America is giving up on the pandemic? • Hacker News Board

Re: America is giving up on the pandemic?

#831

Post by robocat » Mon, Jun 08, 2020, 7:30 AM UTC

geomark wrote: post #489

robocat wrote: post #213

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"One in every 1,000 Black men and boys can expect to be killed by police in this country". If we presume average years of life lost per black person’s death is 50 years, then Covid is less deadly. To lower risk, black people could stay at home and wait for better times...

Those numbers seem to be vastly more than reported numbers of police killings. Whom are you quoting? Because I like to keep track of who makes such exaggerated claims.

This references the source data: https://theconversation.com/police-are-more-likely-to-kill-m...

It says that between 2013 and 2018, about 96 in 100,000 (approx 1 in 1000) African American men were killed by police in the U.S.

Death from Covid is also lifetime risk.

It is a commonly reported statistic if you want to find other publications that say the same thing. Did you try googling for it — for example google: "1000 black men and boys" police

Re: America is giving up on the pandemic?

#832

Post by vl » Mon, Jun 08, 2020, 7:32 AM UTC

shibeouya wrote: post #653

TheOtherHobbes wrote: post #435

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The obvious answer is to make the public less armed than police officers. The less obvious answer is to stop glorifying violence, including gun violence, war porn, drug kingpin lifestyles, cop/detective lifestyles, and other forms of abusive aggression in the media. Considering that the US seems to go insane when a nipple appears on TV without a formal invitation, it's really quite strange that you can watch dramatis…

This whole riots debacle being endorsed and justified by the media has done more for the cause of gun ownership that the NRA ever could. I never ever considered owning a gun in my entire life, but I have one now and not afraid to use it if needed. Several friends have also done the same. The debate for gun ownership is probably dead for 1 or 2 generations, and I do not want to see a single person blaming anyone about…

In US liberals have this idea that police will protect them, but in all documented severe crisis events police was first to run away. Which basically means that everyone is on their own, or at least with their friends/neighbors.

Anyway, take a two day training course on how to use a gun (not “safety” course), otherwise owning a gun is pretty useless. Also, you need to periodically go to the range, and clean the gun after. And stock pile some ammo when you can - you are not going to be able to get any during any crisis.

Re: America is giving up on the pandemic?

#833

Post by dillondoyle » Mon, Jun 08, 2020, 7:32 AM UTC

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

A more fair comparison should include excess mortality for African Americans as a start.

83570 [1] excess deaths in 2002. Another study says AfAm likely death by 65 38-50%, white 20-33%.

That's direct deaths.

I personally would also include life lost in incarceration for basically nothing (way to many sad examples to list).

And all around lower life quality and total bullsh*t that systemic racism has inflicted on POC from the first Colonists.

1 https://www.healthaffairs.org/doi/pdf/10.1377/hlthaff.24.2.4... 2 https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3052342/

Re: America is giving up on the pandemic?

#834

Post by Gibbon1 » Mon, Jun 08, 2020, 7:43 AM UTC

shibeouya wrote: post #653

TheOtherHobbes wrote: post #435

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The obvious answer is to make the public less armed than police officers. The less obvious answer is to stop glorifying violence, including gun violence, war porn, drug kingpin lifestyles, cop/detective lifestyles, and other forms of abusive aggression in the media. Considering that the US seems to go insane when a nipple appears on TV without a formal invitation, it's really quite strange that you can watch dramatis…

This whole riots debacle being endorsed and justified by the media has done more for the cause of gun ownership that the NRA ever could. I never ever considered owning a gun in my entire life, but I have one now and not afraid to use it if needed. Several friends have also done the same. The debate for gun ownership is probably dead for 1 or 2 generations, and I do not want to see a single person blaming anyone about…

Keep living fear of your shadow bro.

Re: America is giving up on the pandemic?

#835

Post by mns » Mon, Jun 08, 2020, 7:46 AM UTC

metrokoi wrote: post #90

Quoted from a letter from 1,000 health professionals on the virus and protests [0] >However, as public health advocates, we do not condemn these gatherings as risky for COVID-19 transmission. We support them as vital to the national public health and to the threatened health specifically of Black people in the United States. We can show that support by facilitating safest protesting practices without detracting from…

This is not just the US, I just realised that in Germany, Munich, there were some "rednecks" and weird people protesting the Corona measures. So they closed down a 100 acres area where Oktoberfest takes place for a 1000 person protest (that's how much they were allowed). Now I live in that area and on that weekend we were stopped by the police while going shopping, and they were stopping everyone to make sure you're not going to the demo. They had more security forces there than people at the protests. These protests are mostly stupid and fringe, and I am really grateful to be living in a country like Germany (not a german) that from my point of view handled the situation quite well as you don't have many reasons to protest the Corona measures here.

Now, this weekend they had a protest here to support the ones in the US, and we just had 25000 people in a smaller place to show their solidarity. How is that going to help people's trust in the decisions taken by authorities, it just makes everything political.

Re: America is giving up on the pandemic?

