Are you scared? : (

[Marigold Devin]

So why have governments worldwide put us on lock down this time?  

Because we don't have ALL the facts. And we don't have ALL the figures.

Perspective ... great, truly.

BUT what scares me the most about ANY situation is the sheeple mentality, the devil-may-care folks.

Do I follow the government's advice? Do I listen to the voices in my own head, my instincts? My instincts tell me to keep the hell away from everyone (but then that is generally what my instincts tell me to do anyway).

The two nurses that live in the adjoining house to my brother had a barbecue yesterday with several friends round, none of whom were socially distancing, so that would suggest it is just a flu virus and the world has gone mental and is overreacting (or THEY are f*cking stupid and the NHS is doomed having scruffy arseholes like them as nurses - they leave their supposedly laundered uniforms out on the line for days at a time, where they have two dogs running free and sh1tting all over - very hygienic!).

And a retired doctor I speak with every Monday also believes massive scaremongering abounds and the governments have overreacted to another simple case of flu. (He is an eye specialist - what does HE know?)

 

 

Edited May 31, 2020 by Marigold Devin

[Orwar]

 Oops.

Edited May 31, 2020 by Orwar
Replied in the wrong tab!

[Qie Niangao]

It's just like the flu, and we need to condemn China for endangering the species with a virus... that's just like the flu.

No wonder they won't listen to science -- they don't even listen to themselves.

That said, there's a whole lot of miscommunication that's come from supposedly responsible Public Health authorities. I can't speak for Europe but both the US and Canada were woefully late to institute self-isolation measures. Canada hasn't had quite the disastrous numbers as in the US (not even in hardest-hit Quebec), but it's not that we did everything right up here, either.

It was painfully obvious at the time -- like, where the f were the Public Health officers? Our household took viral safety measures weeks before our local officials said anything -- and we missed a couple precautions we'd have known if Public Health were doing its job.

One thing I'll never forgive them for was the early, utterly bogus "advice" to not wear masks, and reserve them all for healthcare workers. Leaving aside the actual medical equipment grade N95 masks (which, tragically, still must be reserved for healthcare use), pretending that mask wearing wouldn't reduce the spread of the virus -- might even make it worse because mask wearers touch their face more -- that misinformation persists in the public mind: Folks are still ambivalent about wearing masks here, long after it's known the primary means of contagion is airborne.

Every time I see somebody in public without a mask, I wonder if they're just naturally an a-hole, or if they learned it from Public Health.

Edited May 31, 2020 by Qie Niangao

[kiramanell]

2 minutes ago, Qie Niangao said:

Every time I see somebody in public without a mask, I wonder if they're just naturally an a-hole, or if they learned it from Public Health.

 

I can't speak for the US, but every time I see Trump and his cronies mock Biden and others for wearing a mask (because Real Men Don't Wear Masks), I'm beginning to get a good idea about the origin of the ignorance.

[FairreLilette]

2 hours ago, kiramanell said:

And the WHO? All they've done is having initially been perhaps a little too (outwardly) friendly towards China, in terms of not immediately blasting them to hell. I would probably have done the same thing. China is a de facto Dictatorship, secretive in nature: if you want their cooperation, especially on sharing information, you need to tread carefully. Meanwhile, your own Trump has been downplaying Corona until late April. "We have it totally under control." Yeah, no.

 

The WHO blundered badly by not shutting international airports.  As a matter of fact, George Bush, Jr. and President Obama new more about what to do in pandemic and how to respond then the WHO does.  The WHO did shoddy work.  I would not pay people for keeping secrets so they can tread lightly nor for shoddy work.  They were useless to human life.  

Trump is a figure-head, not a doctor, nor a health organization.  He has to get his information from his team of experts.  However, Trump has been all over-the-map with odd statements but that does not mean his statements are in actuality what is really going on.  He makes statements from him alone a lot of the time.  Don't pay a lot of mind to those because many of his statements are just statements and not things that are going to happen.  He doesn't have that kind of power.  

