We're All Gonna Die

[PhillyPhreak54]

sorry to hear bro.  same here - liberal mom in her mid 60s who is not vaccinated and can't even give me a single reason why.  so strange since they literally got the polio vaccines as children, and I was always fully vaxxed with MMR etc as a child. 

hope she gets better soon.

Thanks and also sorry to hear. Ran to see her at lunch...she's frail and running a 101 temp. I just wanted to see if she needed to go to the hospital because she's stubborn but she's breathing fine and extremely fatigued. She said food tastes horrible which is why she isn't eating. She's ultra healthy, works out 5 days a week and only eats fruits/veggies/quinoa and fish. Doesn't drink or do drugs (except weed).

The most pleasant surprise of the past year was my conservative father vaxxing up and fully stopping all politics talk. He saw, belatedly, what Trump was and the danger he and his cult presented. Better late than never I guess and now he gets to see his grandkids.

How did that miracle happen? I know Republicans who soured on Trump but never Trumpers. Even after he backed Putin and after the insurrection they were still licking his ass.

Good that you checked up on her - keep that up since she is stubborn. Hopefully the breathing issues stay away and don't come around.

[rjs246]

The most pleasant surprise of the past year was my conservative father vaxxing up and fully stopping all politics talk. He saw, belatedly, what Trump was and the danger he and his cult presented. Better late than never I guess and now he gets to see his grandkids.

How did that miracle happen?

I don't really know.

Just like most boomer-ass conservative white men, he still thinks of the GOP as the party of grown-ups, even though it is clearly just a cult of personality that leverages every possible wedge issue for the sole purpose of cutting taxes for the wealthy and corporations. He's a hunter and spends all of his copious free time around other boomer-ass hunters so his tendency towards 2a paranoia is real. Despite marrying a liberal and raising two educated, liberal children, he bitches about liberals all the time.

But somehow, through the fog of his deeply ingrained cultural identity, he retained some contact with reality. Fox News is never on at the house because of my mom, so that probably helps. He still reads the Washington Post every morning. That probably helps too. But ultimately I think it was two things. He's terrified of dying (so the Trump admin's total lack of response to the pandemic infuriated him) and he wanted to salvage some level of respect from his wife and children.

Sorry to hear about your mom. Hopefully, this story has a happy ending and she gets on board.

[ice grillin you]

i have a house in a little town in upstate ny that isnt like the deep south (trump was "only" 57% against hillary) but it is mos def white trashy and old and very conservative...lots of trump flags around....however while i was up there for two weeks this month i found not a single anti vaxxer even from the old doods at the bar who ask for fox news on the tv...they were all pretty matter of fact about it...almost to a person they were basically like im old fat and generally not very healthy and if i get covid ill probably die

that was ruined by a talk i had with a waitress about the child tax credits and she was getting mad at the people in town who were getting the credits when they shouldnt be having kids to begin with...im like ok at least she isnt going all trump or going crazy about sleepy joe or pelosi until right as shes leaving me she says they just want that stillupfront cash

[SD]

My favorite are the "we don't know the long term effects of the vaccine yet". Well we do know short term you don't get overly sick and die like covid. Plus we know the long term effects of covid can be bad.

[PhillyPhreak54]

The problem is people either don't know or choose to ignore the long term effects of Covid. It's apparent when these chuckleheads pull out the "it's just the flu bro" comparisons.

[PhillyPhreak54]

Vegas is reinstating the mask mandate (well the Governor is but that means Vegas)

I'm sure other places will follow.

Meanwhile this thread is scary. All because trumpfargs wanted to politicize a god damn deadly virus. I get angrier by the day about this. We lost a year of our lives because of this and it's gonna happen again.

Oh and kids are on ventilators now in Houston.

https://twitter.com/coo_ray/status/1420060053206413314 21

[MDS]

i feel terrible for mike and subsequently his moms but like....this is what happens when you dont vaxed. i hope she pulls through but im guessing facebook radicalization here about vaccines in general? its gotten a lot of people, even liberal ones.

