All Things Coronavirus (Part 2)

[Dashinka 24,439]

31 minutes ago, laylalex said:

I'm baffled by what "antiquating" is supposed to mean here.

NB Spellchecking I imagine.

[Burnt Reynolds 5,058]

15 minutes ago, Ban Hammer said:

that's hilarious.
https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2019/apr/08/online-laws-threaten-freedom-of-speech-of-millions-of-britons

 

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2015/sep/21/freedom-of-speech-online-witch-hunts-law--bbc

 

https://www.theweek.co.uk/97552/hate-speech-vs-free-speech-the-uk-laws

https://telecoms.com/507498/uk-house-of-lords-to-investigate-online-freedom-of-expression/

 

And as always, government often excludes itself and its preferred people from its own rules. Which is why we just say to hell with that, we'll have our freedoms. We're watching governors and mayors now and their preferential lockdowns, attacking churches and religions, attacking speech, attacking businesses, all while excluding themselves and their preferred demographic from the gestapo compliance treatment. They're painfully transparent about the targeted methodology and its malicious use, illustrating just why government "telling people what to do" is an awful and un-American approach. For now, at least courts have been willing to strike down these authoritarian measures across the country, but institutions are not reliable protectors of freedoms absent a populace willing to fight for it.

Edited November 17, 2020 by Burnt Reynolds

[Nature Boy 2.0 8,370]

52 minutes ago, Ban Hammer said:

ban weddings and solve that problem

That might be a good platform, regardless of virus or maybe weddings are a virus 

[fip & jim 452]

8 minutes ago, Ban Hammer said:

that's hilarious.
https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2019/apr/08/online-laws-threaten-freedom-of-speech-of-millions-of-britons

 

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2015/sep/21/freedom-of-speech-online-witch-hunts-law--bbc

 

https://www.theweek.co.uk/97552/hate-speech-vs-free-speech-the-uk-laws

https://telecoms.com/507498/uk-house-of-lords-to-investigate-online-freedom-of-expression/

 

 

1 minute ago, Burnt Reynolds said:

It isn't. Prior restraint, government level website bans, censorship laws, can't offend the wrong people, it's not even close. So it makes sense that you can say, without reservation, that even though the UK government increasingly institutes narrow concepts of proper behavior and rightthink, people in the US need to be told what to do, even though in the US that's a horrific infringement, and the best defense of it (which isn't an argument at all relevant to the US) is "but we don't have mass shootings and have stellar healthcare!".

The right to offend people! The right to spew hate! The right to infect other people with deadly disease! The right to shoot someone dead and ask questions later. 

 

 

 

[Crtcl Rice Theory 2,432]

[Burnt Reynolds 5,058]

9 minutes ago, fip & jim said:

The right to offend people! The right to spew hate! The right to infect other people with deadly disease! The right to shoot someone dead and ask questions later. 

That's right, the right to offend people, and to be stupid, and guess what, pay for it if you demonstrably wronged/harmed another. You can't argue that you have comparable freedoms just because you have a nanny government that pre-emptively restrains people and excessively punishes them for trivial things, or institutes some narrow concept of proper behavior that people believe is free just because they spent a lifetime in that environment. This is why the UK justifiably gets the "nanny" government comparisons. 

 

An apt approach in the US is education, the utilization of private businesses and private places to make better choices for themselves. The US isn't beyond changing behavior, the key is understanding how and working within a system rather than trying to institute it through authoritarian means, where you're far more likely to find people rejecting it. That's how it's been, and how it will be.

Edited November 17, 2020 by Burnt Reynolds

[yuna628 9,665]

44 minutes ago, Dashinka said:

Don't they?  Is it not the one true absolutism of life?  There are older folks in care facilities that would rather die from the Vid then go without family interactions, so what is better?  The vid cases are growing mostly due to personal gatherings, I for one have not gathered with friends and family since last December, and I do my best to keep my distance from the idiots that are out there, but people are allowed to be idiots in our society.  Now we are getting more restrictions that will hammer folks and businesses already severely depressed, we are getting directives communicated through official channels (not Twitter) that are completely unenforceable without the trashing of the 4th Amendment, and in the meantime we get the elite like Newsom, Whitmer, Cuomo, Bowser, etc. that do what they want anyway.  

 

It is what it is, I am sorry this has hit your family so hard, but unless you want every single American to simply stay home, and every, and I mean every business to close for two weeks, three weeks, six months, etc., I don't see this going away anytime soon besides the fact that this is totally unsustainable.  It is a virus, it cannot be controlled except through distance.

Death will come for us all one day. If one personally tries not to behave in a stupid manner involving practicing good safety measures facing the virus then their chances of dying a normal and dignified death remain better. If however, they die as the result of individuals that believe they have a right to be stupid (thereby their stupidity deprives another of life, liberty, and happiness) that is quite another matter. 

 

I fully expect our governor to return to higher restrictions today, and I fully support that. Most businesses in our heavy red town also supported it. Yes it did cause hardship, but instead of crying about it, they sought out innovative ways to continue to remain open and have been rewarded for their efforts. We can all debate about what the best methods are to mitigate the loss of life, suffering, and business hardship due to the pandemic... but as I've said before pandemics have consequences. Perhaps administrations should have considered this before.

[Burnt Reynolds 5,058]

Some hospitals in Calgary and Edmonton AB are over 100% capacity, but capacity changes. Nonetheless, a high capacity utilization isn't inherently a bad thing, and one of the key considerations in capacity management is the ability to supply/service the added demand. 

