Is it possible to be highly conscious but against covid lockdowns + mandatory masks?

[Consept]

The mask thing I really don't get, I understand its uncomfortable or a bit itchy or whatever but it's not that bad. Most people who are anti-mask claim it doesn't work or there aren't any studies, but either way they are not 100% sure about that, so what a gamble to make where if you're wrong and the mask is even 1% effective 1000s could lose their lives, if you're right you just had to feel slightly uncomfortable in the supermarket for nothing. 

The twisting they do on this issue is crazy. 

The whole thing though I think is a sign that people in certain countries, don't trust their governments 

[Gidiot]

@Consept it’s definitely a lack of trust I would assert that the countries doing the best either were Forced to lockdown or that people willingly obeyed there governments. I can’t blame the us as much I blame trump just because of the messaging that was terrible and the inconsistency of a bipartisan message.

[Consept]

44 minutes ago, Gidiot said:

@Consept it’s definitely a lack of trust I would assert that the countries doing the best either were Forced to lockdown or that people willingly obeyed there governments. I can’t blame the us as much I blame trump just because of the messaging that was terrible and the inconsistency of a bipartisan message.

Its the same here in the UK but we've been split since brexit. It would be interesting to look at countries that have a strong alt right populist movements and correlate that to how theyve done during corona, i would guess countries that are more divided probably have done the worst 

[LfcCharlie4]

I can talk you through why I'm personally Anti-Lockdown / Against the nonsensical restrictions in the UK, I'll start with the restrictions. 

Personally, I think it goes a lot deeper, but Leo has made it clear 'Conspiracy Theories' are not allowed to be discussed on this forum, so I won't mention the deeper reasons. 

10PM Curfew for Pubs- Lmao, this is probably the stupidest thing Boris (our PM) has ever done, all it creates is more- house parties, field parties, raves, crowded streets with zero security and social distancing, this will only heighten crime as well. Not to mention cripple the hospitality industry which has been shown to only be responsible for 5% of cases here, mostly of ages between 18-60, where the risk of dying is minimal. Also, if you go to one of these venues, you surely know the risks you are taking? Just cripples an industry for no reason really. 

6 People Rule- Again, makes little sense to me why you can meet up with 5 friends but if you meet up with 6, you face a fine lol. 

Masks mandated in shops 24th July- At the 'peak' nobody wore masks, at the lowest the virus had been, suddenly they were mandated in shops, after our health advisor actually advised against wearing masks before this as in his words- ' the evidence shows they have little effect, and can actually do more harm than good in many cases.' Hm. 

New mask rule- This is the best one. You walk into a pub / bar etc with the people you're with, with your mask on, you get to the table and take it off, you then have to put them on again to leave the venue, just to take them off as soon as you're outside. Literal madness. 

 Due to these new restrictions LOTS of people have turned their back on even listening to the Gov, and are not complying, even many police officers have said they have no way of enforcing most of these rules. 

Lockdown: 

• Measures like this have NEVER been used for healthy members of a population, originally it was to protect the health service, but then continued for months afterwards. Now, people believe lockdown is the solution to this issue until a Vaccine comes, people forget we have a Vaccine for Flu and that still kills 100,000s a year. 
• Asymptomatic Transmissions- https://www.theblaze.com/op-ed/horowitz-study-weak-asymptomatic-coronavirus-transmission , if anything it seems there is more chance of the virus spreading rapidly when a household member contracts it and everyone is cooped up inside, more so than passing someone for a few seconds when you are Asymptomatic. Remember, this was one of the basis for worldwide shutdown, without a true investigation into it. 
• Destruction of small businesses & livelihoods- While trillion $ corporations have been thriving, small businesses are struggling more than ever, and this will likely be one of the worst recessions in a very long time. I feel if the population was asked at this point, most would be happy to open everything up, and those who wanted to shield themselves could do, and just limit contact between those leading normal lives, and the extremely vulnerable. 
• The chances of dying for a healthy member of the working population is very minimal- Being realistic most people will not die from this, unless they have underlying health conditions / 75+ in age. Therefore, why are we not simply promoting natural health to the general public, what supplements to buy, best exercise routines, Wim Hof breathing, usage of Sauanas, etc etc? And, then protecting those it is actually dangerous for. I know the response will be 'but some 24 year olf who was perfectly healthy died of Covid' and, yes, I get that, but are those rare cases worth shutting down the world for? I can show similar examples of Flu deaths for perfectly healthy teenagers and young adults. 
• Long term implications- In my opinion, the long term implications will cause far more suffering and problems than the virus will. I believe people often underestimate how much suffering & even death extreme poverty can cause, homelessness, mental health degeneration, suicides etc. If you think long term, I genuinely feel this could've been handled in a very very very different way to incoming economic doom that will lead to devastating effects in millions of people's lives. While suicides may not have doubled, they certainly have increased. We have had days in the UK where suicide has caused more deaths than Covid. 
• That brings me on to my last point- Recalculation of deaths & testing issues- I have spoken to several Doctors at cricket, and read enough accounts of people stating how the Covid death figures are very generous. As in, you test positive Today, die of something completely unrelated in the next 28 days, and go down as a Covid death, or have stage 4 cancer, test positive for Covid, and again die 'of' Covid, even though, you were already dying. In regards to testing, the original inventor of the PCR test said his test should not be used in the diagnosis of infectious diseases, so why is it being regarded as the Gold standard? - https://www.weblyf.com/2020/05/coronavirus-the-truth-about-pcr-test-kit-from-the-inventor-and-other-experts/

