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Are there still people who believe it is just "a few eccentrics"? As someone who has a lot of them in my direct family, extended family, and even Facebook frien

Are there still people who believe it is just "a few eccentrics"? As someone who has a lot of them in my direct family, extended family, and even Facebook friends, my perception is that partisanship has reached a point where there is literal mass delusion out there far left and far right. And in the case of covid19, it feels like at least 10% don't fully believe in it (the level of doubt varying by individual and situational circumstances, like needing immediate medical assistance vs being in good health).

Valgrim 6y ago
>there is literal mass delusion out there far left and far right. What delusion is the "far left" believing in, in your opinion?
- soco 6y ago
  People like to look equidistant, so they will blame all extremes the same out of reflex.
- dx87 6y ago
  That everyone who voted for Trump is a white supremacist. I've seen that attitude quite a bit on this site in the days after the election, and I've seen journalists call minorities white supremacists because they didn't vote for Biden. Some people just refuse to believe that he's anything but a wannabe Hitler, and use that as an excuse to say that they have no reason to try and come together as a country.
  - deleted 6y ago
    [deleted]
  - uoaei 6y ago
    Intention matters less than material consequences. Consider the fact that this last year was the worst for hate crimes for at least a decade. If a whole group of people is propping up a leader who literally and almost exclusively enacts white supremacist policies, and uses white supremacist rhetoric/dogwhistles, what else could you call them?
    - vokep 6y ago
      >a leader who literally and almost exclusively enacts white supremacist policies, and uses white supremacist rhetoric/dogwhistles This is where the rift is. This is not true. Yes, some could take that sort of interpretation of what he's saying, and that sort of interpretation being taken by lots of white supremacists regardless of intention, does mean something. But it doesn't mean much, at least, I don't see why we'd expect that to be any significant effect. Just to bring an example, at least, ime the most common "but he said.." claim. The "fine people on both sides" quote. Many misunderstand what he was actually saying there and actually what happened - the event started with a wide range of people on the right, a general conservative gathering seeming thing. It was organized by white supremacists, which lots attending did not realize until some time passed and they started getting uncomfortable and leaving, by the time people were chanting slurs and all, it went full on neo-nazi rally. Trump clearly did denounce that, and what happened that night, and was speaking to the normal people who had attended in the beginning and left later.
      - uoaei 6y ago
        The people in attendance have the personal responsibility to associate themselves and their actions with movements that reflect their beliefs. "Boo hoo, I didn't know the KKK was racist when I joined" is not a defense that folks will treat with any sympathy. Even if it wasn't their intention, they still messed up, and that onus remains on their head. Either way you look at it, those "fine people" are not fine -- they propped up white supremacists, culminating in the brazen murder of an innocent, non-violent counter-protestor and the random assault of numerous others. Even if they didn't know, their actions contributed to that, and they are to blame as are the outspoken racists. What you are saying is, "those people had the privilege to join that march and support those sentiments because they are not threatened by what the march explicitly represents." This is an inherently racist mode of interacting with the world, because it opens avenues for racist violence and oppression, and emboldens more outspoken racists to commit atrocities. Again, intention matters little when lives are at stake. Your argument enables the banality of evil to persist.
- goldenManatee 6y ago
  I believe it’s a platitude of “fair centrism”, not for its concrete weight but it’s symbolism in addressing “both sides”. Veracity and sincerity come to question, when I see this.
  - uoaei 6y ago