But, as far as do I trust my own government at this time to honestly tell me to just go about living my life and then BOOM! a worse pandemic happens this Fall/Winter.  I'm hunkering down and have prepared to do so.  I want to stay in.  Not to mention I think I had this already in January of 2020 and, in fact, wondering what it was.  I asked friends in the building who were sick too and I asked them "Do you have a cold?"  "Do you have the flu?"  Because I wanted to know their opinion on this.  I'll never forget one answer I received which was "I think I have everything."   That about covers how sick you can be from this - "I think I have everything".   I'm nearly five months post my illness in January and not symptom free in my nose with continued mucus for 5 months and drainage into my throat.  

[kiramanell]

31 minutes ago, FairreLilette said:

But, as far as do I trust my own government at this time to honestly tell me to just go about living my life and then BOOM! a worse pandemic happens this Fall/Winter.  I'm hunkering down and have prepared to do so.  I want to stay in.  Not to mention I think I had this already in January of 2020 and, in fact, wondering what it was.  I asked friends in the building who were sick too and I asked them "Do you have a cold?"  "Do you have the flu?"  Because I wanted to know their opinion on this.  I'll never forget one answer I received which was "I think I have everything."   That about covers how sick you can be from this - "I think I have everything".   I'm nearly five months post my illness in January and not symptom free in my nose with continued mucus for 5 months and drainage into my throat.  

 

I'm really sorry to hear you got ill, Fairre.  It's a sh*t disease; and, Trump despite, I hope they find something for you soon. 😷

Edited May 31, 2020 by kiramanell

[FairreLilette]

2 minutes ago, kiramanell said:

 

I'm really sorry to hear you got ill, Fairre.  It's a sh*t disease; and, Trump despite, I hope they find something for you soon. 😷

Yeah, me too.  Me too.  We are awaiting portable chest X-rays for people in this building.  I thought the chest X-rays would be here by now, hopefully soon just to make sure none of us have any kind of walking pneumonia or anything like that.  

But, while mucus may sound innocuous, it isn't.  It clogs up my whole nose and will not blow out.  It's clogged.   I will be asking my doctor could he please send someone here to take a nasal swab in order to see what it is in my nose that keeps clogging up.  It's the same clogging that started when I became sick with this in January of 2020 and I never had it before, ever.

 There are reports now that COVID-19 was definitely spreading in California in January of 2020.  As a matter of fact, someone from Wuhan visited California in December of 2019.  Not sure all the exacts on it but officials are taking seriously that some of us already had this.  But, I'm not even completely well from it yet.  I do take extra vitamin-C to try to boost my immune system.  My doctor tried every kind of allergy medicine on me but there is zero improvement from all allergy medicines.  I know it's not an allergy anyhow because it started in January of 2020 when I became very feverish and ill from a flu-like illness and I don't have allergies either anyways.  It was flu-like yet I still was questioning others who were sick in my building as to what they though it was.  My doctor, I'm sure just tried the allergy meds, just to rule it out kind of thing as protocol.  But, it's not allergies and I need a swab taken so I can have relief via a medicine to kill what is in my nose and going into my throat where I have a hard time getting that out too.  A whole nostril clogging up that will not clear with blowing one's nose is pretty serious.  That mucus in there does not move.  I've tried using warm water to clear it; it helps a little.  

It's not up to Trump right now...I think it's up to me to raise a bit of hell about it so I can be treated too.  Though, as I said, it is known now coronovirus was spreading in California in January despite what the WHO may or may not say.  It is known and it's serious.  

[Lyssa Greymoon]

China locked down Wuhan on January 24th. The WHO declared it "a public health emergency of international concern" on the 30th. Donald Trump spent the next month golfing, holding campaign rallies and telling everyone that everything was fine, it was a Democratic hoax and cornonavirus would miraculously disappear. But China and the WHO are the bad guys. 🙄

Edited May 31, 2020 by Lyssa Greymoon

[Storm Clarence]

12 minutes ago, Lyssa Greymoon said:

China locked down Wuhan on January 24th. The WHO declared it "a public health emergency of international concern" on the 30th. Donald Trump spent the next month golfing, holding campaign rallies and telling everyone that everything was fine, it was a Democratic hoax and cornonavirus would miraculously disappear. But China and the WHO are the bad guys. 🙄

Wrong.  China flew 10's of thousands all over the world after they locked down Wuhan.  WHO said nothing to worry about as it is contained.  You could get out of Wuhan but not in.  So wrong again. 

