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South Dakota nurse says many dying patients still insist Covid-19 'not real'

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Re: South Dakota nurse says many dying patients still insist Covid-19 'not real'

#371

Post by dragonwriter »

jjeaff wrote: post #365
NoSorryCannot wrote: post #291

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You are being unpleasant. But even short an ability of the federal government to unilaterally require masks, it can exert a lot of soft power on the states by having a unified and full-throated position. The CDC, OSHA, federal funding incentives, and just having persuasive leadership that doesn't politicize compassionate mask wearing.

Heck, having a president who says masks are important and is seen wearing one in public most of the time and not saying things like "you can wear a mask if you want to, me personally, I'm not going to" would go a long, long way. However, I'm afraid that the cat is already out of the bag and many weak minds have been poisoned that wearing a mask somehow infringes rights or doesn't do anything.

> However, I'm afraid that the cat is already out of the bag and many weak minds have been poisoned that wearing a mask somehow infringes rights or doesn't do anything.

Negative belief in at least the current reality of the pandemic (if not the historical reality of the disease itself), as well as in mitigation measures like masking, has become an important tribal identity marker. That's going to be difficult to counteract, and probably doesn't work on a rational level (that is, even if you could convince someone that the overt rationale was wrong, that would be more likely to prompt a shift in rationalization than a shift in belief.)

Re: South Dakota nurse says many dying patients still insist Covid-19 'not real'

#372

Post by zoolily »

anonfornoreason wrote: post #166
anoonmoose wrote: post #110

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The basis most people provide is either an inaccurate or incomplete understanding of the rights given to US citizens by the Constitution of the United States, unfortunately.

And your statement shows you do not understand the constitution, or more specifically the bill of rights. You are not given them, they are recognized as natural rights not government granted rights, and the bill of rights merely recognizes them. If someone doesn’t want to wear a mask that is their choice. Your choice is to avoid situations where you might be in contact with people who don’t wear masks. It’s not to fo…

Since most states have had public nudity laws on the books for many decades that haven't been struck down as unconstitutional, I don't see how regulations requiring masks in a time of pandemic would be a problem.

Natural rights are a social fiction and have as much or as little power as we believe they have. You appear to have a strong belief in them, but their power is limited by how much you can convince others to believe.

Re: South Dakota nurse says many dying patients still insist Covid-19 'not real'

#373

Post by mattr47 »

chaostheory wrote: post #205
whalesalad wrote: post #12

My wife and I just moved from Orange County, CA to Detroit, MI this last August. We decided to drive the northern route. Heading through Vegas, Utah, Yellowstone and Montana. Then onward through the plains of North Dakota and Minnesota. Turning north we entered Wisconsin and finally the UP (Upper Peninsula) of Michigan. After a few days exploring we turned south to Detroit. In Vegas the concern for masks started to w…

While the SF Bay Area is much better than most of the country, it's still annoying seeing people here not use masks outside of their homes, or wear them improperly. With masks we can get back to normal relatively quickly, but people just need to wear them

Masks will not allow us to get back to normal more quickly. The only thing that will allow that is immunity through vaccinations. Countries other than the US have implemented strict mask & border controls still do not have a handle on the virus.

Re: South Dakota nurse says many dying patients still insist Covid-19 'not real'

#374

Post by jimkleiber »

wil421 wrote: post #217
enumjorge wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don’t know how these healthcare workers do it. Why would I put my physical and mental health in danger to save people who are that selfish? I suspect many of them need the job. But those who do it out of a sense of duty are better people than I am I guess.

I’m shocked that people who’s job it is to save sick people actually have to save sick people. These people took an oath to help people. You can’t pick and choose who you help based on intelligence or even mental illness. It’s also shocking firefighters have to run into fires. /s

I think it's the number of people they have to save in such a short time. Using the firefighter example, it would be like all of a sudden, the whole city caught on fire. And then once the city is out, the next city catches on fire and because there aren't enough firefighters there, you go to help. And then once that city is out, the next, etc.

Added on top of the fact they are worried they'll catch the virus and maybe even spread it to their loved ones. In the US at least, I imagine most nurses thought they would work with less or non-infectious diseases, like cardiovascular diseases, not an outbreak that could lead them to infecting and killing people they loved.

Again, I think there are just some variables that make this situation different than what they thought they were signing up for.

Re: South Dakota nurse says many dying patients still insist Covid-19 'not real'

#375

Post by kjs3 »

agentdrtran wrote: post #196
Diederich wrote: post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is a harsh thing to say, but I understand where you're coming from. We....all of us, all human beings...need to be very patient and merciful with each other. My wife and I know good, honest and smart people who are fully convinced that Covid19 isn't that dangerous, that it's a hoax, etc. I'm not saying "smart" lightly. All humans...even the best of us...are at our core deeply irrational most of the time. Differe…

> My wife and I know good, honest and smart people who are fully convinced that Covid19 isn't that dangerous, that it's a hoax, etc. I'm not saying "smart" lightly. If they have a Ph.D in theoretical physics but think COVID is a hoax they're still dumb, sorry.

