Sanity Amidst the Chaos

 

I have seen enough graphs, data, and statistics on Ricochet to last me a lifetime. Some of the information is helpful, some of it is confusing, some of it is biased. I had decided to just watch and listen to the discussions and come from a place of “not knowing,” to allow myself to take it all in and eventually draw my own conclusions. Well, eventually has arrived, in the form of my complaints and that ol’ go-to method, common sense.

First, I’m getting upset at the number of personal attacks in the conversations. People are assuming the worst of intentions, becoming defensive and aggressive. My advice (for what it’s worth):

Knock it off.

Even when people get the information wrong, please just disagree and re-state your point. Sarcasm and ad hominem attacks are not only unhelpful, but they are destructive to everyone: to those arguing and those of us who are seeking good information.

Second, I think we are all yielding to the stress of anxiety about the situation. Please take responsibility for your reactions, to the information and to others’ comments, and act like mature human beings. I’m anxious, too, but we should be supporting each other, not trying to take others down.

Third, I’ve decided to take a position on what the government is doing and I’m not going to offer graphs and charts. (I’ll look to others to provide that information.) Here’s what I’ve decided:

  • My husband and I are seniors. I’m healthy, he’s compromised. But we are perfectly capable of taking care of ourselves. We will stay home, except when we need groceries, and we will shop for groceries without your help. It is risky, but so is crossing the street.
  • We are all going to die someday. Nobody knows when his or her date to exit the planet will arrive. You can avoid recognizing that truth, but it will do you no good.
  • As Holman Jenkins said in the WSJ today regarding the focus of our attention: “Wouldn’t it make more sense to pour resources into isolating the vulnerable rather than isolating everyone?” Then we can focus on getting the economy back on-line.

I welcome other common-sense suggestions. You can throw out more data, but I’m not very interested. I’m interested in supporting each other. For those of you who know millennials or have millennial family members who are acting like teenagers, tell them to grow up.

Let’s all grow up.

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  1. Susan Quinn Contributor
    Susan Quinn
    @SusanQuinn

    Barfly (View Comment):
    There’s a wide gray area between tolerating the willful spread of misinformation and medieval thinking on the far left hand, and responding to well-meaning ignorance with scorn and abuse on the other. It is at least as important to keep the logosphere clean as to keep it safe and welcoming. 

    Thanks, @barfly. I am curious about the apparently misinformed comment that Jenkins made. Not to challenge you, but like everyone, I want factual information.

    • #31
  2. Weeping Inactive
    Weeping
    @Weeping

    DrewInWisconsin, Negative Infl… (View Comment):

    I was pretty much on the ledge for the rest of the evening after that.

    And I’m not back to myself today yet.

    Praying for you DIW. May you feel God holding you and your family extra close during this time. May you feel Him infusing you with his strength and peace.

    Praying the same for everyone else here at Ricochet too.

    • #32
  3. Susan Quinn Contributor
    Susan Quinn
    @SusanQuinn

    Caryn (View Comment):
    The short term pain of businesses being shut down will be short term and recoverable if the epidemic curve can be bent down and panic allayed.

    Sorry, @caryn-I knew your background! I pulled out this sentence in your comment, because it seems to be a key factor. It doesn’t answer every question, but at least it’s rational! Thanks!

    • #33
  4. Susan Quinn Contributor
    Susan Quinn
    @SusanQuinn

    Barfly (View Comment):
    Anti-depressant use is an epidemic too. SSRIs are sociopath drugs – they make people not care. I wonder just how much of today’s dysfunction can be attributed to weaklings habituated to diazepam.

    True, for some. I’ve been on the generic lexapro for years and it saved my life. I clearly do care.😊 But there is much abuse and detriment to individuals and society.

    • #34
  5. Susan Quinn Contributor
    Susan Quinn
    @SusanQuinn

    jeannebodine (View Comment):

    I apologize that my comment above didn’t state outright that it represented my view of the situation. It’s more than apparent where I stand so I laid out my arguments but I didn’t contrast these with the others’ perceptions. I didn’t mean to dismiss arguments from the other points of view, I should have made my bias clear from the start. Others can (and have) present their positions that counter mine, otherwise there can’t be any balance, any discussion.

    @jeannebodine–no problem! You were very articulate and I saw nothing in your words that discouraged other comments. Thanks for being so conscientious!

