lanes, etc. and then calculate a safe limit of speed based upon billions of miles of experience that are way beyond any who are not experts in the field.
Quoting NOS4A2
Thanks.
So if believe a person does not have a right to employment, then you can place conditions upon that employment? Like masking, distancing, vaxxing? If a person does not believe in healthcare, can their access thereto be conditioned upon vaxxing? In other words, if there are no positive rights, then we simply have privileges? Privileges which can be denied without the violation of negative rights?
Quoting NOS4A2
Are those rights unlimited? Can the exercise of those rights infringe upon the rights of others?
Do rights (positive or negative) come with responsibilities? Or can you run around exercising your rights, carte blanche, while interfering with the rights of others?
You've obviously never met an Libertarian and only understand Libertarianism as it has been provided to you by others that don't understand it either. Plutocracy is plutocracy. Libertarianism is libertarianism. They are two distinct ideas.
Most people don't really know enough about what it is they are talking about when defining their political stances. Just look at the authoritarian socialists that label themselves as "liberal progressives", and are the same ones that mis-identify libertarians and their stance. Even self-proclaimed libertarians still try to dictate to others how to live their lives, so by definition they aren't libertarians.
If you are equating libertarianism with plutocracy, then what is the label you assign to those that believe individualism trumps collectivism and that everyone should be able to live their lives the way they want as long as it doesn't restrict others from doing the same?
Yes, “obviously” that has to be true.
(At least in your world.) Funny that Trump people often say the same. I let them go on believing it, as I will with you.
Quoting Harry Hindu
Too bad they don’t have the philosophy forum guy to help them differentiate.
Quoting Harry Hindu
Try reading better before giving sophomoric lectures:
Quoting Xtrix
That’s not equivalent by any means.
Quoting Harry Hindu
A person taking one side of a false dichotomy.
If it walks, talks, and acts like a duck...
Are you suggesting that individual-collective is a false dichotomy?
We can't speak of libertarians in a vacuum, otherwise we tread on the borderline of anarchy. Libertarianism is best understood when contrasted with the state. A true libertarian competes as an individual against other individuals at all times, and ideally for the betterment and upbuilding of the nation. Ideally, an individual's "restricting" of others is not for the purpose of destroying or diminishing of the nation, but a matter of stimulating creativity and innovation in the face of competition. The libertarian is always in favor of the sovereignty of the individual and minimization of state authority - the state's only purpose, to regulate the competition between individuals in order to prevent an outbreak of anarchy, and also to prevent the formation of an oligarch.
Sounds like me...when I say: "democracy is a cover for marxism". Just another slave morality underscoring a mass of codependent bleeding-heart pussies.
it's Donald Duck or Daffy Duck or any other anthropomorphized duck.
Only the state gets to legislate. In the absence of referendum the “people” have had no say in any of it.
As for rights, in my view no right shall be infringed. One should not exercise a right that would infringe on the rights of others.
We're not talking about what one should or should not do. We are talking about what one does; and what, if anything, should be done about it. If you don't think anything should be done about it, then just say so.
Quoting NOS4A2
So all rights are unconditional?
Quoting NOS4A2
So the people have no say in a representative democracy? And you would champion direct democracy, as opposed to representative democracy?
I don't know if it's noble, but it can't be good for their base.
P.S. Why hasn't ISIS, et al, weaponized Covid? You'd think they'd have a bunch of guys walking around like Republicans.
Yes.
I’m talking about what one should or should not do.
Indirect democracy can do no better than to legitimize authority and give a man or party the right to control us and steal the fruits of our labour. Representative democracy is democratic in name only.
Okay. I think we can both agree that everyone should be kind, respectful and considerate of everyone else. Were it so. Were it so. In the mean time, back in the real world . . .
Quoting NOS4A2
If everyone did what they should or should not do then yeah, no need for any of that state stuff.
Very much so. Currently my province has, roughly, 4.5 million residents. We also have, at normal operating levels 173 ICU beds. So one bed for every 26,011 people. I have worked different areas that have had 1 ICU bed for every 6000 people. Not surprisingly, the area with 1:6000 has less concerns about overwhelming the system. I find it terrible that the general population of my province is faced with such restrictions and demands by the government because that same government has refused to put in a robust system. The healthcare system here was always inadequate, logically, if a bus accident can result in a code orange (hospital overwhelmed, divert to neighbouring hospitals), then any viral outbreak will do the same. Norovirus and C-diff shut down multiple units annually, demonstrating the following: Our universal precautions don't work for shit (as staff are spreading it from patient to patient, and giving it to themselves, usually 25% are home with whatever is running amok), our isolation procedures suck, and most units are too tightly packed so it is very easy for bugs to spread.
Really, if the system is garbage from the outset, why are we working so hard to save it? Rebuild the damned thing properly and stop patching garbage.
Are you in the middle of nowhere?
It seems to me that we were promised something that they are unable to deliver. Given the denial of rights and other sacrifices the tax-payer has to make, we are also left to pay for these shortcomings, sometimes with our lives and livelihoods. Even the mask mandates and vaccine passports are left to the tax-payer to enforce at their own expense.
Aren't you at the Arctic Circle now?
Entitlement mentality. (How much of their failure to deliver is due to tortious interference with their efforts to deliver?)
Quoting NOS4A2
I know, right. Life is so unbelievably hard, as we pound away on our keyboards, with our full, warm and rested bellies. A billionaire paying a million in taxes is like an income of 100k paying 100. :cry:
Quoting NOS4A2
You mean externalized costs? Welcome to the club! :rofl:
Quoting NOS4A2
That's just another example of being nice and letting the individual decide how best to enforce. But yeah, that's a burden, so we should demand the military come in and enforce at government expense. :roll:
That’s not the case. Where I live, if the business doesn’t enforce the government edicts, it is subject to fine. No individual gets to decide on any of this. This is just another example of the government skirting its duties, working around human rights, and forcing the burden on citizens.
So, the government mandates that you post an imposing asshole at the door, acting like a total jerk, ordering compliance under threat of a beating or getting 86'd? Or does the government allow the business to do what the government does, and respectfully and politely request compliance in order to maintain the privilege of operating a business without fines? I suppose the the government could assume the burden, post troops at the door and demand compliance at the point of a gun. That way the business owner would not be put-upon and subject to the impositions you complain of. Hmmm. Yeah, that's the ticket.
Tortious interference with the efforts will have the latter coming to a store near you. Then we will really hear the hew and cry, the moaning and complaining.
The government is forcing businesses with the threat of fine. The edict is the imposition. There is no “allowing” involved here.
The government is not "forcing." Perhaps you have never experienced forcing? A cloistered life?
There is not only the option of paying the fine, but there is considerable leeway in how to comply. Considerable "allowing", as I laid out for you in my previous post.
You can't exceed 70 mph in a 70 mph zone without paying a fine (if caught) but, so long as you don't exceed 70 mph, there are 70 options and all the fractions thereof.
There is no point in bringing up speed zones and other false analogies, nor quibbling about terms, unless this is an exercise in casuistry. I am saying why it is wrong to threaten people with fines if they don’t comply with what I consider a stupid mandate, so maybe you can tell me why it is right. Until then…
I taught you long ago how to demonstrate an analogy is false, and yet you fail to do it. Thus, it stands unimpeached.
Quoting NOS4A2
Just because you say it is wrong does not make it so. You need an argument as to why it is wrong. It's kind of like your "should" contention. "Should" is meaningless in the real world. Just because you say it is stupid, does not make it so. Same as "wrong".
I've already taught you why it is right, long ago. And those lessons, again, stand unimpeached, even if unlearned. You need to make arguments for your case, not declarative statements. We all agree with what "should" be. DOH! That says nothing about what is, or what, if anything, should be done about it. I noticed you have not argued that nothing should be done in response to one who does what you and I both agree they shouldn't do. (That would include both the individual and the state.)
Anyway, as has been noted by others, all we are seeing is rainbows and unicorns. Fantasy. Say, how did you get internet service up there in the arctic circle? Satellite? Who put those up? How did you get the solar panels and who made them? Or is it a generator you made by hand and fuel with gas you refined from the oil you dug? Did you kill your meat with your hand-made knife? Just wondering if you need a care package.
It would have taken less time to say why it is right. Once again you’ve taught me nothing.
That time was taken several times in previous engagements.
Quoting NOS4A2
I have taught, but you have not learned.
Notice how despite all the restrictions, vaccines, masks, etc Covid is still roaming around eh. As it always was going to. The propaganda lines remain the same "about to reach the turning point" "once the next (whatever) is reached, things will turn around", etc. Always something else and with exactly the same result: a whole lot of not much.
As for the "think about how bad it could have been..." crap, sure. Think about how much better it would have been if we had not had all these panic induced restrictions applied. Minimal job loss, minimal economic downturn, maintained mental health, decreased addiction, decreased suicides...Yep all that certainly would have been terrible. Thank God the governments saved everyone from that. And as a bonus, we all get celebratory needles! Good times for everyone.
Notice the widespread lack of compliance with all the restrictions, vaccines, masks, etc. It's no wonder Covid is still roaming around eh.
That's right, blame something other than the virus. Actual science and vectors and viral spread can eat it; the powers that be yelled out the wrong answer first, louder, and more often than any other response based on logic, so the media believes them. Let's not let minor details like accuracy interfere with a good panic. Where is the fun in that? We have spent so much investing in this fear response, we can't let it go now, it would be wasted effort.
Quick question: if the vaccines actually work why the fuck am I still wearing a mask and why does anyone that has been vaccinated give two shits about Covid? Seriously, the sales pitch doesn't hold up.
It's not blaming something "other than" the virus. It's blaming something aiding, abetting and providing comfort to the virus.
Quoting Book273
You must have done your "research". :lol:
Quoting Book273
You lack the skill set required to determine the answer they yelled was wrong. But "Notice the lack of compliance with all the restrictions, vaccines, masks, etc. It's no wonder Covid is still roaming around eh."
Quoting Book273
Logic was the restrictions, vaccines, masks, etc. You know, science.
Here's the mentality of the opposition. Present company excepted :wink: :
What a job they’ve done already. Their systems failed at each and every step, yet they still present themselves as the solution. We’re coming up on year three of their tinkering and it’s been a racket.
What a job you've done already. Your obstruction failed at each and every step, yet you still present yourself as the solution. We’re coming up on year three of your tinkering and it’s been a racket.
The deaths are on the hands of those who knew they didn't know better.
Because many human beings care about other human beings and are not utterly self-centered.
"I Don’t Know How to Explain to You That You Should Care for Other People." Anon.
Umm, No. The deaths are on life. end of story. Everyone currently breathing is going to stop; that is non-negotiable, no matter who does what, when, or how loud they cry about it, everyone stops breathing, like it or not. Vaccines won't stop it, nor masks, nor fines, nor anything else any government does, ever.
How we live has value, how long we live is important to the time keepers. So really, the question isn't how long can you live, rather, how would you like to die? Because that is coming anyway, might as well come to terms with it.
:grin: I'm not the one supporting the enemy and then blaming the loss on our side. Good job, virus man.
I am not responsible for this. I would have made something far more lethal. If you are going to do something, do it right eh!
I consider the virus and those who conspire with it to be the enemy.
You are responsible for supporting the enemy. Like I said, you don't have the skill set to know how to respond, much less creating something more lethal. You couldn't even do it wrong, much less right.
You work in an ICU, or are you just running the regular rhetoric? Actual healthcare provider on your end, or armchair theorist?
I am thinking armchair theorist.
Yeah, pretty much, but with friends and family (and acquaintances) who have died or suffered from the effects. But let's not get into that, because Doctor Book will just say it's fake news or the evil conspiracy is blaming all death on Covid and it's not real.
But better than armchair theorist, my real motivation is strictly political. I view people on your side as Trump supporting, anti-intellectual, conservative, Republicans. So even if you were right on the merits, I'd be like you and resist "just because." You know, "your own medicine." :grin:
Nah, not my medicine. Just all my training and experience up to April 2020. After that the expectation shifted from "provide patient care and be a patient advocate" to "promote the public health message". We can be fired and lose our license to practice if we are caught "spreading anti-vaccine information" or going against the public health mandate. I am not Anti-vaccine, I am for informed consent and a patient's right to decide on their course treatment. The math does not add up, I can find peer reviewed articles supporting my position, but if I provide accurate, up to date information to my patients, I can, in theory, lose my job because that could be considered to be working against the public health mandate. Nurses and Doctors are leaving the field, not because they dislike the work, but because we are no longer allowed to practice with any autonomy, I must be my company's mouth piece now. Perhaps I am more comfortable being self employed, poor, and ethically uncompromised than wealthy and pushing a line that I don't believe upon my patients.
:cheer: :cheer: :cheer: :strong:
What's the dire situation in this case? The vaccinated are protected. Why should they care? They only care about their beds being occupied in the hospital by the non-vaxed. Or that they are infected again by them. So the call to consciousness ("you're selfish if you don't vax") is just a cry of fear coming out of vaxed mouths. It's the vaxed who are selfish. Believing that vaxing is the only solution to the problem. This propagandized thought and necessary action according to a few people proclaiming themselves the experts and who represent the established culture (scientific thinking, which is the cause of the global outbreak in the first place), is overtaken by the people, and this is subsequently called the reaction of "the collective", which is no more than the selfish thought of the majority who fear. If acupuncture were the state-approved medicine, and acupuncture treatment was made mandatory, I wonder if the vaxers ca?ling for mandate would want to let them be treated with acupuncture needles. It's up to the citizens of a free society to decide if they want a needle or not. Be it a vax needle or accu needles. Any claim to moral responsibility is false and misleading.
It's called a pandemic. Millions have died. Millions more have long hauler problems.
Quoting Cartuna
True that. I don't think smokers go to the front of the line for a lung transplant, or alcoholics for a liver. Why should an anti-vaxxer take up a bed when they get Covid, to the exclusion of someone who needs it from a car accident or whatever?
And it's not all about me, me, me. I might want that bed for a loved one. If you don't want to vax, then don't go to the fucking hospital when you get Covid. Stay home and die. If you are afraid of a needle, that's on you.
Quoting Cartuna
I know the virus is winning this war. I think that is pretty clear. I just find it disingenuous for your side to refuse to take any credit for the win.
You act as if you’ve been neutral, watching from the sidelines; non-combatant, innocent victims, suffering from the oppressive, draconian efforts of my side. That is simply not the case. My side lost the war because too large a percentage of the population actively fought on the side of the virus, spreading it, creating variants, throwing temper tantrums, and otherwise failing to support the troops. Had you all, or at least most of you, joined us in our fight against the virus, we would have won long ago. But, politics.
Anyway, I'm off to bed. You continue to rage against the machine. :roll:
Mechanic: Your car is broken. I will fix it for $50
Customer: It seems ok to me. see? it runs fine.
Mechanic: No, it's broken, I hear a noise. $50 to fix it.
Customer: Well, you are the expert. Here is $50.
Mechanic: Thanks (looks under hood, wiggles something, closes hood) All better.
Customer: I can't hear any difference.
Mechanic: That's because it's better.
Customer: So I can leave now?
Mechanic: No. I hear a different noise. $50 to fix it. Then you can go about your day.
Customer: What? Fine. Here's another $50.
Mechanic : Thanks (repeats initial process)
Customer: So now I can leave right?
Mechanic: No. There is another different noise. $75 to fix it.
This can go on forever.
How many of us would expect the customer to stay there and keep forking out money? And how many would expect passers by to weigh in on the situation and call the customer names when they have had enough of the mechanic shop and want to leave?
So why is it different when It's public health that says "No, you can't leave yet. Now you need a booster..."
Standard response to living. Here Coronavirus has result in 30000 deaths, over 20 months. However, a regular month has 24000 deaths, so really, an increase of 6.25% from baseline. Hardly worth the pandemic response.
No. The alcoholics get a great deal of the blood transfusions however, and ICU time. We treat what comes in, when it comes in. We don't sit at the door in judgement and decide who is worthy of saving or not. That would effectively close the hospital doors to everyone, because it isn't that hard to find fault in decisions that lead to poor health outcomes, therefore, everyone has contributed to their health situation, and so should get no treatment for it. I guess I will hang a closed sign at the hospital doors, power down the Emergency sign and go home eh!
Don't worry, the coffee is on, the machines are ready to go, and we have your back. I couldn't care less about your vaccination status; not before the emergency, during or after. Have a great night.
I think that may be part of your failure to understand pandemic. You are not some Trapper John or Hawkeye Pierce. And I am not Major Burns. You are not in the comfort of some MASH hospital, where you get to step up when the wounded come in, and protest the war in your free time. No. You are now on the front lines, doing the actual fighting. You are the bullet catchers this time around and now you know what it's like. You don't get the luxury of questioning authority when the mission is to assault the hill, where you have leaders, whether you like them or agree with them or not, who are telling you which hill to take, how to execute the mission, and they provide you with the weapons.
If you want to stand around and argue with a seasoned sergeant about a better way to do something, guess what: You're not only endangering your own life, but you are endangering the lives of your fellow troops. You might as well, and actually are, a traitor, giving aid and comfort to the enemy.
If you wanted to be a general, then you should have put the time in and earned your stars. But right now, you need to be fighting. You can write your book after the war, win or lose. Right now we are losing because too many people are with the enemy and, unfortunately we have enemy in the ranks.
I talked to my old Corpsman and asked him how they handled the wounded enemy. He said his charge was first to get our (his) own troops back in the fight. If a person was a lost cause, they moved on to the next troop. If and when there was time, he would go with Hippocrates and take care of the enemy.
But no, we have enemy helping the virus, not only in the rear with the gear, but on the front lines, in our own ranks. If we lose this war (which we are) it will be squarely on their shoulders. All the dead, all the wounded, all the non-combatants. Want to write a book and tell me why the war sucked, why the generals sucked, why the weapons sucked? Fine, do it after the shooting stops.
I've never seen a single General on TPF. At best, it's a bunch of disgruntled solders, whining to the public about the chow and how hard life is as a grunt, and how they would fight the war if they were in charge.
Maybe there should be no war. Maybe we should capitulate to a virus. Maybe it's a virus of our own making (a military industrial complex scheme to get money). But yeah, lead, follow, or get the hell out of the way, or, if you decide to actively resist, risk getting shot. In this case, fired. I'm all for that.
A little off-topic, but on this pandemic/war thing, I find myself eager to tell the Republicans to GFTs next time they pretend there is some existential threat from some tin-horn POS dictator overseas. The run-up to Iraq was all "you don't support the troops" and "you question a POTUS in a time of war" and other shaming which worked. Even the so-called "liberal press" was cowed and gave a pass. Well, I will remember. While I'm already against the next war, no matter which side tries to gin it up, I'm going to remember who was with us and who was against us in this war against a virus. Will I cut off my nose to spite my face? It won't be my nose and it won't be my face. I'll be a selfish little shit. I'm learning how Republicans and conservative play the game. I'll play by their rules and fuck them coming and going.
I want to ask "where is 'here'"? but like I said before, I don't want to get into the weeds. You'd answer, and then we'd be talking about the efficacy and relative draconian nature of the government response in this jurisdiction or that. But every fact presented will just result in a pivot and another complaint. So don't bother.
An increased death rate of 6.25% is indeed tolerable, and should be higher, IF it's limited to political Darwinism. But I'm afraid otherwise good people, some with comorbidities, or unrelated disease or injury are dying or suffering that should not. Is that part of life? Yes, so what? Let it be the lives of those who don't give a shit; not the lives of those who do. But from what I hear, you aren't parsing that distinction. You let anyone in and treat anyone, while some innocent non-combatant who did everything that was asked of him, dies in the waiting room, or on the chopper to some other hospital that might have a bed.
Your analogy can be distinguished with a panoply of relevant differences. But let's start with some of the most important ones:
1. Cars don't infect each other;
2. You have to have (and pay for) a license to drive that perfect car, even if you are objectively qualified;
3. You have to periodically prove yourself;
4. You have to have air quality control devices on your perfect vehicle, whether you think you have the god-given right to pump your shit into the air or not;
5. Government does not have to assume the burden of proving you are not polluting beyond standards they set, based upon criteria that you are incapable of understanding;
6. If you don't want to comply, then you can use your own roads on your own property;
7. If you don't like the way the shop is run, quit;
8. We apply different standards to human life than we do to cars;
9. If everyone would have attached an emission control device and stayed in their lane (like they were politely asked to do), that mechanic would never have opened shop in the first place; nor could he recommend a second, third, fourth repair, etc. But no, we want to drive all over the fuck and gone, bending fenders and pumping tons of shit into the air because 'Murica! Freedom! (without responsability).
I could go on (and on), but suffice it to say, your analogy doesn't pass muster. If you think our response to the pandemic is the equivalent of your huckster mechanic, then stay home and don't use him. A "strike" or a "boycott" if you will. But stay off our roads and out of our public rights-of-way. Guess, what? Then, if it's as you say it is, indeed the jerk will go out of business. But freedom isn't free and rights come with responsibilities. Pay the price and quit using our shit if you don't want to play ball or if you think the game is rigged. That'll teach 'em.
Where I live, an inspection for $50 would be a great deal, actually.
No matter. Vaccination will soon be mandatory in Germany, anyways.
If people wanna vax, why not? It's up to them. I just analyzed the workings of the machine that tries to push vaccination.
It's you who rages against me, together with the machine that tries to arrive at 70% vaccination to reach group immunity (what has happened in Germany now is exactly the situation I asked about on a political forum after which my question got closed almost instantly; 70% is not reached and next year the needle will be driven into you by law; just a small pragmatic measure taken...).
Rage against the human being, by the machine. By means of painting a picture of being an amoral monster ìf not vaxed. Whý do the vaccinated care that I don't vax? Because the 70% of group immunity is not reached if you don't.
There are more ways to fight the disease though, and the appeal to "moral responsibility" is just a means of the established way of thinking and constructing a society which gave rise to a global spread of the virus in the first place.
I have my own means to fight the disease. And now I wear a mask when vaxed people are around not to protect myself but to prevent them from getting infected! Well, of course they are right insofar the working of the vaccine is concerned, as it's not as effective as thought, as was to be expected with a a vaccine based on a small piece of viral DNA, to be proteinized into a single virus spike. Injecting that stuff is not my way of preventing disease, and I just don't want it to be injected in me. That's all!
"Oh, come on, just vax, what do you care? Do it for other people's sake..." Moral respnsibility, yeah yeah. Well fuck that! Now I'm indeed raging against the machine! If it rages to me, I rage back.
In a truly free society all ways of being and living should be allowed, and not only a scientifically based approach, involving mostly abstract knowledge concerning the virus and the world we live in.
It's not that I just wanna be contrary and it's all about me. I care for my loved ones, who doesn't? I don't want them to get sick either. By vaxing or not. It's up to them.
A state-connected approach, shaping modern society, with devastsating effects on the world we live in (when the raging starts...). Giving rise to abstract entities like group immunity, the collective, an real entities offering a means for the virus to go global. You might say I let others do the vaxing for me, but they wanna be vaxed themselves. Good for them! Let those who wanna get vaxed be vaxed! Let those who don't want not be! I think the comparisons with Nazi-Germany are way over the top though.
Don't worry, I will not use your hospital bed when I get ill, nor that of your loved ones. But if you or your loved one get injured in a car incident, she should not occupy my bed or that of my loved one, as we don't drive cars.
And by the way, I have no fear of needles. Why do you think that? I guess it's part of the collective machine puffing its steam...
Why does that matter, you travel on roads, don’t you? If you never go anywhere, the things that you and your loved ones consume depend on automotive transportation. In any case, I probably won’t need the ICU bed because I’ve been vaccinated.
Try quoting me (like I just did you) so I receive notification that you are engaging me. Otherwise, I will assume you are trying to avoid your education.
Quoting Cartuna
Because they are concerned, not just about themselves (like you), but about their loved ones, friends, acquaintances; and access to hospital beds if they might need them for some other reason. Guys like me just want to see who we can count on in a pinch. You know, like when the "big one" comes along.
The rest of your post is gibberish that has been repeatedly and logically trounced in this thread, ad nauseum. For that reason, and your apparent inability to properly engage, I'll leave you to go read it. Or not. Let us know how your horse de-wormer is working out for you. Have another shot of bleach.
Quoting Cartuna
Other than keeping your filthy disease to yourself, that is all anyone asks. Thank you.
I know. I don't go for small pieces of virus DNA though. I want it all... My cells have better things to do than produce spikes. Even that is asked from you. To produce your own piece of virus. For my fellow men...
That's true, praxis. But you might need a bed for non-Covid reasons. I think some folks have already died being life-flighted to other hospitals because the one they went to was full of anti-vaxxer types who went in on bended knee, repenting their stupidity and getting a bed.
Quoting James Riley
You're welcome!
You are the one who is only concerned for yourself and your loved ones. As simply as that. All your talk about caring for loved ones is just part of your persuasion technique to make others follow the road as fixed in your mind. My mind ain't fixed. Yours is. So go caring for yourself and your loved ones by raging and preaching the gospel to others or by converting them to the just way. It doesn"t work for me. I have better means than a vaccine. You should learn them if you care about others. But probably these methods won't work for you as you are vax-fixed and a priori putting your thumb down. And even a simple "I hope you had a good sleep" is already a sign of treason in your eyes. So continue happily in your just way for salvation by the vaccine. i won't take it. I, me, myself, and I. How selfish I am...
Indeed I am. I don't know how to explain to you that you should care about others.
Quoting Cartuna
That is the opinion of one who is selfish, inconsiderate and disrespectful. I find that a lot these days. I want to say it's a sign of the younger generation, but I know a lot of kids who are not like that, and I know a lot of adults who are like you. In fact, I think some 33% of the U.S. is like that. Not sure about elsewhere.
Quoting Cartuna
Yeah, I could go back to school, get my PhD in immunology, practice for 30 years and see what I come up with. Or I could just trust Q, drink some bleach, get some horse de-wormer and roll the dice. :roll:
Quoting Cartuna
Yeah, I typed up, but was not going to post in the hopes you went away. But since you came back:
Quoting Cartuna
There, fixed it for you. And there you have it.
If he gets a stroke and becomes paralyzed, will you pay for him for the rest of his life?
But not in a car.
Careful there. The going rate in Slovenia is now 40% of those hospitalized for covid are vaccinated. 20% of those needing ICU are vaccinated.
How strange that it works only one way -- the non-vaccinated hold a moral responsibility toward the vaccinated. But those promoting vaccination (and the vaccinated) have no moral responsibility toward anyone. Least of all towards those who become ill from the vaccine, or who become ill with covid despite being vaccinated.
My tax dollars help to pay for the roads you use, traffic law enforcement, etc., but you would deny me an ICU bed because you’ve gotten too many DUI convictions?
Sounds like Slovenia is not in accord with world results. So maybe that's not on the vaccine. Probably a bad batch or some black market shenanigans. Let's put the burden of proof on those who cite this tripe without investigation.
Regarding moral responsibility, it's a numbers game, like everything else in science. Society is not morally responsible to provide 100% safety to anyone. Their required emission control devices, seat belts and helmets are what they are. Those who want 100% can stay home and hide under the bed.
Funny how the "tough" crowd wants everyone else to stay home while they go out and create variants.
I don't wanna deny you everything. I just say cars are the cause of many accidents, Mortal ones included. So all cars should be banned, including the roads they travel on. Like all no vaxing should be banned in your eyes.
mRNA vaccines like Pfizer and Moderna don’t use a piece of virus DNA.
False equivalence. Read the thread. This argument has already been trashed, soundly.
I think it's a sound argument. If people don't drive cars, the number of casualties will be reduced. Besides, your constant use of words like trash, filthy or sound will not help you. It's a mere signal of you being part of a propaganda machine. If I must vax, you should stop driving a car. Non-vaxing is a way of life, like driving a car.
Yes, but driving cars has a legitimate purpose. Not being vaccinated doesn’t have a legitimate purpose. Except in cases where there is a medical reason to not get vaccinated, not being vaccinated is just stubbornness.
You don't think. Cars and drivers are heavily regulated, they have emission control devices that are not 100%, you have to wear seat belts, obey limits, stay in your lane, cars don't make each other stop working simply by being there, I could go on demonstrating many other distinctions with a relevant difference, but again, it's already been done.
And still they cause death and injury.
I just don't wanna be vaxed. That's all. Cars have a legitimate purpose because the law is man-made. Just holding on to them is selfish and stubborn.
Wait, I didn't think you got to use that argument? Everything causes death and injury. We're all going to die. So go kill yourself if it's no big deal. Or if you want 100% safety, stay home and hide under the bed while the rest of us take government-mandated precautions, created by people who are experts in the field. You know, like seat belts, and emission control devices, and staying in our lane, etc.
I will stipulate to one point: I'm stupid to try and fix stupid by even opening this stupid thread to rehash arguments that start ALL OVER AGAIN every time some stupid person enters the ring with their stupid understanding of the issues. Yet I keep doing it. WTF is wrong with me?
I hereby publicly promise to never open this stupid thread again.
One thing is clear: The empathy of doctors and nurses, who continue to engage the enemy in the face of overwhelming stupidity on the side of the virus, is totally beyond my empathy. And to think, I'm more empathetic than the people who won't think of others. Jeesh!
Bye!
