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The silenced deaths of the Shanghai 2022 lockdown

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Re: The silenced deaths of the Shanghai 2022 lockdown

#261

Post by whimsicalism »

philliphaydon wrote: post #221
whimsicalism wrote: post #201

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Even if all of that is true, China has had so few covid cases that even that wouldn't explain the difference.

Sure they did aggressive lockdowns. Welded people into apartments and buildings. Etc. and that absolutely contributed to lower covid numbers. But it doesn’t change the fact the reported numbers are massively censored and doctored.

Not to the tune of millions of lives. Nobody who is studying this thinks that China had millions of covid deaths and managed to hide them.

Claims to the contrary are fringe conspiracy theories. The "lab leak" hypothesis is way more probable than the idea that they have hidden 3 million deaths and the associated covid spread... It's just not possible.

Re: The silenced deaths of the Shanghai 2022 lockdown

#262

Post by jsiaajdsdaa »

inglor_cz wrote: post #242
cmarschner wrote: post #231

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The body also needs some other nutrients than the carbs you‘d find in potatoes and rice…

Potatoes are actually the better option. IIRC there was a long experiment in pre-war Poland (University of Lwow, now Lviv in Ukraine) to demonstrate that potatoes consumed with milk, sour cream etc., while very being a very monotonous diet, can nevertheless sustain adults without causing them nutritional deficiencies. Of course, you need to be able to tolerate milk, which many East Asians aren't.

Furthermore, the Irish survived on potatoes and cream alone.

Re: The silenced deaths of the Shanghai 2022 lockdown

#263

Post by whimsicalism »

mikem170 wrote: post #255
sofixa wrote: post #229

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Human rights include the right to life and liberty Literally the first one is to life. https://www.un.org/en/global-issues/human-rights#:~:text=Hum... .

But is it ok to take away others' rights? The UDHR you linked to mentioned freedom from detention, freedom of movement, the right to peacefully assemble, to work, leisure, and education, and to participate in cultural life. All of these rights were negatively impacted by lockdowns which many people did not agree with. In the example of the pandemic: Would it have been better to offer support for the vulnerable (peopl…

Sorry is the "freedom of movement" clause the one that is immediately followed by:

> 3. The above-mentioned rights shall not be subject to any restrictions except those which are provided by law, are necessary to protect national security, public order (ordre public), public health or morals or the rights and freedoms of others, and are consistent with the other rights recognized in the present Covenant.

Or is there some other clause you are referring to that this is actually violating?

Re: The silenced deaths of the Shanghai 2022 lockdown

#264

Post by onlyrealcuzzo »

the_omegist wrote: post #238
open-source-ux wrote: post #7

According to this BBC video report, more Shanghai residents are venting their anger and frustration by posting videos on social media. Such videos are normally censored by China's 'Great Firewall'. The BBC website states: "...the sheer volume of the clips has made it difficult for censors to keep up. Many are also being passed around in private group chats, which has made them harder to catch." Shanghai lockdown: How…

Can anyone explain how an automated filtering/censorship system can't "keep up" with this, technically? Even with a tiny delay, it seems to me the problematic videos or posts could be taken down easily. It's not like every Chinese citizen is posting terabytes of data daily...

My understanding is that normal people have to find and manually block a lot of the content. That's why it can't keep up - because there's MUCH more content to block now than normal.

Anyone?

Re: The silenced deaths of the Shanghai 2022 lockdown

#265

Post by whimsicalism »

nradov wrote: post #214
munk-a wrote: post #111

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If people weren't so resistant to government policy we might have seen something close to zero covid rolled out in the US and, instead of the US being the locus of disease for a number of years, we might have actually ended this pandemic with a decisive but painful quarantine - instead we'll continue in this state of psuedo quarantine for who knows how many years... how we comport ourselves today might just be the ne…

That's just nonsense completely divorced from scientific reality. Even a strict quarantine wouldn't have sufficed to stop a highly contagious respiratory virus with multiple animal reservoirs. It's now clear that the best strategy would have been to focus on protecting the most vulnerable, as recommended by leading experts back in 2020. https://gbdeclaration.org/

WWe have successfully eradicated SARS, a respiratory virus, in the past. If we had actually responded faster we could have done the same.

China has averted 3 million deaths and most of the country has been free of lockdown for the last 2 years once they got the virus under control. That is "scientific reality". Claims that China's numbers are problematic, while probably true, are not the same as saying that China has hidden millions of covid deaths, which basically nobody who studies this believes.

Re: The silenced deaths of the Shanghai 2022 lockdown

#266

Post by onlyrealcuzzo »

natch wrote: post #171

The urge to exert authority that the author speaks of in the beginning is disturbing. Having seen how they do it in China first hand, I am horrified to imagine the fate that awaits Taiwan if China ever takes over. The pent up (falsely based, imho) anger amongst PRC people toward Taiwan and its friendly people is difficult to overstate. If this (Shanghai) is how they treat their own locals, imagine how they will treat…

We can already look to Hong Kong for that.