    • #35
  6. Barfly Member
    Barfly
    @Barfly

    Susan Quinn (View Comment):

    Barfly (View Comment):
    There’s a wide gray area between tolerating the willful spread of misinformation and medieval thinking on the far left hand, and responding to well-meaning ignorance with scorn and abuse on the other. It is at least as important to keep the logosphere clean as to keep it safe and welcoming.

    Thanks, @barfly. I am curious about the apparently misinformed comment that Jenkins made. Not to challenge you, but like everyone, I want factual information.

    Good. Then I’m not going to make it easy-but-not-good-enough by giving you a summary for which I’m not qualified. I challenge you to go now and spend quality time learning enough to recognize why isolating only the especially vulnerable is not a worthwhile strategy. 

    • #36
  7. Susan Quinn Contributor
    Susan Quinn
    @SusanQuinn

    Barfly (View Comment):

    Susan Quinn (View Comment):

    Barfly (View Comment):
    There’s a wide gray area between tolerating the willful spread of misinformation and medieval thinking on the far left hand, and responding to well-meaning ignorance with scorn and abuse on the other. It is at least as important to keep the logosphere clean as to keep it safe and welcoming.

    Thanks, @barfly. I am curious about the apparently misinformed comment that Jenkins made. Not to challenge you, but like everyone, I want factual information.

    Good. Then I’m not going to make it easy-but-not-good-enough by giving you a summary for which I’m not qualified. I challenge you to go now and spend quality time learning enough to recognize why isolating only the especially vulnerable is not a worthwhile strategy.

    I may, with my limited understanding, be able to take a shot at it. Those who are not especially vulnerable can still contract the disease, with or without symptoms, and pass it on to all of us old people! They could be family members, friends, grocery clerks, any grocery employees, and lots of other young-uns–and they can also pass it on to each other with their mindless communal activities!

    How did I do?

    • #37
  8. Barfly Member
    Barfly
    @Barfly

    Susan Quinn (View Comment):
    How did I do?

    How would I know? I’m not setting myself up as an authority. But I will note that useful reasoning in this realm will probably involve numbers.

    • #38
  9. Weeping Inactive
    Weeping
    @Weeping

    JustmeinAZ (View Comment):

    Everyone would be a lot calmer if they turned off the TV.

    And stayed off of Facebook, avoided Twitter, and deactivated their news feeds for awhile. Yes, I truly believe all the hyperventilating is more dangerous to our society than the virus itself will prove to be.

    • #39
  10. JoelB Member
    JoelB
    @JoelB

    I so appreciate the common sense approach of this and so many of your posts @susanquinn

    Let’s agree to be friendly with one another. Nobody really knows where all this will lead, but it will all eventually pass, so let’s not lose the goodwill of the R> community.

    • #40
  11. Susan Quinn Contributor
    Susan Quinn
    @SusanQuinn

    Barfly (View Comment):

    Susan Quinn (View Comment):
    How did I do?

    How would I know? I’m not setting myself up as an authority. But I will note that useful reasoning in this realm will probably involve numbers.

    Perhaps. The difficulty with the numbers is that which source do we trust? The Chinese? The Italians? Not only that, but my proposal was projecting into the future, which is one gaping unknown. Not only that, but wouldn’t most people agree with my comments as legitimate generalizations. Perhaps not.

    • #41
  12. Susan Quinn Contributor
    Susan Quinn
    @SusanQuinn

    JoelB (View Comment):

    I so appreciate the common sense approach of this and so many of your posts @susanquinn

    Let’s agree to be friendly with one another. Nobody really knows where all this will lead, but it will all eventually pass, so let’s not lose the goodwill of the R> community.

    Thanks, @joelb. It would be lovely if we could all learn to be passionate (about our views, whatever they may be) allies.

    • #42
  13. Weeping Inactive
    Weeping
    @Weeping

    Caryn (View Comment):
    The short term pain of businesses being shut down will be short term and recoverable if the epidemic curve can be bent down and panic allayed.

    Unfortunately, that’s not the message I’m getting. The message I’m seeing is: Doom! Gloom! Quarantines and shutdowns may last for months – maybe even a year or more! The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse are riding! The end of the world is coming! We’re all going to diiiie!!!!!

    OK, maybe I’m exaggerating a bit there. But it sure doesn’t feel like it sometimes – which is why, honestly, I’m more skimming the headlines nowadays than I am delving into the subject. I know my limits, and skimming’s pretty much all I can take at the moment.

    • #43
  14. Barfly Member
    Barfly
    @Barfly

    Susan Quinn (View Comment):

    Barfly (View Comment):

    Susan Quinn (View Comment):
    How did I do?

