Why does the media lie?
Generally, the media alters truth or outright lies to appease the public image of parties involved or to induce a current of emotion in the public in order to sway public action.
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Or just because fear sells papers, clickbait page views and ads revenue grows.
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Why does the media lie?
Because the people who control it dictate so. When you own a business, you call the shots. If you have an agenda you wish to push, control of the media provides a means to do so.
"Absolute power corrupts absolutely" -- Lord Acton
Not so. What Power (and/or Wealth) does is remove restraints. When the only control upon a man's actions is that imposed by himself, the morality of a man is laid bare. The trial of poverty is agonizing, yet that of wealth is much, much more perilous. Those who are steadfast in their goodness when all else opposes them are few and far between.
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The part that annoys me the most about the media is that its members position themselves as being infallible. The media is just a group of people; people lie, have opinions and biases, make mistakes and sometimes have over-inflated opinions of themselves. And in the political arena, their sources are people in politics who value the ability to lie and mislead. And yet the media's position is often that it is an infallible institution and should not be questioned, ever.
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This is nothing new. Deception of the American population has been going on since at least the 1940's. I remember Russian immigrants telling me back in the 1980's that the difference between Americans and Russians was that the Russians knew their media was lying to them. What has changed since then is that the media is bolder about lying to our faces, and additional avenues exist for the truth to leak out. Much as I hate people lying, I hate willful ignorance more. What good is being informed of the truth if you reject it on the basis that it is less palatable than the lie? Look at the entire "Trump conspired with Russia to steal the election" scam we have endured for almost four years as an example.
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But ... but ... the ends justify the means.
You joke, but there are many people who actually believe that lie. That is the root from which sprouts another platitude: "The road to Hell is paved with good intentions." Rather, good intention with evil action leads a person toward perdition. God judges mankind based upon both intention and action. In other words, "the means" is "the ends."
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I joke, but I think this is the way a significant proportion of the more visible and vocal media members think. They know better. And yet, similar to what you said, there are a lot of unintended consequences.
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"As I mentioned before, exposure to true information does not matter anymore. A person who was demoralized is unable to assess true information. The facts tell nothing to him. Even if I shower him with information, with authentic proof, with documents, with pictures; even if I take him by force to the Soviet Union and show him [a] concentration camp, he will refuse to believe it, until he [receives] a kick in his fan-bottom. When a military boot crashes his balls then he will understand. But not before that. That's the [tragedy] of the situation of demoralization." - quote from a pretty interesting guy
Consider watching this when you have an hour to spare
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Thanks for the video link. I already knew that stuff, but it was a nice reminder. Perhaps it is because I grew up during the Cold War, but these things are a habitual part of my day-to-day awareness.
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Yes, willful ignorance is the real root of anyone's ability to deceive others. Get enough people to believe what you're telling them by making it seem more palatable (EX, "us vs. them" rhetoric) even if it's blatantly untrue then they will spread your message for you. It's very easy to polarize people, and once that's done it's even easier to get them to follow you unquestioningly by making your "side" seem better than the other. People won't listen to anything you say if you're "the enemy", regardless of how logical it is, because whoever they've thrown in with tells them you're lying.
This isn't specific to politics either, the scary part is ANYONE can do it if they are a good enough orator or are charismatic enough. Just look at all the messed up cults out there.
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It is crazy how much bias there is and how many people don't see it but just subscribe to one narrative or another without trying to be sensible about each topic. It's especially odd when you see a contradiction or a clear double-standard applied from a media outlet on a particular issue.
At the end of the day, it seems to be more about money and viewer engagement regardless of how "healthy" or beneficial that is to society at large. At this point, the media feels more like a support service to stroke people based on their political worldviews rather than a source of objective information.
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Yeah, they really like to fight for their freedom (like of being shot in schools)
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Considering that mainstream media is largely bought and paid for by political interests that in turn shill for corporate interests, none of this is actually surprising. But the way that it has ramped up lately sure is cause for concern, if not alarm. Welcome to dystopia. (Yeah, I know, and I don't always agree with this guy, but the ring of truth is where you find it.)
These days, you have to look everywhere for news in order to uncover a few actual facts. Like these very interesting bits about Bill
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These days, you have to look everywhere for news in order to uncover a few actual facts. Like these very interesting bits about Bill
that was only an opinion, not really news
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Yes, of course. But there were links, to Barron's for instance. And if you wanted to pursue it you could find the stock chart for the Mexico Trust on Yahoo (I tried to link it but it was one of those monster links, but it's easy to find) and see how it's tanking in the days right before Gates, who has been pushing for a pandemic announcement from the WHO, makes a big fat donation to the WHO, and on the very next day, pandemic is proclaimed. The timeline speaks for itself - you may call that opinion or coincidence, and you might be right. The WT is a right wing rag that tends to spin the facts in the directions that they like best so I take it all with a grain of salt. But I do see a very wealthy man exerting undo influence with his money and a cynical opportunism at work behind all the philanthropy and posturing.