    If you think that's what the "far left" are advocating for, your Overton window is so far right that you can't even see the left.
  - throwaway2048 6y ago
    From personal experience, most leftists seem to despise the concept of "fair centrism" as far as centrists themselves see it as being somehow balanced, or fair (they are neither)
- oceanplexian 6y ago
  The #1 delusion is reporting case numbers as a cause for concern instead of deaths and hospitalizations. The others are the inconsistent science behind government orders, like closing restaurants after 10PM, allowing patrons to go maskless when sitting at a table but not when standing, etc. The last would be lying by omission. Florida had 50% deaths per capita vs. NY but NY is lauded as a shining example of how to handle a pandemic.
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
- silverpepsi 6y ago
  A super important component is that with these extremists, I can tell them exactly what I think and believe, and they will contradict me to my face and say no, that is not true, you believe x y z. And the criteria for the claim is simply that I'm not in wholehearted agreement with them. The degree doesn't matter, the ideology demands absolutely submission. It is a mass delusion to say a substantial portion of the population is unable to self report their own beliefs - to say that your group knows better what millions of outsiders to the group think I think the attacks on an honest intellectual interested in the truth not the answer an ideology demands, specifically the attempt to cancel Steven Pinker is an ideal example of this
sam0x17 6y ago
There is no "mass-delusion" on the far left. We are literally at a point where the current daily cases mean that a month from now we will be having around 3-4k deaths per day based on how many people are already infected NOW. That's a 9/11 terrorist attack per day in deaths. Anyone who doesn't acknowledge that is delusional.
- sam0x17 6y ago
  Don't believe me, do the math yourself. Extrapolating from data on https://coronavirus.jhu.edu/data/mortality https://coronavirus.jhu.edu/data/mortality we get: U.S. mortality rate is 2.29%. Average daily cases for the past week have been hovering around 140k (https://covidtracking.com/data/charts/us-daily-positive https://covidtracking.com/data/charts/us-daily-positive). 140,000 * 0.0229 = 3,206 deaths per day. 9/11 was just 2,977 deaths (https://www.google.com/search?q=9%2F11+deaths https://www.google.com/search?q=9%2F11+deaths) So once the cases from the last few days progress further, we will have 3206/2977 = 1.07692307692 9/11s a day in deaths. note: corrected above, should have said 3k not 9-10k. Misremembered my calculations from earlier this week. Analogy still accurate
- Mindless2112 6y ago
  The delusion of the left is that central planning and control will prevent the spread of the virus. That's not exactly wrong -- it just has to be the level of government control that China has. A lot of Americans, myself included, won't tolerate that. (And for the record, I wear a mask.)
  - sam0x17 6y ago
    It's more of a battle of public opinion -- if people on the right were consistent about mask wearing, and didn't believe that they are immune or the virus is fake or whatever, our ability to contain this would be much greater. Sure, we can't force mask wearing at a federal level, but it sure would help if everyone on Fox and Newsmax were working to encourage the use of masks. That would have more weight than any federal or local mandate unfortunately, so it's unproductive to raise the point you're raising, though I agree. This also comes down to enforcement. Even if a federal mandate were somehow passed, if the people's hearts aren't in it in red areas, cops won't enforce it in those areas and it will be a joke. It really is 100% about public opinion. To your point though, I'm pretty extreme left, and I don't think we are going to have an easy time containing it by any means. It is going to continue to rise months and possibly years into a Biden administration, but I think we'll still have a lot less deaths. No one on the left thinks this is magically going away, even with a vaccine. Distribution and production of a vaccine is incredibly difficult logistically, and these things need to be refrigerated. So at best we're looking at like a year from now we all get a vaccine imo.