I wouldn't say that. There are different kinds of "smart", and then there is "poor analytical skills". There are "smart" people, for many values of "smart", that still have such poor analytical skills that they think Covid is fake, the earth is flat, bigfoot is real, Elvis is alive, etc. Just calling them 'dumb' doesn't get to root cause.

Re: South Dakota nurse says many dying patients still insist Covid-19 'not real'

#376

Post by busrf »

Diederich wrote: post #195
dkural wrote: post #119

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why do you think they're good and smart, why do they think Covid19 is a hoax? Surely a good person would try to do the safe thing even if they had doubts.

I worked with a guy named Danny many years ago. He was one of the smartest programmers I'd ever met. Not only did he write great code, but he also always maintained an excellent connection to the his customers who would use the programs he wrote. This was in a hospital. Personally, he was kind, generous, excellent family man. He never really talked too much about politics, didn't care too much for it. He also helped…

Thank you for this comment.

One thing that I have noticed myself and some other engineers I know being susceptible to is the desire to view the world as systematic, ordered, certain, and understandable. It’s a desire to find the root cause to everything, to understand the reason behind everything, and to package that up into a chain of causality that fits within my mind.

The positive side of this is that many of these attributes are needed to be a good engineer. The negative side is, at least for me, trouble dealing with chaos or ambiguity in the world or anything that has an unclear explanation.

Maybe this contributes to being more susceptible to conspiracy thinking. I am not sure; that’s a question for social scientists to uncover.

Re: South Dakota nurse says many dying patients still insist Covid-19 'not real'

#377

Post by Bombthecat »

coding123 wrote: post #107
whalesalad wrote: post #12

My wife and I just moved from Orange County, CA to Detroit, MI this last August. We decided to drive the northern route. Heading through Vegas, Utah, Yellowstone and Montana. Then onward through the plains of North Dakota and Minnesota. Turning north we entered Wisconsin and finally the UP (Upper Peninsula) of Michigan. After a few days exploring we turned south to Detroit. In Vegas the concern for masks started to w…

It's actually the state governments that's at fault here. Not the specifically the people. Let me tell you I was in back-country Oregon recently, some of the MOST republican places within Oregon, not going to name drop the county. Anyway, the Oregon state government is very much democratic (cause you know Portland). But because of that, even the republican counties are under a mask order. And the extremely red counti…

Yeah, but uhhh shouldn't you change your view while dying?? I mean... That's just plain insane.

I'm reminded of monthy python: those lost arms?!? Just a scratch!

Re: South Dakota nurse says many dying patients still insist Covid-19 'not real'

#378

Post by _-david-_ »

mike_h wrote: post #157

Covid is turning out to be a disease of culture. The same virus hit the East and the West. The East got through it, the West is on its knees.

I saw some people say there were two different strains. One that went East and one that went West. I don't know how accurate that is, but it may not be identical.

Re: South Dakota nurse says many dying patients still insist Covid-19 'not real'

#379

Post by kn0where »

clairity wrote: post #357
mikelockz wrote: post #337

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> the primary appeal of masks is for quelling fear and anxiety, not preventing spread. The appeal of masks for me is definitely to lower spread. Yes there is signaling, but also because masks reduce amount of possibly covid-infected droplets expelled from the mouth and nose while breathing and speaking. It is not possible to have a 6 foot bubble around everybody at all times. It is possible to always wear a mask. Thi…

that's rationalization, not science. feel free to wear a mask everywhere if it makes you feel better and aligns with your mediosocial affiliations, but the breadth of science show that masks are effective in specific, marginal situations, not everywhere, and that its population-level effects are drowned out by other, better mitigations.

Maybe we’ve been reading very different breadths of science. Saying masks only work in a small number of situations sounds more like rationalization for not wearing one when we know aerosols are a major source of spread, and that masks significantly reduce aerosol transmission.

Re: South Dakota nurse says many dying patients still insist Covid-19 'not real'

#380

Post by jimkleiber »

Diederich wrote: post #95
nappy-doo wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I work on the mobile contact tracing effort (FAANG), and I am exhausted thinking about it as well, and I don't even risk my life everyday. Part of me wants to say, "fuck these idiots that don't wear masks, just die," but know that they will just get others sick on the way, and use up scarce resources.

This is a harsh thing to say, but I understand where you're coming from. We....all of us, all human beings...need to be very patient and merciful with each other. My wife and I know good, honest and smart people who are fully convinced that Covid19 isn't that dangerous, that it's a hoax, etc. I'm not saying "smart" lightly. All humans...even the best of us...are at our core deeply irrational most of the time. Differe…

I appreciate this. It says to me that we humans are very emotional beings, whether we want to admit it or not. I think many cultures have a tendency to forget that emotions drive our behaviors, or are afraid to admit—feeling about feelings :-)

I wish we would spend more time talking about what people were feeling more so than what they were believing. Like you, I know many people whom I admire for their intelligence who seem to have fallen into a deep distrust of many institutions and individuals in society. How we feel can really distort how we think and what we believe.

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