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The goalposts just moved so far we’re not even on the same field. >> In 1918, several American cities jailed people breaking quarantine or otherwise putting pu
by zaroth 6y ago
The goalposts just moved so far we’re not even on the same field.
>> In 1918, several American cities jailed people breaking quarantine or otherwise putting public health at risk.
And in 2020, several American cities did exactly the same. The link was my citation. Aside from millions of dollars in fines, and hundreds of thousands of small businesses forced shut to the point of financial ruin, yes, people have also been arrested.
>> Public health powers are old, precedented and powerful. They are barely being used here.
Now, the question wasn’t the necessity of the response, or the appropriateness of the response or even the effectiveness of the response.
My incredulity was simply with the characterization of the magnitude of the public health response. The magnitude of the public health response is unprecedentedly and undeniably massive. To say public health powers are barely being applied is wrong, but also unfair to all those who have been directly impacted.
Your opinion that people would be fearful enough of COVID that they wouldn’t have gone out anyway is highly speculative, belied by the data, but also besides the point.
I think your concluding paragraph is entirely inappropriate and against site guidelines. I suggest you delete it. More so, it’s just in bad taste. Two weeks ago an 11 year old shot themselves on a Zoom call. It’s just one of the most grievous examples of the mental health impact of school shutdowns, but the overall mental health of school age children has been broadly effected.
- reissbaker 6y ago> And in 2020, several American cities did exactly the same. Did they? In 1918, people were arrested for leaving their homes without masks on, regardless of whether they were known to be infected. In 1918 San Francisco, people were shot for leaving their homes without masks. A few people being arrested in 2020 for much more serious behavior — breaking quarantine while knowingly infected with COVID — is a pretty far cry from that. That's not to say nothing happened; obviously there were lockdowns, and private businesses were forced to close or reduce occupancy for varying amounts of time depending on the state governments. But individual private citizens were extremely lightly policed in comparison.
- zaroth 6y agoPeople were not shot for leaving their homes without masks. People were shot (innocent bystanders, in one case) during brawls that ensued after being confronted for not wearing masks. I don't know if anyone died from those altercations in 1918, but at least one similar event unfolded in 2020 where a 73 year old man was shot and killed by police; https://www.cp24.com/news/fatal-police-involved-shooting-started-with-assault-call-over-mask-at-ontario-grocery-store-opp-1.5025475 https://www.cp24.com/news/fatal-police-involved-shooting-sta...
- reissbaker 6y agoYour example seems quite different from 1918. In 1918, people were shot when police started a confrontation over their refusal to wear masks. In your example, a man who refused to wear a mask also started assaulting people at a store (because he was angry that they wouldn't service him without a mask), and the police were called only once the assaults started. Then he was shot — because he was assaulting people, not because he refused to wear a mask.