4 ms·

Turning the world into a 'safe space' – but at what cost?

11 points by s9w 6y ago

Barrin92 6y ago
Honestly a horrible article. From comparing the current state of affairs to Henry Simon's utopian socialism, or asserting that Bill Gates symphatizes with Chinese authoritarianism, or even the term 'hygienic fascism' and Italian blackshirts and "climate crusader Jerry Brown". Are we looking at the same US here? The US can't even get people to wear masks properly while cases are exploding and riots took place. I'm pretty sure the US is far away from Brave New World technocracy. What strikes me as oddly 'fascist' if we are going to use that word is this acceptance of death and disease in the name of freedom, as if safety does not matter and mom and pops and the sick and the weak have to be sacrified so the economy can keep going and the youth can enjoy their beachtime. I mean it really betrays a childish worldview to think safety and freedom are polar opposites. Public health is a requirement, not an enemy of freedom. You don't have much freedom if your lungs don't work.
- meritganset 6y ago
  > You don't have much freedom if your lungs don't work. Freedom and safety may not be polar opposites, but there's certainly tension between them. Many believe that you should have the freedom to decide what to do with your own lungs. The idea that you lose freedom because your lungs don't work seems to be a willful misinterpretation of the idea of freedom from government.
  - Barrin92 6y ago
    If the reason why your lungs don't work is a virus, as in this case, you're not just talking about your own freedom, you're talking about the freedoms of others. And given that these brave people are the first ones to line up in the ER, this is obviously an issue of public health, it has the word 'public' in the name for a reason. We're living in complex societies where reckless behaviour puts others at risk. If you live on a sheep farm in the appalachians do with your lungs what you want, the reality of modern urban society is that we're interconnected. In that context freedom and safety are mutually dependent, even reinforcing. The idea of "I can do with my X whatever I want" and then stop thinking there and calling everyone a fascist or an oligarch made a lot of sense if you're a 18th century homesteader, it doesn't make much sense today.
  - Isinlor 6y ago
    Should you have freedom to walk naked? Nudists were advocating this kind of freedom for a long time. I personally have sympathy for this point of view. Passing COVID-19 or flu onto another person, especially elderly, may kill that person. Walking naked with mask if you keep your body clean as far as I can see will not kill anybody. So, why should we enforce clothes if we do not enforce masks?
    - voisin 6y ago
      Bans on public nudity are almost certainly motivated by moral decency and not subjecting children to this, not for health reasons.
      - Isinlor 6y ago
        I know. So, just to be sure. Are you suggesting that limiting freedom because of "moral decency" is ok, but limiting freedom because you can kill people is not? And what is "moral decency" anyway, because in many Asian countries people will look at you as if you are breaking moral standards when without a mask. Also, children are perfectly able to handle asexual nudity. A lot of countries in Europe allow being top-less in public places like beaches. There is just no way to justify things like enforcing bras on women, but not enforcing masks in crowded places during pandemic.
- bluejay2 6y ago
  > mom and pops and the sick and the weak have to be sacrified so the economy can keep going and the youth can enjoy their beachtime Are there no sacrifices involved in shutting down the economy or preventing kids from having normal lives (whether its beach time or attending school)? Are not some of those sacrifices also a matter of life and death?
  - Barrin92 6y ago
    If everyone complies for a relatively short amount of time? No, not really. Most of the sacrificies enacted in countries like Taiwan were mundane, and included doing exactly the opposite of what the author is advocating for. Listening to experts, following guidelines, complying with public health authorities, and collective discipline.
