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America is giving up on the pandemic?

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Re: America is giving up on the pandemic?

#951

Post by grey-area »

joenot443 wrote: post #885
grey-area wrote: post #802

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Of course there is. There are legitimate reasons for owning a rifle in rural America (hunting), there are no legitimate reasons for owning an assault weapon, and guns can easily be made gradually less attractive. If you don't accept this even as a possibility you are part of the problem.

What do you think that way (of the government collecting 300m firearms) might be?

The same way every other country has gone about this.

This has been done after wars for example (after WWII), and after many different conflicts in different countries in Africa. It would take a long time and would require tightening laws gradually and at the same time encouraging people to hand in their weapons.

This is not particularly difficult logistically, the only difficulty is in the American psyche apparently, which seems completely incompatible with this simple common-sense measure. The outcome would be fewer deaths by cop, fewer deaths in burglaries, and fewer mass shootings.

There is abundant evidence from around the globe that limiting the ownership of guns helps limit deaths.

Re: America is giving up on the pandemic?

#952

Post by mindslight »

entee wrote: post #758
javagram wrote: post #664

Earlier quoted context omitted.

FWIW, I don’t think the majority of the officials intended to lie about this. It wasn’t anything that started this year or anything - they’ve had the same message about masks since as far back as the 2009 H1N1 pandemic. https://slatestarcodex.com/2020/03/23/face-masks-much-more-t... > But the CDC has recommended against mask use. I hypothesized that the CDC was intentionally lying to us, trying to trick us into not b…

I think you’re right. I don’t understand the general tendency of assuming malice when a combination of uncertainty about the virus, poor supply chains, and not-very-good underlying data would do just as well. It’s also unclear what “masks” meant in the initial phases. An N95 respirator? A surgical mask? A homemade cloth mask? Each of these has different uses and effects. I seriously doubt most people knew the differe…

The problem with summing up a multi-dimensional tradeoff as simplistic negative advice is that it creates FUD that sticks with us indefinitely. Instead of acknowledging the goal we needed to work towards and getting everyone onto the same page, we end up arguing over a trivial issue as the nonsensical advice continue to echo. The biggest benefit to everyone wearing masks would be that we could finally stop talking about masks.

Remember spending a few weeks agonizing over how to ramp up ventilator production, rather than focusing on masks? And then finally coming around to masks could be useful, with everyone championing DIY cloth masks? We're four months into this thing and most everyone is still proudly wearing those ersatz face-rags, even spending effort to "improve" them as as fashion accessories. Meanwhile a proper N95 costs around $3 to produce and distribute - I thought we were supposed to be an industrialized society!

Re: America is giving up on the pandemic?

#953

Post by chiefalchemist »

tootie wrote: post #946
chiefalchemist wrote: post #670

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Of course all factors were considered. That's not entirely accurate. Even Faucci answered, in response to Rand Paul, he was a virologist. Not a economist, etc. There's been little public acknowledgement of increases in suicides, illness from delayed med treatments, economic fall out affecting deaths, etc.

Fauci doesn't set policy. The CDC doesn't set policy. Even the White House has limited authority. Policy was a mishmash set by governors and mayors with or without support from DC and based on recommendations from multiple health, public safety and economic advisors.

I'm not for or against Fauci. He did what he was asked to do. The problem was he was thrust to the front as The Expert. Again, not his fault. However, that did compromise our ability to have seats at the table for all the unintended consequences.

Re: America is giving up on the pandemic?

#954

Post by danenania »

gridlockd wrote: post #838
danenania wrote: post #434

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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 a…

"Cops generally don't draw their guns unless there is a perceived threat."

Yeah and these "perceived threats" include kids with toy guns, unarmed people with their hands up, and people lying on the ground dying.

Many cops have learned, whether through training or culture, to point their guns first and ask questions later, at a huge cost to society. It seems you don't have sympathy for the people affected by this, but many of us do.

I have a lot of sympathy for police too. They have a dangerous and thankless job, and we all rely on them. But my sympathy ends at those who abuse their power, and those who protect the abusers in their midst.

People who would rather kill another human than accept any risk in trying to defuse a situation peacefully don't have what it takes to do this extremely difficult job, and they should look for another line of work.

Re: America is giving up on the pandemic?