Yeah, well, mRNA then. Big difference. The both contain the same message. Strings of 4 bases. Leading to protein. It's gonna be a knowledge battle now?
Yeah, so why bother about non-vaxing?
I don't think it would do much good to ban anti-vaxers from public life, even if that were somehow possible, if that's what you're suggesting. Vaccination is not generally mandatory. If employers want to make it mandatory that's their prerogative. It's a free country, after all.
Also, Riley has repeatedly pointed out that driving is heavily regulated. People with DUI's are banned, for example.
Yeah, why bother, just get vaccinated.
Just go drive in your nice car and pollute my fresh air! Have a nice trip!
This is already happening here, though. Individual people report that their GP refused to see them if they are not vaccinated.
Quoting Book273
History has shown what people united by dogma can do. It's hard to say no to that.
It looks like a sign of the times: a small improvement, but advertised as a major breakthrough.
It's like those tv ads selling kitchen appliances, thermo socks, mini heaters, wart removers, and so on: "Buy this and your life will turn around completely!"
Society at large has lost all sense of proportion.
Not just fear. It reflects the human craving for uniformity: "Everyone should do the same thing, be the same, even if in the process of becoming so, they die."
Last week, Greece made it mandatory for people over 60 to get vaccinated. The government official who announced the measure listed as one of the reasons for it that it is out of solidarity with the already vaccinated that those not yet vaccinated should get vaccinated. He didn't further specifiy, but it seems he meant something like, "if other people took the risk and got vaccinated, then you should do so too".
There seems to be evidence for this kind of tribalism.
The weird thing is that Trump is always boasting about how he made the vaccine available, and he advises people to get it, though he also respects his follower's freedom (without responsibility). There's too much politicized anti-vax momentum, and it's litterally killing them.
That’s the only excuse one should need to provide, as far as self-ownership is concerned. Anything else presupposes a slavish relationship between individual and “public health”.
Vaccines reduce the chance of death and serious illness from COVID, are less dangerous than COVID, and require minimal time, effort, and cost to get. So I’m going to tell people to get vaccinated, am not morally responsible if it harms them, and won’t pay them any kind of compensation if it does.
IOW, it's perfectly okay to throw a certain percentage of the population under the bus.
Nothing has changed. There is always a bug waiting to get you, always something new and terrible. This time the argument is happening publicly, that's all. Everyone has an opinion, but very few play in actual field. So if all the spectators can shut the hell up, those of us actually involved, trained and formally educated for this stuff, can get to work and do our job.
The war analogy is demeaning to those who actually fought in wars. Adjusting your mask while ordering a latte has nothing to do with war. Anyone that thinks they are comparable is delusional.
Note the collectivist reasoning. “Sometimes you have to do things that are unpopular” (not moral or immoral) for reasons that “clearly supersede individual choices” and are “directed at the common good”. So many rights have been sacrificed on the alter of similar reasoning.
And that's because Americans collectivize pretty easily.
I only regret I have but one life to give for my country. Ask not what your country can do for you...
A country's values are sometimes at odds with their basic nature. IOW, values are set out to explain the goal: what we wish we were. Americans are basically a bunch of sheep who wish they were wolves.
My guess is the same is true of people who routinely speak out against collectivism. They're afraid of their own tendency to give up their identities to the group. Why else would they go on and on about it?
We're all involved, and we each have education and training in stuff. You might want to be specific enough for this to have some meaning.
Let me guess, your job is to advise the public not to waste their time with vaccinations.
It is morally reprehensible that the government has left it to individuals to decide whether to get vaccinated or not, and with which vaccine.
So many people complain, "Oh, these days, everyone's an epidemiologist!" Yet this is the situation that the government has pushed us in! We have to make life or death decisions about things we're not qualified for.
I believe in informed consent and personal autonomy. I advocate for my patient, for best outcomes according to the patient's values and their family's values if the patient cannot convey their wishes. I do not follow public opinion for patient care. I follow best practices, peer reviewed journals to guide practice, and clear defensible ethics. Not mob rules. Panic makes for poor policy which leads to disaster.
That’s true about Americans, as far as I can see.
I would go on and on about collectivism mostly because it is immoral. It is premised on compulsory cooperation, and if that doesn’t work, force, coercion and violence. All one needs do is evoke the common good to justify immoral behavior towards one’s fellows.
Ah, so not an epidemiologist.
No. It's because you think you're a sheep.
Maybe we can have that applied universally as well, and shut the media up too.
I like it!
Common good: the mother of all evil.
You wrote: "So if all the spectators can shut the hell up, those of us actually involved, trained and formally educated for this stuff, can get to work and do our job."
So I assumed you were a specialist in the field of infectious diseases such as an epidemiologist. I am impressed by your work in the ER and critical patient transport though. Mom must be proud.
Which doesn't matter at all when _you_ are the one who suffers the negative side effects of the vaccine. Such as paralysis after a stroke.
The same arguments that are good when applied to the population as a whole are not the same arguments as those that are good when applied to the individual person.
We see the former all the time, but not the latter.
Unless you know ahead of time that the person is more at risk from the vaccine than the virus then the sensible advice is to get the vaccine.
You might as well argue that we shouldn't advise someone to fly rather drive across the country in winter because it's possible that the plane will crash.
You can successfully determine before hand the CHANCES ahead of time, and you can't at all determine before hand the CERTAIN individual outcome.
So... 1999 in 2000 will benefit, and 1 in 2000 will become ill... we don't know which I am going to be, and I don't know anyone who can tell me for sure.
This means that 1999 will defend against coronavirus, and 1 will not.
I ask you to please consider this: if you given a choice to play Russian roulette with a loaded machine gun with 1999 live bullets and 1 blank; or else with a machine gun with 1999 blanks and 1 live bullet; which machine gun will you choose?
https://www.berliner-zeitung.de/news/3g-in-berlin-senat-verbannt-obdachlose-von-bahnsteigen-l
It’s not surprising how cruel the Covid authoritarian is, but they do it under the guise of protecting others. We should start asking for proof of how many people they’ve protected. Get them to point to one.
With the exception of a slight dip in late November, the average daily death count from COVID has been hovering above 1000 deaths a day since early September. We know that the the overwhelming majority of deaths occur amongst the un-vaxed; and we also know (as well as we can know anything) that the majority of these misguided folks are Trump supporters.
https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2021/12/05/1059828993/data-vaccine-misinformation-trump-counties-covid-death-rate
If this trend continues, the logical consequence is that (all other variables kept constant) come November 2022 there will be some 300K fewer Trump supporters. But this information leaves this left winger very conflicted.
Will 300K fewer Trump votes help tip the balance in favor of the Democrats? If yes, then this would seem to be a good thing.
But full stop on that thought. My crazy un-vaxed cousin in Florida died and her son was hospitalized and close to death (seems to be doing better so far). I do not want any more deaths from this thing and I do not wish anyone to die . . . . OK maybe Trump, but that's it.
So how should a person feel about this?
- - - - - - - - -
Meta Note: I don't follow this conversation on a thread on a regular basis, but it seems pretty wide ranging. I am only interested in replies that are on topic. What do I mean by that?
If you disagree with my political stance and think I should become a Libertarian/Marxist/Buddhist? That's fine - but I will not respond to any such replies.
If you are a crazed conspiracy theorist and think that the data is faked? That's not fine - but I will not respond to any such replies.
And yes! Yes! Of course if everyone got vaccinated that would resolve my mixed feelings. But that's not gonna happen, so no point in bringing it up.
So how should a person feel about this?
But enough about me, what do you think about me?
Quoting EricH
Sums up how the thread has gone...
"I'll only respond to people who already agree with me"
Perhaps I was not clear. I am asking a very narrow question. I'll try to re-phrase. If Trump republicans (for whatever reasons) are committing voluntary suicide in large numbers, should I (as a left winger) cynically approve of this behavior for possible political benefit?
I am asking an ethical question - given the particular set of facts that I presented - how should a person feel / behave?
Really? Then I strongly suggest you seek some professional psychological help. If you're seriously asking whether you should be pleased that thousands of people are dying, just because they happen to be of a different political persuasion...
I assumed it was a rhetorical device...
Quoting NOS4A2
Quoting NOS4A2
Quoting NOS4A2
Were they interned in order to send them to the gas chamber?
How long were they expected to be interned (and for what intent)?
Quoting NOS4A2
Quoting Benkei
@NOS4A2, your skewed verbiage betrays an ideological ulterior motive.
SARS-CoV-2 doesn't care.
Quoting Thomas Nagel (1937 - )
Answer: Now we know!
Quoting Pro-Trump counties now have far higher COVID death rates. Misinformation is to blame (Dec 5, 2021)
I guess there's no accounting for adults that haven't grown up.
Fortunately others do.
Quoting Tennessee radio host doubted and mocked vaccines – now he has Covid (Jul 24, 2021)
Italian man tries to dodge Covid vaccine wearing fake arm (Dec 3, 2021)
A new market for silicone prosthetics?
"Want to hit the bar scene unvaccinated? We can help."
I wrote:
“The authorities had initially rounded them up and interned them, it appears, for the non-crime of being in contact with covid-positive people, not because they carried any virus or posed any sort of threat.”
Ur disapproval of my verbiage betrays yours.
Quoting NOS4A2
Quoting Benkei
Quoting jorndoe
I already mentioned why they were interred, and none of it mentioned any gas chambers.
Quoting again
They tested negative. They contained exactly zero SARS-CoV-2. What they did contain were innocent, healthy children.
Schadenfreude
Ah, so "most victims are anti-vax Trump supporters and brought it on themselves" is just harmless schadenfreude
How about "most victims are overweight, or suffer from similarly lifestyle inflicted comorbidities, so brought it on themselves"?
Similarly healthy bit of schadenfreude?
I don't think most victims are overweight or suffer from diseases they chose to have, but it's true that morbidly obese people don't usually survive it (in my experience).
Most victims are people who refused to get a simple vaccine that would keep them safe.
Quoting Isaac
Can you give me an example of harmful schadenfreude? If you want to make the case that I'm somehow hurting myself by feeling this way, I do feel guilty/conflicted so point taken. But otherwise, I can't see how I'm hurting anyone.
I mourn my dead cousin.
I feel sorry for these poor deluded folks, but I'm also angry at them for causing so much needless suffering.
... What do you think they were trying to ascertain?
Thus, they were off to the quarantine centre, like others, per their protocols.
I guess the Aussies put a thorough+swift protocol in place for pandemic containment/tracking, which seems sensible enough.
Did you think it was just fun and games (or "Obergruppenführer Michael Gunner" executing nefarious endlösungs)?
Quoting again again
Quoting EricH
Oh yes, I forgot to mention... I'm not interested in the opinions of any "crazed conspiracy theorists" who disagree with me about the health status of most victims.
Quoting EricH
Yes. Thinking that thousands of people who died somehow deserved it because they had a different political outlook to you. If you can't see the harm that does to your moral virtue and the potential harm that being that kind of shockingly naive bigot could bring about then I doubt my pointing it out at this stage would be any more than throwing stones at a tank.
Snatched off the street at gunpoint (like your comments may suggest)?
Treated well enough and kept in the loop?
Since it's Australia, I'm guessing a reasonably civilized/humane approach, but maybe not?
Ahh yes, civilised internment against their will.
"Would you mind awfully if we imprisoned you for a few weeks?...cup of tea?"
'Cos people are forever scaling fences to escape from civilised, humane treatment.
I suspect they had in mind Australia's notoriously civilised and humane treatment of its indigenous population.
https://www.welcometocountry.org/australias-brutal-treatment-of-aboriginal-people/
https://hir.harvard.edu/police-violence-australia-aboriginals/
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/australia-accused-of-genocide-against-aborigines-1263163.html
What could they possibly have had to worry about when forcibly put behind a fence?
What you gotta do is "accidentally" contaminate a viral (Covid-19) culture with bacteria/fungi (penicillium or other species) and come back after a day/week later and be "amazed" at how the viral culture did so poorly. Add two and two together and voila! we have a cure for viral infections!
Evolution is the solution - the bacteria/fungi that have defenses (antiviral molecules) against the virus will be selected for and then you know what to do after that, right?!
If some Eastern Block nation starting doing what Australia is doing but to, say, Jews or Roma, there would be an internation outcry, led by the Left. But since ANYTHING that make ANYONE question ANYTHING to do with vaccines must be silenced or some 5 year old in California won't get vaccinated against a disease they cannot get,
SILENCE.
In Austria, a year in jail for non-compliance is not on the table and Germany looks set to follow suit.
Seriously.
People who are trying to harm you and people who happen to harm you because they are wrong are two very different categories of people.
This seems to be another common theme here, judging other people's intents using your beliefs. Other people act on the basis of their beliefs, not yours.
So if you believe taking the vaccine is the best way to look after people, you can't judge others as selfish and heartless for not taking the vaccine. That would only be fair if they also thought the vaccine is the best way to look after people, yet didn't take it. If they think the vaccine is overall more harmful then you'd judge them to be mistaken, not selfish.
I can get behind the idea that selfish people deserve any negative consequence they reap, I find it a lot harder to get behind the idea that mistaken people do.
You capture the problem quite nicely. Flying is statistically safer than driving, however there is absolutely no aspect of control with flying, unless you are the pilot. If one does want to rely on the competence of others, with no ability to change the outcome, then flying is the way to go. However, if one would rather own the responsibility of risk, have the potential to change, or at least react, to any adverse conditions that arise while in motion, then driving is hands down the way to go.
Personally I hate flying. Absolutely no control involved in flying, just sit in your chair and hope that none of your pilots are feeling suicidal on that trip, because if they are, by the time you know about it, everyone on board is already screwed. I would rather drive and the mileage on my vehicles reflect that.
I will not advise someone to fly. I will always advise them to do what they are comfortable with. Fly, drive, walk, whatever. It is their call because any consequences of that choice is on them, not me.
Exactly. There's this assumption that once one has two risk figures the decision is clear, as if humans take nothing else into account in their decision-making other than crunching the numbers.
It's odd that on the same site people can puzzle about the morality of deliberately killing one fat man vs merely allowing the deaths of five workers (various trolley problems), most are baffled as to why anyone would make any risk-based decision on any basis other than seeing which number is bigger than the other.
I reserve my right to speak in dysphemism, especially when it comes to matters of injustice and tyranny. These kids didn’t go to the internment camp on their own free will.
And the protocols are not sensible, but stupid; they treat healthy people as threats to public safety, in potentia. They are literally premised on fear and ignorance.
The basis of the entire pandemic response.
Inverted or turnkey totalitarianism in a nutshell.
Disturbingly similar to V for Vendetta...Guy forks mask anyone?
Evolution strikes again
Getting mixed messages... Wasn't the mask-wearer the hero fighting for freedom?
So you're advocating mask-wearing? Cool.
Joe Public : " Wow, look at that! There's even room for my kids. Sign us up!"
Hell I support wearing a mask for valid reasons. I wear an N95 and goggles when I suction any patient on a ventilator, because it is appropriate to do so at the time. I wear full face covering and particulate filtration when I work in old attics because of all the unknown things that could be up there and the insulation particles in the eyes suck ass. I wear full Bunker Gear and SCBA when I am actively fighting a fire. And I wear a full Hazmat suit when I am in a hazmat situation. All masks, all PPE, all when appropriate. I wear none of that shit when I go shopping, because it isn't necessary.
Currently I have a useless piece of crap mask on my face because I am at work and I will be fired if I don't. Does it protect me? No. Does it protect my patients? No. Does it make my employer appear to be doing something regarding the pandemic? Only to the uninformed, but yes, it has positive optic value. One benefit it does have is that I am mostly protected from halitosis, which is a bit of a problem in healthcare, although good gum will usually cover all but the nastiest patient's halitosis.
I wish I could wear a Guy Fawkes mask at work! That would be a hoot.
Why not get a good one?
Quoting Book273
Are you wearing it wrong, or is it just the crapness of the mask? A good mask, worn correctly, will reduce your aerosol spray into, and from, your environment, which is the principle mode of transmission. What worries me is that you are supposed to take care of patients and don't know this.
There's a nutcase nurse living opposite us who also bangs on like this. Personally, I think you *should* stick to your guns, go mask-free, get fired, and thus reduce the liability you pose to others.
Quoting Book273
It's Guy Fawkes. Forks are for eating food with.
Crappy mask worn right. I am not allowed to wear the proper mask. I do in fact know my business, however, just because I know what is what does not mean that I am supplied with, or allowed to use, the proper PPE. Welcome to modern healthcare. My area is just now accepting that this thing "could be airborne". Seriously, that was announce early last week. Now they are reconsidering their masks. Only 20 months late.
Maybe listen closely to what they are saying, and before assuming they are a nutcase, consider the implications if they are in fact being entirely accurate. Scary stuff.
Quoting Kenosha Kid
Seriously, do your research. I pose no more threat to others than I ever did. You could sit across the table from someone with active Covid for a nice 2 hour romantic dinner and your chances of catching Covid increases by a whopping 5%. Not a 5% chance of catching covid, just 5% greater than before. Factor in that 80% of the population won't even know that they had (or have) the virus and the end result barely registers on the attention scale.
yep, it is. Thanks for reminding me.
So your real qualm isn't with mandates but the quality of the PPE provided to you. It's odd, isn't it, that a slip-up like that can make you look like one of the irrational masses squealing about how consideration for the health and lives of others -- your business, I gather -- is a violation of your freedom to... cause the deaths and ill health of others, I suppose.
Quoting Book273
Oh, she very helpfully posts a huge newsletter through my letter box, a full tabloid newspaper's worth. It's all paranoid conspiracy theories drawn from the bowels of Reddit and Fox News. Scary stuff indeed.
Sounds like you do your own research. My partner had covid, really bad. I slept with her every night. Truth told, there was grown up stuff happening too in the early days when we thought it was just a cold. I was fine. So I guess by your logic, everyone is fine, right? That I can sleep with someone with covid and not get it is 100% proof that everyone who encounters someone with covid won't catch it, right?
Like I said, get yourself fired. You're a liability. I think some people just don't get probability theory and you're one of them, which is a problem when your job is to minimise the probability of people contracting a virus. You clearly don't understand how it spreads, in fact the logical conclusion of your reasoning is that covid doesn't exist at all, despite millions of people dying from it. Or was that fake news?
No, my main qualm is with mandates. My minor issue is that we have crap quality stuff to work with. A napkin is a useful as my mask.
Covid is real. And Anthrax exists in the soil around us. Both are true, and verifiable if one wants to look. Both illicit the same level of concern in me. The global covid response is a concern, but more annoying than crippling. The media's constant yammering about it is annoying, but I can turn that crap off, so no worries there. Eventually work will insist on something that I will draw the line at, then I will walk away and do something else. The funny part is, healthcare workers are resigning at unprecedented rates, attributed to "covid burn out", but most of the people I know that left the industry did it because they were tired of the shit being pushed by the employers about covid and the covid response. I do not know one that left because of Covid itself. But no one covers that, we are all leaving due to covid.
AS for millions dying of covid. Yes, millions died of covid. And TB, and the flu (less since covid) and all sorts of other shit. It's what people do, they die. Currently the waitlist to die is at 8+ billion.
Freedom is a state of mind. -- Americanism 101
We are all free to do anything we are allowed to do. Take that however you will.
All's well that ends well.
Quoting paraphrasing George Santayana and David Linwood
Really?
"'Cos smallpox is a virus and SARS-cov2 is a virus, everything must be the same."
What naïve historicism.
Elsewhere I once asked a denier what they'd expect in case of an outbreak.
Their response was looting, riots, chaos, violence, ...
According to them, that's they'd picked up, read, been told, figured, ...
Someone had lost contact with the ground.
There's no particular panic, and the only supposed "fear-mongering" has come from some folk rehashing worst-case scenarios.
If someone is afraid out there, then that's understandable enough, and that's where that ends.
In the two places I call home (different continents), people just follow protocols and go on about their day. :shrug:
Not in any way that actually matters. The effect of social media, the growing distrust of scientific institutions, the enormous lobbying power of corporations, the monetisation of public health, the increasing healthcare costs of an ageing population, the vulnerability from current and future biotechnology, increasing wealth inequality and consequent health inequality...
Not even the bullshit is the same.
But it makes a nice chant for those who want to sweep all the corruption, and systemic malfeasance under the rug of "Oh look at what the looney anti-vaxxers are saying!"
Distraction-based politics at it's best, sad to see so many acting as its ardent spokespeople.
Where's the thread on the unforgivable government failure to provide equitable healthcare?
Where's the thread on the criminal lack of community health facilities that made so many (mainly minorities) at risk?
Where's the thread on the heartless exploitation of government institutions which allowed the obesity crisis which made so many so vulnerable to this disease?
Where's the thread on the treadmill of lobbying, corporate positions and government agencies which erodes any trust people might have had in those institutions to a point where they're basically useless?
Where's the thread on the fucking genocide the pharmaceutical companies are enacting by their refusal to release patents for the drugs we fucking paid for?
...nowhere. Just endless cheap shots at a handful of people, through no fault of their own, too stupid to properly understand what is actually an extremely complicated situation.
If people are falling for misinformation, then stop whining about them and do something to make the information more convincing.
Right, yeah, the inequalities are problematic and ought be addressed.
But do go on about your blanket "Big Pharma" hatred. :) (don't think anyone are cheering them on for the scandals)
What I 'missed' was any actual argument for your case beyond bland assertion.
Quoting jorndoe
Go on then...
Quoting jorndoe
Admitting the limits of our knowledge and acknowledging the weakness in the system are essential stages in gaining people's trust.
Acting like a bunch of fucking omniscient tyrants dogmatically simpering over their quasi-religious devotion to pharmacology is not.
https://jacobinmag.com/2021/04/big-pharma-pfizer-moderna-astrazeneca-profiteering-covid-vaccine
(see the first image for example)
Most reported U.S. Omicron cases have hit the fully vaccinated -CDC
https://www.reuters.com/world/us/most-reported-us-omicron-cases-have-hit-fully-vaccinated-cdc-2021-12-10/
None of what he says contradicts the Reuters article, that "most of the 43 COVID-19 cases caused by the Omicron variant identified in the United States so far were in people who were fully vaccinated, and a third of them had received a booster dose, according to a U.S. report published on Friday."
Why? Omicron spreads faster and appears to cause less severe disease. This should be seen as a great opportunity to achieve herd immunity faster. More infected=more natural immunity, this is a good thing.
I know. It was sarcasm.
The vaccinated folk get a cold. The unvaccinated folk get to go to the ICU.
Then comes covid...
Prior to vaccine: Mask, social distance, limit movement (domestic and international), decrease social interaction, work from home when possible. Virus spreading, people dying.
During vaccine campaign: Mask, social distance, limit movement (domestic and international) , decrease social interaction, work from home when possible. Virus spreading, people dying.
After achieving fully vaccinated status : Mask, social distance, limit movement (domestic and international), decrease social interaction, work from home when possible. Virus spreading, people dying.
I see zero difference, outside of increased division and resentment on both sides of the vaccination issue.
How does a government “slow the spread” if those with colds are given a pass to congregate?
Covid strikes...
...The vaccinated: 80% don't know they had/have it.
...The unvaccinated: 80% don't know they had/have it.
Vaccinated go to the ICU less than the Unvaccinated, true. However, of the 20% that feel symptoms, 75% will not end up at the hospital. Of the 25% that end up at the hospital, most will go home from the emergency department. Yes, the rest will go to ICU, and some will die. Some in the ICU are also vaccinated, and some of them will die as well.
No one ever mentions that the Israeli ICUs are evenly split with vaccinated/unvaccinated. Let's continue to ignore that detail, it doesn't play well.
Well, I can't find support for that - what I found says 75% of new covid cases are unvaccinated. Considering that only around 17% of the population are unvaccinated, that's an extraordinary win for vaccination. 60% of deaths are amongst the unvaccinated, who make up only 17% of the population.
Vaccination is working.
Quoting NOS4A2
If the consequence of congregating is a cold, then there is little need to slow the spread. Any rules still standing are only there to protect the unvaccinated.
Yes, by not getting vaccinated those folk are making it harder for everyone.
There is no "however" being demonstrated. It's more of a "look over here". The vaccine keeps hospital admissions down. Seems like a worthwhile goal considering the state of our healthcare "marketplace".
So 40% of the deaths are vaccinated.
Quoting Banno
So 25% of new covid cases are vaccinated.
Quoting Banno
Sure, but no where near as well as we are being led to believe. So we are mandated to receive a vaccine we don't want (otherwise they wouldn't have to mandate it), that should help, sort of. It was a weak premise when it was initiated and is weakening further as time passes. First the vaccine, then a booster, then maybe another booster, then, and likely, an annual booster too. This is poor medicine to mandate on people.
I would add that up to 30% of the vaccination efficacy can be attributed to the placebo effect, so really, how well is it actually working?
I don't think your position fully appreciates the nature of the threat. True, we aren't being wiped out to the point of threatening civilization. However, if you wait till then you are an idiot. A global existential threat is posed by anything that can spread that quickly and attack the respiratory system. It spreads like wildfire and occasionally stops people from breathing. It's not a good combination of things to ignore; and to ignore it with a tool to stop it in hand looks like a regret waiting to emerge.
It’s not a cold, though, it’s SARS-CoV-2. Even the asymptomatic can spread the disease. The rules permit that a person infected with this disease can congregate with the uninfected, so long as he has his vaccination. This is because the rules are stupid.
What rules, where? I tested positive after a couple of vaxes and the CDC is pretty clear about the directive to not go spreading it via 7 day to 2 week q;tine.
Pro-tip: Keep a bottle of garam masala around. If you have a fever and can't smell it anymore then it may be testing time.
No, they don't.
The likelihood that it progresses to that level is laughable. Our response to it IS threatening civilization as we know it. Welcome to the New World Order. That means the old world order is dead, so yeah, civilization has indeed changed, for the worst from where I sit.
Well, my point was that your position doesn't acknowledge the legitimacy of the threat. So, I guess we are agreeing by demonstration. I have no idea what you have in mind regarding NWO; the irony is it includes a vague threat to civilization. There's two or arguably three things that seem to wipe people out in bunches; famine, disease, and war. It's the middle one, so what are you talking about?
In many places the requirement to enter an establishment is a vaccination pass, not a covid test. So how do the rules prohibit the infected from entering?
They don't test everyone at the door is not a rule permitting the vaccinated infected to mingle. It's bare min. attempt to reduce the odds. Confusing the two is beyond reasonable.
The federal and state vaccine mandates prohibit the unvaccinated from working or entering certain establishments. Is there such a mandate for the infected?
The health code?
In many countries, states, provinces, there are mandates that require businesses to prohibit unvaccinated people from certain establishments.
Your order is incorrect, otherwise, I believe they are all coming. First plague, then famine and war. We have plague now (disease), supply chain issues and rising prices will bring famine, and the riots already occurring in various countries need only get larger to bring about war, and let's face it, it's not like people are getting more relaxed out there.
The Prime minister of New Zealand has already brought up the "New World Order", causing more than a ruffle in the press attending that conference.
Two years ago if you had been told that you would need to produce your papers and photo ID to be allowed to sit down for a dinner out, would you have believed it? Or that the government would be telling you how many family members you can have over for Christmas or birthdays? That you would have to prove you are not sick before going to work each day? OR have to wear a mask everywhere you go in a public building? Or a different set of social rules dependent on the medical choices people have made?
How is this not a new world order? The world I grew up in, and believed in, is dead. The historic image of my country is dead, having been replaced by a quasi-nazi government spewing propaganda and division among it's citizenry. The greater good has stomped our checks and balances as the Judiciary here will not hear any suit against any of the pandemic response by government. My options are: Take it, sans reach-around, Leave the country and try to find somewhere not as intent on screwing the citizenry, or revolt.
We are looking at leaving. That's where I stand. Like it, lump it or leave. Terrible options.
A sensible law - the one in place here, for example - isolates those who are infected; they are not allowed to interact with others. No idea what the law is in your part of the world, but if it permits the infected to congregate, you need better law.
Your point remains obscure. I presume that's why you changed the topic:
My point is the vaccine mandates are stupid if the vaccinated can spread the disease. The point of the mandates is to segregate the vaccinated and unvaccinated, not the infected and the uninfected.
One must isolate if they have covid-19 or are expected to have it. Except not everyone knows they have it, or they don’t want to abide by the rules. Those people can enter establishments and congregate with others, spreading the disease.
Because that's not what that phrase refers to; Bretton Woods was a new world order; the fall of the Soviet Union etc; we make children take a couple dozen vaccinations before starting school. Been doing it for years. And I thought you said a plague was a "laughable" concern? Now it's the already here? People have some Protestant-entertainment wrestling concept of reality. Global dynamics aren't simple.
SO we have one principle: Limit the exposure of the population to those who are infected or likely to be infected
This gives us two policies:
That's sensible, no stupid.
That would be everyone eh. What's your plan?
It's only recently we have had the luxury of not living during some disease outbreaks. In large part due to the long-term proven efficacy of vaccination. Arguably, Covid was things getting back to normal; except used as a political football because lying outright is no longer disqualifying apparently.
No. It is overwhelmingly the unvaccinated - those who choose not to act in their own and the community's best interest; and children.
Don't bitch about something that is entirely in your control. If you don't like being cast out, get vaccinated.
