USCE 2023: Please let them shove a camera up your butt

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Debate & Discussion > USCE 2023: Please let them shove a camera up your butt

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Twincityhacker: Feb 18, 2011

They had to do an online poll because who the gently caress ( besides literal crazies like me ) will answer a phonecall from an unknown number, especially since the phone is likely to describe it as "scam likely."

I do because in the past few months it's all been get out the vote calls.

# ? Mar 27, 2023 17:20

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# ? Apr 27, 2024 23:56

Leon Trotsky 2012: Aug 27, 2009; YOU CAN TRUST ME!*

_{*Israeli Government-affiliated poster}

Mass shooting at a Christian elementary school in Tennessee.

Students ranged from pre-school to 6th grade.

The shooter died after the police showed up, but unclear if he was shot or killed himself.

Multiple people were shot and taken to the hospital, but no info on the severity of their wounds or status.

The shooting just happened roughly half an hour ago.

https://twitter.com/AP/status/1640388972441399298

quote:

NASHVILLE, Tenn. (AP) � The suspect in a shooting at a private Christian school in Nashville on Monday is dead, officials said.

The Nashville Fire Department said on Twitter there are �multiple patients� but their conditions were not immediately clear. The shooting occurred at The Covenant School, where students walked to safety holding hands to a nearby church to reunited with their parents.

The shooter died after being �engaged by� officers, Metro Nashville Police said in a Twitter post. It was not immediately clear whether the shooter died by suicide or was shot by police.

The fire department said they responded to an �active aggressor� but did not give any specifics. Other details about the shooting were not immediately available.

The Covenant School has had an enrollment of about 200 students from preschool to sixth grade in recent years and was founded as a ministry of Covenant Presbyterian Church in 2001, according to the school�s website.

# ? Mar 27, 2023 17:29

Judgy Fucker: Mar 24, 2006

I'm just waiting for the school shooting du jour to finally happen at one of my kids' schools. Almost feels inevitable at this point.

# ? Mar 27, 2023 17:34

Mellow Seas: Oct 9, 2012; Can't post for 10 years!

Judgy Fucker posted:

I'm just waiting for the school shooting du jour to finally happen at one of my kids' schools. Almost feels inevitable at this point.

A few years ago I would've said "statistically, it's still very unlikely," but now... I don't know. There's only about 115,000 schools in the country so depending on where you set the threshold for school shooting (like, do you count incidents where "only" three kids get shot, or ones with no fatalities) the rate has to be up to, I don't know, one out of every 500-10,000 or so. Those are much "better" odds than the chances of your parachute failing while skydiving, which are high enough to keep me from ever skydiving.

Hell the odds are possibly even "better" than the chances of ending up in a car crash where your seatbelt saves your life, and 90% of Americans make sure to buckle up every time.

Rough time to have kids. :/

Mellow Seas fucked around with this message at 17:42 on Mar 27, 2023

# ? Mar 27, 2023 17:38

Zotix: Aug 14, 2011

They are reporting at this time 3 children have died. This is about 15 minutes from where I live. Fortunately I don't have kids, nor do I plan to. But the community was already talking about it when I got out of the gym and stopped at a store on the way home.

This is how common this is now, that it's not even the top story on CNNs home page. Everyone is just so desensitized to it.

# ? Mar 27, 2023 17:48

Leon Trotsky 2012: Aug 27, 2009; YOU CAN TRUST ME!*

_{*Israeli Government-affiliated poster}

Mellow Seas posted:

A few years ago I would've said "statistically, it's still very unlikely," but now... I don't know. There's only about 115,000 schools in the country so depending on where you set the threshold for school shooting (like, do you count incidents where "only" three kids get shot, or ones with no fatalities) the rate has to be up to, I don't know, one out of every 500-10,000 or so. Those are much "better" odds than the chances of your parachute failing while skydiving, which are high enough to keep me from ever skydiving.

Hell the odds are possibly even "better" than the chances of ending up in a car crash where your seatbelt saves your life, and 90% of Americans make sure to buckle up every time.

Rough time to have kids. :/

Mass shootings are somewhat common in the U.S., but school shootings are still pretty rare.

The odds of any given child in the U.S. dying in a school shooting is about 9,950,000 to 1 and only a very small percentage of mass shootings in the U.S. happen at schools (less than 0.1% of people killed by guns are in school shootings).

Part of the reason is the depressing fact that mass shootings outside of schools are somewhat common. Kids under 18 are much more likely to get killed by their parents gun in their house or another peer using a gun than they are at school.

School shootings are just way more high-profile because we have kind of just gotten used to the ~316 people who die every day from being shot in groups of 2 or 3, suicide, or domestic incidents to the point where they rarely make the news.

Leon Trotsky 2012 fucked around with this message at 17:52 on Mar 27, 2023

# ? Mar 27, 2023 17:50

Mellow Seas: Oct 9, 2012; Can't post for 10 years!

