Well written and hit the nail on the head. My in-laws are genuinely nice people. They are very progressive and read the NYT daily and as gospel. I don't discuss politics much at all, besides a few joking comments from time to time. I was wondering why they are ok with the way the paper distorts stories or leaves out very important parts of a story if it makes their "side" look bad. I've come to the conclusion, they have no clue whats going on if its not reported in the NYT or CNN, MSNBC, etc. They didn't even know what the 1619 project was and they subscribe to the NYT.
When the vaccines came out my wife was pregnant and we decided she would hold off as we saw more potential cons than pros (we had already had covid in Nov of 2020). The not so gentle pressure she got from her OBGYN was pretty crazy. She asked the OBGYN if she has seen a lot of babies or mothers have serious issues with COVID and she was told "that information is not important".
After she gave birth she still didn't get the vaccine because that was when Omicron was starting and everyone around us who was vaccinated was still getting it. So again, we decided, whats the point. I got two shots but have no intention of getting a booster. My father in-law, out of the blue, sent this text (with a link to an article) to my wife: "Maddie, just listen to this ABC report on the facts supporting you getting your COVID shot, compared to people who do not get a shot. One last note, if you get sick from a bad case of COVID and die because you do not believe in science, when your children grow up they will ask all of us why you did not protect yourself during this pandemic."
Mind you, we already got COVID a year earlier and just recently easily recovered from a second COVID experience. I'm not aware of a single instance where someone got COVID a 2nd time and died from COVID.
His text perfectly summarizes the BOOMER position and their complete lack of awareness that people make decisions based on many factors. It has never occurred to him that we actually weighed the pros and cons and she decided to not get it based on her own reasons. In his opinion, she is just someone who "doesn't follow the science".
We’re facing a group of people who act in extremely immoral ways through a personal lens of ultimate morality. "Your kids are going to ask all of us why..." is a horrific thing to say to your daughter. "That information is not important" is medical malpractice in my book. These people have oriented themselves 90 degrees towards this ultimate morality, blinding them to the dehumanizing effects of their behavior. There is a never-ending cohort who don't see things through this lens, which seemingly emboldens those who do - those who don't partake in this sort of behavior become the endless fodder for their moral crusade.
If faced with a situation like this, I may explain to a family member or medical practitioner that I can no longer have a relationship with someone who behaves in these ways. Clearly stating that these people have crossed moral boundaries around how they treat other human beings - informing them that this is a barrier that will prevent you from having a close personal relationship/medical relationship/etc. with them - would be the high road in my estimation once these sorts of emotional extorsion and dehumanizing comments start to come your way.
This isn't something I would do lightly – you want to have a discussion about making students at a local school board meeting, wonderful! My opinion is no, but we should definitely be respectfully and honesty be having robust conversations about policy at the local, state, and national level- but when someone told me they hope I (26 years old, not fully vaccinated) learn my lesson when I kill my elderly family members (unfortunately, a true story), the time has come for me to rethink my ability to trust, sympathize with, and be in relationship with them. These people are addicted to the ideas that make them feel safe, so focused on one fear that all other threats become secondary. Attacking their fears is not productive but directing their attention to the core values of a life worth living - hope, meaning, community, family, the pursuit of happiness, etc. - may shake them from their panic and confusion.
Sorry something similar happened to you. While I agree that separating myself from people who say things like that, I have 3 boys who love their grandparents. I can't sour the relationship for their sake. The irony is, by him sending that text, it made her less likely to get the vaccine, not more. People don't like being told what to do, hence the major issue with a vaccine mandate. I did tell her this morning (this text was sent weeks ago with no follow up nor does he mention it when they see each other in person) that it really soured my feelings towards her parents. She said she completely understands.
They truly are good people but lost in their own bubble where nothing can be questioned. I want her to 100% get a different OBGYN but that her choice, not mine.
Feel that. This discussions are hard, and nuanced, and resolution tends to be based on compromise for the well being of all involved - having kids is universally credited as life changing in this respect. Deferring to their best interest is honorable especially when difficult. Way to be a good dad and husband.
"The irony is, by him sending that text, it made her less likely to get the vaccine, not more." This gets to the root of my sour feelings towards these people. YOU'RE NOT HELPING. While a heterodox community is having a discussion about your in-laws in good faith by trying to steelman their position through a lens of generational cultural differences, I highly doubt they are doing much self reflection, or, to be fair, would assume that based on my own experience with people who hold similar views. If we have a SINGLE opinion on vaccines, masks, lockdowns, mandates that don't alight with their own, they call us dumb, mouth-breathing, and dangerous, make assumptions about our political leanings and personal beliefs such as religious affiliations. I don't like to have strong opinions, and I've done by best to keep evolving as better information is made available, but talking to those who wish to consolidate every data point into one narrative just makes that harder, and so I made the decision for myself to prioritize different relationships.
