"Let me be clear: I think the COVID-19 vaccines are a miracle and pulling back on policing during a historic surge in shootings and homicides is a terrible idea. But I don’t wish any harm on people who disagree with me about these topics, or who make decisions they honestly think are best for themselves and their communities."
Those topics are not the same. Unlike crime, when we can see the victims, the people who refuse to vaccinate infect countless others invisibly. Their decisions don't affect only themselves but people like my immunocompromised sister, children, and anyone who has the misfortune to have a heart attack when all the ICU beds are filled because of their selfishness and stupidity.
Feeling schadenfreude is a "better" emotion than utter contempt and hate. The talk show hosts who died after convincing their followers not to vaccinate deserved their fates. Actions have consequences and I refuse to feel shamed by you or anyone telling me I have to "understand" antisocial, selfish utterly stupid behavior.
If one were to back up a few years, one might find far more patience and sympathy with ‘the other side.’ Sure, schadenfreude has been with us forever. But starting this narrative at COVID-19 deniers allows a glossing over of years of setting-the-scene.
A great deal of anger and contempt has been directed at people who have yet to be vaccinated for Covid, and such people are now harried by vaccination mandates from schools and employers, including a sweeping requirement for Federal employees and those working for private companies pursuant to contracts with the Federal government. AFAIK, none of the mandates and few, if any, of the haters make any exception for people who have recovered from Covid infection.
But according to an op-ed by a Johns Hopkins Med School prof published two days ago in the Wall Street Journal, a rigorous study conducted in Israel with a sample group of more than 700,000 people found that the incidence of symptomatic Covid infection in unvaccinated people who had recovered from previous Covid infection was 27 times less(!) than among those who'd been fully vaccinated for Covid but had not previously been infected. The author excoriates the CDC for failing to conduct similar research and publish the results without spin or cherry-picking.
I use “M.” like the French do, for Monsieur but ALSO for Mesdames and Mademoiselle EQUALLY. ALL CAPS are ITALICS. :)
TY (thank You) M. Jilani. Contrary to M. Scott, I'm thankful to have a character flaw pointed out to me. Excuse is that I only think the things, but still... *I* know is, I guess, the point.
I don't get around as much as I'd like to but, ON BALANCE (italics), wouldn't it be the Leftists who are more prone to this disability? If so, I'd relate it to the moral superiority they falsely give themselves.
To those interested, there's a nationwide group that hopes to bridge the gap between Dems and Repubs. https://braverangels.org/ Aim is for each to just see each other as fellow human beings capable of TALKING, if not agreeing.
TYTY again, for this wonderful essay, M. Jilani! :) = 😊
Zaid, I appreciate what you're saying here, and I agree that we walk a fine line when we air these stories. But do you not see any potential value to making people aware of how stubborn political ideologies can have life-threatening consequences? In several of these reports about deaths among the vaccine-resistant, the articles have also highlighted how, among the victim's final words were warnings to their friends and family (and presumably anyone else whom the message might reach) that they regretted their decision not to get vaccinated. I find this especially poignant in the case of political firebrands who vociferously promoted anti-vaccination ideology or downplayed COVID; for their regular listeners to be made aware by friends and family that their dying sentiments were that people should take the disease more seriously and get vaccinated, this has the potential to change some people's minds.
Maybe I'm being naive. Maybe most people are dug in on this issue and aren't going to be swayed by these stories. But I have to believe it's worth trying. Bad ideas are supposed to die because they fail - so one way or another, people have to be made aware that refusing to get vaccinated is a decision that entails far more risk to one's health than taking the vaccine. And while I agree that general statistics on COVID deaths should be enough to establish this, the unfortunate thing is that human beings often tend to be unmoved by such arguments even when they *aren't* skeptical of the veracity of the statistics in the first place. Sometimes, very human stories like this, where an individual with whom the reader identifies on a personal level suffers a tragic fate as a result of misconceptions that they share with the reader, powerful lessons can be imparted in ways where dry analyses fail. Even though it's anecdotal, for better or worse, people respond to anecdotal evidence - much like the almost purely anecdotal "evidence" that fuels vaccine skepticism in the first place.
So I would ask you - is there any way that you feel these articles could be presented in a way that more suits (what I would assume is) their purpose? Do you feel writers are giving cues as subtle (or even overt) "permission" to engage in schadenfreude? Or do you think that this is just an inevitable consequence of even presenting these stories in the first place? Most articles that I read on this honestly don't feel to me like they're crossing a line, but maybe that's just me. Surely though, there must be *some* way to present these stories as compassionate warnings rather than I-told-you-so grave dancing, no?
"Let me be clear: I think the COVID-19 vaccines are a miracle and pulling back on policing during a historic surge in shootings and homicides is a terrible idea. But I don’t wish any harm on people who disagree with me about these topics, or who make decisions they honestly think are best for themselves and their communities."
