Chilli.s
mingling jets and statuettes
The one about speed limits on the road is the best
Discussion: UK anti-vaxx 'freedom' morons, protests and QAnon idiots
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ItWillNeverWork
Messy Crimbobs, fellow humans.
Broadly speaking yes. The devil's in the detail of course.
Don't think I've had the pleasure.
Much like the war on terror we have an enemy that doesn't acknowledge borders or rules of engagement. A simple system catogrising threat level that actually was nonsense and ditched . Limiting our freedom to protect our freedom, blaming Americans for fucking things up.
Chilli.s
mingling jets and statuettes
existentialist explained it, on another thread but the gist of it is a good one:
"And this is, I think, where "mandatory" has to come in. In exactly the same way that we don't say "oh, just drive as fast as you think is safe", but put in limits which are (ahem) broadly reflective of the level of risk on a particular stretch of road, rather than leave it to individual judgement, so there are times when we have to say "the collective good is better served by depriving you of that particular choice". And it exists everywhere, at some level. I won't claim it gets it right every time, but it's a start. And, perhaps not coincidentally, quite a lot of those strictures do end up applying particularly to young men, who tend to be more predisposed to thinking in terms of what THEY want to do than in the service of that collective good."
gentlegreen
I hummus, therefore I am ...
There must surely be people out there who know damn well their reckless behaviour has made them a vector of Covid to vulnerable people ...
The sad thing is such people are likely not to be spotted by any analysis of contact-tracing data ... though perhaps such behaviour may ultimately be inferred ...
If everyone cared as much as they should, we probably wouldn't be having this conversation ...
The sad thing is such people are likely not to be spotted by any analysis of contact-tracing data ... though perhaps such behaviour may ultimately be inferred ...
If everyone cared as much as they should, we probably wouldn't be having this conversation ...
Yep. Just catching up with this and I liked the same IWNW's post you did.
He's not an antivaccer, conspiranoid nutter. TBH raises some valid questions. I'm not sold on the idea of vaccine passports to enter venues. Which venues. Who's holding the data and for how long etc.
existentialist
Tired and unemotional
Those are good, constructive questions, and the sort which should always be asked. I rather feel that our interlocutor thinks he already has the answers, though...
elbows
Well-Known Member
Anyway such policies would make more sense if the vaccines offered sterilising immunity. Since they dont, and vaccinated people can still catch and transmit the virus, I'm more likely to support the closure of venues instead, or at least the return of social distancing rules.
two sheds
Least noticed poster 2007
Fair enough, but how are you about unvaccinated people with coronavirus entering enclosed spaces having large crowds?
gentlegreen
I hummus, therefore I am ...
Yes, the whole overselling of the vaccine was so bloody stupid - even I fell for it and visited my double-vaxxed friends and family one day back in the summer - where we were all unmasked and indoors some of the time - though my own health is a no-brainer given my lifestyle and my BIL was testing several times a week for work so effectively covered the rest of the family ...
I feel sorry for people running such venues, but I won't be visiting any time soon - even if I could be sure people were vaccinated - and the likes of Wetherspoons were already on my "list" ... no hardship for me because I never went to such places in any case ...
WouldBe
Dislicksick
Endangering life is a criminal offence.
elbows
Well-Known Member
It would have been slightly less stupid if Delta hadnt come along, because that variant whittled away at vaccine efficacy but the governent didnt want to substantially change or even tweak their plans, apart from the 'freedom day' delay.
This isn't realistic is it though. The things people can do are only mitigations, not surities. Wreckless or calase individuals going around knowingly infected and passing it on I would thingk, are a minority of the possible transmission vectors
People who are knowingly infected shouldn't be going to any venues, other than for emergencies. i.e. hospital.
It's a good idea to take an LFT at least before going to such venues. It's not a practicle option for me unfortunately but I don't disagree with the advice.
The bit I'm not sold on is checking vaccine status as a prerequesit to enter venues.
two sheds
Least noticed poster 2007
Again fair enough, although I'm not sure how much difference there is between checking vaccine status and checking covid status (which I presume would be needed otherwise the fundi anti-vaxxers/anti-maskers would just lie to get in).
Doesn't hugely affect me I have to say because I'm not planning on going anywhere with crowds.
Doesn't hugely affect me I have to say because I'm not planning on going anywhere with crowds.
WouldBe
Dislicksick
Lots of places require you to show a ticket before you can get in so what's the difference?
At airports not only do you need a ticket but you are also checked to make sure you're not taking anything dangerous on board with you. Again what's the difference?
stdP
One Swiss dinosaur in Polly Gosling's anorak hood
I'm not sure what you thought there was in my post to make you think I'd suggested anything to the contrary. But it requires access to the mast data (generally only telcos and government agencies) and, if you're worried about it being used to track whether you attended a demonstration or whatever, it's easily circumvented by leaving your phone at home.
Many commonly installed phone applications (e.g. WhatsApp) already send a list of your contacts to the lizard mothership.
