Red Mosquito

Rob wrote:There are no concrete answers, here. I simply take issue with this idea that it's always those pesky "liberals" infringing on your freedoms. There are conservatives in red states who are right now taking away abortion rights and dictating to schools what they can and can't teach. And hey, maybe some people agree with those ideas/laws, but it's not a principled argument if you only claim gov't overreach on the issues you personally care about.

I agree that's annoying since both left and right are more than capable of taking away their non-cherished freedoms, but that's not how I interpreted the last few pages. Laws that prohibit actions that endanger others are pretty non-controversial (homicide, driving 100 mph). On the other hand, laws that proscribe or mandate personal conduct (when it isn't clear that others are directly impacted) aren't on as solid a base. That's where arguments like, "but it affects others via higher insurance premiums" come in and may or may not be compelling. But they're in that grey area at best. I take issue with the idea that only selfish people with no regard for others could interpret those kinds of laws as outside of the proper role of government. And the assertion that if you question seatbelt laws (or selective mask mandates) it's because you think seatbelt laws/mask mandates are tyrannical, which strongly implies you're a crazy person who needs not be taken seriously.

4/5 wrote:I take issue with the idea that only selfish people with no regard for others could interpret those kinds of laws as outside of the proper role of government. And the assertion that if you question seatbelt laws (or selective mask mandates) it's because you think seatbelt laws/mask mandates are tyrannical, which strongly implies you're a crazy person who needs not be taken seriously.

That's fair. I think there's a lot of grey area out there. It should noted, though, that Burt associated seatbelt laws with government control over you, and Mac implied that people who support laws like this "have a hard on for totalitarianism." I suppose Burt is right when he says all laws are an example of government control, but no one argues for no laws, so...

As for the mask mandates, history may show they didn't do much to stem the virus, but the rationale at the time was that it would "slow the spread." So, mandating masks at a time when a deadly strain of Covid was spreading rapidly seemed to have some basis in logic, helping to reduce (or slow) damages to individuals and society at large . Again, hindsight is 20/20, and questioning whether the mandates made a difference or not is a reasonable discussion, at this point in time. I certainly don't believe that makes someone selfish or suggests they don't care about others.

Why is hindsight the only lens where one would be allowed to say "maybe mask mandates don't work?" In the moment, there were people who used sound, sane logic to say just that, but that mindset was ridiculed.

I think there's a bit of sanctimony, intended or not, behind saying in 2022 that nobody knew what we were dealing with at the time. Some people knew. They were just lumped in with MAGA and 'merica loving keyboard warriors.

(I was one of those dunking on anti-maskers back then FYI.)

One should separate anti-mandate from anti-mask in these discussions. Much like being pro-choice does not necessarily equal personally choosing abortion in a situation where that choice presents itself.

Just to be clear, this whole seatbelt thing started when I said masks shouldn’t be mandated on airplanes anymore. I said “anymore” which leaves the door open to it having once been acceptable and my statement wasn’t meant to be taken more broadly. We’ve all done the mask mandate debate a thousand times. I said what I said because it seems silly to me to keep that particular mandate in place when indoor mask mandates are being dropped in the vast majority of settings, and with what I believe (perhaps wrongly) we know about the transmission of Covid via aerosols, etc, and air circulation on airplanes, planes aren’t more dangerous and may in fact be less dangerous than most indoor places.

This is mostly to Burt; I don't really have a feeling one way or the other about seatbelt laws. I'm always going to wear mine and if you want to chance it and not wear one, by all means. I just think it is a weird one to hitch your government controls us argument to. You know seatbelts make you safer, you wear them because of that, but then you don't want to just because it is a law? Not trying to argue just trying to understand the logic past "I would do it but only if the government wasn't telling me to do it"..

washing machine wrote:Why is hindsight the only lens where one would be allowed to say "maybe mask mandates don't work?" In the moment, there were people who used sound, sane logic to say just that, but that mindset was ridiculed.

I think there's a bit of sanctimony, intended or not, behind saying in 2022 that nobody knew what we were dealing with at the time. Some people knew. They were just lumped in with MAGA and 'merica loving keyboard warriors.

(I was one of those dunking on anti-maskers back then FYI.)

4/5 is arguing that laws should only prevent damage to others, and I am saying that was (I think?) the rationale for mask mandates indoors. Of course different people had different opinions at the time. There did not, however, seem to be much disagreement among the healthcare experts. Perhaps they were wrong all along, I don't know. I'm not sure why I've seen the term "sanctimonious" twice now, I'm not making a moral argument. In the Spring of 2020, Covid was a novel virus, and it hit hard in many places. We know a lot more now than we did then. If people want to dunk on others 2 years later because maybe the masks weren't as effective as we thought, go ahead, but pandemics don't last forever. We're at a point today where the mask mandates don't make sense anymore to most people.

E.H. Ruddock wrote:This is mostly to Burt; I don't really have a feeling one way or the other about seatbelt laws. I'm always going to wear mine and if you want to chance it and not wear one, by all means. I just think it is a weird one to hitch your government controls us argument to. You know seatbelts make you safer, you wear them because of that, but then you don't want to just because it is a law? Not trying to argue just trying to understand the logic past "I would do it but only if the government wasn't telling me to do it"..

