I know I've said it before, but I never try to convince people in my life that COVID's serious anymore. It just always leaves me frustrated.
So, that said, my wife best friend just texted to say she's got COVID for the first time and she knows we "keep up with COVID" and wanted to ask some questions. Sure, no problem.
She was on a flight last weekend and asks if it's possible that she just tested positive now. We tell her that RAT's are supposedly around day 5-11 now, so that's totally possible.
She asks if we know what the workplace rules are for her, and sure we send her a link. She says that's not at all what her boss said, but OK.
She asks if it's even possible to not give her husband COVID. We go over ventilation, filtration, masks, etc and this is where it really starts to go off the rails. She's just like "Yeah, we're not doing any of that."
She asks if long COVID "is real" or if there's anything else she should know and we're like yeah, it is, there's a lot that's unknown. We're sending you some links about what is known with long COVID rates, the things to look out for, what you can try to do in the meantime, etc. and she reads it and goes "Ummm, yeah. That all looks super sketchy. If any of that were real I'm sure the news would be talking about it. I'm sorry but I think you guys have fallen for some hoax or something here. I have a fever, a runny nose and muscle aches. I'm going to take some Tylenol. We have a birthday party to attend tonight, a kid's party tomorrow and my boss wants me back at work on Monday. Thanks anyway."
I give up.
@BE Your experience captures so well the disconnect those of us who are well-informed re COvid feel, the impassable chasm between ourselves and the vast majority of people who have fallen for the minimizing & disinfo
Oligarch bros have done an extremely effective job w/ their propaganda, using our colleagues, friends, family to create massive peer pressure to conform to this break from reality.
@BE Thinking about the intentionally created & maintained pandemic mass delusion.
Folie a deux= 2 ppl with shared delusional system.
What do we call it when it's a mass delusion, with intense pressure to conform & keep quiet?
I'd forgotten I wrote this about her. My wife was telling me earlier in the week about how her husband's on strike(they live in LA) and won't wear a mask anywhere anymore, but it's mostly OK because "it's mutated so it can't kill people anymore."
She was bragging about how she'll still wear a mask to the grocery store and the doctor, because immunocompromised people need to be there...but nowhere else, I guess...My wife didn't congratulate her for her behavior, so I guess she got upset about it.
All I could really think is that if this is what passes as California leftist behavior these days they're really not that different than the people of Florida. They just act more polite about their behavior.
Long way of saying that you're correct. It's mass delusion, or at least mass willful ignorance so as not to be inconvenienced.
@BE It's that- but I'm cautious because I wear a mask Some of the time. Recalling that graph showing that you have to be in the appx top 5% of most careful re airborne exposure to be likely not to get multiple Covid infections.
Some of the time= multiple infections & infecting others
@BE (saying this as other ppl seem to think- realized it read like I only wear masks some of the time).
I always wear a mask/respirator indoors outside of my own small family. Always. Like scuba diving- I wouldn't take mask off underwater, nor take off my respirator in indoor settings either (outside of own home)
@BE Yeah- I try not to get angry at the minimizers/disinfo ppl, try to remember they're heavily propagandized. But it's hard to endure the mass delusion- when even close friends & colleagues have that attitude as if you're "overreacting" or "anxious" about Covid.
No- just more informed than them about the dangers Covid presents.
Odd how incurious so many are. Odd how they don't even seem to be able to process level of risk of 1 in 10 infection leads to LC & cumulative risk.