#955

Post by monadic2 »

School-Cotton wrote: post #488
monadic2 wrote: post #424

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How do you figure—where would the threat come from? We can certainly still produce necessary goods while the majority of the workforce stays home. In that light—every industrialized country, probably. Certainly other countries every where you look on every continent seem to be doing markedly better at this than the US, including countries that are opening back up . Our best parallels are the goddamn UK and Iran, the…

> where would the threat come from? GDP shrinkage leading to a major decline in level of economic development. > We can certainly still produce necessary goods while the majority of the workforce stays home. Sure, I'm not claiming that we will starve to death en masse -- though that might indeed be a problem in India, it won't be in the US. > How will my 401k ever recover in the next six months?!? Think about all tha…

I’m not sure why the GDP is a concern, frankly. How does this affect citizens in a material way? That is why I keep bringing up the 401k—to illustrate the absurdity of using an abstract measurement (GDP) to justify material loss of life.

Re: America is giving up on the pandemic?

#956

Post by caconym_ »

zests wrote: post #728
caconym_ wrote: post #512

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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-an…

We usually try to keep it a bit more civil here.

Last night, while I watched my city's police force (backed by nat'l guard) launch a militarized assault on a crowd that was unequivocally 99.99?% physically nonviolent, my partner was putting her life on the line (with inadequate PPE) in a COVID-19 ward just down the street from the clouds of tear gas. So I hope you'll understand that I see our current situation as complex and nuanced, with very real lives hanging in the balance, and that as a result I have no tolerance for masturbatory, misrepresentative debate club bullshit I've seen a thousand times before.

But I'm sorry if my incivility offended you.

Re: America is giving up on the pandemic?

#957

Post by dang »

thazework wrote: post #906
dang wrote: post #405

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is a stub comment to collect replies in one place, so that it can be collapsed and prevent too much offtopicness at the top of the thread.

When you make a call for civility the people most likely to exercise increased self-restraint are those who would in any case tend to be more judicious in how they express themselves. Meanwhile those who spew racist hatred will not be deterred and moreover they will now face lesser pushback calling out their barbarism. Source: this thread.

I didn't make a call for civility. The specific words matter.

I haven't read this whole thread, but the parts that I saw definitely did not lack for pushback. The question is how best to push back. Denunciatory rhetoric doesn't work. Its purpose is to provide momentary relief to the denouncer, at the cost of damaging the container and evoking more, not less, hatred from the other side.

There are better mechanisms for pushing back against hatred: flagging, downvoting, responding within the site guidelines, and in egregious cases emailing hn@ycombinator.com.

Re: America is giving up on the pandemic?

#958

Post by throwaway93132 »

gridlockd wrote: post #385
iso947 wrote: post #338

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Americans are far more heavily armed, and there’s a belief that the only defence against a gun is someone with a bigger gun.

I can tell you what isn't a defense against a gun: A baton, a taser, teargas, or any of the other toys that ordinary police get to use in the UK.

And yet, only 2 UK police officers were killed in the last year.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_British_police_officer...

Re: America is giving up on the pandemic?

#959

Post by throw0101a »

gridlockd wrote: post #379
throw0101a wrote: post #331

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> There is a reason that the Police Police are armed. Not all Police are armed (see UK). Also, other countries, while armed, seem to use their firearms much less (e.g., the entire country of Germany seems to use fewer bullets than a single US city).

The vast majority of police forces are armed, even in low-crime countries. > the entire country of Germany seems to use fewer bullets than a single US city So perhaps guns are not actually the problem? There's commensurately little crime occurring in Germany, crime is not punished as harshly and criminals are not armed to the same degree. When somebody is getting arrested in the US, they're looking at years in harsh…

> There's commensurately little crime occurring in Germany,

The stats seem to show comparable crime rates across most industrialized countries; see point 7:

* https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2017/10/2/16399418/u...

There's just more violence in the US:

* https://www.vox.com/2015/8/27/9217163/america-guns-europe

Re: America is giving up on the pandemic?

#960

Post by NicoJuicy »

bkor wrote: post #895
NicoJuicy wrote: post #880

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Who says it's lying? Modern Western world has never had a pandemic in the current globally connected world. Recommendations try to take everything in to account. It's easy now to say: just wear masks. But then, there was even a global shortage of masks for health professionals.

The UK did a study a few years ago on the most important threat. The #1 spot (on importance) was a pandemic and would have way more impact than the #2 threat. The report suggested various things, including e.g. masks, etc. The report was ignored. In US there's been many warnings to subsidize a strategic PPE supply and production. This was ignored. Early on (COVID-19) a US mask producer asked officials to provide mone…

A comet will hit the earth is also easy to predict.

But we won't build something now against it because it's a long time ago.

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