I don't think he said that. He said he usually wears a seatbelt and especially does so on freeways.

Ok maybe I’m missing what he is getting at

4/5 wrote:

E.H. Ruddock wrote:This is mostly to Burt; I don't really have a feeling one way or the other about seatbelt laws. I'm always going to wear mine and if you want to chance it and not wear one, by all means. I just think it is a weird one to hitch your government controls us argument to. You know seatbelts make you safer, you wear them because of that, but then you don't want to just because it is a law? Not trying to argue just trying to understand the logic past "I would do it but only if the government wasn't telling me to do it"..

I don't think he said that. He said he usually wears a seatbelt and especially does so on freeways.

I read that to mean that a law wasn't his reason for doing it. It's just common sense to do so. By the extension of that logic, I understood burt to mean that a government law mandating a seatbelt (or a mask) is not necessary.

E.H. Ruddock wrote:This is mostly to Burt; I don't really have a feeling one way or the other about seatbelt laws. I'm always going to wear mine and if you want to chance it and not wear one, by all means. I just think it is a weird one to hitch your government controls us argument to. You know seatbelts make you safer, you wear them because of that, but then you don't want to just because it is a law? Not trying to argue just trying to understand the logic past "I would do it but only if the government wasn't telling me to do it"..

- I'm not sure what's so weird about it; seatbelts are just what came up in conversation. Laws are government control of our behavior. Maybe it qualifies as authoritarian or tyrannical or just a mild nuisance or acceptable or unacceptable, but it is government control of us. That's just what they are.

- I'm against all laws that try to regulate how I should take care of myself. No one else gets to decide that for me. i don't have any allowances here. There is no grey area in this for me.

- I never said I wouldn't wear one just because its a law (There is probably some value in passive resistance, but I can't see how it would get rid of the law). I also didn't need a law to make me wear seatbelts. I do it anyway.

Rob wrote:

washing machine wrote:Why is hindsight the only lens where one would be allowed to say "maybe mask mandates don't work?" In the moment, there were people who used sound, sane logic to say just that, but that mindset was ridiculed.

I think there's a bit of sanctimony, intended or not, behind saying in 2022 that nobody knew what we were dealing with at the time. Some people knew. They were just lumped in with MAGA and 'merica loving keyboard warriors.

(I was one of those dunking on anti-maskers back then FYI.)

4/5 is arguing that laws should only prevent damage to others, and I am saying that was (I think?) the rationale for mask mandates indoors. Of course different people had different opinions at the time. There did not, however, seem to be much disagreement among the healthcare experts. Perhaps they were wrong all along, I don't know. I'm not sure why I've seen the term "sanctimonious" twice now, I'm not making a moral argument. In the Spring of 2020, Covid was a novel virus, and it hit hard in many places. We know a lot more now than we did then. If people want to dunk on others 2 years later because maybe the masks weren't as effective as we thought, go ahead, but pandemics don't last forever. We're at a point today where the mask mandates don't make sense anymore to most people.

I get that, and I'm sorry I said sanctimonious. It was too harsh for what I was trying to describe. I don't know you or your motives and the word was already used in the thread and seemed like the best way to describe what I was observing, but it's not quite right.

I just mean to say that two years in, I'm finding that the argument for mandating human behavior is not a recipe for success. The social and political cost/benefit and the unintended consequences of mandating (even in a pandemic, especially in a pandemic) does more harm than good for society. You as a government lose authority when you legislate like a parent. By all means, listen to and discern the science (of which as you note has overwhelmingly reached agreement) to make your mask or vaccine decisions, but a government entity shouldn't be the one to make that choice for you. It's just nails on a chalkboard to hear the pro-mandate camp now come to something that a lot of people have been saying all along and act like it's something new.

You know where they don’t have seatbelt laws? Russia!

E.H. Ruddock wrote:You know where they don’t have seatbelt laws? Russia!

That's just because in Mother Russia the seat belts you!

Mask mandates were almost exclusively about signalling how serious covid is.

If they were serious about reducing transmission they would have increased the domestic manufacture of N-95s or equivalent, and they did effectively the opposite of that.

The people implementing the mandates and the people not increasing manufacture are not the same people, but it stands to reason that DOT/ TSA/ state governments could get NIOSH or the FDA on the phone.

I remember an NPR podcast about warehouses full of n95 masks that weren’t allowed to be sold in 2020. Government policy actively prevented them from being produced and distributed on a mass scale.

4/5 wrote:I remember an NPR podcast about warehouses full of n95 masks that weren’t allowed to be sold in 2020. Government policy actively prevented them from being produced and distributed on a mass scale.

Some dudes got funding and purchased equipment to build them, but NIOSH wouldn't do a site inspection or qualify their masks in a timely manner. No such thing as an emergency when it comes to federal bureaucracy.

shut up

all of you

shut this thread down

just shut up

shut it down

Agreed. Covid is over.