Ten million to one is somewhat comforting, but consider that for every death there's dozens of maimings and hundreds, maybe over a thousand kids who are scarred for life. The chances of this affecting your family, even if it's not the death of your child, start to get uncomfortably high.

And when I take those stats in concert with your point that schools are actually a relatively safe place to be... yikes.

# ? Mar 27, 2023 17:53

Randalor: Sep 4, 2011

Leon Trotsky 2012 posted:

Mass shooting at a Christian elementary school in Tennessee.

Please excuse me if I burst into laughter at the first few "Thoughts and Prayers" from politicians because of how darkly comical sending "thoughts and prayers" to a shooting at a CHRISTIAN school is. Listen, if God didn't help them during the shooting, sending more prayers their way sure as gently caress won't change anything.

Or will the narrative now change to "Well, it wasn't as bad as Uvalde, so we see no reason to do anything"?

Jesus Christ the 2nd amendment was the worst thing to come out of the US, and that's including the racism at this point.

# ? Mar 27, 2023 17:56

Zotix: Aug 14, 2011

Randalor posted:

Please excuse me if I burst into laughter at the first few "Thoughts and Prayers" from politicians because of how darkly comical sending "thoughts and prayers" to a shooting at a CHRISTIAN school is. Listen, if God didn't help them during the shooting, sending more prayers their way sure as gently caress won't change anything.

Or will the narrative now change to "Well, it wasn't as bad as Uvalde, so we see no reason to do anything"?

Jesus Christ the 2nd amendment was the worst thing to come out of the US, and that's including the racism at this point.

Don't go into the comments on the Fox news article.

# ? Mar 27, 2023 18:09

cunningham: Jul 28, 2004

Another idea on "community" is the increased mobility of Americans over the years:

* fewer shared experiences with neighbors;
* more feeling of "well, I won't be here long, so why invest time/effort getting to know my neighbors.

Even though we have lived here 10 years, my wife and I are still labeled by our neighbors as "not really Wisconsinites" by some because our families aren't from here. In graduate school, practically none of my neighbors were from the same state - many/most were from other countries - and didn't stick around beyond 4 years. The late-90s had this, sure, but it feels like this has probably gotten more prominent since.

# ? Mar 27, 2023 18:13

Archonex: May 2, 2012; MY OPINION IS SEERS OF THE THRONE PROPAGANDA IGNORE MY GNOSIS-IMPAIRED RAMBLINGS

Randalor posted:

Please excuse me if I burst into laughter at the first few "Thoughts and Prayers" from politicians because of how darkly comical sending "thoughts and prayers" to a shooting at a CHRISTIAN school is. Listen, if God didn't help them during the shooting, sending more prayers their way sure as gently caress won't change anything.

Or will the narrative now change to "Well, it wasn't as bad as Uvalde, so we see no reason to do anything"?

Jesus Christ the 2nd amendment was the worst thing to come out of the US, and that's including the racism at this point.

Sadly, from looking at the early push from right wingers and their propaganda outlets (along with the associated bot nets on social media) they use to create self reinforcing narratives out of fiction we're just as likely to see more slander towards left leaning people, atheists, LGBT people, or whatever target is convenient to push a regressive and inhuman agenda by the Republicans and extremist christians aligned with them.

Remember that these sort of people don't give a flying gently caress about the deaths unless it affects them personally, it's all just a means to an end. A shooting of a christian grade school is from the perspective of the workshopping staff of an average Republican propaganda outlet or politician's PR teams potentially even a good thing to them since it can be used as a bludgeon* against their political adversaries regardless of the history of most of the past shootings in recent years or even the reality of the facts.

They're already trying to blame it on "libtards", gun control, LGBT minorities existing peacefully, and anyone else rather than their own hateful ignorance that shouldn't be permitted to exist in the first damned place. Just a quick look at the R's posting in latest tweets shows some absolutely vile poo poo being posted on the norm. To wit, here's three of the comparatively less vile tweets I saw within 60 seconds of browsing:

https://twitter.com/davaughn101/status/1640402996248072192 https://twitter.com/YaZhynka/status/1640405045748416532 https://twitter.com/JohnnyReno/status/1640405013213204480

* Not that they gave a gently caress before outside of perfunctory performance politics when it was a minority getting shot, or just someone else's kids to begin with. Thoughts and prayers is a snide insult to the sort of people who used it to try and handwave away shootings because right wingers were using it that way to begin with.

Archonex fucked around with this message at 18:33 on Mar 27, 2023

# ? Mar 27, 2023 18:14

Veryslightlymad: Jun 3, 2007; I fight with
my brain
and with an
underlying
hatred of the
Erebonian
Noble Faction

Mellow Seas posted:

I mean hard work itself isn't a "lie," hard work often accomplishes worthwhile things that could not have been accomplished otherwise. All else being equal (all else is not equal), you'd rather have a society of hard workers than one where people are more lackadaisical.

