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America is giving up on the pandemic?

theatlantic.com

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Re: America is giving up on the pandemic?

#511

Post by twblalock »

caconym_ wrote: post #471
twblalock wrote: post #358

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> They just seem to think protesting America's rampant institutionalized police brutality is more worthy than protesting the lockdowns themselves That can’t possibly be a valid scientific opinion on the basis of public health data — until recently the virus was killing more people per day than the police kill in an entire year. It’s a political opinion and this was a political letter. From now on, when public health…

We've heard a lot from black people over the past week or two (and much longer, if you cared to listen) about what typical American policing is like for them. It's not good. It's perfectly valid to see those issues as important but still not worth the risk of spreading COVID-19, but by boiling this down to a contest of how many people each Bad Thing killed in X amount of time, you miss a lot of the nuances in both is…

Scientists are no more qualified at discussing the trade-offs of economics and racial justice and policing than anyone else. By attempting to do so they politicize science and thereby reduce public trust in science.

My problem with their letter is that they made a judgment about these trade-offs and attempted to portray it as a scientific one, when it really wasn't. Based on the data alone, there is no way to reach their conclusion.

Re: America is giving up on the pandemic?

#512

Post by caconym_ »

roenxi wrote: post #483
caconym_ wrote: post #471

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We've heard a lot from black people over the past week or two (and much longer, if you cared to listen) about what typical American policing is like for them. It's not good. It's perfectly valid to see those issues as important but still not worth the risk of spreading COVID-19, but by boiling this down to a contest of how many people each Bad Thing killed in X amount of time, you miss a lot of the nuances in both is…

A protest is a political stunt. That seems to be an essential part of what it means to have a protest. And at risk of being too on topic and reading the article, the issue is that the gloom-and-doom arguments that a lockdown is necessary and correct have been well and truly rejected by the activist wings of politics, and implicitly by a large portion of the commenting-class of journalists. And business. And possibly…

Oh, crap! I forgot that I can ignore context and nuance—and even redefine words and terms at will—to win arguments with zero-effort pedantic nonsense! What have I been doing, arguing in good faith all this time?

Was the civil rights movement a political stunt? I think I'm rolling my eyes so hard over here that they might fly out of my head. Call it what you want, anyway. I don't care.

> the issue is that the gloom-and-doom arguments that a lockdown is necessary and correct have been well and truly rejected by the activist wings of politics, and implicitly by a large portion of the commenting-class of journalists. And business. And possibly the public at large. They clearly don't agree.

This is an outrageous simplification and IMO outright misrepresentation of a very complex issue.

Where I live, where there are big protests with general neutral-to-positive public sentiment toward them, the majority of people have been taking the public health advice re: COVID-19 very seriously. I'd be very wary of suggesting that my own personal perception does or does not match with the country at large, and I think you should too, especially if you're unwilling to acknowledge the nuance of the issues at stake and/or the reality of racial oppression and violence in America.

Would you run back into a burning building to save a 24-pack of Bud Light? Probably not.

Your family dog? Maybe?

Your daughter? Probably.

Re: America is giving up on the pandemic?

#513

Post by bagacrap »

rabidrat wrote: post #211
twblalock wrote: post #92

The article’s authors are losing sight of the original justification for the lockdowns: “flatten the curve” was about preventing hospitals from being overwhelmed. Of course cases will increase when people leave their homes. But have the hospitals been overwhelmed in any of the states that started to reopen several weeks ago? No! In that case the lockdowns have served their purpose. The authors of this article are arg…

In addition to preventing hospitals being overwhelmed, the lockdowns were intended to give us time to develop the infrastructure for adequate testing, tracing, and supportive isolation. With those things in place, we can re-open and still keep the virus in check. If we don't have those things in place, the problem is not the re-opening, which was inevitable since indefinite lockdown and isolation is not sustainable a…

this seems like retcon. I never heard it before now, and there's not been agreement on the method or role of contact tracing in a free society. Am I going to be quarantined if some app says I got near a person who tested positive? That seems ludicrous. States are reopening without tracing or supportive isolation.

Re: America is giving up on the pandemic?

#514

Post by likeclockwork »

zarathustreal wrote: post #389
wpietri wrote: post #355

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Weirdly, hundreds of people were wandering around state capitols with much more dangerous looking weapons, and no cop shot them on site. It's almost like going by "perceived threat" (as determined after the fact by cops) is a giant hole that allows racial bias free reign.

Racial bias is absolutely disgusting. Nothing about the color of a person's skin or their family lineage could ever give indication of the actions they're likely to take. Culture on the other hand, which by definition includes behavior, can be a pretty good indicator. Either way, the room for error grows as the time taken to make a judgement decreases and unfortunately in the situations police find themselves in they…

Why should they shift that risk onto the public? Why are they lauded as heroes when they err on the side of killing innocents? Why shouldn't they be the ones to die instead of the people they've miscategorized as threats? Why are their lives worth more?

Re: America is giving up on the pandemic?

#515

Post by HaloZero »

tenpies wrote: post #500
war1025 wrote: post #3

A thing I've noticed is that they stopped mentioning the daily numbers on the radio (NPR, more specifically Iowa Public Radio). It's sort of like the media has extracted all the juice they can from the pandemic and now we're just left with the pulpy mess that no one really wants to deal with.

