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When did being against lockdowns become harmful? Seriously, they're called "lockdowns," because they are the very opposite of things you want to normalize in a

• Kenji 5y ago
  > When did being against lockdowns become harmful? Exactly at the point where lockdowns became profitable for special interests.
• throwoutway 5y ago
  > Anyway, I'm sure it's only temporary I believe you’re being sarcastic, because as free society and governments move more towards authoritarianism, it will become everything but temporary I agree with everything else you said
  • motohagiography 5y ago
    It was the sarcasm of an entire galaxy collapsed into a total singularity of sarcasm, where being anywhere near its event horizon rips the very fabric crappy corporate and political narrative, and nothing that encounters it can persist in that reality thereafter. That's how sarcastic it was.
    • deleted 5y ago
      [deleted]
    • chitowneats 5y ago
      Beautiful.
  • Max_aaa 5y ago
    Nothing is more permanent than a temporary solution. This is an old Soviet proverb. This also applies to tech.
  • unclebucknasty 5y ago
    Genuinely trying to understand the thinking here: I understand the lack of love for lockdowns. But, on this piece about it not being temporary: is the belief genuinely that COVID-related lockdowns are really just a nefarious ploy for introducing longer-term control in order to subvert our freedoms and usher in authoritarianism?
    • colpabar 5y ago
      YES Why is it so hard to recognize that governments like to give themselves special "temporary" powers and then not give them up?
      • gutitout 5y ago
        We don’t teach history.
      • unclebucknasty 5y ago
        >Why is it so hard to recognize that governments like to give themselves special "temporary" powers and then not give them up? No need to be condescending. I understand that it's happened in the past. But, there's an "unintentional slippery slope" concern; then there's the "willful conspiracy" concern. So, I'm asking whether, in this specific instance, people believe it to be the actual intent of the U.S. government to willfully and maliciously use COVID as a pretext for turning the U.S. into an authoritarian regime?
        • colpabar 5y ago
          Again, yes. That is what some people believe. Maybe all these restrictions won't be in place forever, but some people believe that the government is setting precedent by putting them in place at all, and that they won't hesitate to do it again in the future in response to something far less serious. Trust me, we all really hope we're wrong. But that's what we think.
          • unclebucknasty 5y ago
• sellyme 5y ago
  > When did being against lockdowns become harmful? Around March 2020, for most countries. A bit earlier than that in Japan, China, Italy, South Korea, and Iran.
  • tasogare 5y ago
    Hard to take such a reply seriously since Japan never had lockdown and is doing fine without it. Anyway I wholly agree the GP, the West had gone crazy in both the handling of the pandemic and how heavy handed it is with opposition against the ambient madness. And now governments know they can get away with such power tripping without any consequence, situation will continue going worst and worst on the freedom front.
    • sellyme 5y ago
      > is doing fine without it. 17,000 deaths may be a lot better than some other countries, but I certainly wouldn't describe it as "doing fine" compared to the near-zero death counts in regions that imposed fast and strict lockdowns.
      • chitowneats 5y ago
        I'm actually astonished people still believe "fast and strict" lockdowns work, or that they actually happened anywhere. Edit because rate limiting: In any "lockdown" situation, a large percentage of the population must, by definition, exist in the world to enforce the lockdown, deliver food, keep critical services running, tend to the sick, etc. The desirability and feasibility of a "fast and strict" lockdown is a fantasy of the laptop class and/or authoritarian propaganda. Closing borders before there is community spread, a la Australia and NZ, is a separate issue. Those were not "fast". The borders to those countries have been closed since early 2020. In the case of Australia, their citizens cannot even leave without a special permit that is almost never approved. There is currently no end in sight to their "fast and strict" lockdown. In fact, they have increased restrictions in the last several months in an attempt to prevent interstate spread within the country.
• angelzen 5y ago
  Rest assured, the lockdowns will be lifted as soon as we eliminate Covid.
