Freedom Day

[Riedquat]

People do tend to go very black and white on anything where health is on the line.

Now personally speaking I seem to have more risk tolerance than most these days - people really do seem to get worked up over some things that pose very little risk to them, and at that point I find doing anything, no matter how trivial, absurd. That clashes severely with society and is a not insignificant contribution to why I suffer from depression (must be some irony about how an obsession with physical health is no good for my mental health).

Then you get those who dismiss every concern, at least unless it's pointing a gun at their head.

Why is it always a case of "we must do everything we can possibly think of" versus "nah, don't bother doing anything"? How close to either extreme reality lies will depend upon the situation. It's looking like we've possibly got Covid to the point where it's not really significantly much different from all sorts of other things we live with (for now, but in this day and age banning shoelaces so people can't trip over them doesn't sound too much like satire), but it's also at the point where a bit of caution is still merited. No point in lurching to one extreme or the other.

Oh, I get really fed up with guilt tripping being used in such matters too. It's an instant example of "I'm not interested in discussing this, I'm right and you're wrong if you even think about it for a moment - I didn't."

[Yukaphile]

Let me tell you this, as well, since that post REALLY sounded kinda... Ubermensch in hindsight. It is the duty of the strong to help the weak. I really do think that. But sometimes the best thing to do for someone is to realize they don't need your courtesy. Really. Since the mask is not meant to protect you, but others from you, yes? I see many people out there who still wear masks. For those who need that from others to feel safe, I think those feelings are valid, though I'd encourage them then to, say, go shopping out of hours, you know, early, stuff like that. Because there are going to be those who don't wear them and those feelings are valid too, especially if they've been vaccinated. And especially since I do intend to get my booster in my case. Me, personally, I don't need it. Because if I'm one of the weak who dies, then I die. If COVID beat the odds and killed me, then I'll just fade away. Hell, I hate this planet so much, maybe death would be better. Who knows.

[Riedquat]

"Kinda... Ubermensch in hindsight"? A disturbing reaction (maybe it should be!), so could you explain why please?

As I've just posted in another thread I can be an arrogant arsehole at times, but I was trying to step away a bit and look back from a distance; people do have a tendency to be overly-simple black and white, and exaggeration for the sake of illustration, whilst effective, can end up treading on toes.

My own personal take on masks is that they've been of little use all along in many of the places where they've been encouraged or mandated all along. There are some exceptions (public transport's the biggest IMO), but the subtleties have been destroyed by seemingly "masks are good, don't wear one everywhere and you're killing your granny!" versus "totally pointless waste of time" (or worse still that they're even harmful, based on really tenuous hypotheses).

[Fuzzy Necromancer]

UK here.

30,000 die from flu. Where's the lockdown for that? 24,000 die in road traffic accidents. Where's the curfew for cars? 160,000 die from heart attacks. Where is the ban on McDonalds? 166,000 cancer deaths. Where is the ban on smoking, fat, salt, sugar etc.

Covid is an absolute anomaly. We have taken steps to prevent it that we haven't for any other leading form of death. Meanwhile, thousands are dying because of missed cancer screenings. People are committing suicide due to loneliness. Millions of jobs lost. Whole industries will never be the same again. An estimated 1 billion face masks dumped, with an average degradation time of 450 years.

You know what I think? I think the lockdown advocates are the selfish ones at this point. This is a threat that needs to be lived with before the cure is more harmful than what we are fighting.

PS I'm still happy with my Brexit vote. Do you know who you should blame if you aren't? The 28% of people who didn't bother to vote. That would have been enough to overturn it. You don't like the course of your history but were too lazy to change it? Tough tits. You had your chance. Same as the 43% of Americans who couldn't be bothered to vote in 2016 and woke up to find Trump in the White House.

While I can't speak to the politics of the UK, Boris Johnson and whatever, I feel ya on the lockdowns and mask mandate. Thankfully, here in Minnesota, we have none of those. Very few places make masks mandatory, except hospitals, which is understandable, I think, but still fucking unpleasant.

I think COVID is more so being pushed now as another means to seize greater control over us. Like Prohibition was a century ago. You're never going to be able to legislate morality or ethics, even basic human decency and fairness. If they couldn't do that in caveman days, we sure as shit can't do it now.

I don't wear my mask anymore, I don't care about this new hysteria with "DELTA VARIANT." All along, the scientists are being very clear, very tentative - let the data come in. But 99% survive without the mask, and 50% are asymptomatic. Politicians just want to use it to divide us. I got both my Pfizer shots, so did everyone in my family. If they want me to live in terror, they are going to have to do it themselves, I will NOT do it for them.

Yep, I too have had both my shots and have dropped my mask.

I'm glad that you at least got the shot. Most people here who refuse to wear a mask also refuse to get vaccinated.

Gotta ask, how exactly is calling the strain "Delta" in any related to you being upset you can't call it China Virus? It's not like it originated in the Delta city or anything.

[Fuzzy Necromancer]

I'm of the opinion that the fear of Covid-19 never lived up to the reality.

I don't have the figures for the UK, but Alabama and other conservative states are running out of places to put the corpses.

[Fuzzy Necromancer]

I misspoke and I want to correct that. Obviously I'm NOT condoning people dying, but that's the thing. You're never going to have a completely risk-free life. No matter how good our medicines and our tools get, it's just not going to happen. And no matter how we feel, it is true. Nature is a harsh bitch who does not care about us and whether we live or die. That's the intent I was trying to give. That's all. But that in the grand scheme of things, there are far more to get scared about than the COVID reaction. Which clearspira had listed. For me, something like climate change. Long-term, that could do far more damage. At least we're trying to get on the ball. We'll see if we can do it in time. In no way is a human death acceptable. Well, except maybe some psychotic criminal who evaded justice. Because they are almost certainly going to keep on doing it. But that'd be about it, imo.

