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Which horse film is your favorite? This poll is closed. |
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|---|---|---|---|
| Black Beauty |
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2 | 1.06% |
| A Talking Pony!?! |
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4 | 2.13% |
| Mr. Hands 2x Apple Flavor |
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117 | 62.23% |
| War Horse |
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11 | 5.85% |
| Mr. Hands |
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54 | 28.72% |
| Total: | 188 votes | ||
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freebooter posted:Lol at bolding the first half of the "a bunch of my friends have gotten COVID recently" sentence, but not the more relevant second half ("and they were sick for a few days, and then recovered").
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Jun 6, 2022 14:15
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Inferior Third Season posted:This has always been the case, even before vaccines. It is not interesting or noteworthy. Nah. I have friends who got sick earlier during the pandemic too, and theirs were far more severe, some lasting weeks and even requiring hospitalization (despite the fact that most of them are fairly young). Omicron is way milder, and vaccines still work against it, so it's only normal that the world at large (with a few notable exceptions) has stopped taking it as seriously.
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Jun 6, 2022 16:00
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Hey Gio and Stickman, make your points without using dumb memey catchphrases from the other thread and personal insults, thanks. Or you can always choose not to post here, take your pick.
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Jun 6, 2022 16:58
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Slow News Day posted:Omicron is way milder, This smells a little like bait and we don't need to do this again, it's a very well-trodden argument.
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Jun 6, 2022 17:14
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Sorry looking back over recent posts I also need to concur with my equine colleague and also call Slow News Day out for some very obvious trolling that is neither informative or educational.
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Jun 6, 2022 17:41
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I was just sharing my perspectives in terms of how life has been like in Texas, and my own social circles.  Y'all do you, though.
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Jun 6, 2022 17:55
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That post didn’t really read like trolling unless you count “the pandemic is over because X Y Z is continuing as before” as trolling if it’s not paired with some bazingas like “open biden”. That’s just the normal baseline take from most of the US. As someone who continues to be in one of the severely high risk categories for Covid y’all have got to stop melting down over the fact that other people aren’t, as unfair as it seems. Tiny Timbs fucked around with this message at 18:22 on Jun 6, 2022 |
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Jun 6, 2022 18:17
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Slow News Day posted:I'm happy to report that, here in Texas, the pandemic has been over since like a year ago, when people started getting vaccinated en masse. There has of course been the occasional wave, but people have learned to deal with them, for the most part. Most places are open, almost no venue requires masks, and there's no mask-shaming, at least not anymore. A bunch of my friends have gotten covid recently (the newest variant) and they were sick for a few days, and then recovered. Sorry but bolded feels very much like trolling to me. And your group of friends is not a control group, hth.
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Jun 6, 2022 18:50
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Fritz the Horse posted:It's worth noting that monkeypox causes a rash which makes it easier to identify--there's far less risk of cases going undetected like there is with asymptomatic or mild COVID. See this article from NPR for more.
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Jun 6, 2022 19:02
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Professor Beetus posted:Sorry but bolded feels very much like trolling to me. And your group of friends is not a control group, hth. Not sure why you think it's trolling. Most places in Texas have been open, and the only ones that require masks are places like medical buildings. I'm not saying "covid has gotten milder as per my social circle, therefore the pandemic is over", I'm saying "people have been acting as if pandemic has been over for a while now, and it certainly looks and feels that way." Also, I thought sharing anecdotes is something that was explicitly encouraged because we didn't want every single conversation to be about demands for citation, and what sources are good/bad, etc.? Maybe you guys need to draw some clear lines regarding what types of posts are acceptable.