Oh boy, there are a bunch of lies about hard work, though. A few of them:

- That hard work is an unmitigated good that does not create its own personal and social ills
- That hard work is always worthwhile
- That hard work is a prerequisite for deserving respect
- That one's financial status is a reflection of how hard they've worked
- (The biggest, in the US) That hard work is consistently rewarded, or insulates you from disaster

I largely agree.

But keep in mind, this is hard work within the context of the United States, which already works too goddamn hard.

Put another way, some of the happiest countries in the world have either a smaller work week, or a less large work week. Finland repeatedly places at or near the top of the list over and over for overall happiness. I have to assume at least part of that is rarely hitting the 50 hour mark.

Zotix posted:

They are reporting at this time 3 children have died. This is about 15 minutes from where I live. Fortunately I don't have kids, nor do I plan to. But the community was already talking about it when I got out of the gym and stopped at a store on the way home.

This is how common this is now, that it's not even the top story on CNNs home page. Everyone is just so desensitized to it.

Blef. Going into work/walking around East Lansing after the whole thing at MSU was downright morose. Even if it doesn't touch you personally, it's jarring when it happens close enough to home. I hate how common this is.

# ? Mar 27, 2023 18:15

Mellow Seas: Oct 9, 2012; Can't post for 10 years!

cunningham posted:

Another idea on "community" is the increased mobility of Americans over the years:

* fewer shared experiences with neighbors;
* more feeling of "well, I won't be here long, so why invest time/effort getting to know my neighbors.

Even though we have lived here 10 years, my wife and I are still labeled by our neighbors as "not really Wisconsinites" by some because our families aren't from here. In graduate school, practically none of my neighbors were from the same state - many/most were from other countries - and didn't stick around beyond 4 years. The late-90s had this, sure, but it feels like this has probably gotten more prominent since.

See, this is why I'm saying that at the right price point, you could get people to move to ecologically sound cities built from scratch on rural farmland! :v:

It wouldn't have worked 50 years ago but now that we have the internet, and the percentage of Americans who are fine with (or prefer) never seeing anybody from their family or hometown has grown, things could be different.

# ? Mar 27, 2023 18:16

cr0y: Mar 24, 2005

Zotix posted:

Don't go into the comments on the Fox news article.

Gonna assume it's a combination of false flag/we need to arm the teachers with howitzers/socialism would be worse

# ? Mar 27, 2023 18:18

CuddleCryptid: Jan 11, 2013; Things could be going better

Leon Trotsky 2012 posted:

Mass shootings are somewhat common in the U.S., but school shootings are still pretty rare.

The odds of any given child in the U.S. dying in a school shooting is about 9,950,000 to 1 and only a very small percentage of mass shootings in the U.S. happen at schools (less than 0.1% of people killed by guns are in school shootings).

Part of the reason is the depressing fact that mass shootings outside of schools are somewhat common. Kids under 18 are much more likely to get killed by their parents gun in their house or another peer using a gun than they are at school.

School shootings are just way more high-profile because we have kind of just gotten used to the ~316 people who die every day from being shot in groups of 2 or 3, suicide, or domestic incidents to the point where they rarely make the news.

Not to "as a parent" but my family has been struggling with this some and honestly it comes down to probabilistic thinking. Like you said, it's very rare, and each one is very high profile. It's not very nice to bring up car crash statistics but, yeah, it's not that dangerous to go to school. We just have a lot of schools in America due to our huge population and size and and each shooting feels like it happened in your home town because it *could*, because there is no rhyme or reason why it couldn't have been *your* kid's school.

It will be interesting to see what long term toll all of this takes on the kids. I'm dating myself but I was 10 when 9/11 happened and spent years being constantly told that we were going to get nuked any second because metro Detroit has the capacity to manufacture tanks and blah blah blah. But you're still supposed to go to school. Eventually it just got to the point where I would still show up on days when bomb threats got called in to the school because if I die I die. When something awful could happen at any time for reasons completely out of your control it kind of breaks your brain. But at the same time, kids getting politically motivated might be a panacea for that. If they are able to feel like they can *do* something about the problem then they might end up okay.

cunningham posted:

Another idea on "community" is the increased mobility of Americans over the years:

* fewer shared experiences with neighbors;
* more feeling of "well, I won't be here long, so why invest time/effort getting to know my neighbors.

Even though we have lived here 10 years, my wife and I are still labeled by our neighbors as "not really Wisconsinites" by some because our families aren't from here. In graduate school, practically none of my neighbors were from the same state - many/most were from other countries - and didn't stick around beyond 4 years. The late-90s had this, sure, but it feels like this has probably gotten more prominent since.

I agree with this quite a bit, although I think that there's a few points from my side of things

1) People are holding onto houses for longer so you end up with neighborhoods with wildly different demographics in it. I like my neighbors but also they're like 65 years old and not really good at MarioKart. But at the same time I can rely on them when push comes to shove and they can rely on me.

