2&2 Slider To Leyritz
Well-known member
Putting aside the error in your your claim that 99+% of people will have no “material effects” from COVID, what you are saying is analogous to saying you would have no right to be pissed at a drunk driver who killed your family in a car wreck because you knew driving was risky.
I don’t know the specifics of how Birdman’s daughter caught it, but generally speaking, we have the right to be pissed if people are spreading the disease through reckless behavior. Built into the concept of recklessness is the purpose of the behavior—if the behavior is necessary for the function of the person, family, and society writ large, then we should tolerate more risk than if it is not. On this metric, sending your kid to school is not reckless. Kids need to be educated, for many people there is no other viable option because of jobs, money, etc., and schools are generally taking measures to mitigate the spread of the disease. Flying to the Caribbean for a vacation with 4 other couples, by contrast, is reckless, pretty much regardless of the mitigation measures, because they are not 100%, and the purpose of the behavior is 100% self-centered.
For this reason, if, in fact, Birdman’s daughter got it from a school nurse who had flown to the Caribbean, for example, he would have every right to be pissed, just like you would have every right to be pissed if a drunk driver killed your family.
If it was broadcast, via every possible medium, that 50k people in the state (or whatever the current active number is) were currently at this very moment drunk driving and I still sent my family out driving in it that environment in which they were both hit and killed, then yes I would be a hypocrite to blame someone else for the effect. Birdman has been on this board, literally daily, criticizing others for their risk assessment as the numbers have increased. Yet he has failed to alter his own behavior accordingly, and then continues to blame others for the result. That is a bullshit hypocritical move.
As for the school thing, clearly you do not have kids in the current school situation, as they aren't getting shit out of this hybrid approach. I would argue all day long that my kids got more long-term benefit out of their Caribbean vacation than this entire semester of bullshit "education". So I fully support the travel. You might say that sending my kids to school is not reckless, but from what I've seen a Caribbean vacation risk/reward is far less reckless than the school building.
I have no reservations about admitting that I am part of the "problem", to the extent that going out with a mask on spreads it or doesn't spread it. But everyone else needs to get out from behind their hollier-than-thou bullshit and admit the same. If your participation in society is more than zero, then you are on the same sliding scale that Catamount, Scoots, and I are on.