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The conspiracy theories about Bill Gates are completely out of control at the moment. If you believe everything anyone writes on the internet, he deliberately invented the virus and mixed it with a sterilization drug in order to decimate the population, and he can only be stopped with garlic in his mouth and a flock through his heart. ^^
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A flock of what, though? I am seriously confused. (j/k)
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Sorry, just a dumb non-native speaker here who used a completely wrong word. ^^ I meant stake.
(In German stake is "Pflock", that's probably where my confusion came from)
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It was a joke, I knew you meant stake. As a native speaker of English I've made much sillier mistakes! It was fun to imagine a flock of sheep or doves being used on a vampire though, so thank you! :)
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No conspiracy here. Just opportunism and conflicting interests.
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Yeah but no. Gates has warned for multiple years about the risk pandemics represent, with leaders doing little to prevent it. If they had done more and prepared better, we probably wouldn't have such severe lockdowns now and your "argument" of Bill Gates profiting from the crisis would fall apart.
And if the countries would do a better job to finance UN missions, they wouldn't be in the position to depend on donations from the Gates Foundation and others.
But somehow countries (and most of all the US) failing to do their job is a reason to blame Bill Gates, because he is aware of their failing, the resulting risks and because he is in the position to step in?
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Ben Swann has some good responses to these points, including the political motivations behind the Gates Foundation donations, vastly inaccurate predictions about the death rates, and Sweden's response by refusing to lock down.
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I had to leave that video after 35 seconds, as he managed to be too wrong to be acceptable by then already. I feel sorry for you if you consider his input valuable.
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Mock sympathy aside, what part of the video did you disagree with?
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There was no mocking. In recent years I've seen and witnessed more than enough. I've been upset and angry with your kind, I've done my fair share trying to argue and convince. But by now I gave up putting any time and effort into dialogues with people living in an entirely different reality, as it is a complete waste. I just feel sorry for you and that's it.
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For someone unwilling to entertain different viewpoints, you sure claim to know a lot about "my kind". Know that my intention is not to cause anger or distress, and I hope you will be in the mood to engage in open discourse in the future.
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You don't want open discourse though, you want to see how many people echo your sentiments.
Don't listen to the doctors and scientists, listen to the talking heads on youtube. You already have your mind made up, so where is the discourse when its all about being an edgelord.
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Many doctors and scientists are questioning both the way COVID-19 deaths are being reported, such as Scott Jensen, or the effectiveness of lockdowns, as with Dan Erickson and Artin Massihi. There are others that are fearful to speak similarly, out of concern for retribution from their employers.
Though initially like many others I believed the virus to be much more serious, as more information has come to light it now seems otherwise. I could be mistaken, but "being an edgelord" is not my intention and this sort of vitriol doesn't add anything productive.
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They can hypothesise behind closed doors until they have something suitably grounded in fact and proven to be reliable. Speaking publicly with juicy 'maybes' and lines of reasoning that haven't reached full conclusion, during a pandemic, where people are already stewing, would naturally be seen as a very bad move, and their respective bodies would censure just as sure as if those individuals had piped up with incomplete or faulty notions like the "African-americans don't feel pain as much as caucasians" thing, or the "fluoride in drinking water causes brain damage" thing, and the many other half-baked antivax-grade 'suppressed truths'. It's simply irresponsible to go public or broadcast incomplete hypothesis, and even where new data draws new conclusions, it's equally irresponsible to throw it into the public without first having the information properly tested and tempered so the less gifted with common sense don't pull the equivalent of running off to wash their hands in whole-ass bleach :P
Questioning and re-evaluating is exactly what is at the heart of identifying and safeguarding right now. Questioning is important, absolutely. However inciting the fidgeting masses with careless (and often inaccurate) nuggets is just a recipe for disaster. Armchair experts are not actually out there in the field for a reason, and that should be kept in mind when they build exponentially upon scraps of information while using confirmation bias and personal motivations as the cement between the sparse bricks.
