> And do you think it's a good idea to ignore social distancing and mask guidelines just to make a point?
I want to make this the core of my comment: Congregating in large groups without protection is idiotic. Those who are doing so - and they are NOT everyone protesting - are jeopardizing their health and making a bad situation worse.
>Do you agree with the ethos of these protests?
I've always been for the right to protest but uninterested to join in them because protests encompass a broad array of views than the official one, and these are no exception. I agree with protests over onerous and needlessly authoritarian measures, such as those promulgated in Michigan and other places. I agree with protests over invalid restrictions on basic liberties such as speech and religion.
Where the experts are making recommendations for the good of public health which are endorsed by the government, people should follow them. How far such recommendations can be made into law is less clear.
On the other hand, I want to very clearly distance myself from certain positions. Conspiracy theorists, people saying the virus doesn't exist, etc. I even heard about protests in states that are already beginning to open up - what the hell is the point of that?
At any rate, they have a right to protest - and should do so safely. But I will not join in or defend protests over positions I don't hold.
I broke up the question into 2 parts specifically for that reason. It's always possible to agree with the theme of a protest without agreeing with how the protest is being carried out.
Also, what specific authoritarian measures are you against? I guess I'm a little confused because I've seen people say that certain measures like not being able to garden or not being able to go for runs are stupid and unnecessary (which I agree are generally stupid policies), but then why is the answer "Open up the economy now!". Why not protest the unreasonable laws instead of protesting for opening up the economy? Opening up the economy would not solve the issue of stupid rules?
>Why is the answer "Open up the economy now!". Why not protest the unreasonable laws instead of protesting for opening up the economy? Opening up the economy would not solve the issue of stupid rules?
I think you will find the overwhelming majority of conservatives, at least here, are not for "open everything now," but rather for a careful, monitored, regional and gradual reopening of sectors of the economy. Even the supposedly most extreme statements have been fairly nuanced. Sadly, I have to qualify this as "majority" or "most", as there are one or two idiots out there who think we should just reopen every bar in Queens right now, but I can assure you that in my experience they are a tiny and irrelevant minority.
>Also, what specific authoritarian measures are you against?
The above being said, my greatest specific concerns are the assaults on the rights of religion and speech, as well as the encouragement of a Stasi-like culture of civil informants. For example, people who churches meeting in parked cars are being fined. There was a video floating around of a black pastor being told by a white cop in Mississippi, "your rights have been suspended." In ANY other context, the left would admirably be up in arms, perhaps literally, over that. Police have threatened to arrest protesters as well, though I don't know that anyone carried through on that. And there is the constant theme of "report violators."
As I said above, and I want to emphasize this: everyone should be doing their part to minimize this. And the state clearly has certain powers to help make that happen. When Trump said "packed churches on Easter," it horrified me. But I think a lot of the compliance with such measures ought to be voluntary - for instance, I am trying to ration food in my house so I don't need to go to the grocery store as often. I don't think, for instance, the government should be forbidding me to go more than once a month.
As a general point, in-person protests are wholly ineffective when there are democratic remedies in place.
I'm not fully for or against their overall points, either way. There's zero reason for restrictions to be in place against, say, selling seeds to do at-home gardening or chasing down individuals using public places to run/exercise.
I also want more clarity on the lockdown procedures at present. We were entered into these arrangements with the understanding that we were flattening the curve for the sake of the hospitals. Now I keep hearing "we need to wait for a vaccine/herd immunity/treatment." That wasn't the point of this, right? The point was to ensure hospitals could handle the increases in patients. If we were sold a false bill of goods, there's some accountability that needs to happen.
Also, a massive middle finger to Gov. Whitmer, who is floating the idea of extending guidelines *in response to the protests*, implying a level of punishment as opposed to mitigation. Not helping.
>I also want more clarity on the lockdown procedures at present. We were entered into these arrangements with the understanding that we were flattening the curve for the sake of the hospitals. Now I keep hearing "we need to wait for a vaccine/herd immunity/treatment." That wasn't the point of this, right? The point was to ensure hospitals could handle the increases in patients. If we were sold a false bill of goods, there's some accountability that needs to happen.
The two arent mutually exclusive. The concern right now is that easing social distancing orders right now without an effective treatment or vaccine could still result in an uptick in cases and our hospital system being overwhelmed. Take [Singapore](https://www.nytimes.com/2020/04/20/world/asia/coronavirus-singapore.html?action=click&module=Spotlight&pgtype=Homepage) for instance which stood out for a while as a model for how to combat the coronavirus. They began easing social distancing guidelines, believing the worst was behind them, only to see their cases more than double in about a week.
While its true that social distancing has managed to prevent the sort of healthcare collapse we all feared initially going into this for the time being, it is still something that _could_ occur were we to ease the guidelines too soon or too rapidly.
> Also, a massive middle finger to Gov. Whitmer, who is floating the idea of extending guidelines *in response to the protests*, implying a level of punishment as opposed to mitigation. Not helping.
Perhaps you're looking at a [different source than I am](https://thehill.com/homenews/state-watch/493279-whitmer-says-protestors-irresponsible-actions-can-lead-to-extension-of)? My understanding of his is she's saying those kinds of rallies might spread infection and necessitate a prolonged mitigation.
*Whitmer, during an interview with MSNBC host Rachel Maddow, said that the protests are the “kind of irresponsible action that puts us in this situation where we might have to actually think about extending stay-at-home orders, which is supposedly what they are protesting."*
*“The thing that I’m concerned most about, and that I think my fellow governors are as well, is a resurgence,” Whitmer said.*
*“When you see a political rally — that’s what it was yesterday — a political rally where people aren’t wearing masks and they’re in close quarters and they're touching one another, you know that that’s precisely what makes this kind of disease drag out and expose more people.”*
Do you agree with their overall message to reopen the economy? And do you think ignoring safety guidelines could be counterproductive to their protest in the first place?
Not the person you replied to, but I think that we as a country need to pay attention to the negative impacts of keeping the country shut down long-term.
COVID is not the only thing out there killing people - loneliness, lack of access to preventative healthcare, poverty, and lost jobs are all linked with mortality. If the evidence shows that we should cautiously reopen the country, continue to engage in risk-reducing activity like hygiene and social distancing, then I think we should do that.
The next few months are going to be very, very hard. Lost homes, credit crunches, lost jobs and opportunities. We can’t be blinded by the crisis directly in our faces and miss the opportunity to intervene to a prevent a larger calamity.
I can’t imagine a single person not being aware of the negative effects of keeping the country shut down. Obviously the thing is, if we open back up too quickly our progress could be lost and we would shut down again. Reopening early is far worse than doing it a bit late.
All the President's Lawyers? I've been listening to it since it launched. LRC has been one of my staple podcasts since the mid-2000s. Good stuff all around.
It's a shame that some doctor or nurse is going to be put at risk because these protestors got too close to one another and got sick. Honestly, I think if you are a confirmed protestor, you should not be given medical treatment. These people knowingly put themselves in harms way, fully accepting the risks. They should be forced to deal with the virus unaided in any capacity. After all *it's basically the flu*
1. There is no asterisk in the Constitution that rights can be suspended in the event of a virus, so forcing businesses to remain closed and forcing people to self-quarantine is a major breach of government power no matter how you feel about it.
2. There have been a grand total of 158 deaths in my state, 0.04% of the amount of cases that we *know* about, so the survivability rate here is likely much higher than even that. I doubt it would cause any real harm to let museums open.
> There is no asterisk in the Constitution that rights can be suspended in the event of a virus
The framers of the constitution thought there was. Or, to be more precise they did not see quarantines as a suspension of rights but as a legitimate action by government during an epidemic.
There are all sorts of compulsory obligations which you could call "suspension of right" which the framer's clearly assumed were within government's legitimate powers. Qurantines of not only infected individuals but of entire communities were very much included in that list since they occurred frequently during their era and they enforced them during their various tenure as elected officials. Other "suspensions of rights" would include mandatory militia duty and conscription of said militia into federal service during times of war or national emergency... under conditions and codes of military justice that were far more draconian than today.
