Comment by Tobani | Hacker News Reader

Comment by Tobani | Hacker News Reader

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Almost all of the statements were true. They just needed more context with them.

> "Masks aren't effective"

The point of the (non n-95) masks is not to protect the wearer. They didn't want everybody to cause a run on the n-95 masks for healthcare workers. The cloth masks may not very effective at protecting the wearer.

> "Masks are effective"

Masks are very effective when the infected wear them. Everybody should wear them because they don't know if they're infected or not.

> "Vaccinated don't have to wear masks"

Currently we don't believe vaccinated people. If you get vaccine you don't have to wear a mask.

> "Vaccinated should wear masks"

Unvaccinated people were the first to go everywhere with out masks. That carrot didn't work.. Everybody put them back on.

> "COVID is not airborne"

This could be true!

> "COVID is airborne"

But it catches a ride on water droplets!

> "COVID came from a wet market"

I haven't seen this as part of government messaging

> "COVID came from a lab"

I haven't seen this as part of government messaging

> "If you caught it, you have immunity"

For some amount of time, yes

> "If you caught it, you might not have immunity"

Yep we've got new variants that yo _might_ not be immune to.

> Almost all of the statements were true. They just needed more context with them.

You nailed the issue in the first 2 sentences. All of those things listed are technically true, as long as the context is provided and understood. But when you have the whole situation turn into a bipartisan shitshow, context goes immediately out of the window (both intentionally and unintentionally, just like nuance being lost in twitter discussions). It is you vs. them for everyone emotionally invested into this.

"CDC said COVID is airborne, and if you disagree, you are a science denier and probably a nazi too. No, I am not gonna listen to your 'context'".

"CDC said there is no evidence that COVID came from the wet markets, which means that you claiming that it is possible is a conspiracy theory".

"CDC said that people don't have to wear masks, but now they say people have to wear masks, they don't know what they are doing and are just trying to pacify the population. I don't need context, I am just reciting what CDC said."

Actually looking into the context of the official statements on COVID, there isn't really a contradiction, and their recommendations make sense. But then if you actually absorb the context, then there is no team sports fight to be had, there is no side to cheer and root for, and there are no opponents to defeat who are dumb and wrong (unlike you and your team). The intensity and excitement of the "battle" is positively correlated with willingness to omit context and refusal to consider it.

If it ain't in the headline it's "SO CONFUSING"

Your reply is a perfect illustration of what I was talking about in my original comment. I couldn't have come up with a better example even if I tried.

You conjured up a greatly simplified version of what I said, threw away all the context that actually matters, and built it into something that's easy to rally against for someone who is "on your team".

Yes I thought the irony was beautiful

Except policies don't follow the context. Science says the old are vastly more likely to get severe reactions to Covid but we lock everyone down and still send Covid patients back to nursing homes.

> Except policies don't follow the context. Science says the old are vastly more likely to get severe reactions to Covid but we lock everyone down and still send Covid patients back to nursing homes.

Agreed, this is an issue. But I don't think that "policies tend to disregard context, which leads to poor outcomes, so we should disregard context when arguing about policies too" is a sound approach.

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