I'm all for questioning the status quo, but the lockdown approach is hardly a profit machine for the big cogs in society. It should be equally important to question why exactly people are in such a hurry to risk a premature lift of such measures, rather than instead expending that effort upon demands to boost provisions for the populace out of work. The cross-nationality comparisons of what works and what doesn't work is also resulting in incomplete or false comparisons as it is nearly always steeped in confirmation bias and not looking at regional factors. Population density, temperature, environmental factors, habits among the local population, cultural modifiers in diet and activity, etc, that may have unseen influences on those statistics. Instead they nearly always draw conclusions based solely on the delay between death-rates and specific variants on isolation measures. Everyone is forecasting, projecting and claiming to have the cutting insight, yet do little in the way of acknowledging the sheer variety of unknowns.
The people who will surprise us with worthwhile insight won't be the newsmedia that follows popularity, politics and money, nor will it be random outsiders, talking heads or entertainment personas. It'll be people within the industry talking up the chain in channels out of sight to people who actually influence policy. And even then you can bet your ass that there will be several layers of caution and testing before they suggest any widespread scaling down of specific guards.
As for 'not being productive', your thread opener consisted of a heavy bias video and nothing else. It set a harsh tone, and offered nothing new or even any nuance for conversation or discussion. It simply gave a devoted thread to a stewing subject, by loudly voicing only the part of disatisfied. The frustration / impatience expressed Golwar and Antocapone is quite mild given the timebomb you left untended and unguided. Again, you posted a parody in another reply subthread that used an oft-parroted false comparison of car accidents VS a pandemic with what may easily have a contagious incubation period, and in another reply chain you asserted that the WHO is controlled by China for stepping cautiously along with the rest of the globe on Taiwan matters. So the act of being neutral and playing it only by facts after opening this pandoras box in such a manner, and then following it up as you have been? It's wearing thin. By all means, discuss the subject, but your pattern of engagement isn't pairing very well with the attitude that you haven't been provocative.
So if you actually want 'discourse', then it's not too late to edit your opening post to reshape this, and maybe start qualifying your claims with less 'weasel words' and more sources given the global nature and its highly politicised version of things in america. It's kind of a serious thing, so if you're going to challenge the safeguards (as imperfect as they may be) then you have to be dead certain and back it up heavily, or you're gambling your opinion against other peoples safety based only on the charisma of internet personalities and rich investors wanting their business machines fueled with warm bodies again. I mean, I had a brief google on who 'Scott Jensen' was following this post as an example, and he was previously quoted as saying that covid-19 would effectively be a mild four-day flu for most people? I mean, really? That demotes him from 'expert you should listen to above the established peer review' to 'just another person who is grasping at straws like the rest of us'.
If you want to change minds, you've got to put in the legwork. If not, and you drop provocative links and treat exhausted scoffing replies as just closeminded, then you're only likely entrenching people with the passing opinion that you're a tribal-media devouring goblin of sorts. Which is kinda funny given the title of the thread, and the subsequent sole link in the body text being an equivalent to "...and just believe everything I tell you instead" :P If you've got something you want to say, then by all means have a shot at actually saying it. Your blank thread opener is still awaiting, even if the chance at a strong first impression and honest engaging replies may have passed this time.
Ugh, this is why I only skim-read before. I knew if I paid attention I'd dump a whole grumpy batch of word spaghetti on someone.
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I think you underestimate the people's capacity for rational thought and making decisions about their own wellbeing, but I still appreciate your response.
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Making decisions about their own well being, like not getting their kids vaccinated? What about all the obesity?
I really don't get the disconnect. You feel you know better than doctors and scientists, and because you feel you do know better that gives you the right to endanger others in your community? For what purpose? To get a haircut?
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Conspiracy mongering doesn't add anything productive.
I am sure we both can scrape up people to represent fringe ideals but adopting them as the point of reference and portraying it as the mainstream is disingenuous at best.
"Many doctors and scientists"- yea right. Probably same percentage that deny climate change or link vaccines to autism. To me it sounds like you are getting all your information from a Youtube algorithm. You name 3 people, doctors I suppose, who disagree with thousands and thousands of doctors and scientists from many countries.
I'm in NY. It's pretty bad here. It's not the Spanish Flu, and it does seem to be lower than the 3.4% mortality rate that they initially thought. The anti-body tests here showed NYers had about 5-20% of people with anti-bodies which would suggest a mortality rate of .5%, which is still high enough to overwhelm the medical systems if there was nothing being done to stop the spread. Even if it's .5% mortality rate, the US medical system has one of the lowest hospital bed per capita ratios in the world. All the beds would easily fill without counter measures, most hospitals here were already well above 90% capacity just from the flu this year, and COVID seems to be about 5 times more deadly than the flu, so do the math.
I have 2 direct family members who are medical workers and they are dismayed at the sort of conspiracy crap they see on social media. 60,000 people die in a single month in this country but let's ignore 99% of doctors and scientists and look for the 1% of bought and paid 'doctors' that will help people sleep better at night and allow them to go out and get freedom haircuts because that is what America is all about.
