Google and Facebook mandate vaccines for employees at U.S. offices • Hacker News Board

Re: Google and Facebook mandate vaccines for employees at U.S. offices

#281

Post by avh02 » Thu, Jul 29, 2021, 7:48 AM UTC

oldcigarette wrote: post #90

I work at google and am vaxxed but this pisses me off. I decided that the vaccine was worth the risk and for the best overall but if someone makes a different calculus I can understand and respect that. IMHO they gone way outside the reasonable scope of an employer - this is a cultural decision at the society level - why the fuck does my employer give a shit about this. Unless the employees are only commuting back an…

what i think people forget is that this isn't (IMO) about what the company wants or whatever, it's about the fact that offices are a nasty space where everybody breathes everybody's air - and diseases simply don't give a crap about where that happens. I'm pretty sure if google were an outdoor office complex where everybody sat 10 meters apart from each other they wouldn't give a crap about your vaccination status.

If anything, i think it has highlighted things like how cramped public transport, bars, clubs, etc really are and we just never paid it attention.

At the end of the day, this is one of the mitigations of a disease's spread and an office is somewhere it can happen. Let me flip it: Remote work ends and you now have to go back in, you're not vaccinated because [whatever reason you want] and you inevitably end up contracting the virus (along with it's risks). (My pessimistic guess is: people then sue the company for unsafe working conditions.)

Re: Google and Facebook mandate vaccines for employees at U.S. offices

#282

Post by grepfru_it » Thu, Jul 29, 2021, 7:49 AM UTC

yosito wrote: post #270

marton78 wrote: post #190

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not sure I can explain anything related to the FDA (I'm European) but maybe I can shed some light on the insight what people are worried about. These vaccines have been applied hundreds of million times in the past year, true. Therefore, we have a very good understanding of their adverse effects in the first 6-12 months. What we cannot know, however, are possible adverse effects that are longer term. Susceptibili…

> If these vaccines were regular, inactivated virus vaccines There are also inactivated viral vector vaccines for COVID. I got J&J because it was what was available to me. I would have gotten an mRNA vaccine if I could. I agree that the mRNA vaccines should be studied for long term effects, but with what we know about them so far, my prediction is that we will find them to be much safer in the long term than viral ve…

>I expect that

I challenge you to try again without assumptions! Unless you are saying, for those who are unsure of long term health risks, to just follow your expectations?

Please take a pause before replying to understand why people are hesitant to blindly follow the blind

Re: Google and Facebook mandate vaccines for employees at U.S. offices

#283

Post by White_Wolf » Thu, Jul 29, 2021, 7:51 AM UTC

ngc248 wrote: post #213

colechristensen wrote: post #169

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One has to believe at some point that liberty is worth a certain amount of risk. >Do you believe that someone's refusal to comply with basic sanitary precautions should take precedence over my and my family and loved one's desire to not die of a preventable disease? Did you and your family get vaccinated? What unvaccinated people do does not affect your risk profile in any meaningful way. Are your kids too young to g…

>>> One has to believe at some point that liberty is worth a certain amount of risk. Others will be taking a risk for your liberty, that is where it becomes unacceptable. We live in a society and individual freedoms must be balanced by the responsibilities towards your fellow man.

Maybe I'm missing something obvious here but arent those that don't want the vaccine a risk just for themselves? If they want to risk it it's their problem/choice.

One thing everyone seems to ignore is those people that have immunity/antibodies and don't actually need a vaccine. Why is that?

As far as I managed to read here and there not even the shot I had protects me from catching or spreading the virus. It only reduces(at least I hope) the damage done when infected even though my age group should be ok-ish even without.

Re: Google and Facebook mandate vaccines for employees at U.S. offices

#284

Post by machinelearning » Thu, Jul 29, 2021, 7:52 AM UTC

TulliusCicero wrote: post #246

ReadEvalPost wrote: post #222

I'm really upset with this decision. I have not gotten the vaccine as I prefer the known, extremely low risk of contacting COVID over the unknown longitudinal risk of the vaccine. My right to make these personal decisions regarding my bodily autonomy is extremely important to me. Under no circumstances will I yield that decision to my employer! Their demand only further reinforces my desire not to take the vaccine. W…

We've had mandatory vaccinations for public schools for decades, and it's largely a settled issue. This is no different. If people want to put others at risk of harm, employers are under no obligation to indulge them.

> This is no different.

To be fair, it actually is different. The mechanism of action and the EUA timelines are different and unlike most other widely available vaccines. It is ok to disagree on the crux of the argument which is whether taking the vaccine is a net good, but non-factual arguments do not help.