2) A lot of the issue with your immediate neighbors is that if you don't put effort into maintaining a positive relationship with them then your only experiences will be when there is a problem, and if every conversation with a person is a negative one then you aren't likely to go out of your way to improve your relationship.

CuddleCryptid fucked around with this message at 18:23 on Mar 27, 2023

# ? Mar 27, 2023 18:19

Mellow Seas: Oct 9, 2012; Can't post for 10 years!

cr0y posted:

Gonna assume it's a combination of false flag/we need to arm the teachers with howitzers/socialism would be worse

GUN FREE ZONES! :bahgawd:

# ? Mar 27, 2023 18:19

Byzantine: Sep 1, 2007

Randalor posted:

Please excuse me if I burst into laughter at the first few "Thoughts and Prayers" from politicians because of how darkly comical sending "thoughts and prayers" to a shooting at a CHRISTIAN school is. Listen, if God didn't help them during the shooting, sending more prayers their way sure as gently caress won't change anything.

Shout louder, for surely he is a god! Maybe he's deep in thought, or distracted, or on a journey. Perhaps he is sleeping and must be roused!

# ? Mar 27, 2023 18:22

Velocity Raptor: Jul 27, 2007; I MADE A PROMISE
I'LL DO ANYTHING

Zotix posted:

Don't go into the comments on the Fox news article.

Got curious and checked it out and there is a flurry of comments and replies happening right now. Most of it is exactly what you'd expect, but there were a few gems that stood out.

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Debate & Discussion > USCE Spring 2023 - understand guns don't kill people guns kill people. Period - end of story.

# ? Mar 27, 2023 18:23

Kalit: Nov 6, 2006; The great thing about the thousands of slaughtered Palestinian children is that they can't pull away when you fondle them or sniff their hair.

That's a Biden success story.

Randalor posted:

Jesus Christ the 2nd amendment was the worst thing to come out of the US, and that's including the racism at this point.

It's one and the same since the 2nd amendment exists solely because of racism

Kalit fucked around with this message at 18:36 on Mar 27, 2023

# ? Mar 27, 2023 18:29

GlyphGryph: Jun 23, 2013; Down came the glitches and burned us in ditches and we slept after eating our dead.

Veryslightlymad posted:

I'm more distressed that so many people believe in the lie of hard work than I am in any decline of any other dubious personal value.

Hard work is an extremely useful instrumental value for a wide variety of terminal values, even moreso in the current US environment where a lot of the things that made it less important (like functioning trust networks) are now less available, and where you need to work harder to get a lot of the things you want. Hard work, well, works, for a hell of a lot of things, especially when you don't have a lot else in terms of assets. Most of the good things remaining in my life still exist because there are still people willing to work hard to make them happen.

Also, when adopted as a value, it provides a cheap source of confidence, pleasure, and bonding.

There are a lot of lies people tell about hard work, but the survey doesn't seem to make any effort to tease out how many believe those. I don't think valuing hard work in and of itself requires believing any lies.

Also, I know at least a few people who are huge believers in the importance of hard work as a value but don't, for example, apply that to things like "their job".

Veryslightlymad posted:

Those were the only values they even bothered to ask about? I don't know how to feel about that. "Like I don't belong here," I guess.

Frankly, this is the part that confused me, what an odd subset of "values" to consider "defining American character" and "who we are"

GlyphGryph fucked around with this message at 18:41 on Mar 27, 2023

# ? Mar 27, 2023 18:29

Gerund: Sep 12, 2007; He push a man

Velocity Raptor posted:

Got curious and checked it out and there is a flurry of comments and replies happening right now. Most of it is exactly what you'd expect, but there were a few gems that stood out.

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Debate & Discussion > USCE Spring 2023 - understand guns don't kill people guns kill people. Period - end of story.

I am surprised that even some Fox News commentators have realized that you can't fortressify our way out of soft target spree killings with man-held machine guns.

# ? Mar 27, 2023 18:30

DarkCrawler: Apr 6, 2009; by vyelkin

Randalor posted:

Jesus Christ the 2nd amendment was the worst thing to come out of the US, and that's including the racism at this point.

It's not like the two things aren't connected to eachother.

# ? Mar 27, 2023 18:35

Kammat: Feb 9, 2008; Odd Person

Kalit posted:

It's one in the same since the 2nd amendment exists solely because of racism

Could you expand on this? I'm familiar with gun control laws only becoming popular when the "wrong people" started carrying, but I'm honestly stumped figuring out the racial angle on the 2nd.

# ? Mar 27, 2023 18:37

Kalit: Nov 6, 2006; The great thing about the thousands of slaughtered Palestinian children is that they can't pull away when you fondle them or sniff their hair.

That's a Biden success story.

Kammat posted:

Could you expand on this? I'm familiar with gun control laws only becoming popular when the "wrong people" started carrying, but I'm honestly stumped figuring out the racial angle on the 2nd.