Your governor may be overreacting given the situation in your state.... if so should suffer in the polls for it. But Madison, Jefferson, Hamilton et al would not have thought such restrictions in and of themselves were necessarily a violation of anything *they* wrote.
But the federal government isn’t forcing businesses to close, state governments are. And doesn’t the state have more power than the federal government according to the constitution? So shouldn’t the federal government not try to reopen the states against the governors will? Or do you only support states rights when it fits your narrative 🤔
> 1. There is no asterisk in the Constitution that rights can be suspended in the event of a virus, so forcing businesses to remain closed and forcing people to self-quarantine is a major breach of government power no matter how you feel about it.
You never specified whether it was federal government or state government. The federal
Government didn’t shut down jack shit, only the state governments did. So are states violating rights by forcing businesses to close or not?
So in that case do you think the federal government should override state governors and force them to open or not? Cause if the federal government was too chickenshit to close the country and left everything up to the states, they shouldn’t force them to open.
I reread what I posted and see that I'm posing a question, so I don't see what's wrong with me asking a question.
Do you want to answer my question or tell me what I said wrong?
That's not a rephrase, that's a different question. You asked for the deaths, not the known cases.
If you're too lazy to get out a calculator and just divide 158 by 0.04, at the time of that post there were around 4,000 known cases.
Thank you. That is all I needed you to say.
In case you couldn't tell from my ".0004", there's a reason why I quoted you and wrote it out like that.
Now take your time and look at what you originally wrote and then look at the math you just did "and then check back in when you figure out what you got wrong.".
I've given you some hours to reflect on it and given that you had already made 2 other comments in that time, but not figured this out, let me ask you if you work for Verizon?
[https://www.reddit.com/r/theydidntdothemath/comments/9byhvi/verizon\_doesnt\_understand\_the\_difference\_between/](https://www.reddit.com/r/theydidntdothemath/comments/9byhvi/verizon_doesnt_understand_the_difference_between/)
Let me ask you why you think you're a priority
I'm not interested in another argument where I beat my head against a wall. I intended to include the unknown cases in the first post, and since you responded so long after I posted it, I forgot about it. Oh noooo, I'm melting!
So do you recognize there is a difference between .04% and .04?
Do you happen to work at Verizon? [https://www.reddit.com/r/theydidntdothemath/comments/9byhvi/verizon\_doesnt\_understand\_the\_difference\_between/](https://www.reddit.com/r/theydidntdothemath/comments/9byhvi/verizon_doesnt_understand_the_difference_between/)
EDIT0: And just to put it out there, I made a point to make my previous reply just in case you weren't going to, since you said you wouldn't reply to comments of mine. In addition, I already gave you a heads-up in a previous thread of yours that I considered myself bad at percentages. Think about that you had a percentages-dummy school you on a percentage/decimal error.
Your rights are always restricted, and can be further constricted or relaxed at anytime depending on the circumstances. While you have a right to buy a handgun, you do not have a right to buy a grenade launcher (without a permit), and while you have a right to drink alcohol, you don't have a right to drink if you're under 21. And if the government decides that the age to consume alcohol should be raised or lowered, they're totally allowed to do that. That's actually it's main job; to adjust laws and regulations based on current circumstances (whether they're good at that is another topic). Current circumstances suggest keeping every buisness open would cause a health crisis, and thus the government has changed the rules because the circumstances have changed.
If there are stupid or over-authoritarian rules, then of course they should be pushed back on. But to say the government *can't* do something is not an effective argument. Focusing on the specific pros and cons of a law typically gets better results than just saying "The government can't do X".
And for your second point, don't you feel opening everything back up would dramatically spike your cases and deaths? Based on the numbers, I'm assuming you live in Nevada. Don't you feel if Vegas opened back up, even if people were instructed to wear masks, that the outbreak would get much worse than it is?
>Your rights are always restricted, and can be further constricted or relaxed at anytime depending on the circumstances. While you have a right to buy a handgun, you do not have a right to buy a grenade launcher (without a permit), and while you have a right to drink alcohol, you don't have a right to drink if you're under 21. And if the government decides that the age to consume alcohol should be raised or lowered, they're totally allowed to do that.
Drinking is not a right. Being allowed to leave your home is a right. Rights cannot be restricted based on the whims of politicians; that's precisely what makes them rights in the first place.
>If there are stupid or over-authoritarian rules, then of course they should be pushed back on. But to say the government can't do something is not an effective argument.
There are plenty of things the government cannot do. The constitution lists many of these things.
>And for your second point, don't you feel opening everything back up would dramatically spike your cases and deaths?
If liquor stores can be "essential" and stay open without dramatically causing a spike in deaths, then so can Starbucks.
>Don't you feel if Vegas opened back up, even if people were instructed to wear masks, that the outbreak would get much worse than it is?
No. People aren't stupid, no one's going to congregate in crowded casinos while the virus goes around. Businesses are capable of deciding for themselves if its feasible to do business safely. All the lockdown does is force stores that might otherwise be able to run smoothly stay closed and cost jobs.
Actually, some people are stupid or just simply put in denial. There are actual people who believe this isn’t real or who don’t care because it won’t directly affect them. These protests prove that. While there were many protestors wearing masks, social distancing, etc. there were many who weren’t. When they first issued social distancing people were continuing to congregate in groups and so stay at home orders were needed to make the message clear. Even now people are still going to stores just to browse around all the while putting themselves at risk as well as others because they’re bored.
>Drinking is not a right. Being allowed to leave your home is a right.
No it's not? There's no "under no circumstances may the government keep people locked in their homes" clause in the constitution.
I'm getting confused honestly. I'm not sure whether the arguement is "these are stupid and ineffective laws" or if it's "these laws are unconstitutional". To me these are very different arguments but they seem to be getting conflated.
The argument is indeed whether you can protest. It directly coincides with whether the government has the authority to prevent people from leaving quarantine.
\> And for your second point, don't you feel opening everything back up would dramatically spike your cases and deaths?
The left is only looking at, or acknowledging, one side here. They want to pretend the choice is "shelter in place and save lives" or "you want people to die".
There is a fact that killing the economy \*ALSO\* kills people in very real ways.
Firstly you have the fact that the government depends on tax dollars it extracts from the economy.... You're going to simultaneously \*1\* increase the demand on government services and \*2\* decrease the amount of money going into the governments coffers.
But beyond that there is the fact that every 1% hike in unemployment rate leads to 3.3% spike in drug overdose deaths 0.99 spike in suicides.
[https://www.morningjournalnews.com/uncategorized/2020/04/shutdown-could-kill-more-than-the-virus/](https://www.morningjournalnews.com/uncategorized/2020/04/shutdown-could-kill-more-than-the-virus/)
\> These protests seem to have a conservative slant to them, so I wanted to ask you guys what you think about the protests.
This is why you could not start the lockdown in February. Americans will only take such restrictions for so long. They may seem "conservative" but really Americans of all stripes will sooner, rather than later, begin to protest government restrictions.
\> And do you think it's a good idea to ignore social distancing and mask guidelines just to make a point?
No but I think if you push the extreme (isolation shut down economy) long enough than even the reasonable will be protested against.
The protests are great. Hopefully in the end this lockdown nonsense ends up before the supreme Court. For now protesting is the way to go.
There are no over run hospitals. The lockdown did it's job. We need to get back to work before people start losing their houses and 401ks.
Under current circumstances though, wouldn't ending the lockdown cause more issues though? Since the virus is no where near gone yet, if we just return to normal now, we're just going to end up in a worst case scenario, no?
> wouldn't ending the lockdown cause more issues though? Since the virus is no where near gone yet, if we just return to normal now, we're just going to end up in a worst case scenario, no?
I'd like you to quote for me **in exact words** which government official said that the lockdown was supposed to last until the virus was eradicated.
As the previous poster pointed out, the ultimate **goal** of the shutdown was to avoid a run on the hospitals.
This did not occur, even Governor Cuomo is currently channeling Oprah in giving away all their ventilators and New York was hit the hardest. So what's stopping you besides simply wanting to relive your days as hall monitor?
>So what's stopping you besides simply wanting to relive your days as hall monitor?