 This is without factoring in the lesser effects it is having on people, such as the extreme fear and anxiety. I know perfectly healthy 18-20 year olds who are afraid to leave their house & go for a walk still because of the Media & Social Media making this out to be WAY worse than it actually is. My mum for example has often said she doesn't know if she will ever go back to mixing with people and often feels live isn't worth living anymore. I don't see that maximization of Love & Consciousness. 

But, we all have different opinions on everything.

Personally, I feel this should've been used as an opportunity for Governments to push healthier lifestyles, teach about nutrition on national levels, help people understand Vitamins & Minerals, learn about breathwork, learn how to boost your immune system naturally, while focusing on helping the Vulnerable & Elderly do the same & of course protecting them. But, at this stage, I don't think these restrictions are the solution for the vast majority of the population. 

My question to Pro-Lockdown folks, when does it all end? When we get a vaccine? When we get down to 0 cases? When we realize you can't suppress a virus forever.

What about when there is spikes in years to come, do we continuously shut down the economy over winters? Are we going to do the same for Flu outbreaks? (50,000 excess deaths in 2018 from flu in the UK, but it never got mentioned)

I'm sure you will all disagree with me, and call me 'low conscious' and selfish, or a murderer or whatever the latest insult is, but I just don't agree with quarantining healthy people, sorry, and think there are much smarter ways to deal with this. 

Instead of people actually evolving and becoming healthier, more conscious beings, people think a Mask & Vaccine is the be all, end all. While they continue to smoke, eat fast food, remain overweight and do nothing to improve their health, that is just very backwards to me.

 

P.S. If anyone wants to have a chat about the deeper reasons behind all this, feel free to message me! 

 

Edited September 29, 2020 by LfcCharlie4

[Fran11]

@LfcCharlie4 You are just a selfish killer man  LOL

Seriously speaking, I'm pro-lockdown and masks, but it's true it can't go on indefinitely. In Argentina is's been 6 months and povery is exploding, among other problems.

There needs to be a balance.

Many people are too simplistic and cliche about it, and promote unreasonably long lockdowns without any holistic vision.

Edited September 29, 2020 by Fran11

[Consept]

1 hour ago, LfcCharlie4 said:

I'm sure you will all disagree with me, and call me 'low conscious' and selfish, or a murderer or whatever the latest insult is, but I just don't agree with quarantining healthy people, sorry, and think there are much smarter ways to deal with this. 

Instead of people actually evolving and becoming healthier, more conscious beings, people think a Mask & Vaccine is the be all, end all. While they continue to smoke, eat fast food, remain overweight and do nothing to improve their health, that is just very backwards to me.

I agree with you in that ultimately having the prevention of a healthy living standard is obviously going to improve peoples healths, mentality etc but its almost like a separate issue, because right now if people started that doing it it wouldnt get rid of covid and the situation we're in, so there does need to be emergency measures of some kind. Also, as you know, in the UK its not that easy to switch peoples habits, im sure you remember Jamie Olivers healthy food in schools campaign where the parents and kids protested and also recently when the lowered the sugar in irn-bru and Scottish people signed petitions against and i think many boycotted it. So in other words promoting habit changes seems to be hard in the UK whether its tempoary measures like the covid stuff or longer term measures like what youre talking about. 

