4 ms·

99% of mask usage was wasteful and pointless safety theater, like wearing them outdoors. similarly, most natural gas is used for power generation and industria

99% of mask usage was wasteful and pointless safety theater, like wearing them outdoors. similarly, most natural gas is used for power generation and industrial processes. in the US, only ~15% is used residentially, and most of that is for home heating, water heating, and clothes drying. about 1/3 of our national energy use is derived from natural gas, so you're on the order of 1% (or less) of national energy being consumed by natural gas cooking. it's a tiny problem in the energy pollution mix. we'd be much better served in this regard by focusing all our efforts on reducing carbon pollution from electricity production and transportation, which accounts for well over half of the problem, not a tiny slice like gas cooking because it's a "small sacrifice".

HarryHirsch 5y ago
I'm reminded of fluorine chemistry. Back in the days before the Montreal Protocol you could get all sorts of halofluorocarbon starting materials for pennies because they were byproducts of CFC manufacture. But nowadays cost is prohibitive, a 100 g can of CF2Br2 will set you back hundreds because it's a specialty chemical and the paperwork is outrageous. It's a genuinely small sacrifice for most, but for a select few there's great cost.
- willis936 5y ago
  SF6, CFCs, etc. The increased costs fixed the problem: labs now use closed loops instead of purging to atmosphere daily. Same story with helium, though not for environmental reasons. That's the system working.
DangitBobby 5y ago
> 99% of mask usage was wasteful and pointless safety theater, like wearing them outdoors. False. Wearing masks is a very simple, safe way to reduce spreading your infection to others [1]. Please stop spreading misinformation. 1. https://www.ucsf.edu/news/2020/06/417906/still-confused-about-masks-heres-science-behind-how-face-masks-prevent https://www.ucsf.edu/news/2020/06/417906/still-confused-abou...
- clairity 5y ago
  false, distancing is even simpler and more effective in a wider variety of situations, and suffers from none of the inane identitarian signalling to boot. stop spreading misinformation.
  - DangitBobby 5y ago
    Social distancing is another example of a sacrifice that people were unwilling to make. Though I wouldn't call it minor.
  - jasonwatkinspdx 5y ago
    You can do both. The only identitarian signaling I see in this thread is your post with it's view on people who simply think it's reasonable to wear a mask, even outside.
- gruez 5y ago
  control-f for "outdoor" in your source: 0 results
  - DangitBobby 5y ago
    I honestly can not even wrap my head around why they included the word "outdoor" in their original comment since outside use is such a miniscule portion of mask usage that I have no idea how it could meaningfully contribute to the 99% figure. I didn't really take it to be sincere, maybe more of an accidental strawman. So I guess I just ignored it.
Dylan16807 5y ago
> 99% of mask usage was wasteful and pointless safety theater, like wearing them outdoors. You'll have to do better than that. Yes, outdoor use was probably a waste of time. I would also say it was worth doing until we had data. But then, what else? Outdoor use is just a fraction. How do you get from that to 99%?
- clairity 5y ago
  pretty much all public mask wearing was performative rather than effective. even indoors, besides care settings (hospitals, nursing homes) and social-focused venues (bars, clubs), most of the work was being implicitly done by distancing. almost no public venue was dense enough that casual proximity was more than an exceedingly remote risk (lightning strike level). most risk was with friends & family in private spaces, and those are overwhelmingly the least likely around whom you’d mask, but where it would have had real mitigative effect. instead, we masked outdoors and at the grocery store because of a wrongheaded focus on strangers in public spaces rather than familiars in private spaces, resulting in 99% useless safety theater.
  - dailyanchovy 5y ago
    Also, where I live it is permitted to wear fabric face masks that do not protect against the virus. They do stop drops of sneeze granted. I think those type of masks are useful for reminding others to keep their distance more than they are for actually protecting against the virus.
  - Dylan16807 5y ago
    It's not that easy to distance properly in a grocery store when people keep moving around and there isn't good airflow. And if you live with someone it's pretty hard to avoid spreading sickness with just a mask. What percentage of transmission do you think happened between friends and family that don't live together? And you didn't even mention the workplace, which I would expect to be a huge issue and also a big chunk of mask use. It's possible that the things you're saying are right but you need a lot more evidence of transmission rates in different situations.