The President was advised to not shut off China - but he did it anyway. 

Insofar as WHO being the bad guys, yes.  And they will get no more of my tax money.  I respect President Trump's convictions. 

[Scylla Rhiadra]

That China both screwed this up early on, and acted in bad faith in withholding information that might have reduced the impact of the pandemic is pretty much incontrovertible, I suspect. China is, after all, a brutal, ambitious, and repressive regime; we'd expect no better from them.

That the WHO has shown a fair bit of incompetence in managing the crisis is probably less cut-and-dry, and any critique needs to account for a lot of mitigating factors, but a pretty strong argument can be made that a review of their response, and some much-needed reforms, would be a very good thing.

That politics, domestic and international, is inevitably going to play a role in how different nations and institutions have responded to the crisis is surely a given -- although what has been most surprising to me, at least in a Canadian and European context, is how little an impact this has probably had on the actual measures taken. For the most part (and there have been exceptions, of course) I have been reasonably impressed, in my country, by the approaches taken by a prime minister for whom I have little respect, and a provincial premier whom I frankly despise.

All of these things are issues that need careful analysis, and that are certainly the proper subject of thoughtful and informed discussion.

BUT the disinformation and strategic manipulation (however incompetently performed) of this crisis for purely partisan ends in the US is unlike anything I'd ever thought I'd see in the face of an unfolding tragedy like this.

Seeing posters here spout, with an eye to the next election, utter lies and thinly-veiled racism by rote from their political party's current PR playbook leaves me with the sour taste of vomit in my mouth.

[FairreLilette]

26 minutes ago, Lyssa Greymoon said:

China locked down Wuhan on January 24th. The WHO declared it "a public health emergency of international concern" on the 30th. Donald Trump spent the next month golfing, holding campaign rallies and telling everyone that everything was fine, it was a Democratic hoax and cornonavirus would miraculously disappear. But China and the WHO are the bad guys. 🙄

This is, imo, silly Lyssa.  You all seem to want to blame everything on Trump insteed of opening your eyes to the truth especially when Trump doesn't even have the power you and other Trump haters seem to assign him.   

Do you understand the difference between Trump and a doctor?  Or you just trust the media only?  

Edited May 31, 2020 by FairreLilette

[FairreLilette]

18 minutes ago, Storm Clarence said:

Wrong.  China flew 10's of thousands all over the world after they locked down Wuhan.  WHO said nothing to worry about as it is contained.  You could get out of Wuhan but not in.  So wrong again. 

The President was advised to not shut off China - but he did it anyway. 

Insofar as WHO being the bad guys, yes.  And they will get no more of my tax money.  I respect President Trump's convictions. 

I am not a Trump supporter nor a Republican but hating everything he does simply because he is a Trump or simply because he is a Republican is just frankly silly if not downright idiotic.  

I cannot support the WHO with any tax payer dollars either.  Absolutely not!   But, others will, simply because it is Trump and not their darling whomever that may be.  To some people I want to say this is not all your money simply because it wasn't your darling in office.   If you want this WHO org, you pay for it.  

Let, alone did she even read that COVID-19 was in my building prior to the dates she posted and/or in my post that someone from Wuhan was in California in the Winter of 2019?

Stupid Trump posting I should call it.  Just stupid, stupid.    

 

Edited May 31, 2020 by FairreLilette

[Lyssa Greymoon]

11 minutes ago, FairreLilette said:

This is, imo, silly Lyssa.  You all seem to want to blame everything on Trump insteed of opening your eyes to the truth especially when Trump doesn't even have the power you and other Trump haters seem to assign him.   

Do you understand the difference between Trump and a doctor?  Or you just trust the media only?  

What did I say that was wrong? Everything I said is an indisputable fact. Yes, I do understand the difference between Trump and a doctor. One of them is the president of the United States, the other is not.

