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I’m a liberal who thinks the return of mask mandates is dumb
Not only do we exist, there are lots of us
July 30, 2021 | 8:16 am
Once we were vaccinated, they told us, we were free to move about the country, as the Southwest ad says. Now, suddenly, they’re rolling back that freedom, however incrementally. I think it’s wrong to place restrictions on people for a disease for which they almost certainly don’t have, are vaccinated for and have a 99.8 percent or higher chance of surviving even if they do get it. ...
The whole episode was weird and disheartening. I consider myself a liberal. ...
Our rulers promised us a return to ‘normal life’ and normal life seemed to be slowly returning.
Now, suddenly, the powers-that-be are starting to dial it back, and I’m concerned that they’re preparing to lower the lockdown hammer again. Masks feel to me like the gateway drug, so ‘I’m vaccinated and I shouldn’t have to wear a mask’ seems like a reasonable position to take. That’s not exactly ‘Comet Ping-Pong’, ‘Sandy Hook Was A Hoax’ or ‘Bush Did 9/11’ territory. And it’s certainly not ‘vaccines don’t work’, because they obviously do.
Since my dumb little Facebook post, I’ve received several hushed, whispered messages from people ‘like me’ who agree but said they are afraid to speak out because someone will report them. But they shouldn’t be afraid.
There has to be room for those who are slightly left-of-center to criticize COVID policy. I don’t want to make anyone sick. I just want consistent guidance and the ability to live freely and make my own choices. Somewhere along the line, liberals forgot that was something to value.
I’m a liberal who thinks the return of mask mandates is dumb
@Patrick, you're a liberal? Are you a democrat?
WineHorror1 says@Patrick, you're a liberal? Are you a democrat?
@WineHorror1 No, that's a quote of the original article. It's quoting me quoting someone else.
Onvacation saysWineHorror1 saysPatrick saysWhen people start dying from the "vaccine" in large numbers
Does anyone know when this is supposed to start happening?
Next flu season when those primed by the jab get exposed to the CCP virus in the wild they die in a cytokine storm.
That's one theory.
Do people actually believe this?
From my point of view, given that in my age group I have a vanishingly small chance of death, ....
I think the "Delta" hysteria is making people nervous.
Assume the vaccine IS deadly, we'll know in time if it is or not. If it is, it is.
WookieMan saysIt was kind of sad to watch, especially kids playing with masks on.
Child abuse.
I can picture in year 5 of the rolling lock-downs, the Ferrets dragging themselves into a State Injection Station for their 16th booster and cursing the "Vaccine Hesitant" for their situation.
Our universal use of unscientific face coverings is therefore closer to medieval superstition than it is to science, but many powerful institutions have too much political capital invested in the mask narrative at this point, so the dogma is perpetuated. The narrative says that if cases go down it’s because masks succeeded. It says that if cases go up it’s because masks succeeded in preventing more cases. The narrative simply assumes rather than proves that masks work, despite overwhelming scientific evidence to the contrary.
Glenn Greenwald
@ggreenwald
14h
Amazing: Google's YouTube suspended @RandPaul -- a US Senator and a medical doctor -- for disputing the efficacy of cloth masks.
JUST LAST WEEK: Biden's former COVID adviser, the epidemiologist Michael Osterholm, told @camanpour exactly the same thing.
Bongino Report
@BonginoReport
13h
So @YouTube suspends @RandPaul, a medical doctor, for saying the exact same thing about cloth masks as Biden's former COVID adviser Dr. Osterholm?
Makes total sense if you're a leftist!
Glenn Greenwald
@ggreenwald
14h
Here's Dr. Osterholm on CNN saying exactly the same thing that @RandPaul just got suspended from YouTube for saying: that cloth masks, as opposed to N95s, provide very, very little protection. Why can yo say this on CNN or PBS but not YouTube????
Glenn Greenwald
@ggreenwald
14h
Here's Dr. Osterholm on CNN saying exactly the same thing that @RandPaul just got suspended from YouTube for saying: that cloth masks, as opposed to N95s, provide very, very little protection. Why can yo say this on CNN or PBS but not YouTube????
https://twitter.com/ggreenwald/status/1425486313831243778#m
also got the shot because he said the safety data checked out
He also got the shot because he said the safety data checked out.
IF masks have any marginal efficacy it is certainly only N95 masks.
I've been quite disappointed with Greenwald recently. As a constitutional lawyer, I imagined that he would be far more passionate about vaccine passports.
Lets try masks again!
It worked so well last time.
https://www.deplatformdisease.com/blog/addressing-dr-daniel-stock-claims?fbclid=IwAR1MqADX7a-ZgGQLgyWZ3uAwe4fk5HsA1s98iUE9eq8KyzhS3VQ0wAVZgBU
A very long read in this link… but it’s a good counter argument to all the half-baked ideas spewed on.