You know who DOES want us so afraid of COVID? The global authoritarians. I mean, they're just using it to crack down on our freedoms. Just like after 9/11, and it's just getting worse and worse and worse. I think at this point, being afraid serves them more than us. There are exceptions for where I wear the mask, of course. Like the hospital, as I said. That I do understand. But that's really it. Not all people who drop the masks now are anti-vaxxers, yet a lot of the mainstream narrative is that they are. Again, it's a good tool of division, in how the ruling class can single out those who have dropped the masks as being dangerous monsters putting other people at risk, and so the outrage is turned back onto them instead of where it belongs, with our political heads. I mean, surely, Fuzzy, you better than anyone would agree it's how they divide us so well to keep us put down as class peons? Because then there's more chance for them to keep carving up this country and all its resources finer among themselves.

Surely I would not agree.

This is not a political division. This is a public health policy, and people like you are MAKING it into a political division. Most of the authoritarians I see are pretending everything is fine or getting vaccines in private while calling on their followers to fight vaccine mandates and take horse medicine. I see NOTHING authoritarian, unjust, or tyrannical about trying to get everyone vaccinated during the pandemic.

Not everything you don't want to do is Authoritarianism. If I assume that you are unvaccinated because i don't see you wearing your mask, it's because so many people are bragging about both at the same time, or waving "No masks no vaccines no tyrrany!" signs.

[Fuzzy Necromancer]

Let me tell you this, as well, since that post REALLY sounded kinda... Ubermensch in hindsight. It is the duty of the strong to help the weak. I really do think that. But sometimes the best thing to do for someone is to realize they don't need your courtesy.

No, they do. Courtesy is important for the common good. Consideration of how your actions affect others is the very basis of a functioning society.

If your post sounded a little Ubermensch, it's because it has shades of a certain alien character from Babylon Five. The one who insisted on having sex human-style.

[McAvoy]

UK here.

30,000 die from flu. Where's the lockdown for that? 24,000 die in road traffic accidents. Where's the curfew for cars? 160,000 die from heart attacks. Where is the ban on McDonalds? 166,000 cancer deaths. Where is the ban on smoking, fat, salt, sugar etc.

Covid is an absolute anomaly. We have taken steps to prevent it that we haven't for any other leading form of death. Meanwhile, thousands are dying because of missed cancer screenings. People are committing suicide due to loneliness. Millions of jobs lost. Whole industries will never be the same again. An estimated 1 billion face masks dumped, with an average degradation time of 450 years.

You know what I think? I think the lockdown advocates are the selfish ones at this point. This is a threat that needs to be lived with before the cure is more harmful than what we are fighting.

PS I'm still happy with my Brexit vote. Do you know who you should blame if you aren't? The 28% of people who didn't bother to vote. That would have been enough to overturn it. You don't like the course of your history but were too lazy to change it? Tough tits. You had your chance. Same as the 43% of Americans who couldn't be bothered to vote in 2016 and woke up to find Trump in the White House.

While I can't speak to the politics of the UK, Boris Johnson and whatever, I feel ya on the lockdowns and mask mandate. Thankfully, here in Minnesota, we have none of those. Very few places make masks mandatory, except hospitals, which is understandable, I think, but still fucking unpleasant.

I think COVID is more so being pushed now as another means to seize greater control over us. Like Prohibition was a century ago. You're never going to be able to legislate morality or ethics, even basic human decency and fairness. If they couldn't do that in caveman days, we sure as shit can't do it now.

I don't wear my mask anymore, I don't care about this new hysteria with "DELTA VARIANT." All along, the scientists are being very clear, very tentative - let the data come in. But 99% survive without the mask, and 50% are asymptomatic. Politicians just want to use it to divide us. I got both my Pfizer shots, so did everyone in my family. If they want me to live in terror, they are going to have to do it themselves, I will NOT do it for them.

Yep, I too have had both my shots and have dropped my mask.

I'm glad that you at least got the shot. Most people here who refuse to wear a mask also refuse to get vaccinated.

Gotta ask, how exactly is calling the strain "Delta" in any related to you being upset you can't call it China Virus? It's not like it originated in the Delta city or anything.

OCP finally tore down old Detroit? Damn it RoboCop.

[Yukaphile]

Seems more that you're trying to guilt-trip me, since I got both my shots, you still want me to suffocate in that slave muzzle. And scientific data takes time to come in. Making decisions based on incomplete data would have to be for political reasons, nothing else, which is what has happened over the last year. I'm actually not talking about anti-vaxxers, people who are dumb enough to think vaccines are some kinda chemical and refuse to take it out of paranoia about the government. I mean the people who faithfully got them. If they wanna ditch the masks, they have every right to. And frankly, they should.

[Madner Kami]

I'm of the opinion that the fear of Covid-19 never lived up to the reality.

I don't have the figures for the UK, but Alabama and other conservative states are running out of places to put the corpses.

As of now, between ~133k and ~155k people are reported to have died in the UK from CoViD or CoViD-related issues.

Mind you, this number is with all the lockdowns, curfews and mask-mandates in effect, unlike with the flu, where people generally treat it like being less problematic than stepping onto a Lego-brick barefooted. By comparison, about 30k people die from the flu or flu-related issues each year in the UK...
This also does obviously not account for any remaining long-term health-issues, something that is largely kind of a not-thing for surviving flu-victims.