[ice grillin you]

thats very kind of you to not want his mother to die

[MDS]

i do what i can to help the peoples

[Geowhizzer]

Found out that my nephew's stepsister just passed from COVID this afternoon.  She was 43.  We'll see if this opens his (or more importantly, his wife's) eyes.  I wish I could say I was optimistic... but I'm not.

Governor DeathSantis is refusing to go along with the CDC recommendations regarding masks.  He will refuse to allow the school districts to reimplement the mask mandates from last year.  He is emphasizing the "rights" of the parents to decide that for their children.

My guess is that I will see very few students masking up.

Also, no district-based online learning this year.  The state-run virtual school will still be available.

[SD]

i feel terrible for mike and subsequently his moms but like....this is what happens when you dont vaxed. i hope she pulls through but im guessing facebook radicalization here about vaccines in general? its gotten a lot of people, even liberal ones.

Appreciate it. She's just stubborn. I was against taking the vax when all this first happened but back to my chicken pox story farg going through that shtein plus I read up enough on it to know there's minimal risk. I wish people would dive into the science about how it works.

thats very kind of you to not want his mother to die

lol...In fairness I know his mom passed when he was young so I don't doubt his sincerity

[rjs246]

I wish people would dive into the science about how it works.

Um no. No no farging no. This is literally the problem.

I'm not trying to pick on your or your mom but do either of you, or anyone you know, work in epidemiology? Are either of you research scientists? Do either of you work in medicine? Do either of you work researching infectious diseases? Are you a microbiologist?

If the answer to any of those is no then no, you shouldn't be "doing your own research". This farging lunacy needs to end. Having access to the internet does not make us all equally qualified to make a decision about what is and is not the right thing to do in every situation. We're all so convinced of our own farging brilliance on every goddamned topic that we've managed to elect a serial sex offender, con-man, gameshow host, tax fraud, sociopath to the farging presidency.

Do your own research on topics that you are an expert in. Do your own research on topics that you are well versed in professionally or scholastically. Do it. Knock yourself out. For everything else, rely on the experts. Otherwise we're just hurtling inexorably towards stupidity and chaos.

And for the love of god, stop farging encouraging people who have already illustrated poor judgment on subjects that they are not experts in to "do their own research". farg. Come on.

[MDS]

i cannot functionally understand how people think they know more than doctors and infectious disease experts

i get the people who inherently dont trust the government and go the other way if theyre pushed to do something. theres some justification there albeit they are very wrong here. the people who think reading a few websites or watching some tik tok videos makes them smarter than a epidemiologist with 3 decades of experience...no. NO.

[SD]

What I'm saying is some understanding about how they work would go a long to people realizing they're not much different than the way other vaccines work. It's nice to live in a country where we can decline life saving vaccines

https://www.doh.wa.gov/Emergencies/COVID19/VaccineInformation/HowVaccinesWork

https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/vaccines/different-vaccines/how-they-work.html

https://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/coronavirus/in-depth/different-types-of-covid-19-vaccines/art-20506465

https://health.ucdavis.edu/coronavirus/covid-19-vaccine/how-covid-19-vaccines-work.html

[rjs246]

I mean. You don't need to link to the information and research on vaccines that experts have done for me. I already believe in science and scientific expertise. I'm not an epidemiologist so, as a normal rational human, I rely on the expert consensus. Which overwhelmingly says "get vaccinated dummy". 

Telling every dumbass to just read about the vaccine will lead to WILDLY varying outcomes. Which is quite literally the opposite of what is required to defeat a pandemic. We need everyone in lock step. Sorry edgelords, just get vaccinated and shut the farg up.

But, as Americans, we think we're entitled to argue against doctors and researchers and scientists who are trying to save everyone's lives. At what point did an ethos of individualism morph into the belief that we're all equally fit to make life or death decisions on every single subject? This country is so farging stupid.