Valgrim 6y ago

>there is literal mass delusion out there far left and far right. What delusion is the "far left" believing in, in your opinion?

soco 6y ago
People like to look equidistant, so they will blame all extremes the same out of reflex.
dx87 6y ago
That everyone who voted for Trump is a white supremacist. I've seen that attitude quite a bit on this site in the days after the election, and I've seen journalists call minorities white supremacists because they didn't vote for Biden. Some people just refuse to believe that he's anything but a wannabe Hitler, and use that as an excuse to say that they have no reason to try and come together as a country.
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
- uoaei 6y ago
  Intention matters less than material consequences. Consider the fact that this last year was the worst for hate crimes for at least a decade. If a whole group of people is propping up a leader who literally and almost exclusively enacts white supremacist policies, and uses white supremacist rhetoric/dogwhistles, what else could you call them?
  - vokep 6y ago
    >a leader who literally and almost exclusively enacts white supremacist policies, and uses white supremacist rhetoric/dogwhistles This is where the rift is. This is not true. Yes, some could take that sort of interpretation of what he's saying, and that sort of interpretation being taken by lots of white supremacists regardless of intention, does mean something. But it doesn't mean much, at least, I don't see why we'd expect that to be any significant effect. Just to bring an example, at least, ime the most common "but he said.." claim. The "fine people on both sides" quote. Many misunderstand what he was actually saying there and actually what happened - the event started with a wide range of people on the right, a general conservative gathering seeming thing. It was organized by white supremacists, which lots attending did not realize until some time passed and they started getting uncomfortable and leaving, by the time people were chanting slurs and all, it went full on neo-nazi rally. Trump clearly did denounce that, and what happened that night, and was speaking to the normal people who had attended in the beginning and left later.
    - uoaei 6y ago
      The people in attendance have the personal responsibility to associate themselves and their actions with movements that reflect their beliefs. "Boo hoo, I didn't know the KKK was racist when I joined" is not a defense that folks will treat with any sympathy. Even if it wasn't their intention, they still messed up, and that onus remains on their head. Either way you look at it, those "fine people" are not fine -- they propped up white supremacists, culminating in the brazen murder of an innocent, non-violent counter-protestor and the random assault of numerous others. Even if they didn't know, their actions contributed to that, and they are to blame as are the outspoken racists. What you are saying is, "those people had the privilege to join that march and support those sentiments because they are not threatened by what the march explicitly represents." This is an inherently racist mode of interacting with the world, because it opens avenues for racist violence and oppression, and emboldens more outspoken racists to commit atrocities. Again, intention matters little when lives are at stake. Your argument enables the banality of evil to persist.
goldenManatee 6y ago
I believe it’s a platitude of “fair centrism”, not for its concrete weight but it’s symbolism in addressing “both sides”. Veracity and sincerity come to question, when I see this.
- uoaei 6y ago
  If you think that's what the "far left" are advocating for, your Overton window is so far right that you can't even see the left.
- throwaway2048 6y ago
  From personal experience, most leftists seem to despise the concept of "fair centrism" as far as centrists themselves see it as being somehow balanced, or fair (they are neither)
oceanplexian 6y ago
The #1 delusion is reporting case numbers as a cause for concern instead of deaths and hospitalizations. The others are the inconsistent science behind government orders, like closing restaurants after 10PM, allowing patrons to go maskless when sitting at a table but not when standing, etc. The last would be lying by omission. Florida had 50% deaths per capita vs. NY but NY is lauded as a shining example of how to handle a pandemic.
deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
silverpepsi 6y ago
A super important component is that with these extremists, I can tell them exactly what I think and believe, and they will contradict me to my face and say no, that is not true, you believe x y z. And the criteria for the claim is simply that I'm not in wholehearted agreement with them. The degree doesn't matter, the ideology demands absolutely submission. It is a mass delusion to say a substantial portion of the population is unable to self report their own beliefs - to say that your group knows better what millions of outsiders to the group think I think the attacks on an honest intellectual interested in the truth not the answer an ideology demands, specifically the attempt to cancel Steven Pinker is an ideal example of this

sam0x17 6y ago

There is no "mass-delusion" on the far left. We are literally at a point where the current daily cases mean that a month from now we will be having around 3-4k deaths per day based on how many people are already infected NOW. That's a 9/11 terrorist attack per day in deaths. Anyone who doesn't acknowledge that is delusional.

sam0x17 6y ago
Don't believe me, do the math yourself. Extrapolating from data on https://coronavirus.jhu.edu/data/mortality https://coronavirus.jhu.edu/data/mortality we get: U.S. mortality rate is 2.29%. Average daily cases for the past week have been hovering around 140k (https://covidtracking.com/data/charts/us-daily-positive https://covidtracking.com/data/charts/us-daily-positive). 140,000 * 0.0229 = 3,206 deaths per day. 9/11 was just 2,977 deaths (https://www.google.com/search?q=9%2F11+deaths https://www.google.com/search?q=9%2F11+deaths) So once the cases from the last few days progress further, we will have 3206/2977 = 1.07692307692 9/11s a day in deaths. note: corrected above, should have said 3k not 9-10k. Misremembered my calculations from earlier this week. Analogy still accurate
Mindless2112 6y ago
The delusion of the left is that central planning and control will prevent the spread of the virus. That's not exactly wrong -- it just has to be the level of government control that China has. A lot of Americans, myself included, won't tolerate that. (And for the record, I wear a mask.)
- sam0x17 6y ago
  It's more of a battle of public opinion -- if people on the right were consistent about mask wearing, and didn't believe that they are immune or the virus is fake or whatever, our ability to contain this would be much greater. Sure, we can't force mask wearing at a federal level, but it sure would help if everyone on Fox and Newsmax were working to encourage the use of masks. That would have more weight than any federal or local mandate unfortunately, so it's unproductive to raise the point you're raising, though I agree. This also comes down to enforcement. Even if a federal mandate were somehow passed, if the people's hearts aren't in it in red areas, cops won't enforce it in those areas and it will be a joke. It really is 100% about public opinion. To your point though, I'm pretty extreme left, and I don't think we are going to have an easy time containing it by any means. It is going to continue to rise months and possibly years into a Biden administration, but I think we'll still have a lot less deaths. No one on the left thinks this is magically going away, even with a vaccine. Distribution and production of a vaccine is incredibly difficult logistically, and these things need to be refrigerated. So at best we're looking at like a year from now we all get a vaccine imo.