#836

Post by blub » Mon, Jun 08, 2020, 8:07 AM UTC

rayhendricks wrote: post #826

javagram wrote: post #687

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Contact tracing a protest makes no sense anyway. Taking down a list of people who dined at a restaurant during a certain time period is one thing. How are you supposed to contact trace a 10,000 person protest? No one is going to know the random people they happened to be standing next to and chanting at a specific moment. If these protests are super spreading events it blows a huge hole in any attempt at contact trac…

If COVID can’t spread as well due to higher heat and wind that would be great. But literally this evening I saw the same thing again walking around with the thousand protestors in close proximity to the police. According to the CDC the last super-spreader event in this area was 53.3% to 86.7% infected [0] but that was in an enclosed space. [0] https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/volumes/69/wr/mm6919e6.htm

I doubt that.

Consider that when people are yelling and standing tightly packed together, even if there's wind it won't blow away the droplets, just the aerosols. And new aerosols will be continuously generated...

Re: America is giving up on the pandemic?

#837

Post by gridlockd » Mon, Jun 08, 2020, 8:22 AM UTC

wpietri wrote: post #355

manfredo wrote: post #347

Earlier quoted context omitted.

another ~140 were armed with "toy weapons", such as the infamous shooting of Tamir Rice. But it's unclear whether that should go into the category of "unarmed" since this is still a threat perceived by police. Here is an image of Rice's toy gun: https://www.cleveland.com/resizer/CbjnPy-8-HkfIl1ApQ431f_Dlh...

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.

These guys didn't get shot either, coincidence?

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/EZxuXBLXQAAGxMC?format=jpg&name=...

https://i.dailymail.co.uk/i/pix/2015/08/13/16/2B554932000005...

https://preview.redd.it/zr7cp4ggz5351.jpg?width=960&crop=sma...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7dWRuf2t4wY

Re: America is giving up on the pandemic?

#838

Post by gridlockd » Mon, Jun 08, 2020, 8:41 AM UTC

danenania wrote: post #434

gridlockd wrote: post #394

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Like you said, that's not representative. It means nothing. Of course, if you just add up all the cases across the country, then you don't need armed police in 99% of case. The problem is that you don't know which one percent does need armed police. You want police to be able to bring the situation under control as soon as possible, you don't want to wait for people to get stabbed or shot by some guy who couldn't be…

It may not be the answer to all our problems, but when tens of thousands of people on tons of mind-altering substances are able to keep the peace without police or guns present, it certainly means something . It’s not as if there aren’t plenty of issues to deal with—issues that would surely be handled far more violently and less effectively by the police if there weren’t alternatives. “The problem is that you don't k…

> It may not be the answer to all our problems, but when tens of thousands of people on tons of mind-altering substances are able to keep the peace without police or guns present, it certainly means something.

Anything that a bunch of yuppies do in their leisure time is not representative of anything else. It can not to be used to draw conclusions on what to do about, say, crime in the inner cities.

> Perhaps there are more intelligent ways to triage than treating every situation like a military engagement? > Often the cops showing up with guns drawn is what turns a situation violent.

Cops generally don't draw their guns unless there is a perceived threat. If there is a perceived threat, not having a gun puts cops at a severe disadvantage.

Of course there's the option for cops to just not engage and let the situation play out. There's the option for cops just to not do any policing, to not even show up. That'll reduce victims of police brutality for sure. That's already happening in some areas and all these calls for defunding the police will surely have an impact there.

Re: America is giving up on the pandemic?

#839

Post by Stupulous » Mon, Jun 08, 2020, 8:42 AM UTC

eganist wrote: post #766

whiddershins wrote: post #306

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Even if police shooting were brought down to zero, I think it would take like 100 years to save as many lives as we’ve lost to Covid, right? And some people think that without intervention it would be more like 480,000 in the UD alone. So ...

> From the perspective of the protesters, taking this opportunity to protest and possibly achieve change means hopefully lowering the general mortality risk for generations to come, not just in the immediate COVID future. I didn't mention police because this was never just about the police.

It's not clear to me how this protest attempts to solve racism, even if that is a goal of participants. Demands I've seen have exclusively been for changes to policing. The words Black Lives Matter refer to police violence.

I definitely agree that it would be morally acceptable to suffer even a hundred thousand deaths in exchange for a permanent end to racism. And I could even be persuaded to believe that such actions should be taken now, as opposed to say a year from now. But that is not an outcome I expect, as I haven't even heard proposals for how that might be done.

I'm all for the reform people are asking for. But it is not my belief that the net effect of this right now will be positive.

Re: America is giving up on the pandemic?

#840

Post by 1bc29b36f623ba8 » Mon, Jun 08, 2020, 8:51 AM UTC

claudeganon wrote: post #738

chasd00 wrote: post #699

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I got very skeptical reading the reaction to the antibody studies here. Also, the total hate for Sweden really depressed me. I've always held this place in high regard but I suppose it's still just more of the same.

I mean, Sweden is fairing badly next to their neighbors, and horrendously compared to countries like Taiwan and South Korea (who also didn’t have lockdowns). I don’t think people hate the country so much as they’re assessing the relative failure of their approach.

Sweden failed to protect their own elderly, mainly because national authorities simply assumed that local authorities were ready to fight a pandemic, when they were in fact hopelessly underfunded and staffed by underpaid staff with no PPE and who were expected to do stay at home on their own initiative and without payment if they got sick.

The same happened in a few places here in Finland, and I am quite certain that if we'd let COVID-19 through retirement homes the way our dear neighbors did, we'd have a much higher death-rate.

The actual Swedish stragegy, i.e. a soft lock-down with strong recommendations and only minor restrictions in travelling and gatherings, could actually have worked. Unfortunately, we'll never know as they screwed the retirement home situation up as bad as they did.