7 ms·

COVID itself was not one of the horsemen, but rather governments' reaction to it. Shutdowns, mandates, school closings, etc. are what caused 95% of the problems

COVID itself was not one of the horsemen, but rather governments' reaction to it. Shutdowns, mandates, school closings, etc. are what caused 95% of the problems. The vast majority the deaths and hospitalizations were older folks who were well into their retirement years. There were exceptions to this to be sure, but if you look at the data this was the case. I don't blame the over-reaction that happened early on when the pandemic first began and people were unsure of what it really was; but it became very obvious after just a few months that young, healthy people were at minimal risk. Still, the politicians decided that it was a 'crisis that couldn't go to waste' and exploited it to the max. We are still suffering, not from COVID itself, but from the reaction to it.

wbl 4y ago
The only thing really shut down were schools.
- didgetmaster 4y ago
  ...and cruise ships, and restaurants, and theaters, and government buildings, and...
  - wbl 4y ago
    Restaurants and theaters were open in the summer of 2020.
babypuncher 4y ago
Yes, we should have sacrificed millions more old people for the sake of the stock market. Our billionaires really need the help.
- didgetmaster 4y ago
  No. We should have done more to protect those who were actually the most vulnerable instead of doing things like insisting that first graders wear a mask all day in class. In case you didn't notice, the over-reaction (including shutdowns) caused the stock market to rise significantly during the first two years of the pandemic so the opposite of your comment actually happened.
  - eatsyourtacos 4y ago
    >who were actually the most vulnerable instead of doing things like insisting that first graders wear a mask all day in class Having kids wear masks in school is exactly helping part of the most vulnerable group. You know who spreads more germs? Fucking kids. You know where large groups of people who are good at spreading germs and often times have nothing else in common outside of that place? Grade schools. A descent population of elementary school teachers are in the upper age ranges. Grandparents (group in vulnerable range) often take kids to school/pickup and help take care of the children. So you really need to stop and think what in the hell you are saying acting like elementary school kids should not have been wearing masks.
    - suddenclarity 4y ago
      Swedish health officials decided throughout that the adult population isn't able to wear a mask correctly so recommended against the use. Touching it by moving it or taking it off/on will make your hands into spreaders. If adults can't do it, I'm curious how kids deal with it.
      - babypuncher 4y ago
        Today we have the benefit of hindsight. We have mountains of data showing that masks and other social distancing mandates did in fact significantly slow the spread of COVID-19, despite the number of idiots who wore their masks incorrectly.
    - llampx 4y ago
      Where I live, kids were never made to wear masks and even mandatory testing was dropped pretty fast.
- llampx 4y ago
  We sacrificed the financial and mental health of young people for the sake of old people, many of whom turned out to be anti-vax afterwards. Outside of institutional investors, most old people are the most invested in the markets compared to young people so they have an interest in seeing the market go up.
ambicapter 4y ago
> and exploited it to the max To do what? Crash their local economies?
- didgetmaster 4y ago
  To boost their own political power (which includes enriching their donors), regardless of the consequences to the economy or the personal freedoms of their constituents.
LatteLazy 4y ago
The fact that the response worked shows it was not necessary...
- slaw 4y ago
  Response didn't work. Sweden without lockdown fared better than US and with lockdowns. https://www.statista.com/statistics/525353/sweden-number-of-deaths/ https://www.statista.com/statistics/525353/sweden-number-of-...
  - vkou 4y ago
    You're making a great argument to throw out US culture wholesale and replace it with Swedish culture. If we just do that, it sounds like we won't need lockdowns, and all sorts of other annoying and bad things like EPOs and PPOs and metal detectors in schools and the highest incarceration rate in the world. It's weird how the 'Sweden does it better' argument always gets meaningful traction when it comes to lockdowns, but never with healthcare, or civics, or gun culture.
    - captainbland 4y ago
      Let's not forget social security and trade union/collective bargaining participation.
    - slaw 4y ago
      Compare California with strict lockowns to Florida with more relaxed lockdowns. There is not significant difference with excessive deaths.
      - vkou 4y ago
        Compare how they were implemented in practice[1], outside of parts of SF and LA. Nobody remotely followed the rules in the rest of the state. Again, Sweeden didn't have a low excess death rate because they didn't do lockdowns, they had a low excess death rate because people in Sweeden acted responsibly to control the spread. Instead of harping on about lockdowns, why aren't we harping on about developing social responsibility, instead? (The answer is obvious - it's in direct contradiction to the 'ME, ME, ME' culture we put on a pedestal here.) [1] Even in theory, they were not meaningful. China had meaningful lockdowns, ours looked more like someone LARPing at doing a lockdown.
eatsyourtacos 4y ago
>We are still suffering, not from COVID itself, but from the reaction to it. You are absolutely correct. We are suffering from the reaction of selfish people who can't even put on a god damn mask or take a vaccine to help someone else and act like children spouting out "mah freedom!" because they can't possibly imagine doing something to help others.
- 41amxn41 4y ago
  [flagged]
  - slaw 4y ago
    They are not retarded, just religious. If you think why people are not reasonable and cannot think straight. Just think it is their religion. No arguments can make them think. If they believe wearing mask can save the world, there is nothing you can do.
    - AnimalMuppet 4y ago
      It is often so. But be careful of yourself. It's really easy to say "My position is self-evidently right, and the only reason they can't see it is because they're blinded by their religion", when your position is also at least partly religious, and you aren't really listening to reason either. This is especially true with something like Covid, where there were (at least) two opposing religious views. And each side could look at the irrationality of the other side and say "See? We're right, and they're insane." They were using the irrationality of the other side as evidence to support their own (also irrational) position. (When I say both were irrational, I do not mean that both were equally irrational. But Covid policy positions solidified mainly into two different camps, and both camps had their religious elements. And both camps used the other side's religious elements to prove to themselves their own rightness.)
      - slaw 4y ago
        My position is if you are religious to wear a mask, I am fine with that. If you are religious to not wear a mask, I am fine with that too. Just don't force any of your religion on me.
UncleEntity 4y ago
People are still beating that old dead horse? It wasn’t about who was entitled to live but to keep the hospitals from getting overwhelmed and having people dying off from perfectly treatable causes. I had to get my gallbladder removed during Covid and that wouldn’t have happened if the ER was completely overrun with old people dying. As it was they sent me home to die the first time I went in and the second time I had to argue with them to admit me because they were only taking critical cases.
- slaw 4y ago
  Hospitals were never overwhelmed. Those hospitals made for covid patients were mostly empty.
  - UncleEntity 4y ago
    Because most people conformed with the mandates and kept it from spreading like wildfire. The very fact they made special hospitals is telling in itself…
    - slaw 4y ago
      Covid was spreading like wildfire anyway, whether people conformed or not. Only in China covid was contained. Government spend money on useless projects like covid hospital all the time.

