Teachers are ready to quit rather than put their lives at risk • Hacker News Board

Re: Teachers are ready to quit rather than put their lives at risk

#841

Post by war1025 » Sat, Jul 18, 2020, 4:16 AM UTC

oramit wrote: post #703

isthispermanent wrote: post #541

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes. This is largely the problem. Unfortunately, I don't think it would have mattered whether it was a left or right president. The side not in office would have done the opposite. Everything is a political proxy war right now.

I'm not so certain. There is extreme political polarization, yes, but I don't think we can honestly look at the situation at hand and not see the giant Trump shaped elephant in the room. He hasn't ever governed as a "unity" president. That has worked for him when things were generally humming along but it fails catastrophically in times of crisis. Lots of people (myself included) simply don't believe he can put aside…

> He hasn't ever governed as a "unity" president.

Obama never governed as a "unity" president either.

Bush immediately after 9/11 was probably the last time there was some semblance of political unity in this country.

Re: Teachers are ready to quit rather than put their lives at risk

#842

Post by Izkata » Sat, Jul 18, 2020, 4:20 AM UTC

vondur wrote: post #780

strgcmc wrote: post #615

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This. And maybe we shouldn't trust China's reported data, but Europe is almost doing miraculously well if you compare to the USA. Not going for eradication, but containment. With containment, everything else is possible (healthcare system not overloaded, economy can be opened up, schools can reopen, etc.). The US has capitulated completely, and even containment isn't really on the table nationally; on a state-by-stat…

Where in the US is the health care system overwhelmed?

Right now, I'm aware of problems in Texas. Don't know how widespread or if other states are, though.

Re: Teachers are ready to quit rather than put their lives at risk

#843

Post by war1025 » Sat, Jul 18, 2020, 4:22 AM UTC

kingaillas wrote: post #766

isthispermanent wrote: post #718

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is what I'm talking about. I want to preface this with: I've voted blue ticket my entire life... The numbers just do not back this claim up. NY/NJ/CT all have the absolute worst outcomes so far. NY and Gov Cuomo couldn't be more adored by the media. Meanwhile the red south and others that never locked down are sitting at about 10% the deaths of the blue northeast. You can say wait two weeks, but we've been waiti…

>NY/NJ/CT all have the absolute worst outcomes so far. They were also hit early in this ongoing pandemic and had to fight hard to get it under control. That red states are now ticking up is a sad commentary on their governance, which is a mix of hubris, denialism, and willful ignorance. > Cases have gone up but deaths have not. The average age of the infected is lowering, and they tend to survive.

> The average age of the infected is lowering, and they tend to survive.

An illness that lasts two weeks and then goes away is a shitty two weeks.

We're sitting at what, a shitty five months now?

I guarantee there are a lot of people out there who would take a rough couple of weeks over what we've done to their livelihoods this year.

Re: Teachers are ready to quit rather than put their lives at risk

#844

Post by kyrra » Sat, Jul 18, 2020, 4:24 AM UTC

diogenescynic wrote: post #258

Oxx wrote: post #189

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Good. The current state of the world is incredibly unnatural when you compare it to even 50 years ago. Everything is too connected. We are so much more efficient, but so much more fragile. The best thing you can do to save the world is save yourself and your family. Less fragility, more robustness at the personal / local level. I am mid twenties, and was homeschooled my entire childhood. My father owned a technology…

I don't think homeschooling is usually like you're describing. Most of the people I have met who were homeschooled were not social adjusted or developed and didn't seem 'normal' by most standards. Most of them had parents who were either extremely religious or some other ideological tendency (survivalist, etc).

How many people have you met that were homeschooled but you just didn't know it? Hard to really quantify something unless you ask the question of every person you've met.

Re: Teachers are ready to quit rather than put their lives at risk

#845

Post by timsally » Sat, Jul 18, 2020, 4:28 AM UTC

rayiner wrote: post #440

not2b wrote: post #230

Earlier quoted context omitted.

All of this is a consequence of ideologies that have become popular in the US both in politics and in business. Having government direct a mobilization is not acceptable. A mandate that people wear masks is not acceptable. Having manufacturing capacity to make low-value products in large numbers in the US is bad business when poorer countries can do it for less. Having spare inventory is bad, because just-in-time man…

We’re not a “country.” We’re 50 different states with a federal government, which doesn’t have public health as one of its assigned roles. This isn’t an ideological point, it’s a bare recitation of fact. Somehow, other federal republics like Germany managed to engage in an effective pandemic response while leaving most of the work to the states. For example, while Germany eventually had a mask order everywhere, the s…

> We’re 50 different states with a federal government, which doesn’t have public health as one of its assigned roles.

COVID is clearly a national security issue, which is squarely a matter for the federal government. The prior administration made pandemic response part of the national security apparatus (i.e. the NSC). According to public testimony, this continues in the current administration despite a reorganization.

You claim a bare recitation of fact, but in my view that is completely inaccurate. There is a fundamental misunderstanding here. One of the first iterations of our government under the Articles of Confederation didn't have a strong enough government to respond to national security threats and we could have lost the war for it. Having a strong federal government that can accomplish things the states cannot is literally the reason for our government as it exists today.

As I mentioned, by our own government's admission pandemic response is a national security issue. There are two additional reasons why this is clear. First, what if the pandemic was started by a biological weapon? Would we still leave it to the states then? Certainly not, yet it would be the same exact pandemic whether started by terrorists or by accident. Second, COVID is going to cost hundreds of thousands of lives and billions of dollars. On and don't forget it literally took a nuclear powered aircraft carrier off the battlefield. It is then by definition a national security issue because of how weak it makes our country.