[FairreLilette]

4 minutes ago, Lyssa Greymoon said:

What did I say that was wrong? Everything I said is an indisputable fact. Yes, I do understand the difference between Trump and a doctor. One of them is the president of the United States, the other is not.

A fact to you, but otherwise no.  If you want to pay for this WHO thing, you pay for it as that is about all I have to say about it.  I was already sick before the date WHO announced anything.  I think I should sue them, not pay them.

Edited May 31, 2020 by FairreLilette

[Luna Bliss]

[Luna Bliss]

(I'd move to New Zealand in a heartbeat)

The New Leader of the Free World

Eat Your (Nonexistent) Heart Out, Donald Trump

 

“What do you think of her? I think she’s — “ asked Helen, the CEO.

“She’s our leader,” cut in Claudine, slowly, dreamily, her eyes wide.

“Well,” Ben, the grizzled London copper chuckled, “I can’t dispute that.”

“I really like her!” chirped the Kid Kieran.

“She,” concluded my kid sis, “is our Real President.” And for once, there was no millennial irony in her voice at all.

The doggies stopped running circles around the green, and looked up at us for a moment, grinning.

“Wait, what? Who is? Is this about Killing Eve?” I was late to this evening’s little group of friends from around the world meeting at the park, walking our little buddies, watching them play in the long sunny evenings.

Then it hit me. “Let me guess.” I took my best shot.

Claudine clapped in delight. Ben laughed, rolling his eyes. My kid sis beamed approvingly. Helen smiled.

Jacinda Ardern. The new leader of the free world. Isn’t she fast becoming something like that to many of those, I suppose, who are still sane and thoughtful people? And there’s something deliciously funny about it, precisely because there’s also more than a grain of truth in it.

Jacinda is like the anti-Donald. Young woman, old man. Fiery social democrat — disgusting ultra-conservative bordering on authoritarian-fascist. Thoughtful, intelligent, empathic, warm woman. Sociopath, narcissist, idiot man-child. The contrast is pretty funny when you think about it. Especially when you imagine the size of the tantrum…that a fool as insecure as Donald Trump would throw…at the very thought of… a whole world…admiring a young woman…actually building a better society…more than him.

She’s not just the anti-Donald, though. She’s the anti-Bolsonaro, the anti-Boris-Johnson, the anti-Nigel, the anti-Putin, anti-Modi. She’s the literal antithesis in every way of the strongman politics that have swept across the globe like a volcanic eruption of mass idiocy. I’ll come back to that.

One woman keeping the lights of civilization on…against the…collective strongmen of the world. It is funny, because it reveals how weak and stupid and vain they really are. Hence, people like my friends at the dog park look up to….the thirty-something prime minister of a tiny country at the edge of the world. And also to the country. Let me try to explain, in my own words, why they do. (And by the way, I don’t say any of this out of ideology. I’m not really political, I don’t care enough about it to be ideological. I’m just a pragmatist. The facts tell me this.)

Who do you see at the other end of the world? It’s absurd to speak of Americans as free in any meaningful way. Nobody thoughtful can think America is a country that leads the free world anymore — and yes, I do think there is a “free world.” Is America even part of the free world anymore?

Americans don’t have decent healthcare, retirement, education, incomes, governance. Trust and happiness have plummeted, and suicide and hopelessness are skyrocketing. Freedom became free-dumb in America. But in places like New Zealand, it evolved. It became the idea that we are freer when we all have expansive public goods, like healthcare, education, retirement, and so on. We are freest when we can treat everyone like a human being with dignity and worth — doesn’t “everyone” include us, too? — not like disposable commodities, rivals for scarce resources, adversaries in a never-ending, brutal, daily contest for survival — one that ultimately makes people hated enemies — as in America, where people still don’t even really know they’ve been dehumanized that way. Americans are regressing backwards in time at light-speed — fast becoming a nation of “low-wage service workers”, an economists’ euphemism for “servants.”