Those topics are not the same. Unlike crime, when we can see the victims, the people who refuse to vaccinate infect countless others invisibly. Their decisions don't affect only themselves but people like my immunocompromised sister, children, and anyone who has the misfortune to have a heart attack when all the ICU beds are filled because of their selfishness and stupidity.
Feeling schadenfreude is a "better" emotion than utter contempt and hate. The talk show hosts who died after convincing their followers not to vaccinate deserved their fates. Actions have consequences and I refuse to feel shamed by you or anyone telling me I have to "understand" antisocial, selfish utterly stupid behavior.
If one were to back up a few years, one might find far more patience and sympathy with ‘the other side.’ Sure, schadenfreude has been with us forever. But starting this narrative at COVID-19 deniers allows a glossing over of years of setting-the-scene.
A great deal of anger and contempt has been directed at people who have yet to be vaccinated for Covid, and such people are now harried by vaccination mandates from schools and employers, including a sweeping requirement for Federal employees and those working for private companies pursuant to contracts with the Federal government. AFAIK, none of the mandates and few, if any, of the haters make any exception for people who have recovered from Covid infection.
But according to an op-ed by a Johns Hopkins Med School prof published two days ago in the Wall Street Journal, a rigorous study conducted in Israel with a sample group of more than 700,000 people found that the incidence of symptomatic Covid infection in unvaccinated people who had recovered from previous Covid infection was 27 times less(!) than among those who'd been fully vaccinated for Covid but had not previously been infected. The author excoriates the CDC for failing to conduct similar research and publish the results without spin or cherry-picking.
Here's a link to the op-ed, but if you're not a paying WSJ subscriber you may be blocked from seeing the entire text: https://www.wsj.com/articles/covid-19-coronavirus-breakthrough-vaccine-natural-immunity-cdc-fauci-biden-failure-11631548306?mod=searchresults_pos1&page=1
I use “M.” like the French do, for Monsieur but ALSO for Mesdames and Mademoiselle EQUALLY. ALL CAPS are ITALICS. :)
TY (thank You) M. Jilani. Contrary to M. Scott, I'm thankful to have a character flaw pointed out to me. Excuse is that I only think the things, but still... *I* know is, I guess, the point.
I don't get around as much as I'd like to but, ON BALANCE (italics), wouldn't it be the Leftists who are more prone to this disability? If so, I'd relate it to the moral superiority they falsely give themselves.
To those interested, there's a nationwide group that hopes to bridge the gap between Dems and Repubs. https://braverangels.org/ Aim is for each to just see each other as fellow human beings capable of TALKING, if not agreeing.
TYTY again, for this wonderful essay, M. Jilani! :) = 😊
Zaid, I appreciate what you're saying here, and I agree that we walk a fine line when we air these stories. But do you not see any potential value to making people aware of how stubborn political ideologies can have life-threatening consequences? In several of these reports about deaths among the vaccine-resistant, the articles have also highlighted how, among the victim's final words were warnings to their friends and family (and presumably anyone else whom the message might reach) that they regretted their decision not to get vaccinated. I find this especially poignant in the case of political firebrands who vociferously promoted anti-vaccination ideology or downplayed COVID; for their regular listeners to be made aware by friends and family that their dying sentiments were that people should take the disease more seriously and get vaccinated, this has the potential to change some people's minds.
Maybe I'm being naive. Maybe most people are dug in on this issue and aren't going to be swayed by these stories. But I have to believe it's worth trying. Bad ideas are supposed to die because they fail - so one way or another, people have to be made aware that refusing to get vaccinated is a decision that entails far more risk to one's health than taking the vaccine. And while I agree that general statistics on COVID deaths should be enough to establish this, the unfortunate thing is that human beings often tend to be unmoved by such arguments even when they *aren't* skeptical of the veracity of the statistics in the first place. Sometimes, very human stories like this, where an individual with whom the reader identifies on a personal level suffers a tragic fate as a result of misconceptions that they share with the reader, powerful lessons can be imparted in ways where dry analyses fail. Even though it's anecdotal, for better or worse, people respond to anecdotal evidence - much like the almost purely anecdotal "evidence" that fuels vaccine skepticism in the first place.
So I would ask you - is there any way that you feel these articles could be presented in a way that more suits (what I would assume is) their purpose? Do you feel writers are giving cues as subtle (or even overt) "permission" to engage in schadenfreude? Or do you think that this is just an inevitable consequence of even presenting these stories in the first place? Most articles that I read on this honestly don't feel to me like they're crossing a line, but maybe that's just me. Surely though, there must be *some* way to present these stories as compassionate warnings rather than I-told-you-so grave dancing, no?