Negatory
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Posts posted by Negatory
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2 hours ago, brabus said:
Segue - I think the greatest source of the immense strife we see in our country is colossal assholes like you who vehemently shit on someone for having a different view point or set of beliefs than yourself. Absolutely you can think it’s all gibberish, but when you belittle people for their personal beliefs and attack their core values, you’re just a POS bully. Time for some introspection, or just keep being a total shitbag, you’re call.
I think most people support personal religion up to the point where folks abuse and cherry pick their core values to use religion as a trump card (pun intended) to do whatever they want and impact others. See gay marriage, abortion, COVID, abortion etc.
I don’t even agree with mandates for the whole population, but trying to pursue religious exceptions come off as one of the most disingenuous “You can’t make me!” temper tantrums possible - not a genuinely held belief.
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1 hour ago, ViperMan said:
I'm not traditionally religious, but do you really think this? IMO all humans are religious - see the new religion of wokism taking root. Some people know what they're religion is called...man other 'enlightened' ones think they're above it. Like it or not, something in your life is functionally equivalent to religion, you just may not know what it is. The religious instinct runs much, much deeper than thinking a dude does or doesn't live in the sky.
It is overly simplistic to say that all humans are innately religious. I’m not, and I think you’ll find that is true for many others.
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Unbridled libertarian policies that prioritize individual liberty over all else sound good until you implement them. Just like socialist policies. It’s why unbridled capitalism in the 1800s HAD to be regulated, for example.
I am of the opinion that there should be a balance of individualism and collectivism in an ideally functioning society. I believe your viewpoint is unrealistic for the same reason that I believe a communist viewpoint is unrealistic.
If individuals are not expected, even to the smallest extent, to make sacrifices for the good of their country or countrymen - in any case - what is the point of that society?
See also: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tragedy_of_the_commons
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3 minutes ago, BashiChuni said:
Thanks for proving my point for me. 1% death rate is not worth uprooting democratic norms and traditions for.
I know you, specifically, want COVID to be over. You can tell by how every about 3 weeks you post that you personally are over it. Cool. But you lack ability to provide a coherent fact based argument or use statistics, which significantly hurts your point.
If 1 out of 100 people die in a population die due to a disease it is not a 1% death rate. It would only be 1% if 100% of the population got the disease. Currently, they’re estimating that only about 50-100M people in the US (15-35% of the population) have had COVID, which means it is more like a 3-7% death rate in that population.
Incoming “Doesn’t change anything.” Tell me, what sort of mortality or long term effect is worth vaccinating society? I’d like to set the stage, before you answer. Polio has about a 1 in 200 chance of causing paralysis. In those cases 5-20% of the population dies. So the overall mortality risk for polio is less than 0.1%. Also, you probably know, we are approaching double the total casualties of WWII.
1 hour ago, di1630 said:So we shut down the economy for a 1% death rate in the elderly and a 0.0007% death rate in under 65…..I bet the death rate of healthy people is remarkably low.
Same comment. Your statistics are intentionally misleading and wrong.
There’s about 212M folks in the 0-49 age range. There have been 52.8k deaths. That right there is a .024% chance of death. Oh wait, not everyone was infected, as previously talked about, so in reality it’s closer to .075-.15% chance of death. I can still buy that maybe that’s acceptable, but we’re talking you being off by a factor of at least 100.
For those 50-64, there’s about 62M people. There have been 145k deaths. That is 0.2% of the population. Which means a CFR on the order of 0.6-1.2%.
Population size source: https://www.statista.com/statistics/241488/population-of-the-us-by-sex-and-age/
COVID deaths source: https://www.statista.com/statistics/1191568/reported-deaths-from-covid-by-age-us/
All of your guys’ analysis also conveniently ignores the fact that over 80% of those infected by the disease have a long term symptom or side effect: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-021-95565-8
I am all for having a debate about whether blanket vaccine mandates are useful, or what the cutoff is. But I am not at all interested in BS statistics, lies, or just plain feelings, which is what significantly reduces both the effectiveness and credibility of the anti vaccine side’s arguments.