Broadly the same for me too. It's a much wider topic covering pretty much everything, but I'm wary of data fetishists of practically any political stripe (someone's already mentioned Blair's attempt at ID cards, another attempted power grab by a control freak IMHO) but my primary concern (well before the pandemic was even a thing) has largely been the privatisation of the NHS and the ideological move to "for-profit" healthcare, of which the data brokers are a hugely profitable part. But that's a discussion for another time, it has perhaps reached the limit of this thread to contain it and might be better off being hived off in to its own thread. Suffice to say it's a bit of a wild west out there and lots of questions about who collects this data and what they are able to do with it remains unanswered.
As I mentioned above, this is my biggest concern re: the specifics of vaccine passports (and, at a larger scale, vaccines in general): complacency. Sure, they're a hugely effective weapon in the fight against diseases, but they should never be the sole focus, and as the covid vaccines don't 100% stop transmission they shouldn't be used as a free pass that assumes that they do.
About the same as I am for vaccinated people entering closed spaces having large crowds: excessively wary. I know that most people aren't excessively stupid and have had at least one vaccine, but I also know that some people are stupid and stopped taking any precautions whatsoever when they did get their vaccine.
Neither of these are medical procedures though, and are largely elective. You could very well get a nice large helping of hyperbole and say that, since you need to get a ticket for the bus, that's the same as providing your fingerprints, a blood sample and a full genomic sequence. There's degrees of what should and shouldn't be necessary here which I think is largely what this debate is about.
(Just in case anyone is in doubt or doesn't know my posting history, I had my booster jab last week and I'd be prepared to believe in god if it would allow me to pray for a special place in hell for the anti-vaccine nutters; preferably one where they suffer eternal smallpox, polio, etc)
existentialist
Tired and unemotional
See the bit where I talked about new posters rocking up and starting to moan. I know you've been moaning about Urban for years, because you've been doing it ever since I arrived (and presumably before)
WouldBe
Dislicksick
I thought we were on about government getting access to be able to track people.
Didn't say they were medical procedures. Last time I checked going to the footy, cinema or clubbing were all elective. No one is forcing you to go.
scalyboy
They’re taking the piss now
Aside from the grifters and the hardcore Bill-Gates-controls-the-vaxxed-sheeple-from-his-Space-Jew-Death-Star loons, I reckon the majority of anti-vaxxers are motivated by a sense of outrage that their privileged lifestyles are being slightly curtailed.
People chat nonsense about "tyranny", "this vile regime" and make absurd comparisons with the Holocaust. They know very little of real tyranny.
The highest proportion of ‘vaccine hesitant’ citizens (even before Covid) are in Europe, the USA and Australia. In developing world countries, people appreciate the value of vaccines as they are confronted with the effects of disease – there's a much higher take-up rate.
Who now in the UK knows of a friend/relative/neighbour with polio? I can think of one person I know. In the early C20th there would’ve been more. The rarity is due to the success of vaccination.
Where is the harm in wearing a mask for 30 minutes or so? I rather like wearing one outdoors now in the cold weather, stops my nose going red. The opposition to vaccine checks for mass entertainment events and travel, it’s hardly a major imposition, but it’s a change to the normal freedoms that people have come to expect and take for granted.
Older people (I would include myself in this category) seem to be more mask-compliant and that, I would guess, is due to them being at greater risk, but also because they are old enough to recall a period before the extraordinary wealth most of us now have in a consumer society. I don’t have personal recollections of WW2 but heard about it from relatives.
During WW2 ID cards were mandatory, as were ration books, petrol restrictions, conscription, and this lasted until the early 1950s.
I don’t get why some people can’t understand that in a time of (inter)national crisis there are certain freedoms that must be temporarily restricted. As has been said by other posters here, It is not in Capital’s interests to impose permanent restrictions on the retail /entertainment sector. Especially not our abysmal ‘libertarian’ government.
People chat nonsense about "tyranny", "this vile regime" and make absurd comparisons with the Holocaust. They know very little of real tyranny.
The highest proportion of ‘vaccine hesitant’ citizens (even before Covid) are in Europe, the USA and Australia. In developing world countries, people appreciate the value of vaccines as they are confronted with the effects of disease – there's a much higher take-up rate.
Who now in the UK knows of a friend/relative/neighbour with polio? I can think of one person I know. In the early C20th there would’ve been more. The rarity is due to the success of vaccination.
Where is the harm in wearing a mask for 30 minutes or so? I rather like wearing one outdoors now in the cold weather, stops my nose going red. The opposition to vaccine checks for mass entertainment events and travel, it’s hardly a major imposition, but it’s a change to the normal freedoms that people have come to expect and take for granted.
Older people (I would include myself in this category) seem to be more mask-compliant and that, I would guess, is due to them being at greater risk, but also because they are old enough to recall a period before the extraordinary wealth most of us now have in a consumer society. I don’t have personal recollections of WW2 but heard about it from relatives.
During WW2 ID cards were mandatory, as were ration books, petrol restrictions, conscription, and this lasted until the early 1950s.
I don’t get why some people can’t understand that in a time of (inter)national crisis there are certain freedoms that must be temporarily restricted. As has been said by other posters here, It is not in Capital’s interests to impose permanent restrictions on the retail /entertainment sector. Especially not our abysmal ‘libertarian’ government.
the data suggests you're wrong here - anti-vaccine sentiment is more common in deprived and minority ethnic communities, and among the young.