Those having a bit of a bitch here about separating vaccinated folk from unvaccinated folk: keep in mind that it is their choice to be unvaccinated. Folk need to learn to accept responsibility for their choices... :razz:
Yes. The problem now is what to believe, for everyone. Our military (Canada) admitted that in the early stages of the pandemic (spring 2020) they saw, and acted upon, an opportunity to use Covid as a propaganda experiment. They admitted this, it is not theoretical. They said they only did so for the first three months. (April to end of June). Which aligns with what I experienced at the time. Our information changed, nearly a complete 180, from Thursday to the following Tuesday. Science does not move that quickly, ever. Results are rapid, but disseminating it out and having it reviewed would never happen that fast. Our military did that, our prime minister supported it. This is our government and for some reason, I am supposed believe the shit they shovel my way?
Quoting Banno
Next time I have a fat guy on the stretcher having a heart attack I will make sure to let him know that Banno says he should have hit the gym and eaten more salad; now accept the responsibility of your choices fatty, and die with dignity. Same with the alcoholics, people that get in car accidents if they were driving too fast...You know. you are completely correct, I will just hang a sign on the ER doors "CLOSED. Banno says deal with your choices"
Yeah, that'll work.
Then I wasn't referring to you.
As for the rest, the irony was lost on you. Yes, it's complex.
Several kinds of influenza are globally endemic.
I am trying to keep positive but it is so difficult because by the February it will be 2 years of coping with the pandemic and, how for many, it is has turned life upside down.
Whooping Cough.
Yeah it sucks. Great way to build abdominal muscle though, and lose weight. I still think hitting the gym is a better plan though, less chances of breaking a rib.
Does anyone feel safer there, because of the pandemic response? Here we have healthcare workers resigning at unprecedented rates because we are tired of "optics" with no actual value, being given scripts "to explain the value of the intervention to patients and visitors" even though we don't believe what we are being told. We got into health care to help people, not be a political mouth piece. The decline of healthcare staff is being attributed to Covid Burnout, but in truth, we are mostly tired of being bullied by the employer, mandated to get vaccinated when we don't want the damned thing, and having to edit every time someone asks us about Covid. That is the source of the burnout, not Covid proper.
I will assume it's just a very long haul of the same debate, same restrictions, vaccinations and coronapassports until it fiddles out like the War on Terror.
You see, there was no time the "War on Terror", that started 20 years ago, did come to an end. It's still basically fought in various places. In Iraq the "War on Terror" is still fought, and so is in North Africa. After the disgraceful pullout from Afghanistan people simply don't want to talk about it, to refer to it. The term has vanished from the vocabulary, and the new threat that people are urged to be afraid is China.
Same will be with the Covid-19 pandemic. The virus will simply become similar to influenza A, and the officials will urge people to have the next shot, and then the next. Just as with the annual flu shots. And politicians, health officials, simply will stop referring to the pandemic...as a pandemic. Nobody has the balls to declare that the measures taken now will be ended at a formal time, so they will be there for years to come. Even then when far less people die of Covid than other spreadable diseases.
Perhaps in 2030 when you go to your local medical center, you'll still see some signs about how to prevent COVID-19. And people won't bother about it, but likely many won't shake hands anymore. I assume that will happen: the World will be a colder place with less physical contact with people you don't know. Hand shaking is then such an old gesture then, I guess. Just like the gesture of a man kissing the hand of a woman, it will perhaps become too theatrical.
So you command people to do things, or you give them (unsolicited) advice, and you take no responsibility for the outcome if they act accordingly.
I wouldn't dare do that.
It's so convenient to blame covid for what is actually the general decline of quality in human interaction.
I sometimes watch interviews with people talking about how covid measures are restricting their lives, and how alienated they feel because of them. And I wonder, have these people never gone to school? Do they not work?
What has been the normal, regular, ordinary experience for so many minorites, for those bullied and mobbed, excluded from normal society, has now become a temporary experience for a few more people. And they cry foul?!
This is the mentality of mobsters, gamblers, and drug dealers. I am none of that, so I don't reason this way.
We're supposed to have a scientific and ethical approach to the issue of public health.
I wonder when (!) they'll start segregating the vaccinated based on which vaccine they've been vaccinated with.
There is already a trend to hold those who got Pfizer in better esteem than others.
Exactly. Vaccination is first and foremost a social measure, not a medical one.
Quoting Banno
They do. All you need is a covid pass, and then you can do anything you want. You can be a superspreader.
Quoting Banno
Except when they don't.
In Slovenia and some other EU countries, 40% of those hospitalized for covid are vaccinated, 20% of those in ICUs are vaccinated.
Quoting Banno
What we're "protecting" first and foremost is the dogma, and the government and the pharmaceutical industry from any and all responsibility.
Quoting Book273
Exactly. Covid simply isn't like small pox, or measles, or polio etc. With those diseases, once a person is infected, they mostly get the disease, and it's clear they have it. In contrast, in covid, most people have mild symptoms or none at all. Covid just isn't comparable to those other diseases.
It's Christian thinking: You deserve eternal suffering if you fail to pick the right religion.
At the forum, we even have a member who is fully vaccinated, a proponent of vaccination. And who is now sick with covid.
They admitted to a counter disinformation operation that targeted a few domestic social media users. Considering disinformation was crippling to the initial hopes of preventing an endemic phase; getting out in front of it does seem like a good idea and within the scope of national security. It just backfired pretty bad , based on what a 5 min google search turns up. Quoting Book273
They tried to subvert the public conversation and couldn't manage it for more than 3 months? Doesn't sound like much of a threat in general and nearly irrelevant a year later. There's plenty of work that has been done by epidemiologist, so I don't really have any issue finding reliable sources of information.
I'm more concerned with conservative media needing some way to frighten people so they don't rationally question their leadership. They seem to want to frame the whole world into good and evil like a bible story and then sell the emotional relief of being on the side of the "good guys". It's been shocking to see how many people never grow out of this childlike view of the world. The level of fear, anger, and hatred they seem to be forced to maintain has to be devastating to their quality of life. Personally, I don't trust anyone that tells me who to hate.
Being able to circumvent public safety is not the same as the rules encouraging it. Full stop, there's no counter argument. Does twisting the truth achieve anything?
In the hands of a stupid government the principle gives us a stupid policy. When a fully vaccinated but infected man shows up at a establishment with a vaccine passport, he gets let in, increasing the likelihood of spread and illness. A vaccine passport does not indicate health or antibodies, and it is terribly discriminatory.
A private establishment chooses to statistically reduce the risk to it's staff and patrons. Discriminatory? If one's identity is dependant on resisting public health measures, then it's probably a good time to take a little inventory about what really matters.
800th time, a vaccine doesn't have to be perfect to be relevant. These arguments aren't compelling unless you've already made your mind up.
The mandates I speak of are official orders from governments. These orders require private establishments to enforce discriminatory government policy, or risk fine and other punishments. These policies have been implemented around the globe, if you weren’t aware.
What do you mean? Spell it out.
What twisting of truth?
Yours is a perverse interpretation. As is the remainder of your post. I feel sorry for you.
I believe you. What you are speaking to has been referred to as "imprinting". Animals do it well and you are right, there is minimal lasting damage to a relationship while the lesson learned is life long.
I can't verify your laws, but here if someone did so they would receive a $1000 fine. IN addition anyone they infect could take civil action against them.
• how to wear your mask
• coronavirus - how to wash your hands
Oh but of course! What else would be better that when being rude and not caring about manners, you can insist that you are only being thoughtful and taking into consideration others. And that those who perform these antique antics, likely shaking hands or (OMG!), hugging or kissing to the cheek are putting others in danger. Just as one now famous and widely popular doctor said, he would like that people would not shake hands anymore in general.
People just love it when something that has been nearly a vice can be portrayed as an virtue. And yes, I think people have become more rude and unfriendly in the past two decades compared to the 20th Century.
And yeah, then we'll notice that being lonely has increased! Well, thanks [s]Faceb[/s], correction, META, we will have a better alternative reality to go in later. (As if I'm not here already commenting someone who is a totally stranger to me likely living on another continent or at least in another country)
Quoting baker
How many now have started to work from home? Working from home isn't because of Covid, but this experiment has surely increased working from home.
It's far cheaper for your employer if the employees stay at home and work from there and only occasionally comes to a physical meeting or something. No need to have or rent huge office spaces.
Quoting baker
Ah yes, the evil arrogant majority with their white privilege. They (we) surely deserve this!
Generally "discriminatory" is considered an unjustified distinction, like race, age, or sex. Refusal to participate in a public health matter is a justified distinction even if considered disagreeable. The threshold for keeping an endemic wave from spiking is pretty sensitive and the R value of the mutations seems to be increasing. Lastly, people just aren't used to having to manage outbreaks of infection. Power granted to the government regarding matters of public health have been understood to be necessary for centuries. If a man wants to live as an island then he ought not complain when finding himself on one.
You keep pretending that the holes in the system are the system for the sake of an argument. There is no provision for an exception granted to infected persons who happen to be vaccinated. Can infected persons be allowed unintended admission? Yes, it isn't a perfectly exclusionary distinction. The "twist" is seeing this as hypocrisy instead of a statistical limitation.
An extreme example would be arguing that not everyone is required to wear a parachute because they don't open on occasion.
Sigh. The vaccine does not prevent a person from getting Covid. The vaccine significantly reduces the odds that you will catch it - and if you do catch it the vaccine significantly reduces the odds that you will have a serious case.
Anyone who ever said that the vaccine totally prevents Covid is wrong. Indeed, even the liberal press has criticized such mistaken statements
Sigh. No it doesn't. The vaccine significantly reduces the prevalence of cases in the community and significantly reduces the prevalence of serious outcomes in the community.
Whether the reduction in your risk, of either, was significant depends on what your risk was in the first place.
...besides which, as I understand @baker's position, it has nothing to do with the significance of the reduction and everything to do with the heartless abandonment of the poor sods for whom it doesn't work, or worse.
But, then to actually give a shit about that would require one to take a break from their work in Pfizer's PR team and actually look at one of the other major health interventions we could have been spending their $6 billion payday on, so I don't see much hope there.
One can show prejudice against any category of people, of whatever status. This category of people in particular, for whatever reason, do not want these chemicals injected into their body, as is their right. Other categories of people are required to prove their medical history, which is no one else’s business. But because of their status the unvaccinated are being denied access to many components of ordinary life, even if they are at relatively no risk of illness, or have antibodies, and have zero coronavirus on their person.
None of it stops the spread of coronavirus.
Quoting NOS4A2
Alright well we have a vaccine and generally the strategy with that tool has been to give it to people. Do you suppose vaccine uptake will increase by eliminating the mandates?
I acknowledge it's unfair and manipulative. Give people enough of a tax credit and they'll take any shot you give them. And it compensates them for the benefit to society it provides. In the US we already killed off the most vulnerable. 1 in every 100 over 65 I think was the summation. So, personally I think my sentiment is actually closer to your argument than mine. But, I stand by the objections to it's being over sensationalized.
Really? On the basis of PCR? That seems like opening a hornet's nest of counter claims. Didn't your government only just return three detainment camp escapees, despite them testing negative, on the grounds that "the tests aren't perfect"? Imperfect enough to imprison as a precaution, yet perfect enough to make you $1000 the poorer (typical capitalist response - you can do what you like if $1000 is pocket money, but if it's your life savings you'd better hope to God you're no falsely accused - best just stay in, not worth the risk). It sounds like a legal (and ethical) nightmare!
Are you OK with this state of affairs? If not, what is your solution?
I don't consider the unvaccinated special, but governments worldwide consider the unvaccinated special enough to keep them out of participating in many aspects of the market, their jobs, in some cases denying them access to free healthcare (Singapore), to board a plane (Canada), to shopping in malls and other retail, and even hospitals (France). In Austria, one can be fined $4000 a month by virtue of the absence of Pfizer, Moderna, or AstraZenica in his blood.
Of course if you threaten to fire people because they do not want a vaccination, or deny them access to any facet of a free society—dining, entertainment, shopping, travel, free healthcare—many will fall in line. Coercion and threat and state force are powerful means to get people to do what you want. The point is it is morally wrong for a government to coerce people by threatening to take their rights away, and if they do not abide, to take their rights away.
As I've already said...
Quoting Isaac
You're baffled because you think I believe the things you believe and then can't understand why I reach a different conclusion. I don't believe the things you believe. That's why my conclusions are different.
Since you and I are epistemic peers (I assume?) our disagreement is not resolvable by anything other than reason from shared beliefs. Such discussion seems to be out of fashion these days, replaced by the latest fad for believing everything our governments tell us and yelling for the public flogging of anyone who disagrees.
My 'position' has been laid out a dozen times, supported entirely by reputable medical journals and scientists qualified in the relevant fields. Disagreement trails off into either silence or insult, I've nothing left but bored potshots half-heartedly lobbed.
The public discourse on these matters is an absolute disgrace, if the world wanted to walk right into a populist, right-wing world order it could not have found a better way.
Do as your government tells you, don't question the mainstream narrative, publicly shame those that do... Do you see the zeitgeist leading to a new era of enlightened socialism?
Do you mean to say in this particular case or during all or most outbreaks of disease?
A reply straight from the rightwinger's textbook:
Shoot, don't aim.
Act in bad faith.
Assume the other person is immoral, and an idiot.
Don't bother to get to know the other person or remember things about them.
Conjure up the most idiotic interpretation of their words, and then insist that this is what they mean.
Place the entire burden for the quality of the interaction on them.
This is how you win.
Take a look: Is the country you live in actually in a state of an epidemic? Has the government declared it?
People keep talking about a pandemic, but whether a country is officially, legally in a state of an epidemic is another matter.
What are you talking about?!
I have stated my position many times, but you and your fellows just don't find it worth to remember it. This is the message you're sending.
Quoting Cheshire
Then why doesn't the government act accordingly?
Why is it placing the whole burden of responsibility on the people?
In relation to this pandemic, compulsory vaccinations, and vaccine passports.
No.
Quoting Isaac
Wrong government - that was NT.
Oh ok, but in principle the government can do these things and under the proper conditions you think they are reasonable. Just for clarification. There's a big difference between arguing the case in general and whether or not Covid should qualify.
:lol:
On what basis then? Must I wring blood from the stone!
Quoting Banno
I see. Although not relevant anymore if the fine's not based on PCR anyway. Presumably in NT then one could walk into a bar vaccinated but infected and suffer no legal opposition?
:up:
A good 250 pages in, I wonder how many times repetitions have been posted.
Quoting NOS4A2
Do you think there is some magical spell that stops the virus?
It's about stemming the tide, containing, tracking, learning.
Some of your comments can't be differentiated from paranoia.
Quoting again again again
Your line of thinking exits before getting to duration and intent (asked more than once).
Anyway, I, for one, would like to stomp the virus (unlike @Book273 apparently), and move on.
Maybe this is a good time to separate doers and deniers?
Is it really a vice or anything even resembling a vice?
Do you know anyone who actually believes that the stuff written in the Declaration of Human Rights matters?
Very few do, and they are ridiculed.
Good idea.
Quoting Isaac
The same wrong argument made a million times is still the wrong argument.
You're forcing us into mediocrity, into thinking like gamblers, mobsters, and drug dealers. Into narrow-mindedness and hard-heartedness. Into moral depravity.
Just chiming in to point out the near exact repetition of the conversation over a year ago (comment below was made in December 2020).
Quoting boethius
And also October 2020:
Quoting boethius
Of course, it's now "anti-vax" to point out the original claims about vaccines ending the pandemic that had zero evidence supporting them at the time ... turns out didn't come true.
What I got wrong though, is that blaming the insane sequence of failed policy and bailouts and gifts to large corporations on the group of people (that we knew ahead of time would exist, and sane policy would take into account as basic reality ... not to mention groups of people in poor countries that won't be vaccinated as we don't give a fuck about them anyways and it's logistically impossible to deliver) refusing vaccination has basically saved government from further scrutiny (... at least in the mass media).
Written over a year ago: we've entered the groundhog days scenario of stupid policy ... during a situation we seem now to be in the exact repeat of, just with the experience of vaccines not having solved the problem last year ... but are going to this stime ... well, no one's actually claiming that anymore at all, but get your boosters!
There's now not even nominal policy for most Western governments stating some plan out of the pandemic: restrictions until further notice.
And yet every day we hear things like, "If so and so would've gotten the vaccination, he'd be safe and well."
You said such a thing just the other day, I quoted you.
The pro-vaccination lobby insists on this simplificationism. Sure, when talking in the abstract, they'll say
Quoting EricH
But when it comes to pointing fingers in actual cases, they forget all about that, and we get
Quoting EricH
Your dead cousin being one of them.
?
I remember a prediction made on this very forum a year ago:
Quoting Isaac
And also this analysis:
Quoting Isaac
(Stated over a year ago, fast forward to today)
At this forum, not once have I seen that a pro-vaccer said that people should get vaccinated for their own sake.
Not once has anyone who has told me to get vaccinated said that I should do it to protect my health.
Not once. Not a single time.
Instead, they said I should do it for others. Or that I should do it in order to protect others or not to be a burden on them.
I watch the national news on tv, and parts of the news on several other channels. It was only a handful of times that I've heard people who advocate for vaccination said that people should get vaccinated for their own sake. Instead, the overwhelming majority of exhortations to vaccinate are that we should do it for others. To show solidarity with medical personnel who are overwhelmed. To show solidarity with the already vaccinated. And so on, but it's almost always about others.
As if our lives don't matter, or as if we matter only insofar as we could be spreaders of the disease or take up a hospital bed that someone else wants.
Such profound contempt of humans, masquerading as altruism and solidarity.
The moral numbness that we are now being forced into ...
Dealing in potentially dangerous substances, calculating odds, and playing Russian roulette is how mobsters, gamblers, and drug dealers operate.
But it appears that gone are the times when mainstream society would think that operating that way is not ethical.
The obvious remains obvious. Covid was pretty unpleasant even after be vaxxed. Like, keeping your brain on a light simmer for 2 weeks. I never had any respiratory effects, so antidotally I think it was worth the trouble in my experience. If you'd like respiratory distress then definitely don't get it.
?
You yourself quoted
Quoting EricH
And that's definitely not the only time that's been posted.
Apparently, one of those things that don't sink in with some people.
You could at least try to keep it coherent.
That's why mandatory vaccination could be a last resort. It would force the government to act more transparently and to take at least a part of the responsibility for the safety and efficacy of the vaccine.
The only problem is that with covid in particular, the "effectiveness" of the vaccine would be about the same as the course of the disease without the vaccine, and then the government could take the credit and make vaccination mandatory indefinitely.
I'm vaccinated. Do I feel safe, protected? No.
Do you know what that is?
Most victims are people who refused to get a simple vaccine that would dramatically reduce the odds that they will be infected.
Generally, comments are directed toward the quoted bit at the top. Can I confuse anything else for you?
This part is false
Yes. Your image of me.
Poster convinced vaccines don't correlate well with disease outcomes. Freely equivocates as needed.
Alright, what would you prefer.
Agreed ... except I would say that was already the plan last year ... as I pointed out over a year ago:
Quoting boethius
No. You can only stop a virus by not letting is spread to others. But there is no evidence governments can accomplish this task. So why let them?
https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/volumes/70/wr/mm7034e5.htm#F1_down
Edit: Plus, the symptoms between the vaccinated and the unvaccinated vary immensely:
https://uihc.org/news/vaccinated-vs-unvaccinated-how-sick-can-you-get
Not a good analogy; overeating and alcoholism are addictions, and driving too fast is due to overconfidence in one's abilities. Not getting vaccinated, though, is a choice not to do something that has little attendant risk, based on either, or some combination of, believing stupid conspiracy theories, paranoia, or just bloody-minded refusal to do what you are told you should.
Those who believe stupid conspiracy theories may be able to be educated, those who are paranoid may not be able to overcome their paranoia, it's those who are just bloodymindedly recalcitrant who most of all should be expected take responsibility for their decisions. Of course they won't because they think it is wrong that they should be told what they should do.
What I see no justification for is publicly arguing against vaccination since it flies in the face of all the evidence. Also arguing against businesses mandating vaccination, when all they are doing is protecting themselves against being held responsible if someone becomes infected in the workplace (as well as simply protecting their employees, customers and associates) is just absurd in a time when occupational health and safety, and litigation for failure to comply with the requirements is so prevalent.
It’s not looking good. I suspect that they’ll widen the goal posts, determine that those who are fully vaccinated are in fact not, and exclude the vaccinated from various aspects of normal life until they get the next Pfizer wonder drug.
It's an odd question.
So we have in place a strong and competent tracing system. Folk who have been identified as potentially carrying the Dreaded Lurgy are asked to get tested and isolate pending the result. If someone were to attend a venue during that period they would receive a $1000 fine.
Same for positive cases.
Yes, the treatment of First Nations folk has been sadly wanting. It's a symptom of a systemic issue, one we need to deal with.
From a damage control perspective, letting it run rampant would have caused much less. So yep, I say let it run!
Exactly.
How 'identified'?
Look, the point being made here is simple. (and also answers @EricH's question earlier). There's a whole host of solutions to this crisis - better investment in healthcare, proper equipping of ICUs, removing barriers to healthcare in minority and poor communities, transparent and believable information about hygiene practices, efficient and fast lockdowns, social distancing, masking, and vaccines.
Of that list, vaccines, are a very effective aid to reducing disease severity in those at risk. Their effect on transmission in actual population settings hasn't even been established, their benefit to the under 25s is marginal if present at all, their potential to end the crisis has been labelled "a myth" by the government's own experts...
...yet all we hear about is their promotion, how anyone not taking them is public enemy number one. Nothing about the government's abject failure to provide equitable healthcare, zip about the food industry's ruthless complicity in the obesity and heart disease that makes so many more vulnerable to this, nada about the pharmaceutical companies' sickening profiteering at the expense of poorer countries...
There's one thing which will determine if you are liable to spread the virus to others, and that's having the virus. Whether or not you are likely to have the virus can be determined by a test. Any other means of determining if you're a likely threat is a secondary proxy of less value. There's one thing which determines if you're immune and that's having the appropriate antibodies, that too can be tested for, any other measure is a secondary proxy of less value.
So why vaccine mandates, why vaccine passports? Why use these second-best proxy measures of infectivity and immunity?
Why do governments push the one solution that earns the largest government lobby group the world has ever seen billions of dollars...? Do we really need to ask?
Why do the media push the one solution which earns one of their largest advertising revenue stream billions of dollars, media companies on whose board sit the same people as sit on the board of the global pharmaceutical companies (just for good measure)...? Again, no mystery.
Why do the medical scientific journals and establishments, mainly funded and overseen by the pharmaceutical industry, keep publishing data supportive of this one solution and reject, or smear, data opposed to it...? Not much mystery there either.
Why do the government agencies like the FDA who have a known 'revolving door' system of cushy corporate consultancy positions as rewards for those favourable to the industry, come out in support of the industry solution...? Not exactly rocket science.
Why do independent left-wing voices, supposedly concerned about things like social welfare, fighting corporate overreach and government 'sponsorship' rackets, act like they're in Pfizers PR department...? That's the mystery that's actually interesting. That's what keeps me coming back to pick at it.
I hadn't dared to post Norman's work, I'm glad someone did. Another perfectly decent career down the pan. He hasn't had a single paper accepted by any journal since publishing his query about the validity of these statistics. A perfectly normal (actually slighter higher than average) acceptance rate up to that point. But apparently nothing to see here...
Since it's out now - his evidence to the UK's Parliamentary committee - https://committees.parliament.uk/writtenevidence/13847/pdf/
One reason I've been away from the forum a few months is I accused a private equity investor of money laundering (because he was obviously laundering money and trying to use our engineering documents and concepts to do so ... then tried to make me actively help launder money by offering a million Euro bribe), which created a shit storm that persists to this day.
But the other reason, is that the libertarian critique of most of the left turns out to be true, not surprising for the corporate left, but I have been genuinely surprised at the extent it's true for also for the "independent voices".
Likewise, I thought maybe the US needed assault weapons for all to check US government power ... but in advanced democracies we were "better" and there was effective democratic processes that made the threat of violent insurrection unnecessary political tool.
It's painful to see I was wrong, how easily so called advanced democracies become "paper carrying" jurisdictions.
Turns out Nazi's were totally correct about the use of coercive medical interventions (whatever people want to call it), relentless propaganda and blaming everything on a scapegoat that in turn solicits unquestioning loyalty to government power insofar as governments can deliver on harms to those scapegoats.
I guess the idea now is that the Nazi's were just wrong about the reasons for their coercion, wrong about their particular version of "peer reviewed science", and wrong about the class of people targeted for scapegoatism and second class citizenship ... but they were right about the basic setup, as long as the reasons happen to be claimed as "correct" this time? That's the European policy?
Yep.
JCVI statement 19th July - ‘any decision on deployment of vaccines must be made on the basis that the benefits of vaccination outweigh the risks to those people who are vaccinated’
JCVI view on the health benefits of universal vaccination in children - ‘the health benefits in this population are small, and the benefits to the wider population are highly uncertain. At this time, JCVI is of the view that the health benefits of universal vaccination in children and young people below the age of 18 years do not outweigh the potential risks’.
Government response two weeks later - new guidance issued for the rollout to include healthy 16-17 year-olds with no new data presented.
JCVI statement in response September 3rd - ‘there is considerable uncertainty regarding the magnitude of the potential harms’.
Government response - fuck off and take the fucking vaccine
Again, that we expect this from governments is lamentable but unsurprising. That we expect independent socially-minded people to actively do their dirty work for them is shocking.
Fuck! Well done.
Quoting boethius
Yeah, as I said some way back...
Quoting Isaac
A little fear was all it took.
Governments and their corporate sponsors are presiding over the largest transfer of wealth the world's ever seen and the left-wing want to keep the front page firmly focussed on the trivial medical decisions of a handful of the population.
By contact tracing. I remain somewhat surprised by your questions - I had thought this a universal practice. Does your community not use QR code check-ins to identify casual and close contacts?
I understand your concerns, but I do not share them. The evidence I've seen is that vaccination reduces viral load and hence transmission.
Money heading off to Pfizer and friends might be regretted eventually. Nationalise 'em, I say.
The idea Dr. Norman (and his whole team!) can just be removed from the conversation is completely absurd. Likewise, other experts, of which there are many with advanced degrees, professorships, questioning the statistical "evidence" of the governments as well as moral / legal basis for mandates in any case.
I was told by a doctor, who I happen to know, just last weak that she spoke with her infectious disease colleagues and they are all against the mandates and say the policy is driven by politics and not science; that the health minister her has made "fighting Covid" her little personal war.
Of course, these doctors aren't against reasonable policy vis-a-vis Covid, but against using Covid as the only health metric of society. For instance, my friend doctor and most of her colleagues were extremely worried about school closings due to the mental health consequences on children (rich kids with good parents "no school" can fun, but a lot of poor kids school is the place they get a good meal, have structure and feel safe, not to mention just physical space needed to stay healthy: being stuck in an apartment was difficult for adults and adult relationships, yet society decided the affect on children can be completely ignored; and that's not even to mention the obvious consequence on learning!).
But, ok, if they're wrong (in particular that we can know "cost-benefit" without even collecting the data about the costs!), people can present the rebuttal.
Academics that don't speak out are simply corrupt.
Quoting Agent Smith
What Assange helped expose were obvious conspiracies such as unjustified killing of journalists and torture (denied at the time ... and even if "legal" in the States due to someone writing a memo, that didn't make it magically legal in other countries where supporting, directly or indirectly, the US torture program was obviously illegal, at least nominally, in other Western countries).
Assange being extradited to the US is likewise an obvious conspiracy between US and UK governments, as the charges are complete bullshit. But again, if you use the standard any thing stamped "legal" by a government cannot, by definition, be a conspiracy to make a mockery of the law or then against international legal standards or simply moral standards, then feel free to assume Assange publishing whistle blower information can be considered "espionage".
Likewise, if high ranking politicians openly advocating assassinating someone is cause for political asylum if coming from a corrupt government of a poor country ... but not if the US does it. Feel free to apply such a double standard.
Now, dictionary has re-defined "anti-vaxx" to refer to those also against mandates; i.e. creating second class citizens. Assange, like most anti-authoritarians on both the right and the left, are against such mandates. The whole point of the limit to government power is not that "well, it's ok as long as the government happens to be 'right'" it's because governments should need to actually convince their populations to comply (use that reason and science they keep talking about to convince people to comply in good faith) and also ... maybe the government's gets it wrong next time; who's to judge.
If people aren't convinced because they have lost faith in institutions for waging unjust wars, letting elites get away with obvious crimes, degrading the environment, obvious irrational and massively harmful policies like the war on drugs, degrading work conditions, fraudulent inflation numbers justifying lowering wages in real terms and increasing rents, etc. etc. etc. maybe trust and respect need to be earned, and making credible institutions is the solution and not institutions simply skipping the whole "convince people" part and using coercion and force to implement "right according to themselves".
Are the obvious conflict of interest, misrepresenting data, hiding data, using proxy data to draw unsupported conclusions, not collecting data that can only say "the wrong things", etc. etc. a criminal conspiracy? Well, no. It's business as usual.
Is the Philosophy Forum finally catching up to the fact that everything about this crisis reeks?