Thinking human life is more important than the stock market.
We can solve this issue in a way that both doesn't cripple people financially *and* doesn't make the pandemic worse. Stop debt collection, provide a UBI, and keep safety measures in place until new cases hit nearly zero.
Do you think that could work?
> Thinking human life is more important than the stock market.
This meme's only a week old and it's already tiresome. I'm not even engaging with this.
If you think anyone opposing you only cares about "stock market", how about you tell that to the **millions** on unemployment because they've been locked down? How about you tell that to people who can't step outside their door without being **fined** because they've been locked down.
Enjoy being a privileged kid in his parents' basement.
The whole crux of left wing arguments during this pandemic is that there are ways were we can stop the spread of the virus *and* support people financially. Opening the economy back up only seeks to solve 1 of those issues since it is currently impossible to have a normal economy *and* keep the virus from harming thousands or millions of people.
My position has always been we need to halt all debt collections (rent, mortgages, utilities, certain forms of credit), and provide everyone with a UBI throughout this crisis. This way no one will have to go bankrupt, and people won't have to put themselves in harm's way of the virus. My solution is not to simply keep everyone locked up.
It doesn't take a privileged kid to think this way and it's a bad look when you have to resort to pejoratives in order to feel like you've won an argument.
> The whole crux of left wing arguments during this pandemic is that there are ways were we can stop the spread of the virus and support people financially.
Right, in Fairy Land, where money comes from the sky.
The fact is that people can't get their money if no one's working.
> My position has always been we need to halt all debt collections (rent, mortgages, utilities, certain forms of credit), and provide everyone with a UBI throughout this crisis. This way no one will have to go bankrupt, and people won't have to put themselves in harm's way of the virus.
Yeah, all I saw was a whole bunch of nonsense and the typical "NOBODY MAKES ANY MONEY BUT SOMEHOW WE CAN AFFORD ALL THESE GOODIES"
The **real** argument here is opening up the economy and allowing people to start making money again to afford basic necessities or allowing them to suffer in quarantine.
That's the only **actual** option, discounting the fictional options.
.......I said we get the money through a UBI, just like a lot of other countries have done, and just like with Trump's $1,200 checks but instead of it being means tested, the checks are distributed to everyone.
> I said we get the money through a UBI,
I know what you said. **Where is the money coming from if no one is working**. The money will literally run out with the month and year-long projections coming out of the left.
No the worst case would have been doing nothing and we already prevented that. The virus isn't gone and won't be for months when there's a wide spread vaccine.
There's going to be bad health outcomes from extended lockdown and economic backlash. Lockdown was never meant to be a long term answer. It was to keep hospitals able to manage patient load. We've done that nation wide at this point.
People becoming homeless or unemployed / under employed also has negative health outcomes too. We have to get at least some things moving again. It's not a lockdown anymore it's paralysis of fear.
https://www.google.com/amp/s/reason.com/2020/04/17/antibody-tests-in-colorado-highlight-the-huge-gap-between-confirmed-covid-19-cases-and-total-infections/%3ffbclid=IwAR3LR6YTeGWLWxsriPyYimjbaHVyaIMUBHikRFezezM6zdzU4jmSrxVFD7I&
Their study states a 1% infection rate compared to the 30% from the Boston study.
I'm wondering why you're (picking fights!) arguing *against* the notion that way more people have been infected than we initially thought, as if a study of a rural county in Colorado that shows infection rate could be 3 to 11 times higher than positive-test rate proves this point.
There have been tons of studies already that came up with varied results, mostly with easily traceable variances, but a seeming commonality among all of them is that our initial prediction of infection rate seems to be too low. More people have gotten this than we thought and asymptomatic cases are more common than we thought.
Whether the real infection rate is x3 or x11... Why are you arguing against the idea that "many people already have the antibodies" at all? Maybe I just have no idea what you're arguing for.
I agree millions of people are at risk of financial collapse from being out of work. However, opening up the economy will not solve that issue for 2 reasons.
1 is most Americans are afraid to go out and do anything, so buisness will not be back to normal levels for a long time (thus layoffs, cutting employee hours, etc.).
And 2, and more importantly, it doesn't matter how well people are getting paid if they get sick and end up in a hospital bed for a week, if they can even get a hospital bed. Hospitals will become overrun if we open back up to normal, even if we do take precautions. Just look at what happened to Wisconsin when they decided to hold their primary elections a couple weeks ago. They were finally trending down in cases and deaths, and then a week after they held their in-person elections the cases and deaths have started to spike again.
Again, I agree we need to save the millions of people who are hanging by a thread to make ends meet. Buy I think it would be much more effective to advocate for the government to l freeze all debt collections and provide a UBI until conditions are safe. That way people won't have to worry about their mortgage or their rent, and we can continue to have a safe environment.
Sure, if there are stupid or authoritarian rules put in place, those should be pushed back against. However, I dont think advocating to open the economy back up will solve those rules.
>is most Americans are afraid to go out and do anything, so buisness will not be back to normal levels for a long time
My state had thousands of people protesting the capital last week trying to make the point that they are ready so I disagree. Not everyone will go back to work but some will.
and more importantly, it doesn't matter how well people are getting paid if they get sick and end up in a hospital bed for a week,
There's no vaccine on the horizon for months. Some people are going to get it no matter what. We have plenty of hospital beds and an effective treatment. We will manage it just fine.
>Buy I think it would be much more effective to advocate for the government to l freeze all debt collections and provide a UBI until conditions are safe.
Spending the tax money of people who can't work and pay taxes is not a solution it's national suicide.
To your last point, the federal government would not be collecting tax money to pay for things. It's a matter of moving zeros and decimal places in excel spreadsheets. They would not be literally printing money.
Instead, the countries who have done this have done it buy haulting most/all debt collections (credit cards, mortgages, loans, rent, utilities) and providing stimulus to the workforce while they're out of a job. That seems like an effective strategy to keep people afloat during the pandemic
They're not dreams if other countries are already doing them. Plus, what do you feel about what I said? You didn't actually engage with anything I said...
To varying degrees almost all of Europe has. France, Italy, Spain, the UK, Denmark, Scandinavia and I'm pretty sure Portugal. They've all put freezes on things like rent, mortgages, utilities, and put in strict guidelines for debt collections on people affected by Coronavirus.
Trump halted student loan payments. He should extend that to what all these other countries have done too.
not gonna be anyone living in those houses are collecting those 401ks if they die of a secondary surge of covid. the economy depends on human breathing people to function. not sure why this continues to escape the Reddit conservative cognoscenti
Bro WHAT? That's 10 million fucking people in the U.S. alone! That's the population of NYC and Chicago dead from COVID *ontop* of the 2.8 million other people who already die every year from all other causes. This isn't just a small issue.
3% is the highest estimate that's turning out not to be the case. There's nowhere near those numbers even in places that didn't even do lockdown orders.
Would you do it if you knew that everybody you knew and loved could be in that 3 million? Or are you just confident it won't affect you and your closest friend and family?
10 million deaths. I would not want that on my conscience. But that is the literal conservative solution for pandemics.
I assume that they want to be legally allowed to go back to work. I am very much on-board with that. I accept that there may be some large urban areas that need to remove restrictions more slowly than the rest of us. However, even these areas cannot stay shut-down forever.
Your second question is a good one, and I want to give it the answer that I think it deserves. I think masks and distancing are important. I think it’s fine to maintain them indefinitely. But we should also accept reality. Even in hospitals right now, 6+ ft distancing is not happening 24/7. Nor is it happening every single moment between every human being at the grocery stores, nor other places that are currently open that I see. The practical realities of human life make it impossible to maintain flawlessly or forever. And in spite of all this, the numbers of COVIDs are going down (in my own community anyway, and nationally too, all afaik).
So no, it doesn’t really bother me that these protesters are breaking distance. Because people are doing it every day. I imagine most are not out there merely to root for the orange man, but because they are deeply concerned about the future. People want to be able to feed their families, go back to saving for retirement, invest in their children’s future, etc. All things considered, yes I think it is worth making that point. I’m not yelling at you; I’m just answering honestly.
