Big Blue Huddle

I would respectfully disagree that masks are only a 2 cost. I think that would be a fair rating if we were only accounting for physical comfort considerations, but the cost extends to social considerations as well. There is no question (and I don't need an official study to believe this) that masks inhibit human communication to some degree. Facial expressions, changes in facial expressions mid-sentence, etc absolutely matter. So when human beings do not communicate as well as they otherwise would, I believe costs come with that, and they are not negligible.

I think the "cost" of wearing a mask to say a supermarket or doctors' office is at most a 2, and probably more like a 1 or 0.5. That really doesn't bother me at all. If however I were a kid trying to make friends at a new school that had a strict "masks on at all times policy", I think the cost would be worse than a 2, and that is just one example.

Quote from: chiller99 on January 08, 2022, 09:54:51 AM
This has been so trying personally with losing almost 3 years of time being locked down due to lack of immunity. Its both physically and mentally trying in being safe during these extensive outbreaks and being a chemo patient has me suffering more than I can put into words.

I am very sorry to hear about this. While this has been challenging for almost everyone, very few can claim anywhere near the struggles you have clearly had to endure. I hope you recover both quickly and with as little discomfort as possible.

Quote from: MightyGiants on January 08, 2022, 08:39:37 AM
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">ICNARC have updated their analysis of COVID patients in critical care in England, Wales and NI. They now show boosted patients as well.

They are shown in green.

Yes, I've put them on the chart.

You have to squint. pic.twitter.com/51nVHbxl6s</p>

Quote from: MightyGiants on January 05, 2022, 10:07:24 AM
I will add I have heard some school districts are taking the "first 2 weeks remote" so that the holiday surge from the holidays doesn't blow up the schools in terms of outbreaks.   I have to say there is merit in the idea, even with the negatives.   One of the other issues not mentioned in the article is how a school or classroom can be completely disrupted by an outbreak.    You get a bunch of kids infected and exposed they will have to stay home and if you don't have remote learning options they fall behind even worse.  Remote learning may not be as good as in-person but no learning is certainly the worst.

For sure these are very valid points. While I think virtual learning is not a good substitute, it is clearly dramatically better than nothing at all. Protecting against the latter is a worthwhile objective indeed. Not to mention if a critical number of teachers in a school catch it, then it's hard for the school to do much of anything (plus older ones or less healthy ones could be in real danger).

It's not an easy problem to solve or an easy set of issues/priorities to juggle. I just know that requiring kids to wear masks every second of the day in school (even during sports in my daughter's school's case) brings with it a real price to pay for kids, and I hope they are not overly conservative around this policy in the future, especially if this strain continues to prove to be very mild.

I do get the point about the impact of a huge outbreak in a single school though. With that said though, if everyone in the school gets it at the same time and they have to shut down for say 10 days, while that won't feel ideal at the time, that might not be so horrible once that event has passed.

Quote from: Bob In PA on January 04, 2022, 10:50:16 PM
https://www.nytimes.com/2022/01/04/briefing/american-children-crisis-pandemic.html

I am glad the Times ran this. The toll this whole crisis has taken on children (on many levels) has been exorbitant. While I appreciate an support the need for caution, forcing young kids to wear masks every second of the day in schools where there are already vax mandates presents an enormous cost both to learning and social development. And of course, this is all on the heels of what was basically a lost year for many children who had to stay at home and "learn" and "develop" watching a screen on a laptop by themselves. I'm not saying that that should not have happened. I am simply pointing out that the costs are immense. A single missed (or very insufficient) year alone is a huge deal for a child. And this is continuing. I cannot imagine what the after-effects will be on many of these kids later in life.

I don't know what the perfect answer is for all of this, both presently and moving forward, but I am not sure that enough balanced thought or holistic consideration is put into this issue in this part of the country. I have no issue with masks in general and wear mine all the time. In fact I probably wear mine more than most of my peers. However I am a middle aged adult and am long since removed from my formative years. I just hope public policy makers remain extremely nimble around ongoing developments and that relaxing of various restrictions is as thoughtful as the imposition of them has been.

Quote from: brownelvis54 on January 04, 2022, 08:46:19 PM

I get it. But without hope...what else do we got?

Our football team?

Interesting, thanks. Will take a look.

If you like Dean Winters, and you have not ever watched the series "Oz", I thoroughly recommend it. In fact I recommend it even if you don't particularly care about Dean Winters. Even though it's about 20 years old, I think it's one of the best TV series ever made. It's absolutely gripping. It's very violent but it is extremely engaging, smartly done, and superbly acted.

I think "cautiously optimistic" on a relative basis is a reasonable stance to have at this point. That does not mean anyone is popping corks, or saying this is "over", or suggesting that there won't be more difficult periods in the future. Nor is it drawing any "conclusion", preliminary or otherwise. It's a merely an acknowledgment that omicron seems significantly less virulent than other strains (as demonstrated by numerous other countries) combined with some initial hope that this strain may help with immunity against others'. I don't think it's jumping to conclusions nor is it a green light to go out and take silly risks.

I have seen much of this, and I will say that I am cautiously optimistic about the medium to longer term trajectory of this whole crisis from where we are today.

Of course, on the other hand, if the government of a country or those elite few who control social media go too far to suppress the flow of information, you can end up like this:

https://twitter.com/BNODesk/status/1477373810189996033

Quote from: LennG on January 01, 2022, 12:18:38 PM
I voted BAD as I do not use social media.
I am not on Facebook, Instagram, or whatever else is out there.