When I say “new leader of the free world,” I don’t just mean Jacinda Ardern. I mean New Zealand. As a society. New Zealand is a textbook example of what it means to be a thriving, functioning, modern society in the 21st century. It is a leader in that sense. It ranks seventh in the Social Progress Index — and is going to rise far higher after Coronavirus, easily cracking the top five or three. America, meanwhile, ranks a dismal…26th. And it’s going to plummet. There’s something special about New Zealand, happening in it, right about now. The world should pay attention.

As a glaring example of global leadership changing hands, New Zealand had among the world’s best responses to Coronavirus. It didn’t just flatten the curve. It “crunched” it, as epidemiologists say. Do you know how many people died of the virus in New Zealand? Just 21. Twenty one. How many does America have? A hundred thousand and counting. That’s a stunning accomplishment. A remarkable one. Sure, New Zealand’s a small country. But being a big country doesn’t give you a license to just watch helplessly as thousands die. That’s just a rationalization for negligence.

New Zealand has just a handful of deaths because it did the precise opposite of what America did. It locked down early, it tested and traced, and so forth. In other words — shocker — it listened to scientists. Jacinda took the warnings seriously, and acted fast. Did you know that Columbia University epidemiologists have estimated if America had done that, the death toll could easily have been cut in half — or more? That’s fifty thousand needless deaths — at least. But many Americans — to the world’s horror — still don’t appear to care much. Why? Well, a lot of them take their cues from Trump. He first denied there was a pandemic, then he laughed, then he minimized it, then he did nothing, then he…encouraged people to drink bleach. Result? Historic catastrophe — which is still unfolding before our very eyes.

But it’s not just its world-leading Coronavirus response. New Zealand is a pioneer in many respects, today — an institutional innovator. It’s testing out what’s called a “well-being budget.” We invest in the things which improve lives most, first. It’s becoming what I might call one of the world’s first eudaimonic economies. That choice is going to pay off in spades. Who doesn’t want a better life — apart from, well, Americans? Isn’t that precisely what we should invest in — not more Facebooks and penthouses-in-the-sky for trillionaires? A lack of investment in anything that matters is exactly how America descended into a nation of new poor, one giant servant class attending to a tiny group of ultra-rich.

Hence, by now, Jacinda has won the admiration and respect of thoughtful and intelligent people the world over. My barometer is my little dog park — my tiny group of friends from around the world, which cuts through every kind of boundary there is. Helen the CEO, Ben the cop, Claudine the consultant. They don’t have much in common. Yet when Claudine joked that Jacinda is “our leader” — and she wasn’t really joking — everyone laughed, because it was secretly true. Those across the world who want better societies are starting to think of Ardern as something a little like their “real” leader — not the wackos and lunatics and bigots and idiots who run their governments. They look at their societies, and wonder: “Why can’t we build something a little more than New Zealand? What the hell went wrong with us?”

Now, it’s easy to idealize a politician. I’m trying to tell a story that goes deeper than that — about the maturity and evolution of a society. I often say “gentle and wise New Zealand.” I mean those words. It takes a society of thoughtful and gentle and wise people to elect an Ardern, just as it takes a society of grinning American Idiots to be ruled by a Trump. There is something special about New Zealanders right about now, in an unstable world, buffeted by catastrophe.

You see, they did something remarkable. They bucked the rising tide of global right-wing fanaticism, led by strongmen, who are demagogues. Americans elected a Trump. Brits elected a Boris, and chose to Brexit. Indians have their Modi. Brazilians are now ruled by a cackling, preening Bolsonaro. New Zealanders did something that’s still underestimated, beautiful, and funny: they gave the middle finger to the world’s strongmen, collectively, and elected a…young woman from the left.

For an economist like me, it’s hard to overstate how remarkable that is. I’ve been predicting the rise of strongman politics for about a decade ago, as economic stagnation sets in around the globe, which always triggers neo-fascist politics. That relationship is as predictable as the sunrise to me. New Zealand is one of just a handful of countries to be able to stand tall amid this fatal tide of demagoguery and strongman politics. It broke the dynamic that Britain, America, Brazil, and India, among others, fell prey to. How did it do that?