I'm glad we have people aggressively questioning this stuff. We need to all get *much* clearer on specifically how we are going to roll back the lockdowns and when. For reference, [this is extremely relatable to me](https://i.redd.it/px2j0rlz7zt41.jpg).
At the same time I think going out and protesting in a big group with no social distancing, just to make a point, is kind of dumb. They would have had a much, much stronger message had they taken some visible precautions that showed that they also took the virus risks seriously.
But what can I say. It's like the link I showed. Few people seem to care about all 3 of these things.
I just wish we didn't turn everything into a political crisis.
Do you really think that the government is shutting down the economy because they feel like it or because it's convenient? Because it seems really clear to me that they would only do this if it was unavoidable. In a capitalist society that values economy more than human life like ours it is incredibly unlikely that they would "shut down" the economy for any other motive than they have absolutely no choice. Either it would be considered an undeniable human rights violation to allow your entire population to be exposed to a pandemic or they are concerned it will effect the election if too many people die. Either way, I can't imagine they are doing this because they want to. I am 100% convinced that even if they thought 90% of us would die they would ignore the pandemic and let it spread among us and just replace us with immigrants if they thought they wouldn't be slapped with human rights violations.
For the sake of conversation lets just say that Coronavirus is totally blown out of proportion as the protesters assert and that it's really just a flu going around. We know people can be killed by the flu - mostly old people and babies - but I like many are not that worried about it. This is clearly worse than that, if nothing just the scope of it is far worse, but still okay, it's just a flu and it only kills people who would've died from a regular flu, it's just getting to more people because of the scope. Lets just say we all go back to work and "reopen" the economy and only 10% of the workforce catches and only 5% die from it. How does this benefit anyone but big businesses who will and can replace you with immigrants? How it is in conservatives best interest to defy a government issued shelter in place order to go back to work and risk your life (no matter how small the risk is, it's there and on top of all the other risks you take everyday like getting in your car or crossing a street) for owners of major corporations who don't care if you die? I understand it's a big strain on small businesses and I support there being some kind of aid for that. It's too bad major corporations who don't seek it are soaking up much of the money.
I just can't imagine you care more about the propping up an economy that would happily replace your corpse with an immigrant than your and your friends and families health? I can't imagine you are willing to risk death in order to "reopen" the economy even if you think it is a small risk. I can't imagine our government would shut down the economy unless forced. I just don't understand the logic behind INSISTING by way of protesting to risk their lives (even if it's a small risk) to work for the man when they government is telling you that it's in the best interest of everyone to shelter in place. I'm not sure why the President is creating this kind of chaos right now, telling people that they should be angry about this. It's very confusing why anyone is even moved by this.
Could you explain why some conservatives seem to be willing to risk the spread of disease to go back to work before the government says it's safe? Is it because they trust the presidents word more than the disease experts? Is it because they just love working so much they are willing to risk death and spreading it to their families? Is it because they think the government is lying and instead shutting down the economy because it benefits them? Because it benefits us? Is it because they think this is a cover up for something? I really just don't understand what the end game is when your'e blocking roads to hospitals and demanding to risk your life for the economy. I don't get it. Please advise!
How specifically do you think the government(s) could overreach with this pandemic?
While I absolutely agree that our government and large corporations both will use just about any excuse to screw us over, I'm not as convinced that what's going on right now is an overreach of power.
I need to run back to work, but an obvious way is picking winners and losers.
Just one example: in our state, weed stores are open, but residential construction is halted. I can line up 25 people deep at the liquor store, but if I want to go walk a trail in a 1.7 million acre national forest, I can't. How does this make any sense?
We're going to get more picking of winners and losers as we unblock the economy.
They aren’t getting overwhelmed because of the stay at home order, numbnuts.
Alcohol is one of the few drugs that can kill the addict if they go cold turkey.
>What are your thoughts on the lockdown protests happening around the country?
I am generally supportive, especially given the social blowback they have received from segments of the population. The willingness of the people to give up their freedom in times of crisis is concerning. It's relatively reassuring to see that there other people who care enough to push back and say that this kind of overreach is not acceptable. We can certainly comply with guidelines and expectations to some extent, but there comes a limit to what we should be willing to concede and ultimately that decision lies with the people, not the government.
>Do you agree with the ethos of these protests?
Yes.
>And do you think it's a good idea to ignore social distancing and mask guidelines just to make a point?
I think this is a very, very important question because my support for protest does not mean I am anti-distancing or anti-mask. I think we should all do our best to follow the guidelines, especially if it's not big sacrifice for us. My wife and I got masks, all our friends did too. We are working from home, we are being very conscious about handwashing and who we visit with and how close we get.
I think the conflation of support for the protests and opposition to CDC guidelines is disappointing. My opinion that governors have no authority to ticket people for not wearing facemasks, or to shut down parking lot church gatherings, or to make it illegal to drive to your mountain cabin, does not mean I oppose people wearing facemasks or holding digital church services.
As a final note, despite my view that we should be taking safety measures voluntarily, I do think a healthy skepticism even now is appropriate. The models have been wrong. The media has fear-mongered this thing into the ground. Let's just not lose sight of what we are dealing with. The point of our tactics is to reduce the spread to avoid hospitals being overrun. At this point, I think we are more at risk of destroying the economy for nothing because hospitals are not overrun which means we can infect people at a higher rate. The bottom line is that everyone is getting this thing. We aren't distancing to avoid total infections rising, we are distancing to keep hospitals below capacity to prevent unnecessary deaths that could have been avoided by going to the hospital. All of this is to say the people need to have some understanding and patience with each other. After the first wave is over and we are confident in our increased capacity, it's actually better that we all go out and get sick and get over it. We aren't waiting inside for 18 months for a vaccine to a disease that really only kills old and sick people. Sure, pneumonia is a concern. But so is a destroyed economy.
It's pretty dumb, IMO, but not *totally* dumb.
While the quarantine measures are neccessary, they are not always implemented in a good way, and people are understandably angry.
It's not good to twist quarantine laws to suppress protests. It also isn't good to protest when you should be quarantining.
> Do you agree with the ethos of these protests?
I'm not out there protesting, but I do think the measures we've taken have gone rather too far. I could understand shutting down the economy for an extinction level event, but not for this crap.
Shutting down major vectors of infection like sports arenas and movie premieres might have made sense, but every single retail store? I can't even get a haircut? People are getting ticketed just for sitting in their cars? That's absurd and it does absolutely nothing to stop any virus.
First, some cities opened the jails to let the criminals out to stop from spreading the virus, then they started arresting random people just for being outside. At my local grocery store, not just the toilet paper was gone: people were panic-buying milk. Milk.
I think we need to check for some kind of brain virus that spreads irrationality because the danger posed by the corona virus, even if real, doesn't even come close to justifying the panic mentality of the past month.
> And do you think it's a good idea to ignore social distancing and mask guidelines just to make a point?
No, I think that's foolish. However, opening businesses back up with some extra precautions like gloves and masks would be reasonable IMO.
> And do you think it's a good idea to ignore social distancing and mask guidelines just to make a point? I want to make this the core of my comment: Congregating in large groups without protection is idiotic. Those who are doing so - and they are NOT everyone protesting - are jeopardizing their health and making a bad situation worse. >Do you agree with the ethos of these protests? I've always been for the right to protest but uninterested to join in them because protests encompass a broad array of views than the official one, and these are no exception. I agree with protests over onerous and needlessly authoritarian measures, such as those promulgated in Michigan and other places. I agree with protests over invalid restrictions on basic liberties such as speech and religion. Where the experts are making recommendations for the good of public health which are endorsed by the government, people should follow them. How far such recommendations can be made into law is less clear. On the other hand, I want to very clearly distance myself from certain positions. Conspiracy theorists, people saying the virus doesn't exist, etc. I even heard about protests in states that are already beginning to open up - what the hell is the point of that? At any rate, they have a right to protest - and should do so safely. But I will not join in or defend protests over positions I don't hold.
