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America is giving up on the pandemic?

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Re: America is giving up on the pandemic?

#191

Post by messick »

ianai wrote: post #35
lostapathy wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think this is a lot of it, for better or worse. I feel like a lot of people are afraid to talk about anything but the protests lately, lest they be branded as not supporting the protests.

What’s crazy though is for the first time in my life I actually fear for the future existence of the US. I watched 9/11 in real time and that didn’t feel as much of a threat to our existence as this does. There’s an actual civil war movement among the extremists now. I don’t think that existed during the civil rights movement days, even. Nor even the Vietnam fallout.

Nah man, the cops don’t have it in them to actually destroy the country. Those extremists will quit long before then.

Re: America is giving up on the pandemic?

#192

Post by messick »

alexilliamson wrote: post #75
ianai wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What’s crazy though is for the first time in my life I actually fear for the future existence of the US. I watched 9/11 in real time and that didn’t feel as much of a threat to our existence as this does. There’s an actual civil war movement among the extremists now. I don’t think that existed during the civil rights movement days, even. Nor even the Vietnam fallout.

White supremacists have wanted civil war since... the actual civil war? I'm not sure there has ever been a point when civil war was not on the table among extremists. Do you have particular current examples that are especially disconcerting?

Pretty sure OP was calling the people peacefully protesting police brutality as “the extremists”.

Re: America is giving up on the pandemic?

#193

Post by metrokoi »

axguscbklp wrote: post #180
bryant wrote: post #130

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

The thing is, normalizing against population figures goes both ways. Yes, in incidents of white-on-black or black-on-white homicide, for every 10 million white people in the US, ~26 were victimized whereas ~53 for every 10 million black people. But there are more than 4 times as many white people as black people in the country. It is of course a drastic simplification, but if we roughly say that the average black per…

Yes, if my math is correct the number of whites victimized by blacks should be ~10 per 10 million if crime was affected by percentage of the population alone since whites are 70 percent of the pop. and blacks 12. Of course pure statistics should not be the only way of looking at the world.

Re: America is giving up on the pandemic?

#194

Post by gruez »

throwmehaweh wrote: post #144
twblalock wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Their statements make sense if you realize that public health experts have not been speaking to the American people the way scientists would speak to an informed audience. They were being political because they didn't think the people could handle nuance. They oversimplified the explanation of the science and pushed for lockdowns at all costs with no exceptions. Now, by admitting there are exceptions, they reveal tha…

It’s the epitome of hypocrisy. How could anyone take them seriously now that they’ve shown to be complete frauds? Is it any wonder that half the country doesn’t trust the government lockdowns? “Stay inside”, “don’t gather in groups”, “cancel your wedding”, “wear a mask during sex”, but oh hey, it’s OK to go downtown and riot, burn down buildings, and throw bricks at the police.

>but oh hey, it’s OK to go downtown and riot, burn down buildings, and throw bricks at the police.

This is not a good faith depiction of what the protesters are doing.

Re: America is giving up on the pandemic?

#195

Post by ianai »

messick wrote: post #192
alexilliamson wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

White supremacists have wanted civil war since... the actual civil war? I'm not sure there has ever been a point when civil war was not on the table among extremists. Do you have particular current examples that are especially disconcerting?

Pretty sure OP was calling the people peacefully protesting police brutality as “the extremists”.

Nope.

Re: America is giving up on the pandemic?

#196

Post by pstuart »

mydongle wrote: post #138
pstuart wrote: post #129

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

It seems you see this in terms of idea and theory. I am looking at things from a greater view, seeing the actual effect and impact of things. This is the same thing when health experts told everyone masks don't work. They were wrong. And you will be wrong as well. Since if you believe I am against the protest, then it's in my benefit that the protests continue, so all my supposed enemies die off. Believe what you wan…

The "masks don't work" message the beginning was a tragic mistake. I think I understand why it might have come to be, but it was a mistake nonetheless.

Mistakes happen. If we learn from them they become lessons.

I do see this in terms of idea and theory, as well as practice. These protests are a legitimate response to systematic abuse. It clearly has peoples attention, and that's a good thing from my perspective.

I don't want to be wrong, so could you clarify exactly how I'm wrong? In supporting protests? In taking the letter you cited on its word that social distancing and other preventative measures should be taken by protesters?

I can only guess that you are against these protests, in that you quoted them as "protests" and can only cite the the negatives you see (not enough social distancing and too much violence).

If the current administration prevails, I will indeed be on the wrong side of history by virtue of who is writing it, and why. I'm proud to be on the side that opposes fascism and I don't need external approval to know that authoritarianism does not promote a just society.

Re: America is giving up on the pandemic?

#197

Post by pstuart »

mydongle wrote: post #142
mrcorona wrote: post #137

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People living in a certain form of hell aren't afraid of dying of corona... I personally would rather die of pneumonia than 20 or so bullets to the back from an agent of the state operating with a hair trigger and impunity. Do people really think MLK felt safe when he was protesting? He was brave, new assassination was likely, and still marched.

Yeah, but if all the proponents of BLM die to Covid-19, who is going to be there to keep up the fight afterward? This is all very short-term thinking. There are other ways to protest.

> There are other ways to protest

I'm genuinely curious. Would you care to elaborate?

Re: America is giving up on the pandemic?

#198

Post by _red »

twblalock wrote: post #109
metrokoi wrote: post #90

Quoted from a letter from 1,000 health professionals on the virus and protests [0] >However, as public health advocates, we do not condemn these gatherings as risky for COVID-19 transmission. We support them as vital to the national public health and to the threatened health specifically of Black people in the United States. We can show that support by facilitating safest protesting practices without detracting from…

Their statements make sense if you realize that public health experts have not been speaking to the American people the way scientists would speak to an informed audience. They were being political because they didn't think the people could handle nuance. They oversimplified the explanation of the science and pushed for lockdowns at all costs with no exceptions. Now, by admitting there are exceptions, they reveal tha…

There something more going on. In the past 3 months the following narratives have been pushed by the MSM:

1 - Trump is a racist for suggesting that borders should exist

2 - Trump is liable all covid deaths for not closing the borders fast enough

3 - The state/police are great for enforcing stay-at-home orders and social distancing

4 - We need thousands or millions to assemble in the streets to fight police

This is the type of schizophrenic messaging that happens during societal collapse.

Re: America is giving up on the pandemic?

#199

Post by messick »

jl6 wrote: post #103
6gvONxR4sf7o wrote: post #43

I support the protests, and believe they can be done safely, but we can't forget about the virus. A quick googling gives me numbers between 300 and 1000 people dying of police violence per year. Call it 1k-2k per year. If we eliminate 50-100 years of that, we match what coronavirus has done in a couple months. However, places are starting to relax the shelter-in-place rules already, so people going out now isn't comp…

Is that 300-1000 unjustified deaths, or does it also include situations where the use of deadly force may have been reasonable?

I guess it’s certainly “possible” that US cops justifiably shoot and kill more people every year than most counties have done of the last hundred (assuming they have ever done it at all), just not very possible.

Re: America is giving up on the pandemic?

#200

Post by neonate »

Barrin92 wrote: post #4

The concerns are right but public assembly is critical in a democracy, and cannot be put on hold indefinitely. It's probably the most fundamental right in any civil society and with all these takes I have seen on twitter about COVID and the protests, a lot of people seem to seriously unerestimate the value that free assembly has. Covid as bad as it is will be an issue of the near future, civil rights gains or losses…

The issue is the double standard with which some protestors were condemned while others were lauded based solely on which causes (and which classes of people) the commenters happened to politically support. It's transparently unprincipled, to the point of being a sad joke.
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