I'm confused (or surprised, whichever turns out to be the case). Are you saying that there's a $1000 dollar fine just for attending a social gathering just knowing you've been in contact with someone who's had Covid (having been contacted on your tracing app)? In England it was never even a legal requirement to isolate, only a recommendation.
The asymptomatic, the socially isolated (as measured by 'pings'), the negatively tested, the bearers of natural antibodies, the vaccinated. All have good reason to believe they're less infectious than average, yet all have a small chance of being infectious despite their status. But only one of the five gets their freedom (in all cases - sometimes tests are allowed, sometimes not). It's the one that earns money for the pharmaceutical companies. The very same pharmaceutical companies who spent an unprecedented amount of money last year lobbying the very governments who make the decisions about who's free and who isn't.
Corporations are getting away with lobbying government into choosing solutions that massively favour them at a time when we desperately need more careful planning and social welfare spending than ever. If that's not something we should be opposing then I've totally misunderstood what left-wing politics was about.
Quoting Banno
The discourse around this topic has become so toxic, it's refreshing to hear someone disagree in such respectful terms. I appreciate that.
Quoting Banno
I was pitching for up-against-the-wall-come-the-revolution, but yeah...nationalise sounds more pragmatic!
Interesting interview with Stefan Baral on that topic
https://www.newstatesman.com/uncategorized/2020/10/why-scientists-fear-toxic-covid-19-debate
Only a few pages back (or perhaps on the other thread) I cited Vinay Prasad (a perfectly well respected contributor to public health discourse for decades) and the person I cited it to immediately trawled through his previous work to find something, anything, by which his name could be smeared out of the discussion.
Likewise when citing Martin Kuldorff (didn't he do an interview on a show which also interviewed an anti-semite?), Pete Doshi (didn't he write an article that was opposed to Pfizer a few years ago?), Sunita Gupta (didn't she get funding from AIER who also funded Philip Morris)...and so on...
No-one shies away from citing government figures of industry-sponsored trials.
The pharmaceutical industry spend an average of $233 million per year, on lobbying the US federal government; $414 million on contributions to presidential and congressional electoral candidates, national party committees, and outside spending groups; and $877 million on contributions to state candidates and committees. It dwarfs, for example, the AIER's purported role in the Great Barrington Declaration by several hundred thousand orders of magnitude, yet it's the dissenters that get put under the spotlight and the mainstream treadmill of lobbying money and cushy consultancy posts is waived through...nothing to see here. It's pathetic.
The Great Barrington Declaration (which I don't actually agree with, by the way - I'm using it as an example of the discourse, not an example of good policy) was trodden into the dirt for receiving web hosting and administrative support from AIER (who, again, I've got absolutely no time for) totalling some thousand at most. The government appointed CDC declarations are treated as gospel despite receiving over a billion dollars from the very industry whose products their pronouncements are about - and no-on even so much as raises an eyebrow.
Evaluating the number of unvaccinated people needed to exclude to prevent SARS-CoV-2 transmissions
Background:
Vaccine mandates and vaccine passports (VMVP) for SARS-CoV-2 are thought to be a path out of the pandemic by increasing vaccination through coercion and excluding unvaccinated people from different settings because they are viewed as being at significant risk of transmitting SARS-CoV-2. While variants and waning efficacy are relevant, SARS-CoV-2 vaccines reduce the risk of infection, transmission, and severe illness/hospitalization in adults. Thus, higher vaccination levels are beneficial by reducing healthcare system pressures and societal fear. However, the benefits of excluding unvaccinated people are unknown.
Conclusion
Vaccines are beneficial, but the high NNEs suggest that excluding unvaccinated people has negligible benefits for reducing transmissions in many jurisdictions across the globe. This is because unvaccinated people are likely not at significant risk – in absolute terms – of transmitting SARS-CoV-2 to others in most types of settings since current baseline transmission risks are negligible. Consideration of the harms of exclusion is urgently needed, including staffing shortages from losing unvaccinated healthcare workers, unemployment/unemployability, financial hardship for unvaccinated people, and the creation of a class of citizens who are not allowed to fully participate in many areas of society.
...that worked well.
Never hear people mention the under reaction happens on an exponential curve and the over reaction on a logistic curve. When something fails to contain the virus and there is no virus the result is minimal, but the opposite means one step the other direction results in a greater negative result.
That could work, though I don't know about large international companies.
(Now wait for someone to yell "Communism!", "Theft!" :grin:)
Jail time for employees that can be held accountable, board members, ...
Being health-related means serious enough, laissez-faire capitalism won't do.
Anyway, a bit peripheral here, might warrant a new opening post, though I'd expect most to be disgusted about the scandals.
[sup]Some high profile scandals, might have been posted before ...
• Bristol-Myers Squibb to Pay More Than $515 Million to Resolve Allegations of Illegal Drug Marketing and Pricing (Sep 28, 2007)
• Merck to Pay More than $650 Million to Resolve Claims of Fraudulent Price Reporting and Kickbacks (Feb 7, 2008)
• The Case Against Pfizer (Sep 2, 2009)
• Pharmaceutical Giant AstraZeneca to Pay $520 Million for Off-label Drug Marketing (Apr 27, 2010)
• GlaxoSmithKline whistleblower awarded $96m payout (Oct 27, 2010)
• GlaxoSmithKline to Plead Guilty and Pay $3 Billion to Resolve Fraud Allegations and Failure to Report Safety Data (Jul 2, 2012)
• Johnson & Johnson to Pay More Than $2.2 Billion to Resolve Criminal and Civil Investigations (Nov 4, 2013)
• Lessons from GlaxoSmithKline’s record $492 million bribery fine in China (Sep 23, 2014)
[/sup]
If we were to do a Venn Diagram of our positions, there would be a fair amount of overlap. I would enthusiastically support all of these things even if the pandemic had never happened.
Quoting Isaac
I would put vaccines second in that list but otherwise we are largely in agreement.
Quoting Isaac
I guess daily testing of the entire population and enforced isolation of people who test positive might also work. I can't speak for other countries, but that would never fly in the good old USA.
Quoting IsaacI could be mistaken but to the best of my knowledge that is not correct. You can have antibodies and still get Covid - albeit most likely a mild case.
Quoting Isaac
Agree that the profit motive should be removed from health care in the USA. But I do not buy the narrative that the influence of the evil pharmaceuticals extends to all the countries in the world that have socialized medical systems.
Quoting Isaac
Whether vaccine mandates prevent transmission is an open question - there are both pro & con studies. But I still go back to the fact that the daily death rate in the US is over 1K and that 99% of the deaths are unvax'd. In New York City, after vaccines were mandated for municipal workers? The rate of vaccinated workers shot up dramatically. I don't have the exact figures, but it went from something like 60% to over 90%. If vaccine mandates will get folks to take the jab when they otherwise would not, then I approve.
Quoting Isaac
This is going back to my schadenfreude. I get the distinction between being deliberately harmed and mistakenly harmed, but this only goes so far. Regarding beliefs, one of the most common topics of conversation on TPF is the distinction between knowledge & beliefs. I am not going too deeply down that particular rabbit hole, but if a person's beliefs do not correspond to reality then bad things can happen. I understand why people are suspicious of government (especially African -American), but at some point you have to either accept the facts or take your chances.
We are all responsible for the reasonably predictable consequences of our actions. If a person does not get a vaccine and they also put themselves in situations where they can get exposed, they are gambling not only with their health & lives but also the health & lives of the people they are close to.
Now if a person were to say "It's my choice, and if I get Covid I will stay at home and accept the consequences of my actions - if necessary I will die of Covid so that I will not put an unnecessary burden on the health system. Plus I will pay for the medical costs of anyone I infect"
I guess I could sort of respect that. But that's not happening. Instead large numbers of people are ignoring sound medical advice that in most cases would keep them healthy, but when they get sick they go back to the same medical system whose advice they ignored.
When I hear about one of these anti-vax media commentators dying of Covid, I cannot help but feeling some moment of schadenfreude.
- - - - - - - - -
I thank you again for your thoughtful and reasoned responses. My real world activities are calling and I have to bow out of this conversation.
An institution with a mandatory vaccination policy, compulsory mask policy, and surveillance testing has become a den of superspreaders. So what will they think of next?
Most? Most seem to presume their products are manna from heaven, their every word is the gospel truth and any notion that they might be manipulating information wild conspiracy theory.
I've posted most of those before. Between the deafening silence, in place of solidarity, I was accused of being mentally ill.
So no. I don't think most would be disgusted about the scandals. Most want to sweep the scandals under the rug and pretend it isn't happening. See my response to Boethius above.
Quoting Isaac
It's not enough to look at all those scandals and simply say 'tsk!'. These people are in charge of the response to the crisis. I just don't understand how people cannot put the two facts together.
They (you included) seem to have no trouble seeing the severity of the disease. They maybe agree that the pharmaceutical industry (and their ties with government and regulators) are as bent as a nine-bob note. Then, when deciding what to fill the front pages with, think that the fact that these criminals are being handed the reins and unflichingly believed wholesale at every turn is of secondary import to that fact that a few nutjobs think the vaccine turns them into a 5g transmitter.
No chance they say "ah shit, nothing is working, might as well stop all the bullshit restrictions and carry on." Too bad really, because that is the most logical approach. Don't worry though, someone will say I am an anti-vaxer and write me off. It is much more comfortable for them that way.
That's a misleading quote.
All students at Cornell are supposed to be fully vaccinated, otherwise they aren't supposed to be there.
Breakthrough cases are always to be expected with the proportions depending on 1) social distancing 2) virulence of the variant.
The main problem is the lack of social distancing. Vaccines can only help to a statistical extent and even then, only for non-idiots.
Misleading how? The point being made was...
Quoting NOS4A2
...(literally the only point made in the entire post).
So how does the fact that everyone there is vaccinated make the quote misleading with regards to that point. It is indeed true that the policies in place (specifically the vaccine) have not worked to prevent this cluster, that's the only point being made and the quote supports it entirely transparently.
Quoting magritte
No, the main problem is that the vaccine is a poison making those who take it vulnerable to the new variant.
(see what we can do if we abandon the need to cite our theories?)
But you didn't make any point at all. I wish you would.
Lack of social distancing is the superspreader, and that's regardless of any variant of COVID or any other communicable disease.
College campuses are social gatherings, students are there to socialize, and it's this lack of social distancing aspect that the university is addressing.
Wasn't my point.
Quoting magritte
A dangerous vaccine ingredient is the is the superspreader, and that's regardless of any variant of COVID or any other communicable disease.
College campuses are fully vaccinated, and it's this dangerous vaccine ingredient that the university should be addressing.
...or
...we could cite our sources and have a proper conversation.
The point is that a whole series of actions were taken, many imposed against the preferences of the students. Let's say your theory is true (it's certainly more likely than mine). It doesn't address the question at hand, which is whether all those other protections had an effect significant enough to justify their imposition. If, as you say, it's all down to social distancing anyway, then why were vaccines and masks mandated but social distancing not?
It’s clear to me that these kinds of restrictions created a false sense of security among the compliant. But if the omicron variant is involved, it’s not clear social distancing measures would have stopped anything.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2021/11/24/hong-kong-valve-face-mask-covid/
Folk sometimes lock themselves into a loop of rationalisations in such a way that every criticism of their belief can be twisted into a justification for that belief.
Take care.
I don't understand how an otherwise reasonable fellow can hold to this.
We know vaccination works. We know that flattening the curve of infection allows health systems to cope. We know that vaccination has slowed the spread of the virus, helping flatten that curve.
There is a moral imperative to protect people.
The forum is the worst possible place to have this discussion, since it forces folk into opposing camps. This is not a productive discussion.
Don't have any time this evening but wanted to clarify this was a rhetorical device not something I actually think. I thought it was more obvious than it clearly came out.
My point was that when we espouse pet theories without citations (even in support of anti-covid measures), we invite any such theories as the one I made up to the discussion.
It was a poorly thought out device and I shouldn't have risked it in this climate.
See the context...
Quoting Isaac
Sorry for the confusion.
I find myself trying to protect those around me at a time when booster vaccinations are available but in short supply, while the wider community is engaging in activities that can only lead to greater spread. The return to "normality" posses a very real threat to vulnerable folk. As I pointed out to @Tom Storm, open policies will result in the deaths of first nations folk, the homeless and other low social status folk, the sick, the disabled, the elderly and children. That is, it is a form of passive eugenics.
Avoiding those outcomes ought be a high priority, even above combating the greed of Pfizer and friends and the stupidity of governments.
I understand that, I think our difference is only that I don't believe (unfortunately) that it's possible to separate them such as to prioritise the former.
I haven't had the privilege of working with indigenous communities, but I have worked with many minority communities, particularly working class urban poor. These communities reel from one kick to another. I don't know if it made the international news, but some or our communities are still reeling from being burnt alive inside their own homes at Grenfell. A situation where the government approved something which they knew was unsafe and unnecessary to make their buddies rich.
Now the government wants to approve something which is definitely making their buddies rich, but this time we want to say it's different, this one really is safe and necessary, honest.
The boy who cried wolf didn't only harm himself when the wolf finally came, he hurt the sheep, the shepherd, the farmer...
As I said to @jorndoe, if people are falling for misinformation, and we care about that, it's on us to make the information more convincing. That's what I see transparency as doing, that's what I see reasonable debate as doing - making the crucial key message more convincing.
The key factor is trust and trust is not earned by ridiculing people's justified beliefs (and let's face it "the government are screwing us to make the wealthy richer" is a completely justified belief) - I'm not here suggesting you are ridiculing other people's beliefs, I'm talking about the public discourse - though this thread in general would certainly be a good example.
The smearing of dissenting voices, the refusals to talk about the pharmaceutical companies in anything but glowing terms, the relentless pushing of the one money-making bit of the raft of solutions required...all these erode trust, feed conspiracy theories, hamper efforts to get communities to adopt the strategies needed.
I'm not going to name names, but you'll be aware, no doubt, that psychologists were involved in devising government policy from day one (at least here in England, I suspect elsewhere). There were two camps - 'scare them shitless' and 'earn their trust'. The former won. They shouldn't have.
The misinformation is quite convincing...is that not why so many are convinced? Socrates proved that nothing is more convincing to mankind than misinformation, and history has corroborated. You have made some key connections here...it would seem that if the crucial key message is to be made more convincing, then it should be packaged as misinformation. This would probably require that the presentation be sufficiently inflamatory so as to incite emotional reactions (rather than logical responses) in the target demographic.
If nothing else, a generation will pass, one which is physiologically unaffected by covid, then the free world will be imposed upon by another fabricated immanent threat...one that the easily convinced will buy into without blinking an eye.
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/12/21/opinion/vaccine-hesitancy-covid-omicron.html
So in other words: we're losing the battle of education, knowledge, facts, information, communication, etc. Corporate media and social media (but I repeat myself) are leading more and more people into conspiracies and bogus beliefs and into silos. That is clear.
What to do about it? Use "incentives." Translation: rewards and punishments. When people behave like animals, treat them as such and that will work. Behaviorism prevails, in this case. Simple principles of classical and operant conditioning will be enormously effective.
There's a part of me that's very leery about all this, even though I think it's justified in this case, based on scientific and medical consensus/direction, but much like the analogy to the teenager coming home for curfew because she's afraid of "negative incentive," that's far from ideal. Best to have a child understand why the rule is in place to begin with, not simply to force compliance with threats. If you're truly unable to make him or her understand the rule, for whatever reason, then you're left with no alternative -- but that doesn't negate the fact that you have a real issue on your hands.
And we certainly have a real issue in the United States. Our powerful corporate and political (but I repeat myself) masters, through their ownership and control of media and their infiltration of the education system, have really done a number on the populace. We're as divided and confused as ever. Not even a pandemic can change that. If 9/11 happened today, I doubt that would change anything either. Perhaps we had the best chance to come together in 2009 -- instead we got the Tea Party and Occupy, and Obama bailing out the banks.
Maybe it's already over, folks.
Anyway -- if "incentives" is the way of the future, it'll lead to even more division and violence. But when half the country's behavior effects the other half and vice versa, something has to be done. This is a tough one -- but in the end I blame the 40 years of the neoliberal assault and the influential people who engineered it. This is what comes from putting greed above everything.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2021/12/19/sen-warren-tests-positive-coronavirus-says-she-is-grateful-protection-vaccines-booster-shot/
More examples of fully vaccinated people with boosters spreading the virus. Now we know the claim that a vaccinated (and now boosted) populace will bring us out of the pandemic was a false promise. Politicians lied and people died.
See above article. Maybe it *is* better to treat them like animals after all.
Remember the old phrase "There's no cure for stupid." Apropos, I think.
Bullshit.
Largest lobbying power over governments - Pharmaceuticals https://www.investopedia.com/investing/which-industry-spends-most-lobbying-antm-so/
Largest control over mainstream media- Pharmaceuticals https://trofire.com/2017/04/11/big-pharma-owns-corporate-media-americans-waking-fighting-back/
Media coverage has actually overall become more pro-vaccine during the pandemic - https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2021.11.07.21266018v1
Largest funding control over medical science - Pharmaceuticals https://www.bmj.com/content/348/bmj.g3058.long
Influence over government regulators - Pharmaceuticals https://www.science.org/content/article/fda-s-revolving-door-companies-often-hire-agency-staffers-who-managed-their-successful
Best performing hedge fund in the world's favoured investment - Pharmaceuticals https://portfolio-adviser.com/will-baillie-giffords-big-bet-on-moderna-pay-off/
But apparently it's not the influence of the multi-billion dollar corporation in every aspect of government, media, science and investment you're concerned about. No. It's the influence of some right-wing nutjobs and a few yoga loving health freaks. Yes. I can hear Wall Street quaking in its boots right now at the prospect of the shocking influence Proud Boys have over some corner of Farcebook. How will they ever cope?
The point is, the corporate interest driving government, media and scientific responses is overwhelmingly pro-vaccine. There's not a single major corporate player with an anti-vaccine agenda, and one of the largest, most powerful industries in the world is the main beneficiary.
So either the corporate agenda just happens on this rare occasion to be a good one (tragically failing to defeat the forces of ignorance), or the corporate agenda is responsible for the failure to defeat this crisis.
Either way, the idea that the anti-vax movement is the major player here, overwhelming a spirited defence by those plucky underdogs - the US government and the pharmaceutical industry - is laughable.
As if modern medicine has an evil agenda. :lol:
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/opioids
Opioids make life saving surgery possible. Modern medicine is among the greatest accomplishments of the species and you think a few cases of abuse make it entirely evil. That's ridiculous.
I haven't even mentioned modern medicine. My comments were about the pharmaceutical industry, if you're only referring to the medicines, then I'm not sure what your point is.
Question. Do you think we'd have made greater advances in modern medicine if it were a) nationalised, b) more heavily regulated, or c) less heavily regulated?
If you answered (a) or (b) then you admit that medical advances have happened despite the profiteering of the pharmaceuticals, not because of it. If you ananswered (c), then this conversation's over. I just can't take you seriously.
Corporations gather round the things we need. That's how it works. General Mills makes a profit off their products. That doesn't mean anything about the safety and efficacy of their crackers.
If you want to target the mRNA vaccines, do so on their own merits, not on the vehicle the species uses to make and distribute them.
What does this have to do with whether people should get vaccinated?
Neoliberal bullshit. Corporations generate demand for their products. Why the fuck else do you think they spend billions on lobbying, advertising, sponsorship and sales? They sure as hell don't just wait around for a need to organically arise out of the grateful community.
Quoting frank
Really? Just read back over literally any section of this interminable thread. It's not about whether any individual should take the vaccine. It's about whether government (and indeed society's) policy should be to throw everything it's got at one single aspect of the solution (the one that makes their primary sponsers richer), rather than focus on those areas where their attention yields most benefits. Just putting the same effort into clean water supplies or malaria nets could have saved twice the lives for half the cost.
We utilized a virtual budget to make mRNA vaccines a reality. That's how we do anything big: we conjure money out of thin air. This has been going on since banking was invented.
So yeah. As soon as we have a global dictatorial government, we can intelligently prioritize. :up:
Then goes on to cite the pharmaceutical companies. :lol:
I think you missed the point.
Meanwhile we have a pandemic to deal with, which is kind of important enough.
Even if those companies (and facemask, hand sanitizer, horse dewormer companies) had conspired to create and deliver the virus worldwide (which they didn't), we'd still have to deal with the darn thing. :meh:
I'll venture a guess... If you put together a new opening post making a case for dealing with those scandals/companies, then it'll likely be fairly quiet, because most already agree. How to deal with them (not if) would more be up for debate.
Please let me know if you spot anything.
True, yes. They’re not stupid — they know what’s good for the bottom line.
Quoting Isaac
When 20 or 30 percent — being conservative — refuse vaccination, I’d say that’s become a major player, yeah. Same with the election lie — even the Wall Street Journal and Fox News (and every major corporation) don’t go that far. Yet something like 40% of Americans think Biden isn’t legitimate.
My point wasn’t about the anti-vax movement. It was about the divided, confused, and completely irrational state of affairs we’re living in. Vaccine irrationality, like election irrationality, is but one symptom. I do indeed blame the powerful for this — they’ve created this monster that they can no longer control. As I said before, it’s due to 40 years of policies that have decimated the populace and years of brainwashing/cultivating irrational attitudes.
Murdoch and Fox News, for example, share a great deal of responsibility for this — and for Trump. But does Trump now telling viewers to abandon Fox News somehow negate this? Not at all.
You said...
Quoting Xtrix
...then said...
Quoting Xtrix
Since the most powerful group in that list are the pharmaceutical companies themselves, who are pushing the pro-vaccine agenda. So it's hard to see how you're blaming them for ignorance (wherein I assume - perhaps wrongly - you're referring to anti-vaccine sentiment)
Basically, if we're making irrational choices about vaccines and you're blaming that on corporations then you're either saying that it's supporting the vaccine that is irrational (which I merely assumed you weren't from our previous exchange), or that the corporations have been encouraging us to reject the vaccine (which is clearly nonsense). Or, I suppose a third option that the corporations have been persuading us to take the vaccine but it's backfired and caused us to reject it, which is one of the issues I've been arguing all along.
Alternatively, I have indeed missed your point entirely - in which case perhaps you could make it slightly less opaque.
Quoting Xtrix
But this argument is completely circular. The idea that 20-30% of people's failing to take the vaccine is problematic is something you've repeated because it's been told to you by government agencies and media. The organisations you've just admitted are rife with corruption and corporate influence. You can't say that the corporations are right on this occasion because of the data the corporations have just given you showing how right they are.
If, on the one hand you're going to say...
Quoting Xtrix
... you can't then use the information you've acquired from the very sources you've just accused of misleading, to argue that they're not (on this occasion) misleading. We have one source of data on Covid spread and extent - government data. We have one dominant source of data on the vaccine efficacy - pharmaceutical company (and corporate sponsored) studies. If you'd want to say that those organisations can't be trusted (and you'd be right) then you've no ground at all to make strong claims about the nature of the pandemic or it's efficacious treatment. The data you're basing such assessments on comes from the very organisations you've just indicted in leading us astray.
Yes, we do. We also have a malaria crisis to deal with, an obesity crisis, an opioid crisis, an AIDS crisis, a poverty crisis, a TB crisis, a diarrhoea crisis, a child labour crisis...
The death rates now are no different to those a few years ago. There's nothing world-shattering about Covid, it's just one more in the long list of killers. It's just one that has a newly patentable drug to peddle as the only solution.
Virtually all of the WHO's top interventions to save lives globally and nationally are more cost effective than the $300,000 per QALY invested in the Covid response. More than most medical treatments, more than almost all mooted interventions in the developing world. So, if not corporate intervention. You tell me why the governments have decided to save the covid-threatened at almost seven times the cost they were previously willing to spend on the poor, the starving and the sick.
Goodie, let's keep up our pandemic stomping efforts. :up: Containing, tracking, learning, ...
[sup]
Dec 01, 2021 WHO recommends malaria vaccine for children - malaria
Dec 02, 2021 First Malaria Vaccine a Major Milestone Despite Hurdles Ahead - malaria
Dec 06, 2021 More malaria cases and deaths in 2020 linked to COVID-19 disruptions
Dec 10, 2021 Communication between immune cells shows potential for cancer vaccine - cancer
Dec 10, 2021 Scientists developed Promising and safe mRNA HIV vaccine :up: AIDS
Dec 18, 2021 I want to build muscle and lose belly fat. A nutritionist said to eat more protein and snacks. - obesity
Dec 19, 2021 Outgoing NIH director implores Fox News viewers to stay focused on the real 'enemy' :up: good advice
Dec 20, 2021 FDA approves first injectable PrEP medication to lower HIV risk - AIDS
Dec 20, 2021 BioNTech's mRNA Cancer Vaccine Has Started Phase 2 Clinical Trial :up: cancer
Dec 20, 2021 34 healthcare and biotech startups that are set to take off in 2022, according to top investors :eyes: watch?
Dec 21, 2021 FDA approves first injectable HIV prevention drug - AIDS
Dec 21, 2021 Criminals have stolen nearly $100 billion in Covid relief funds, Secret Service says :angry:
Dec 22, 2021 Covid Deaths Exceed Annual Death Toll of HIV, TB and Malaria
[/sup]
I didn't ask if the pharmaceuticals intended to monetise those problems too. I asked you why you thought our governments weren't previously willing to spend the money on saving those lives that it is now willing to spend on saving COVID-threatened lives (now that 'saving' them involves huge transfers of wealth to the pharmaceuticals).
I don't doubt for a minute the pharmaceuticals will profiteer from all those crises as well.
Why an anti-malaria vaccine now when mosquito nets have been available for decades, are cheaper and yet budgets to pay for them have been cut?
Why a cancer vaccine now when moves to stop the sales of cigarettes, processed meat, and carcinogenic chemicals have been blocked at every turn. Why a cancer vaccine when simply cleaning the urban air could save millions of lives?
Your sycophantic apologetics for the pharmaceutical industry is noted. The question was about effective interventions.
So who would you want as pandemic manager? The government?
A little query for you (and any other nothing-to-see-here, business as usual advocates) to help me to see the other side of...
The following is mainly from Vinay Prasad's blog, I'm going to paraphrase...
In April 2021 Pfizer CEO declared "People will likely need a booster shot of Pfizer's vaccine within 12 months"
Immediately, the CDC, the WHO and various vaccine advisory boards responded, with Fauci saying it should be a 'public health decision' and Pfizer should not be making such announcements. The WHO were even more condemnatory.
In July 2021 Pfizer announced they would be seeking FDA approval for their boosters.
A few days later, there was a private meeting between Pfizer officials and the White House administration.
A short while later, the White House launched a media campaign advocating boosters in defiance of the advice from the WHO, the advice from their own FDA, the advice from their own ACIP, and the advice from several independent experts.
The Director and Deputy Director of the FDA's Office of Vaccine Products both resigned over the political influence on scientific advice and wrote a paper for the Lancet detailing their concerns https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736(21)02046-8/fulltext as well as several pieces in popular newspapers.
The White House declared a meeting (with the newly standing-in FDA team and the ACIP) to respond to the article. Both teams of scientific advisers recommend scaling back the booster advice to only the more elderly population.
Walensky (CDC Director - a government appointee) unilaterally overrides the advice of all of her advisors, yet again, to roll out boosters to all age groups.
They are told, in no uncertain terms that this is unscientific - by the former chiefs of vaccine safety at the FDA, by the former FDA vaccine Advisor Paul Offit, by several independent experts, by their own Advisory committee (the ACIP), their own Vaccines and Related Biological Product Advisory Committee, and by the WHO.
In December, they expand the booster programme to 16-17 year olds with no new evidence and all their advisory boards advising against it.
---
So, the question for you is - what happened at that private meeting that gives you such confidence in the government's approach here?
Did the Pfizer officials hand over some super robust scientific evidence that neither the WHO, the ACIP, the VRBAC, Harvard and Maryland Medical Schools, nor their own advisors had access to?
Or did they offer a substantial donation to party funds?
And these are the people you'd prefer to have in charge of pandemic policy? People who ignore the advice of literally all of their scientific advisory boards to pursue a political (or worse, economic) agenda?
Anyone who thinks governments are 'following the science' is dangerously deluded. Finding some scientists who say what they want to hear and ignoring, smearing and sacking the rest, does not constitute 'following the science'.
Quoting Xtrix
Quoting Isaac
I see no reason to distrust the figures from hospitals and medical establishments on this particular issue.
The point about corporate media brainwashing people is fairly straightforward, especially in conservative media -- which has now gone off the rails completely. Fox News being a prime example. However, they and their corporate backers generally want people to take the vaccine -- because it's good for business (won't have to lock down again, etc).
There's no contradiction. They've simply created a monster, as I said before, that now they cannot subdue. Even Trump was booed when he said "get the vaccine, it's good." That's not contradictory either.
Quoting Isaac
I'm not using information from the sources I mentioned. I don't get my information from social media or corporate media (NBC, ABC, CNN, Fox, MSNBC, CBS, etc).
But even if I did, there's a real difference between straight reporting and opinion sections. "Commentators" like Sean Hannity et al. are far more influential than the Fox Newsroom. Take a look at the Wall Street Journal, as well. A very good newspaper -- yet their editorials are to the right of Attila the Hun.