I think of New Zealand as the Canada of the East, sometimes, and Australia as it’s America. I know that’s an imperfect analogy. Still, let me employ it. Canada, unlike is a bilingual, bicultural society. In stark contrast to hyper-conservative America — a nation plunging backwards into medieval levels of exploitation — it’s a social democracy. And Canadians are just…nice. Warm. Friendly. Everything that Americans — renowned for their hostility, aggression, selfishness, and cruelty, aren’t. All that is true of New Zealand, too.

New Zealand and Canada are both societies at the edge of the world. They were the final outermost frontiers of waves of colonization. And for that reason, I think, they escaped much of the weight of terrible history in a place like America. A Promised Land like America is one which also must be purified. It’s one in which the pure can enslave the impure. A Promised Land is a curse.

America and Australia developed in some of the same ways for just this reason. They weren’t edges of the world — they were whole new continents to take. The Promise was too great. They are both marred by savage histories of violence and extermination. And both are still ruled by ultra-conservative politics, which reject climate change, equality, the world, the future.

It’s true that New Zealand and Canada have painful histories, too. But they have gone a longer way towards making a difficult peace with that sordid history. It’s easy for me to say that, of course, so they themselves must be the judge. But that is precisely the point. When I say this to New Zealanders — or most Canadians — they will say: “but we haven’t done enough to make amends yet!” There is a hunger to be better people. To transcend yesterday’s strife. To write history anew. In America and Australia and Britain — is that hunger even there?

New Zealand and Canada are among the world’s gentlest, most progressive, most thoughtful nations. How did they get that way? My explanation is a combination of the above — societies at the edge of the world who had to do the difficult work of learning to coexist, something that Promised Lands never did. When you’re at the edge of the world, there’s nothing else left to exploit. You coexist — or you collapse. Still, looking backwards is one thing, and looking forward another.

You can see the power of cooperation, empathy, and warmth in the example of New Zealand very, very clearly right about now. The countries with the highest death tolls are America, Britain, and Brazil. What do they all have in common? Strongman politics. Violent, chest-beating men in charge of everything, marching armies of grinning idiots towards martyrdom. That’s not a coincidence — it’s a relationship. Strongmen are leading their nations to epic disaster — but many are still happily following them, partying all the way into the abyss.

Jacinda isn’t just the anti-Trump. She’s the anti-Trump because New Zealand is kind of the anti-America. Americans think that the opposite of America is a country like Iran or Saudi. Ironically, nothing could be further from the truth. America’s a lot like those countries — replete with death penalties, mass violence, racism, religious fanaticism, and so on. The true opposite of America is a place that largely rejects the values of aggression, hostility, enmity, and cruelty.

New Zealand’s stunningly successful response to Coronavirus was a product, I think, ultimately, of that: those deeper values. Ardern isn’t a dictator. She couldn’t have ordered people to do much of anything. It was people themselves, who, seeing the gravity of the threat, cooperated with one another. But to see the gravity of that threat requires a people who have matured emotionally far beyond, say, Americans: who possess a greater degree of empathy, warmth, courage, wisdom, purpose.

For New Zealanders themselves to have taken on Coronavirus says they are a people who have cultivated greater maturity in themselves. That sounds pretentious, overblown, but I mean it. Americans are still having pool parties…while the virus hasn’t even peaked yet. The story is about a whole country that the rest of us should learn from.

The future is going to require those values of cooperation, empathy, warmth, courage, caring. Societies with more of them are going to prosper — and those without them are going to fall. You can see that already in the example of Canada and New Zealand versus say America and Britain. This gap will only grow wider. Why?

The pandemic shut life down for a few months. Now imagine the effects of the catastrophes on our doorstep. Climate change, ecological collapse, mass extinction. The economic depressions and social chaos and political gridlock they yield are going to make today’s look like a mere warm-up. When climate change strikes severely — about a decade from now — only societies with cooperative and caring values are going to survive it best. Those with the Darwinian values of cruelty, selfishness, and hostility aren’t going to survive it at all. Who’s going to rebuild cities torn apart by fires and floods? Who’s going to care for those who flee? What will a “job” be then?