The question for me is, is there trust for the government, if there is trust then you would permit them to make mistakes as you know that their intention is whats best for the population, if there isnt trust then every move they make will be questioned. That there is lack of trust really falls on the governments hands and how shady and self-serving politics has been over the years. If we hadnt had all the crap with the bankers bonus', sub-prime mortgage recession, bail outs, Brexit, austerity, trickle down economics, iraq, grenfell etc etc, all within the last 10-15 years, and the government was seen to be for the people rather than corporations then i think there wouldnt be too much distrust and the people would go along with whatever. If you look at Sweden their strategy might be right or wrong but the point is people followed along, as did most of the countries in northern europe dispite differing strategies. So really i think what were seeing is the result of poor government decisions with a capitalist mindset that has run riot. Thats not to say there arent good people in the government but the system that exists is not for the people and those are the ones rebelling. 

The actual actions theyre doing for covid i think people would complain either way, if you remember at the start Boris wanted to do herd immunity and literally everyone complained about it, thats why they switched the strategy to a lockdown type thing, so either way people would complain i think. Im actually suprised they did do a lockdown considering how their main concern is the economy, but guaranteed, if we didnt lockdown, people will be out protesting now about how we should lockdown and most likely would be the same people protesting now lol 

Edited September 29, 2020 by Consept

[Willie]

It is possible. Statistically very unlikely, however.

[LfcCharlie4]

@Fran11 I agree, I actually thought a 3 week lockdown to protect the NHS was a great idea, before it became 3 months lmao. 
 

@Consept Yep, I have little trust in our government lmao, tbh I think deep down Boris wants herd immunity but he’s afraid of the backlash so almost got bullied into a lockdown ?

[tuckerwphotography]

2 hours ago, LfcCharlie4 said:

My question to Pro-Lockdown folks, when does it all end? When we get a vaccine? When we get down to 0 cases? When we realize you can't suppress a virus forever?

That is the question for me. I don’t know anyone who is planning on getting the vaccine. Most friends and family I’ve talked to are freaked out by the concept of a vaccine with long term health impacts that are unknown. Say 40% of the US doesn’t get the vaccine. And say COVID mutates and becomes a seasonal or reoccurring virus. Do we go on like this forever? Is this the new normal? Are masks here to stay? Is life going to become one giant Zoom meeting?
 

I don’t have a strong opinion about all of this mostly because I don’t feel I have enough solid information to make a judgement, but for all those who were so triggered by this thread’s original post, perhaps you could answer some of the questions above in a rational, thoughtful way without comparing people to Nazis. Lol

[Consept]

18 minutes ago, LfcCharlie4 said:

Yep, I have little trust in our government lmao, tbh I think deep down Boris wants herd immunity but he’s afraid of the backlash so almost got bullied into a lockdown ?

Definitely, im not sure hes that bothered either way, he just doesnt want to look bad, like with brexit lol

I think to answer the op though I would say most people that are anti-lockdown, not you Charlie cos i think youre more advocating for healthy lifestyle, but most just dont want their life to be impacted and so are actively looking for reasons why there shouldnt be a lock down, it doesnt really come from a place of high consciousness in that theyre not taking the whole situation into account, for example it would be hard to keep the position if they had direct experience with it ie going to the hospital, talking to people that have had covid etc. Lock down may or not be the right choice but i feel that the intention behind the people protesting it comes more from a place of selfishness which you could call low consciousness, many people ive talked dont believe it because they dont know anyone who has it, which is pretty selfish imo as i wouldnt say cancer doesnt exist because i dont know anyone who has it. The people on the other side some are people that just will follow the government, of course thats true, but a lot of them are aware of how bad a lockdown is and are making sacrifices because they believe its the right thing, so their intention is not self interested because they too are suffering from the lockdown. So it doesnt necessarily make them higher consciousness but it means they are taken into account a wider scope and most likely you wouldnt find many highly conscious people who are staunchly against a lockdown, although i do understand your intentions are slightly different Charlie 

[Fran11]

38 minutes ago, tuckerwphotography said:

And say COVID mutates and becomes a seasonal or reoccurring virus.?

Yeah, following the cliche "save lives at all costs" line of reasoning, even if COVID dissapeared, why not just use masks forever in order to prevent other diseases? 