I generally enjoy your writing on these issues but I think you have the basic structure of our government completely reversed. We threw out the Articles of Confederation and created a stronger federal government because disjoint states did not have the ability to respond to massive threats at the scale of COVID.

One you throw out your designation of COVID as a public health matter and recognize it is an issue of national security (again by our government's own admission) I think a lot of your other arguments do not hold up. Some things that you mention as a matter of law are clearly correct with respect to masks. But the idea that "nobody thought pandemic response was mainly a federal responsibility" is completely false and counter to the ideals of our government after the Confederation Period.

Re: Teachers are ready to quit rather than put their lives at risk

#846

Post by sigotirandolas » Sat, Jul 18, 2020, 4:35 AM UTC

jimbokun wrote: post #488

RestlessMind wrote: post #423

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Let's see - US government instituted reasonably prompt lockdowns. They mailed one-time stimulus checks to everyone, gave 600$ unemployment insurance boosts, ramped up hospital capacities, opened up other support measures for businesses and allowed 50 parallel experiments (at state level) to see what works and what doesn't. Was the response perfect? Certainly not. Did some other countries do better? I'm sure we could…

The US has handled the pandemic worse than any country in the world, except maybe Brazil. Otherwise, I can't think of a country that has handled it worse. Which countries are doing a worse job than the US in handling Coronavirus, in your opinion?

Spain and UK all had a fair amount of drama and government incompetence, still have worse death/1M stats than the USA by a fair margin, and are forecasted to be hit harder economically (-11% vs -7% USA in 2020 GDP). It's still way too early to tell if they are actually going to end up worse, since this is still going at full swing in the USA, and there are a lot of uncertain factors, but I think there's a fair chance they end up being as bad or worse than USA.

Re: Teachers are ready to quit rather than put their lives at risk

#847

Post by bandushrew » Sat, Jul 18, 2020, 4:48 AM UTC

isthispermanent wrote: post #777

samatman wrote: post #668

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It appears to have worked for New Zealand, though notably, not anywhere else, even Australia. So you can argue that it was infeasible, and I would have to agree with you. But you can't argue it was impossible.

Not infeasible no, I agree. But, if you want to know what draconian policy really is, you can look at NZ. That place is no joke. It's state-managed isolation or a quarantine facility for at least 14 days and until you test negative. There are a bunch of reports of people breaking out of these facilities after having been there for more than a month. Just zero chance this would work in America.

Thats overstating it a little. or even a lot.

Nobody has been in those places for more than a month, its 2 weeks.

The 'escapees' so far have been an alcoholic (went to the nearest bottle store) and a couple of people with mental issues.

The REASON those people escaped is because the places aren't prisons, or even close. They were hotels, high quality hotels in some places...with no police presence at all...

There was a bunch of fuss made by the public because it was eventually realised that people were being allowed out without testing to attend funerals under a compassionate exemption.

Your description makes it sound like something very different to the reality.

Its toughening up a little now, because everyone in NZ wanted them to toughen up, but for a long while the reality was that all you had to do to leave was decide that you wanted to leave.

Most people didn't, of course, because most people aren't dicks.

Re: Teachers are ready to quit rather than put their lives at risk

#848

Post by theonething » Sat, Jul 18, 2020, 4:50 AM UTC

oramit wrote: post #358

What we currently have going on right now is a complete collapse in confidence. So many commenters are debating the death rate, case counts, hospitalizations, etc, which is all besides the point. Heres the thing: even if you believe people are being irrationally afraid, telling people they are stupid and should just suck it up isn't going to get people to cooperate. Do you want to be smugly right, or do you want thin…

> we didn't follow through with the lockdown nationally to actually stomp the virus

Do you think an enforced national lockdown is feasible in the US?

Given the size of the country, the culture of independence, the relatively loose union of 50 states and other factors, my answer is no.

Re: Teachers are ready to quit rather than put their lives at risk

#849

Post by rahimnathwani » Sat, Jul 18, 2020, 4:56 AM UTC

diogenescynic wrote: post #258

Oxx wrote: post #189

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Good. The current state of the world is incredibly unnatural when you compare it to even 50 years ago. Everything is too connected. We are so much more efficient, but so much more fragile. The best thing you can do to save the world is save yourself and your family. Less fragility, more robustness at the personal / local level. I am mid twenties, and was homeschooled my entire childhood. My father owned a technology…

I don't think homeschooling is usually like you're describing. Most of the people I have met who were homeschooled were not social adjusted or developed and didn't seem 'normal' by most standards. Most of them had parents who were either extremely religious or some other ideological tendency (survivalist, etc).

The ideology is the common-causal variable.

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

Re: Teachers are ready to quit rather than put their lives at risk

#850

Post by viraptor » Sat, Jul 18, 2020, 4:57 AM UTC

war1025 wrote: post #843

kingaillas wrote: post #766

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>NY/NJ/CT all have the absolute worst outcomes so far. They were also hit early in this ongoing pandemic and had to fight hard to get it under control. That red states are now ticking up is a sad commentary on their governance, which is a mix of hubris, denialism, and willful ignorance. > Cases have gone up but deaths have not. The average age of the infected is lowering, and they tend to survive.

> The average age of the infected is lowering, and they tend to survive. An illness that lasts two weeks and then goes away is a shitty two weeks. We're sitting at what, a shitty five months now? I guarantee there are a lot of people out there who would take a rough couple of weeks over what we've done to their livelihoods this year.

> An illness that lasts two weeks and then goes away

Two big assumptions. This is true for many, but between this and death we also have people sick for months or with possibly permanent health damage. We also have completely asymptomatic cases. It's a spectrum, not few specific outcomes.