    How would I know? I’m not setting myself up as an authority. But I will note that useful reasoning in this realm will probably involve numbers.

    Perhaps. The difficulty with the numbers is that which source do we trust? The Chinese? The Italians? Not only that, but my proposal was projecting into the future, which is one gaping unknown. Not only that, but wouldn’t most people agree with my comments as legitimate generalizations. Perhaps not.

    You’re teasing me, aren’t you. When I suggested you learn something of epidemiology, I didn’t mean to take four minutes and marshal what you already knew. That you felt the worth of Jenkins’ comment to be a matter of opinion suggested to me that you hadn’t done the math. Perhaps I’m wrong about that, but if not then what I’m asking is for you to go and spend quality time, several hours I would guess, learning to do the basic mathematics of epidemic spread and response. Then you’ll be in a better position to make  judgements regarding sources and numbers, and I’ll have another intelligent and well informed person to discuss the matter with.

    I have to go back to work, so I won’t save this pedantic reminder. People of the left try to argue directly, mind-to-mind. People of the right find things in the real world and say “This is what I see. What do you think about it?” 

    • #44
  15. Susan Quinn Contributor
    Susan Quinn
    @SusanQuinn

    Barfly (View Comment):
    I have to go back to work, so I won’t save this pedantic reminder. People of the left try to argue directly, mind-to-mind. People of the right find things in the real world and say “This is what I see. What do you think about it?” 

    Yes, I was teasing you. But I’ll be honest with you. The amount of work I would need to put in, in the areas of science and math, are not worth the effort to me. Those are areas that I am mostly unfamiliar with, and find intimidating to pursue. I envy people like you and @caryn who are comfortable in those studies. So I rely on the data of others, and hope that by reviewing enough data, I can come to reasonable conclusions. I suspect you’d tell me that’s lazy learning, and perhaps it is. But at this point in my life, I rarely look into areas that don’t intrigue me or call to me. Just call me lazy Susan.

    I do appreciate very much the points you have made, though, @barfly.

    • #45
  16. Front Seat Cat Member
    Front Seat Cat
    @FrontSeatCat

    Everyone I know is working from home. My friend up in Cape Cod also, and her kids are home too, with on line lessons. She is trying to keep them focused. but playing in the backyard is more fun. They will even have a virtual piano lesson. She is signing up to deliver meals on wheels to seniors. Sometimes it’s best to shut off the TV and computer and take a walk – check on the neighbors. I caught my busy neighbor getting her trash can and she said she has 15 cases of toilet paper (she’s in the hotel industry and they are at full capacity at the moment!) so if I need toilet paper to come over! I saved your and @she’s post about baking bread for days like this, so I can listen to the Sound of Music skit and look at that bread!! Time to read those books, play some classical music, call and text friends and loved ones, work on the photo album. 

    We are in Lent. I am starting each day with my usual prayers, but also Bible reading and other spiritual reading to set the tone. I witnessed a bad wreck today – what a time to head to the hospital, but people are stressed out and distracted. Slow down and list the things you are thankful for, even mentally. 

    • #46
  17. Susan Quinn Contributor
    Susan Quinn
    @SusanQuinn

    Front Seat Cat (View Comment):

    Everyone I know is working from home. My friend up in Cape Cod also, and her kids are home too, with on line lessons. She is trying to keep them focused. but playing in the backyard is more fun. They will even have a virtual piano lesson. She is signing up to deliver meals on wheels to seniors. Sometimes it’s best to shut off the TV and computer and take a walk – check on the neighbors. I caught my busy neighbor getting her trash can and she said she has 15 cases of toilet paper (she’s in the hotel industry and they are at full capacity at the moment!) so if I need toilet paper to come over! I saved your and @she’s post about baking bread for days like this, so I can listen to the Sound of Music skit and look at that bread!! Time to read those books, play some classical music, call and text friends and loved ones, work on the photo album.

    We are in Lent. I am starting each day with my usual prayers, but also Bible reading and other spiritual reading to set the tone. I witnessed a bad wreck today – what a time to head to the hospital, but people are stressed out and distracted. Slow down and list the things you are thankful for, even mentally.