Re: The silenced deaths of the Shanghai 2022 lockdown

#267

Post by BobbyJo »

seanmcdirmid wrote: post #235
BobbyJo wrote: post #210

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> it isn't CPC driven (rather, private companies are supposed to self censor The CCP dictates what gets filtered, so not sure what you mean by them not 'driving' it. Are you saying that because they don't own the hardware? If so, that's rather pedantic, given that the party has effectively unlimited power to dictate how any given resource is used, and is doing so in this case. > The Great Firewall specifically is pac…

> The CCP dictates what gets filtered That isn’t accurate, the CPC (let’s use the correct acronym at least, even if the word order is different in Chinese) doesn’t dictate, they just tell the private companies “don’t allow anything that will make us mad”, and they then have to enforce rules that aren’t dictated, but are left intentionally very vague. The internet companies would of course be in a much better place if…

> That isn’t accurate, the CPC (let’s use the correct acronym at least, even if the word order is different in Chinese)

No thank you. The English web is still wholey organized around the term CCP. I'm not going to switch my terminology because the party wants me to, no matter how nicely they ask.

> doesn’t dictate, they just tell the private companies “don’t allow anything that will make us mad”,

You are aware of the definition of dictate correct? So, you can see how that is what that is, no? Vague, sure, but that's still a command, and still carries legal consequences if you do it wrong. Just because Xi doesn't feel the need to create a formal list everytime a new meme pops up doesn't make it less of dictation.

> The internet companies would of course be in a much better place if the government just did all the filtering for them

Cost savings for the party I suppose.

> the government simply maintains a list of what to block that all ISPs (most state owned) plug into.

Wait, I thought it was vague? Sounds like it's absolute, just ever changing. That's not what vague means.

Re: The silenced deaths of the Shanghai 2022 lockdown

#268

Post by rini17 »

bllguo wrote: post #243
kharak wrote: post #160

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I didn’t say it was obvious? Even in the western world, it’s sometimes contested. Still, the consequences of having and not having human rights have been observed often enough by now. Including in Chinas (recent) history.

Oh please, spare me. So what did "ample opportunity to learn the lesson" mean? "Observed often enough by now," we don't need to talk any specifics, _obviously_ Western ideals are superior! End of history and all that jazz, huh? I was hoping for more critical thought when you rightly mentioned this to be a "deeply philosophical problem."

I understood parent as: The unnecessary deaths count in China since the Great Leap is obvious and provides the learning opportunities. But sadly none are taken and death toll is ongoing. But hopefully someday learning and philosophy can take place as it did in the West after the war. If I read that right, what in there is so inflamatory to you?

Re: The silenced deaths of the Shanghai 2022 lockdown

#269

Post by sph »

inglor_cz wrote: post #242
cmarschner wrote: post #231

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The body also needs some other nutrients than the carbs you‘d find in potatoes and rice…

Potatoes are actually the better option. IIRC there was a long experiment in pre-war Poland (University of Lwow, now Lviv in Ukraine) to demonstrate that potatoes consumed with milk, sour cream etc., while very being a very monotonous diet, can nevertheless sustain adults without causing them nutritional deficiencies. Of course, you need to be able to tolerate milk, which many East Asians aren't.

The milk doing all the hard work, as it's a nutritionally complete food to raise babies.

You don't last long on potatoes only. I bet milk only is doable even if very not optimal to an adult body.

Re: The silenced deaths of the Shanghai 2022 lockdown

#270

Post by mikem170 »

whimsicalism wrote: post #263
mikem170 wrote: post #255

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But is it ok to take away others' rights? The UDHR you linked to mentioned freedom from detention, freedom of movement, the right to peacefully assemble, to work, leisure, and education, and to participate in cultural life. All of these rights were negatively impacted by lockdowns which many people did not agree with. In the example of the pandemic: Would it have been better to offer support for the vulnerable (peopl…

Sorry is the "freedom of movement" clause the one that is immediately followed by: > 3. The above-mentioned rights shall not be subject to any restrictions except those which are provided by law, are necessary to protect national security, public order (ordre public), public health or morals or the rights and freedoms of others, and are consistent with the other rights recognized in the present Covenant. Or is there…

The intention behind my reply was to say that the right to life is not the only right that people have, they have many others, and it is not a simple matter of saying one right some people want automatically gets priority at the expense of many other rights for many other people.

I'm not sure if I'm misunderstanding your comment. Are you saying that restricting rights to protect public health is more important than the right of freedom of movement and other rights?

This is why I mentioned the flu as an example of how difficult it can be to draw a line. Why don't we lock down everyone for the flu every year? Is it because the numbers are different? People still die. Even when people agree on the numbers they don't interpret the risk the same. Some people don't think covid was that big a deal, certainly not worth the impact lockdowns had on everyone. And I also mentioned the idea of helping protect the vulnerable without punishing those who don't feel they are vulnerable. I think a lot more could have been done in this regard.

I just don't get why some people feel justified imposing on the rights of others when there are other approaches. Different values, I suppose.

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