It is downright disrespectful to all these people who are risking their health and that of their families to have a bunch of internet sleuths with their Youtube PHDs come in and call safety measures designed to protect them and the people they care about mere conspiracies.
You want answers? Go ask your local ER doctors what they think. Feel free to come to NY and volunteer at one of the hospitals, if you don't think it's that serious.
I really don't understand why people keep making this a political issue, when it is a health issue. This isn't about freedom, your Rights End when they Infringe on the Rights of Another. You can't put your community in danger, no one has the right to that.
Look up the case of Jacobson v Massachusetts. The guy wanted to refuse a smallpox vaccine and the Supreme Court ruled in favor of the state, stating that “a community has the right to protect itself against an epidemic of disease which threatens the safety of its members.”
People that dismiss a pandemic don't do so at their own risk, they do it at the risk of the entire community. It is dangerous, and potentially deadly. Most of these people won't realize their folly until it hits close to home and that is really sad.
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I live in Sweden and I can tell you that's complete and utter bullshit. Sweden has ridiculously high death-rates compared to our neighboring countries (3-4x more)... and that's even with our horrendously bad statistics the government are providing.
The number of cases is "low" in Sweden because we don't do a whole lot of testing to begin with and haven't since this thing began. Not to mention that they are kind of fuzzy with what exactly they count as a Covid-19 death as well. Our statistics are so skewed it's ridiculous. Other countries automatically count any patient who has the virus and dies as a Covid-19 death, and Sweden does not... for whatever reason. Underlying diseases can still count as a cause of death despite the virus being present.
They also did absolutely NOTHING to protect the elderly. Essentially every single retirement home has had cases in Sweden, something that apparently seems to be fine with the government. I guess since it means they have to pay out less pensions for those people, and less money to the caregivers, for the them it's a win-win. They took zero preventative measures to protect them. It's absolutely disgusting.
To see US people use Sweden as some kind of example of doing things right is just appalling. The Swedish authorities didn't do shit about this and we are, and will continue to be, paying for it with lives.
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Yeah, I don't always agree with Tucker either but he is right on here. Crazy how Youtube is censoring any videos that question the WHO directives, even though they have been repeatedly wrong and are pretty much controlled by China.
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...and are pretty much controlled by China.
Like, do you have the slightest clue how hilarious that claim is?
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Anyone who doesn't believe that the WHO panders to China, only needs to ask Taiwan.
https://www.cfr.org/in-brief/why-does-who-exclude-taiwan
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Do you have a clue how irrelevant that is? Taiwan is excluded from pretty much any international organization, even the most irrelevant ones.
And only about 15 nations maintain formal diplomatic relations with Taiwan. Is China to blame for that? Yes.
But the WHO isn't pandering more to China because of that, than 90% of all nations and 99.99% of all organizations.
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It's very relevant. You don't seem to have read that one, so maybe this one?
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-health-coronavirus-taiwan/taiwan-who-spar-again-over-coronavirus-information-sharing-idUSKCN21T0BA
And tell me again who is responsible for all this death, chaos and privation, that might have been contained if certain parties had acted earlier and with more transparency. Actually, please do not tell me, if you can't discuss this with a little more courtesy and less combativeness.
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First of all this report is as irrelevant. Taiwan didn't receive a reply if human to human transmission is possible, by 31. December.
Probably because China only announced by 20. January that such a transmission might be likely, it was confirmed by 26. January. Scientists tend to only share "facts" if they have evidence that support these. And I don't expect the WHO to be acquainted with time travels.
That China acted irresponsible is undoubtedly true, they tried to deny, hide and downplay the crisis.
The problem is: So did Trump and others.
And contrary to China they weren't taken by complete surprise by a virus with 100% unknown characteristics. Contrary to what Trump and others claim, we knew pretty much what was coming at least by the end of February. Sure, point your finger on China. I'm upset about their first reactions too. But others acted just as ignorant and dangerously foolish. If not even more so.
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You will get no argument from me regarding my country's response to the pandemic. It's been abysmal, and continues to be. They tell the populace to stay home (which I do not disagree with btw) but do not give them the means to do so. Instead, our legislature has given a 3 trillion dollar slush fund to corporations, while throwing the scraps to small business and the working class. Wall street is booming now, while we have Depression era unemployment, people can't pay rent and are standing on breadlines. Civil unrest is growing here and may boil over soon - their solution: reopen the country and leave us all vulnerable to a second wave, rather than giving us what we need in order to stay home.