  • chitowneats 5y ago
    We've tested and found covid-positive white-tailed deer all over New York state. Presumably there are other animal reservoirs. We now know that the vaccines widely available (at least those used in the US, Israel, the UK) have waning effectiveness, likely requiring periodic boosters. We also know those vaccines are non-sterilizing, meaning it is at least possible for fully vaccinated individuals to contract and transmit the virus. Even assuming vaccine mandates in perpetuity, and widespread compliance, there will presumably be some overlap of "lapsed effectiveness" in the population between boosters. We literally don't have the capacity to administer boosters to all 200 million American adults exactly at the same instant, or even in the same month. Nor do we know for sure how long the effectiveness window lasts, or whether that may vary between individuals or type of vaccine. How exactly are we going to "eliminate" covid, given this reality? Many Americans are terrified that the goal is "elimination" of the virus. Similar to the War on Terror, wherein we did a tremendous amount of collateral damage endlessly chasing an unattainable ideal.
    • c0nducktr 5y ago
      > We've tested and found covid-positive white-tailed deer all over New York state. Presumably there are other animal reservoirs. Do you regularly interact with white-tailed deer in confined spaces? > We now know that the vaccines widely available (at least those used in the US, Israel, the UK) have waning effectiveness, likely requiring periodic boosters. What's wrong with a vaccine needing boosters? Many do. > We also know those vaccines are non-sterilizing, meaning it is at least possible for fully vaccinated individuals to contract and transmit the virus. Even more reason for people to be vaccinated. It keeps them out of the hospital. Even assuming vaccine mandates in perpetuity, and widespread compliance, there will presumably be some overlap of "lapsed effectiveness" in the population between boosters. We literally don't have the capacity to administer boosters to all 200 million American adults exactly at the same instant, or even in the same month. > Even assuming vaccine mandates in perpetuity, and widespread compliance, there will presumably be some overlap of "lapsed effectiveness" in the population between boosters. Lapsed effectiveness isn't something that prohibits us from containing the virus > We literally don't have the capacity to administer boosters to all 200 million American adults exactly at the same instant, or even in the same month. It's honestly pretty sad that you think we couldn't do this. Have Americans really gotten that lazy? > How exactly we are going to "eliminate" covid, given this reality? Many Americans are terrified that the goal is "elimination" of the virus. Similar to the War on Terror, wherein we did a tremendous amount of collateral damage chasing an endless, unattainable ideal. I'm not sure what to say to this. "We don't care to contain it, therefore its' impossible to contain"?
• vikingerik 5y ago
  Being against lockdowns is harmful to Facebook, because locked-down people consume more Facebook. That's all Facebook really cares about, and everything else is just justification for that.
  • c0nducktr 5y ago
    >because locked-down people consume more Facebook. Do they? If it's all about the money, my guess would be Facebook has lost out on ad revenue, because a lot of the ad payers don't have customers. There's still a third possibility, they're making some moral decision, although that's hard for me to believe given the company's past decisions. Maybe the lost revenue has made them make a moral decision? It could always be a combination of these reasons, and I'm sure there's others I haven't accounted for.
• moistly 5y ago
  > When did being against lockdowns become harmful? When it leads to a healthcare crisis.
• cma 5y ago
  It's a basic public health measure during emergence of a novel communicable disease. No one would question locking down a small town temporarily if it was airborne ebola. You can argue about severity and what is an appropriate response, but to just say lockdown is harmful and off the table no matter how severe and contagious seems insane and suicidal for a society. I'm not responding to what Facebook is doing in the article or coronavirus lockdown response specificly, just your statement: 'Seriously, they're called "lockdowns," because they are the very opposite of things you want to normalize in a free society.' In a free society you still can't drive on the wrong side of the road. You can't go into a business and fire off shots in random directions (maybe won't hit anyone, like you maybe won't infect anyone vulnerable or infect someone else who will go on to during a deadly outbreak).