wbl 4y ago

The only thing really shut down were schools.

didgetmaster 4y ago
...and cruise ships, and restaurants, and theaters, and government buildings, and...
- wbl 4y ago
  Restaurants and theaters were open in the summer of 2020.

babypuncher 4y ago

Yes, we should have sacrificed millions more old people for the sake of the stock market. Our billionaires really need the help.

didgetmaster 4y ago
No. We should have done more to protect those who were actually the most vulnerable instead of doing things like insisting that first graders wear a mask all day in class. In case you didn't notice, the over-reaction (including shutdowns) caused the stock market to rise significantly during the first two years of the pandemic so the opposite of your comment actually happened.
- eatsyourtacos 4y ago
  >who were actually the most vulnerable instead of doing things like insisting that first graders wear a mask all day in class Having kids wear masks in school is exactly helping part of the most vulnerable group. You know who spreads more germs? Fucking kids. You know where large groups of people who are good at spreading germs and often times have nothing else in common outside of that place? Grade schools. A descent population of elementary school teachers are in the upper age ranges. Grandparents (group in vulnerable range) often take kids to school/pickup and help take care of the children. So you really need to stop and think what in the hell you are saying acting like elementary school kids should not have been wearing masks.
  - suddenclarity 4y ago
    Swedish health officials decided throughout that the adult population isn't able to wear a mask correctly so recommended against the use. Touching it by moving it or taking it off/on will make your hands into spreaders. If adults can't do it, I'm curious how kids deal with it.
    - babypuncher 4y ago
      Today we have the benefit of hindsight. We have mountains of data showing that masks and other social distancing mandates did in fact significantly slow the spread of COVID-19, despite the number of idiots who wore their masks incorrectly.
  - llampx 4y ago
    Where I live, kids were never made to wear masks and even mandatory testing was dropped pretty fast.
llampx 4y ago
We sacrificed the financial and mental health of young people for the sake of old people, many of whom turned out to be anti-vax afterwards. Outside of institutional investors, most old people are the most invested in the markets compared to young people so they have an interest in seeing the market go up.

ambicapter 4y ago

> and exploited it to the max To do what? Crash their local economies?

didgetmaster 4y ago
To boost their own political power (which includes enriching their donors), regardless of the consequences to the economy or the personal freedoms of their constituents.