I don't entirely follow your argument about Taiwan. Maybe it's a language thing. They couched their message to the WHO in terms that any virologist with a working frontal lobe could read as alarm over SARS-like symptoms with multiple patients under isolation and study - i.e. suggesting an unknown disease with human transmission. When they received no reply from either China or the WHO, Taiwan went into immediate lockdown. It was smart, they were right, and now have survived it all with minimal damage. So if they are not in the WHO, they really should be. And the WHO should have paid better attention at the time - they failed us all. We may have to disagree on this though, as nothing has proved to be more dangerous and foolish than China's initial response. Studies and models suggest that China could have achieved 95% containment, had they acted sooner, in which case, we wouldn't even be having this conversation now.
Fwiw, I don't hate Bill Gates. He's done wonderful things to address child mortality around the world. And who knows, maybe he'll take the money he makes off that Mexico fund and put it right back into his charities. Of course, in times like these, when our governments let us down, none of us can afford to look a gift horse in the mouth. But, I don't have to like the idea of living or dying off the largesse of billionaires. And the way to accomplish that is to not have governments who cater to plutocracy and help create those billionaires in the first place. People love to focus on Trump, but really, he's not the disease, he's just the symptom. But that's a whole other discussion.
Thank you for your courteous reply.
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My problem with the Taiwan topic is that they are smart and use it as a leverage against their international isolation. I don't blame them, I'd probably do the same in their situation. But some critics in the West exaggerate the relevance of Taiwan greatly, usually to deflect their own failings.
Agreed, Taiwan did a great job with this crisis. They had the experience with other epidemics originating from China. And I generally wouldn't want to see them banned of any international organization.
But regarding COVID-19 Taiwan would have been pretty much irrelevant for how this pandemic developed in the West either way. Be it South Korea or Singapore, there are several WHO members who reacted quickly in a similar way as Taiwan, with success. All this happened before the virus reached the West in greater numbers and yet we acted the way we did.
My trouble about condemning the WHO is that there is rarely anyone considering their situation. They depend on the cooperation of nations. They can't force countries to open up for their own investigations. They can't force countries to initiate appropriate measures to combat the crisis. I am pretty sure that the WHO did the best they could, their failure to achieve more ultimately is the result of the heavyweights, be it China or the US, playing games and being concerned about their reputation instead of everything else that actually mattered.
Ultimately I do trust the verdict of our specialists. In case of Germany that are Drosten, the Robert Koch institute and others. They erred often enough too, but they managed to explain their reasons logically at every single step and phase. And why shouldn't I admit scientists a learning process? Same applies for the WHO.
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Not sure the WHO has done the best it can. I, for one, think it is good that the US is calling out the WHO's bullshit. I do trust that in the grand scheme the WHO generally has good intentions, but I think the general blind adoration and trust for it is naive. This isn't some small NGO where people are sacrificing to make a difference. This is a very wealthy political organization with huge budgets that is subject to corruption, and needs to go through periodic corrections. That's just par for the course.
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While the WHO isn't a NGO, it also isn't a political organization.
And while there is also always the danger of corruption where money is, nobody capable of reason would cut WHO funding DURING a pandemic and BEFORE the investigation even began.
There is only one group who might want to do that: Those in dire need of a scapegoat, with some symbolic harsh reaction. And the fools who it attempts to address, applaud.
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WHO is under the UN. It is very much a political organization. From the standpoint that actions speak, you can see its treatment of Taiwan as clear evidence of this.
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Well, the budget of the WHO was 4.4 billion USD last year. IMHO that´s pretty low for such an organization.
For comparison (yes, not comparable, I know), the US military budget was 693 billion USD, net profit of Apple was 55.3 billion USD, Johns Hopkins University budget is much higher than that of the WHO...
USA paid 400 million to the WHO last year... as they are not paying now, China´s money is getting even more important -> no chance for Taiwan (well, as before).
Contributions from countries stayed the same since 1993, so now 3/4 of the money is coming from donations... and the donors can determine what their money is used for.
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I would be interested to see how the money is actually allocated. I read some appalling figures as far as how much is being spent on travel and first class flights, though to be fair I also didn't see any sources cited. But if you strip out frivolous spending and misappropriation of funds (or do we consider this a cost of doing business?), how much does the WHO really need to coordinate activities and share information?
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Wait, I thought the WHO is controlled by Bill Gates? Now it's China?! Well, which is it? xD
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His life work currently is literally eradicating various diseases. I mean, opinion pieces are interesting, absolutely, but the fact you take this as gospel while also going against your own narrative in the same comment...?