HarryHirsch 5y ago

I'm reminded of fluorine chemistry. Back in the days before the Montreal Protocol you could get all sorts of halofluorocarbon starting materials for pennies because they were byproducts of CFC manufacture. But nowadays cost is prohibitive, a 100 g can of CF2Br2 will set you back hundreds because it's a specialty chemical and the paperwork is outrageous. It's a genuinely small sacrifice for most, but for a select few there's great cost.

willis936 5y ago
SF6, CFCs, etc. The increased costs fixed the problem: labs now use closed loops instead of purging to atmosphere daily. Same story with helium, though not for environmental reasons. That's the system working.

DangitBobby 5y ago

> 99% of mask usage was wasteful and pointless safety theater, like wearing them outdoors. False. Wearing masks is a very simple, safe way to reduce spreading your infection to others [1]. Please stop spreading misinformation. 1. https://www.ucsf.edu/news/2020/06/417906/still-confused-about-masks-heres-science-behind-how-face-masks-prevent https://www.ucsf.edu/news/2020/06/417906/still-confused-abou...

clairity 5y ago
false, distancing is even simpler and more effective in a wider variety of situations, and suffers from none of the inane identitarian signalling to boot. stop spreading misinformation.
- DangitBobby 5y ago
  Social distancing is another example of a sacrifice that people were unwilling to make. Though I wouldn't call it minor.
- jasonwatkinspdx 5y ago
  You can do both. The only identitarian signaling I see in this thread is your post with it's view on people who simply think it's reasonable to wear a mask, even outside.
gruez 5y ago
control-f for "outdoor" in your source: 0 results
- DangitBobby 5y ago
  I honestly can not even wrap my head around why they included the word "outdoor" in their original comment since outside use is such a miniscule portion of mask usage that I have no idea how it could meaningfully contribute to the 99% figure. I didn't really take it to be sincere, maybe more of an accidental strawman. So I guess I just ignored it.

Dylan16807 5y ago

> 99% of mask usage was wasteful and pointless safety theater, like wearing them outdoors. You'll have to do better than that. Yes, outdoor use was probably a waste of time. I would also say it was worth doing until we had data. But then, what else? Outdoor use is just a fraction. How do you get from that to 99%?

clairity 5y ago
pretty much all public mask wearing was performative rather than effective. even indoors, besides care settings (hospitals, nursing homes) and social-focused venues (bars, clubs), most of the work was being implicitly done by distancing. almost no public venue was dense enough that casual proximity was more than an exceedingly remote risk (lightning strike level). most risk was with friends & family in private spaces, and those are overwhelmingly the least likely around whom you’d mask, but where it would have had real mitigative effect. instead, we masked outdoors and at the grocery store because of a wrongheaded focus on strangers in public spaces rather than familiars in private spaces, resulting in 99% useless safety theater.
- dailyanchovy 5y ago
  Also, where I live it is permitted to wear fabric face masks that do not protect against the virus. They do stop drops of sneeze granted. I think those type of masks are useful for reminding others to keep their distance more than they are for actually protecting against the virus.
- Dylan16807 5y ago
  It's not that easy to distance properly in a grocery store when people keep moving around and there isn't good airflow. And if you live with someone it's pretty hard to avoid spreading sickness with just a mask. What percentage of transmission do you think happened between friends and family that don't live together? And you didn't even mention the workplace, which I would expect to be a huge issue and also a big chunk of mask use. It's possible that the things you're saying are right but you need a lot more evidence of transmission rates in different situations.