LatteLazy 4y ago

The fact that the response worked shows it was not necessary...

slaw 4y ago
Response didn't work. Sweden without lockdown fared better than US and with lockdowns. https://www.statista.com/statistics/525353/sweden-number-of-deaths/ https://www.statista.com/statistics/525353/sweden-number-of-...
- vkou 4y ago
  You're making a great argument to throw out US culture wholesale and replace it with Swedish culture. If we just do that, it sounds like we won't need lockdowns, and all sorts of other annoying and bad things like EPOs and PPOs and metal detectors in schools and the highest incarceration rate in the world. It's weird how the 'Sweden does it better' argument always gets meaningful traction when it comes to lockdowns, but never with healthcare, or civics, or gun culture.
  - captainbland 4y ago
    Let's not forget social security and trade union/collective bargaining participation.
  - slaw 4y ago
    Compare California with strict lockowns to Florida with more relaxed lockdowns. There is not significant difference with excessive deaths.
    - vkou 4y ago
      Compare how they were implemented in practice[1], outside of parts of SF and LA. Nobody remotely followed the rules in the rest of the state. Again, Sweeden didn't have a low excess death rate because they didn't do lockdowns, they had a low excess death rate because people in Sweeden acted responsibly to control the spread. Instead of harping on about lockdowns, why aren't we harping on about developing social responsibility, instead? (The answer is obvious - it's in direct contradiction to the 'ME, ME, ME' culture we put on a pedestal here.) [1] Even in theory, they were not meaningful. China had meaningful lockdowns, ours looked more like someone LARPing at doing a lockdown.

eatsyourtacos 4y ago

>We are still suffering, not from COVID itself, but from the reaction to it. You are absolutely correct. We are suffering from the reaction of selfish people who can't even put on a god damn mask or take a vaccine to help someone else and act like children spouting out "mah freedom!" because they can't possibly imagine doing something to help others.

41amxn41 4y ago
[flagged]
- slaw 4y ago
  They are not retarded, just religious. If you think why people are not reasonable and cannot think straight. Just think it is their religion. No arguments can make them think. If they believe wearing mask can save the world, there is nothing you can do.
  - AnimalMuppet 4y ago
    It is often so. But be careful of yourself. It's really easy to say "My position is self-evidently right, and the only reason they can't see it is because they're blinded by their religion", when your position is also at least partly religious, and you aren't really listening to reason either. This is especially true with something like Covid, where there were (at least) two opposing religious views. And each side could look at the irrationality of the other side and say "See? We're right, and they're insane." They were using the irrationality of the other side as evidence to support their own (also irrational) position. (When I say both were irrational, I do not mean that both were equally irrational. But Covid policy positions solidified mainly into two different camps, and both camps had their religious elements. And both camps used the other side's religious elements to prove to themselves their own rightness.)
    - slaw 4y ago
      My position is if you are religious to wear a mask, I am fine with that. If you are religious to not wear a mask, I am fine with that too. Just don't force any of your religion on me.

UncleEntity 4y ago

People are still beating that old dead horse? It wasn’t about who was entitled to live but to keep the hospitals from getting overwhelmed and having people dying off from perfectly treatable causes. I had to get my gallbladder removed during Covid and that wouldn’t have happened if the ER was completely overrun with old people dying. As it was they sent me home to die the first time I went in and the second time I had to argue with them to admit me because they were only taking critical cases.

slaw 4y ago
Hospitals were never overwhelmed. Those hospitals made for covid patients were mostly empty.
- UncleEntity 4y ago
  Because most people conformed with the mandates and kept it from spreading like wildfire. The very fact they made special hospitals is telling in itself…
  - slaw 4y ago
    Covid was spreading like wildfire anyway, whether people conformed or not. Only in China covid was contained. Government spend money on useless projects like covid hospital all the time.