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Jun 6, 2022 19:11
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Slow News Day posted:Not sure why you think it's trolling. Most places in Texas have been open, and the only ones that require masks are places like medical buildings. I'm saying that "the pandemic is over" as a declarative statement, which you originally did, is not the same thing as "people are acting as if the pandemic is over." I'm not sure what value an anecdote like "my friends are all basically fine" has unless you're going to also produce definitive data showing that omicron is actually milder than previous strains and you're not just dealing with confirmation bias. As Fritz pointed out already, we don't need a stupid "omicron is mild/milder" debate. Here is an example for you: an anecdote about you personally having Covid and what that experience was like; potentially informative or interesting. An anecdote from a health care worker like MadJackal or UCS Hellmaker about what Covid looks like on the ground; for sure informative and interesting. An anecdote about all your friends being fine and everyone in Texas acting like covid is over; not particularly interesting or informative, because most people have friends and family who have gotten Covid, and most people are also already aware that most places have ceased taking Covid seriously. If you think I'm being unfair or arbitrary about this, feel free to reach out to Koos or another mod about it.
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Jun 6, 2022 19:28
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Professor Beetus posted:If you think I'm being unfair or arbitrary about this, feel free to reach out to Koos or another mod about it. Your tone-policing is of course arbitrary — you literally just declared that a single phrase in one of my posts, taken out of its context, sounded too "declarative", and that using the word "mild" was too inflammatory (which, let's be honest, is because certain people take offense to it). But it's also not something I'll lose sleep over.
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Jun 6, 2022 19:46
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Slow News Day posted:Your tone-policing is of course arbitrary — you literally just declared that a single phrase in one of my posts, taken out of its context, sounded too "declarative", and that using the word "mild" was too inflammatory (which, let's be honest, is because certain people take offense to it). But it's also not something I'll lose sleep over. Keep posting through this! We were just saying what you were posting sounds like an idiot trolling. Within this circle of posters. This round of posts is more mildly bad. My personal opinion of what's happening, only, of course. Which is very valuable. (USER WAS PUT ON PROBATION FOR THIS POST)
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Jun 6, 2022 20:20
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The guy yesterday who openly made up fake numbers to show that not isolating 5 days after onset of symptoms might be a good idea was a better troll of this thread, IMO. Bring that back!
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Jun 6, 2022 20:23
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When will the pandemic be "over"? I'd posit that the answer "when everybody acts as though its no longer a thing" is about as legit a definition of "over" as anything else, practically speaking anyway.
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Jun 6, 2022 20:32
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global warming is over
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Jun 6, 2022 20:50
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Slow News Day posted:Your tone-policing is of course arbitrary — you literally just declared that a single phrase in one of my posts, taken out of its context, sounded too "declarative", and that using the word "mild" was too inflammatory (which, let's be honest, is because certain people take offense to it). But it's also not something I'll lose sleep over. It's not tone-policing to ask you to be more specific in your language so as to avoid the appearance of bad faith trolling. If you post about it in the thread again you can take a posting break. Again, reach out to another mod or Koos if you feel like you're being single out unfairly. e: Don't need the backseat modding Jaxyon, thanks. How are u posted:If you're making a joke, well, "everybody" is not acting like global warming is not a thing. Quite far from that, really. In both cases, the government is the one driving the lack of progress made on the issue, not public sentiment. It doesn't matter if a large segment of the population wants action taken on covid or global warming, because the inaction of government on either issue is the main problem. It's an apt comparison. Professor Beetus fucked around with this message at 21:06 on Jun 6, 2022 |
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Jun 6, 2022 20:52
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mom and dad fight a lot posted:global warming is over If you're making a joke, well, "everybody" is not acting like global warming is not a thing. Quite far from that, really.
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Jun 6, 2022 20:53
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Professor Beetus posted:In both cases, the government is the one driving the lack of progress made on the issue, not public sentiment. It doesn't matter if a large segment of the population wants action taken on covid or global warming, because the inaction of government on either issue is the main problem. There is nothing government can do (outside of China I guess) to make the pandemic be "over" if it isn't already, or "over" any faster if it isn't. I would argue that the pandemic is over in a colloquial sense (if not an epidemiological sense) because COVID no longer poses enough of a threat to a large enough segment of the population and/or our hospital systems that public health authorities judge it necessary to enact the unprecedented measures we saw in 2020 and 2021. In another sense it won't be "over" for years or decades or who knows, centuries, because the virus that causes it is never ever going away and the best we can hope for is either a sterilising vaccine or that it mutates down and/or enough generations grow up with it and get exposed to it early that it ultimately mostly just affects humans to the same degree as the other cold-causing coronaviruses. I know that there's plenty of people in this thread who still think the entire world should pursue the Chinese strategy, but putting that fantastical notion to the side, how do people want governments and/or people to behave if they believe "COVID isn't over," and why?