LDC
On est tous des pangolins
I think there's a difference between people that are hesitant or resistant to having the vaccine and those that are 'anti-vaxxers' as such tbh, and also those against restrictions which afaik isn't the demographic you mention.
Show me some data that shows the anti-vaxxers to be a substantially different demographic then, cause otherwise it's just reckons.
It'd be really convenient if it was a phenomenon restricted to loudmouth wealthy boomers, but unfortunately it isn't.
LDC
On est tous des pangolins
It's not restricted to one group, there's different subsets with different reasons and behaviours, and iirc the vaccine hesitant or skeptical ones are the demographics you mentioned (BAME and poor) but the ideological anti-vaxxers/anti-lockdown conspiracy 'theory' types that are producing most of the stuff we talk about here mostly isn't them. Fair enough it's reckons as I'm posting now, but there have been some studies (maybe even posted on here ages ago?) looking at this I'm sure.
The two vaccine hesitant people I know aren’t of the loon variety. Or at least they don’t express wild theories. Neither are known to each other but I think there might be a Xtian element behind both.
presumably your ideological anti-vaxxers are a subset of the 4% who responded negatively to vaccines in the ONS vaccine hesitancy survey? because if they are they're still mostly drawn from poor and BAME demographics. The rich and the over 50s are all on 98-99% pro-vaccine.
stdP
One Swiss dinosaur in Polly Gosling's anorak hood
I thought we were on about government getting access to be able to track people.
There's more than one form of tracking, and more people doing it than just governments. In the case of the UK I'm probably less worried about the government than private companies (which are generally far less transparent than the government, although the current incumbents of Westminster are working to make themselves ever more opaque), especially of the sort that's used to "nudge" people to vote in the way the highest bidder wants people to behave (Cambridge Analytica being the most infamous example but many others including Google and especially Facebook do the same sort of thing). Already you have things like health and driving insurance premiums tied to tracking metadata (do they go for a run, do they drink, do they hang around with smokers, do they know any drug dealers, do they habitually drive too fast etc etc), so for me it's not a big leap to get from where we already are to surveillance capitalism becoming the expected norm.
And aside from going to the cinema twice, I haven't done anything of the sort. But do you think people should be able to be subjected to medical procedures in order to do these things, and where do you or don't you draw the line...? Regardless, trying to sway back on topic I think the point I and IWNW are worried about is, once the apparatus for forcing everyone to be tracked is built and placed in to either public or private hands, will it ever be dismantled? My inner Winston Smith says it's a lot of power to have over people and both the current government are the private sector love hoovering up this stuff, so no it won't. Thus I'm not a fan of the apparatus being built in the first place when i think there's better ways to tackle the pandemic (such as a test and trace program that's not shambolic).
I didn't realise this position puts me in to what many seem to think is loonspud territory but I have to say I'm a bit surprised at the laying in to people for not being all gung-ho about vaccine passports
pogofish
Testicle Hairstyle
Back in an earlier stage of lockdown, I was queuing in my local supermarket and watched a store manager giving the store’s big, bad, badged/licenced, knuckledragger of a doorman a bit of sage advice:
”look ….., I know it strictly says that people should be shoping on their own but when you see two people shopping together and one looks a bit old and frail or has some trouble moving, it is absolutely the right thing to think that one of them may be in need of a little help and the other is helping them. Ejecting them really isn’t a good idea as it can get us a very bad name.”
Oh… dear…!
I somehow don’t think that retail is getting the cream of the crop just now?
mojo pixy
...שלא נמצא בשמאל
I know a few "vaccine hesitant" people. A few at work (not any more, they've all left, 4 or 5 staff, all young women fwiw). A couple of my son's friend's parents, the "wellness" hipstery ones. That's it. Nobody I speak to seems to care much about a 'vaccine passport'.
But nor do I tbh, I was more exercised about the care staff thing. And I agree this is all probably the thin end of a very bad wedge but am struggling to care any more. With a human population set to top 10 billion in my lifetime, just as our long-earned climate crisis starts to really bite, I think "individual freedom" looks more and more like an anachronism. I suspect we (and our descendents) are going to have to give up a lot of previously valued individual freedoms over the next few generations, if human life is to continue on this planet at all.
Sorry, it's been a long day...
The problem for me isn't "vaccine passports" tbh, this is a least-worst solution to the problem of protecting vulnerable people in public places. If there's a better solution I'd love to hear it.
But nor do I tbh, I was more exercised about the care staff thing. And I agree this is all probably the thin end of a very bad wedge but am struggling to care any more. With a human population set to top 10 billion in my lifetime, just as our long-earned climate crisis starts to really bite, I think "individual freedom" looks more and more like an anachronism. I suspect we (and our descendents) are going to have to give up a lot of previously valued individual freedoms over the next few generations, if human life is to continue on this planet at all.
Sorry, it's been a long day...
The problem for me isn't "vaccine passports" tbh, this is a least-worst solution to the problem of protecting vulnerable people in public places. If there's a better solution I'd love to hear it.
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