5 ms·

On the one hand, I agree with you. People should be more responsible. But if your strategy is "people should have less sex for a while" then your strategy wil

On the one hand, I agree with you. People should be more responsible. But if your strategy is "people should have less sex for a while" then your strategy will fail -- just as our "everyone stay home for two weeks" didn't work for Covid. Even if most people will follow the guidelines, enough people won't and your strategy will fail. So, yes, it is a government failure that we didn't have vaccines on hand for virus we stopped vaccinating for a long time ago. These are things we can control. We give the CDC a lot of money to help prevent these things. By the way -- you can't get a test if you're not a man that has sex with men -- and that's very likely skewing the results. On Twitter many straight people report having blisters and symptoms but are denied tests because they don't fit the profile.

chitowneats 4y ago
Very bizarre to me the way that avoiding covid was moralized and yet the same public health professionals seem more than a little skittish to do so around this. Particularly when the behavior is easier to avoid than breathing the same air as other people. I'd also like to add that having group sex in public places is not the only way to have sex. Your comment seems to conflate this with all sexual activity.
- corrral 4y ago
  Yeah... I was mostly in favor of Covid restrictions but it's bizarre to say that "no doing [huge list of normal things everyone does]" is fine and if you don't play along you're a plague rat, but balk at "maybe avoid having tons of anonymous sex with strangers for a little while" because that's just unreasonable.
  - MichaelCollins 4y ago
    Reasonable or not, resistance to that suggestion is a reality. We have to play the hand we're dealt.
- suscialmadia 4y ago
  There is a long and dark history to moralizing and even legislating how and when consenting adults can have sex with each other. So maybe it's a bit like discussing eugenics. It wasn't a particularly difficult topic when people like Plato were abstractly philosophizing about ideal societies, but it is a charged topic today because we have seen where that road leads in practice. It's also easier to ask people to make shared sacrifices which everybody should bear equally.
- nostromo 4y ago
  We shouldn't have moralized the response to Covid either. Trying to shame people into getting vaccinated blew up in our faces -- we now have an entrenched group of people that seem to be opposed to all vaccines, not just those for Covid-19. People will have sex in ways you and I don't approve of. If your plan is to get them to stop -- it won't work. Just as telling people not to visit their family during Covid didn't work. A better plan is to get people vaccinated, make testing fast and easy, and to inform people about risk profiles.
  - daenz 4y ago
    If you're deliberately engaging in risky behavior, you don't also get to blame the government for the consequences. The government is not there to facilitate every possible impulse people have at all times.
    - nostromo 4y ago
      Note how puritanical feelings about sex and sexual minorities come into play here. > A grandma dies because her family ignores rules around not gathering during Covid-19 -- tragic. > A young man dies because he has sex with too many partners -- well, he should have known about the risks.
      - chitowneats 4y ago
        Insinuations of homophobia are not helping your case. We're talking about having anonymous group sex vs. breathing air. I would feel the same way and see the same glaring distinction if we were talking about a heterosexual orgy.
      - daenz 4y ago
        I'm not sure how that is related to my comment unless you are suggesting that I also hold those beliefs.
      - corrral 4y ago
        I mean... "fuck around and find out" or similar was a pretty damn common response when people who chose to publicly ignore common-sense precautions died of Covid.
wonderwonder 4y ago
I actually agree with you, I think HIV proved that people very much allow their sexual needs to control them even when theirs and others lives are at risk. It was not so much a strategy as cry out to the universe for people to have some common sense and respect for the safety of themselves and others. It would be such a simple win if people just kept their pants on or at the very least limited themselves to one sexual partner at a time for a little while. Its Darwinism screaming at us in the face. This will likely be a situation where the government is forced to step in and save people from themselves.

chitowneats 4y ago

Very bizarre to me the way that avoiding covid was moralized and yet the same public health professionals seem more than a little skittish to do so around this. Particularly when the behavior is easier to avoid than breathing the same air as other people. I'd also like to add that having group sex in public places is not the only way to have sex. Your comment seems to conflate this with all sexual activity.

corrral 4y ago
Yeah... I was mostly in favor of Covid restrictions but it's bizarre to say that "no doing [huge list of normal things everyone does]" is fine and if you don't play along you're a plague rat, but balk at "maybe avoid having tons of anonymous sex with strangers for a little while" because that's just unreasonable.
- MichaelCollins 4y ago
  Reasonable or not, resistance to that suggestion is a reality. We have to play the hand we're dealt.
suscialmadia 4y ago
There is a long and dark history to moralizing and even legislating how and when consenting adults can have sex with each other. So maybe it's a bit like discussing eugenics. It wasn't a particularly difficult topic when people like Plato were abstractly philosophizing about ideal societies, but it is a charged topic today because we have seen where that road leads in practice. It's also easier to ask people to make shared sacrifices which everybody should bear equally.
nostromo 4y ago
We shouldn't have moralized the response to Covid either. Trying to shame people into getting vaccinated blew up in our faces -- we now have an entrenched group of people that seem to be opposed to all vaccines, not just those for Covid-19. People will have sex in ways you and I don't approve of. If your plan is to get them to stop -- it won't work. Just as telling people not to visit their family during Covid didn't work. A better plan is to get people vaccinated, make testing fast and easy, and to inform people about risk profiles.
- daenz 4y ago
  If you're deliberately engaging in risky behavior, you don't also get to blame the government for the consequences. The government is not there to facilitate every possible impulse people have at all times.
  - nostromo 4y ago
    Note how puritanical feelings about sex and sexual minorities come into play here. > A grandma dies because her family ignores rules around not gathering during Covid-19 -- tragic. > A young man dies because he has sex with too many partners -- well, he should have known about the risks.
    - chitowneats 4y ago
      Insinuations of homophobia are not helping your case. We're talking about having anonymous group sex vs. breathing air. I would feel the same way and see the same glaring distinction if we were talking about a heterosexual orgy.
    - daenz 4y ago
      I'm not sure how that is related to my comment unless you are suggesting that I also hold those beliefs.
    - corrral 4y ago
      I mean... "fuck around and find out" or similar was a pretty damn common response when people who chose to publicly ignore common-sense precautions died of Covid.

wonderwonder 4y ago

I actually agree with you, I think HIV proved that people very much allow their sexual needs to control them even when theirs and others lives are at risk. It was not so much a strategy as cry out to the universe for people to have some common sense and respect for the safety of themselves and others. It would be such a simple win if people just kept their pants on or at the very least limited themselves to one sexual partner at a time for a little while. Its Darwinism screaming at us in the face. This will likely be a situation where the government is forced to step in and save people from themselves.