Here's a good article about it: https://www.npr.org/2021/06/02/1002107670/historian-uncovers-the-racist-roots-of-the-2nd-amendment

TLDR: It exists because land owners feared a slave revolt and thought the federal government would take too long to, or wouldn't, respond

Kalit fucked around with this message at 19:00 on Mar 27, 2023

# ? Mar 27, 2023 18:41

Archonex: May 2, 2012; MY OPINION IS SEERS OF THE THRONE PROPAGANDA IGNORE MY GNOSIS-IMPAIRED RAMBLINGS

Gerund posted:

I am surprised that even some Fox News commentators have realized that you can't fortressify our way out of soft target spree killings with man-held machine guns.

I mean, you can literally see people on social media astro-turfing the idea of open carry teachers or whatever the gently caress crazy nonsense they're on in the immediate aftermath of the news breaking. Heck, that selection of tweets I posted up above even had a self declared "warrior christian" saying we need heavily armed teachers like the crazy rear end in a top hat he or she is.

It's just that the right wing media floated the idea of escalating firearms sales by making teachers purchase and bring a gun to school during earlier spates school shootings and it was met with a disgusted reaction from the wider public who rightfully identified the effort as an attempt to sociopathically handwave away the problem in such a way that would turn effectively schools into blood soaked danger zones. What with teachers having an extra psychological burden of knowing who to shoot and when on top of everything else wrong with it. So they've backed off from openly supporting this for now for obvious reasons.

Archonex fucked around with this message at 18:56 on Mar 27, 2023

# ? Mar 27, 2023 18:41

CuddleCryptid: Jan 11, 2013; Things could be going better

Kammat posted:

Could you expand on this? I'm familiar with gun control laws only becoming popular when the "wrong people" started carrying, but I'm honestly stumped figuring out the racial angle on the 2nd.

As it is written it was supposed to be for militias, but because of the laws surrounding slavery black people were obviously not able to carry guns, or even any kind of possible weapon up to and including walking sticks. That didn't go away until basically the civil rights movement, and even then gun control laws were put into place specifically because white Americans were scared of black Americans having guns.

# ? Mar 27, 2023 18:44

BonoMan: Feb 20, 2002; Jade Ear Joe

So 7 dead.

Shooter (female who appears to be in teens)
3 kids
3 adults.

https://www.cnn.com/us/live-news/nashville-shooting-covenant-school-03-27-23/index.html

This morning, like every morning, I dropped my kids off and thought "hope this isn't the last time I see them alive."

God this country is just so hosed up.

# ? Mar 27, 2023 18:45

Mellow Seas: Oct 9, 2012; Can't post for 10 years!

CuddleCryptid posted:

That didn't go away until basically the civil rights movement, and even then gun control laws were put into place specifically because white Americans were scared of black Americans having guns.

You know what we could really use in this country is a bunch of black people exploiting workers and hoarding wealth, then people might want to do something about those issues.

# ? Mar 27, 2023 18:46

Cygnids: Dec 14, 2021

Mellow Seas posted:

We just went through something where the EPA said "there's not really any reason to think there's dioxins here," and everybody screamed "dioxins, dioxins!" until finally they tested and what do you know, there weren't any dioxins, except in the Indiana test that was basically intentionally designed to show dioxins because they stored the samples in a place teeming with dioxins. (What was up with that anyway?)

hi mellow, sorry if replying to you in particular is annoying since it's more about replying to multiple people that said things like this, but I wanted to chime in since this false narrative has gone uncorrected in this discussion for a while; too lazy to get a link to the previous thread but this is about this article correct? https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2023/mar/17/norfolk-southern-derailment-east-palestine-ohio-carcinogenic-chemical-levels

If Indiana was intentionally trying to enflame panic with their testing, it seems weird for them to have announced that their tests show it as safe (and the article did directly include the context of the soil being sent and tested at the toxic waste dump, unlike what was implied).

quote:

The EPA did not respond to specific questions from the Guardian, but in a statement the agency doubled down on its assessment.

�The available data, analyzed and validated by an independent laboratory, shows the waste from East Palestine that went to Indiana does not contain harmful levels of dioxins,� a spokesperson wrote.

Experts also cautioned that the levels may be safe for Indiana�s purpose � storing toxic waste in a landfill � and unsafe in the context of public exposure to the chemicals around the crash site.

I'm very confused in general when people rely on the EPA-ordered tests for their arguments, it really feels like people are desperate for anything that can tell them things are safe there; is this type of organization really where we get our definitive science from for this? (edit: correction, I think the indoor air tests from this quote weren't ordered by the EPA, just referenced by them)
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2023/mar/11/norfolk-southern-air-testing-cteh-ohio-train-derailment

quote:

About a quarter century ago, the Center for Toxicology and Environmental Health was founded by four scientists who all had done consulting work for tobacco companies or lawyers defending them. Now known by its acronym, CTEH quickly became a go-to contractor for corporations responsible for industrial disasters. Its bread and butter is train crashes and derailments. The company has been accused repeatedly of downplaying health risks.