Societies like America have a grim, grim future precisely because their Darwinian values — let the weak perish, so the strong survive! — are going to produce more and more grotesque dystopias in an age of existential threats. By contrast, societies like New Zealand and Canada are far, far better prepared. They understand the mathematics of catastrophe: pay a little bit now, to stop the problem getting much worse, spinning out of control, later. Lock down now — prevent death from reaching American levels. Do the right thing — because the right thing is how we have more of a common good. There is more to go around for everyone when we mostly do the right thing, the good thing, the natural thing.

America, by contrast, has had its entire vision of good and bad, right and wrong, perverted. What’s good? What’s right? Greed, cruelty, aggression, enmity. You’ve got to be a killer. If you don’t display those values from a very young age, you’re written off as soft, weak, useless, a liability. Greed is good, selfishness is perfectly fair, and what’s good is me being ruthless in my pursuit of self-gratification, and indifferent to everything else. Americans might not agree with that, but the truth is that’s what they’re rewarded for, from school through college to the day they find a job to the day they die, because they never retire. Good guys don’t win in America. Trumps do.

These qualities that Jacinda displays so abundantly — compassion, warmth, wisdom, empathy, cooperation — what are they, really? They’re the precise opposite of patriarchy. Patrarichy: a system where men submit in order to the more violent one. Hierarchies of violence made of bands of brothers are formed this way. They carve up everything in society for their benefit — land, women, money. The brothers bond through and with violence.

Sound like America to you? It should. Think of the hazing ritual of the fraternity, like a gang beat-in. America’s one of the countries in the world never to have had a female leader — and also has worse female political representation than Pakistan. America is patriarchy writ large. The bands of brothers control everything, and they do extreme violence to maintain their grip — whether needless war, or making sure a whole country goes without decent healthcare.

The result, though, is what happens in patriarchies: the most violent, stupid, brutal, idiot rises to the top. That’s Donald Trump. Trump personifies the values of patriarchy. Everyone’s a commodity. The point of life is personal agin, acquisition. You keep your underlings in line with intimidation and threats — and that includes a whole society. Any level of brutality and violence — a hundred thousand dead — isn’t just acceptable, it’s desirable. How else do you prove how tough and indifferent you are?

You can have a democracy, or you can have a patriarchy, but you can’t have both. The results for Americans have been disastrous — mass death, economic ruin, social breakdown.

Jacinda’s values are different. If I say they’re “feminine,” I’ll get in trouble with the woke police. So let me just say that they’re…non-patriarchal. They’re human. Jacinda is that rarest of things. She is the last remaining humanist leader, perhaps, on planet earth. New Zealand is that rarest of nations, too. A wise and gentle place, seeking a better place in history. People mature and wise enough, perhaps, not to fall prey to the demagogue’s seductions and the strongman’s promises. And simply choose the best leader among them — no matter who she happens to be.

Let us all take a moment not just to idly admire all that. But to learn from it.

Umair
May 2020

[FairreLilette]

I think some people just give Trump too much power.  Power that he doesn't even have.  This is not all about Trump but people feed on every word, every word without even knowing the power he has or doesn't have.

However, I will say that the economic recovery started to take shape under the Obama Administration and the Trump Administration followed through with it.  

The Obama Administration needs some respect here too with Republicans.  Some of those banks were insolvent and had to go.  Now our banks, that I need (I'm going to speak for myself on this one), are bankrupt.

This is not all about Trump.  He has a whole team.  His power is not that vast.  

As far as suing the WHO, I think we should as a possibility.  But pay them?  Absolutely not.  But, Trump haters will think we should pay them just because Trump says not too.  

[Gatogateau]

'You are entitled to your opinion. But you are not entitled to your own facts.'—Daniel Moynihan

Concept.