- chrisco255 6y ago
  Look, if you want to live in a bubble, you should be free to strap on an airtight suit and walk around in it. Personally, I'm healthy, young, symptomless, and I've got a strong immune system and I'm fully aware of the risks of disease. But life is too short to spend years of your short existence cowering in fear or being arbitrarily controlled with what you can and can't do by power hungry politicians who think they can regulate nanometer sized viruses out of existence. The cost is way too high. My ancestors went to war to fight for freedom. Many of them died on the battlefield. I don't take that for granted, and I do not consent to yielding it to Covid Karens.
  - Barrin92 6y ago
    >Look, if you want to live in a bubble, you should be free to strap on an airtight suit and walk around in it. In my country we did that for three months and now we have 100 infections per day and everyone's life has returned to 90% normal. Which was literally my point. If you on occassion listen to experts and officials and do what they say then you don't need to tell yourself stories about your brave ancestors and their battles in the normandy, you simply solve problems, and then life goes back to normal, without deaths and with the freedoms you had before.
    - chrisco255 6y ago
      What's 90% normal? Are you able to go to church, concerts, movies, school, bars, restaurants, with no mask requirements and no occupancy requirements?
recursivedoubts 6y ago
It is obvious now that if totalitarianism is to be imposed on a modern country, the easiest route is via scientific authority coupled with technological tools. In the US, the constitution (such as it is) was voided and very few people objected. (This is an objective fact, not a value judgement. I am as confused and concerned as the next person.) That does not mean that the current situation is an attempt to impose a totalitarian system, but it does give me pause.
- chrisco255 6y ago
  An indefinite state of emergency is an indefinite state of tyranny. I don't like any of this one bit. The arbitrariness of the Covid restrictions, quarantining the healthy, the symptomless, and the young, who show extremely low levels of susceptibility...is crazy. We've never approached a pandemic in this way in human history. Even during Spanish flu, which was several orders of magnitude more deadly than Covid, there was a few weeks of shutdown in a handful of cities and mask wearing mandated in a handful of cities for a few weeks at most. In my particular state, Texas, 3300 have died from Covid. 6 months into the pandemic. Population 27 million. In 2018 we lost over 10,000 to the common flu. At this pace Covid will have fewer deaths than the flu in 2018. I think they've turned the entire planet into a TSA checkpoint. Asinine process, arbitrary rules, shutting down businesses who have no legal recourse, forcing compliance and huge fines for not doing so. This is all too much. An individual has the sovereignty to assess their own risks. Give people information, but let them make their own choices. I have yet to hear when these arbitrary draconian policies will be rolled back. The disease may be with us forever. Somehow our ancestors went through Spanish flu, tuberculosis, polio, and smallpox without these sweeping policies. It's quite maddening.
  - donclark 6y ago
    How many of people contracted Covid-19 and will have health issues for the rest of their lives? How does that compare to the flu?
    - recursivedoubts 6y ago
BrandoElFollito 6y ago
This also depends on the country. We have in France a heightened level of terrorist attacks (plan vigipirate). This is in place for two years now and gradually everybody starts to ignore it because the authorities did not lower it. It started on everyday life, then schools were not that protected anymore, then the administration buildings. I actually had to look up whether it is still in place. So you have countries where a long state of alert can turn into tyranny, then you have France where everybody ignores it after some time.