In since-deleted marketing on its website, CTEH once explained how the data it gathers about toxic chemicals can be used later to shield its clients from liability in cases brought by people who say they were harmed: �A carrier of chemicals may be subjected to legal claims as a result of a real or imagined release. Should this happen, appropriate meteorological and chemical data, recorded and saved � may be presented as powerful evidence to assist in the litigation or potentially preclude litigation.�

Despite this track record, the company has been put in charge of allaying residents� concerns about health risks and has publicly presented a rosy assessment.

It was CTEH, not the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), that designed the testing protocol for the indoor air tests.

And it is CTEH, not the government, that runs the hotline residents are directed to call with concerns about odors, fumes or health problems. Local and federal officials, including the EPA, funnel the scared and sick to company representatives.

Especially since there was a direct and immediate financial benefit for the tests coming out as they did (same article, just below that section).

quote:

The results of CTEH�s tests in East Palestine were used at one point to deny a family�s reimbursement for hotel and relocation costs. Zsuzsa Gyenes, who lives about a mile from the derailment site, said she began to feel ill a few hours after the accident. �It felt like my brain was smacking into my skull. I got very disoriented, nauseous. And my skin started tingling,� she said. Her nine-year-old son also became sick. �He was projectile puking and shaking violently,� said Gyenes, who was especially concerned about his breathing because he has been hospitalized several times for asthma. �He was gasping for air.�

Gyenes, her partner and son left for a hotel. At first, Norfolk Southern reimbursed the family for the stay, food and other expenses. The company even covered the cost of a remote-controlled car that Gyenes bought to cheer up her son, who was devastated because he was unable to attend school and missed the Valentine�s Day party.

But the reimbursements stopped after Gyenes got her air tested by CTEH. Gyenes was handed a piece of paper with a CTEH logo showing that the company did not detect any VOCs.

The next time Gyenes brought her receipts to the emergency assistance center, she said she was told that no expenses incurred after her air had been tested would be reimbursed because the air was safe.

Why should we be confident by default that a Trump-gutted EPA can aggressively hold such an organization to accurate science against those incentives?
https://www.nytimes.com/2023/01/23/climate/environmental-protection-agency-epa-funding.html

quote:

Michal Freedhoff, who leads the E.P.A.�s chemical unit, told Congress recently that the office of chemical safety would fall short of its obligations and miss many �significant statutory deadlines.� She blamed the fact that after a 2016 law significantly increased the agency�s duties, the E.P.A. under the Trump administration never sought the resources from Congress that were required to perform the work.

In fact, Mr. Trump tried each year to slash the E.P.A. budget by at least 30 percent. Highly skilled scientists and other experts left the agency as the Trump administration dismantled science advisory panels, disregarded scientific evidence and weakened protections against pollution.

�They beat down the E.P.A. work force, a lot of people left dispirited,� said Senator Tom Carper, Democrat of Delaware and chairman of the Committee on Environment and Public Works, which oversees the E.P.A.

The result is that the E.P.A.�s chemical safety office is way behind, Ms. Freedhoff told Congress. Attracting and retaining staff has been difficult because of the heavy workload, she said.

And the EPA resisted ordering testing for these for weeks anyways!
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2023/feb/24/ohio-train-derailment-health-pollution

quote:

Though a growing chorus of calls from independent environmental researchers and senators is pressuring the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to test for dioxins and other dangerous chemicals, the agency has resisted taking those steps, and, some critics say, is needlessly putting residents� health at risk with its decisions.

�We don�t have any information on the presence of dioxins and we don�t have information on whether [the EPA] is testing for them because the messaging has been focused on �We�re not seeing vinyl chloride�, and that�s problematic,� said Pete DeCarlo, an environmental health researcher with Johns Hopkins University who characterized dioxins as a �particularly nasty chemical�.

A Norfolk Southern train carrying vinyl chloride used to produce PVC plastic derailed on 3 February in the small industrial town of 4,700 people located at the edge of the Appalachian hills, close to the Pennsylvania border. The EPA on Tuesday released data that showed no major concerns for a range of chemicals for which it had tested, but independent scientists who reviewed the data say a number of gaps remain, even beyond dioxins.

And it apparently can take months to be able to measure things like the impact on wells!
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2023/mar/05/forgotten-towns-ohio-toxic-train-derailment

quote:

�In the immediate aftermath, regulators were absolutely right to be most concerned about the acute toxicity of contaminated air and water sources. But now they must turn their attention to areas potentially contaminated by the plume and test for dioxins to protect people with grazing animals, crops and vegetable gardens,� said Betsy Southerland, former director of science and technology at the EPA�s office of water. �They must also clearly communicate to private well owners which contaminants they need to monitor and when. People need clear answers � their concerns should not be blown off.�

Contaminated surface soil should be replaced by clean earth before planting season, but it could take months for dioxins to end up in water wells, added Southerland.

