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Observations on Tyranny
I probably have too much time on my hands; that might explain my musings.
We like to think of ourselves as modern with all our technology and plenty, though few, if any of us has had anything even nominally to do with these conveniences other than affording them. How quickly would we revert to a far less modern self if something were to interrupt our means and modern advantage? How many of us would continue to thrive in a more primitive circumstance?
Sometimes I think that all these COVID-19 mandates and precautions are little more than superstitions. I mean, honestly, we all handle and reuse our little masks. I see them looped on so many rearview mirrors. We keep them tucked in the console or glovebox. I have never removed a disposable mask with any care nor dropped it in a plastic bag, much less washed my hands afterward. As for the washable masks, how do you tell the inside from the outside when reusing them? (Oh, come on; we all reuse them.)
I’m reminded of the plague masks of the middle ages. I’m sure that the medicos of those days hoped and believed in their hearts that these masks were protective. Science, baby!
A very few of us still habitually use hand sanitizer, but most of us have given it up. (I never took it up at all; my hands are dry and cracked enough.) My local Wal-Mart literally has vast bins of the stuff near the entrance. Prices have plummeted.
I hike five or six times a week, in the early morning, on the trails in and around Phoenix. I see overly cautious people every day, masked and distanced, hiking in the bright sun and brisk morning air. I hike maskless. They clamber away, distancing them from me, an obvious vile carrier of death. A fair number of them wear those masks with valves, concentrating their vile exhalations in a mortal stream. It makes me laugh.
I try to wish them good morning. Some return the greeting, but many don’t. They don’t want to encourage a directed breath. Many of those masked are young, twentysomethings. I question their ability to evaluate risk. Liberty does come with risk, but does this generation have the temerity to keep it? That is a serious question.
I’m the only one in my family who is not yet fully inoculated. I’ve had one dose of Pfizer, the second on April 11. I was reluctant to participate, but my daughter the microbiologist, an expert in the real science (she is a professor at Vandy Medical School) convinced told me to proceed. She explained the real science, which was significant, I must say. So, I decided to take the vaccine to placate her, though I would prefer to acquire the immunity naturally. I am 66 and in very good health; but I guess there is a risk that I might be one of the unfortunates whose immune system over-reacts to the virus.
The larger problem with those who seek authority and power when a crisis permits is the absolute need to be right. When they are proven wrong, the appeal is altered; they were simply mistaken, the science was unclear, but now, once again, they are right! Still right! There are no limits to these prevarications, nor of those who believe in them. This is not science, no matter the claims, but myth. No doubt, if Fauci mentioned that letting blood protected from COVID-19, people would rush to the barber.
We will never really know the truth regarding SARS-CoV-2, its true lethality and threat, or even its origin. There are too many too vested in the COVID-19 crisis. But we do know this, the crisis did not go to waste. Many, many other things, like trust in science, the economy, the livelihoods of many, the minds of our children, the successes of the Trump administration, were laid waste.
Tyranny always acts for our own good and when it does, we are always the worse for it.
Published in General
Amen
I wonder if the same people who chastised me for the use of the word “Tyranny” will come fuss at you
Maybe. Liberty can be lost abruptly, but more often it is stolen away bit by bit by those who do it for our own good. There will always ninnies who will trade liberty for a false sense of security.
I’m ready for some type of national referendum on the masks. It would provide an opportunity for the vaccine developers to explain the incredible success rate of their vaccines in protecting people against the virus.
As Dr. Makary of Johns Hopkins has said, we are well on our way to community immunity simply because so many people–as many as perhaps 100 million, a third of our population–have already had it–and the known reinfection cases are 5 out of 23 million, and thus it appears immunity is “durable.” And we have millions of people who have acquired immunity through vaccination.
There is simply no need to keep going with a general mask policy anywhere. Asymptomatic people do not appear to be transmitting the disease. It’s people with active infections being in close quarters with other people for more than 10 or 15 minutes. We’re doing better with getting people to have the test and if the test is positive, to self-quarantine. That alone is keeping the infection rate down.
It’s stupid. Beyond that it’s bordering on a widespread mental illness. I’d laugh if I didn’t so clearly see and weep for the trauma and fear these people are fostering in children, teaching them to fear fresh air and social interaction.
Like, like, like, like, like.
Young children can no longer use facial recognition as part of their development. We are deliberately hurting children with this mask “dog and pony” show.
Insanity does not require reason. Insanity is an endemic virus. To protect yourself from this virus, avoid wearing a mask.
Courtesy of Joe over at Politically Incorrect Humor.
During the early stages of the epidemic my son who is 46 lectured me repeatedly about using hand sanitizer, washing the fruit or vegetables I bought at the grocery store, and a whole host of other precautions. I live in a relatively rural area which is becoming suburban. It is more densely populated than I would like it to be, but it aint the city. The county which includes that cities of Tacoma and Puyallup publishes a daily list of the number of “confirmed cases” and deaths on a daily basis. They break down the location of those cases by areas. My particular area hasn’t had much to be concerned about. I have pretty much lived my life as I have since retiring 8 years ago. My one accomodation is to wear a mask when I shop since the store requires it. I got my vaccinations last month, and, frankly, I am unconcerned. I spend between 10 and 15 hours a week out on my bike riding mostly roads. I carry a mask in my jersey pocket, not because I think it is necessary, but just in case I have some kind of problem with my bike or need to go into a store, neither of which has happened in the last year.