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1 hour ago, BashiChuni said:
That article isn’t wrong. Most are mild.
Which is why your point is asinine. 800k people have perished. 1 out of every 100 folks over the age of 65. With most of the cases being mild.
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7 hours ago, ViperMan said:
In my world, spite is a perfectly acceptable reason for not taking a vaccine, and it requires no justification beyond, or even to that standard.
Cool. Always nice to be reminded of why society is ultimately going to fall apart.
You think in the golden ages of America people said stuff like this? I’m all for people having informed opinions and not getting vaccinated, but supporting people just being assholes is stupid.
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Hope so, but we probably need to wait and see. If you remember, this is what everyone said back in 2020 as well.
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16 minutes ago, pawnman said:
So get the J&J shot. It's not mRNA.
That's unironically a good point. The "there's not enough data" argument has very little evidence behind it. I think getting away from feelings-based arguments is in everyone's best interest.
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9 hours ago, Mark1 said:
You might want to gain a cursory understanding of exponential/logistic growth dynamics before you accidentally say something as absurd as this again.
Careful trying to use math as your high horse, because there is actually validity in what Ratner is saying from a mathematical perspective. Marginal changes in R0 for an extremely infectious disease do not significantly affect the ultimate end state. This is because a population is limited, so exponential growth is ultimately only possible at the beginning. And logistic limiting effects are basically unimportant until a huge amount of society has been infected. This is due to the fact that, even with masking and vaccines for the entire population, the vaccine would spread with an R0 well greater than 1. That’s what actually matters. None of this feel good, I have less likelihood to give COVID to my kids when they are at home, bs. The truth is, they’ll just get it in the future.
In reality, with an R0 estimated around 5, with vaccines that are 50% effective (many studies dispute this and estimate it closer to 10-30%), you’d still need masks and social distancing to be close to 60-70% effective. Good thing the CDC, in internal modeling, estimates masking effectiveness around 20-30%. For a good summary, just read the delta predictions on the last source below. Bottom line is that it is nigh impossible to stop this with the vaccines we have.
Sources:
R0 of Delta: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/34369565/
Vaccines are not that effective after a short period of time: https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-021-02689-y
Masking efficacy is estimated at 20-30%: (page 20)
In reality, all that these mandates do (for a shot that is not as effective as we wish it was) are draw out the inevitable - most of the population will get infected at some point. If hospitals are fine - and they ARE right now, from a national perspective - what’s the benefit to society of the blue curve vs the red one? Yeah, people are going to die. But there actually isn’t much you can do about it, and most of it really is their own choice as to whether they want to be vaccinated or not.
We should do what we can to “flatten the curve” to a level that is sustainable from a healthcare perspective. The vaccine has been extremely effective in reducing hospitalizations and death for society to a sustainable level. Curve: flattened. If we’re sustainable now, then we have won. Mandates aren’t going to help society any more, and instead will only serve as a tool to continue politicization of the masses. The only thing that would actually work is having people stay home and actually limit contact - a la China - but we’ve seen the disastrous effects of that policy on both the economy and society. Juice isn’t worth the squeeze.
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3 hours ago, tac airlifter said:
That link says households with vaccinated people spread C19 at 25%, and unvaccinated households at 38%. That’s only a 13% difference. Add to that observation there was no discussion of how severe symptoms were (if any at all), and it’s quite clear this is not a “pandemic of the unvaccinated.” Frankly it’s not a pandemic at all, COVID is over as a threat. Now we’re talking about mandatory boosters? This is insane.
To be clear, a 38% vs 25% is more like 50% more likely to be infected.
Just like if it was 10% vs 1% it wouldn’t be 9% - it’d be 1000%.