It would also save a lot of lives. Even more so, over the years.

Would being against this also make you a killer? 

Again, not saying I'm against masks. But let's be a little more reasonable about this.

 

Edited September 29, 2020 by Fran11

[Fran11]

19 minutes ago, Consept said:

they are taken into account a wider scope  

To me, taking a wider scope would be to consider both the importance of the pandemics AND the lockdown side-effects. 

This would result in a reasonable lenght of lockdown. Not in being simplistically either for or against it.

At least in my country, it's been six months, and the limitations of looking a complex systemic problems from only one POV are becoming obvious. 

Edited September 29, 2020 by Fran11

[Consept]

18 minutes ago, Fran11 said:

To me, taking a wider scope would be to consider both the importance of the pandemics AND the lockdown side-effects. 

Yes I agree I'm not sure if that was clear in my post. A lot of people against the lockdown, that I've come accross anyway, outright reject there's even a virus, which is what a lot of the protests are about. The people on the other side are not denying the virus obviously but they're also feeling the effects of the lockdown themselves but are sacrificing for other people. A high conscious person would look at both sides and I don't think they'd deny the virus so that they could benefit 

[commie]

2 hours ago, Fran11 said:

Argentina is's been 6 months and povery is exploding, among other problems.

Argentina can ill afford to pay millions to do nothing or hand out billions in easy credit to businesses like rich states such as Germany. Of course the crisis has to be managed differently.

32 minutes ago, Fran11 said:

why not just use masks forever in order to prevent other diseases? 

It would also save a lot of lives. Even more so, over the years.

The difference is that there is little immunity to this virus which is unique considering how serious and contagious the disease is. Once immunity has built up through exposure or vaccine, that will become a legit question.

I'd be OK with masking forever in public transport and such or with dropping masks most of the time but some habits (including hand hygiene) have probably changed forever. I would be surprised if people stopped wearing masks in medical settings during flu outbreaks for instance.

[Michal__]

For me the most important question to answer is what are the long term effects of the virus.

I've read cases where perfectly healthy elder developed schizophrenia after covid. Also we still don't know for sure what it does to lungs long term.

Short term covid is perfectly safe in my opinion. 

It is a really complex problem.

[Fran11]

29 minutes ago, commie said:

Argentina can ill afford to pay millions to do nothing or hand out billions in easy credit to businesses like rich states such as Germany. Of course the crisis has to be managed differently.

Yes, of course there are no common exact recipies for all countries, each case has to be considered separatedly.

Rich countries can hold on longer.

29 minutes ago, commie said:

The difference is that there is little immunity to this virus which is unique  

No, there's also Influenza, Tuberculosis, and many others. Depending on the region of course.

And even in infections where there's immunity it's not always effective and still a lot of people die, and it could be reduced if we wore masks. 

Edited September 29, 2020 by Fran11

[Preety_India]

I thought Argentina was a rich country. 

Anyway, masks are really important. 

[Fran11]

5 minutes ago, Preety_India said:

I thought Argentina was a rich country. 

5 minutes ago, Preety_India said:

Anyway, masks are really important. 

Yes, masks are helpful and can be used for relatively long periods of time, they don't cause much problem.

A six month lockdown in a poor country is a different story.

Edited September 29, 2020 by Fran11

[commie]

9 minutes ago, Fran11 said:

No, there's also Influenza, Tuberculosis, and many others.

Influenza immunity is so widespread almost everyone has some. It's not a binary thing. Current vaccines don't do the same thing as a natural infection and you get innate immunity too. Look it up.

TB isn't even a virus. So far as I know, treatment remains straightforward.

[Member]

7 hours ago, commie said:

The Holocaust also sounds like zero empathy but most people who've carried it out or defended it weren't sociopaths. Unless of course you're a politician, running your mouth about sacrificing the elderly and so forth in public spaces isn't self-serving (quite the opposite) nor is it merely misguided. It's basically missionary zeal... that or looking for a fight.

If I would say something like 'people die anyway, fuck'em and just play with their corpses', does that make me a psychopath? Nope, I just like killing people because they will die anyway. This is literally what the OP said here "immunocompromised are going to get an unfair deal either way". So nope, I'm not tolerant to this kind of thinking because it is dangerous and inhumane. Psycho or not, it SUCKS and cannot be a highly conscious trait.

Edited September 29, 2020 by Member