Keep in mind it's an election year, and the biggest failure in the US and the world, New York, is extremely Democrat. It is critical to the Democrats to shift the conversation. Clearly blaming Trump for the city's failure isn't going to work, so the pivot was to waiting until there was one particularly bad case of police abuse against a black person and then light the powder keg. If you look back this year there have…

I don't see why America would be outraged by the man in Philadelphia? Like it seems a terrible murder but what do you expect people to rise against?

I'm glad the Democrats are shifting the conversation. You think this hasn't been happening regularly for decades? At the very least this has been brewing since 2014 and Ferguson.

They might try to blame Trump but honestly he's given the Democrats enough material just by literally stoking the flames instead of trying to be conciliatory.

Re: America is giving up on the pandemic?

#516

Post by shkkmo »

rayiner wrote: post #479
hobs wrote: post #415

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Worthy isnt the number of deaths involved, its the amount of justice it might achieve in response to. Protesting the lockdown is not a just cause. Saying "Well now anything doctors say is political!" does not show good intent or faith, but someone looking for a gotcha statement so they can say "See, they were political actors all along!"

Who decides? Reasonable people can believe that protesting orders that shut down people’s’ livelihoods is a just cause. Publix health officials sure as hell shouldn’t be making those judgment calls.

Public health officials can presumably take a non-political stance for lockdowns. This it seems to me that even given a neutral stance on BLM issues, there can be a non-political basis for discriminating between the value of the goals of the two different protest movements.

Re: America is giving up on the pandemic?

#517

Post by cmdshiftf4 »

grey-area wrote: post #447
Animats wrote: post #304

Total deaths in US caused by police. (2019, full year): 1112 [1] Total deaths in US caused by coronavirus (last Friday, one day): 975 [2] [1] https://www.theroot.com/here-s-how-many-people-police-killed... [2] https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/#countries

The US is no5 in the world for police homicides, just behind countries like the Philippines, Syria, Brazil. Not a record to be proud of - 1,536 in 2019 according to wikipedia. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_killings_by_law_enforc... Other countries manage to achieve numbers like 2 for Japan, 3 for the UK, 11 for Germany which is nowhere near even adjusted for population. American police kill more people per ca…

Do you think it's intellectually honest to compare countries with very, very low rates of firearms access to a country where firearms are available to anyone who wants one?

You're comparing the USA, which has about 100k shootings per year, 36k deaths involving guns of which 33% (~12k) are homicides, to the UK which has 50-60 cases of homicide involving a gun per year.

The fact is that the US police are far, far, far more likely to encounter a suspect with a gun in the course of their duty than the UK police are.

38 US police officers were shot dead in the line of duty last year. The UK had 3.

They're not equatable.

Re: America is giving up on the pandemic?

#518

Post by realtalk_sp »

bagacrap wrote: post #504
realtalk_sp wrote: post #296

The comment thread here, and the national attitude more generally, is the literal embodiment of cognitive dissonance. Science and facts are only useful insofar as they are convenient to our ends. I suppose, in light of the shortcomings of human nature, it would be a lot easier to make the point that needs to be made if we were dropping bombs on coronavirus victims and broadcasting the carnage instead of rolling them…

I think you're right that "science" and "data" are only believed when they align with one's views. But people seem to care a lot more about coronavirus deaths than deaths from war, flu, air pollution, traffic accidents, cancer (since screenings are down since lockdown), etc, so I can't agree with you on the other point. Let's not forget that the data is far from all collected, and the science is not settled, wrt eith…

You're digressing from the core, indisputable truth: these protests, in the present environment, will result in a significant number of deaths. Sure we won't start to have a sense of just how many until a few more weeks have passed, but we can say with relative certainty it will be "significant".

The reason people are dodging this is because it makes these protests morally indefensible, on balance. This is terribly inconvenient if you've entrenched yourself in a particular way of thinking and no longer wish to question it.

Re: America is giving up on the pandemic?

#519

Post by dehrmann »

HaloZero wrote: post #501
dehrmann wrote: post #484

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm disappointed there isn't a call for impeaching Trump for breaking up the protest in Lafayette Square. That has to be one of the places most symbolic of free speech in the US, and breaking up a protest there, in particular, is an obvious attack on free speech.

He's already been impeached. He wouldn't be indicted. There's so many better things to go over now like the actual cause of the protests.

He was impeached for abuse of power and obstruction of congress, both pertaining to Ukraine. He can be impeached again on First Amendment charges.

> He wouldn't be indicted.

A First Amendment violation might be harder for some Republican senators to stand behind.

> There's so many better things to go over now like the actual cause of the protests.

With Trump threatening military action to break up protests? I think protecting the right to protest could be more important. It's also a clear problem with a clear solution. That doesn't exist for abuse of police power; it's a much more nuanced issue.

Re: America is giving up on the pandemic?

#520

Post by bagacrap »

nkozyra wrote: post #38
ac29 wrote: post #22

Daily new deaths have been steadily falling even as states continue to ease or eliminate restrictions [0]: https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/us/ This article seems to completely ignore that, instead focusing on positive test results, even though the vast majority of infections are mild or even completely asymptomatic. If anything, America is giving up on the breathless projections of mass die off that…

Sort of. Florida has seen a consistent uptick in the last week. Some other states are seeing a bounce. I will say that 100k+ deaths is nothing to treat so trivially.

Treatment of the coronavirus has been anything but trivial. The monetary cost per year of life saved has been out of line with that of any other intervention for any other disease or threat to human life.
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