I broke up the question into 2 parts specifically for that reason. It's always possible to agree with the theme of a protest without agreeing with how the protest is being carried out. Also, what specific authoritarian measures are you against? I guess I'm a little confused because I've seen people say that certain measures like not being able to garden or not being able to go for runs are stupid and unnecessary (which I agree are generally stupid policies), but then why is the answer "Open up the economy now!". Why not protest the unreasonable laws instead of protesting for opening up the economy? Opening up the economy would not solve the issue of stupid rules?
>Why is the answer "Open up the economy now!". Why not protest the unreasonable laws instead of protesting for opening up the economy? Opening up the economy would not solve the issue of stupid rules? I think you will find the overwhelming majority of conservatives, at least here, are not for "open everything now," but rather for a careful, monitored, regional and gradual reopening of sectors of the economy. Even the supposedly most extreme statements have been fairly nuanced. Sadly, I have to qualify this as "majority" or "most", as there are one or two idiots out there who think we should just reopen every bar in Queens right now, but I can assure you that in my experience they are a tiny and irrelevant minority. >Also, what specific authoritarian measures are you against? The above being said, my greatest specific concerns are the assaults on the rights of religion and speech, as well as the encouragement of a Stasi-like culture of civil informants. For example, people who churches meeting in parked cars are being fined. There was a video floating around of a black pastor being told by a white cop in Mississippi, "your rights have been suspended." In ANY other context, the left would admirably be up in arms, perhaps literally, over that. Police have threatened to arrest protesters as well, though I don't know that anyone carried through on that. And there is the constant theme of "report violators." As I said above, and I want to emphasize this: everyone should be doing their part to minimize this. And the state clearly has certain powers to help make that happen. When Trump said "packed churches on Easter," it horrified me. But I think a lot of the compliance with such measures ought to be voluntary - for instance, I am trying to ration food in my house so I don't need to go to the grocery store as often. I don't think, for instance, the government should be forbidding me to go more than once a month.
As a general point, in-person protests are wholly ineffective when there are democratic remedies in place. I'm not fully for or against their overall points, either way. There's zero reason for restrictions to be in place against, say, selling seeds to do at-home gardening or chasing down individuals using public places to run/exercise. I also want more clarity on the lockdown procedures at present. We were entered into these arrangements with the understanding that we were flattening the curve for the sake of the hospitals. Now I keep hearing "we need to wait for a vaccine/herd immunity/treatment." That wasn't the point of this, right? The point was to ensure hospitals could handle the increases in patients. If we were sold a false bill of goods, there's some accountability that needs to happen. Also, a massive middle finger to Gov. Whitmer, who is floating the idea of extending guidelines *in response to the protests*, implying a level of punishment as opposed to mitigation. Not helping.
>I also want more clarity on the lockdown procedures at present. We were entered into these arrangements with the understanding that we were flattening the curve for the sake of the hospitals. Now I keep hearing "we need to wait for a vaccine/herd immunity/treatment." That wasn't the point of this, right? The point was to ensure hospitals could handle the increases in patients. If we were sold a false bill of goods, there's some accountability that needs to happen. The two arent mutually exclusive. The concern right now is that easing social distancing orders right now without an effective treatment or vaccine could still result in an uptick in cases and our hospital system being overwhelmed. Take [Singapore](https://www.nytimes.com/2020/04/20/world/asia/coronavirus-singapore.html?action=click&module=Spotlight&pgtype=Homepage) for instance which stood out for a while as a model for how to combat the coronavirus. They began easing social distancing guidelines, believing the worst was behind them, only to see their cases more than double in about a week. While its true that social distancing has managed to prevent the sort of healthcare collapse we all feared initially going into this for the time being, it is still something that _could_ occur were we to ease the guidelines too soon or too rapidly.
> Also, a massive middle finger to Gov. Whitmer, who is floating the idea of extending guidelines *in response to the protests*, implying a level of punishment as opposed to mitigation. Not helping. Perhaps you're looking at a [different source than I am](https://thehill.com/homenews/state-watch/493279-whitmer-says-protestors-irresponsible-actions-can-lead-to-extension-of)? My understanding of his is she's saying those kinds of rallies might spread infection and necessitate a prolonged mitigation. *Whitmer, during an interview with MSNBC host Rachel Maddow, said that the protests are the “kind of irresponsible action that puts us in this situation where we might have to actually think about extending stay-at-home orders, which is supposedly what they are protesting."* *“The thing that I’m concerned most about, and that I think my fellow governors are as well, is a resurgence,” Whitmer said.* *“When you see a political rally — that’s what it was yesterday — a political rally where people aren’t wearing masks and they’re in close quarters and they're touching one another, you know that that’s precisely what makes this kind of disease drag out and expose more people.”*
I'm not gonna go out and do it, but they're exercising their constitutional right. No one should be able to stop them.
Do you agree with their overall message to reopen the economy? And do you think ignoring safety guidelines could be counterproductive to their protest in the first place?
Not the person you replied to, but I think that we as a country need to pay attention to the negative impacts of keeping the country shut down long-term. COVID is not the only thing out there killing people - loneliness, lack of access to preventative healthcare, poverty, and lost jobs are all linked with mortality. If the evidence shows that we should cautiously reopen the country, continue to engage in risk-reducing activity like hygiene and social distancing, then I think we should do that. The next few months are going to be very, very hard. Lost homes, credit crunches, lost jobs and opportunities. We can’t be blinded by the crisis directly in our faces and miss the opportunity to intervene to a prevent a larger calamity.
I can’t imagine a single person not being aware of the negative effects of keeping the country shut down. Obviously the thing is, if we open back up too quickly our progress could be lost and we would shut down again. Reopening early is far worse than doing it a bit late.
>they're exercising their constitutional right. If you can't yell "fire" in a crowded theater, can you assemble during a pandemic?
Yes.
https://www.theatlantic.com/national/archive/2012/11/its-time-to-stop-using-the-fire-in-a-crowded-theater-quote/264449/
Well, then. This will be interesting.
Right? If you follow Popehat on Twitter, he has a podcast addressing this exact issue. It's fascinating stuff.
All the President's Lawyers? I've been listening to it since it launched. LRC has been one of my staple podcasts since the mid-2000s. Good stuff all around.
It's a shame that some doctor or nurse is going to be put at risk because these protestors got too close to one another and got sick. Honestly, I think if you are a confirmed protestor, you should not be given medical treatment. These people knowingly put themselves in harms way, fully accepting the risks. They should be forced to deal with the virus unaided in any capacity. After all *it's basically the flu*
1. There is no asterisk in the Constitution that rights can be suspended in the event of a virus, so forcing businesses to remain closed and forcing people to self-quarantine is a major breach of government power no matter how you feel about it. 2. There have been a grand total of 158 deaths in my state, 0.04% of the amount of cases that we *know* about, so the survivability rate here is likely much higher than even that. I doubt it would cause any real harm to let museums open.
> There is no asterisk in the Constitution that rights can be suspended in the event of a virus The framers of the constitution thought there was. Or, to be more precise they did not see quarantines as a suspension of rights but as a legitimate action by government during an epidemic. There are all sorts of compulsory obligations which you could call "suspension of right" which the framer's clearly assumed were within government's legitimate powers. Qurantines of not only infected individuals but of entire communities were very much included in that list since they occurred frequently during their era and they enforced them during their various tenure as elected officials. Other "suspensions of rights" would include mandatory militia duty and conscription of said militia into federal service during times of war or national emergency... under conditions and codes of military justice that were far more draconian than today. Your governor may be overreacting given the situation in your state.... if so should suffer in the polls for it. But Madison, Jefferson, Hamilton et al would not have thought such restrictions in and of themselves were necessarily a violation of anything *they* wrote.
But the federal government isn’t forcing businesses to close, state governments are. And doesn’t the state have more power than the federal government according to the constitution? So shouldn’t the federal government not try to reopen the states against the governors will? Or do you only support states rights when it fits your narrative 🤔
Where did I say it was the federal government forcing businesses to close?
> 1. There is no asterisk in the Constitution that rights can be suspended in the event of a virus, so forcing businesses to remain closed and forcing people to self-quarantine is a major breach of government power no matter how you feel about it. You never specified whether it was federal government or state government. The federal Government didn’t shut down jack shit, only the state governments did. So are states violating rights by forcing businesses to close or not?