Not sure what you're struggling with here.
Quoting Isaac
I never accused medical experts of leading us astray. I've accused the corporate media for leading many people astray, to the point that they're now ripe for making stupid decisions, like refusing to wear masks or take the vaccine.
Omicron is like a vaccine. Just crap luck it didn't come earlier.
1st jab: Astrazeneca
2nd jab: Moderna
3rd jab: Pfizer
Philosophically sound: Eclectic (a little bit of this, a little bit of that). I'm gonna confuse the hell out of Covid-19.
:grin:
bring on the naysayers...
Yes. That's clear from what you've already written, but since you're not the Oracle of Delphi we expect reasoning or justification for your beliefs. Its a discussion forum. It gets a bit boring if it's just an exchange of pronouncements. I'm not interested in your opinion, I'm interested in your reasons.
Quoting Xtrix
Again, reasons please, not just opinion. Unargued for opinion is boring, there's nothing for me to respond to.
Quoting Xtrix
So where do you get your information from? Direct from the source? You personally interview medical experts? Take the death counts yourself? Ask the MEs what the cause of death was?
Quoting Xtrix
So corporate media is prepared to steer society off a cliff, encourage mass deaths and leave no habitable earth for our grandchildren, but apparently infusing actual news stories with bias is one step too far for them? Who are these people?
Quoting Xtrix
But the data you're basing your conclusions on doesn't come from medical experts. It comes from the government and the media. Unless you've taken some private poll of medical experts yourself, if so I'd be really interested in the results?
I'll try and make the distinction really simple for you...
If Professor Bob of Oxford University tells you something - that's you getting the information from medical experts
If the government agency say "our medical experts say..." that's you getting your information from the government, not the experts - I really don't know how much more gently I can break this to you, but governments lie.
If a newspaper says "most experts say..." that's you getting your information from the media, not the experts - again, not to shatter your comfort bubble, but newspapers are biased (yes, heaven forbid, even in their news reporting - I know, the scoundrels!)
Even if a medical journal publishes a paper (https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/21216501/), the WHO publishes advice (https://gh.bmj.com/content/bmjgh/6/6/e005216.full.pdf), or even the American Association of Really Smart People issues a statement, those are all filters applied to expert opinion. Filters largely controlled by corporate or political interests, filters with their own personal biases.
Because there’s no evidence whatever to believe these numbers are inaccurate. True, there could be a vast conspiracy — but that’s on you to show.
Quoting Isaac
Reasons for what?
I think the reasons behind conservative media are fairly straightforward: appeal to advertisers, stoking hostility and prejudice, etc — all very good for business. Ditto for MSNBC.
After years of Rush Limbaugh and the undermining of truth, it’s no wonder that people are confused about whether to take a safe, effective vaccine. Or whether the election was “stolen,” etc.
These are symptoms, from years of media conditioning that has systematically undermined science and expertise.
Quoting Isaac
From scientific journals and medical journals, mostly. The Lancet, Science, Nature, etc. I also read the Times, WSJ, etc.
Quoting Isaac
Straw man.
Not once did I say corporate media is “prepared” to steer us off the cliff. In fact corporate America happens to be aligning itself with science and facts when it comes to vaccines — why? Because they’re not idiots, and when it comes to their bottom line they’re very serious. Same with polling.
Perhaps it’s helpful for you to pause 5 seconds before responding to what you THINK I’m saying, and look at what I’m ACTUALLY saying.
Quoting Isaac
Hospitals are government and media? Medical journals are government and media?
Quoting Isaac
Yes, because I’m definitely the one struggling to understand here. :roll:
Quoting Isaac
Riveting analysis. Thank you for the insight.
Quoting Isaac
Yes, and thankfully you’re here to weed it all out for us.
The reality is you’re as much a victim of the info-demic as the suckers who believe the election was stolen, repeating exactly the same lines and “challenging” sources and the very nature of truth and facts just to maintain their conditioned beliefs. Yes, I know you reject this assessment.
The issue isn’t science and medicine — or even government. The issue is that most Americans listen to opinion shows, run by corporate America, and are stuck in information silos via social media. That is what’s accelerating these whacky beliefs and stupid decisions, not to mention our divisions. There’s nothing controversial about this — it’s well documented and rather obvious. You want to somehow appropriate this fact and apply it to science and medicine, a la Trump and “fake news,” but that’s your issue, not mine.
Quoting General Motors ignition switch recalls
As an aside, would you actually like to join Strang and his many colleagues around the world? (They differentiate.)
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/356756711_Latest_statistics_on_England_mortality_data_suggest_systematic_mis-categorisation_of_vaccine_status_and_uncertain_effectiveness_of_Covid-19_vaccination
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/355437113_Discrepancies_and_inconsistencies_in_UK_Government_datasets_compromise_accuracy_of_mortality_rate_comparisons_between_vaccinated_and_unvaccinated
https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2020/04/we-could-be-vastly-overestimating-the-death-rate-for-covid-19-heres-why/
Quoting Xtrix
Reasons for believing your claim. That it's just...
Quoting Xtrix
None of those publications record death rates.
Quoting Xtrix
So you're polling hospitals directly yourself? And yes, journals are media.
Quoting Xtrix
Uh huh, and "thankfully you’re here to weed it all out for us."
Which two mentioned things?
Quoting jorndoe
Differentiate what?
You're being quite opaque here.
You had mentioned the number of people vaccinated. These articles have nothing to say about that. They’re talking about vaccinated and unvaccinated death rates.
Quoting Isaac
I never once mentioned death rates.
Quoting Isaac
Polling hospitals myself? Is this a serious question?
Journals are not corporate media — which was the topic. My fault, I guess, for not specifying the obvious.
Quoting Isaac
No — I simply encourage people to listen to the science and to medical experts. I’ve said that from the beginning, and have been very transparent about my sources and about what sources I take seriously. I take the Lancet seriously; I don’t take social media or corporate opinion shows seriously (as most Americans do, and which was the initial —uncontroversial — point I was making).
Sorry that you struggle with truisms in your quest to defend vaccine “skepticism.”
[sub]Feb 27, 2021 Children with long covid
Apr 28, 2021 7 Effects of the COVID-19 Pandemic on Kids
Dec 27, 2021 New York City sees four-fold increase in COVID-19 hospitalizations among kids
Dec 28, 2021 Child Covid hospitalizations are up, especially in 5 states
? take care of your 5-year-olds out there
[/sub]
So ...
No. I mentioned (bolded for your reading pleasure).
Quoting Isaac
If not death (and death which higher vaccination levels could mitigate), then what problem are you raising with the poor vaccination rates. Your argument that it's a problem (the low vaccination rates), relies on studies and data produced by exactly the corporations and governments (and presented in the exact media) you've condemned for 'leading us astray'.
So I'll ask again - from where are you getting your data on death rates if not a government? From where are you getting your judgement on vaccine efficacy if not a corporation? From where are you getting your view of "the majority of medical professionals..." if not the media?
Did you gather your own data? No. Did you conduct your own trials, or understand the intricacies of the actual published papers? No. Did you poll the experts yourself? No.
You trusted governments, media and corporations to do those things for you and decided to believe the results you were thereby handed.
Quoting Xtrix
Yes. you said you trusted the hospital data. I assume you're polling them yourself. Otherwise it's not the hospital data you're trusting is it, it's the data of whomever tells you they've polled the hospitals.
Quoting Xtrix
Who owns the journals then? A kibbutz?
Quoting Xtrix
You were earlier imploring that we not 'do our own research'. Now you're saying we should listen directly to the experts. Which is it?
Quoting Xtrix
I seriously doubt you have even close to the expertise to judge the accuracy of an article in the Lancet. I've also presented several papers from journals, each one you've dismissed in favour of your preferred narrative. This idea that you're just impartially constructing an opinion by listening, unfiltered, to the experts is transparently bullshit. You choose the experts you're going to listen to on the basis of whether they're supporting the message your politics inclines you to believe.
It seems all we do is repeat.
The right course of action in the 'task at hand' is determined by who you trust to deliver it. The two are inseparable.
If the 'task at hand' were to build a wall, the fact that your builder had criminal convictions for negligence is extremely relevant, no?
I've already mentioned several sources which I (and apparently you) find credible.
But I don't remember saying 20/30% is "problematic," I said that after years of consuming media that systematically undermine academia, expertise, science, research, and truth, there is an outgrowth of stupid decisions. Perhaps it's the word "stupid" you object to -- fine. Irrational is better. Many (though admittedly not all, but i would argue MOST) of that 20/30% are making these decisions irrationally, partly based on the consumption of the media I mentioned before (in this case, conservative media -- talk radio and Fox News in particular and for longer; social media like Facebook more recently). I don't necessarily include you in this group, but I don't remember much about my exchange with you.
Quoting Isaac
If you consider science and medicine somehow part of corporate and social media (which I what I was talking about) or governments, fine. I don't. If we discount all science that is funded by corporations or government, we're ruling out a lot indeed. I think it's important to be skeptical, but remember that it's in the interest of corporations and governments to get facts, to really know what's going on -- if for no other reason than that it increases their power, control, wealth, self-interests, etc. I mentioned polling as one example. That's extremely important to companies -- they want accurate polling, not simply what they'd like to hear -- because it turns out being delusional about the world is often a very poor policy, especially when it comes to numbers.
In any case, I never accused the government of "leading us astray" in this case, nor corporations, because I think both happen to be (reluctantly) doing the right thing by following the advice of experts. They haven't done that great a job -- I think, much like with climate change, that we should be following more of the prescriptions, the programs that scientists and experts are advising. Here we're back to where I think we discussed consensus -- and I argue in favor of following the consensus, particularly if it's overwhelming.
Quoting Isaac
So listening to experts, and to the evidence and studies that they cite from credible sources, and even looking at the sources directly (science and medical journals), I would hardly qualify as "trusting government and corporations." It is true that journals and academic research publications generally, are a type of "media." They are not corporate media.
So yes, one thing you mentioned is technically true: I'm trusting a form of media. Short of polling people myself and seeing and collecting evidence first hand, as you mentioned, and which is absurd, I have to often rely on media. If I speak to friends who are also experts in a given field, if not dealing with them face-to-face, I have to rely on e-mail, telephones, texts, and even letters -- all are a kind of medium. If we want to get technical. Bottom line: yes, I mostly trust experts and the reasons and evidence they present.
Quoting Isaac
Who cite their sources, which come mostly from hospitals, doctors, researchers, etc. True, they could all be wrong. So could mechanical engineers and quantum physicists. But I usually have to assume they know what they're talking about. I extend the same approach to general medicine and epidemiology.
Quoting Isaac
When did I say that?
Quoting Isaac
It's not very difficult to follow research papers. Those that make the top journals are usually clearly written as well. What you mean by "accuracy" I can't say -- there is, again, a large degree of trust involved. But I take the attitude that even I wanted to learn further or look into the experiments or data myself, that what I found would align with the data, results, and evidence that's being presented.
I never claimed to be myself an expert in medicine. Rather, I said I listen to the experts.
Quoting Isaac
Right, but I never once made that claim. Of course I'm partial -- I hold a particular set of values and beliefs. I hold a perspective. That's everyone, I would say. I try my best to put emotions aside -- that I'm less successful with. But that frustration, even borderline contempt, really is rooted in wanting to see human beings thrive rather than suffer and die. I wouldn't mistake this flaw as having much to say about my analysis, beliefs, principles, and conclusions.
Quoting Isaac
But this assumes I'm in the two-party trap which I've already myself condemned. This gets launched at me occasionally, but I see no evidence of it. I have made no secret of my voting record and rationale for it, of what I think of our political and economic system, of the power of misinformation and social media bubbles, who I follow/consult/listen to, what sources I trust, etc. I feel no loyalty to any political ideology, even anarchism. It's whatever our current situation calls for -- a kind of pragmatism perhaps. Is that the "message" that's being supported by Nature, Science, the Lancet, the New York Times, the WSJ?
...and the 80/70%? You think they've made their decision rationally because...? It happens to be the same as yours?
Quoting Xtrix
Who said anything about discounting. Gods! I'm genuinely baffled by the almost religious submission you people have on this issue. Do you really not see any position to take between 'discounting all science' and actively campaigning for one of it's products to be forceably injected in the entire population of the world? There are positions in between, you know.
Quoting Xtrix
See above. What level of scepticism are you displaying here. Where is any reasonable caution in what you advocate? Scepticism is using their products to the minimum necessary at the utmost need. Scepticism is understanding that not everyone is going to be as trusting as you and nor should they. Scepticism is accepting that, with uncertainty, people ought to be allowed to make their own choices. Scepticism is campaigning for oversight, checking data, listening to dissenting voices.
You're exhibiting none of this. Corporate science says everyone must take the vaccine and you unquestioningly fall in line. They say 'jump' you say 'how high?'
Quoting Xtrix
So? That doesn't therefore mean it's in their interests to provide those facts to us, unfiltered. What they themselves benefit from knowing and what they benefit from us thinking are two completely different things.
Quoting Xtrix
Yes. Notwithstanding my disagreement about being morally obligated to follow a 'consensus', it's this conclusion that I'm questioning. What Lancet article told you there's a 'consensus'? What medical expert did you speak to who'd conducted a poll of his peers? You talk of 'consensus' as if that were an established fact, but there's been no such check. As far as I can tell, there's healthy debate among experts about the extent and force with which the vaccine should be used. There's disagreement as to it's use in the under 25s and further use in the under 40s, disagreement about the value of cloth masks (particularly for the very young), there's disagreement about the value of boosters, there's disagreement about the use of passports, there's disagreement about the value of natural immunity, there's disagreement about the role of vaccines in ending this (as opposed to just reducing illness severity).
Where's your impartial, non-media, evidence of the 'overwhelming consensus' you keep referring to?
Quoting Xtrix
I must have confused you with someone else then, I'm not trawling back through your comments. If you say you didn't say it I'll take your word for it. I assume then, you're in favour of people doing their own research?
Quoting Xtrix
Such a common theme here Do you not see the flaw?
1. I believe the people who tell me that x is going to avoid suffering and death.
2. I believe them because I want to avoid suffering and death.
So if I told you that you should put a bowl of trifle on your head right now or a billion people will die you'd do it - because you want to avoid suffering and death? No, obviously not. You don't choose who to believe on the grounds of the severity of the message. Those who oppose the global enforcement of vaccinations do so because they too want to avoid suffering and death. When someone like Vinay Prasad speaks out against promoting vaccines for children, he's obviously concerned about the suffering of the children. What makes you think you've the monopoly on concern?
Quoting Xtrix
As I said. Both sides can claim to be concerned about suffering and death. You still picked a side nonetheless, so your 'concern' here has nothing to do with the side you've chosen.
Quoting Xtrix
No insisting that any mention of the word 'politics' must refer to your party ties is what assumes that.
Absolutely. I have a useless mask on my face for "optics" not actual value. I was mandated to get the vaccine, not because I needed it, but because the health region wanted to be able to post really high uptake in healthcare workers to further promote vaccine uptake in the general public, 80% of which also did not really need the vaccine. Now my health region can make statements like "98% of healthcare staff are fully vaccinated". No mention of firing us if we didn't submit to the vaccine, and no mention of the 1600 staff that walked away, rather than get the useless vaccine. We also have signs all over the hospital explaining that all staff are to wear masks due to Covid, but no mention of the fact that even the Chief Medical officer of the province admits that those same masks are useless. Now we are more short staffed, more burnt out, and still doing useless shit for optics. Yes, hospitals are government and media run, make no mistake there.
Indeed. Not to mention the fact that, contrary to our bizarre mythology, hospital reports are not provided by the plucky, overworked nurse. They're provided by the entirely un-plucky overpaid hospital manager.
Well, the manager's manager is an even less plucky, even more overpaid cog, and I sympathise, but I don't see your story as much of defense. You left. What does that say about the moral fibre of the ones that didn't, the current incumbents?
Or is it perhaps a continuous cycle of disenchanting the idealists? I can imagine that. Perhaps it's not so broken after all. "How do we deal with these idealistic doctors?", "Stick them in management for a year, crush them with soul-destroying bureaucracy, then put them back on the ward". Like breaking horses!
Oh but I forget. There's a crisis on, so we all must pretend that hospitals are all run by Dr. Kildare. He wouldn't massage any figures would he?
A good deal of them are making the decision because of media, what their doctors say, etc. So I would say they're making a correct decision, in that it corresponds to the consensus of experts, but not necessarily made through extensive thought or research.
Quoting Isaac
I realize this is your take on the matter, yes. It's stunningly ridiculous.
I'm not listening to "corporate science," I'm listening to science.
Maybe you have disagreements about quantum theory as well. Does my listening to the consensus about quantum theory mean I'm only following "corporate physicists"?
You fail to see, repeatedly, why there's even this level of "debate" and "controversy" to begin with. Those who are just "asking questions" about last year's election make similar claims about skepticism. What they fail to see is that their skepticism on this particular issue isn't an accident to begin with. It's a product of our current intellectual climate, which has its causes -- many of which I've gone over already, and which vaccine "skepticism" is simply another example of. That the 2020 election was stolen is also believed by many people -- and it's irrational. Do we say those who believe the election was legitimate are equally irrational because they don't know the ins and outs of state election laws?
The science and medical consensus on vaccines is overwhelming. They're safe and effective. The expert consensus on the election is that it was free and fair. Many people believe otherwise in both cases. My point is: there are reasons for this. The reason, in part, is years of consuming media that systematically undermine trust in science, expertise, government, academia. It's anti-intellectual and usually conspiratorial. This was the point, and it still stands.
Quoting Isaac
Of course. Polling is a good example.
Quoting Isaac
There is overwhelming consensus that vaccines are safe and effective, and should be taken by those eligible. I'm not interested in "debating" this again. If you want to continue your quest, you're welcome to. The point made wasn't exclusively about vaccine resistance, which is only one symptom of a larger problem.
Quoting Isaac
Of course.
Quoting Isaac
I don't. I think you misread what I wrote or I didn't communicate it effectively. I was in that case describing my own emotional reactions -- that they arise mostly out of concern for the continuation of the human experiment.
Quoting Isaac
Fair enough, I suppose. I have no idea what political factor you're referring to, in this case.
Quoting Book273
Hospitals are not governments, and they're not media.
Quoting Isaac
We should listen to experts and have reasonable faith in our scientific and medical institutions and processes, whether in a crisis or not. The real crisis, however, is why non-experts (like you) pick certain issues to "question" and not others. That very choice is not an accident, whether it's about election fraud or vaccine efficacy. Millions believe in election fraud -- and I bet every one of these people feel that they're the exception, in that that they came to this belief on their own free will.
I had someone just tell me almost exactly the same thing about election fraud -- that I'm the dupe for trusting in government data. That's an interesting fact.
We’ve also had to fundamentally alter our lives, go into lockdowns, all for the expressed purposes of avoiding overwhelming the hospitals. So we were double-crossed: forced to alter our lives in order to protect them from their own failure to provide the healthcare they promised us. Maybe this failure will lead some sort of change.
Quoting Xtrix
Quoting Xtrix
Quoting Xtrix
Quoting Xtrix
I asked
Quoting Isaac
You don't need to "go over all this again", just point me to the impartial scientific journal from which you obtained your knowledge that there's an 'overwhelming consensus' on the issues you advocate. You keep using 'safe and effective', but you're advocating far more than that. Amoxicillin is 'safe and effective' too - doesn't mean I ought to take it. You're advocating a particular health policy regarding vaccines (and masks, and distancing, etc), that it's 'safe and effective' is woefully insufficient as justification. So again, what are your sources for this claim that your position is supported by an 'overwhelming consensus'?
Quoting Xtrix
Seriously? You don't see any political similarity in people who are strongly pro-vaccine? You think they're from a wide range of political beliefs? It's crap. To a man, they're all the generally liberal-left leaning, post-enlightenment, secular, urbanites. You find me a single transphobic vaccine supporter I'll give you ten quid. What's a position on transgender issue got to do with a position on treatment for a pandemic? Nothing at all. but you'll not find an overlap because it's a political tribal decision. pro-transgender, pro-vaccines, pro-immigration, pro- gay marriage, pro-climate action, etc. I could probably take a more than 50/50 guess at what music they like.
Quoting Xtrix
Indeed. Recently I've been listening to Vinay Prasad, Stefan Baral, Martin Kulldorff, Jay Bhattacharya, Norman Fenton, Pete Doshi, Paul Hunter... Or are they the 'wrong' experts?
I think that you make some good decisions. It seems that there are so many myths and things which are contradictory. I know people who cling to the belief that they cannot catch Covid_19 and I am fed up with explaining that it masks only prevent passing germs onto others. Also, some people are adhering rigidly to advice and others doing exactly what they like in terms of mixing, including people with Covid_19 socialising freely while some people who are negative are being so careful.
There just seems to be no balance and the most absurd thing is seeing discarded masks littered on public transport. At some point, if Covid_19 becomes a thing of the past, so much of contradictory advice and behaviour may be viewed as involving so many mistakes. The problem is that those giving rules are making them up as they go along. Some of it seems to be about prescriptive rules. I wonder if it would be more helpful if the emphasis was on harm minimization, with a focus on people balancing risks, amidst all the uncertainties.
Not my position. Vaccines are safe and effective— there is a consensus on this. Find your own articles about it if you’re interested— literally any credible journal or organization in the world.
https://tec.mx/en/news/national/research/nobel-laureate-calls-trust-scientific-consensus-vaccines
This is exactly what I’m saying.
Quoting Isaac
:yawn:
Do these experts claim the vaccines aren’t safe and effective? Probably not.
Again: election fraud is also widely believed. Why not spend your time defending that as well?
Scrolled by, might speak to your sentiments, don't know ...
No patents, reminding of Salk's polio vaccine. I guess we'll see what comes of it.
So ...
Quoting Isaac
Just those?
As I said Amoxicillin is also safe and effective. Should I take that too? Being safe and effective is not sufficient justification to cover all the policies you advocate.
Quoting Xtrix
I asked you for a non-media source for your claim that there's an 'overwhelming consensus' of scientists in favour of the policies you advocate. You've given me a media source showing that one scientist agrees with you.
Quoting Xtrix
No. Neither do I. Again, 'safe and effective' does not automatically lead to 'everyone ought to take them'. One is a technical assessment, the other policy. We do not advocate the consumption (certainly not the enforced consumption) of every medicine which is safe and effective.
Being 'safe and effective' is merely the minimum threshold requirement to advocate the consumption of a medicine. It's not sufficient reason alone.
So, once more. Your favoured policy that everyone eligible ought to take the vaccine. Where is your (non-corporate, non-government, non-media) evidence that an 'overwhelming majority' of experts agree with you on this?
Mmm, a noble aim, but I think this goes too far the other way. We need substantial resources to properly test new drugs, especially ones with such a widespread expected cohort of recipients. Nationalisation is the only route forward I can see. At the very least a forced release of the patents the pharmaceuticals already hold.
Quoting jorndoe
Not exclusively no, but mostly. I make no claims to impartiality. I listen to those experts who are saying things that align best what I already believe.
The keyword there being 'experts', not 'anyone'.
It's a distinction I don't see many here grasping. There's a world of difference between listening to experts who align with your existing beliefs and listening to anyone who aligns with your existing beliefs.
Edit for the slow ones at the back, the 'world of difference' is that the former checks your beliefs are at least reasonable, the latter checks nothing.
I wasn't advocating "policies," I was pointing out that irrationality abounds.
Also, amoxicillin is safe and effective, yes. Should people start refusing to take amoxicillin when told to by a doctor, I think the example would be relevant. During a pandemic, when experts are encouraging taking the safe and effective vaccines, and people are refusing for irrational reasons (for the same reasons they believe in election fraud), I'd say that's a problem. That was my entire point.
Somehow you don't -- fine. Not interested in expanding on truisms.
Quoting Isaac
Again, I wasn't advocating policies. I was pointing out something that anyone who isn't caught up in the "controversy" of vaccines would readily recognize. I was also questioning the "incentive" policy. That's not advocacy.
It's not one scientist, it's thousands of scientists and doctors. I simply liked how closely what he was saying matched what I was. What he's pointing out is so obvious it shouldn't even have to be stated. Alas, apparently it does.
Quoting Isaac
Yes, and you persist in thinking that "everyone ought to take them" is my "policy" that I'm "advocating." You're wrong. That's not what I'm advocating, and that's not what I initially said. To do the legwork for you, this is what you decided to chime in on:
I quoted a New York Times article about using "incentives" to encourage vaccination...
I stand by every word of that. I'm sorry you continually want to make this about your bizarre vaccine obsession.
No you weren't. You were declaring anyone who disagrees with you to be 'irrational' under the thin guise of of some pseudo-intellectual sociological commentry. "Oh, isn't it tragic how so many people don't see the obvious truth that I'm so blessed with the vision of...". Yeah, we're all devastated that we lack your divine insight into the truth, do lead us into the light won't you.
Quoting Xtrix
No it wasn't. Your point went on to blame corporate media, in a bizarre twist. Apparently the one group who stand to gain billions from everyone taking the vaccine are actively discouraging people from taking the vaccine in an devilishly cunning double-bluff.
Quoting Xtrix
Quoting Xtrix
Then what the fuck are you doing here? If any and all disagreement is immediately consigned to that which is not worth responding to, because what you've said is just an obvious truism, then why did you say it? Anyone you're prepared to discuss it with already agrees, anyone who disagrees is rendered unworthy of response. What exactly did you have in mind. Did you want a prize?
Quoting Xtrix
No, it was definitely one scientist. They gave his name and a photo and everything. I may not be smart enough to see all the truisms a true Oracle such as yourself can see, but I can count. That was one.
So your evidence of this 'overwhelming majority'? That another truism you're not willing to discuss?
Quoting Xtrix
So you stand by every word of an article bemoaning the fact that some (eligible) people haven't taken the vaccine, but it's not your position that everybody (eligible) should take the vaccine...?
Oh and anyway...
Quoting Xtrix
...it's apparently not even about vaccines at all.
So the article (about vaccine mandates), worries about a lack of vaccine uptake, you quote it on a thread about Coronavirus (largely the vaccine-based response), but apparently talking about vaccine uptake is a bizarre diversion. I can only say how sorry I am that I misconstrued the obvious topic... turnip cultivation was it?
...and to think that here's me worried about something trivial like corporate greed among the largest transfer of wealth from the poor the world has ever seen, when there's some nutjobs who think the vaccine's going to turn them into a 5g transmitter. Yes, that's definitely our main concern; forget the corporate takeover of the world's economy, forget insider trading, lobbying power, control of the media, revolving doors, ministers having shares in the very companies they're supposed to regulate, consultancies offered as prizes for towing the line, billions spent in putting up puppet politicians to work solely for corporate aims, laws being passed left, right and centre to curtail freedom and enhance corporate powers (whistle-blower penalties, civil disobedience bans, spying without warrant...)
No. Forget all that. Some people think a silly thing about a medicine - that's where all our focus should be.
Quoting Isaac
:yawn:
I quoted myself. But believe what you wish.
Quoting Isaac
I’ve said repeatedly that they’re encouraging people to take the vaccine. But to you this means I’m saying they’re discouraging it. Incredible how warped your perception has become in your bizarre obsession. Oh well.
Quoting Isaac
No, it’s thousands of scientists. I quoted one. My quoting one does not mean there is only one who agrees vaccines are safe and effective, which was the point — nor about misinformation, which was my initial point. But keep trying.
Quoting Isaac
I stand by every word of mine. The article, which was a launching point for what I wrote, does not advocate “everyone” that’s eligible take the vaccine, and in fact makes the obvious qualification — which you seem so eager to point out.
I’ll make it easier so as not to hurt your ego: Some people are refusing the vaccine for irrational reasons. Many, in fact. This is what I’m talking about, what the article was talking about (incentives), and what the scientist I quoted was talking about. Some have legitimate reasons — which is all you seem to care about.
Heaven forbid we don’t always acknowledge what should be obvious — we may be accused of thinking that “everyone,” without exception, should be forced to take the product of Big Pharma.
Sorry you took it all so personally. May your pet project of deep-diving all things vaccine continue unabated.
Quoting Isaac
Not all our focus— but it’s a symptom of a major problem. A problem which, believe it or not, relates to the other issues you rattled off. Despite what you misperceive, this was the point.
I don't think so. The money for the COVID-19 response came out of thin air. And now we have inflation. That's how that works.
It's not about what I believe, this is a debating platform, you're expected to support your positions against interlocutors. That's the point. Otherwise just write the stuff you think in your own private journal, or start a blog if you really want the world to hear. This is a debating platform, if you're not prepared to debate, you're in the wrong place.
Quoting Xtrix
No, it means your point is flawed. Corporate media may well be responsible for 'irrational thinking' but vaccine hesitancy is a terrible example of it because all it shows is that people do not follow corporate media. As I said, just a thinly veiled attempt to get another "aren't non-vaxxers stupid" comment in by putting it in a new dress.
Quoting Xtrix
So you claim. I've yet to see you're evidence.