 

For me it puts it in perspective that US healthcare, namely hospitals (in this example), are so used to excess (excess third party costs, excess beds, excess staff, excess inventory, any of these, variably), people have no idea how to handle seeing a higher utilization, nor do they understand that in most cases higher utilization is a good thing. If people ever want healthcare affordable, or ever want a functional universal on a local scale, they have to start from a perspective of cost minimization and responsive capacity management. This is how healthcare has been managed in Canada, and I'd say, very well, in comparison. We want no wait times, but the lower utilization, excess beds, and such (all driven by mandates and the infuriating insurance industry), are a bad thing, and are massive cost drivers. At some point logic has to give somewhere and people need to decide what tradeoffs they really want.

Edited November 17, 2020 by Burnt Reynolds

[fip & jim 452]

8 hours ago, Burnt Reynolds said:

That's right, the right to offend people, and to be stupid, and guess what, pay for it if you demonstrably wronged/harmed another. You can't argue that you have comparable freedoms just because you have a nanny government that pre-emptively restrains people and excessively punishes them for trivial things, or institutes some narrow concept of proper behavior that people believe is free just because they spent a lifetime in that environment. This is why the UK justifiably gets the "nanny" government comparisons. 

 

An apt approach in the US is education, the utilization of private businesses and private places to make better choices for themselves. The US isn't beyond changing behavior, the key is understanding how and working within a system rather than trying to institute it through authoritarian means, where you're far more likely to find people rejecting it. That's how it's been, and how it will be.

Why are you on this forum? 

[fip & jim 452]

9 hours ago, Burnt Reynolds said:

That's right, the right to offend people, and to be stupid, and guess what, pay for it if you demonstrably wronged/harmed another. You can't argue that you have comparable freedoms just because you have a nanny government that pre-emptively restrains people and excessively punishes them for trivial things, or institutes some narrow concept of proper behavior that people believe is free just because they spent a lifetime in that environment. This is why the UK justifiably gets the "nanny" government comparisons. 

Do you even understand how the world views your "freedoms"? They pity the US. They laugh at the president. They rejoice that he will be gone if Americans protect some semblance of democracy. 

 

You said it yourself. The right to offend. The right to be stupid. And the tragedy is that in by believing that you have the right to be offensive and stupid Americans will suffer. Be offensive. Be stupid. And don't be surprised if in the end that's all you have left. 

Edited November 18, 2020 by fip & jim

[Burnt Reynolds 5,058]

11 minutes ago, fip & jim said:

Do you even understand how the world views your "freedoms"? They pity the US. They laugh at the president. They rejoice that he will be gone if Americans protect some semblance of democracy. 

 

You said it yourself. The right to offend. The right to be stupid. And the tragedy is that in by believing that you have the right to be offensive and stupid Americans will suffer. Be offensive. Be stupid. And don't be surprised if in the end that's all you have left. 

The President is the choice Americans made, and while your disdain for American freedoms is quite hyperbolic, it does make me wonder why you chose to come to a place you clearly have so much animosity toward.

[fip & jim 452]

2 minutes ago, Burnt Reynolds said:

The President is the choice Americans made, and while your disdain for American freedoms is quite hyperbolic, it does make me wonder why you chose to come to a place you clearly have so much animosity toward.

Care to answer a question? Then maybe I'll reciprocate. 

 

Why are you on this forum? 

[Burnt Reynolds 5,058]

Just now, fip & jim said:

Care to answer a question? Then maybe I'll reciprocate. 

 

Why are you on this forum? 

Hard pass, I wasn't asking an actual question.

 

Part of immigrating to a place is assimilating to their laws and customs. Freedoms are one of those things. Those don't go away because of a virus, or because someone said something another person subjectively finds offensive. I'll leave the argument tonight by citing the US Supreme Court, in an 8-0 decision tearing apart the concept of "hate speech" (of which is accepted over yonder), and a state Supreme Court in striking down authoritarian state/local leaders trying to use the broad logic espoused about "serious problems" and the unacceptable authoritarian implements of a government just telling people what to do:

 

Quote

 But no matter how the point is phrased, its unmistakable thrust is this: The Government has an interest in preventing speech expressing ideas that offend. And, as we have explained, that idea strikes at the heart of the First Amendment. Speech that demeans on the basis of race, ethnicity, gender, religion, age, disability, or any other similar ground is hateful; but the proudest boast of our free speech jurisprudence is that we protect the freedom to express "the thought that we hate." 

https://casetext.com/case/matal-v-tam

 

Quote

The Court closes this Opinion as it began, by recognizing that Defendants’ actions atissue here were undertaken with the good intention of addressing a public health emergency. But even in an emergency, the authority of government is not unfettered. The liberties protected by the Constitution are not fair-weather freedoms—in place when times are good but able to be cast aside in times of trouble. There is no question that this Country has faced, and will face, emergencies of every sort. But the solution to a national crisis can never be permitted to supersede the commitment to individual liberty that stands as the foundation of the American experiment. The Constitution cannot accept the concept of a “new normal” where the basic liberties of the people can be subordinated to open-ended emergency mitigation measures. Rather, the Constitution sets certain lines that may not be crossed, even in an emergency.

https://www.scribd.com/document/476017344/Judge-Stickman-s-order-in-Butler-County-v-Wolf

[TBoneTX 45,091]

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[Ban Hammer 13,283]

9 hours ago, fip & jim said:

 

Why are you on this forum? 

it is not your place to ask this question to members.  if you feel there is an issue, use the report button and convey your concern to the mod team.