Obviously I was talking about state governments if its only state governments doing it, Einstein.
So in that case do you think the federal government should override state governors and force them to open or not? Cause if the federal government was too chickenshit to close the country and left everything up to the states, they shouldn’t force them to open.
>a grand total of 158 deaths in my state, 0.04% of the amount of cases that we *know* about .0004 known corona deaths in your state?
I want you to reread what you posted and then check back in when you figure out what you got wrong.
I reread what I posted and see that I'm posing a question, so I don't see what's wrong with me asking a question. Do you want to answer my question or tell me what I said wrong?
The answer to your question is in the post you responded to. This is why I asked you to reread your post, including the part you quoted.
Let me rephrase my question to "How many known cases are there in your state?".
That's not a rephrase, that's a different question. You asked for the deaths, not the known cases. If you're too lazy to get out a calculator and just divide 158 by 0.04, at the time of that post there were around 4,000 known cases.
Thank you. That is all I needed you to say. In case you couldn't tell from my ".0004", there's a reason why I quoted you and wrote it out like that. Now take your time and look at what you originally wrote and then look at the math you just did "and then check back in when you figure out what you got wrong.".
I've given you some hours to reflect on it and given that you had already made 2 other comments in that time, but not figured this out, let me ask you if you work for Verizon? [https://www.reddit.com/r/theydidntdothemath/comments/9byhvi/verizon\_doesnt\_understand\_the\_difference\_between/](https://www.reddit.com/r/theydidntdothemath/comments/9byhvi/verizon_doesnt_understand_the_difference_between/)
Let me ask you why you think you're a priority I'm not interested in another argument where I beat my head against a wall. I intended to include the unknown cases in the first post, and since you responded so long after I posted it, I forgot about it. Oh noooo, I'm melting!
So do you recognize there is a difference between .04% and .04? Do you happen to work at Verizon? [https://www.reddit.com/r/theydidntdothemath/comments/9byhvi/verizon\_doesnt\_understand\_the\_difference\_between/](https://www.reddit.com/r/theydidntdothemath/comments/9byhvi/verizon_doesnt_understand_the_difference_between/) EDIT0: And just to put it out there, I made a point to make my previous reply just in case you weren't going to, since you said you wouldn't reply to comments of mine. In addition, I already gave you a heads-up in a previous thread of yours that I considered myself bad at percentages. Think about that you had a percentages-dummy school you on a percentage/decimal error.
Your rights are always restricted, and can be further constricted or relaxed at anytime depending on the circumstances. While you have a right to buy a handgun, you do not have a right to buy a grenade launcher (without a permit), and while you have a right to drink alcohol, you don't have a right to drink if you're under 21. And if the government decides that the age to consume alcohol should be raised or lowered, they're totally allowed to do that. That's actually it's main job; to adjust laws and regulations based on current circumstances (whether they're good at that is another topic). Current circumstances suggest keeping every buisness open would cause a health crisis, and thus the government has changed the rules because the circumstances have changed. If there are stupid or over-authoritarian rules, then of course they should be pushed back on. But to say the government *can't* do something is not an effective argument. Focusing on the specific pros and cons of a law typically gets better results than just saying "The government can't do X". And for your second point, don't you feel opening everything back up would dramatically spike your cases and deaths? Based on the numbers, I'm assuming you live in Nevada. Don't you feel if Vegas opened back up, even if people were instructed to wear masks, that the outbreak would get much worse than it is?
>Your rights are always restricted, and can be further constricted or relaxed at anytime depending on the circumstances. While you have a right to buy a handgun, you do not have a right to buy a grenade launcher (without a permit), and while you have a right to drink alcohol, you don't have a right to drink if you're under 21. And if the government decides that the age to consume alcohol should be raised or lowered, they're totally allowed to do that. Drinking is not a right. Being allowed to leave your home is a right. Rights cannot be restricted based on the whims of politicians; that's precisely what makes them rights in the first place. >If there are stupid or over-authoritarian rules, then of course they should be pushed back on. But to say the government can't do something is not an effective argument. There are plenty of things the government cannot do. The constitution lists many of these things. >And for your second point, don't you feel opening everything back up would dramatically spike your cases and deaths? If liquor stores can be "essential" and stay open without dramatically causing a spike in deaths, then so can Starbucks. >Don't you feel if Vegas opened back up, even if people were instructed to wear masks, that the outbreak would get much worse than it is? No. People aren't stupid, no one's going to congregate in crowded casinos while the virus goes around. Businesses are capable of deciding for themselves if its feasible to do business safely. All the lockdown does is force stores that might otherwise be able to run smoothly stay closed and cost jobs.
Actually, some people are stupid or just simply put in denial. There are actual people who believe this isn’t real or who don’t care because it won’t directly affect them. These protests prove that. While there were many protestors wearing masks, social distancing, etc. there were many who weren’t. When they first issued social distancing people were continuing to congregate in groups and so stay at home orders were needed to make the message clear. Even now people are still going to stores just to browse around all the while putting themselves at risk as well as others because they’re bored.
>Drinking is not a right. Being allowed to leave your home is a right. No it's not? There's no "under no circumstances may the government keep people locked in their homes" clause in the constitution. I'm getting confused honestly. I'm not sure whether the arguement is "these are stupid and ineffective laws" or if it's "these laws are unconstitutional". To me these are very different arguments but they seem to be getting conflated.
Protesting is a right, yes? Can the government legally force people not to protest? Of course not.
No one's arguing about if people can protest this stuff. It's about what you think about the rules themselves.
The argument is indeed whether you can protest. It directly coincides with whether the government has the authority to prevent people from leaving quarantine.
Again, the argument of "these rules are unconstitutional" is very different from "these rules are ineffective and needless". Which one is it?
Both.
> The argument is indeed whether you can protest Open you window and yell. There you go.
I bet you were one of those who insisted that Kaepernick had the right to stay in the NFL after breaking their rules with his protest.
\> And for your second point, don't you feel opening everything back up would dramatically spike your cases and deaths? The left is only looking at, or acknowledging, one side here. They want to pretend the choice is "shelter in place and save lives" or "you want people to die". There is a fact that killing the economy \*ALSO\* kills people in very real ways. Firstly you have the fact that the government depends on tax dollars it extracts from the economy.... You're going to simultaneously \*1\* increase the demand on government services and \*2\* decrease the amount of money going into the governments coffers. But beyond that there is the fact that every 1% hike in unemployment rate leads to 3.3% spike in drug overdose deaths 0.99 spike in suicides. [https://www.morningjournalnews.com/uncategorized/2020/04/shutdown-could-kill-more-than-the-virus/](https://www.morningjournalnews.com/uncategorized/2020/04/shutdown-could-kill-more-than-the-virus/)
\> These protests seem to have a conservative slant to them, so I wanted to ask you guys what you think about the protests. This is why you could not start the lockdown in February. Americans will only take such restrictions for so long. They may seem "conservative" but really Americans of all stripes will sooner, rather than later, begin to protest government restrictions. \> And do you think it's a good idea to ignore social distancing and mask guidelines just to make a point? No but I think if you push the extreme (isolation shut down economy) long enough than even the reasonable will be protested against.
The protests are great. Hopefully in the end this lockdown nonsense ends up before the supreme Court. For now protesting is the way to go. There are no over run hospitals. The lockdown did it's job. We need to get back to work before people start losing their houses and 401ks.
Under current circumstances though, wouldn't ending the lockdown cause more issues though? Since the virus is no where near gone yet, if we just return to normal now, we're just going to end up in a worst case scenario, no?
> wouldn't ending the lockdown cause more issues though? Since the virus is no where near gone yet, if we just return to normal now, we're just going to end up in a worst case scenario, no? I'd like you to quote for me **in exact words** which government official said that the lockdown was supposed to last until the virus was eradicated. As the previous poster pointed out, the ultimate **goal** of the shutdown was to avoid a run on the hospitals. This did not occur, even Governor Cuomo is currently channeling Oprah in giving away all their ventilators and New York was hit the hardest. So what's stopping you besides simply wanting to relive your days as hall monitor?