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11 minutes ago, Blue said:
For all of the noise made about the DoD mandates, has a single servicemember been let go yet?
Yep, sure have. Basic training and tech school. More to follow, probably.
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18 minutes ago, 08Dawg said:
In my mind, this issue really boils down to where the country is right now. I don't think we've ever been as divided and bitter as we are right now, and it's for multiple reasons. Party politics is one reason...twenty years of war is another. Even if the president decided to commit to military action, going force on force with Russia or China is a far different animal than counter insurgency ops along the Euphrates. I just do not think the American people have any appetite for seeing young Americans coming home in body bags, likely by the tens of thousands, fighting for a country that most people probably can't find a map and that I would argue, does not come across as beneficial to us.
Yeah. When you put it that way, f$&% that. I’m not interested in being a pawn in another failed war like Vietnam.
At the same time, if we don’t use our military for things like this, it begs the question as to what’s the point of even having the military we have? Do we only exist to police Iran/N Korea/etc?
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1 hour ago, M2 said:
That is like 5% of the total force. Time to do more with less I guess.
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1 hour ago, FLEA said:
You can't issue an order (for anything in the military) unless there is a military neccesity for that order.
A lot of people would disagree that there is a military neccesity for the CV19 vaccine seeing as how it doesn't impact readiness and doesn't provide an intrinsic health benefit to the force.
Regardless, really no reason to call anyone a snow flake over a philosophical difference of opinion. Especially when you don't understand the nuance of another person's perspective.
I think you really only need to look at the USS Theodore Roosevelt to invalidate almost all of these arguments. They can just apply the lessons learned from that experience to basically any potential combat scenario and, bam, everyone in the military must be vaccinated.
In this case, does nuance of one's opinion really matter?
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33 minutes ago, tac airlifter said:
For children, the cure has been worse than the disease. I’m speaking here not just of the vaccine but more importantly of the forced isolation, school lockdowns, school masking, no friendships, blunted development, etc. The same experts who championed those practices are now forcing a vaccine while hiding the scientific data for 55 years.
I can agree with this for children. At least I can agree that the evidence supporting the need to get vaccines for healthy youth is shaky.
But do you guys support boosters for those over the age of 50 or 60? Boosters for those with BMIs > XX? Maybe boosters for those with certain immune issues?
Because there are very little actual analytical or data based reasons not to other than political propaganda says to be a pain in the ass to the “liberal” branch of society.
Thats the main issue with a lot of this conversation. Many folks on here are taking absolutely indefensible black and white stances (no boosters whatsoever, no shots whatsoever!) with no justification other than their political circle wouldn’t like it disguised with an “I don’t feel like it.”
Also, it’s a fallacy to say that an argument is incorrect (some people should get boosters) just because they said something else that may not be true (it’s imperative for children to be vaccinated). You don’t get to conveniently ignore all of the evidence of science or experts or whatever just because you disagree with one conclusion.
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3 minutes ago, brickhistory said:
I'll give this one a "maybe." He and SECAF were 'fired' over the multiple nuke buffoonery events, but, yes, it was a disagreement with USAF and SECDEF over Predator CAPs vs. F-22s.
So, the 'maybe' part of this was did he resign over principle or get fired? Huge difference.
If it was resigned over principle and we needing more than the relatively few F-22s we did buy, then good on him.
And Gates is definitively in the "failed us" category of VMFA187 above. Failed us in Afghanistan and left us light on firepower for any near/peer fight.
Thanks, Bob!
I talked personally with Gen Moseley about this ~10 years ago and think it was genuine. But everyone is entitled to their opinions.
Agree with everything you said about Bob.
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3 hours ago, brickhistory said:
Agree, but would add in our most senior military leadership for some several decades. Post- Fogelman, name one four-star that has resigned in protest or over principle. The guys who are supposed to provide their best military advice to our civilian leadership. Now, granted, they may have pointed out the issues behind closed doors, which they are supposed to do, but not one has resigned over being ignored. Indeed, it certainly appears that at least one sitting general took it upon himself to conduct different foreign policy than his duly-elected, Constitutional boss.