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"Facts" Of course it's some conspiracy nut thinking his dogshit fanfiction is facts. Bill made my frogs gay.
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Wow. That's a lot of effort for a video trying to kill more people.
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https://www.thoughtco.com/oversimplification-and-exaggeration-fallacies-3968441
And still they want to kill more people. It's more sad than funny
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This is a parody video making fun of fearmongering hyperbole. Since you posted a link related to exaggeration and oversimplification, maybe you could elaborate on your original comment?
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Parody that is too close to the source can easily become indistinguishable from a genuine article. You shouldn't be surprised when it is mistaken as such.
Without proper seperation it doesn't just lose comedic value, but it also ends up serving almost the same social role too (serving both tribes in their idealogues). Hence why there are a lot of 'schrodingers assholes' where a person is either serious or 'just joking' depending on the reception they recieved. It's a bitter subject and 'parody' that flies in this kind of pattern isn't going to land like just sardonic humour for many.
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Ah, I was referencing the second video I posted by Remy, but I can see I wasn't clear. I wasn't trying to pull the "it was just a joke bro" defense; despite being humor I agree with the points made in both videos.
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I suppose that's what I get for not paying more attention to the subcomment thread, heh. The link in the OP set a certain bitter tone so I had skimmed rather than fully engage and find my mood plummeting, and ended up missing out that vital detail :P
I did just now click through to the parody actually intended, and I barely got into it before finding it similarly off-colour. While it is a parody about 'fearmongering hyperbole', it only parodies the 'fearmongering hyperbole' that fits a certain current narrative and even uses an often parroted false comparison as its main pivot. It comes across as less of a mere harmless parody and more of an tribal strawman dressed up as amusement. Comboing that with the link in the opening post, and claims that WHO are 'controlled by China'? Yeah. Hard pass.
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it's just like there exists laws on these topics already.
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Kinda like opening a discussion about a free game just to learn that the link is broken or there are no more keys available
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People need to stop getting their news from Social Media and Youtube.
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I swear, a man named Adolf Hitler could pop up today, start the Nazi party and do everything the same way again and people would still support him and say we shouldn't go to war with him.
Be skeptical, sure. But also, how many plagues with evidence of social distancing working amazingly well do we need to realize that perhaps staying at home watching Netflix is worth it so medical systems don't collapse and the elderly won't die.
But the real question is this... Who benefits from people staying inside?
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I swear, a man named Adolf Hitler could pop up today, start the Nazi party and do everything the same way again and people would still support him and say we shouldn't go to war with him.
People are still people. The details change, but the patterns of behavior remain the same.
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Got to love that permanent war mentality to distract from domestic problems.( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)
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Sadly, not only I agree with the idea that a new Hitler could happen at any time, I think that at this point we wouldn't even be surprised. The general reaction would be something like "yeah, apocalypse was taking its sweet time, for when the fire rain tho?".
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Thank you. The last line is what people don't understand. Nobody 'gains' anything from a lockdown. Sadly people will want to believe that there isn't a valid reason for all those measures and just 'want to do what I want!'. But hey, one day this will be over and people being dickheads for the sake of it will not cost lives. One day...
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in Germany we open up again now and because we didn't had that many deaths there are some people who say: told you, it was not that bad so the whole lockdown was not needed anyway...
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Optimism is good, but you're praising cars not crashing when cars aren't driving since steering wheels are getting fixed.
Not only has the curve already been partially flattened, meaning to an extent the issue's been suppressed a lot. But also, that's not how Corona works. Open up fully, give it two weeks and let's see what happens. Plus, no reason to forget that you had a lockdown since the 22nd. Not the 22nd of April, but March.
But it'll be the same way as per usual. People will blame you for not reacting if shit goes bad. But if you do all you can and do everything even perfectly, people will blame you for overreacting. There's no fanfare for a stopped catastrophy since most people don't even realize one's looming.
We shouldn't be massive pessimists. Just that we should not forget that measures were implemented. The curve's literally been noticed already.
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Braindead right wingers would eat their own shit if MUH FAKE NEWZ MEDIA would tell them eating your own shit is bad.
Owning the libs is the only reason they get out of bed.
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All squares are rectangles, but not all rectangles are squares.
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Media? Hahaha.
The last time i watched TV was like 15 years ago.
This statement says two things. One, you find the consumption of news media laughable. Two, that by refraining from watching TV for 15 years, you have successfully avoided said media's influence.
I was simply pointing out the fallacy of the second point. Which you then confirmed by explaining that yes, TV is a category of media, but certainly not its whole. I affirmed the same point-- not all rectangles are squares, just as not all media is TV.
You're being needlessly pissy when I wasn't even insulting you.