Quoting Xtrix
Yes. In a direct response to my request that you support your claim of an 'overwhelming majority'. So it matters that there's only one. I didn't ask "do any scientists agree with you?" I asked where you got your evidence of an 'overwhelming majority' from. I've asked four times now and you've dodged the request each time. It's quite simple. You made the claim that an 'overwhelming majority' of scientists supported your position. I just want to know where you got the numbers from, that's all
Quoting Xtrix
But some people are taking the vaccine for irrational reasons too. You agreed. So you've come onto a thread about Coronavirus, just to point out the general fact that lots of people are irrational.
Yes.
Good discussion?
Thanks for the tip. Funny thing with me, though: I like to argue for my positions, not positions people think I hold. I also don’t debate truisms. If one wants to debate about the earth being flat, they’re welcome.
Quoting Isaac
No, you mean your point is flawed. Because it’s your point you’re arguing against, not mine. Perhaps it is flawed — but I’m not involved.
Quoting Isaac
Fox News is corporate media. Most talk radio is corporate media. They try to walk a thin line — as you do — about vaccines, but they know they’re audience. Remember Trump was booed about the vaccines?
But yes, generally these people no longer even follow Trump or Fox about vaccinations. That’s why I mentioned, repeatedly, that they’ve created a monster they can no longer control. I also said, crucially, that social media is what’s driving a lot of this irrationality. True, they’re owned by major corporations who “try” to regulate the spread of misinformation (Facebook, Google) — but they too have created a monster they can no longer control.
The contradiction you’re looking for just doesn’t exist. If you want to truly debate what I’m saying, then challenge the claim. That would mean challenging whether corporate media really did create this monster in the first place. Maybe other factors are more relevant — education, economic conditions, etc.
That at least would be interesting, and perhaps I could learn something. What you’re doing is just misrepresentation. That’s boring.
Quoting Isaac
Well I don’t know if there’s a poll asking doctors “do you think the vaccines are safe and effective?”, and I’m not interested in even googling it, so I guess you got me. I have no numbers. I did read somewhere that something like 98% of physicians received the vaccine — but otherwise I suppose I’m going by literally any credible scientific or medical source I’ve read. Or any credible organization, for that matter (I include the WHO, CDC, AMA, etc).
So no, I have no poll and no exact numbers. Maybe a sizeable percentage don’t believe germs exist. I’ve yet to see a poll, so I guess we can’t be sure.
Yes, we all know this is exactly what triggered you, essentially being one yourself. But don’t worry, it wasn’t directed at you. I also should have said “irrational,” not “stupid.” My bad.
Apropos of the article I cited, yes. Just one more symptom (an important one) of a much wider problem of irrationality. The article talks about a potential solution of “incentives,” which I was leery about.
I think that’s an interesting discussion, yes. Because there’s little else to say about coronavirus or the vaccines, despite you wanting to relitigate this over and over again.
Let's look at that claim then.
Corporations have presided over the largest accumulation of wealth the world has ever seen. The pharmaceuticals have, in the space of just over a year, managed to take public funds and turn them into private patents that they've sold to over 80% of the population of the western world. An absolutely unprecedented success for any product ever. New legislation is being passed which will make it harder for people to report on corporate malfeasance, and the left-wing has voluntarily gagged themselves from complaining about any wrongdoing for fear of undermining confidence in their products.
Meanwhile, some nutjobs think the vaccine will turn them into a 5G transmitter because some Facebook page told them so.
Perhaps you could start by explaining why you think the latter is super important whilst the former is just old hat that there's not much point talking about.
Governments have paid them for their vaccines. Most vaccines being offered are free. So this can be misleading. But should governments be paying private corporations for potentially life-saving medicine? I don't think so -- but that's a different story.
Quoting Isaac
If that's in fact the case, I'm against it. I also think there should not be patent protection in this case. Whatever wrongdoing you're referring to, I don't know. I know the Johnson and Johnson vaccine was linked with blood clots and something like 10 people died out of millions...I don't see that being suppressed, really. But if there is some wrongdoing I'm unaware of, that's been suppressed for fear of undermining confidence, I'd certainly take a look.
Corpoate malfeasance doesn't surprise me. In this case it would, because of how heavily it's been scrutinized.
Quoting Isaac
I don't think that.
The latter is a symptom of a bigger problem, part of which you've mentioned. Another symptom is the election fraud claim. You can mock both as just some "nut jobs," and perhaps in other decades you'd be correct. When a majority of people, who identify with one of two major political parties, believe these things...that's not a minor issue anymore. And not very funny.
https://www.theguardian.com/business/2020/oct/07/covid-19-crisis-boosts-the-fortunes-of-worlds-billionaires
It's not all to do with government stimulus and investment money.
By whom? You think government agencies are impartial in this?
Quoting Xtrix
But they clearly don't. The figure for non-vaccination is hovering around 20-30%. You've agreed that there are some rational reasons for not taking the vaccine (though you equally rationally disagree with them). Many people are scared, many confused, many just incorrigible procrastinators. The list of those actually going along with the sort of irrational misinformation you're referring to is vanishingly small and, most importantly, have virtually no power at all.
So why are so many hung up on this group? Why is so much hatred being stoked up for a small, easily defeated straw-enemy which never had any real power, whilst those with real power continue to rake it in whilst you look the other way?
It's distraction tactics 101. If you're looking for dangerously irrational behaviour it's people like you falling for the oldest trick in the book as if you were toddlers at magic show.
There are properly powerful people making enormous amounts of money at the expense of oppressing an increasingly subjugated working class. They don't give a shit about a few nutjobs, but they sure as hell give a shit about making sure that's the only thing you're thinking about.
By the scientific and medical communities, and by the general public. I've yet to hear anything significant in this regard. I asked for what you were referring to and got nothing, so there's that as well.
Quoting Isaac
Yes, they do. The unvaccinated, and those polled who say they will never or probably not be vaccinated, are mostly Republicans. Party affiliation is one of the best predictors. In terms of election fraud claims, it's off the charts. Something like 60-70% of more.
Quoting Isaac
I think you're underestimating the percentage who are refusing for irrational reasons because of the information they consume. This is why party affiliation is such a good predictor.
Quoting Isaac
I suppose the same is true about election fraud? Could be, I suppose -- there's no way to see into every individual's mind. But I'd say it's no coincidence that those who profess vaccine "skepticism" or refusal, and those who claim the election was stolen, happen to be majority Republican. There's no mystery as to why that is, all you have to do is take a look at the media they consume. Which was my point.
Quoting Isaac
Quoting Isaac
Unfortunately, the world is a complex place. Making general statements about corporations and the subjugated working class, while true, doesn't simply explain everything. As I said before, I'm against the entire capitalist system, I'm against the private medical and pharmaceutical companies, etc. But that has nothing to do with whether the product, no matter if it's Viagra or the vaccines, are safe and effective. If they created a vaccine at a private company, great -- they should share it with the world. The malfeasance you spoke of, I see no evidence of -- despite the attention its garnered. Again, if you have some I've overlooked, fine.
You're downplaying the significance of vaccine refusal, which is significant. You're downplaying the role of social media-drive irrationality, which is significant. And you're trying to find something that simply isn't there when it comes to these companies which have produced the vaccines. Not a bad instinct -- corporations will cut as many throats as they can get away with -- but not applicable in every scenario.
So yes, I think the bigger issue, until evidence points elsewhere, is the large number of unvaccinated people refusing vaccines because of their information bubbles. If you think there'd be this level of refusal 30 years ago, prior to the anti-vax movement and prior to Facebook/Twitter/YouTube, etc., we should simply agree to disagree and move on.
Yes. You seemed to be assuming the world's money supply is fixed so that if billionaires get richer, it must have been a transfer of wealth from poor people. Did you not assume that?
I've cited stuff dozens of times, I'm not going to just repeat it all, it's your view I'm interested in here. If you don't know about the stuff I've posted I want to know why. You're clearly a well informed person in general. Has the whole debate passed you by. It was all over the editorials of the BMJ for months. The Editor in Chief there wrote directly to the FDA about it...but for you, a non-story?
Quoting Xtrix
For God's sake man! Have you no humility at all? Do you really think that "Yes they do" is supposed to suffice as an answer at the level of conversation we should be aiming at here? If you want to support an argument that the numbers are significant, then give me the numbers. Without them you're just a loony on a soapbox. Where are you getting your numbers from? 'A significant number of people are rejecting the vaccine on irrational grounds because of what they read on Facebook etc' you say. Only 20-30% of the population are rejecting the vaccine at all. At least some of them are rejecting it on rational grounds, just plain fear, just plain procrastination. so than leaves you something in the low twenties at best. Hardly a policy-changing force to be reckoned with.
And no, 'the majority of vaccine deniers are Republican' is not the same as 'The majority of Republican's are vaccine deniers'.
Your claim that "a majority of people, who identify with one of two major political parties, believe these things" is not supported by your evidence that "unvaccinated, and those polled who say they will never or probably not be vaccinated, are mostly Republicans" Do you see the difference?
Quoting Xtrix
OK. Why do you think that? Is it just something you 'reckon' or have you read something that tells you so (read in your scientific journals of course, since we're not trusting corporate media).
Quoting Xtrix
No, I very much doubt that's a coincidence either. Republicans are generally less well educated and so tend to be more easily persuaded of daft positions.
Quoting Xtrix
Again, your 'point' is flawed. The media they consume is wholly owned by rich corporations. The same rich corporations who have made more money than they've ever made out of this crisis including the profits and share hikes from the vaccine. Either they've suddenly become massively incompetent overnight, or the division serves their purposes. Now what purpose could possibly be served by promoting a vaccine heavily to one group and then promoting fear of it in another...? Why, that would only work if the group who'd been fed the pro-vaccine line spent all their time focussing on the group who'd been fed the anti-vaccine line so that the people in charge of both messages can bring in even more money without anyone paying them the slightest attention at all. But hey, who'd be daft enough to fall for that...again?
Quoting Xtrix
Of course it has. They're the people telling you it's 'safe and effective'. If they can't be trusted it throws the whole thing out.
Quoting Xtrix
Well, then show me the significance. Your word obviously isn't good enough. Where are your numbers and measures of effect?
Quoting Xtrix
Yet earlier you were saying that you might have missed it. Which is it? It isn't there, or you haven't looked?
Quoting Xtrix
What problem is it causing? (and yes, I mean for you to provide evidence of the problem it's causing, not just tell me again that you 'reckon' it is)
Quoting Xtrix
I don't. I think Facebook/Twitter/YouTube are responsible for an enormous amount of the problem we face. I'm just not so stupid as to think they only stoke one side.
Yes, to a degree.
https://mises.org/library/how-inflation-helps-keep-rich-and-poor-down
Even the formal model, the Nairu (the non-accelerating inflation rate of unemployment) allows that people begin to expect prices to keep going up so you get an inflation in the general level of prices that undermines purchasing power.
So no, inflation is not free money.
Isaac. You assumed if billionaires get richer, the money must have transferred from poor people, and thus made the astonishing assertion that the COVID response was the single largest shift in wealth from poor to rich in history. You'll have to back that up with facts.
And yes, inflation reduces buying power, but it also erodes return on investment. That's why the US, an economy with financial institutions at it's center, is hyper-antagonistic to inflation.
Quoting Isaac
Quoting frank
I agree with @frank here.
First, money supply isn't fixed. Second, money isn't transferred from the poor, because, uh, they don't have money in the first place! If I'm a rich guy and can go to the bank and get a million dollar loan to invest in something with a return-on-investment of 5% and pay a 1% interest rate and a poor investor could get a loan of 5000$ and pay 4% interest rate to invest in the same investment, the money that I'm making surely doesn't come from him! Me and the poor investor get both the money from the bank, which creates it basically from thin air. I'm just getting richer than the poor guy. One has to understand the difference between what is relative and what is absolute as the World isn't a place where the amount of wealth is fixed and anyone who gets more wealth would be taken it from others. This is simply not how the World works as wealth is created.
You see, the poor guy is only relatively getting more poor, but he isn't in absolute terms getting poor, in fact he is getting a little bit richer as the debt leverage is working for him too, but only in a smaller scale. Hence it's simply wrong to say that this means I'm getting more wealthy from the money of the poor people.
Another example of the difference between relative and absolute: If Elon Musk and Bill Gates would move into my neighborhood, my neighborhood would see income inequality rise dramatically and I would be relatively far poorer in my neighborhood than before the two moved in. Of course my absolute wealth didn't change and I'm as wealthy (or poor) as before, but by any relative statistic I would be "worse off" than before. In fact, income inequality decreases when there is an economic depression. Yet in an economic depression it's the poor that suffer the most, because they can drop into absolute poverty.
About corporate malfeasance? I guess it did— but I have a feeling we’re talking passed one another.
Quoting Isaac
I have many times on this thread and others. It’s all over the papers and polling. Republicans, Trump voting districts, evangelical Christians, etc — all much more likely to refuse the vaccine.
Quoting Isaac
True. But if not a majority, it’s significant. Regarding election fraud claims, which I also mentioned, it is indeed a majority. Consider that fact — is that a problem? I think so.
Quoting Isaac
A majority of Republicans believe these things, yes. Both statements say the same thing. The former statement was referring to both vaccine refusal and election fraud. The former claim about "majority" may be wrong now, however -- I think it's over 50% who are vaccinated now.
Brookings
So a large minority of Republicans are unvaccinated, and a majority believe in election fraud. Both are deeply concerning, and there's no coincidence why this is so.
Quoting Isaac
You've repeatedly been corrected about this. I'll do so again, and for as long as it takes.
Quoting Isaac
No, they are not the same corporations. Believe it or not, but media conglomerates and large pharmaceutical companies have different interests, despite both being part of corporate America.
Regardless -- as I've said before, I also include social media, which has become unhinged. That's not quite the same as CNN, Fox, and CBS. Corporate media, in this case, has been fairly unified, rightly, about the vaccine. But that's because it serves their interests.
That's not what I'm talking about. I'm talking about the last 30 years of undermining the institutions of academia, science, medicine. That has mostly come from conservative media, accelerated in our time by social media.
Quoting Isaac
Yeah, it does seem there's a lot of messaging out there, particularly on social media (with strands of it on Fox and talk radio), that are continuing the long tradition of undermining trust in institutions, particularly when the "other party" is in charge. That creates yet another wedge issue and keeps everyone divided. Not once did I say I lay the ultimate blame on the people, however. I blame the elites and the media they control, for continuously undermining truth and sowing division. They created a monster, and now they can't stop it (particularly on the social media front).
Quoting Isaac
The numbers of unvaccinated are well known. 62% are fully vaccinated in the United States. 73% have taken at least one dose. Many were coerced into doing so by their employers, etc. But regardless, let's say the number is 20% of the population. If you don't think 70 million people is significant, you're not paying attention. In order for herd immunity to be achieved, the numbers should be in the 80s at least. But that's a pipe dream now -- there's already too many variants.
As far as social media-driven irrationality, there's a lot of good work on this. The effects are everywhere and obvious.
Social Media as a Primary Factor of Irrational Behavior
Trystan Harris also articulates the phenomenon very well. But there are plenty of articles and studies done about the negative effects of social media. I've no interest to give more than I've already cited. I find the question itself disingenuous.
Quoting Isaac
Yes, I may have. I have looked, quite a bit, but haven't found much in terms of "malfeasance." I mentioned the J&J bloodclot issue, etc. But given that you already accept that vaccines are safe and effective, I don't understand what you're driving at. You also refuse to explain what you're driving at or provide any references whatsoever. Your prerogative.
Quoting Isaac
See above. The more people vaccinated, the better. Less people get sick, less people spread the disease, the symptoms are milder, less hospitalizations, etc. Good for everyone.
But it's another disingenuous question. Why do you think doctors are recommending the vaccines so much? We're in a pandemic and we have safe and effective vaccines, and so those who are eligible should take them. Fairly simple, so I look forward to seeing how you misrepresent it.
Quoting Isaac
Yeah -- I never said they did. In the cases I mentioned, vaccines and election fraud, it so happens that this is coming mostly from Republicans. But not long ago there was widespread hysteria about "Russia stealing the election" of 2016, mostly from left-leaning sources. Which was obvious from the beginning was a complete waste of time. But Twitter and SNL loved it.
Many people don't research the vaccines at all, they just follow the advice of doctors. Those doing so in this particular case happen to be doing the right thing. The same is true of following other advice of medical experts -- if they say you need surgery, I would argue it's rational to take that advice even if you haven't done a deep dive into surgery.
Media influences many people. Still, that doesn't make them all the same, just as the political parties aren't the same, despite having some common ground (like both being corporate parties).
I don't think this is the appropriate place for this discussion (which is purely about economics). I've given a very brief case, as have you both.
The point I was making - with regards to the topic - does not depend on whether the poor get poorer or not. The point I was making was that it's ridiculous to suggest that this crisis is a 'monster out of control' when it's yielded exactly what those in charge wanted - more power and more money.
Does that sound like an out of control monster?
That doesn't constitute an argument that the numbers are 'significant'. For that you need a negative effect and evidence of causation. You've given neither. Negative effects are abound these days, unfortunately, so we'll take that as given - your evidence that these 'irrationals' are causing any?
Quoting Xtrix
They very clearly don't.
Quoting Xtrix
Assuming those figures are mutually exclusive and exhaustive (everyone is one of those three options), you have 69% of people not planning to get vaccinated. That's obviously untrue since over 70% of people have been vaccinated.
Your figures don't add up. You've only around 25% of the entire population to play with, even if all of them were Republican 'irrationals'.
Quoting Xtrix
We've been through this. You giving an opinion to the contrary is not 'correcting' someone, it's disagreeing with someone. I'll draw a diagram.
Your opinion about what is the case ||| What is actually the case
Do you see how they're two different things?
Quoting Xtrix
Your evidence?
Quoting Xtrix
I disagree. I think it's come from those institutions themselves being demonstrably untrustworthy.
Quoting Xtrix
None of the population is significant. Government policy is dictated by corporate lobbying. the views of the population have a vanishingly insignificant effect.
Quoting Xtrix
Your evidence?
Quoting Xtrix
A point I've made before. The vaccines they tested and the vaccine they're about to put in your arm are not the same (obviously). In order for their tests to be meaningful in terms of global effect, we have to trust that they take no future shortcuts, or malpractice. Seeing as whistle-blowers have already shown that they do exactly that, and that pharmaceuticals are now taking steps to legally curtail whistle-blowing, I think we've cause for concern.
Quoting Xtrix
Again, you've provided no evidence of this. Qualified experts in the field disagree on that.
Quoting Xtrix
Well...
Quoting Xtrix
and
https://scri.siena.edu/2018/04/22/most-responsible-for-opioid-abuse-mds-over-prescribing/
Or do you think doctors are magically immune from media influence, zeitgeist, personal bias? What a obscenely bourgeois way of thinking. The clever professional above all the media circus, pities the poor stupid proletariat who can't tell the difference. Will we have have to step in and save them from themselves, the poor things? Us enlightened, unbiased academics with the wisdom of Solomon, coming to the rescue of the the poor dumb plebs. How noble.
Depends on why they are refusing to listen to the doctor. Is amoxicillin the best actual choice of antibiotics? Are antibiotics actually required in their case? Do they trust their doctor? If any of those answers are "No" then declining to take amoxicillin is perfectly reasonable, despite it being safe and effective.
I recommend antibiotics when required, and only when required. I also recommend treating a fever with Tylenol (paracetamol for across the pond) when required, but not for low to midgrade fevers, those are there for a reason so we should let the immune system work unimpeded as much as possible. I strongly advise all of my patients to ask as many questions as they like until they are satisfied with the answer. They might not like my answer, but it will always be as clear as I can make it and provide the best possible information available. That way, whatever they decide, they have the best information available to them.
Safe and effective is all well and good, but if something is not required, why should anyone take it?
There has to be more to it than just that. Good hypothesis though! :up:
Simple is harder to fight actually. It is usually more resilient and has less areas to exploit weakness in. A better mouse trap is simple, not more complex.
Nothing complex about a tsunami: a big wall of water moving at 150+ kilometers per hour. However, all you can do is get out of it's way, if not, you are screwed.
Quoting Xtrix
Yet...
Quoting Xtrix
So here's a conundrum for you.
https://www.beckershospitalreview.com/hospital-physician-relationships/physicians-in-these-14-specialties-more-likely-to-vote-republican.html
Doctors in Family Medicine are more likely than not to vote Republican. even if you take the data direct from Campaign contribution data from the FEC, it's about 50/50 across Physicians in general.
So most Republicans are mislead by the media - we know they're being mislead because they deny the truth. The truth that has been told to us by our physicians...most of whom are Republicans, the ones who are mislead...
Err?
I don't think it's inappropriate to caution other posters about hyperbole and misinformation, especially wrt a public health issue
If the inflation persists and the economy tanks (stagflation), it might result in an out of control monster. We have to understand that the actions taken against the pandemic have been taken in the economic realm.
We cannot just think of the pandemic as a health or medical issue and then assume that other things, like the economy or economic policy, are totally separate from it.
Around here the government has seized the economy, effectively denying many people to conduct businesses, and in some cases to leave their homes, to enter businesses, to gather with others.
Unfortunately, these aren’t market forces at work here, but legislation that favors those who can afford to adapt to capricious government policy, those who who can afford to work from home, those who work on the internet, and so on.
None of this would have been possible without a vast segment of corporate interest, as large telecommunication companies, social media companies, multinational technology companies, media companies, have already provided the infrastructure required to pull it all off. We have effectively been forced to use their products and services, if not to survive, than to retain some sanity during isolation. Our loss, in fact, is their gain.
No, neither do I.
Good to see you joining lustily in with the new tradition of calling disagreement 'misinformation'. You do have to move with the times.
We'll see.
Quoting ssu
Yes, I completely agree, though I suspect you and I have very different ideas about how that economy functions.
I'm sorry, I mean... I suspect I have some misinformation about how that economy functions...
...I'm still getting used to the newspeak.
If you could provide evidence that the covid response was the biggest transfer of wealth from poor to rich in history, that would be much appreciated.
World record: 1 million Covid cases reported on Monday Jan. 3rd in U.S. and more half a million Covid cases average in last 7 days
Here you go:
https://newleftreview.org/issues/ii123/articles/robert-brenner-escalating-plunder
Incidentally, Americans who have not read this article are bad people.
Well it appears to have been done already (thanks @StreetlightX).
Also there's https://ips-dc.org/us-billionaire-wealth-584-billion-20-percent-pandemic/
And https://americansfortaxfairness.org/issue/pressure-builds-repeal-135-billion-millionaires-giveaway-cares-act/
If you prefer your news in the right-wing flavour
https://www.forbes.com/sites/giacomotognini/2021/04/06/meet-the-40-new-billionaires-who-got-rich-fighting-covid-19/?sh=5f66e0b117e5
https://inthesetimes.com/article/covid-19-coronavirus-wealthy-corporate-welfare
https://www.ft.com/content/747a76dd-f018-4d0d-a9f3-4069bf2f5a93
Notwithstanding the evidence of transfer, the point I was making was simply that it's absurd to suggest the corporations have 'created a monster'. They've created the exact thing they intended to create - a distraction from their continued oppression of the working class. Same old...
Oh no worries, economists themselves have very different ideas about how the economy functions. As the saying goes, when two economists meet three alternative and opposing views of how the economy works are presented.
You don't have free markets anywhere. Didn't have much even before the pandemic. Especially what isn't tolerated at all is that the market would correct it's excesses, which has created the current economic situation we live in.
As this has been such a huge forced experiment, there has been also negative effects that everybody has seen. For example, the schooling from home has been a terrible disaster and it's something that (at least here) is the last thing the government wants to do.
So you agree the largest wealth transfer in history didn't just happen. You coulda said so.
There's no god, so it doesn't matter.
Yes, it’s a state-managed collectivist economy through-and-through, and the current seizure is only evidence of how far it is willing to go. But forcing businesses to limit capacity, to enforce mandates, to close early, to adopt shifting policies, to collect subsidies, to outlaw dancing, gathering, walking to the bathroom without a mask etc. is unprecedented, especially in countries that haven’t quite swallowed the socialist pill yet.
So science is untrustworthy. Yes, I do disagree with this. I think science is, in fact, trustworthy— and the best enterprise we have for determining what’s true.
But it’s been undermined for political reasons. Climate denial, election fraud, vaccine irrationality, etc. All symptoms of the same underlining issue.
Quoting Isaac
No one once said that “this crisis” (here I assume you’re referring to th pandemic) is a monster out of control. Rather, it is a symptom — along with election fraud and other instances you want to ignore — of an underlining problem. It is that underlining problem that is the monster. That underlining problem is a systematic, deliberate erosion of trust in science and expertise.
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41562-021-01115-7
No.
There's not an iota of science or public health driving any of this madness:
https://www.nytimes.com/2022/01/05/opinion/republicans-trump-lies.html
Not sure how you get that from what I've said, but...
Science is an activity, not an institution.
Quoting Xtrix
What political reasons? What have the Republicans got to gain from vaccine hesitancy? The vast majority of their shares are in the companies who'll benefit from vaccine uptake, the vast majority of their lobbying money comes from those who'd benefit from vaccine uptake, so what have they got to gain from vaccine hesitancy? In fact, what has anyone got to gain from vaccine hesitancy?
Quoting Xtrix
No, I'm referring to the 'crisis' you were talking about - that people believe any old crap they read on Facebook.
Quoting Xtrix
What am I ignoring?
Quoting Xtrix
Right. So a minority of people not trusting science and expertise is a monster for the powers that be? Why? What have they got to lose from that state of affairs?
You've not linked any of this to a 'problem' yet. What's the problem that's being caused by this minority not trusting scientists?
Quoting Xtrix
Go on... If the Republican doctors are not mislead then how do you support your claim that a majority of Republicans are mislead? Are you claiming that doctors are somehow immune from the forces of misinformation that mislead all other Republicans? If so, then what's their secret? What's the source of this powerful immunity to influence they have - and more importantly, why did it fail them when a few complimentary soaps were enough to sway them toward prescribing lethal amounts of opioids?
From your article
...all good so far. Republicans win seats if Obama is pilloried, The gun lobby get sales if guns are still legal, the fossil fuel industry swell profits if climate change is denied.Then...
Republicans gain if people take vaccines (the whole thing was developed on their watch). Industry gains if people take vaccines (by the billions of dollars), the most powerful lobby in the world is pushing for it and most countries (US included) are falling into line with increasingly draconian measure to make it impossible not to be vaccinated). So where's the problem here? Are there laws being avoided which could increase vaccine uptake? No. Are there budgets being cut which could have gone to vaccine manufacturers? No Are there regulations being put in place which make it difficult for vaccines to be produced and marketed? No. Are there pecuniary restrictions in place which artificially restrict vaccines in favour of their alternatives? No.
Unlike fossil fuels, voting shenanigans, gun laws, and every other right-wing lovechild. The entire system is already set up to make vaccines the clear winner. Vaccination is, without a shadow of a doubt, as well supported by the industrial and legal system as guns, fossil fuels and vote gerrymandering. Yet you're trying to paint them as the victims here. The poor oppressed pharmaceuticals who no-one trusts, how will they ever sell their products now, with so little trust. they've hardly got anyone rooting for them - just the largest lobbying group the world's ever seen, virtually every major news outlet in the country, a legal team the Gods themselves are frightened of and political support so strong that many countries are considering making it a legal requirement to 'enjoy' their products...
Sob! However will they cope!
So you do believe that? Cheeses.
Science is an institution. Of course it's an activity. You're saying it's untrustworthy, apparently as both.
Quoting Isaac
That's like asking what they have to gain for going along with the election lies. Their constituents believe it -- a large number of them -- and so they cater to them.
But that wasn't the point. The point is that science has been undermined for political reasons for decades. I mentioned climate denial, but there are plenty of others. The sugar industry, the tobacco industry, etc. The connection to politics is obvious.
Quoting Isaac
For the corporate powers, people don't fall in line even when the message is legitimate, as with vaccines. This is bad for business. For political powers, they risk losing the election. Just ask Liz Cheney how it's going.
Quoting Isaac
Not only scientists, but science and expertise in general. What's the problem with this? What's the problem with a majority of Republicans thinking the election was stolen? Because I believe rationality and truth matter. Believing nonsense leads to very real and very damaging actions -- whether regarding the environment, or food, or drugs, or vaccines, or free elections.
Quoting Isaac
Some doctors are Republicans. Misled about what, exactly? Vaccines? Elections? A majority of Republicans claim the election was stolen -- does that mean a majority of Republican doctors believe the election was stolen? Not necessarily.
Quoting Isaac
No, but given their expertise in medicine, I assume they are less likely to be mislead by a Facebook post about how vaccines magnetize you than the average person.
Quoting Isaac
Their "secret" is that they've studied medicine. So education, I guess? At least when it comes to medical misinformation. When it comes to election fraud claims, who knows? I haven't seen any evidence that about it one way or the other.
Quoting Isaac
Ask Trump, who was booed by his crowd when he said "Take the vaccine, it's good," what he stands to lose. He quickly pivoted to nonsense about "freedom." That's what the Republicans have to lose: their voters.
Quoting Isaac
?
How strange.
What lengths countries like the US go because of less than a million deaths in couple of years because of such a puny pandemic. A mere two thousand deaths per a million! Or even less. The Spanish Flu had killed tens times more by now.
Oooh, the horrible, horrible collectivism.