A surprisingly large number of people have sent me a video that is inundated with disinformation about COVID-19 and its reach seems considerable so I have deemed it significant enough to address. In the video, one Dr. Dan Stock from Indiana at a school board meeting opines at length about all the things we’re supposedly doing wrong with COVID-19 (by the way, the FSMB has now stated that spreading misinformation about COVID-19 vaccination may put medical licenses at risk, though state medical boards have final say it seems; rest assured I will be examining the rules in Indiana quite closely). The speech is little more than a verbal gish gallop: a tactic used by science denialists usually over written forums wherein they post a bunch of links that they claim to support their points but in reality most of the citations are unsupportive or even unrelated to their claim- but this serves the appearance of evidence (this is a famous example). He is doing this verbally- he is making a series of incorrect arguments (that are self-contradictory) and essentially seeking to overwhelm opposition with the volume of arguments he makes. The thing is, as I’ll discuss, he discredits himself very early on, so you don’t have to subject yourself to listening to his nonsense because I did it for you.
To begin, the speaker describes himself as a “functional family medicine physician,” which per him “means [he] is specially trained in immunology and inflammation regulation.” Firstly, this isn’t even how most sources define functional medicine. The Cleveland Clinic Center for Functional Medicine defines functional medicine as
a personalized, systems-oriented model that empowers patients and practitioners to achieve the highest expression of health by working in collaboration to address the underlying causes of disease.
This definition, admittedly, is completely meaningless because the foundation of literally all medicine is built on understanding the pathophysiology of conditions and addressing their underlying cause whenever that is possible (which unfortunately isn’t always feasible) and the implication that other clinician specialties do not do this is on its face pretty offensive. It also tells you nothing about the actual scope of a functional medicine physician’s expertise as far as the ailments they address or which aspects of the human body they specialize in. Perhaps most importantly though, it is not what Stock describes, which most closely seems to describe an allergist/immunologist (which he is not). The title of “functional medicine physician” is usually a red flag for quackery, and he’s already misrepresented his own expertise, so this isn’t off to a great start. An explanation of the problems with functional medicine generally may be found here. Also functional medicine is not a specialty recognized by the American Board of Medical Specialties nor the American Medical Association.
Next he claims that coronaviruses and all respiratory viruses are spread by aerosol particles which are small enough to go through your mask, which is a misleading in several ways. Aerosols refer specifically to very small droplets which in general can linger in the air for prolonged periods of time (and they are blocked by masks). While there is evidence that during certain medical procedures like intubation, SARS-CoV-2 can become aerosolized, most contact tracing studies do find that prolonged close contact with individuals is needed for transmission to occur (but obviously there are exceptions). There is definitely a role for aerosol transmission in COVID-19 but precisely how much is not well-defined. He then argues that masks don’t work because viruses are small enough to pass through them. The problem with this reasoning is viruses do not travel as individual viral particles- they are inside the aerosols and droplets. That’s what the masks block. The IDSA has graciously compiled the multitudinous, surfeit evidence demonstrating the effectiveness of masking here which anyone is free to peruse at their leisure.
He then states that all respiratory viruses wait for the “immune system to get sick in the winter” which is baseless. The seasonality of respiratory viruses is a complex matter dependent on many factors, many of which have nothing to do directly with immunity. For instance, when it’s cold, people gather indoors for prolonged periods close together in poorly ventilated spaces. Humidity is lower which also affects virus transmission as it allows aerosols to remain suspended for longer and mucociliary clearance may be impaired. Additionally, not all respiratory viruses peak in the winter. Vitamin D levels in the winter may also play a role but it’s probably not that important in higher income nations because true vitamin D deficiency is relatively rare. I discussed vitamin D at length here. He goes back to this point several times but there’s still no evidence for the value of vitamin D as therapy or prevention in COVID-19. Having adequate vitamin D levels is critical for optimization of one’s health, absolutely, but there is no evidence that vitamin D alone is protective from COVID-19 (and in fact there are Mendelian randomization studies suggesting in fact that vitamin D does not affect risk for COVID-19 as well as a randomized controlled trial).
Stock then makes a meaningless and unfalsifiable remark that sounds scary by saying that the vaccines make your immune system become “deranged.” He provides no evidence or reference for this most extraordinary claim even though the burden of proof lies with him for making it. This comment is vague and meaningless and he does not clarify what constitutes immunological derangement. What specific pathologies are the vaccines causing indicative of immunological derangement? We have near real-time safety data on them and the risks (which are themselves exceptionally rare) are: anaphylaxis 2.5-4.7 per million doses, thrombosis with thrombocytopenia syndrome (TTS) with the JJJ vaccine at 3 per million doses, Guillain-Barre syndrome at 7.8 per million doses of JJJ, and the rare cases of myocarditis whose rate is hard to define generally but goes up to ~7 per 100,000 second doses of the vaccine in younger males and is far lower for everyone else. COVID-19 patients on the other hand may have substantial immunological challenges. They develop functional autoantibodies that worsen disease and people who recover from COVID regularly have new autoimmune diseases, including diabetes. Some evidence demonstrates prolonged disruption of normal peripheral immune system function following COVID-19 in some patients. I discussed the differences in disease-acquired immunity and vaccine-acquired immunity here for those seeking additional details.
Stock then says something about filtering out the virus but the context is no longer masks or any nonpharmaceutical interventions so I’m not sure what he’s talking about and also says the virus can’t ever go away because it has animal reservoirs (zoonotic virus). This is not the whole truth. Certainly, barring a universal coronavirus vaccine that can be given to animals and ideally one that is itself transmissible, SARS-CoV-2 is not a viable candidate for eradication because it has animal reservoirs that can keep introducing it into the population. This does not mean that vaccination cannot alleviate the public health burden of COVID-19. It does it every year for flu, which is another zoonotic disease.
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