> Don’t use govt control to suppress speech on social media. It’s not conducive to any sort of trust building
The federal government lied about masks. Local governments lied about lockdowns. Nobody lied about vaccines.
The folks who can’t be fucked to not get and spread measles weren’t tipped over the edge by the mask lies because they’re the same folks who wouldn’t follow a mask mandate.
When Trudeau said "[t]he best vaccine for you to take is the very first one that is offered to you," they were aware of the potential threats that AstraZeneca posed, and yet, it took about 15 more days before the government suspended its use. He was well aware of the risks he was taking by telling everyone it was safe, and yet, did it anyways (the fact that he even said such a thing indicates as much).
What were these "lies"? Lying requires an intent to deceive. You can be wrong about something without lying about it. During the early days of COVID, there was little information about the effectiveness of anything, and governments may have hastily made statements without yet having all the facts, but that's very different than intentionally deceiving.
> What were these "lies"? Lying requires an intent to deceive
“In early 2020, Fauci and other public health officials advised against mask use by the general public, citing both doubts about efficacy and a need to preserve limited supplies for healthcare workers” [1]. That second part brings it close to a lie. (There was no need to advise against mask use.)
America fucked up thrice: the mask misinformation in March, talking down the lab-release hypothesis (which would have motivated right-wing nutters into being less selfish), and not regulating local jurisdictions who took specific measures (e.g. no public outdoor gatherings in San Francisco, or vaccine mandates in open-air venues in New York).
Otherwise, we did pretty well. And I’m sceptical someone willing to put their family and community at risk would see things differently if any of the above changed.
> In early 2020, Fauci and other public health officials advised against mask use by the general public, citing both doubts about efficacy and a need to preserve limited supplies for healthcare workers”
Huge stretch to consider this intent to deceive. This is as much of a lie as imposing rations during wartime. And not even that much, since Fauci's statements were suggestions and not mandates. They were basically saying, "We're not yet sure if they work well, but we're looking into it. But for now, supplies are limited, so let's not deprive healthcare workers who actually need them."
> They were basically saying, "We're not yet sure if they work well, but we're looking into it. But for now, supplies are limited, so let's not deprive healthcare workers who actually need them."
No, they could have said that. In fact, they should have said that. Instead what they said was some convoluted statement actually saying something like there was no evidence for masks working (null hypothesis), worded such that most people not skilled in critical reading would interpret it as an indication that masks didn't work.
It was most certainly a black mark on public health officials, along with the various closures of open air venues - parks, beaches, etc. (of course not that these things justify any of the abject denialist craziness of the "other side")
Yea, I agree in the perfect world, with a cooperative public who want the best for everyone, they should have said that. In reality, (as we know now) the American public largely doesn't give a shit about anyone but themselves, and any argument to "do something to help someone else" was just going to be ridiculed and ignored. They had to structure the message in the form of "Right now, we think X works, Y doesn't, and to help yourselves, do X, and don't do Y." because any other message would be totally ignored. I wish we weren't surrounded by selfishness, but we are.
It seems like you switched your argument from they didn't lie to the lie was justified ?
But even in your framing, I think they could have simply not said anything for a few days to the general public while healthcare workers went and scooped up whatever was still floating around in the consumer inventory. Coming clean and saying we think this might help, but the supply is low and they're more important for healthcare workers would have built trust rather than creating another transparent move that undermined it.
I do get they were under significant pressure, especially with the anti-leadership above them causing unnecessary chaos for political gains. I just think if we're doing a postmortem here we should acknowledge that the lying was a mistake.
The bigger fuck up was having an anti-leader in the bully pulpit amplifying outlandish anti-society positions. The usual mainstream conservative right wing opinion would have been something like "wear a mask / stay home / etc to protect yourself and your own family". This would set normative societal behavior, even though some people would do otherwise for their own reasons (with one possible reason being a headstrong individualist desire to exercise freedom). But instead a large group of mainstream people, who would have otherwise been perfectly content following along with the system's recommendations, were basically goaded into denialism as mainstream pop culture. It's hard to look at this and conclude anything other that the occupier of said bully pulpit is either directly a foreign agent sowing division for division's sake, or at the very least demented in a social media bubble managed by foreign agents.
COVID should have been a slam-dunk country-uniting event, like 9/11. I didn't like GWB at all, but he and his staff managed to (briefly) unite Americans and get us all working in one basic direction[1]. If we actually had a respectable statesman in charge when COVID hit, we might have actually all come together to do the right thing. But, instead we had a belligerent clown who wasted no time before making it partisan and urging defiance and division. Absolute tragedy.