Those cushy corporate boards and revolving very senior gub'mint posts ain't gonna fill themselves...
One example: Gen Moseley fell on his sword for the F-22.
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Duh, it’s to defend your god given right to buy an iPhone for $1000 as opposed to $2000. The price of outsourcing important manufacturing.
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10 hours ago, FLEA said:
You heard something you thoght was wrong so you looked it up. Unfortunately what you looked up was wrong but you still tried due dilligence to get the story straight
Appreciate the words but I didn’t try hard enough. What actually happened is I got lazy. I took a preconceived notion about my perception of the world and looked up only supporting evidence because I didn’t have time to figure out if my viewpoint was actually correct.
Its something I’ve called other people on here out for, so it’s extra embarrassing. My bad.
In this day and age, you sometimes legitimately have to spend 5 minutes to figure out if the sky is actually blue, or if it’s just another stupid democrat talking point.
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8 hours ago, lloyd christmas said:
I genuinely appreciate the honesty as well. I am curious if your views on who or which party you will vote for in the future has changed. If not, why? If so, are there any other narratives that you are opening your eyes to other than COVID?
I ask because I’m hopeful that eyes are being opened all over the country to various false narratives. I think Virginia is a sign of that.
Yep, sure, they changed. I never had an issue with parties - voted Republican from 2000-2008, voted for Obama in 2012, then voted Trump in 2016. I just couldn’t vote for Trump again in 2020. Some days recently, though, I wish I had.
There are plenty of independents that are immensely disillusioned with wokeism, double standards, and equity BS. Also, hating on America is so fuckin lame. If an election was today, I’d put big bucks on not the Dems (if Rs can find a single person other than Trump).
I just wish I could find a party that combines republican independence/foreign policy ideals with a desire to both effectively tax/deal with the folks that exploit our economy (99% of people with NWs > 50M) and acknowledge scientific evidence on things like global warming. Need more scientific populism. Geniocracy anyone?
But instead, because both those things are in drastically different political parties, I - and tons of others like me - have to compromise in a dumb way.
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15 hours ago, Hacker said:
This thread is emblematic of there literally being two completely different understandings of reality out there in contemporary American society.
Yeah. I will say it is and was very hard to remain unbiased in news sourcing since the Trump presidency for both sides (maybe it actually began around Obama?). I’m wrong in this case, for sure.
COVID, ironically, has been the biggest eye opener of people being brainwashed for me. I think I’m doing better now.
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3 hours ago, SPAWNmaster said:
This thread is proof that none of you are spending time on high side 🤣.
Great bait, man! Adds nothing to the conversation. And the joke about the “high side” was apparently entirely lost on you.
Let’s keep this forum unclass because, well, it has to be. And with that, I’d like to point you to the wargaming scenarios that resulted in the idea of “NGAD” that showed that we get crushed without a fundamental rearchitecting of AirPower in 5-10 years.
I am 100% certain Lockheed/Boeing, the pentagon, and our entrenched leadership will fail to deliver the actual change we need to win overwhelmingly. And I am certain that the American people won’t go fight a war of attrition against China a la WWII. It’s all fun and games until every single fourth Gen fighter is shot down without firing a shot.
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I hadn’t seen or followed the Pelosi thing. Although it was in January before we were in pandemic mode, I’ll say I stand corrected. I just never felt like people were mad about travel bans once we agreed Covid was a thing.
16 hours ago, VMFA187 said:You are an idiot. Like, legitimately fucking stupid.
As, I'm assuming, an officer, how can you be so blind?
Whoa buddy, calm your tits. But overreaction is a specialty on this forum.