I was a biology major in college, took Bacteriology, and have read extensively into the history of plagues and immunology. I worked in schools with a large number of undocumented alien students and was exposed to a host of nasties. I am appalled at teachers who refuse to go to work with or without the vaccines. Covid is nasty, but we have had a lot of nasty stuff over the years. This entire psychodrama was drummed up and exploited, and has been overplayed for far too long.
I just watched the 24 episodes Teaching Company series on the Black Death. The death rate for those who caught the plague was around 80% for Bubonic Plague and pretty close to 100% for those who got either the septicemic or pneumonic forms of the disease. Covid death rate is somewhere south of 1% of all infected, and many of those deaths were not caused by Covid, but Covid was present at the time of death. When I see, as I do daily, a list of how many people have died while infected with Covid in my area, I get the impression that nobody dies of heart attacks or strokes, or “old age” anymore. The vast majority of deaths reported are people who are at or above the life expectancy for humans, and all have underlying conditions. It begins to look bogus to me. This is, as stated above, a dog and pony show that got a capper the other day when ten reporters sat around with scripts in hand and played out a well rehearsed drama with Joe Biden. I am seriously sick of this stuff.
Eugene, have you noticed the near 100% compliance with the Dictator’s mask mandate? I believe there is no hope for the (former) people of Washington State. They are now all slaves. Except for a few, including you and me.
I did get my second vaccine dose today. No line, in and out in 25 minutes, including the 15 minutes wait for possible adverse effects.
Oh, yeah, And I call them Health Nazis, both here and on my own blog.
Totally appropriate! The ones that amaze me at the people either walking or riding on the Foothills Trail that traverses the Orting Valley along the Carbon River. People out walking wearing masks when no one is around, or people walking together wearing masks, or the ultimate absurdity, wearing masks while riding a bike on the trail. The number of sheeple in this state defies the imagination.
Recent experience in Texas brought home to me the fact that official pronouncements regarding masks and other matters have little impact on what the people actually do.
At the beginning of this pandemic people were wearing masks, staying home, and socially distancing well before that became official policy.
Lockdowns were announced, but they were rarely enforced and violations of them were not uncommon. Violations of mask mandates were common and depended on the establishment. You could find barbers and hairdressers, drinking establishments, etc., if you wished. My favorite barbershop never required masks.
And on the flip side, when the mask mandate was rescinded in Texas it didn’t seem to make much difference. Most places still require them.
If this was a conspiracy on the government’s part to grab power then I’m not sorry to tell them that the power is illusory. In these matters the people do as they see fit.
My aggravation was just re-incensed this morning by a picture my brother sent of his 14 yr old daughter who had just won a dance competition. The picture was of her – ALONE – wearing a mask. What’s the point of that?
Doug, can you explain the science that your daughter told you that convinced you to take the shot? I completely respect anyone who has gotten it or has refused, but I side with your suspicions on much of it. I live in FL and people from other areas of the country think we are all free-wheeling, maskless and germy. Not only have people obeyed the mask mandate, distance and hand washing, they still are. What doesn’t make sense is wearing a mask when you are riding a bike or out in the fresh air, but whatever.
There are tremendous consequences that we are just seeing the beginnings of from the lockdown, children are suffering, depressed, losing their communication skills, many areas are still under water with commerce, etc. The fear factor keeps coming up. I know this is a lot to take in, but if you have not seen this documentary, it might give you a bigger picture, and where this could go:
https://articles.mercola.com/sites/articles/archive/2021/02/13/the-new-normal-documentary.aspx?ui=0b10245d59396dacb0f0af0ff78a12084fe3d3e6878dfccc168ac133cbe2726b&sd=20200212&cid_source=dnl&cid_medium=email&cid_content=art1HL&cid=20210213&mid=DM803582&rid=1083234995
Some of what she explained, I already knew, like the fact that Pfizer and Moderna (the two dose innoculations showing the best results) are novel. They are not neutralized virus capsules or weakened viruses, but RNA snippits that invade proximate cells and instruct your cells to make a particular protein found on the COVID virsus’ spikes, the point where COVID attaches to healthly cells. This protein is released from these “infected” cells, causing an immune reaction when these proteins are recognized as foreign. Thus, when you are exposed to COVID, your immune system is primed to attack the virus at its most vulnerable point, its attachment mechanism. The RNA messenger in the innoculation is very fragile and does not persist in your body for long, which is why a second does is recomended.
Got second dose yesterday and lived to tell the tale.
It’s the insistence on ritual disinfection that fascinates me. Made sense in the early “we know nothing and fear everything” era of precautions, but a year later, every retailer has someone spraying down the self-checkout machines and cart handles. This is probably permanent – hey, coldanflu season, you know, why not?
What I fear is never seeing the plastic barriers at the check-out aisles come down. We will be maskless and vaccinated but the barriers are still up, because Safety. Every commercial interaction from here on is predicated on doubt and caution.
Fear of a lawsuit dictates so much of modern society
This is why no one in the “state” will give the “all-clear, the pandemic is over”. They are deathly (see what I did there?) afraid of one person dead from the wuflu after that pronouncement. They pee in their pants just thinking about it.
Disagree. Fear of liability is real for small business owners — thus signs of masking and social distancing even in places where the government doesn’t mandate it. But states use “other people’s money” so there is no fear of lawsuits. There is fear of losing power. And power thrives in a pandemic (real or imagined).
Fear of losing office. I lied and people died sort of thing.