But itās an undeniable truth that cases were rising very sharply in the pre-Christmas period.
Was that not scary?
Of course there are agendas involved. ISAG have an agenda. Gript have an agenda. Business lobby groups have an agenda. Doctors working on the front line who are interviewed have an agenda. NPHET have an agenda. The Government in their own way have an agenda. Posters here have an agenda. Everybody has an agenda.
Good faith debate will, or should, thrash out whose agendas are worth listening to most closely and whose should be listened to less.
Well obviously I disagree about the debate, but if youāve found it to be worthy then who am I to disagree, itās been very one sided.
I believe myself to be firmly in the middle, I see valid arguments for both sides, just because Iām not entrenched in the OIUTF at all costs donāt take it that Iām gone the other way
I know that you see the difference. Itās not good enough that you think it coincided with the truth.
Iāve posted an article from behavioural psychologist advising NPHET criticising them for relying on fear to engender compliance. I agree with her. I think itās a good critique. This is one of the areas I think we could have managed a lot better by the way.
Hereās another article that builds on the earlier one criticising the fear based approach to messaging, thereās an article or you can listen to her talking to Matt Cooper at about 49 mins.
Edit: I donāt read gript as Iām sure you know. The example I gave didnāt come from gript.
Thereās a reporter from southern California who has been writing for the past year and really struggling to try and understand how SoCal did so well and then got overwhelmed in the fall/winter wave. She spoke to the head of the Immunology department at UCSD (San Diego) and asked him what in his opinion drove it. He simple answered āI donāt knowā. Probably the most honest answer we have had from an expert.
I think there is a very large degree of fear of being seen to be wrong involved at all levels, and especially in the current media environment.
Natural cautiousness, disbelief, incomprehension at the scale of the challenge and the measures that would be needed. All that contributed to the slow response.
When I was posting here before I myself went through a period of cognitive dissonance about what was happening. Fear translated into gallows humour, but that was mixed with a sort of tired āseen it all beforeā type mindset going back to previous pandemics. I think the penny started dropping for real around the last eight or nine days of February 2020 that this really was deadly serious.
Fair play to you, you saw the threat early. I disagree with a lot of your posting since the pandemic began but you were definitely off the mark early.
But sometimes I think there has to be fear, sometimes the gravity of a situation is such that there is no alternative. What I do think is counterproductive is preaching at ordinary people for venial sins as regards breaches of restrictions. If you think Iām extreme, I have a brother who is way more extreme in this regard, despite being at best partially informed, and his attitude is not persuasive to say the least.
One of the unmentionable doctors made what I thought was a great call back in December. She looked at the rates rising suddenly, with an identical trajectory across all london boroughs. While all around here list their heads she said it was bollox and that the most likely explanation was cross contamination in a test centre. ā¦she was right of course
I donāt think youāre extreme. I still think youāre purposely missing the point, Iāve drawn the distinction for you already, not that you needed me to, and Iāll leave it at that. I do have an extremely negative view of the ISAG. I do agree on your second point, itās what the people in the articles I posted links to were talking about.
She reports people from standing outside a church socially distance yet goes to BLM protest. The definition of a WOKE politician who is all for free speech until it doesnāt suit her narrative.
Donāt know anything about herā¦ But McGuirk has an odious track record that is being ignored because you agree with him. Youāre a clever lad, Iām sure you can see the point
I know Iām repeating myself but this girl gets far too much of the spotlight on TFK, sheās just a harmless local councillor, she stands for a lot of what is good in Limerick city also, we donāt really need to drag her into this horseshit every day, she gets a difficult enough time of it online without us adding our voice to it
I think part of the issue is that ISAG have continually tried to portray themselves as not having a political agenda - of being a group of scientists presenting āfactsā.
Because our goals and objectives havenāt changed. LIDTF, nphet and the gubberment have consistently move the goalposts, denied science and blundered along for 13 months. Scandal after scandal left untouched mainly yet the common man (& women & whatever you identify as) is left to blame and suffer.