Re: Corona Virus: is it the beginning of the end?
Carving time.
Accman wrote:
"No Jade, we don't always do whatever we can to make sure others are safe. This is why we have accidents caused by drunk driving, and those caused by people texting on their phones when they should be focused on the roads."
Yeah. These are outliers, people who are *gasp!* deliberately doing stupid things to endanger others. Sound familiar? When you get behind the wheel of a car while drunk, you're making a decision, however muddy, to operate your vehicle, and given that your reflexes and inhibitions are impaired, it's a ridiculous choice to consider. But hey, at least drunk people are, y'know, drunk. They've been impacted by a substance they willingly imbibed which has screwed with their ability to do the right thing. What excuse do you have?
As I said, these people are outliers. You know what I was trying to say in my previous post, so don't try and distract from the point I'm making. Safety guidelines are everywhere. The fact that some people ignore them only proves my point. Usually, those who do it are being selfish to one degree or another. Sometimes, no harm is done; at other times, somebody dies. The drunk driver who has three too many, drives home and kills someone is not a murderer; they didn't mean to kill anyone, but they made the choices which led directly to that person's death. A person who goes into an environment where a virus is loose, without protection, willingly and repeatedly, when others are advising caution and where others could get sick and die, is in pretty much the same boat. Next!
Accman wrote:
"Also, since when is it right to make people pay fines up to 1,000 dollars for not wearing a mask as I've been seeing in some states. Also, since when is it suddenly right to put someone in jail for not wearing one as has been mandated in some states? No, this is going too far."
If you're going to deliberately choose to endanger the lives of others, and common sense won't reach you, then fines and jail time may be the next best thing. First they tried asking. Then they tried pleading. Americans still wanted to get their hair cut and spend time on the beach, and numbers started spiking again. Past a certain point, tough times call for tough measures. If you won't play nice and actually consider the lives of others - not their well-being or livelihoods, but their actual lives - then I think it's only reasonable that you be called to account for it. In a ton of instances, driving while on your cell phone hurts nobody, but it does increase the risk that you hurt or kill someone else, or yourself. You can be fined for it. What makes this any different, really? Personally, I'm especially fond of fines over jail time, since the prison system is already a hot mess in America and that will just put you in closer contact with other idiots who aren't going to wear masks, increasing the likelihood of a Covid-19 outbreak inside the jail. Which, now that I think of it, would be both tragic and sort of ironic...
Accman wrote:
"You're example of wearing the right kind of gear for welding is good, and sensible too, but you don't spread a welding virus so that is kind of like fitting a square peg into a round hole."
So which is it? Is it a sensible comparison or not? Because in your first breath you're supporting it, and in the next you're condemning it (square peg, round hole). No, you can't spread a welding virus, of course. In fact, by not wearing protective gear, you actually don't risk hurting anyone else, but you would almost certainly hurt yourself. You have no problem with protection that helps you only, but have an issue when you're being asked to help others. I see how it is now.
Accman wrote:
"Again, whatever you think is best for you, that is what you should do. If it helps others, wonderful. I am well aware of the health risks that go with not wearing a mask, but I am also aware of those that come with wearing them, and they aren't worth it. There is scientific evidence on both side of this which is why we should make up our own minds on that."
Proof. You're short on proof and long on vaguery. You're basically throwing your hands up and asking to be left alone; it's a version of "you say tomato, I say tomatto", but that's not necessarily how this works. It presupposes that your assertions are equal to mine, have similar proof to mine, have equal or perhaps greater validity than mine, but you have yet to furnish a single shred of evidence to support your claim. I've already demonstrated in multitudinous ways that masks are effective at lowering the risk (read: not eliminating the risk entirely) of Covid-19 transmission. As far as science that proves that masks are harmful? Sure, if you're a COPD patient, or have other breathing problems, or are morbidly obese, or have other specific medical ailments, sure. Do you have an ailment that makes breathing difficult? Because now would be a really good time to disclose that, if you're going to. I somehow doubt this to be the case, however, since if you had a breathing problem and said so, explained that you wearing a mask would actually risk your own life by significantly lowering your OSAT levels, we wouldn't even be arguing. There are people who don't wear masks for bonna fide medical reasons, because these masks represent a greater risk to their health than they're worth. I won't bother those people, and I believe that some sort of accommodations should be put in place for people who have legitimate health problems. But "I can't smell things" is not a legitimate health problem, and as I pointed out before, your right to smell freely is not equal to someone else's right to live. So no, they're not equal. Whatever risks a mask might represent are limited almost entirely to those with pre-existing conditions, but since we're talking about you here, this really doesn't qualify. Sorry. Next!
