Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

How Twitter moderated the Covid debate

thefp.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

281–290 of 986 posts

Re: How Twitter moderated the Covid debate

#281

Post by Nomentatus »

unity1001 wrote: post #208
RyanShook wrote: post #20

I'm not a conspiracy theorist but I think the longest lasting legacy of covid will be the distrust it created for big government, big pharma, and big tech.

> the distrust it created for big government, big pharma, and big tech. No worries. The people will forget it just like they forgot the Iraq War, the Avandia drug scandal, the Three Mile island, the Mexican gulf oil leak, Iran-Contra and everything else. They will vote in the election. The administration will change. And despite the incoming administrations will be staffed fully by the SAME people who staffed the adm…

History strongly shows that epidemics do change political consciousness, toward psychological conservatism. It will take two generations (as with economic depressions) before things get anything like as loose and sloppy again. We'll fail in other ways, meanwhile. Eventually, UK citizens lost their faith in the aristocratic system. But they did. I may be kidding myself but I think there will be some permanent change from this.

Re: How Twitter moderated the Covid debate

#282

Post by kornhole »

barbazoo wrote: post #223
kornhole wrote: post #113

What might been useful to mention here is how much money was being paid by big pharma in advertising dollars to the platforms and in campaign contributions. It was and still is an enormous amount.

Source?

I am proud that this comment earned me a -3, but I looked up information for you: 2020 spend on social media Pharma advertising was $152M. https://www.fiercepharma.com/special-report/top-10-ad-spende...

2020 spend on dark money contributions was over $500M https://www.opensecrets.org/news/2020/12/pharma-lobby-poured... Direct campaign contributions were less: https://www.opensecrets.org/industries/indus.php?ind=h04

Re: How Twitter moderated the Covid debate

#283

Post by Nomentatus »

mmcgaha wrote: post #197
AustinDev wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am a conspiracy theorist[1], and this was all well known since before we even did '2 weeks to slow the spread'. I'm just glad some of the mainstream folks are figuring it out now. [1]: The term "conspiracy theory" is itself the subject of a conspiracy theory, which claims the term was popularized by the CIA in order to discredit conspiratorial believers, particularly critics of the Warren Commission, by making them…

The best part about being a conspiracy theorist is not having myocarditis.

Heart problems caused by the virus, especially if you haven't been vaccinated, are far more frequent and severe than from the vaccination. Our immune system is powerful and can hurt us all by itself; but it's powerful because it has to be.

Re: How Twitter moderated the Covid debate

#284

Post by 88913527 »

matheusmoreira wrote: post #279
seneca wrote: post #258

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sorry, are you suggesting that people without a college education are too ignorant to make judgements about their own health and that it's therefore ok to lie to them? This sort of high handed paternalism is exactly the attitude that has destroyed faith in institutions.

That's exactly what they are suggesting, unfortunately. I was about to reply to another comment but I think it was deleted. I think what I wrote is important enough to post here anyways. > It's obvious the messaging landed on was chosen was to maximize the individual choice to vaccinate as that was reasoned to the best possible outcome for all. This is inducing people to pick the choice you consider correct. This is…

If people are as indeed as smart as you and your parent commenter say they are, then they will understand there doesn't exist any risk-free medical procedure. Having to remind of them of that fact is the kind of patronizing you both seem to be rallying against, after all. The argument could evolve further to say, the messaging doesn't matter at all, since everyone is smart enough to make their own choice, so why be upset about it? Or, stated in other words, when exactly where they lied to if you claim they're smart enough to dissect the nuance? I guess the ultimate terminus of this discussion is the interpretation of what it means to characterize the vaccine as safe.

Re: How Twitter moderated the Covid debate

#286

Post by AnimalMuppet »

wmf wrote: post #271
dannyw wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are very real people who have been harmed by side effects from the vaccine. Whether the virus itself would've been more deadly is a question for another time, but if your loved ones were unlucky enough to get myocarditis from the vaccine, and you were silenced on social media, sometimes invisibly like you're being gaslit, and so were the doctors and researchers, it's easier to understand the strong emotional re…

Side effects you say? Obligatory reminder that millions (maybe over 10 million) of anti-vaxers have long covid.

That sounds like you're part of the gaslighting. What, no non-anti-vaxxers got long Covid? Don't kid yourself. (And even if you do, don't try to kid us.)

Re: How Twitter moderated the Covid debate

#290

Post by Nomentatus »

cma wrote: post #73
RyanShook wrote: post #20

I'm not a conspiracy theorist but I think the longest lasting legacy of covid will be the distrust it created for big government, big pharma, and big tech.

For me it gave a big distrust of conspiracy theorists and reflexive contrarians, due to things like the ivermectin saga.

It gave me a reflexive distrust of both sides. Govt officials utterly ignorant of the published research and happy to contradict it then reverse themselves next week; and unread citizens cheerfully making up their own fantasy worlds.

I was prepared with 20 N95 masks (ten years old but carefully sealed for a pandemic.) Which didn't matter because the provincial care workers spread the illness like wildfire through my building (they were seeing clients willy nilly all over the place, with no PPE, and with rules that forbid them from taking a day off with a note from a doctor who's face they'd breathed into. Also with no PPE.)

The vaccination story was a big win; and that was the decision that counted. So science won, and govts got the one key choice right, China aside. Antivaccers, zero.

Post reply on HN