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I don't actually believe in freedoms. One person's freedom to do what they want with their body conflicts with another person's freedom to live in a drug free

I don't actually believe in freedoms. One person's freedom to do what they want with their body conflicts with another person's freedom to live in a drug free society. This leads to a semantic argument over the word and what freedoms are right or wrong, which is just trying to construct your own axiomatic system, but you can't ever prove the correctness of the axioms that you adopt. Its a pointless endless argument and you can't ever come to any agreement. The thing to look at is outcomes and unintended consequences. And really this about the fact that our hospitals and ICUs are going to fill up and we only have a limited supply of people to run them, even if we could have Elon Musk pump out a million ventilators or something. Getting coercive about vaccinations is something that apparently has to happen because not enough people are doing it. And the vast majority of people do actually want an ICU to go to if they get into a bad car accident. That's why freedoms don't actually matter. Our hospitals are turning into fucking warzones and we should be dealing with this like we're on a war footing. And in this case the enemy is a virus, not human, we should be able to agree as a species that we'd like to defeat its efforts. Instead we have humans with brainworms simping for the virus.

dangerlibrary 5y ago
The emphasis on freedoms comes about in the context of a world where powerful entities (governments, private corporations, wealthy individuals) are often oppressive, cruel, and/or corrupt. In that context, it is useful to constrain their power at all times - even when it has negative consequences in the short term. In the immediate circumstances, I don't disagree with you - but that's a result of the circumstances. We happen to have an extraordinarily safe and effective vaccine available, and COVID-19 is debilitating, deadly, and causing havoc in our healthcare system. It's less obvious that anti-disease measures governments took in the past, or may take in the future, should be seen as uncontroversial. Taken to an extreme, your argument could be used to prevent the propagation of certain combinations of genes. Similar arguments were also used to justify mass-spraying DDT to eliminate malaria. https://www.cdc.gov/malaria/about/history/elimination_us.html https://www.cdc.gov/malaria/about/history/elimination_us.htm...
- lamontcg 5y ago
  mass spraying DDT has some large unintended consequences. probably so does preventing the propagation of certain genes. when i mentioned unintended consequences i very specifically meant that no policy can be considered in a vacuum without considering externalities, blow back and the response to of human society to those policies. for example, a world where aborton is illegal and clotheshanger abortions didn't happen isn't one of the possible options. it all needs to get tested against actual reality and not wishful thinking.

dangerlibrary 5y ago

The emphasis on freedoms comes about in the context of a world where powerful entities (governments, private corporations, wealthy individuals) are often oppressive, cruel, and/or corrupt. In that context, it is useful to constrain their power at all times - even when it has negative consequences in the short term. In the immediate circumstances, I don't disagree with you - but that's a result of the circumstances. We happen to have an extraordinarily safe and effective vaccine available, and COVID-19 is debilitating, deadly, and causing havoc in our healthcare system. It's less obvious that anti-disease measures governments took in the past, or may take in the future, should be seen as uncontroversial. Taken to an extreme, your argument could be used to prevent the propagation of certain combinations of genes. Similar arguments were also used to justify mass-spraying DDT to eliminate malaria. https://www.cdc.gov/malaria/about/history/elimination_us.html https://www.cdc.gov/malaria/about/history/elimination_us.htm...

lamontcg 5y ago
mass spraying DDT has some large unintended consequences. probably so does preventing the propagation of certain genes. when i mentioned unintended consequences i very specifically meant that no policy can be considered in a vacuum without considering externalities, blow back and the response to of human society to those policies. for example, a world where aborton is illegal and clotheshanger abortions didn't happen isn't one of the possible options. it all needs to get tested against actual reality and not wishful thinking.