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Jun 6, 2022 21:29
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freebooter posted:There is nothing government can do (outside of China I guess) to make the pandemic be "over" if it isn't already, or "over" any faster if it isn't. At the very least I don't see why mask requirements needed to be dropped en masse, there's benefit to asking people to mask up indoors even without the spectre of COVID, like in cold/flu season. But thanks for putting some effort into your post.
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Jun 6, 2022 21:35
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In King County where I live, in summer 2021 after we all got vaccinated and before the bad variants came to town, cases were down to like 2-3 per 100k population per day. That's probably about as "over" as COVID could possibly be in a major US urban area. Obviously that didn't hold up against Omicron, but still, it's an example of what was possible for a time. Not really helpful for looking at what to do in an Omicron (and beyond?) future though?
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Jun 6, 2022 21:36
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Professor Beetus posted:At the very least I don't see why mask requirements needed to be dropped en masse, there's benefit to asking people to mask up indoors even without the spectre of COVID, like in cold/flu season. But thanks for putting some effort into your post. IMO some of the old mask mandates probably did more harm than good - the "wear a mask until you're at your seat in the restaurant", or "so long as you don't have a drink in your hand in a packed arena" don't have much practical upside and decrease confidence of mask mandates in general. I think a reasonable compromise (although I'd wonder how many people would even do this) is masks in essential retail, healthcare and private transit. For better or worse, the conversation even among people who still care about COVID has shifted to protecting the vulnerable, and it's reasonable to say that if vulnerable people want to protect themselves, unfortunately indoor dining and going to concerts might need to be off the table for now. But everyone needs to go to grocery stores or pharmacies and wearing a mask while shopping for groceries doesn't meaningfully impact your shopping experience, so it makes sense to keep those around.
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Jun 6, 2022 22:04
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enki42 posted:IMO some of the old mask mandates probably did more harm than good - the "wear a mask until you're at your seat in the restaurant", or "so long as you don't have a drink in your hand in a packed arena" don't have much practical upside and decrease confidence of mask mandates in general. It wasn't the mask mandate that was doing harm, it was continuing to allow indoor dining while mask mandates were still in place that did harm. I am in complete agreement with your follow up paragraph.
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Jun 6, 2022 22:12
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freebooter posted:I would argue that the pandemic is over in a colloquial sense (if not an epidemiological sense) because COVID no longer poses enough of a threat to a large enough segment of the population and/or our hospital systems that public health authorities judge it necessary to enact the unprecedented measures we saw in 2020 and 2021. I think assuming "no longer" instead of "doesn't currently" is a dangerous assumption.
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Jun 7, 2022 01:34
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GutBomb posted:I think assuming "no longer" instead of "doesn't currently" is a dangerous assumption. Hospitalizations are about where they were this time last here(for the US as a country) but trending upward instead of downward like they were in 2021. I do dearly love the "covid is over because it's not currently at it's worst right now" that we've done like 4 times already.
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Jun 7, 2022 01:38
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Jaxyon posted:Hospitalizations are about where they were this time last here(for the US as a country) but trending upward instead of downward like they were in 2021. eh hospitalizations right now are trending upward cause people are sick as gently caress with other things. My facility any covid so far has been incidental and not the major cause for being admitted, or literally didnt have an impact on the patients condition. Mind you even hospitals have lowered testing requirements, now its only for respiratory impacts that require testing.