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https://www.factcheck.org/2020/03/the-facts-on-trumps-travel-restrictions/
I didn’t really recall outrage about Trump travel bans from a racism perspective. Turns out, that’s because it’s more of a republican talking point than reality.
Show me some examples if I’m wrong.
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COVID-19 (Aka China Virus)
in General Discussion
Posted · Edited by Negatory
I don’t know why, but this thread being locked and then reopened with this crap has really hit a nerve. I’m tired of these “points” that aren’t points. Are we ever going to acknowledge facts and actually debate policies based on reason opposed to emotion? Are we going to talk about things like reasonable age based policies or rotating geographic protections? Are we ever going to actually acknowledge that the real risk is somewhere in the middle of “0.00007%” and “everyone is at significant risk?” Are we going to talk about risk based policies that actually take into account things like BMI, race, or health status to more effectively deal with this pandemic? Are we going to discuss policies to actually temporarily deal with the increased real hospital risk over time in a population if we do have a large infection? Are we going to discuss the high chance that Omicron actually will max out hospitals again even with vaccines based on its extremely high infection rate and ability to evade previous immunity? About how it’s almost a mathematical certainty we will approach 1.0M cases per day in the next week?
Or are we going to keep posting politicized, debunked talking points on both the liberal and conservative sides and then argue about how they’re wrong when we’ve had these discussions 10 times already? Whether that’s folks on the left not acknowledging the significantly diminished effects of the vaccine on transmission/infection or folks on the right posting bs talking points like you just did - it’s all fuckin stupid. But, just as you would say “Orange man bad” to condense an actually intricate thought into a BS political viewpoint, I guess I could just summarize your post as “Brandon XD lol”.
I’m reminded of a good ole saying that generally holds true - definitely in these debates: “The amount of energy needed to refute bullshit is an order of magnitude larger than is needed to produce it.” But let’s look at his “points.”
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brandolini's_law
1) 0 religious exceptions have been passed - so what? This is a question literally just to generate outrage, but not logically. We’ve addressed hypocrisy here in other threads, and I don’t think it was successfully refuted, but I guess if you keep saying that religious exemptions should be approved then by golly I guess they should be.
2) Him asking why the FDA didn’t explicitly recommend the vaccine is irrelevant when the CDC explicitly does recommend it. Oh, why didn’t he mention that? Intentionally misleading to split hairs between gov organizations to make it seem like the government doesn’t have a stance
3) The vaccine has been highly politicized, resulting in orders of magnitude higher reporting than for previous vaccines. This is literally just how politics appears in statistics - its comparing tomatoes to apples. I agree that there are potentially mildly increased risks of myocarditis for young males - but that’s not his point. He is saying that there are blanket increased rates of adverse events - which isn’t true, it’s just total numbers.
4) Bullshit trying to mislead people about Comirnaty generic vs brand when they are chemically identical and the government treats them legally the exact same. But he didn’t want to mention that? This is maybe the dumbest argument that armchair lawyers love to cite.
5) Only looking at deaths is intentionally misleading when we’ve seen that COVID can make things like carrier or submarine readiness questionable based purely on sickness, outbreaks, or long term effects. You had COVID? It takes you out for a few days. Oh and don’t forget that 10-30% of folks that had COVID have long term effects on their neuromuscular, digestive, respiratory, or cardiovascular systems. But we can ignore that. We can ignore everything but deaths, right? By the way, you’re also required to be vaccinated against rubella and the flu, which are significantly less bad from every aspect, yet where are the complaints? Also, quick question, how many marines have died from Rubella?
And I’m done here. It has taken me 10 times the energy to halfway refute this dumb video that has “legitimate questions.” Every singe one was intentionally misleading, largely fallacious, and irrelevant. I honestly look forward to this guy and similarly misguided folks like him that spout BS on social media in uniform getting their well-deserved discharges as they intentionally disrupt good order and discipline.
To end this rant on an even more sarcastic note, make sure to listen to Donald Trump’s recent direction to go get your booster.