A Boston friend who is about 60 years old recently shared that the 50+ shutdown orders from the Maskachusetts governor had resulted in the loss of her fitness habits, a cessation in her gym visits, a substantial weight gain, and a general feeling of poor health. The shutdown that protected her from Covid-19, in other words, has rendered her far more vulnerable to Covid-19 than she ever was previously (see “Extra Pounds May Raise Risk of Severe Covid-19” (NYT, October 10, filed under “belaboring the obvious”).
Had this weakened her faith in the Church of Shutdown and made her think that we can’t prevent deaths, but only shift them from the elderly to the non-elderly? (see “The COVID-19 shutdown will cost Americans millions of years of life” for a partial calculation of how Americans will die prematurely over the coming years)
No!
She still believed in the religion for herself and others. I related to her the complaint of a 35-year-old helicopter instrument student that the shutdown was orchestrated by married people home in their big houses with their kids. “What about people like me,” he asked, “who still want to find someone to have children with? My social and dating lives were destroyed by the lockdown. Then, just as soon as things started to open a bit, I had to work 15 extra hours per week and go on the night shift because so many guys were home collecting their $600 per week and wouldn’t come back.” (I refrained from sharing that he might want to consider moving away from the jurisdiction of Massachusetts family law if his goal is to have children and remain part of their lives after the mom decided she needs to have sex with some new friends while hanging onto his paycheck.) Her response was simply to deny that the 35-year-old had suffered a loss. She imagined herself better situated to evaluate the impact of the shutdown on his life than he himself was.
She has some opportunities to observe high-school and college-age residents of the Boston area. As far as she can tell, they are not heeding directives to maintain social distance, wear masks when together, etc. As long as there is this substantial segment of the population ignoring most of the orders, doesn’t that mean that the plague will eventually spread widely, even if the orders could have worked in a more efficient police state? Apparently not!
Liberals finally have a state-sanctioned religion they can support: the church of shutdown.
Bodily autonomy (the phrase grates) applies to reproduction but not respiration. Our immune systems are no longer our own, but collectivized for the greater good, with results on par with most forced collectivizations.
My question is if lockdown, climate change, BLM, and LGBTQIA+, are all divinities in the same pantheon, like the hindoo; or aspects of one unitary woke divinity, like the christian triune of father, son, and holy ghost?
You should have heard Alan Chartock on NPR today talking about the Great Barrington Declaration. He was vituperatively dismissive, and had a hard time composing himself enough to avoid dripping all over the microphone with contempt for the “smart people” who just want to “let people die.”
He claims everyone in Great Barrington is “furious” with the libertarians co-opting the town for their murderous scheme.
But he doesn’t want marijuana in Great Barrington, so he’s against that Essential Business.
https://www.berkshireeagle.com/alan-chartock-i-publius-great-barrington-runs-risk-of-becoming-next-vegas/article_4f144190-1034-5c44-98f5-06ad36d330e0.html
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alan_S._Chartock says he has a degree in political science. So he is just the white man to explain why a brown woman (Sunetra Gupta) is completely clueless.
You can listen to Dr. Chartock talk about the Great Barrington Declaration on WAMC’s “This Week In Review” starting at about 12:00 on:
“Alan, you have the Great Barrington Doctrine now to discuss.”
“Well, the Great Barrington Doctrine, of course, suggests that everybody should be allowed to just DIE. [Phone ringing] … I’m OUTRAGED by the way, by this so-called “Great Barrington Doctrine” … OUTRAGED. They’ve got a bunch of smart people, libertarians I’m told, very fancy titles after their names, and I don’t care what they do, but what they DID was it to call it the “Great Barrington Doctrine” and the people of my little town of Great Barrington, 7,000 people in the winter, 30,000 people in the summer are INFURIATED by these characters, many of whom aren’t from here, by the way, calling it the “Great Barrington Doctrine.” And saying that the spread should go on…and then people will die…and so what? We had an outstanding doctor on this morning who said it could be 2 million more people dying as a result of that.”
So Dr. Chartock isn’t a fan, and I think he’ll be voting for Jay Battacharaya (he wouldn’t mention his name!) to be committed to the padded cell as soon as possible after the election.
https://www.wamc.org/post/week-review-101620
Head on out to 12:00 to listen his opinion of the Great Barrington Declaration. Of course, when people with positions he agrees with have fancy titles after their names, it’s all to the good.
https://gbdeclaration.org/
As I said: “In the most marginal and facetious terms.” I underestimated Chartock’s rhetorical skills.
And Ray Graf is going to be in the padded cell with them, if you listen to the rest of the show. There’s no dissent allowed in Dr. Chartock’s universe.
@Philg: She’s obviously some miserable brown troglodyte woman with a fancy sounding title after her name, usurping the Great Dr. Chartock’s territory with obscene, degenerate and murderous ideas.
“She has some opportunities to observe high-school and college-age residents of the Boston area. As far as she can tell, they are not heeding directives to maintain social distance, wear masks when together, etc. ”
Perhaps the helicopter student should consider dating a college age woman, since they don’t seem to be affected by the shutdown?
“…the shutdown was orchestrated by married people home in their big houses with their kids”
This is the crux of it. The class of people with the voice and influence to get the government to implement rigorous contact-tracing, testing, and isolating policies that could actually eliminate covid19 as China did, are just chilling, working from home and waiting for someone else to magically fix the problem.