• endofreach 5y ago
  This is not coming from „east german authoritarian spirit“. This is the west and the uprising „progressive left“ (whatever you want to call it). To me it seems they take on lots of ideas from the US progressives. Especially these „suppress for freedom“ type of thinking. The label they put on the protesters is „querdenker“ - which used to be a cool word to describe thinking differently. The media said they are dangerous since the beginning. Some estimates say there are up to 15-20% of right-extremists partaking in the „protests“. The conclusion for the majority in germany is: there are nazis and that‘s why the protests should be forbidden. Obviously we shouldn‘t allow people fighting against minorities to do whatever they want. But the remaining 80-85% are „normal“ people (a lot might be too esoteric, but hey, that‘s nothing bad per se). „One bad apple, spoils the bunch“, it seems. Though, the current government (mostly of the CDU, party of chancellor Merkel), was involved in a few corruption scandals lately. Politicans are no apples, but these dangerous people wanting their constitutional rights back obviously are. I don‘t like the opinion of the „querdenker“ movement. But i am much more concerned with the german acceptance to restrict their constitutional rights. Germans are good following rules. They‘re no revolutionaries, they‘re top executors. So they should be extra careful on which rules get set. There will not be a lot of people questioning rules as soon as they are set but rather just live by them. as history has taught us more than the one, bad, bad, time. Btw: Even most people in east germany who have important roles are from the west.
  • endofreach 5y ago
    One last addition: i have been to a east german city recently. When i was there, there was no mask mandate anywhere. Not in malls, not in bars, clubs (which weren‘t even open in other cities at that time). Nowhere, except for public transportation. While my city was still in „lockdown“, no private meetings with groups bigger than 10, police checking in on private parties, we had 13x the „incidence rate“. This was one of the cities with the lowest cases in all of germany. I wonder how that‘s possible. Might all these measures not be as effective as we hoped? Should we return to accept that life is a risk, thank science for the vaccine, take it or not and live life? I know it sounds bad, but to me, this whole pandemic politic still seems fishy.
    • 5y ago
• marsokod 5y ago
  Here Facebook is not targeting anti-lockdown accounts here. It's just the shortcut used by the article's title but the targeting is different. They are targeting accounts that are coordinating themselves to spread misinformation and incite violence.
  • tharne 5y ago
    That's all well and good, save for the fact that "violence" has become a much squishier term lately. Particularly, though not exclusively, on the the left there's an increasing tendency to classify unpopular or ugly speech (as opposed to actions) as a form of violence. It's not hard to see where this goes.
  • IMAYousaf 5y ago
    That context changes everything.
  • motohagiography 5y ago
    Conflating anti-lockdown accounts and misinformation/violence is the motte and bailey fallacy that got them their clicks. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Motte-and-bailey_fallacy https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Motte-and-bailey_fallacy
• flohofwoe 5y ago
  The headline is very generous, this is not about merely being "anti-lockdown". The problem isn't that the Querdenkers are "anti-lockdown", but that they are actively spreading much more harmful misinformation, like anti-vaxxing propaganda. Parts of the movement have also been classified as extremist in December 2020 and are observed by the "Verfassungsschutz" ("Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution").
  • elliekelly 5y ago
    > Querdenkers Does this word mean something akin to alt-thinkers? Or maybe sideways thinkers?
    • flohofwoe 5y ago
      Basically "not thinking like the mainstream", heavily implying that the "masses" are manipulated by the government and media, same shtick as every other conspiracy theory group.
• ruszki 5y ago
  When "anti-lockdown" became an euphemism for a lot of missinformation and lies.
  • Spivak 5y ago
    Yeah, like it's totally fine to be against lockdowns on principle -- I know a lot of people in my social circle that are against mandatory lockdowns (and want advisory only) because it gives yet another thing for police to selectively enforce in poor and minority areas. But then there's this internet mass that self-identifies using the label "anti-lockdown" which is full of people who are at best crazy and unhinged. But people read the headline and assume that "$social_media is censoring my opinions!" when it really just a specific group that has co-opted some label to pseudolegitimze their views.
• commandlinefan 5y ago
  Normally censorship like this is the sort of thing I'd look at and say, "this will be used for malicious purposes eventually", but FB went ahead and jumped straight to step two in this case and started out using it maliciously.