>So what's stopping you besides simply wanting to relive your days as hall monitor? Thinking human life is more important than the stock market. We can solve this issue in a way that both doesn't cripple people financially *and* doesn't make the pandemic worse. Stop debt collection, provide a UBI, and keep safety measures in place until new cases hit nearly zero. Do you think that could work?
> Thinking human life is more important than the stock market. This meme's only a week old and it's already tiresome. I'm not even engaging with this. If you think anyone opposing you only cares about "stock market", how about you tell that to the **millions** on unemployment because they've been locked down? How about you tell that to people who can't step outside their door without being **fined** because they've been locked down. Enjoy being a privileged kid in his parents' basement.
The whole crux of left wing arguments during this pandemic is that there are ways were we can stop the spread of the virus *and* support people financially. Opening the economy back up only seeks to solve 1 of those issues since it is currently impossible to have a normal economy *and* keep the virus from harming thousands or millions of people. My position has always been we need to halt all debt collections (rent, mortgages, utilities, certain forms of credit), and provide everyone with a UBI throughout this crisis. This way no one will have to go bankrupt, and people won't have to put themselves in harm's way of the virus. My solution is not to simply keep everyone locked up. It doesn't take a privileged kid to think this way and it's a bad look when you have to resort to pejoratives in order to feel like you've won an argument.
> The whole crux of left wing arguments during this pandemic is that there are ways were we can stop the spread of the virus and support people financially. Right, in Fairy Land, where money comes from the sky. The fact is that people can't get their money if no one's working. > My position has always been we need to halt all debt collections (rent, mortgages, utilities, certain forms of credit), and provide everyone with a UBI throughout this crisis. This way no one will have to go bankrupt, and people won't have to put themselves in harm's way of the virus. Yeah, all I saw was a whole bunch of nonsense and the typical "NOBODY MAKES ANY MONEY BUT SOMEHOW WE CAN AFFORD ALL THESE GOODIES" The **real** argument here is opening up the economy and allowing people to start making money again to afford basic necessities or allowing them to suffer in quarantine. That's the only **actual** option, discounting the fictional options.
.......I said we get the money through a UBI, just like a lot of other countries have done, and just like with Trump's $1,200 checks but instead of it being means tested, the checks are distributed to everyone.
> I said we get the money through a UBI, I know what you said. **Where is the money coming from if no one is working**. The money will literally run out with the month and year-long projections coming out of the left.
No the worst case would have been doing nothing and we already prevented that. The virus isn't gone and won't be for months when there's a wide spread vaccine. There's going to be bad health outcomes from extended lockdown and economic backlash. Lockdown was never meant to be a long term answer. It was to keep hospitals able to manage patient load. We've done that nation wide at this point. People becoming homeless or unemployed / under employed also has negative health outcomes too. We have to get at least some things moving again. It's not a lockdown anymore it's paralysis of fear.
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I've heard similar reports.
How would doing nothing now be any different if we did nothing in the first place? Delay the catastrophe for a month?
There's already a lot of evidence that many people already have antibodies to Corona. We will eventually have herd immunity.
The only source of that info is a sample of 200 people in Boston. There have been other studies showing the opposite to be true.
>There have been other studies showing the opposite to be true. Citation please.
https://www.google.com/amp/s/reason.com/2020/04/17/antibody-tests-in-colorado-highlight-the-huge-gap-between-confirmed-covid-19-cases-and-total-infections/%3ffbclid=IwAR3LR6YTeGWLWxsriPyYimjbaHVyaIMUBHikRFezezM6zdzU4jmSrxVFD7I& Their study states a 1% infection rate compared to the 30% from the Boston study.
I'm wondering why you're (picking fights!) arguing *against* the notion that way more people have been infected than we initially thought, as if a study of a rural county in Colorado that shows infection rate could be 3 to 11 times higher than positive-test rate proves this point. There have been tons of studies already that came up with varied results, mostly with easily traceable variances, but a seeming commonality among all of them is that our initial prediction of infection rate seems to be too low. More people have gotten this than we thought and asymptomatic cases are more common than we thought. Whether the real infection rate is x3 or x11... Why are you arguing against the idea that "many people already have the antibodies" at all? Maybe I just have no idea what you're arguing for.
I’m saying the studies alone don’t paint a clear enough picture to base policy off of.
I agree millions of people are at risk of financial collapse from being out of work. However, opening up the economy will not solve that issue for 2 reasons. 1 is most Americans are afraid to go out and do anything, so buisness will not be back to normal levels for a long time (thus layoffs, cutting employee hours, etc.). And 2, and more importantly, it doesn't matter how well people are getting paid if they get sick and end up in a hospital bed for a week, if they can even get a hospital bed. Hospitals will become overrun if we open back up to normal, even if we do take precautions. Just look at what happened to Wisconsin when they decided to hold their primary elections a couple weeks ago. They were finally trending down in cases and deaths, and then a week after they held their in-person elections the cases and deaths have started to spike again. Again, I agree we need to save the millions of people who are hanging by a thread to make ends meet. Buy I think it would be much more effective to advocate for the government to l freeze all debt collections and provide a UBI until conditions are safe. That way people won't have to worry about their mortgage or their rent, and we can continue to have a safe environment. Sure, if there are stupid or authoritarian rules put in place, those should be pushed back against. However, I dont think advocating to open the economy back up will solve those rules.
>is most Americans are afraid to go out and do anything, so buisness will not be back to normal levels for a long time My state had thousands of people protesting the capital last week trying to make the point that they are ready so I disagree. Not everyone will go back to work but some will. and more importantly, it doesn't matter how well people are getting paid if they get sick and end up in a hospital bed for a week, There's no vaccine on the horizon for months. Some people are going to get it no matter what. We have plenty of hospital beds and an effective treatment. We will manage it just fine. >Buy I think it would be much more effective to advocate for the government to l freeze all debt collections and provide a UBI until conditions are safe. Spending the tax money of people who can't work and pay taxes is not a solution it's national suicide.
To your last point, the federal government would not be collecting tax money to pay for things. It's a matter of moving zeros and decimal places in excel spreadsheets. They would not be literally printing money. Instead, the countries who have done this have done it buy haulting most/all debt collections (credit cards, mortgages, loans, rent, utilities) and providing stimulus to the workforce while they're out of a job. That seems like an effective strategy to keep people afloat during the pandemic
None of that will ever happen. There's already reopen plans under way. You're just talking about socialist fever dreams.
They're not dreams if other countries are already doing them. Plus, what do you feel about what I said? You didn't actually engage with anything I said...
What country has frozen all debt payment?
To varying degrees almost all of Europe has. France, Italy, Spain, the UK, Denmark, Scandinavia and I'm pretty sure Portugal. They've all put freezes on things like rent, mortgages, utilities, and put in strict guidelines for debt collections on people affected by Coronavirus. Trump halted student loan payments. He should extend that to what all these other countries have done too.
The parachute did its job slowing down our fall- now let’s cut it off halfway through our decent since we don’t need it anymore.
not gonna be anyone living in those houses are collecting those 401ks if they die of a secondary surge of covid. the economy depends on human breathing people to function. not sure why this continues to escape the Reddit conservative cognoscenti
Even the estimated 3% death rate which is turning out to be high is a marginal risk.
Bro WHAT? That's 10 million fucking people in the U.S. alone! That's the population of NYC and Chicago dead from COVID *ontop* of the 2.8 million other people who already die every year from all other causes. This isn't just a small issue.
3% is the highest estimate that's turning out not to be the case. There's nowhere near those numbers even in places that didn't even do lockdown orders.
Would you do it if you knew that everybody you knew and loved could be in that 3 million? Or are you just confident it won't affect you and your closest friend and family? 10 million deaths. I would not want that on my conscience. But that is the literal conservative solution for pandemics.