    Sound advice (pun intended!), FSC. I frankly love the fact that I can slow down. That’s a great opportunity for me, since I’ve always valued rushing around. So take that lesson, folks: Everyone. Slow. Down

    • #47
  18. Ben Lang Inactive
    Ben Lang
    @BenLang

    Susan Quinn (View Comment):

    Barfly (View Comment):
    I have to go back to work, so I won’t save this pedantic reminder. People of the left try to argue directly, mind-to-mind. People of the right find things in the real world and say “This is what I see. What do you think about it?”

    Yes, I was teasing you. But I’ll be honest with you. The amount of work I would need to put in, in the areas of science and math, are not worth the effort to me. Those are areas that I am mostly unfamiliar with, and find intimidating to pursue. I envy people like you and @caryn who are comfortable in those studies. So I rely on the data of others, and hope that by reviewing enough data, I can come to reasonable conclusions. I suspect you’d tell me that’s lazy learning, and perhaps it is. But at this point in my life, I rarely look into areas that don’t intrigue me or call to me. Just call me lazy Susan.

    I do appreciate very much the points you have made, though, @barfly.

    If you’re curious on the math for how epidemic growth works, see here for an approachable explanation: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kas0tIxDvrg&feature=share&fbclid=IwAR0KPhX6DRnxwTJALBZ7coS-BazNzUn1fAWMCzKFeKSAdK0ooUl2_9vtvrI

    This is crucial to understanding the seriousness of what’s going on, and just how big the impacts can get (even if a relatively small percentage of people are affected either ‘seriously’, ‘critically’, or actually die from the virus)

    For some insight into the numbers actually being reported, see here: https://ourworldindata.org/coronavirus

    This deals specifically with reported deaths from COVID-19 – and as of March 17th it has taken roughly 5 days for deaths to double in the US…

    The numbers don’t give a complete picture as there are mitigating circumstances (i.e. countries that already have draconian measures in place to mitigate spread, etc…), but it gives you a starting place to understand scope. The math ins’t difficult, but it’s not intuitive. Most people have a VERY difficult time grasping exponential growth. We tend to think in linear terms.

    We should at least start our thinking in the right way about this. The math doesn’t lie even given the non-prefect assumptions we’re working with. 

     

    -BEN

    • #48
  19. Susan Quinn Contributor
    Susan Quinn
    @SusanQuinn

    Ben Lang (View Comment):
    If you’re curious on the math for how epidemic growth works, see here for an approachable explanation: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kas0tIxDvrg&feature=share&fbclid=IwAR0KPhX6DRnxwTJALBZ7coS-BazNzUn1fAWMCzKFeKSAdK0ooUl2_9vtvrI

    @benlang, thank you SO MUCH!! I am definitely going to watch the video, and I hope it will help me make more sense of this situation. I may be back with questions, so stay tuned!!

    • #49
  20. Steven Seward Member
    Steven Seward
    @StevenSeward

    DrewInWisconsin, Negative Infl… (View Comment):

    I would like people to stop posting their doomsday scenarios. It seems to have become some kind contest who see who can imagine the worst of worst-case scenarios.

    I predict 50 Billion new cases and 120 Billion deaths by April 15th.  I could be slightly off…

     

    • #50
  21. Susan Quinn Contributor
    Susan Quinn
    @SusanQuinn

    Steven Seward (View Comment):

    DrewInWisconsin, Negative Infl… (View Comment):

    I would like people to stop posting their doomsday scenarios. It seems to have become some kind contest who see who can imagine the worst of worst-case scenarios.

    I predict 50 Billion new cases and 120 Billion deaths by April 15th. I could be slightly off…

     

    I need all the smiles I can get!! Thanks, Steve.

    • #51
  22. Steven Seward Member
    Steven Seward
    @StevenSeward

    Susan Quinn (View Comment):

    Steven Seward (View Comment):

    DrewInWisconsin, Negative Infl… (View Comment):

    I would like people to stop posting their doomsday scenarios. It seems to have become some kind contest who see who can imagine the worst of worst-case scenarios.

    I predict 50 Billion new cases and 120 Billion deaths by April 15th. I could be slightly off…

     

    I need all the smiles I can get!! Thanks, Steve.

    BTW, my name is Steven.  If my wife heard you call me Steve, she would slap you!

     

     

     

     

     

    (just in case.., that’s a joke, Son)

    • #52
  23. Susan Quinn Contributor
    Susan Quinn
    @SusanQuinn

    Steven Seward (View Comment):

    Susan Quinn (View Comment):

    Steven Seward (View Comment):

    DrewInWisconsin, Negative Infl… (View Comment):

    I would like people to stop posting their doomsday scenarios. It seems to have become some kind contest who see who can imagine the worst of worst-case scenarios.