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Jun 7, 2022 07:30
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Professor Beetus posted:At the very least I don't see why mask requirements needed to be dropped en masse, there's benefit to asking people to mask up indoors even without the spectre of COVID, like in cold/flu season. But thanks for putting some effort into your post. enki42 posted:I think a reasonable compromise (although I'd wonder how many people would even do this) is masks in essential retail, healthcare and private transit. I would prefer it (at least for now) if masks were still mandatory in retail based on the common-sense rule that, unlike in a bar or restaurant, they're not impeding you. You're not trying to have a conversation with anyone or eat or drink anything, and you're generally in there for less than 10 or 20 minutes, so why not? Of course there is still the problem of meaningful enforcement; masks are mandatory on public transit in Melbourne and I'd estimate 50% compliance in the morning rush in 30% in the evening. That's in a setting which theoretically has empowered, ticket-issuing law enforcement (though I'm yet to see it) whereas in retail it's some poor part-time teenage cashier who has to do it. I would like to see more enforcement of that on trains etc but really can't fault the government for lifting the retail mandate on practical grounds. Schools I don't know enough to say about; offices, I went back in April and was masking at first but it really does suck to wear one all day long (the first time I'd ever done so) and really does impede communication. (And is presumably less risky than retail anyway since you have the same people mixing daily, rather than the flux of strangers you get in a shopping centre.) GutBomb posted:I think assuming "no longer" instead of "doesn't currently" is a dangerous assumption. Certainly we could have a deadlier new variant crop up any day now - just like some deadly superflu could appear (and always could have appeared) - but no amount of public health lever pulling in the interim is going to meaningfully affect that. The only thing governments can do is attempt to control the caseload of existing variants, and the only metric they should be basing their decisions off for that is how their hospital systems are coping.
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Jun 7, 2022 09:46
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Falcorum posted:Blame the UK, they started openbiden as soon as possible so they could go on about the benefits of brexit, so other EU countries followed them right after. At least in Portugal people still seemed to be masking well into late last year, gently caress knows now that Summer temps are approaching though I can only speak for Belgium, but the pandemic has been over for the past months and mask mandates have been gradually cancelled. I guess the same will be true for most European countries.
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Jun 7, 2022 11:16
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For me the people sticking to arguing for all relatively harsh* measures that theoretically could reduce covid must be enacted and motivating level of action with frankly absurd hyperbole (all resistance to any NPI is only to appease Capital) are people that like the concept of "War on Drugs" - ie, absolute strong arming instead of nuanced, flexible and sensitive measures with selected strong measures as required that are rolled back at the first opportunity. The War on Drugs literally done more harm than not doing anything at all. China's absolute adherence to similar for covid is likely going to cause more excess deaths in the medium to long term per capita than what is going to be achieved in Australia, New Zealand or Sweden over the same timeframe. *admittedly less silly than the spraying tinned food and your shoes when getting home to your kids locked inside for literal months that was de rigor at the start, remember when OOCC was collectively yelled down for saying it was stupid and not sustainable for the length of time Covid was going to be around? haha good times.
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Jun 7, 2022 11:35
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I can only speak for the Nordic countries in Europe and all mandates, testing and regulations have been gone since early February to mid March depending on country. If someone were in a coma and missed all of 2020-2021 I don't think they would notice the pandemic at all over here, it's largely only mentioned at this point in relation to the Shanghai lockdowns and maybe and more rarely in relation to the US.
Cirvot fucked around with this message at 11:43 on Jun 7, 2022 |
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Jun 7, 2022 11:40
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Electric Wrigglies posted:China's absolute adherence to similar for covid is likely going to cause more excess deaths in the medium to long term per capita than what is going to be achieved in Australia, New Zealand or Sweden over the same timeframe. how do you figure?