(I wonder how the US recovered from the evil socialism and the trampling of the rights of the individual during the Spanish Flu)
It’s not like medicine or anything else has advanced in a century. No, it was surely the fact that we outlawed dancing and meddled in everyone’s lives that saved them. Bless the government for taking our rights.
Still, nearly a million dead Americans, even if the vast majority were old, shows that we haven't put aside the threat of pandemics yet.
From where are you getting that? I think science is the ultimate method for discovering what is the case about our world. I don't think scientific institutions are doing it very well. Is that so hard to understand?
Quoting Xtrix
So the Republicans are persuading people to be anti-vaccine because it wins them votes because people are anti-vaccine? Do you realise how daft that sounds?
Quoting Xtrix
Not to me it isn't. Climate I get, sugar I get, tobacco I get. All big industries, big lobbying power. The connection is indeed obvious. Money.
So anti-vaccine sentiment. Who's earning the money out of that?
Quoting Xtrix
So people don't fall into line? Yet...
Quoting Xtrix
Which is it? Do people fall into line according to the media they're fed, or not?
Quoting Xtrix
That's just a truism. Believing something which is false is obviously risky, I asked you why believing the anti-vaccine message was problematic.
Quoting Xtrix
I wasn't suggesting it was necessarily the case. I was asking why you thought it wasn't.
Quoting Xtrix
The vaccines were developed two years ago. How would their medical training tell them whether they're safe or not?
Where was all this medical training when they were over prescribing opiods in return for a sandwich hamper?
What went wrong with Pete Doshi's medical training that caused him to be so concerned? What's gone wrong with Vinay Prasad's who's concerned about myocarditis in the under 40s? Did their medical training not stick? Odd that they made it so far up to now.
Quoting Xtrix
We're talking about why people have been fed an anti-vax message in the first place. Your argument here is circular.
Quoting Xtrix
I'm asking why you think that suddenly the most powerful industry in the world has so little influence you're worried about it's key message not getting through.
Lets review this claim...
The opioid crisis has killed more than half a million people. It's responsible for the first decline in life expectancy in the US for a hundred years. Let's see how the medical training of the experts helped us during that unprecedented slaughter.
The Government wouldn't risk such a thing would they...?
But the journals would have spotted such obvious misinformation surely...?
Those Pharmaceutical white knights, we can trust them though...?
But the family physicians, the surgeons, the medical experts with all their training...?
But we're all saved because of those experts at the FDA who'll step in to make sure everything's safe and sounds, no...?
Well. After all that, the 'experts' will definitely put systems in place to make sure that doesn't happen again...won't they?
What kind of kindergarten-level naivety makes you think we can trust 'the experts'?
Quoting Marshall McLuhan
The Republicans are not persuading their constituents to be anti-vaccine. Many of their constituents were already anti-vaccine. Many of their constituents are also believers in the election lie. We see how Republicans are handling that as well.
Ask yourself why they go along with something demonstrably untrue. What do they gain? What's the Problem? etc. It's fairly obvious in my view.
Quoting Isaac
Probably Alex Jones and some YouTube hucksters. But I don't think money is the reason anti-vax sentiment arose initially. I think it was originally sincere. Misinformation travels far and wide, and in social media at lightning speed. There doesn't have to be any money behind it, even if some exploit it. Same with QAnon -- I don't know who makes money off of it. I don't know who makes money off the election lie, for that matter.
Quoting Isaac
No, you just want to make it so. The underlying issue is a erosion of trust in science, medicine, and academia. The anti-vax message has thrived on social media for years -- not on corporate media.
I'll repeat what I've said from the beginning: the anti-vax movement, and the millions of people who adhere to it, are but one symptom of a larger problem. That larger problem is irrationality driven by misinformation and an undermining of science for political and financial purposes by corporate media. This has now taken on a life of its own within social media.
Corporate America, and their media, by no means like the January 6th events. They don't like vaccine refusal either. This seems to continually trip you up. But it's not at all contradictory. They cannot control a monster they themselves helped to create. The underlying cause of all of it, I think, is years of neoliberal policies. But that's another story.
The same thing I hear from Alex Jones followers, creationists, and election fraud enthusiasts. They'll gladly point out how everyone once thought the world was flat, and the many instances where "science" got it all wrong, the experts were all fooled, instances of corruption, etc.
The experts are wrong sometimes. They could be wrong about all kinds of things. Unfortunately, you're not an expert yourself. You're some guy on an internet forum who seems obsessed with this issue. What's truly naive, however, is thinking you've cracked the case that thousands of experts are currently studying because you've spent several hours selectively perusing. I get the exact same claims from climate denialists and 9/11 truthers, who will argue in great detail why they're correct. I have no interest in engaging with it on that level.
I'm quite in agreement with you about the way social media creates narratives which are outside of anyone's control, so we needn't disagree on that point. My disagreement with you is over the God-like ability you think you have to identify which messages are in the 'out-of-control' pile and which aren't. From where I sit, the rabid, spittle-flecked invective aimed at anyone so much as raising a doubt about vaccines sounds indistinguishable the dumb redneck version of 'them's takin' ma freedom'.
Quoting Xtrix
I didn't ask you for a list of tenuous candidates for your laughable attempt to defame by association. I asked you why you thought we could trust the experts. It should be a fairly simple question to answer. You admit that...
Quoting Xtrix
So there remains the question of why you believe, on this occasion, they're not. Your argument that 'it's what the medical professionals are saying' is circular, because they're the experts who are "wrong sometimes". Your argument that it's social media out of control is circular because you've admitted to social media campaigns which are very much in control.
So, notwithstanding the lame attempts to dodge the question with "it's just obviously true and I won't discuss it", you've yet to provide any justification at all for your belief that (unlike all other examples) this social media campaign is out of control, and (unlike loads of other examples) the experts have it right this time, and (unlike practically every other example) the corporations are working in our best interests this time, and (unlike just about every other example) the government has our back here and we ought to do as we're told.
You're making vaccines the exception to just about every other trend in left-wing thinking for the last 50 years. This time, the government aren't in the pocket of lobbyists, this time the experts aren't in the pay of corporations, this time the media message isn't being manipulated to favour the status quo...no, apparently this one is different. Because...?
Quoting Xtrix
Where have I written a single post claiming to have 'cracked' anything? I've not made a single claim that is not supported by a relevant expert.
I'm arguing one thing and one thing alone...
That whilst it is our moral responsibility to base our actions on the opinion of relevant experts, we must be free to choose which experts we decide to trust. Governments cannot be allowed to mandate or coerce us into trusting the ones they choose.
The track record of governments, institutions and even individual experts en masse, demonstrates clearly that scientific accuracy is not a reliable motivating factor behind majority opinions in any of these camps.
Quoting Risk for Newly Diagnosed Diabetes ›30 Days After SARS-CoV-2 Infection Among Persons Aged ‹18 years — United States, March 1, 2020–June 28, 2021
We'd want to know if vaccination or something else makes a difference, or whether mere contact with SARS-CoV-2 can trigger diabetes regardless. Vaccination making a difference seems plausible, since a similar difference in emergence of diabetes hasn't been noticed at large, but this would have to be backed by numbers. Adding diabetes to possible effects kind of sucks; knowing with more certainty whether vaccination, COVID-19 disease or something else makes a difference would be helpful.
I’m not getting into this again. I trust the consensus of experts. The reasons I trust them I’ve been over multiple times.
We can question anything at any time, including expertise. Indeed science, medicine and expertise gets it wrong sometimes — that’s not the point. They could also be wrong about climate change and quantum mechanics and evolution. The more interesting question is why expertise and consensus gets questioned in certain circumstances and not others. Why the sudden controversy and deep questioning (all the way down to “What is truth? What is a fact?”) about *this* topic and not about others? That’s the question.
You’re not an expert on this matter. Yet you question this and not other areas you also aren’t an expert in, like physics and mathematics and chemistry. To me there’s little reason to doubt why that is. You claim to be an exception, like everyone else does. Fine — I take your word for it. You’ve already stated the vaccines are safe and effective, so there’s little else to say. Why? Because I haven’t once made the claim that everyone should be forced to take them. Not once. That seems to be your worry, along with the power of the pharmaceutical industry, which I’m also strongly against.
The point I was making, and which remains true, is that the irrationality that exists about this issue — much like the election fraud issue, climate denial, etc. — has fairly clear causes, which is the neoliberal policies of the last 40 years, and the role of information — the “infodemic” as some have labeled it. The rest is your inventions and caricatures.
The vaccines are safe and effective. That’s what they’re not wrong about. Whatever you’re referring to is your own fabrication. Maybe they’re wrong about the moon landing.
Quoting Isaac
Unlike all other examples? Are you suggesting social media misinformation is never out of control? There are in fact many examples. I have no idea what “campaign” means here.
In any case, this is more fabrication. Social media in general is an accelerant of misinformation. Asking “where’s the evidence” about something you already have stated you agree with just shows you’re not interested much in what I’m saying. It gets tiresome repeating it over and over again.
Quoting Isaac
Fabrication. I haven’t once stated any of this. This is your own representation.
The vaccines are safe and effective. Thus, following the advice that every medical organization in the world is saying — that those who are eligible should get vaccinated — happens to be the right move. You disagree that this is what they’re saying — fine.
Experts are saying we should move on climate change. If businesses and governments start listening — should we be suspicious? Sure. It probably means that it ALSO makes them some money. It doesn’t mean we throw out the science of climatology.
Which is just nonsense. It’s like saying it’s rational to base your decisions on facts and math, but we should be able to choose what facts and what math.
Yeah, maybe some want to trust Alex Jones instead of the CDC on vaccines, or their local barber about the effects of smoking— whatever. But decisions that effect third parties — other people — are no longer simply a matter of personal preference.
Creationists pick their own experts too. They’re free to do so. They’re not free to have nonsense taught in schools. People are free to take horse de-wormers if they want to, they’re not free to infect others with COVID or use taxpayer money to pay for their hospital bills.
The norm was once to trust the institution of science and medicine. Ditto for government. That’s all changed. Deliberately so. When reality conflicts with your religious beliefs or your wealth, one move is to deny reality. That starts with undermining trust in experts. Vaccine irrationality is but one symptom of this — it was politicized from day one, and riding a wave of anti-vax bullshit that has been growing for 20 years and which has exploded on social media.
If you have specific concerns about the vaccines — and there are legitimate ones — fine. There’s not consensus about everything, and there’s a lot we don’t know about certain aspects. But that’s your pet project, not mine. Stop interjecting that into an entirely different discussion.
What consensus? You've not provided a shred of evidence for this supposed consensus you're following. When asked you provided me with a mainstream media opinion piece from a single scientist.
Quoting Xtrix
Are you seriously unable to think of a reason why people are questioning the response to Covid and not, say, black holes? People's lives have been devastated.
Quoting Xtrix
Again I just can't believe you're really that blind. Very little about mathematics or chemistry affects my life. The government's response to Covid can variously lose me my job, ban me from seeing my loved ones, keep me shut in the house, force me to publicise my private medical data, force me to take medications I've no desire to take... What theory in mathematics or chemistry does that?
I'm just baffled as to how you'd be searching around for some political reason why people have taken a position on this particular theory but not others.
Quoting Xtrix
Yes, but your posts are a performative contradiction.
Quoting Xtrix
I didn't ask you what you thought they were not wrong about, I asked you why you thought they were not wrong, on this occasion.
And we need to put to bed this idea that they were just 'wrong' on opioids. Massive corruption and complacency lead to the deaths of nearly a million people. They didn't just forget to carry the fucking one, or mislabel a sample. It wasn't an error, it was system-wide deliberate failure to protect people. Unless you're claiming the system's been completely rebuilt from the ground up since then, then we're just going to get the same failures over and over again.
Quoting Xtrix
No. Some social media is out of control, some clearly isn't, so simply pointing to the fact that some social media is out of control is clearly insufficient as an argument that this particular message is one of those messages which is out of control, as opposed to one of those message which isn't.
I'm completely in agreement about the social media out-of-control theory. I'm asking why you're not.
Quoting Xtrix
Really? You're saying that we can't choose which mathematicians to listen to either? Why in earth not?
Quoting Xtrix
Niether Alex Jones, nor the local barber are experts. Either argue against something I'm actually saying or don't bother responding. This disingenuous manoeuvring is tiresome. I'm talking about choosing which experts to listen to. Experts. You know - epidemiologists, infectious disease experts, immunologists, medical scientists. For fuck's sake, you know what 'expert' means.
Quoting Xtrix
I don't see any evidence of such times, but regardless. I think it's a good idea to trust in science and experts (not sure about governments though). It's exactly this trust that I'm advocating, against your promotion of a trust in media, government and zeitgeist.
Nor do I need to, since you already agree with it. Unless you want to take back your statement that vaccines are safe and effective. That's the consensus to which I'm referring. You may go on thinking about something else; it's not what I'm talking about.
Quoting Isaac
Peoples lives are devastated when bridges collapse as well. Doesn't give everyone the right to pretend to be experts in engineering. Peoples lives were devastated in 9/11, as well -- doesn't give the millions of "truthers" out there the right to pretend to be experts in the structural integrity of buildings.
Similarly, Covid is indeed an unprecedented event. Doesn't give people the right to become irrational about vaccines -- which is what I'm talking about. Whatever you're talking about, only you know.
Quoting Isaac
It affects a great deal of all of our lives, actually. And I suppose if we wanted to, we could start "questioning" these fields as well.
Quoting Isaac
No one is being forced to take the vaccine. They're given a choice to take them or, in some cases, lose their jobs. That's a decision the employer makes, and is unfortunately within their rights to -- just like wearing a uniform, being on time, saying certain words, etc. If we count this as "forced," then all these other aspects are forced as well. In schools and many places of employment, they've been around for decades. I had to take a Tb and hep vaccine for a job once -- it was required.
No one has a gun to your head to take the vaccine. And to take a stand on this issue, especially when we needed a high percentage of people for herd immunity, is simply ridiculous to me. Once again it's another example of something that has been around forever (vaccine requirements) suddenly becoming a hot-button issue. If you're truly interested in worker freedom, how about dedicating more time to unions instead of railing on about vaccines? You'd think you're being asked to undergo a kidney transplant. Many places allow for more frequent testing as an alternative, regardless. But continue on your quest.
Quoting Isaac
Covid has been politicized, but that doesn't fully account for the irrationality surrounding it. The anti-vax movement has been around for a while. Social media echo-chambers and conspiracy theories abound.
Quoting Isaac
There's no contradiction in my posts, so far as I can see. Whatever you've pointed out has been shown, over and over, to be fabrications. So yes, if you want to put words and thoughts into my mouth, then I'm sure there are many contradictions. What's really going on is fairly simple, and has been from the beginning: you have a very poor understanding about what I'm saying. I feel I've been clear, but who knows? Maybe it's me. If so, fine -- my bad. But you'd think after telling you many times that what you're saying isn't what I'm saying, that you'd take a second to reconsider whether this entire line of discourse isn't really a complete waste of time, an outgrowth of misunderstanding.
Quoting Isaac
How strange.
Because all the evidence I've seen presented thus far seems to indicate that the vaccines are safe -- and effective. I've also taken the vaccine myself. I know scores of people who have taken the vaccine. I've seen the numbers of vaccinations -- literally billions of people. I've seen the numbers presented for deaths, strokes, blood clots, heart attacks, and other side effects -- and, doing simple arithmetic, found them to be very rare. I read about vaccinated people having less severe symptoms and not requiring hospitalization as often as unvaccinated people. And so on.
Could all of these numbers be faked? How do I know where they come from? Isn't it just the same agencies giving me these numbers? Isn't it the corporations running the studies? Isn't the FDA bought by big pharma? Etc. etc. :yawn: Yeah, and maybe we faked the moon landing. I'm not interested in that discussion, in case that's where you're taking it.
But I trusted in the experts (including my doctor) well before many people were vaccinated. I was one of the first few who received a vaccine -- and had no hesitation. Could I have been wrong? Sure. People could have started dropping dead after three months, who knows? But I'm not surprised that I wasn't.
Quoting Isaac
I'm not interested in the opioid issue. That's an instance of big pharma faking studies/data and pressuring doctors to prescribe their drugs, and many doctors going along with it. This didn't receive 1/100th of the attention the COVID vaccines have from the beginning. It's a completely different issue from what I'm talking about. If you want to obsess over it, start a thread.
Quoting Isaac
Why am I not in agreement with a "theory" that I put forward several pages ago and have been repeating as one major cause of the irrational behavior we see? :lol: Might as well make up whatever you like, I don't care.
Quoting Isaac
I didn't say mathematician, I said math.
Again -- if you want to pick your own facts, you're welcome to.
Quoting Isaac
Says who? As long as anything goes, so does who we consider an expert.
Quoting Isaac
If you had taken this advice days ago, I would have saved several thousand words.
Quoting Isaac
Where's your evidence that these experts are experts? (Just doing an impression.)
Quoting Isaac
https://www.pewresearch.org/politics/2021/05/17/public-trust-in-government-1958-2021/
https://news.gallup.com/poll/352397/democratic-republican-confidence-science-diverges.aspx
Quoting Isaac
Again, I hear the same lines from creationists. Just advocating for "real" science. Because everyone has a lock on that -- especially laypeople who've made one issue the target of their OCD.
It's incredible that we are still at this stage of things. Forget about "cooperation" with Global Warming, we can't deal with this BS.
Unreal.
Both symptoms of the same problem. Irrationality.
'Safe and effective' is a statement of fact, a property of the vaccine(s). You're advocating policy. The fact that the vaccine is safe and effective is not a policy.
I'm disputing policy, not a property of any vaccine.
You're advocating policy, not a property of any vaccine.
If you seriously can't tell the difference then you really are a lost cause.
Quoting Xtrix
I agree entirely. No one should go around pretending to be experts. Again, there's not much point in arguing about matters we agree on, it's in the post you responded to.
Quoting Isaac
Quoting Xtrix
Yes, but you're talking about it on a public platform, not your own mind. It's like me saying at a murder trial "I'm just saying murderers ought to go to prison". No one's disagreeing with that, the question is whether the defendant is, in fact, a murderer. The question here is whether vaccine avoidance is, in fact, irrational, not whether irrationality is a bad thing.
Or did you seriously come on to a public philosophy forum to make the point that irrationality is a bad?
Quoting Xtrix
And yet...
Quoting Xtrix
In what bourgeois privilege do you live in which the threat of losing your job doesn't constitute 'force'?
Quoting Xtrix
Yes. And when employers use these rights to impose excessively on their staff those of us on the left speak up about it. We don't just say "well, it's their right, so...whatever"
Quoting Xtrix
How do you know what I spend my time doing?
Quoting Xtrix
No, but I suppose if they did you'd still say "well, you're free to get shot, it's their right to hold a gun to your head, so...whatever"
Quoting Xtrix
No one is seriously talking about vaccines achieving herd immunity. The UK's chief vaccine advisor called the idea "a myth".
Quoting Xtrix
Good. Other people trust in experts too. Experts who disagree.
Quoting Xtrix
Yeah, right. You're talking about why people don't trust experts. I give you an example of experts being responsible for the deaths of nearly a million people and you're seriously trying to claim it's irrelevant?
We're talking about why people don't trust the pharmaceutical companies, the Journals, the FDA, and doctors. I offer a recent event in which the blatant, undisputed, corruption of the pharmaceutical companies, the Journals, the FDA, and doctors caused the deaths of 720,000 people and you're seriously fucking trying to say it's irrelevant. Your sycophancy has reached a new low.
720,000 people died and you're trying to brush it off as if someone forgot to shut the gate and some cows got out. Sickening.
Quoting Xtrix
Yes, that's right. I don't know if you're familiar with the concept but people sometimes say one thing but believe another.
Quoting Xtrix
Then what's your point? That no one disagrees in mathematics? That's not the case.
Quoting Xtrix
Seriously? It would explain a lot if you can't tell the difference between a professor in the medical sciences and a radio DJ.
Quoting Xtrix
Their diplomas. Their university pages, their body of published work.
Here, for example is Paul Hunter.
https://research-portal.uea.ac.uk/en/persons/paul-hunter
https://scholar.google.co.uk/citations?user=xhp8aXsAAAAJ&hl=en&oi=ao
Here's Stefan Baral
https://publichealth.jhu.edu/faculty/2433/stefan-baral
https://scholar.google.co.uk/citations?user=UtjhWp8AAAAJ&hl=en&oi=ao
It's not difficult. Now you do the same for Alex Jones and I'll believe your ludicrous claim that they're the same.
Quoting Xtrix
So you think that's a bad thing? Again, that would explain quite a few of your posts...
Here's what the 'experts' are saying...
Every single paper, pre-print, opinion piece, consultancy report, podcast and blog written by someone holding doctorate level qualification in epidemiology, infectious diseases, immunology, pharmacology or public health policy.
That includes the Great Barrington declaration, Stefan Baral's concerns about myocarditis, Vinay Prasad advising against masking children, Pete Doshi asking that FDA approval be withheld, Katherine Yih's concerns about pulling funding away from public health, Martin Kulldorff's worries about the effect of lockdowns on medical treatments, Andrew Pollard's concerns about pursuing a herd immunity strategy, Marion Gruber's concerns about booster doses, Sarah Walker's concerns about vaccination in children, Alfred Sommer's advocation of natural immunity, Matthew Memoli's advice about focussing vaccines on the vulnerable, the JCVI advising against vaccination for children, Aaron Prosser's work on the NNT of vaccine passports, Norman Fenton's concerns about how we record Covid cases, Paul Hunter's worries about how we record Covid deaths... I could go on
Every single one of these people is a qualified professor of medicine or statistics at a respected university, all have a large body of published work in their field, some are even government advisors. Every single one of them raises a question about the government's response to Covid which could rationally give people pause when considering the best course of action for them.
If you want to lump them in with Alex Jones then you've lost any right to be taken seriously. These are scientists at the top of their field.
The only claim on which rests your entire argument, is that government policy (or policies you support), are the view of a 'consensus' of experts. The very claim for which you've been unable to provide a shred of scientific evidence.
Seeing as you're having trouble with this.
You've made three claims.
1. That a 'significant' proportion of the 20-30% of people still not vaccinated have been "irrational" in making that decision.
2. That this "irrationality" is driven by social media.
3. That this is a major problem we need to be concerned about with regards to global issues.
I'm disputing (1) on the following grounds
i. Many experts do not agree with 100% vaccination as an aim, many dispute the government's roll-outs to certain age groups. Following experts is perfectly rational. You've failed to make the case for your claim that we somehow ought to find out what the majority are saying and follow that, and even if you had, you've failed to provide any evidence of this majority other than your say so. Note - the action you're describing as irrational is {not taking a vaccine}, that's different to the opinion {vaccines are unsafe or ineffective}.
So to be clear. Following the advice of experts is perfectly rational behaviour, it does not become irrational if those experts happen to be in a minority.
ii. Many people, quite rationally, don't trust the institutions advocating the vaccine. The pharmaceutical companies are routinely involved in lies and misinformation, often escalating to criminal activity, doctors are easily pressured to prescribe whatever the pharmaceutical companies tell them to, and regulatory agencies have been shown to be unduly influenced by industry and government - the director and deputy director have just walked out of the FDA over undue government influence, 11 of 16 FDA medical reviewers involved in approving 28 products now work for the companies whose products they regulated. Mistrust of the FDA is entirely warranted. Your counter that this issue is more heavily scrutinised is, again, without a shred of evidential support.
So to be clear, it is not irrational to assume institutions will behave in a manner you've conclusive evidence of them having recently behaved.
iii. Your characterisation of the vaccine hesitant as gullible rednecks is inaccurate. Here, for example is a consultant anaesthetist with the NHS - https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2022/jan/08/nhs-doctor-challenges-sajid-javid-over-covid-vaccination-rules. Here's the government's own chief vaccine advisor
.
I'm not disputing (2), I agree that whatever irrationality remains, it is driven by social media.
I'm disputing (3) on the grounds that the major lobbying powers have little to zero concern for the opinions of a small amount of people who were going to vote Republican anyway. Voters make almost zero difference to policy which is driven entirely by lobbying. I suspect your already agree with this and are just making a pointless exception, but if you don't I can provide a detailed argument in support.
The reason this irks me so much is that labelling everyone who disagrees with you as 'irrational' prevents us from actually reaching any kind of cooperative consensus, but rather just perpetuates the toxic tribalism that social media has been stoking for these last few years. It also undermines the legitimate use of the category to exclude from the conversation those who are genuinely irrational, all you do is give them ammunition with which fight their 'we're being silenced' campaign.
I'm not advocating a policy. The article I cited was advocating a policy of incentives, which I was examining.
Quoting Isaac
I think I've made it quite clear that I'm referring to irrationality, and thus irrationality surrounding vaccine avoidance, of which there is plenty. Not all, of course, because there are always exceptions. But yes, when people refuse to get vaccinated because they think they'll be magnetized, or lose ability to have kids, or be implanted with a chip, etc., that's completely irrational -- and fueled by social media.
You're quite right that there's no point arguing over truisms. Yet this is what I've stated from the beginning, and here we are.
Quoting Isaac
I see only what you post on the forum. Seems like you spend a lot of time on this topic.
Quoting Isaac
Not now, no. But they were.
Quoting Isaac
Disagree about what?
Quoting Isaac
Yes, I hear this from 9/11 truthers as well. They're equally correct.
Quoting Isaac
:rofl:
And this is exactly what conversations like this typically reduce to.
Yeah, maybe 2 + 2 will equal 5 one day -- who knows? Some people disagree. Some people disagree with the sphericity of earth.
There's no such thing as truth or fact, so anything goes. Pick your favorite experts, your favorite math, etc., and be happy.
I'll skip reading the rest of your posts. I'm no longer interested. Stick with your "experts" and be well.
Hand sanitizers contain our favorite, legal-for-millennia, psychoactive drug, alcohol [math](C_2H_5OH)[/math] which is also the active agent i.e. it does the killing.
Should we make it mandatory for bars to be open 24/7? Drinks to be served without age or other restrictions of any kind!
:lol:
Great one! Man, you're great! No kidding! I owe you!
Go drinking with your buddies.
Like good old Boris did! What a loveable character, a small child in the parliament of monkeys.....
Also, don't forget the Covid conspiracy theories - they're big in democracies, further undermining attempts to check the pandemic. Anyhow, Covid conspiracy theorists have managed to connect the dots: (more) pandemics [math]\rightarrow[/math] (more) freedom. Diseases (especially those that can cause pandemics) are an enemy of freedom as measures against them tend to be authoritarian in character.
Of course, one might say Covid originated in communist China. Firstly, is China really communist and secondly, I'm talking about dissemination/spread and not source.
Daughter visited this weekend and mentioned that the alcoholics in the hospital where she works routinely steal and drink the hand sanitiser. Now that's dedication.
:smile: I'm a chain-smoker. I know the feeling.
This is anecdotal but a colleague of mine told me (today) that his friend tested negative for Covid for the whole month he (the friend) was drinking and when he underwent another test, at the end of this Dionysian month, his result came out positive i.e. he had Covid. Go figure!
And at the moment I have an ordinary cold - sore throat runny nose temperature, and that's not very much fun... but that's sod's law.
1 person emits 2 tons of CO[sub]2[/sub] per year.
Death toll from Covid (humans as individuals): 5,000,000 and counting.
Actual death toll from Covid (humans in terms of CO[sub]2[/sub] emission): [math]\frac{2.3 \times 10^9}{2} = 1.15 \times 10^9[/math] = 1 billion!
StyleGAN (This Person does not Exist)
:D
I would assume this pandemic will end as T.S. Elliot wrote "not with a bang, but with a wimper":
First it was about the leaders of countries holding press conferences and issuing dramatic restrictions. Then the presidents and prime ministers have other more important things to do and the press conferences are held by a health minister or the sort. Then it's just some official. Then even the media doesn't participate. Then it becomes an issue that you can read at a government web page just like about the new flu variants and new seasonal flu shots. They do recommend people to get seasonal flu shots, you know.
That's where the covid-19 will be buried and will stay for perhaps decades if not longer.
And of course, this long thread will be buried somewhere in the backpages.
Snow shovels are needed here. Actually have to go and do some shoveling after this...
But yes, again good points from you earlier.
https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-021-03619-8
Not that our newly formed government is thinking about that. They're actually planning on saving 6 billion in 4 years. How's that for a stab in the back after all the work doctors and nurses did in the past 2 years?
In order to bypass human stupidity, lower slow and costly distribution and build up herd immunity fast, wouldn't a genetically modified virus be a better way towards that since it will distribute itself? It would bypass anyone who's stupid and doesn't understand how vaccines work, it would bypass slow and bureaucratic distribution chains, bypass corporate profits and be equal between poor and rich nations.
If there was a way to remove lethality and increase transmission rates, that would be a much more effective distribution towards herd immunity than any kind of vaccine. So modifying the virus towards that and intentionally setting it loose could be a very controversial but more efficient way of ending a pandemic.
I think we need to adapt our society as fast as the virus adapts its DNA. In particular, there are intersections with climate change measures that seem like obviously sensible precautions. Big reduction in international travel, a big move to level up access to basic hygiene, food, and medicine worldwide, routine hand washing and mask wearing when in close contact. A lot more care over domestic animal hygiene, and more protection for wilderness. There's probably more...