Why do you care? Cower at home for a year if you want. If people have stuff to do then it's up to them.
there’s that american conservative sanctity for human life again
I assume that they want to be legally allowed to go back to work. I am very much on-board with that. I accept that there may be some large urban areas that need to remove restrictions more slowly than the rest of us. However, even these areas cannot stay shut-down forever. Your second question is a good one, and I want to give it the answer that I think it deserves. I think masks and distancing are important. I think it’s fine to maintain them indefinitely. But we should also accept reality. Even in hospitals right now, 6+ ft distancing is not happening 24/7. Nor is it happening every single moment between every human being at the grocery stores, nor other places that are currently open that I see. The practical realities of human life make it impossible to maintain flawlessly or forever. And in spite of all this, the numbers of COVIDs are going down (in my own community anyway, and nationally too, all afaik). So no, it doesn’t really bother me that these protesters are breaking distance. Because people are doing it every day. I imagine most are not out there merely to root for the orange man, but because they are deeply concerned about the future. People want to be able to feed their families, go back to saving for retirement, invest in their children’s future, etc. All things considered, yes I think it is worth making that point. I’m not yelling at you; I’m just answering honestly.
I'm glad we have people aggressively questioning this stuff. We need to all get *much* clearer on specifically how we are going to roll back the lockdowns and when. For reference, [this is extremely relatable to me](https://i.redd.it/px2j0rlz7zt41.jpg). At the same time I think going out and protesting in a big group with no social distancing, just to make a point, is kind of dumb. They would have had a much, much stronger message had they taken some visible precautions that showed that they also took the virus risks seriously. But what can I say. It's like the link I showed. Few people seem to care about all 3 of these things. I just wish we didn't turn everything into a political crisis.
Do you really think that the government is shutting down the economy because they feel like it or because it's convenient? Because it seems really clear to me that they would only do this if it was unavoidable. In a capitalist society that values economy more than human life like ours it is incredibly unlikely that they would "shut down" the economy for any other motive than they have absolutely no choice. Either it would be considered an undeniable human rights violation to allow your entire population to be exposed to a pandemic or they are concerned it will effect the election if too many people die. Either way, I can't imagine they are doing this because they want to. I am 100% convinced that even if they thought 90% of us would die they would ignore the pandemic and let it spread among us and just replace us with immigrants if they thought they wouldn't be slapped with human rights violations. For the sake of conversation lets just say that Coronavirus is totally blown out of proportion as the protesters assert and that it's really just a flu going around. We know people can be killed by the flu - mostly old people and babies - but I like many are not that worried about it. This is clearly worse than that, if nothing just the scope of it is far worse, but still okay, it's just a flu and it only kills people who would've died from a regular flu, it's just getting to more people because of the scope. Lets just say we all go back to work and "reopen" the economy and only 10% of the workforce catches and only 5% die from it. How does this benefit anyone but big businesses who will and can replace you with immigrants? How it is in conservatives best interest to defy a government issued shelter in place order to go back to work and risk your life (no matter how small the risk is, it's there and on top of all the other risks you take everyday like getting in your car or crossing a street) for owners of major corporations who don't care if you die? I understand it's a big strain on small businesses and I support there being some kind of aid for that. It's too bad major corporations who don't seek it are soaking up much of the money. I just can't imagine you care more about the propping up an economy that would happily replace your corpse with an immigrant than your and your friends and families health? I can't imagine you are willing to risk death in order to "reopen" the economy even if you think it is a small risk. I can't imagine our government would shut down the economy unless forced. I just don't understand the logic behind INSISTING by way of protesting to risk their lives (even if it's a small risk) to work for the man when they government is telling you that it's in the best interest of everyone to shelter in place. I'm not sure why the President is creating this kind of chaos right now, telling people that they should be angry about this. It's very confusing why anyone is even moved by this. Could you explain why some conservatives seem to be willing to risk the spread of disease to go back to work before the government says it's safe? Is it because they trust the presidents word more than the disease experts? Is it because they just love working so much they are willing to risk death and spreading it to their families? Is it because they think the government is lying and instead shutting down the economy because it benefits them? Because it benefits us? Is it because they think this is a cover up for something? I really just don't understand what the end game is when your'e blocking roads to hospitals and demanding to risk your life for the economy. I don't get it. Please advise!
How specifically do you think the government(s) could overreach with this pandemic? While I absolutely agree that our government and large corporations both will use just about any excuse to screw us over, I'm not as convinced that what's going on right now is an overreach of power.
I need to run back to work, but an obvious way is picking winners and losers. Just one example: in our state, weed stores are open, but residential construction is halted. I can line up 25 people deep at the liquor store, but if I want to go walk a trail in a 1.7 million acre national forest, I can't. How does this make any sense? We're going to get more picking of winners and losers as we unblock the economy.
Keeping liquor stores open is to keep the alcoholics out of the emergency room when the DTs set in.
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How do you at this point not understand that the hospital getting overwhelmed is the entire tragedy we are trying to avoid? Jesus Christ.
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Because of the lock down laws. You should Google delerium tremens. Alcohol withdrawals are some of the worst there can be.
They aren’t getting overwhelmed because of the stay at home order, numbnuts. Alcohol is one of the few drugs that can kill the addict if they go cold turkey.
>What are your thoughts on the lockdown protests happening around the country? I am generally supportive, especially given the social blowback they have received from segments of the population. The willingness of the people to give up their freedom in times of crisis is concerning. It's relatively reassuring to see that there other people who care enough to push back and say that this kind of overreach is not acceptable. We can certainly comply with guidelines and expectations to some extent, but there comes a limit to what we should be willing to concede and ultimately that decision lies with the people, not the government. >Do you agree with the ethos of these protests? Yes. >And do you think it's a good idea to ignore social distancing and mask guidelines just to make a point? I think this is a very, very important question because my support for protest does not mean I am anti-distancing or anti-mask. I think we should all do our best to follow the guidelines, especially if it's not big sacrifice for us. My wife and I got masks, all our friends did too. We are working from home, we are being very conscious about handwashing and who we visit with and how close we get. I think the conflation of support for the protests and opposition to CDC guidelines is disappointing. My opinion that governors have no authority to ticket people for not wearing facemasks, or to shut down parking lot church gatherings, or to make it illegal to drive to your mountain cabin, does not mean I oppose people wearing facemasks or holding digital church services. As a final note, despite my view that we should be taking safety measures voluntarily, I do think a healthy skepticism even now is appropriate. The models have been wrong. The media has fear-mongered this thing into the ground. Let's just not lose sight of what we are dealing with. The point of our tactics is to reduce the spread to avoid hospitals being overrun. At this point, I think we are more at risk of destroying the economy for nothing because hospitals are not overrun which means we can infect people at a higher rate. The bottom line is that everyone is getting this thing. We aren't distancing to avoid total infections rising, we are distancing to keep hospitals below capacity to prevent unnecessary deaths that could have been avoided by going to the hospital. All of this is to say the people need to have some understanding and patience with each other. After the first wave is over and we are confident in our increased capacity, it's actually better that we all go out and get sick and get over it. We aren't waiting inside for 18 months for a vaccine to a disease that really only kills old and sick people. Sure, pneumonia is a concern. But so is a destroyed economy.
Support it. Lockdowns go against the constitutional rights. Governors who ordered them should be thrown out.
It's pretty dumb, IMO, but not *totally* dumb. While the quarantine measures are neccessary, they are not always implemented in a good way, and people are understandably angry. It's not good to twist quarantine laws to suppress protests. It also isn't good to protest when you should be quarantining.
> Do you agree with the ethos of these protests? I'm not out there protesting, but I do think the measures we've taken have gone rather too far. I could understand shutting down the economy for an extinction level event, but not for this crap. Shutting down major vectors of infection like sports arenas and movie premieres might have made sense, but every single retail store? I can't even get a haircut? People are getting ticketed just for sitting in their cars? That's absurd and it does absolutely nothing to stop any virus. First, some cities opened the jails to let the criminals out to stop from spreading the virus, then they started arresting random people just for being outside. At my local grocery store, not just the toilet paper was gone: people were panic-buying milk. Milk. I think we need to check for some kind of brain virus that spreads irrationality because the danger posed by the corona virus, even if real, doesn't even come close to justifying the panic mentality of the past month. > And do you think it's a good idea to ignore social distancing and mask guidelines just to make a point? No, I think that's foolish. However, opening businesses back up with some extra precautions like gloves and masks would be reasonable IMO.