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Jun 7, 2022 11:54
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Slow News Day posted:Not sure why you think it's trolling. Most places in Texas have been open, and the only ones that require masks are places like medical buildings. I just spent two weeks in the UK, Poland, Germany and the Czech Republic and almost noone I saw even gave covid a thought, it very much 'feels over' in those places although I have no idea of their medical stats. I could count the number of people wearing a mask on one hand. I also got absolutely hammered by my first cold in like 2 years and it suckkkked. Did not miss being ill
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Jun 7, 2022 11:54
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quote:China's absolute adherence to similar for covid is likely going to cause more excess deaths in the medium to long term per capita than what is going to be achieved in Australia, New Zealand or Sweden over the same timeframe. I can empathize with the rest of your post (although I think calling "wear a mask when you're in a grocery store" harsh is a bit much), but I'd like to hear what you think the mechanism for these excess deaths is going to be. COVID was a top 3 cause of death in most places in 2020 and 2021, and is on track so far for 2022 (What the fall looks like will determine this, but I think that's anyone's guess at this point). I could see the argument that lockdowns and restrictions could cause some amount of deaths, but for it to be one of the top 3 causes of death in a country seems implausible.
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Jun 7, 2022 11:59
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enki42 posted:I can empathize with the rest of your post (although I think calling "wear a mask when you're in a grocery store" harsh is a bit much), but I'd like to hear what you think the mechanism for these excess deaths is going to be. Some NPIs I fully get behind and of course education is strongly supported. I wear a mask whenever outside or near other people and they are still insisted upon if you to fly a plane and to go into a mall here (in West Africa). I don't wind myself up about people not wearing a mask but I think people can go shop the outside shops or catch a bucka bucka if they don't want to use a mall or plane with a mask. For the China vs Sweden et al comparison, it likely can go one of two ways; ~ China retains harsh lockdowns every few months in one city or another (at least at land borders if they totally lockdown air travel). Deprivation, poor medical outcomes, increasing poverty each and every time. Incurring negative effects each time worse than the lingering "overhead" of covid in a "living with it" country such as New Zealand, Sweden, Senegal is. Eventually overtaking the combined excess deaths and worse effects that all those countries incurred at the start before vaccines and during the transition from without covid to endemic covid. This may take a decade or more, maybe a century. ~ China transitions from without covid to endemic covid, the pain of which is (now, due to vaccination already being widespread) not going to be significantly lessened by the delay they are winning by the ongoing sporadic lockdown economy. Once broadly in the community, it will still get to the old peoples homes (for eg) in the end and a lot of those; even with the vaccine, are not going to survive. Of course, there is the option of a newer better more strongerer vaccine or treatment can be developed that eliminates most negative impacts, stops the disease in its tracks and China is happy to use it, in which case I am wrong and China looks the best but I think that unlikely. An important point about the controls and the deaths they cause, the causes of death in a covid free country is not "due to covid control measures" but spread across a broad number of categories that were directly from controls or from the general reduction in the economy. Eg, "malaria" (development of treatments got put on hold due to covid), "respiratory disease" (efforts to transition to non-emitting tech got put back due to the restricted economy), "violence" (as poorer parts of the world (or China I bet) have suffered the worse from economic contraction and this reflects in crime, civilian breakdown and disorder), etc.
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Jun 7, 2022 12:59
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freebooter posted:Of course there is still the problem of meaningful enforcement; masks are mandatory on public transit in Melbourne and I'd estimate 50% compliance in the morning rush in 30% in the evening. That's in a setting which theoretically has empowered, ticket-issuing law enforcement (though I'm yet to see it) whereas in retail it's some poor part-time teenage cashier who has to do it. I would like to see more enforcement of that on trains etc but really can't fault the government for lifting the retail mandate on practical grounds. I mean the genie is kind of out of the bottle at this point and it would be hard to reinstate mask mandates now, let alone recommend high quality masking. There was a genuine opportunity for those in power to normalize masking, maybe even respirators, in “essential” settings (the absolute bare minimum), and that was thrown out the window in May of last year when the CDC said fully vaccinated people no longer have to mask. Since the latest shift to “Community Level” guidance, there’s not a chance in hell we see masks again. It really cannot be understated how damaging their decisions were to public health, not just in the near term but the long term as well. And yes I know you’re in Australia, but decisions the US CDC makes seem to trickle down everywhere else.