But at the moment, the priorities are saving travel and tourism, levelling down, profiting from vaccine sales, and 'getting back to normal'. :death:
Perhaps there are reasons also for that.
The economic recession due to the pandemic was just papered over by the central banks, which made the statistics simply not make sense. And now thanks to that we have inflation. (Which I estimate will not be as transitory as they say).
Vitamin D deficiency is associated with more severe disease. Here.
Quoting ssu
Reasons for being unreasonable:
https://foreignpolicy.com/2010/10/15/five-zombie-economic-ideas-that-refuse-to-die/
There are people profiteering from crisis, and from increasing disasters, and unfortunately they are dominating the world. Here in the UK, the government trumpets economic growth while presiding on a huge decline in living standards.
The alternative is central planning. That would also be full of woe and dastardly deeds. It's just how we are. Pick your poison.
Let's change!
Gotta let them play out their story.
People might remember that Sweden chose a different path from other EU or Western countries. Now it's signalling basically the end of restrictions due to the pandemic.
The Czech Republic is on a similar path:
I'm hoping my country follows the similar path. They have already basically abandoned the corona passport requirement.
May as well. Sooner or later everyone is going to get the Omicron vaccine.
“Haha! No spitting in public! That’s all we did to you, honest!”
The protesters have blocked some important border-crossings, impeding the government’s bottom dollar, and stewing more fear in the ruling class than any Molotov-throwing rioter ever could. All they demand was an end to public health mandates, but Canada’s state-run television likens them to insurrectionists, as is fashionable these days. The worrying part is that none of this is surprising.
See the shoutbox for further updates on Canada.
Yeah, right.
Good to see the Canadian government really pull out all the stops to sort out these terrorists.
The sooner these extant threats to civilization are dealt with the better. Then Canada can get back to decent civilzed behaviour. Like...
Letting it's major mining companies shrug off gang rape...http://protestbarrick.net/article.php@id=971.html and collude with slave labour...https://www.cbc.ca/news/world/eritrea-fifth-estate-1.3444779.
Letting oil companies walk over tribal rights.. https://www.aptnnews.ca/national-news/85-first-nations-tribes-call-on-trudeau-to-condemn-enbridge-for-involved-in-dakota-pipeline-project/.
Selling arms to regimes responsible for human rights abuses...https://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/politics/canada-now-the-second-biggest-arms-exporter-to-middle-east-data-show/article30459788/.
All without touching a penny of their money.
But protestors disagreeing about public health strategy, well...clearly they must be stopped at all costs.
Nothing new there. Ever been audited by the revenue department?
Second largest arms exporter...hmmm. From 2016. That sounds a bit fetched when you think that Canada would be pass then Russia, France or UK in arms deals.
You do know that General Dynamics and Prat& Whitney are American corporations? It's not like there is an Canadian owned arms industry, but the following:
Hence Canada doesn't show up on any ordinary list.
But coming back to the actual topic, seems that the Canadian government hasn't noticed that after omicron the attitudes have changed and this is the time when ordinary, let's say even non-Trumpian not populist-governments, are easing the restrictions and are going the way Sweden went long ago.
Sure. I've just been getting some continuing education about tobacco abuse. It's stands out starkly that governments do nothing about it when it's clearly killing people: about half a million Americans each year.
Well we hear now that the truckers are all American infiltrators, or Russian plants, or both possibly, so clearly Canada has no limits as to the jurisdictional scope of it's clampdown on terrorists. Not really the point, though.
Quoting ssu
Yep, the narrative is losing it's sway. It's as if some other distraction has come along to take its place. Oh look...https://news.sky.com/story/ukraine-a-full-invasion-by-russia-could-trigger-world-war-three-warns-government-minister-in-kiev-12496570. Look over there! Another shock crisis the solution to which will make the largest industrial lobbies even richer, who'd a' thought it, what a coincidence.
Yep. 8 million deaths a year and still no simple ban on sales. But not only tobacco.
Obesity (4.7 million deaths) - fuck all, not even a sugar tax, let alone any restrictions on advertising.
Pharmacuticals pushing opiods (half a million deaths) - fuck all, they're back at it pushing for even less oversight.
Banks laundering money for drug cartels (tens of thousands of deaths) - fuck all (to be fair HSBC did get a very stern look from the AG)
Endemic alcohol abuse (3 million deaths) - fuck all, not even so much as funding support groups
Companies supporting child slavery (79 million in hazardous work) - fuck all, voluntary schemes for whitewashing.
Pesticides, PCFEs, greenhouse gases... all treated like side-issues which must be weighed carefully against economic interests and personal freedom
And yet the idea that the mandates, lockdowns and censorship over covid are all done out of our government's concern for human welfare is somehow supposed to be not only plausible, but so much so that alternative narratives are dismissible as 'conspiracy'.
Well...they really have had a Damascus moment haven't they, what a stroke of luck. I guess we're all saved.
No doubt they'll be flexing their new found legislative muscle on all those other issues any minute...but I won't hold my breath.
Yep. The US is starting to drop mask mandates. It's becoming thoroughly endemic here.
Have you ever had your bank account frozen for participating in a protest?
From Vinay Prasad (the well known fringe extremist and far-right agitator - apparently!)
No, that's just how the modern media works.
First it was leaders of countries who held media briefings about corona-virus. Then it was the ministers and officials in charge of health issues. Then a lower ranking officials who held the meetings with lower media participation. Then the media didn't report it anymore as the most important news and goes on to other news. And in the end, you might find information about the coronavirus and the pandemic just by going to your national health officials website.
That's how pandemics end....not with a bang, but with a whimper, like a famous poet said.
But if we point to the failure of governments to do anything about the sugar and tobacco industries, we're saying the government should have far reaching power to protect the health of citizens. Measures taken to control the pandemic were exactly that.
No, but I've had a lot worse, I've been beaten and kicked all over my body. Believe it or not, that's what quite often happens when you protest the authorities.
I think the fact that freezing their bank accounts might hurt them says a lot about the type of people that are protesting there. Who are they, a bunch of spoiled rich kids, who feel so entitled as to be excluded from having to take their medicine? Oh the poor children, we ought to feel so sorry for them, now that the government has decided to put an end to their three week long rave party, up on the hill. They'll become a lot more informed about what it means to lose one's freedom, when they find themselves in a jail cell.
I've walked through three different freedom convoy protests where I live and it is nothing like what you describe, so I can reject your characterization out of hand. All walks of life and background were in attendance. I suppose I can understand your position, though, because perhaps you've never had to use a bank account, which is used to store something called "money", the prevailing means by which many of us buy food and pay bills. A little bruise is nothing in comparison.
The protests have been so peaceful that the Ottawa had to make honking illegal in order to impose any punishment. Now anyone who donates to it will be subject to investigation and the seizure of money without due process or court order, and all for donating some money to a bunch of truckers parking their trucks and honking their horns.
Uh huh, nothing to see here, everything as it should be, always was, always will be...
Appeal to mediocrity isn't an argument, no matter how well it fits with the script for the 'worldly wise voice of centrism' character you like to play.
Not at all. The point I'm making is that it's ridiculous to argue that the government's draconian interventions in this pandemic are all for our own good and not for any other motive when the history of successive governments has been an unbroken run of unwillingness to even so much as lift a finger to prevent the deaths of millions every year.
Those who argue that the suggestion of ulterior motives is 'paranoid conspiracy' are asking us to believe that governments who have done absolutely nothing about the deaths of millions again and again, from crisis after crisis are suddenly possessed of a hand-wringing concern for humanity which somehow eluded them when millions were dying from opioids, obesity, smoking...or simple poverty.
The common theme is that in those other issues, corporations (who spend billions lobbying those very governments) stood to gain by the government dragging its feet. This time they stand to gain by the government laying it on thick.
Cui bono.
It doesn't mean that. The media operates how it does. Then there is the reality that is happening, which is important.
Quoting Isaac
Sorry for being centrist and not going with the given stereotypical characters.
You realise passing off moderate centrism as the only truly wise assessment in all situations is a 'stereotypical character'. It's pretty much the archetype.
Some things actually are bad, sometimes there is massive collusion, sometimes the group that seem like the 'bad guys' seem that way because they actually are the bad guys.
Wealthy corporate CEOs and shareholders lobby, bribe and coerce governments and media outlets to act in ways which increase their wealth, that's not even in dispute. Every time you explain away some situation of benefit to them as something that just 'happens anyway' you take the spotlight away from that behaviour, you underplay it's significance.
If you had a portfolio of absolutely conclusive evidence that no collusion took place I'd understand your position, you might want to take down the unmitigated greed but are compelled by the evidence to admit no such thing this time...
...but you're not. There's no wealth of evidence either way, so the question is why your default position is to underplay the influence of the super wealthy. Are you hoping they'll let you into the club if you show a decent amount of servility?
It does not follow that since government has failed in some ways to protect public health that it can't be doing that with pandemic measures.
I can point out ways that the US government has been very diligent and effective on some public health issues, but I want to highlight the logical issue above.
I didn't say it did. It's a constant theme here (in reflection of wider society)... Glance back over my contributions on this thread. Who's making the claims? It's not (largely) the anti- side, it's the pro- side. I'm happy for you to think the government are being super helpful this time. The problem here is that you (generic you) are not so happy for me not to think that. It's my legitimacy in reaching different conclusions that's being constantly called into question, not your legitimacy in reaching the mainstream ones.
What I'm arguing against is not your opinion that the government have it right this time, I've no problem with you thinking that. I'm arguing against the repeated assertion that I can't even argue the opposite without having my mental health called into question.
I'm not arguing that the government actually are colluding with corporations for their benefit in managing this crisis, I'm arguing for the far lesser claim that it's not 'paranoid conspiracy' to think that they are... It's absolutely uncontested fact that that's what they do at least some of the time.
Wait. We were talking about intentions and you jumped to effectiveness. It's two different things.
I'm not surprised that mistakes were made starting from China's original fuck ups regarding recognition and containment.
Humans do fuck up on the way to getting it right. But even if they fuck up completely, they can still have good intentions.
Is this something you accept?
Absolutely. What I object to is the insinuation that it's paranoid conspiracy simply to argue that people haven't had good intentions in any given case. They might have, they might not have. It's perfectly legitimate to argue either case in any given set of circumstances.
Personally, here, I see a lot of effort being put into silencing opposing narratives and that immediately makes me suspicious that intentions are not good, but it's only a suspicion, I'm only arguing for the right to hold such a suspicion and not be branded a lunatic or anti-social for doing so.
Sure.
Quoting Isaac
Ok. We're lifting mask mandates in a couple of weeks where I live. Yay!
That's an expected reply, which sums the attitude very well: 'money is more important than a healthy body'. Obviously the proclaimed "freedom" is not even relevant, it's a money issue. And having money in the bank account is prioritized over having a healthy body. Thanks for the demonstration, NOS.
Quoting NOS4A2
Right, you'd categorize a bunch of 120db air horns and train sirens blowing 24/7, right outside your front door as "peaceful". I'd classify that as torture. You know, one of those horns can be heard miles away (literal truth), imagine a bunch of them right outside your door. Now torture is illegal, but those who engage in it always find new ways of doing it, and claim what they're doing does not qualify, in the attempt to avoid reciprocal punishment.
That’s the expected reply. It suits perfectly well a pampered culture. A bruise is worse than poverty. Getting a spanking is worse than the government stealing your property.
They are torturers now. I guess the protesters are much stronger than the rest of the population because they are right next to the horns instead of miles away. So they are torturing themselves, and they still look as happy as clams.
Far more typical is simply to see everything as a racket of the rich. Either it's leftist or the right-wing populism, but for both it's the elite that is against the ordinary people. And that's all basically what one has to say.
If being against the "everything" part, but admitting that there are indeed rackets and obviously many want to influence the public discourse (and those with money have more ability to do it) is a bit too complicated, well, sorry.
I'm open for discussion and as this is a corona-virus thread, do notice that a) I was first doubtful about the corona-epidemic and thought it might be something similar to what we have seen earlier. And people here (and naturally the events) did make me change my mind. Then b) I have considered the lab-leak hypothesis to be totally possible, perhaps even probable even before it was totally politically incorrect.
Do you mean those GoFundMe accounts?
[tweet]https://twitter.com/KenPaxtonTX/status/1490033056341803009[/tweet]
... scrolled by the other day.
Quoting NOS4A2
The lives of local residents were interrupted by the noise.
There were counter-protests and locals that wanted them to quit keeping them up at night.
They spoke, were heard, interviewed, discussions took place; now they're no longer interested in that, only that others hear them.
I'd kind of like to conclude my personal pandemic tracker, it's getting long.
Juvenile adults doing theatrics ain't helping.
No, I mean bank accounts. Bank accounts are being frozen for the crime of donating to a protest.
Correction, the bank accounts are frozen for contributing to illegal activity. That's the point of the emergencies act, it allows the government to make declarations as to what is illegal, like the torture described above. Sorry NOS, but you seem to be out of sync with the reality of the situation, just like those people I saw on TV, getting arrested today. They keep insisting, we're in the right, we're not doing anything wrong, they can't arrest me. Like you, they just don't seem to understand, it's the government who decides what constitutes a crime, not the criminals.
Quoting Metaphysician Undercover
If BLM blockaded the US capital NOS would be singing a different tune.*
Just more ingroup-outgroup posturing.
*The I Just Lost My Shit Hebe-Jitterbug Threnody
No need to apologise, I just find the position absurd. You admit that "there are indeed rackets and obviously many want to influence the public discourse (and those with money have more ability to do it)", but then want to argue that sometimes they...just don't.
Were they having a collective day off? Did they suddenly find themselves in a Disney film and have a change of heart? Were they just about enact their plans to manipulate the media narrative in their favour when the junior secretary runs in and say "well, what luck, that all just happened anyway!"
Having admitted that extremely powerful forces are capable of manipulating government, media and other industries to act in ways that are favourable to their interests, it pretty much stands to reason that they will just continue to do so on every occasion until something prevents them. It stands out as an oddity when someone wants to make the claim that 'on this occasion they just didn't', certainly when presented without any evidence at all.
If they didn't, why not? even if things were going that way anyway, why not push them further?
Thanks for the article links. Some hilarious journalism, the Scientific American piece was brilliant...
...What? Complicity between government and media? Where have I heard that suggestion before?
...Come now, how could governments and media possibly 'manufacture' consent? This is starting to sound like some kind of 'paranoid conspiracy'.
...No! Why have they started doing that all of a sudden, when their previous scaremongering and daily publication of case numbers obviously had no effect at all on public opinion. Those naughty journalists...
...Disgraceful, to think people could frame their own opinion as rational and all opposing opinion as irrational - where could they have gotten that idea from?
Oh, and I particularly liked...
...'official' as in produced by government agencies...the same governments you've just accused of colluding with media to mislead people. My, they are capricious aren't they? One minute the source of gospel truth, the next downright liars... It's no wonder we can't trust them (except when they advise things we agree with, of course, when it would be nothing but rampant paranoia to not trust them unquestioningly)
Haha.
You don't see the obvious illogicality in everything is a racket? So, all the media does is to lie? Not even a single issue that is truthful or objective? Not even one? All issues are done further the financial interests of the extremely wealthy? And somehow we cannot see what part is motivated by an agenda? Or at least someone like me (I guess).
Quoting Isaac
What is absurd about it?
Perhaps I'll give an obvious example.
Remember the Occupy Wall Street -protests some years ago? Russia Today reported them with good objective journalism and interviewed the various protesting people, which obviously didn't come from a certain mold and had quite variegated views. For them, objectivity worked well as it was to show that people are unhappy about issues in the US. Compared to American media covering the protests, RT was better. But then when it was Russian people demonstrating against Putin, yes, RT did cover them too, but you obviously noticed the difference. Suddenly the protesters weren't interviewed as much and RT was a lot more like the US media, even more cautious not to give the protesters a voice. The agenda part was obvious. And then if it something that TRULY is in the interest of Putin, then they stick to the official line. (With the US the obvious example when the country actually goes to war. The reporting isn't like during the Vietnam war, when the military didn't actually bother so much with keeping the media in line. And didn't understand what the impact is when the soldier on the field is interviewed and has a voice.)
So would I say that RT lies all the time? Of course not.
The issue is that you can perfectly read Chinese, Iranian, Russian or American news outlets and notice just where the media bias is, yet to see that they report issue with adequate journalism and when it's obvious when they have an agenda. Why I chose RT above is that here the link is obvious, just as with Chinese media. With US media it can be a bit different as the not all adhere to one agenda.
Let's stick to the topic of this thread. So @Punshhh started it two years ago when it wasn't yet called a pandemic. Is everything about it a lie?
Well no. That's like me saying "You don't see the obvious illogicality in everything has a bias", or "everything has an ideological assumption", or "everything is limited by context"... The mere claim of universality is insufficient alone to warrant your concerns. Lots of things are universally the case.
Quoting ssu
I explained, but you didn't answer.
What are these forces, you admit exist, doing on the days they don't interfere? Why do they chose not to interfere when you've admitted they're perfectly capable of doing so and it's to their benefit if they do?
To be clear - what's absurd is suggesting that forces which are both capable of, and stand to benefit from, manipulation of the mainstream narrative, simply don't do so for no reason at all.
Quoting ssu
No one is suggesting the media always lie. But in your example its clear the objective is to favour Russia. That fact that the truth happened to do that on any given occasion is irrelevant to understanding the message the media deliver because had the crowd not been that way, the message would have been the same, all that would have changed would be the degree of manipulation required to get to it.
Quoting ssu
As above, there's no reason not to assume some facts of reality might coincide with the agenda.
The point of all this, as I made clear to frank above is not to make a claim about what is the case.
I have never, and would never, make a truth-claim about the severity of the crisis nor the effectiveness of any if the interventions, my claim here has solely been that it is neither irrational, nor paranoid, nor conspiracy-theory not any of the other labels I've been given, to not trust the mainstream narrative on any of these matters. The mainstream narrative is manipulated by corporate and government powers at least some of the time, we all seem to agree on that, so concluding that this is one of those times is perfectly rational.
And many news and media companies have this bias towards their country. In fact, their readers and viewers often do also. I can be rather sure that if/when the Finnish television reports on a Finnish company having problems with a third world government, they will likely be supportive of the view of the Finnish company and be skeptical about the third world officials making complaints.
Yet once you do notice what is the underlying agenda, then you can estimate quite well what is bias, what is the agenda talking and what is objective journalism.
Yet I disagree with "had the crowd not been that way, the message would have been the same, all that would have changed would be the degree of manipulation required to get to it." The message wouldn't be the same. There are the actual events that do happen, you know. Hence the message cannot be the same. You do have the actual events that you then have to report. You may try spinning it, try tell a different story that isn't remotely true to the actual event or simply not to report the event. It all comes down how informed the reader is. Does he or she read different media outlets? Is he or she informed enough to notice what is true or not?
How? All of the information most people get is from media of some description, so using their prior 'knowledge' (from previous media reports) to discern bias in current media reports is just question-begging.
Or are you claiming that only newspapers are biased, that other forms of data dissemination are somehow immune?
https://www.tabletmag.com/sections/science/articles/the-mask-debacle
I’m well aware that the government can invent crimes and violate its charter of rights and freedoms. I’m just saying it’s wrong and tyrannical to do so.
I love when you foam at the mouth.
Spoken like a true troll. Well done.
No, they don't.
History tells a lot of the why the present is the way it is. Television news isn't where you get to know things. Books, documentaries, studies, seminars, lectures. There you can gather the kind of knowledge you need to put things to perspective. And you can (and should) listen and read opposing views.
It starts from the basics you learn at school. And now it's so easy to circumvent the journalist just by looking up the actual documents, listen to what the politicians actually have said, not the points that a journalist has selected to pick up and made an interpretation of his or her own about it.
All you need is some time and interest.
...are all forms of media.
Or are you seriously of the opinion that whilst the unrivalled lobbying power of the largest organisations the world's ever seen has dominated the notoriously powerful mass media, but they've somehow met their match at a handful of tweed-suited university deans and the barely functional management of the main academic journals?
Quoting ssu
So now we are to do our own research? So you'd disagree with the widespread proscriptions around pandemic about doing one's own research?
I completely agree with you here, but I think you're naïve if you want to suggest this approach applies to the "most people" my comment is about.
No, but those notoriously powerful mass media or the "unrivalled lobbying power of the largest organisations" aren't so insuperable as you portray them.
It's not them, it is up to yourself to make up your mind!
Should be something like: masks can help (when used right).
The politicized rabble and ideological opinions, don't somehow change the facts/evidence. :shrug:
So what if I have to mask up while out on the town?
Dissidence for dissidence's sake is teenage politics/behavior, mala fides.
We do our best to figure things out bona fides, like the truth of the matter for example :ghasp:, and take it from there.
Hopefully we can get over the hurdle, the sooner the better, without unnecessarily risking lives, or whatever some caution might have prevented.
[sup]• How efficient are facial masks against COVID-19? Evaluating the mask use of various communities one year into the pandemic (Jul 21, 2021)
• Surgical masks reduce COVID-19 spread, large-scale study shows (Sep 1, 2021)
• (meta) Do face masks work? Here are 49 scientific studies that explain why they do (Sep 17, 2021)
• Why We Need to Upgrade Our Face Masks—and Where to Get Them (Sep 30, 2021)
• What’s the best MASK to protect me from the Delta variant? (Oct 6, 2021)
• An Ocean Away, I Found Some Common Sense on Mask Wearing (Oct 12, 2021)
• How well masks protect (Dec 2, 2021)
• Face mask fit modifications that improve source control performance (Dec 15, 2021)
• N95, KN95 Or Cloth Masks? What To Wear To Best Protect Against Omicron (Jan 10, 2022)
• What Do Masks Do to Kids? (Feb 7, 2022)
• Children and COVID-19: State-Level Data Report
[/sup]
Yep. So why isn't it?
The point being made is that if masks only help when used right, why mandate them in situations when you know they're not going to be used right (primary age schoolchildren, reluctant Republicans, dottering retired hedge-fund managers who've never lifted a finger to help others in their life...)?
What is the public health benefit of a policy which you know isn't going to work?
Quoting jorndoe
Are you seriously that partisan? Who's 'we' here? 'We' the good people of 'science' unaffected by bias, bribery, lobbying, zeitgeist, peer pressure, careerism, ideology...the saints standing above the rest of humanity mired in those things. Do you realise how arrogant that sounds?
And this 'citation bombshell' tactic is pathetic...
Quoting jorndoe
Specifically states...
...which supports the argument in the piece.
Quoting jorndoe
This is the Bangladesh RCT. It showed that "cloth masks did not offer a statistically significant rate reduction (cloth mask: 0.74%, control: 0.76%, P=0.540)"
Quoting jorndoe
I can't access this site in Europe
Quoting jorndoe
Actually supports the argument that cloth face masking doesn't work. As does...
Quoting jorndoe
...not sure what you're trying to say with these. Perhaps embed your citations within the context of an actual argument rather than just spew them all up at the end?
Quoting jorndoe
Is an opinion piece. I already have your opinion, citing someone else's opinion is not evidence of anything other than that someone else also thinks that way. Just padding out your citations with puff pieces doesn't help your credibility.
Quoting jorndoe
The trial referenced was still a mechanistic trial not an RCT and it didn't measure the endpoint (reduction in infection) only mechanism of particle filtration. Even then the reduction from surgical to cloth masks shows "decreasing from ~78% at 0.3 micron size to ~5% at the 10 micron size" that cloth masking will be rendered ineffective in reducing the clinical endpoint after a few hours.
Quoting jorndoe
Another mechanistic trial. These tell us nothing.
Let's say the shedding of viral particles is reduced by 11% (the figure from your most recent mechanistic trial), that means that one of two things can bring the number of viral particles up to a level where infection is likely...
1) taking off your mask
2) spending ~11% more time in that environment
So either masking is pointless in environments you're spending little time in (they were safe anyway, low chance of encountering sufficient viral particles), or masks are useless in environments you spend hours in (like school) because even at 11% reduction the air is going to fill with viable particles within a matter of hours and you're screwed.
Quoting jorndoe
This one actually states “Cloth masks are little more than facial decorations. There's no place for them in light of Omicron,” - Do you even read these first?
Quoting jorndoe
From the study itself
Since when did public health policy become - "we'll mandate something and if anyone happens to turn up some data that it's harmful we'll stop". what on earth happened to 'Do No Harm'?
Are you seriously advocating the enaction of health policy on the basis that there's no trial out there on the matter so we can do what we like?
Quoting jorndoe
I don't know what this one's supposed to show other than that children are at virtually zero risk from this and are more likely to be run over on the way to mask store than they are to die from the disease it's supposed to offer an miniscule amount of protection from, if they're worn right (which they're not).
___
Besides which, none of this is the point.
You've got trials showing masks are effective but they've got some issues (reliance on mechanism rather than RCT, no clinical endpoint measures, low rates of reduction problematic in long-term exposure environments...)
I've got some trials which show masking is ineffective - mentioned in the article, but here's a good summary too.
That's the makings of a discussion. You know...where people talk about the pros and cons, look at the evidence, hold different opinions. The point of the article I posted was that this is not what we have.
As I've said ad nauseam now I don't have any problem at all with you looking at your collection of evidence and concluding that, for you, masks are the best bet.
I have a problem with you insisting that unless I reach the same conclusion as you I'm somehow either mentally or morally deficient. It's just school-yard tribalism and it's downright irresponsible when there's a public health emergency that needs a serious clear-headed response.
Right. So you'd agree with me, on this topic, then, that the presentation of data from the CDC, FDA, journals, experts etc. should not be presented as if it were gospel truth, but rather as contributions to be critiqued like any other (within the bounds of our prior knowledge)?
Because it seems you've been arguing the opposite in the past, though I may have misinterpreted.
If so, then we find ourselves in agreement.
Why do you complain about the self-evident truth, and insist that it's somehow "wrong"? What qualifies as a "crime" is what the government dictates is a crime. Isn't that self-evident to you? And that dictation must be allowed to change with an evolving society. Or do you think that the original laws, those of Draco or something like that, should persist unchanged, forever and ever, dictated to never be allowed to change?
I think you have things backward. To make a "charter" which forces the government to adhere in a fixed way, to some dictate which would cripple its capacity to "invent crimes" is what is tyrannical. In reality, the government needs to be able to "invent crimes" faster than the criminals can act them out. But as you correctly indicate, giving a government the power which it needs, to properly govern an evolving society, is fraught with disagreement, therefore very problematic. And it's a problem which obviously has not been solved.
Nobody is a gospel of truth. And since a global pandemic hit us, it's totally understandable that there are errors, overreactions and misguided attempts as there also can be successful decisions. Good example of this is how totally different was the response in Sweden compared to other Nordic or European countries. A totally different response on the lockdown issue simply shows that these aren't things that are "right" or "incorrect". And the Swedes are totally happy with the path that their social democrat government put them. Even if the deaths were a little bit higher in Sweden, they weren't all that higher at all.
There's just this level of hostility towards different opinions, and also the ease in how the discourse can be manipulated. But that doesn't mean one cannot make sense about it.
Quoting Isaac
That can indeed have happen, because I also don't find an obvious disagreement here.
We is euphemistically anyone operating bona fides. Aren't you? (Like concern for each other?)
Quoting Isaac
... which together with the rest (some of which were listed), taken together, tell us where things are at. Not sure why anyone would call that pathetic. :shrug: However tediously long, Russell and Patterson make good points (also mentions *cough* motivated reasoning).
Quoting Isaac
Attached as markdown to retain links.
Quoting Isaac
For me? It's a social thing. I'm not aware of many masking up when on their own. You honestly think you live in a different world, however it works doesn't apply to you?
Quoting jorndoe
... doesn't depend on he-said-she-said, rather, the discourse is to figure it out bona fides, that's kind of the reason for the discussions in the first place, resulting in practicalities. :mask:
Quoting Isaac
Irresponsible indeed. And, indeed, serious clear-headed and in everyone's best interest, concern for each other. :mask:
Quoting jorndoe
[sup](Maybe go back to covering the scandals?)[/sup]
Sorry, markdown is just plain text, a simple format that can represent some formatting and links and such. Can be saved and opened as any other plain text file.
Cool.
Quoting jorndoe
You used the term in response to mask mandates. Masks were mandated by a specific group of people, so referring to them in that way is a judgment on those specific people, not just some euphemistic group. I'm attacking that judgment.
Quoting jorndoe
Because it was so obviously partisan. You just chucked as many pro-mask studies as you could find. The existence of a pro-mask position among scientists is not in doubt so there's nothing contributed by them.
What the article was opposing was the narrative. Discussion of masks being inadequate were banned, actually banned. People espousing the idea were labelled paranoid, conspiracy theorists. (Same happened with the lab leak theory - not a one off). That's not a matter that's resolved by saying "well, some scientists believed masks were helpful". It's got a really serious impact on the way science is conducted.
Quoting jorndoe
No, but in a situation of uncertainty, its not appropriate for one group to simply impose their favoured strategy over another, and certainly not to lie about certainty in order to do so.
Quoting jorndoe
This is the scandal. Discussion of legitimate scientific dissent was actually banned. You don't think that's scandalous?
(Thanks for sorting that markdown for me, it was an interesting read)