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"Just marveling at how some people can be a stick up every ass"
Well, their tone was a bit backhanded, but I think it's still an important distinction.
Not watching TV doesn't free you from the ever-present political spin that invades a ton of medium. This whole thread happened because someone seemingly pitted the (somewhat reliable) notion of 'newsmedia always lies' against the blind-spot of 'charismatic ranting non-newsmedia personalities shouldnt be given the same scrutiny'.
We're in an age right now where 'fake news' is a popularised idea, where any information that is inconvenient or in disagreement with yourself can simply be ignored by waving your hands and uttering those magic words. Sorta like how previous politicians can absolve themselves of any responsibility, no matter how grave, by waving their hands and saying "I misspoke".
And you are most definitely being pissy in the return-fire ;P
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"Convincing you people otherwise is a waste of time, for once you have decided that the other party is; "insert here whatever" it's done deal."
The hypocrisy in this line is bizarre to the point I had to pause and wonder if was a shot at humour?
You branded me both an 'enemy' tribesman, and asserted I am utterly deaf I am to dissent, all because I acknowledged your tone the same as I acknowledged your previous opponents (that is : mildly)? In your eagerness to parrot the tried-and-true accusation that the other person is unable to be convinced due to closemindedness, you forgot that the subject matter didn't even have anything that required 'convincing'. I mean, what, do you think I'm somehow disagreeing and suggesting you have been watching TV all these years? :P
I mean, this is kinda the whole 'fake news' magic hand-waving mentality thing I was talking about.
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... it's almost like you got information from an outlet/tool just there :D
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Perhaps, just perhaps, some industries should not be dictated by profit.
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(sad laugh) If only...
Unfortunately, mankind is largely motivated by self-interest, so that remains a dream.
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Sadly, once business have their talons latched onto something, peeling them back and returning something to the public domain seems to be nigh-impossible.
Here in the UK, our ongoing disbelief at repeatedly hearing the words "Reducing the number of staff / beds" over the years has finally bit us in the ass, all thanks to executive decisions based on self-interested budget matters. Not even healthcare as a right avoids the blowback effects of the faceless business machine. I have no idea how the hell a place like america is surviving while their medical system is not only driven wholesale as a business, but one with bizarrely inflated charges.
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My opinion about this has stayed the same from the start of this mess, the economy can be fixed later but you can't fix death. Fighting for "freedom" as in the freedom to go out and die or spread death is pretty dumb.
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Except the economy is linked with quality of life.
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It's hard to talk about quality of life with... you know... no life
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Unfortunately, life is more nuanced and people are committing suicide due to having their quality of life being lowered. If it didn't happen to you, does not mean it is not happening. Stay safe!
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You can't save all lives, and you do need a functioning economy, otherwise your downstream issues may be even worse. It's complex, and I applaud the politicians that are at least trying to get that balance right.
The easiest thing for a politician right now is to shut everything down the name of saving preventing any deaths, which is impossible but makes for heroic PR, then leave behind an effed up economy people generations to have have to deal with.
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I applaud you for stepping forward and making a point towards a narrative different from that mainstream media is trying to sell to us.
I have done a lot of research and been watching and hearing all kinds of information during the course of what is happening in the whole world (!) at this time and I find the results alarming. I find it even more alarming how many people actually buy into consensual mainstream narratives without researching for their own, denying facts or refusing to even look at them because they don't align with their narrative of choice - as could be seen in this very thread.
Your video simply nailed it. Thank you :)
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I find it even more alarming how many people actually buy into consensual non-mainstream narratives without researching for their own, denying facts or refusing to even look at them because they don't align with their narrative of choice - as could be seen in this very thread.
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I don't disagree with you. I would just add that some of it stems from the decreasing trust in a media figures who are too self-important and in a rush to post first, full knowledge of the facts be damned. So people start turning to alternate sources.
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I don't have a problem with using alternate sources, if they at least have some creditability.
I don't disagree that mainstream media (whatever that is) should also be reviewed, but sadly a lot just ignore mainstream completely and believe everything non-Mainstream without given it a second look
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Again, very much agree. It's just unfortunate that to get clean news, people have to go to multiple sources and try to piece things together and filter things out themselves. Would love a news organization that just reports the facts. Sadly, that probably doesn't generate enough sensationalism ... or the news organizations think people are stupid and thus have to explain through editorial commentary / talking heads.
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It's the age of narcissism and anti intellectualism on overdrive. People buy into cult of personalities on YT more then actual scientists because internet hucksters are not challenging and will confirm whatever narrative that pleases you.