Why maybe it's what I have seen from others. Yes, it can keep you close to family, but, for the most part, it's mostly about people needing a spotlight on themselves, what they do all day, what they eat all day, ability to push agendas without ever really having to reveal themselves.
Do I really care what half the world ate for breakfast, bought at the supermarket, experiences at the beauty parlor, you get what I mean.

I just see it as a platform for people to say this is ME. Is THAT a good thing?

I completely agree that social media is lame and a waste of time when people use it entirely for narcissistic reasons (like thinking large numbers of people care what they had for breakfast that morning). I have a twitter account, and I avoid following individuals who engage in this sort of thing, even if some of their other tweets are useful to me. The narcissistic, self-absorbed stuff definitely turns me off.

However, I do like to follow accounts that put out interesting or useful information with a reasonably high frequency. And there are a handful I also follow because they amuse me. I feel if you curate your list of accounts you follow carefully and update it frequently (both by removing non-performing accounts and adding new potentially good ones), you can end up with a pretty decent overall feed that can be worthwhile to peruse from time to time.

Do I think this replaces more traditional consumption of news, like consistently reading articles from reputable publications? Absolutely not. Do I think even a carefully curated twitter list will still split out plenty of junk? Yes I do. Do I think overuse of it and constantly being on it is a good thing? No, I certainly do not. But I do think it is a supplementary info source that can be useful and entertaining.

Quote from: MightyGiants on January 01, 2022, 07:18:50 AM
So based on the times of the videos, none of what you posted would qualify as "misinformation" especially as it relates to actual misinformation like the blog Bob posted

MG,

My own take on these videos was not that there was any sort of ill intent on the part of those speaking. "Misinformation" tends to imply that there was such ill intent (although it doesn't have to mean that), so perhaps it wasn't the absolute best word choice. Maybe "inaccurate information" or "falsehoods" would have been better. And as far as these statements being "true at the time", I have two thoughts on that:

(1) They could be stated differently. "Current research suggests that" or "From what we can tell right now" type qualifiers could have been used. Just saying "if you get the vaccine you are at a very, very low risk of getting covid" is a clumsily matter of fact way of putting it. In fact, I'm not even sure that was "true at the time." I don't recall scientists or the drug companies saying if you take the vaccine you are highly unlikely to get covid. Even back in the early days of the vaccine, we talked about percentage of effectiveness, but that was not the same as saying you almost definitely won't get it if you're vaccinated. I certainly never thought that getting the vaccine meant I would not get covid. So Biden's words in his video seem particularly false and misinformed, which is less than ideal when you're the POTUS managing a national and global crisis. Trump was heavily criticized for exactly this sort of thing, and very rightfully so, so Biden should not get a full pass just because he's not Trump.

(2) You said yourself that there was an element of fibbing on the part of the government with the "lose the mask" advice. So, in fact, to a certain extent they actually were being manipulative and deliberately deceptive. Unfortunately, being lied to or even fibbed to by leaders seldom rubs people the right way, even if the ultimate intentions are good.

The bottom line in my opinion is that when people hear things from leadership stated in a matter of fact, "this is how it is" sort of way, and then these statements later turn out to be false or are gone back on, that tends to lead to mistrust or at least a loss of confidence in the validity of information people are hearing. The "well it was true at the time" bit isn't going to resonate with large swaths of this country as a legitimate excuse. Nor is that even wholly true when it comes to the Biden remarks in that video.

My own personal take is that its capabilities allow for a fast spread of information which can be incredibly useful and valuable. It also allows you to focus specifically on certain individuals and filter others out (in the way that you acquire information). And obviously it allows you to keep in touch with people well. I voted "good thing", because I would certainly rather have it than not have it. I'm not a big Instagram or TikTok person, but Twitter is incredibly useful, and so are others like LinkedIn etc.

Where I think it can become destructive is the overuse of it, which is definitely an issue in this country. That can lead to all sorts of problems, depression being one. It is also no substitute for human interaction in the flesh. And obviously any misuse of it with bad intentions is also a problem and can be very damaging.

Quote from: MightyGiants on January 01, 2022, 10:50:40 AM
One of the underappreciated dangers of social media is that it can lead to depression.   One of the truisms I learned in life is that the key to unhappiness is to always compare one's self and one's lot in life to others.  There are always going to be people who seem to have it better than you in at least one aspect of life.  Yet despite that being true, it's human nature to naturally compare.

This is where social media can become dangerous.    Many people on social media either knowingly or unknowingly try to create fictions where their lives appear better than they really are.   They are careful in what and how they share things to try and create this image that they are leading great lives.    That in itself is harmless and not even a bad thing.  If anything, it's simply not complaining about the bad in life.  Yet for many people, as they browse through all the posts of wonderful homes, great relationships, wonderful family gatherings, rewarding jobs, and awesome vacations start to feel like their own lives are poor by comparison.  This can often lead to depression

Excellent point. This is especially true on Instagram. It is commonplace now for people to post all kinds of fake pictures or old pictures that are misleading and trying to make their lives look much more exciting or well funded than they are. I hadn't really considered that this could make others depressed. I always felt this untruthfulness showed a lack of confidence or possibly depression on the part of the poster. Interesting point that it can also make others depressed.