The more this notion of "the media is falsely enflaming these concerns" is propagated in popular media and in discussions, the easier it is for Republicans to run on "Ohio is forgotten"; saying that the EPA did good testing and that people are being influenced to be somewhat unreasonable in their concerns/worry is not a good look next to poo poo like this.
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2023/mar/27/ohio-train-derailment-chemicals-health

quote:

On Sunday, the EPA officials said that they did not detect any contaminants in the air. But my granddaughters had developed blotches all over their bodies. They looked like burns, as if they�d spent too much time next to a sun lamp. My seven-year-old granddaughter�s leg was beet-red. They were coughing and their eyes were burning. I began to experience constant headaches and a nagging cough.

My wife�s cousin is a cancer researcher at Stanford. She called us and said, �Get the girls the hell out of there.� The railroad company had given us a voucher for two nights at a hotel, so we drove to an inn about 15 miles away.

On 6 February, officials decided to �burn off� the vinyl chloride rather than risk it exploding. The EPA said that there was a small uptick in toxins near the burn site and that it was to be expected. Dead fish started turning up in streams.

After a couple of days out of town my granddaughters� rashes started to fade but we all continued coughing. I�ve been an athlete all my life. I don�t smoke or drink and was a pretty decent basketball player for many years. I�ve never had a persistent cough like this before.

On 8 February, authorities lifted the evacuation order. The EPA said its testing showed that the air and water were safe. We didn�t trust that assessment. Part of my family went to a relative�s house in West Virginia. Each time I�ve gone to East Palestine to check on my house my headaches start again.

It�s now been six weeks since the wreck. I dread night-time because when I lie down to sleep the constant coughing starts. My wife of 35 years woke me up recently because my breathing was so bad; she said I sounded like I had fluid in my lungs. Other people are having similar experiences. The ER doctors say it is chemical bronchitis.

I�ve lost 15 pounds due to stress and anxiety. In addition to all the unexpected expenses, I�m paying for a home that I don�t live in and I don�t know yet whether insurance will help. They�ve been saying that they don�t cover �chemical spills�. Other people are even less lucky � they can�t afford to leave. Our friend�s son keeps having nosebleeds.

And as a reminder, that mention of "dead fish turning up in streams" in the quote refers to almost 44k fish dying the day of
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/ohio-t...ent-to-recover/

quote:

According to Mertz, the newest estimates show that roughly 38,222 small fish were potentially killed as a result of the derailment, as well as an additional 5,500 other species of fish, amphibians and other creatures. The areas included in those estimates include Sulphur Run, Leslie Run, Bull Creek and North Fork Little Beaver Creek. All of those animals are believed to have died "immediately after the derailment," Mertz said, and none are believed to be members of endangered or threatened species.

(thankfully that's not an ongoing thing, presumably because it got diluted pretty quick; as implied in the quote that article later mentions how they haven't seen more since then)

Note that I suspect I don't have much to discuss about this and just wanted to drop in context, since imo we're very much still in the "wait and see" phase of it and nobody really knows anything except for the obvious spike and drop in acute toxicity that came from the shorter lived chemicals.

Cygnids fucked around with this message at 19:09 on Mar 27, 2023

# ? Mar 27, 2023 18:52

haveblue: Aug 15, 2005; Toilet Rascal

The first time I heard of pickleball was this story so I wrote it off as a fad for rich WASPs

(The conflict there was resolved by banning pickleball from the playground and redirecting it to dedicated brand new pickleball courts, so it's hard to say who won)

# ? Mar 27, 2023 18:58

plogo: Jan 20, 2009

Pickleball mania is a right wing plot astroturfed by coordinated reactionaries such as Michelle Malkin

# ? Mar 27, 2023 19:06

Triskelli: Sep 27, 2011; I AM A SKELETON
WITH VERY HIGH
STANDARDS

Kammat posted:

Could you expand on this? I'm familiar with gun control laws only becoming popular when the "wrong people" started carrying, but I'm honestly stumped figuring out the racial angle on the 2nd.

I�ll let you solve it yourself, but think about it: why would a state need multiple standing armed militias on call when it�s not wartime?

# ? Mar 27, 2023 19:14

Presto: Nov 22, 2002; Keep calm and Harry on.

Pickleball is becoming a problem in my neighborhood because there are courts about 100 yards away from some of the houses; and some people I guess just CAN'T STOP PLAYING PICKLEBALL because the people living in those houses are complaining that they hear the Pock!-Pock!-Pock! noises until like 11 PM.

# ? Mar 27, 2023 19:14

Dick Trauma: Nov 30, 2007; God damn it, you've got to be kind.

Is Pickleball just the old Smashball... a big paddle and a squishy ball that doesn't travel far?