Accman wrote:
"Testing certainly is a double-edged sword. What if you get tested and it shows positive. You later find out, after your being isolated from the rest of the world that the test was in fact a false positive. Congratulations, you just wasted two weeks of your life, two weeks you're not going to get back. There have been proven to bee a great deal of false positives. I guess in the end there really is no perfect solution for it."
Okay, let's unpack this. False positives do happen, and more tests will naturally yield more false positives. For these people, it's going to mean two weeks where they are in self-isolation, and it may also result in considerable anxiety (a fact you neglected to mention, by the way, and I find it telling that you focus on the lost time only). So okay, yeah, that sucks, I'll grant you, but hey, at least at the end of those few weeks, you come out with your health fully intact and can breathe a sigh of relief. False alarm; everything's okay. Life will go on..But now look at the other side of this. More testing also means more true positives, because more people are being tested. Stands to reason, right? More confirmed positive cases means more people to be treated, which will result in more lives saved overall. These are people who might well have died without treatment. They weren't just going to have their lives suck for two weeks; some of them would die without the test and the subsequent treatment that a positive diagnose would lead to. So on one pan of the balance scale, you have anxiety, annoyance and isolation. On the other, you have improved quality of life, and in some cases, life itself that would otherwise have been lost. I don't know about you, but that's not even close to an even balance.
My advice: don't even try for a utilitarian bioethics-based example. Don't even think about leveraging the argument that hospitals aren't equipped for the flood of patients more confirmed positives would represent. For one thing, you already tried saying that at least in Pennsylvania, they're basically way, way overprepared for anything (I mean, you only talked about ventilators, but I guess those dang ventilators can just about run themselves, and don't need teams of overworked doctors and nurses to bother with the sick patients who will need them, right?). For another thing, this gets into the thorny question of slowing down testing to deliberately lower the burden on the medical system. Embracing this philosophy also tacitly admits from an entirely new angle that the best way forward is to just let some people die, because that's apparently how we will conquer this pandemic. But then you have to start asking what sort of criteria allows you to be tested. Who gets included, and who gets excluded? And why? And that is not something that you, I, or anyone here is in a position to make decisions on. So yeah, don't waste your time. It won't go well for you.
Accman wrote:
"If living in fear of something like this is what makes you feel good, then do it. I have explained this and the science behind it and that isn't good enough. It's almost like you want to be afraid of this thing, and expect everyone else to join in. I know that isn't the case, but I'm just saying that is what it feels like to me."
You have not really explained any science at all. You've waved in the general direction of some numbers for Pennsylvania that do not even come close to representing either the country as a whole or the pandemic's reality, and...that's pretty much it. No, I do not advocate for fear. When I go out of my home, masked or otherwise, I am not afraid. I am cautious. I do not make a point of hugging strangers, cuddling up next to people on buses or whatnot, but I'm also not just going to cower in fear for the foreseeable future either. Unlike you, I know that masks do lower the risk of transmission. Unlike you, I'm willing to protect myself and others, because I recognize that my desire to preserve my own life is perfectly reasonable, and my desire to preserve the lives of others if I can is likewise a good thing. That's not fear; it's civic responsibility. I'm sorry you can't seem to figure out the difference, but that's not really my problem.
Accman wrote:
"I am sorry that others may get sick from this, but I am not going to mask up just to step out of my own home. That is absolutely ridiculous, and I will not go along with doing that."`
So you finish on a high note: "I'm sorry that people are getting sick but not sorry enough to do anything about it." Normally, when people say that they're sorry, it means that they want to fix it if they can. They want to do something about it. "I'm sorry", when said when you have no intention to change your behaviour, is not only meaningless, it's fucking insulting. You cannot be truly sorry that people will get sick if you do not intend to do your part in minimizing their risk. You can't test them, treat them and cure them. You can't give them masks, make them wear said masks or make them practise proper hygiene. There are a ton of variables you can't control, but there are a few variables that you are in complete control of, and you won't even bend on those. As such, you aren't sorry a bit. Stop feeding us bullshit, dude. It just leaves a really bad taste.
-- Audiogames-reflector mailing list Audiogames-reflector@sabahattin-gucukoglu.com https://sabahattin-gucukoglu.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/audiogames-reflector