11 points by s9w 6y ago

Honestly a horrible article. From comparing the current state of affairs to Henry Simon's utopian socialism, or asserting that Bill Gates symphatizes with Chinese authoritarianism, or even the term 'hygienic fascism' and Italian blackshirts and "climate crusader Jerry Brown". Are we looking at the same US here? The US can't even get people to wear masks properly while cases are exploding and riots took place. I'm pretty sure the US is far away from Brave New World technocracy. What strikes me as oddly 'fascist' if we are going to use that word is this acceptance of death and disease in the name of freedom, as if safety does not matter and mom and pops and the sick and the weak have to be sacrified so the economy can keep going and the youth can enjoy their beachtime. I mean it really betrays a childish worldview to think safety and freedom are polar opposites. Public health is a requirement, not an enemy of freedom. You don't have much freedom if your lungs don't work.

meritganset 6y ago
> You don't have much freedom if your lungs don't work. Freedom and safety may not be polar opposites, but there's certainly tension between them. Many believe that you should have the freedom to decide what to do with your own lungs. The idea that you lose freedom because your lungs don't work seems to be a willful misinterpretation of the idea of freedom from government.
- Barrin92 6y ago
  If the reason why your lungs don't work is a virus, as in this case, you're not just talking about your own freedom, you're talking about the freedoms of others. And given that these brave people are the first ones to line up in the ER, this is obviously an issue of public health, it has the word 'public' in the name for a reason. We're living in complex societies where reckless behaviour puts others at risk. If you live on a sheep farm in the appalachians do with your lungs what you want, the reality of modern urban society is that we're interconnected. In that context freedom and safety are mutually dependent, even reinforcing. The idea of "I can do with my X whatever I want" and then stop thinking there and calling everyone a fascist or an oligarch made a lot of sense if you're a 18th century homesteader, it doesn't make much sense today.
- Isinlor 6y ago
  Should you have freedom to walk naked? Nudists were advocating this kind of freedom for a long time. I personally have sympathy for this point of view. Passing COVID-19 or flu onto another person, especially elderly, may kill that person. Walking naked with mask if you keep your body clean as far as I can see will not kill anybody. So, why should we enforce clothes if we do not enforce masks?
  - voisin 6y ago
    Bans on public nudity are almost certainly motivated by moral decency and not subjecting children to this, not for health reasons.
    - Isinlor 6y ago
      I know. So, just to be sure. Are you suggesting that limiting freedom because of "moral decency" is ok, but limiting freedom because you can kill people is not? And what is "moral decency" anyway, because in many Asian countries people will look at you as if you are breaking moral standards when without a mask. Also, children are perfectly able to handle asexual nudity. A lot of countries in Europe allow being top-less in public places like beaches. There is just no way to justify things like enforcing bras on women, but not enforcing masks in crowded places during pandemic.
bluejay2 6y ago
> mom and pops and the sick and the weak have to be sacrified so the economy can keep going and the youth can enjoy their beachtime Are there no sacrifices involved in shutting down the economy or preventing kids from having normal lives (whether its beach time or attending school)? Are not some of those sacrifices also a matter of life and death?
- Barrin92 6y ago
  If everyone complies for a relatively short amount of time? No, not really. Most of the sacrificies enacted in countries like Taiwan were mundane, and included doing exactly the opposite of what the author is advocating for. Listening to experts, following guidelines, complying with public health authorities, and collective discipline.
chrisco255 6y ago
Look, if you want to live in a bubble, you should be free to strap on an airtight suit and walk around in it. Personally, I'm healthy, young, symptomless, and I've got a strong immune system and I'm fully aware of the risks of disease. But life is too short to spend years of your short existence cowering in fear or being arbitrarily controlled with what you can and can't do by power hungry politicians who think they can regulate nanometer sized viruses out of existence. The cost is way too high. My ancestors went to war to fight for freedom. Many of them died on the battlefield. I don't take that for granted, and I do not consent to yielding it to Covid Karens.
- Barrin92 6y ago
  >Look, if you want to live in a bubble, you should be free to strap on an airtight suit and walk around in it. In my country we did that for three months and now we have 100 infections per day and everyone's life has returned to 90% normal. Which was literally my point. If you on occassion listen to experts and officials and do what they say then you don't need to tell yourself stories about your brave ancestors and their battles in the normandy, you simply solve problems, and then life goes back to normal, without deaths and with the freedoms you had before.
  - chrisco255 6y ago
    What's 90% normal? Are you able to go to church, concerts, movies, school, bars, restaurants, with no mask requirements and no occupancy requirements?

recursivedoubts 6y ago

It is obvious now that if totalitarianism is to be imposed on a modern country, the easiest route is via scientific authority coupled with technological tools. In the US, the constitution (such as it is) was voided and very few people objected. (This is an objective fact, not a value judgement. I am as confused and concerned as the next person.) That does not mean that the current situation is an attempt to impose a totalitarian system, but it does give me pause.

chrisco255 6y ago
An indefinite state of emergency is an indefinite state of tyranny. I don't like any of this one bit. The arbitrariness of the Covid restrictions, quarantining the healthy, the symptomless, and the young, who show extremely low levels of susceptibility...is crazy. We've never approached a pandemic in this way in human history. Even during Spanish flu, which was several orders of magnitude more deadly than Covid, there was a few weeks of shutdown in a handful of cities and mask wearing mandated in a handful of cities for a few weeks at most. In my particular state, Texas, 3300 have died from Covid. 6 months into the pandemic. Population 27 million. In 2018 we lost over 10,000 to the common flu. At this pace Covid will have fewer deaths than the flu in 2018. I think they've turned the entire planet into a TSA checkpoint. Asinine process, arbitrary rules, shutting down businesses who have no legal recourse, forcing compliance and huge fines for not doing so. This is all too much. An individual has the sovereignty to assess their own risks. Give people information, but let them make their own choices. I have yet to hear when these arbitrary draconian policies will be rolled back. The disease may be with us forever. Somehow our ancestors went through Spanish flu, tuberculosis, polio, and smallpox without these sweeping policies. It's quite maddening.
- donclark 6y ago
  How many of people contracted Covid-19 and will have health issues for the rest of their lives? How does that compare to the flu?
  - recursivedoubts 6y ago

BrandoElFollito 6y ago

This also depends on the country. We have in France a heightened level of terrorist attacks (plan vigipirate). This is in place for two years now and gradually everybody starts to ignore it because the authorities did not lower it. It started on everyday life, then schools were not that protected anymore, then the administration buildings. I actually had to look up whether it is still in place. So you have countries where a long state of alert can turn into tyranny, then you have France where everybody ignores it after some time.