Re: Google and Facebook mandate vaccines for employees at U.S. offices

#285

Post by acituan » Thu, Jul 29, 2021, 7:53 AM UTC

nindalf wrote: post #184

I’ve typed out 3 comments to 3 separate people before deleting them. I didn’t see the point. Folks, it’s a good idea to heed dang’s warning at the top of the thread. I’ve read all the comments and can confidently say there’s nothing worth reading here. Just people absolutely convinced of their ideas and principles, shouting past each other. Nothing we haven’t seen on this topic 50 times before. You’re better off goin…

> I’ve read all the comments and can confidently say there’s nothing worth reading here

I particularly dislike this type of comments, which tell people what to feel and think about a thread, however well meaning it might be. You're in a performative contradiction when you shallowly dismiss the entire thread with an overgeneralization and with that make it definitely less useful.

Yes, this thread is more divided than your usual one, but I personally found useful nuggets of information in the comments, so it is definitely not "nothing worth reading".

Re: Google and Facebook mandate vaccines for employees at U.S. offices

#286

Post by TulliusCicero » Thu, Jul 29, 2021, 7:53 AM UTC

RubberMullet wrote: post #272

TulliusCicero wrote: post #264

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's a war that has to be fought. It's like...hmm, it's like "racism is great" vs "racism is awful". These two opinions can't really exist in society in large numbers simultaneously without explosive results. Eventually, one side has to win. That's the only way you get peace. That's the way I see it, anyway. edit: an example, and a counter-example. Gay marriage is the example: there was never going to be a steady equ…

> it's like "racism is great" vs "racism is awful" Or like "racism is great" vs "racism is awful" vs "this isn't racism".

Maybe? Anyway, the main point is that there has to be a resolution, and that will only come about through conflict of some kind, which is what we're seeing playing out.

People don't want to hear this, but does anyone have a plausible alternative that might actually happen? Where a debate like this was resolved sans conflict?

Re: Google and Facebook mandate vaccines for employees at U.S. offices

#287

Post by Layke1123 » Thu, Jul 29, 2021, 7:55 AM UTC

nindalf wrote: post #184

I’ve typed out 3 comments to 3 separate people before deleting them. I didn’t see the point. Folks, it’s a good idea to heed dang’s warning at the top of the thread. I’ve read all the comments and can confidently say there’s nothing worth reading here. Just people absolutely convinced of their ideas and principles, shouting past each other. Nothing we haven’t seen on this topic 50 times before. You’re better off goin…

Get vaccinated you idiot.

Re: Google and Facebook mandate vaccines for employees at U.S. offices

#288

Post by chopin » Thu, Jul 29, 2021, 7:55 AM UTC

yosito wrote: post #270

marton78 wrote: post #190

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not sure I can explain anything related to the FDA (I'm European) but maybe I can shed some light on the insight what people are worried about. These vaccines have been applied hundreds of million times in the past year, true. Therefore, we have a very good understanding of their adverse effects in the first 6-12 months. What we cannot know, however, are possible adverse effects that are longer term. Susceptibili…

> If these vaccines were regular, inactivated virus vaccines There are also inactivated viral vector vaccines for COVID. I got J&J because it was what was available to me. I would have gotten an mRNA vaccine if I could. I agree that the mRNA vaccines should be studied for long term effects, but with what we know about them so far, my prediction is that we will find them to be much safer in the long term than viral ve…

Afaik at least for the Adenovirus based ones these have not been used before as well.

Re: Google and Facebook mandate vaccines for employees at U.S. offices

#289

Post by grepfru_it » Thu, Jul 29, 2021, 7:56 AM UTC

throwawaysea wrote: post #182

FreakyT wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Exactly -- people are still free to not get vaccinated, but they're not free to go to aggregate settings where they might infect everyone there, which seems like a reasonable compromise. It's the same approach as with antivax parents -- don't want your kids vaccinated? Then you'll need to homeschool them.

> Then you'll need to homeschool them. This would be fair if the equivalent public school spending for that student were instead given back to parents as a voucher to spend on homeschooling or on a different education provider of their choice with different vaccination requirements. But otherwise there is a financial coercion into divulging health choices or giving up bodily autonomy that doesn’t feel right to me.

Remember when employer-sponsered healthcare plans tried to mandate how birth control could be used by women? I couldn't help but notice a lot of people arguing against their own rights.. and now here we are

Re: Google and Facebook mandate vaccines for employees at U.S. offices

#290

Post by TulliusCicero » Thu, Jul 29, 2021, 7:57 AM UTC

machinelearning wrote: post #284

TulliusCicero wrote: post #246

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We've had mandatory vaccinations for public schools for decades, and it's largely a settled issue. This is no different. If people want to put others at risk of harm, employers are under no obligation to indulge them.

> This is no different. To be fair, it actually is different. The mechanism of action and the EUA timelines are different and unlike most other widely available vaccines. It is ok to disagree on the crux of the argument which is whether taking the vaccine is a net good, but non-factual arguments do not help.

Obviously some of the details are different, they're different for every contagion, but the principle is the same: the interest in public health overrides the normal interest in preserving individual bodily autonomy, just like with vaccinations and schooling.