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They didn't make any point. They bowled a grenade into an empty thread opener like someone might throw a grenade into an adjacent room. :P
Happily devouring anything that non-mainstream media says without properly scrutinising or considering the context / source of their data, isn't just no better than 'buying into mainstream media', it's a gamble with worse odds, as there is little to no involvement of peer review, and the confirmation bias present in even the base data gathering leaves far less room for entertaining alternative conclusions. Dissent and discourse are important, absolutely! But to present incomplete or unproven hypotheticals as truth to be acted upon without a grounded course of action is irresponsible at best. And when lacking a strong, grounded case and alternate course of action, appealing to the public with little more than mockery of the current efforts to spur discontent fuelled by strawmen, data with incomplete context, and relying on the audiences lack of familiarity with the subject? It's a tiny step away from antivax 'rationality', if there is indeed any seperation at all. It is not a lucid way to progress through any topic, much less one factoring fatalities and immediate contagion.
Given the OP has chosen almost entirely to not engage the criticism and counterpoints, perhaps you will in their stead? What exactly is the hidden data and unspoken conclusions you feel are outweighing the currently accepted rationale / action plan? Why do you feel they outweigh the current majority of our (global) medical professionals and what do you feel it suggests we do differently? While holding doubt of anything the mainstream media says is natural, what particular part of their covid-19 coverage have you found to be abjectly false?
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The guy supplied zero sources if he even has any. Please do not trust him just because he has a million youtube subscribers.
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Beautiful
- Let's ignore the quarantine is supposed to slow down the spread of the virus to not destroy the national health system, let's just forget that, and replace that with low quality irony.
- Let's say that MUH OPINION AND FREEDOM > people that studied this shit their whole life, if someone says that your "opinion on how a pandemic should be handled" based on a 10 min read on bumbitybobidymedicalfacts.com may be stupid you are literally Hitler
- IT'S-JUST-A-FLU.MP3 ahaha if you get shot in the head while having covid you are counted as a corona victim hahah ! let's just ignore that in most hit regions of Italy the death rate in march 2020 compared to last years is +500% PURE COINCIDENCE 😎
- Hopefully that's not an easy way to get views on youtube and money, hopefully when he needs a doctor he uses wikipedia to heal on his own, hopefully he designed his house without an architect, because who knows better, experts and people who studied are conspiring with lizardmens and Bill Gates
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Yep. So many people literally get their information and 'facts' from Youtube, the place where anyone can post a video about anything.
Forget credentials we live in an era of personalities.
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Amazing how people apply certain quotes like "bruh if you believe in the majority opinion you're probably wrong" to every possible situation, forgetting that we're talking here about a vast majority of opinions of scientists. You know, the specialists? The people who actually studied this topic? But no, let's trust random youtubers.
By the way, constitutional rights are not absolute. We're talking about the right of freedom vs the right to public health. You can't just evoke your right to go out and put public health in danger.
About the media being biased, I acknowledge that. We shouldn't blindly trust the media, it's important to debate and question stuff. Thing is, we do should trust specialists, and the majority of them say that it's important to take these precautions.
When the dead people stop being numbers and start becoming names of close friends and relatives, maybe people will stop posting these cringe irony videos on youtube.
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Thats the thing, once these edgelords actually know someone who is sick with it, someone who passed away, then they will change their tune; but by then it's too fucking late.
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Once you get to know the world better, you will start to realize that "absurdity is reality."
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My take on this is that to take everything - including but not limited to: large-stream media, small-stream media, governments, THIS THREAD, YouTube videos, rumors, etc. with a HUGE grain of salt. But it's almost impossible for a human being to not be biased, and you WILL eventually be swayed to one side of the discussion, that side might not be 'true', or 'correct' using our logic, so it would be best to not be 100% sure that 'this is certainly correct, it's what I'm told since I was born', etc etc, and keep an open mind to different sides of the discussion as well, it might not be 'correct' using your logic but might very much be 'true'.
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From what ive seen the "left" uses statistics and facts to guide the nation for solutions to this problem, while the "right" just uses their feelings which is kind of weird or maybe its not.
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Statistics and facts are apparently biased and faek newz when they undermine right wing politics.
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Last week was a very, very good week. For a change.
Media faces 'Extinction Level Event'
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So you dont want to follow governments orders? And instead you wish to do what you want and if there are consequences then face the consequences and learn from them?
Oh good thing the consequences of your actions are not only possibly your own death but hundreds or thousands of others that you infect. But hey! atleast we learned from our mistakes even if it costs hundred of thousands of lives, we even got to keep our freedom to get haircuts!
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Wow. Simon Pegg has grow such a hair on the quarantine.
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Awaken With JP
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