Some real eye-rolling groaners in this thread, surprise, surprise. ETA: There really is no sense in trying to discuss this with people who have already made their minds up, regardless of facts—and yeah, that means listening to a guy who is not a doctor and has been reported many a time as not reading his briefings and . . . ETA2: To be on topic (also concept), as things are right now I'm not terribly worried about getting COVID. I'm isolating and will continue to do so for a long time if necessary. I'll continue to wear a mask, social distance. I don't need the government to tell me to take precautions. I *am* afraid of all the people who, because of their lack of common sense, are going to be in the second wave. I'm afraid for our economy. I am afraid, as in concerned, not afraid as freaking out.

Edited May 31, 2020 by Gatogateau

[kiramanell]

9 minutes ago, Gatogateau said:

'You are entitled to your opinion. But you are not entitled to your own facts.'—Daniel Moynihan

Concept.

Some real eye-rolling groaners in this thread, surprise, surprise. ETA: There really is no sense in trying to discuss this with people who have already made their minds up, regardless of facts—and yeah, that means listening to a guy who is not a doctor and has been reported many a time as not reading his briefings and . . .

 

LOL, that cat spinning picture is way more cute than the usual beating dead horse one ppl often post. 😍

And yeah, I should have quit at Marci.... err, Scylla's "*GROAN*"

Edited May 31, 2020 by kiramanell

[FairreLilette]

1 hour ago, Scylla Rhiadra said:

but a pretty strong argument can be made that a review of their response, and some much-needed reforms, would be a very good thing.

Even though I agree with most things Scylla has to say and she speaks truths while remaining seemingly impartial, I still cannot agree with payment while the WHO, makes reforms, Scylla.

I guess I can talk more clearly about it after I calm down.  I am one of the one's whom became very sick from this.  One cannot know what it is like unless you walk in the shoes of those whom have been really ill from this.  

The United States has it's own Centers for Disease Control and that is whom I'd prefer to listen too.  The WHO endangered my life and to ask for reforms and pay them is not really understanding those who are sick from this, imo.  

Sue them yes, pay them...no way.   Why should I pay someone who made me sick when they knew darn well?  

Edited May 31, 2020 by FairreLilette

[Lyssa Greymoon]

55 minutes ago, FairreLilette said:

A fact to you, but otherwise no.  If you want to pay for this WHO thing, you pay for it as that is about all I have to say about it.  I was already sick before the date WHO announced anything.  I think I should sue them, not pay them.

Indisputable facts that can be looked up by anyone. They were all widely reported. Can you do that or shall I get the receipts for you?

[FairreLilette]

3 minutes ago, Lyssa Greymoon said:

Indisputable facts that can be looked up by anyone. They were all widely reported. Can you do that or shall I get the receipts for you?

It doesn't matter Lyssa.  I and much of California and others were sick weeks before the WHO declared anything.  So, why should I care?  Do you want me to give those dates to a lawyer or something?  I'm sure lawyers already know (sarcasm).  

Edited May 31, 2020 by FairreLilette

[Luna Bliss]

33 minutes ago, FairreLilette said:

Trump haters

I agree that we are seeing partisan politics dominate some people to such a degree that little objectivity remains. When you hate someone then everything they do is wrong (unless you work very hard to overcome the bias that underlies hate). And when you like another a lot then it can sometimes be difficult to see their actions as faulty, or at the very least it's easy to make excuses for them (often because you've simply taken the time to understand them better).

But...just because people are shouting "orange man bad, orange man bad" does not mean the orange man isn't bad.  It can be very difficult to determine, looking from the outside, whether someone's statements (regarding criticism of Trump in this case) come from only hate vs coming from a person who has looked at the facts clearly and made an assessment (even while hating the person they disagree with).

Edited May 31, 2020 by Luna Bliss

[Luna Bliss]

32 minutes ago, FairreLilette said:

As far as suing the WHO, I think we should as a possibility.  But pay them?  Absolutely not.

I'll have to look at this more carefully...I don't know a whole lot about the WHO issue but did form an opinion early on that they made mistakes.

However, not using the resources they provide could be worse in the long run!  And  I don't like the general tendency of Trump, which is to wall off the US from the rest of the world, an unhealthy Nationalism.  We need boundaries, sure, but we need to cooperate as well...and Trump slants too far in one direction.

Edited May 31, 2020 by Luna Bliss

[Selene Gregoire]

oi...