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Jun 7, 2022 17:52
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freebooter posted:Certainly we could have a deadlier new variant crop up any day now - just like some deadly superflu could appear (and always could have appeared) - but no amount of public health lever pulling in the interim is going to meaningfully affect that. The only thing governments can do is attempt to control the caseload of existing variants, and the only metric they should be basing their decisions off for that is how their hospital systems are coping. Sure it can. There's a gigantic pool of variant factories constantly being infected and reinfected right now. NPI mandates can certainly shrink that pool. It's not like they come from nowhere, and it's not like people don't know this by now.
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Jun 7, 2022 18:34
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Electric Wrigglies posted:causes of death in a covid free country It also depends on whether you include failing to vaccinate old people (and intentionally using inferior vaccines, but I think 3 dose Sinovac is still okay) as part of the overall Chinese covid response. The pandemic is clearly not over in China in the sense that uncontrolled spread there would be really bad; it's not an entirely fair comparison but Hong Kong has almost as many deaths per capita as the lowest US states despite having zero covid until 2022. A difference between China and Australia is that China still has lots of unvaccinated high risk people who have never been exposed to covid and Australia does not (and that partly explains why China still does lockdowns, but I don't think they are doing much to vaccinate those people either )
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Jun 7, 2022 18:42
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James Garfield posted:It also depends on whether you include failing to vaccinate old people (and intentionally using inferior vaccines, but I think 3 dose Sinovac is still okay) as part of the overall Chinese covid response. The pandemic is clearly not over in China in the sense that uncontrolled spread there would be really bad; it's not an entirely fair comparison but Hong Kong has almost as many deaths per capita as the lowest US states despite having zero covid until 2022. I completely agree with all of this and is part of the reason of why I suggest that kicking the can down the road with 0-covid is worse than biting the bullet, putting a nominated end date on zero some months in the future and pushing to vaccinate with the best that is available. You don't get vaccinated by then? sorry brah, you are collateral damage.
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Jun 7, 2022 20:41
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Gio posted:Masking was never really enforced in the first place. I remember back in late 2020 when mask compliance in a lot of retail shops was drat near 100% (compliance includes the handful of dicknosers and chin-strappers) there would still be the lone person wearing nothing at all and no one said anything to them. It relied on largely on peer pressure and the mandates gave people who may be peer pressured to not wear one an excuse for wearing them. Masking was definitely legally enforced in Melbourne during lockdowns, at least on the anecdotal evidence that I saw cops giving people fines in the street, and after lockdown (but not masks) lifted I would argue the majority of retail/hospitality venues I visited had staff enforcing both masking and vaccine certificate checks. (I assume this is at least partly because the department of health was conducting anonymous checks just like they would on kitchens or whatever, and there were seriously large fines for small businesses.) This was dropped not because the everything revolves around America and the CDC - in fact if you suggested to an Australian public health official that their advice was guided by American public health bodies they'd probably be insulted - but because mask mandates and vaccination check-ins, like anything else, are a political tradeoff and the benefit to them was no longer considered to outweigh the cost in terms of public goodwill. This was particularly true in Melbourne compared to elsewhere in Australia because even among people who accepted the need for the lockdowns, there was a perception the state government often went too far i.e. closing children's outdoor playgrounds and the overnight curfew. If you persist with a mandate that the public (fairly) thinks is excessive out of an abundance of caution, you're not going to have as much of their support if you ever really need to instate it again. GutBomb posted:Sure it can. There's a gigantic pool of variant factories constantly being infected and reinfected right now. NPI mandates can certainly shrink that pool. It's not like they come from nowhere, and it's not like people don't know this by now. Under this logic you have to be prepared to implement and enforce NPI mandates for the rest of human history.
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Jun 7, 2022 21:30
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Gio posted:Masking was never really enforced in the first place. I'm curious how you think masking could have been "really enforced". Would that be cops patrolling every public and indoor space and physically removing people who refused to mask? Would it be the expectation that private entities like shops and restaurants would have to enforce it themselves? The first seems wholly impractical, as there are not enough cops in the nation to cover every masked space. I guess we could have like hired tens of millions of mask-minders or something whose job was just to spend all day every day enforcing masking? I'm trying to game it out, and none of the possible answers seem practical in any sense.
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Jun 7, 2022 21:41
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