1: Unfortunately, that direction was a series of ridiculous overseas wars, but that's besides the point.
Sure they did. Go back and listen to what the media and politicians were saying about the vaccines when they were first released: you won't get COVID, you won't spread COVID. We ended up at "you'll still get COVID and spread COVID, but your symptoms will be lessened".
I'm not anti-vaccine by any means, but the story around COVID vaccines changed...a lot.
> Go back and listen to what the media was saying about the vaccines when they were first released: you won't get COVID, you won't spread COVID
You’re making the claim. Show me.
I remember this debate happening online. It was stupid then as it is now. The clinical outcomes were clear as day: reduced hospitalisation. And Jonas Salk’s original polio vaccine was non-sterilising and not only not non-infecting, but actively infecting.
I saw those statements. Sorry, no, can't be arsed to find proof, because it's not my claim. But it was definitely being stated, publicly, by authoritative-sounding people. IIRC at least some were in the administration (or in government health agencies, which from the public's perception amounts to the same thing).
The fact that you are unaware of it means you've got your head-in-the-sand.
"Calling on Americans to get vaccinated against Covid-19, Biden said, “If you’re vaccinated, you’re not going to be hospitalized, you’re not going to be in the ICU unit and you’re not going to die.”"
> But then, during a third exchange, Biden said that since the vaccines “cover” the highly transmissible Delta variant of the virus: “You’re not going to get Covid if you have these vaccinations.”
It's... literally the next paragraph. Right next to the part you quoted.
I see it now. That's misleading. It contains a nugget of truth inasmuch as a vaccinated person has lower odds of a SARS-CoV-2 infection turning into Covid, but it's not a guarantee. (Nothing in immunology is, but that's a punt.)
It should have been couched, it wasn't, and I can see someone seeing that as lying.
That said, if Biden had used more delicate words, do you think these folks would have taken their MMRs? Are people who make stupid decisions for the next decade because Trump lies about everything sympathetic because they couldn't evaluate source authority?
You asked for a source. I gave you one. It had multiple lies in it. You didn't even open the link.
Now you are pretending that someone can't go on YouTube and find more lies about the vaccines from the likes of people like Rachel Maddow. People have assembled long clips, it's a meme.
"Nuggets of truth", my lord, pure delusion.
"But but but what about some hypothetical scenario where the president didn't lie?"
You said they lied when they said "you won't get COVID, you won't spread COVID".
Someone doubted you. You responded by posting a quote from President Biden: "If you’re vaccinated, you’re not going to be hospitalized, you’re not going to be in the ICU unit and you’re not going to die."
That does not support your earlier claim. There is support for your earlier claim at the site you took the quote from, but the usual convention here is that if you quote a site you quote the part that supports your argument.
When someone asks you a question, and your response is to post some quotes from an article and a link to the article, people assume that the quotes are meant to answer the question. Most won't follow the link unless they either want to make sure you quoted accurately or they want to see if there is more interesting stuff in the article.
Those claims were true for the original COVID strain. They were not for the late strains, so that is why the message changed. Because the facts changed.
No. They lied, well one person specifically who I’ll refrain from naming because he is a lightening rod for controversy, lied by implying that herd immunity was possible and that it was the goal. It was the precise reason I took the vaccine and the precise reason I tried hard to convince many younger low risk friends to take “the” vaccine. It was 100% a lie, and that’s a matter of record.
Saying something you believe to be true isn't a lie, even if more information later makes you change your mind. You are expecting a level of perfection that just doesn't exist.
I believe Fauci knew enough to know that herd immunity wasn’t a real probability when he was on the news talking it up as the way we “return to normalcy”. Will there ever be a public trial to disprove my belief and vindicate what seem like glaring mistakes as honest scientific naivety rather than misguided public health messaging strategy? Maybe. But it seems few are interested in the actual historical facts and would rather let sleeping dogs lie, bygones be bygones, since it’s all water under the bridge anyway and we have new things to fear like book banning and transgender athletes and Tucker platforming people who think Macron’s wife’s a dude. I’m inclined instead to believe knowledge is power, history repeats itself and governments should be transparent and accountable, even if it means putting our kings on trial.
The federal government lied about masks. Local governments lied about lockdowns. Nobody lied about vaccines.
The folks who can’t be fucked to not get and spread measles weren’t tipped over the edge by the mask lies because they’re the same folks who wouldn’t follow a mask mandate.