# ? Mar 27, 2023 19:15

CuddleCryptid: Jan 11, 2013; Things could be going better

Cygnids posted:

hi mellow, sorry if replying to you in particular is annoying since it's more about replying to multiple people that said things like this, but I wanted to chime in since this false narrative has gone uncorrected in this discussion for a while; too lazy to get a link to the previous thread but this is about this article correct?

As was said repeatedly in the last thread, there is no such thing as vibes based testing. Unless you believe that the EPA is literally fabricating data we have no reason to believe that their testing is false. They likely didn't test for dioxins in the surrounding area because it wasn't until some dipshit professor said they could be an issue that it became a public concern and when they were forced to test it, surprise surprise, it wasn't an issue.

Could there be a spike in cancer rate down the road from people who were exposed to it in the immediate surroundings the first day of the crash? Hard to say. But is the land fine now? The only tests that say otherwise came from a literal toxic waste dump using soil that was directly under the crash site, which was where the tests that were taken for that guardian article were sampled from.

# ? Mar 27, 2023 19:16

Dick Trauma: Nov 30, 2007; God damn it, you've got to be kind.

DeSantis is scheduled to be at this gun store on Thursday to push his book. :patriot:

EDIT: Snipped the link because it's from a right-wing shithead organization. ATF raided a big gun store called Adventure Outdoors in Smyrna, GA.

https://www.eventbrite.com/e/the-florida-blueprint-ft-special-guest-gov-ron-desantis-in-cobb-county-tickets-591435047147

code:

Starts on Thursday, March 30 � 1:30pm EDT

Location
Adventure Outdoors 2500 South Cobb Drive Southeast Smyrna, GA 30080

Dick Trauma fucked around with this message at 19:23 on Mar 27, 2023

# ? Mar 27, 2023 19:18

Mellow Seas: Oct 9, 2012; Can't post for 10 years!

I appreciate the response Cygnids.

The thing about testing being used to protect firms from liability sounds bad, and I'm sure it's been misused plenty over the years, but it's also true that sometimes they just aren't liable. I'm not sure how I'm supposed to take stuff like this seriously:

quote:

The results of CTEH�s tests in East Palestine were used at one point to deny a family�s reimbursement for hotel and relocation costs. Zsuzsa Gyenes, who lives about a mile from the derailment site, said she began to feel ill a few hours after the accident. �It felt like my brain was smacking into my skull. I got very disoriented, nauseous. And my skin started tingling,� she said. Her nine-year-old son also became sick. �He was projectile puking and shaking violently,� said Gyenes, who was especially concerned about his breathing because he has been hospitalized several times for asthma. �He was gasping for air.�

Like, am I missing something or there is simply no way on God's green earth this was actually caused by the derailment? (Keep in mind that this was days before the controlled burn.) If people a mile away were projectile vomiting then the immediate fallout of the disaster would've been orders of magnitude worse than it was. I mean somebody correct me if I'm way off base on this...

And honestly part of the reason I'm so skeptical is because it's pretty much unambiguously true now that an absolute deluge of exaggerated, inaccurate and falsely alarmist stuff has come out of East Palestine. That kind of material undermines people's confidence in all information about a situation. If we are working under the assumption that orgs like the EPA are always lying to us, then aren't we going to end up doing something stupid when they're telling the truth?

CuddleCryptid posted:

Could there be a spike in cancer rate down the road from people who were exposed to it in the immediate surroundings the first day of the crash? Hard to say.

It's super hard to say and will always be hard to say, because there are hundreds and hundreds of environmental exposures that happen to a person in their lifetime that have small multiplier effects on their cancer risk. "At risk of cancer" is a spectrum - events like this could increase somebody's chances of developing cancer by, say, 50% or so, and it would still be hard to suss out from statistics when you're dealing with a small sample, which this town is.

Mellow Seas fucked around with this message at 19:23 on Mar 27, 2023

# ? Mar 27, 2023 19:20

Kalit: Nov 6, 2006; The great thing about the thousands of slaughtered Palestinian children is that they can't pull away when you fondle them or sniff their hair.

That's a Biden success story.

Dick Trauma posted:

DeSantis is scheduled to be at this gun store on Thursday to push his book.

Sadly, it will probably help with DeSantis' popularity as he complains about big government picking on local businesses

# ? Mar 27, 2023 19:21

Youth Decay: Aug 18, 2015

Nashville shooter was a 28yo woman. I believe this is the first school shooting committed by a woman since the Cleveland Elementary School shooting in 1979.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cleveland_Elementary_School_shooting_(San_Diego)

# ? Mar 27, 2023 19:35

Adbot: ADBOT LOVES YOU

# ? Apr 27, 2024 23:56

Jaxyon: Mar 7, 2016; I’m just saying I would like to see a man beat a woman in a cage. Just to be sure.

This is now the pickleball thread

In this essay I will deconstruct pickleball as a metaphor for the degradation of the political apparatus under late stage capit

# ? Mar 27, 2023 19:50

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Debate & Discussion > USCE 2023: Please let them shove a camera up your butt

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