    I predict 50 Billion new cases and 120 Billion deaths by April 15th. I could be slightly off…

     

    I need all the smiles I can get!! Thanks, Steve.

    BTW, my name is Steven. If my wife heard you call me Steve, she would slap you!

     

     

     

     

     

    (just in case.., that’s a joke, Son)

    I knew you were Steven! I could even hear Caryn calling you Steven. (Thanks for the heads up. 😉)

    • #53
  24. The Reticulator Member
    The Reticulator
    @TheReticulator

    Caryn (View Comment):
    The short term pain of businesses being shut down will be short term and recoverable if the epidemic curve can be bent down and panic allayed. That includes denuding grocery store shelves. My gosh, it isn’t even a diarrheal disease. What are people doing hoarding toilet paper?? 

    I am glad to have a real epidemiologist here, but the best epidemiologist in the world can’t rely on that expertise to predict whether the shutting down of businesses will be recoverable. Most likely it will be recoverable, but the rate and extent of recovery will be important, and the epidemiological models can’t tell us that. (I don’t even trust economists to tell us that, but that’s another issue.)    

    • #54
  25. Instugator Thatcher
    Instugator
    @Instugator

    Caryn (View Comment):
    As you say, quarantine–including social distancing–works in bringing down the number of new cases. That bends the curve down and keeps the serious cases from overwhelming the health care system. That saves lives. Fortunately the disease is mostly not serious–not much worse than a very bad flu. But that doesn’t mean it shouldn’t be taken seriously, because it is contagious before symptoms manifest. The short term pain of businesses being shut down will be short term and recoverable if the epidemic curve can be bent down and panic allayed.

    Amen.

    The reason why it works is that it limits the opportunities for infection to occur.

    It breaks the quantities of the human transmission vector.

    Breaks the vectors.

    Now breathe and relax and enjoy the staycation.

    • #55
  26. Clifford A. Brown Member
    Clifford A. Brown
    @CliffordBrown

    I am guardedly hopeful that Dr. Birx will actually bring forward a reasonable model, as she said she was having a meeting this week to do. The two dangerous extremes she will need to avoid is an overly sunny model that gets falsified with far more hospitalizations and deaths, and an overly doom and gloom model that is also falsified by what happens and is blamed for the lasting harm, including deaths attributed to the excessive shutdown of our economy. In either case, future threats and warnings will be discredited with a critical mass of the public and elected officials, another bad outcome.

    • #56
  27. Stad Coolidge
    Stad
    @Stad

    DrewInWisconsin, Negative Infl… (View Comment):
    It seems to have become some kind contest who see who can imagine the worst of worst-case scenarios.

    There is only one worst-case scenario:  the Democrat nominee wins the Presidency in 2020 . . .

    • #57
  28. Stad Coolidge
    Stad
    @Stad

    JustmeinAZ (View Comment):
    and then we’re going out to our favorite Mexican restaurant.

    We can’t here.  Our idiot governor (SC) has closed all restaurants except for delivery and take-out.  I’m voting against him in the next primary . . .

    • #58
  29. Stad Coolidge
    Stad
    @Stad

    jeannebodine (View Comment):

    I second this. We are in the midst of a national crisis that has the potential to damage our nation forever. We are watching as Americans relinquish their civil liberties at an unimaginable rate. The lock down of people and businesses, once used, will likely be used again. Power, once obtained, won’t be relinquished voluntarily.

    We are witnessing the destruction of small and medium businesses and an unimaginable human toll of lost jobs, lost opportunities, destruction to families that may be permanent.

    This may be a hard thing to say, but will the economic damage be worth the deaths we prevent?  The left often uses the “if it will prevent one death” argument to further the argument for their policies.  We already accept the death toll price of automobile accidents in order to keep our freedom to motor around the country.  I know it’s a tough thing to say when the impact is personal, but bad things happen in life.

    Fight the virus with the best medical abilities we have – look for cures, vaccines, whatever it takes.  But for goodness sake, get this economy rolling again . . .

    • #59
  30. Steven Seward Member
    Steven Seward
    @StevenSeward

    Stad (View Comment):

    JustmeinAZ (View Comment):
    and then we’re going out to our favorite Mexican restaurant.

    We can’t here. Our idiot governor (SC) has closed all restaurants except for delivery and take-out. I’m voting against him in the next primary . . .

    Same with our Goobenor.  I never liked DeWine of Ohio from the start.

    • #60
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