Nobody is removing your freedoms by having different beliefs and of course the government is using fear to get power. People are rationally afraid of the impacts of this pandemic and want the government to respond, why wouldn't that lead to more power? In some situations that power is probably justified but that doesn't mean that every response they have is justified or that they won't use those powers for other things once they have them. You don't have to look much further than the growth of the surveillance state since 9/11 to see how fear is used during a crisis to garner powers that aren't given back once the crisis is over and are expanded to include a whole bunch of things that they weren't originally intended for. The communist Chinese governments use of a social credit system to bestow privileges to citizens comes to mind as a possible outcome. Some people are wary of that.
So once again, lets tell the truth and not just mock people with different views. A different view of how to balance the various costs and benefits of policy when it comes to rights, freedoms, and restrictions is not misinformation... it is simply a different view. Misinformation is lying, which there is plenty of, but nothing Elon said in those tweets is misinformation. We are all allowed opinions, Elon included, and his opinion in those tweets seems to be that if we give the goverment the power to fire people from their jobs over vaccinations in this particular crisis that the power will not be given back when the crisis is over but will simply be used to make other things "requirements" down the road. Some people are OK with that but Elon is not for whatever reasons he has.
The Canadian truckers are specifically protesting against vaccine mandates in their industry for cross border truckers handed down by the Canadian government. The government is telling them that they cannot make a living if they do not get their shots. These are essential workers keeping the supply chain moving while we sit at our computers half the day and argue about this nonsense on the internet. The idea that firing these people is a good idea, during a supply chain crisis and worker shortage in that industry, is at least debatable and possibly just dumb. Especially now that we know with Omicron that the infection rate for vaccinated people is pretty high (I've read 75%), prior infection provides robust immunity that is at least comparable to vaccines (many have been previously infected because they've been out working this entire time), and vaccinated people shed similar amounts of the virus as unvaccinated people when infected (for a couple days less on average).
While I agree that they should get their shots, because it reduces their risk of severe disease and death by an order of magnitude which is bad for them and puts extra strain on the healthcare system, I have serious concerns about these types of mandates especially at this stage of the pandemic. The amount of people left after omicron that aren't either vaccinated, previously infected, or both is really not going to be that large and the ill-will that these mandates will create will have both short and long term implications in the economy and future elections.
The newfound tolerance for authoritarianism in traditionally "liberal" circles the last few years is an interesting phenomenon... I suppose it should have been obvious when they proclaimed people "voted against their own self interest" in 2016. Statements like that let you know that they thought they knew better than you did what was good for you. All I am saying is be careful what you wish for. What if these newfound powers are in the hands of some clown like Trump or AOC in 2024... because at this rate those might be our two options.
While governments have done power grabs and then not given it back, the Patriot Act being an example, there are also cases where governments have taken powers in an emergency and then given them back. That frequently happens after a natural disaster like a hurricane, tornado, or severe earthquake. It also happened during the world wars in the US and many other countries.
And pertinent to this discussion, it has happened throughout American history many times in past epidemics and pandemics. We haven't had a pandemic in 100 years so memories of the last one have essentially left living memory. The only people alive who remember the 1918 flu pandemic were small children when it happened and are extremely elderly now.
Mandatory quarantine of people who had been exposed to diseases was a common occurrence in this country's history as well as many other countries. The measures taken by governments were often more draconian than what we see today. Typhoid Mary ended up imprisoned on an island on the Hudson River for the rest of her life. There was a leper colony in Hawaii.
Vaccine mandates are also common. As people upthread pointed out mandates to go to school and in the military as well as for international travel are all common and have been most of our lives. My grandfather had a bad reaction to the vaccines given to him in 1917 to ship out to France and lost all his hair. He got little sympathy, they were mandated and he was an ambulance driver in the war.
The roll out for the COVID vaccines were the fastest in history. We have a wealth of data on their safety and so far the side effects from the vaccines are much milder than from the infection they are preventing. The flu vaccine on the other hand is something I've never had. I haven't had the flu as an adult, the risk of a bad outcome from the flu if you don't have risk factors is low, and the vaccine can have some side effects (though also relatively uncommon). I choose not to get it because of those factors.
The risks from even Omicron are vastly higher than the flu. Its far more contagious and I did get sicker with it than I have with any bug since I had the chicken pox at 28. It was shorter than the original COVID I had in early 2020, but I felt worse.
I haven't gotten the booster because my antibody levels are still decent. the infection in December was essentially my booster, so I'll wait. By the time I am ready for the booster the Omicron specific booster might be available which will probably be more effective.
Even if people aren't getting hospitalized at the same rates with Omicron, it's putting a big strain on the hospital system because of the sheer numbers of people infected. The fast spread of this variant is having an impact on the economy because so many people are out of work sick. And some people don't kick Omicron easily. One person my partner works with and a client of hers have had Omicron cases that have dragged on for a month. Her work colleague does a lot from home, so he's able to continue at about 80% effectiveness, but he sounds awful when she and he talk on the phone (she frequently uses speakerphone).
Right now we don't have a great vaccine for Omicron, but hopefully that will be solved soon. But the old vaccines do help prevent Omicron for at least a couple of months, so they aren't useless. Even if people aren't dying at the same rate with Omicron, they are getting sick enough to be out of work and that is having an impact. Also a large enough number are sick enough to end up in the hospital and that is putting a strain on hospital systems around the country. Even if most of those people go home, it's expensive, and a lot of people who need hospital services aren't getting them because elective surgeries are getting put off.
Vaccines have become a political issue and they shouldn't have. Because the push back is so high, I think they should be limited, but if it wasn't a political issue, I would be for them. This is a public health emergency and there is a lot of history pre-1918 for measures far more draconian than what we have seen thus far and all those measures were lifted when the emergency passed.
www.newsweek.com