Thanks for the posts, Zach, and thanks for everyone here. This is a really cool community. I spend a lot more time than I would have expected reading through comments on the HoS. I expected top notch journalism from Ethan, but have been surprised by the thoughtfulness, honesty, and writing quality of the subscribers. I hope it stays that way : )
Woof man, people feel incredibly free to say awful shit as long as they are on "The Right Side". I don't think we would see exactly eye to eye on the merits of the booster if we discussed it for 20 minutes, but holy shit, there is a lot of space between "not seeing eye to eye" and being a callous prick.
Maybe we wouldn't see eye to eye on the merits of the booster but having the conversation is exactly how you get people to see your perspective. A Sam Harris podcast is what convinced me to get the vaccine to begin with. I don't agree with his opinion on most topics but I listen to his podcast to get a perspective from someone who I don't agree with on most political topics. Why do I listen to him? Because I trust him and he doesn't think just because I'm conservative, that I'm a racist, dumb ass.
That's what scares me so much about Rogan and the push to cancel him. Conversations are how you get people to change their minds and see different perspectives. It's very interesting how he hasn't had any shows this week. The conspiracy part of my brain thinks they are working on a buy out so both parties can go their separate ways.
Man, that is totally wild. If my in-laws did that, we would have some extremely serious problems with the future of our relationship. I admire you for keeping a cool head.
My MIL has asked me twice why I didn’t get the vaccine. I told her both times why and that was the end of it.
One simple rule I have: Don't ever react strongly to a text, particularly from people 40 and older who don't understand how to convey any kind of nuance in a text message lol
yeah and this is a great example of trust erosion. I made peace with getting the vaccine because I trust my doctor and he told me it was a good idea and laid It out as such: "you're not gonna die of covid, and you're not going to have more than a day of a sore arm or discomfort from the shot. It could keep you from being laid up for a week or two." But the government created a policy by which I had to get the vaccine to keep my job, and there was no accommodation for natural immunity. Last I checked, natural immunity showed to be more effective at reducing the effects of Omicron than vaccines. The government mandate of course, stated in it's executive summary that it's ruling were "science-based".
The midwives my wife works with have almost lost several later term pregnant Covid patients and have had to deliver infants at 35 to 37 weeks to make sure mom and baby stayed alive , so yeah they put a little pressure on pregnant women to get vaccinated.
Then maybe the OBGYN should have given that information?!?! Saying "that information is not important" does not actually help inform the patient of the pros and cons. Should OBGYN's "put a little pressure" on pregnant women to deliver their baby or get an abortion? A doctors job is not to "pressure" patients into a decision they feel is best for them. Some doctors offices are taking away scales so people don't feel bad about their weight. We know obesity is a leading cause for Covid deaths but we don't care about "pressuring" fat people to lose weight. We only "pressure" unvaccinated people. So yeah if the midwives your wife works with put "pressure" on their patients I think they suck at their job.
Of course they promote weight loss , eating properly and screening for diabetes and doing otherprenatal screening tests and testing for beta strep. That’s not sucking at their job . That’s called relating to the patient health measures that will promote a positive outcome in the delivery room . Nothing is more tragic than a patient with gestational diabetes losing a baby. Reminding a patient at each visit the importance of self care is good practice , not sucking.
I appreciate the anecdote, but in order to draw a single conclusion from this, there's would have to be a lot more information. When would be some very important (Alpha, Delta, Omicron), as well as health condition of the mothers. Without either, this is just a useless anecdote.
Zach brings up a very good point. A well trained medical practitioner knows that communication is equally important as medical science when dealing 1 on 1 with patients. If you give someone perfect medical advice in a way that makes them feel pressured, you risk undermining the potential good that the medical care could provide; that would be the definition of sucking at your job.
One thing I think you leave out from the Boomer Doomer typology is the implication (and sometimes explicit declaration) that Americans are too irredeemably stupid to be trusted. It flows from all Boomer Doomer takes - this idea that Americans must be lied to, misled, or otherwise guided because if we give them a full view of reality they'll merely drown in their own stupidity. Complex policies cannot be explained; why bother? Americans are stupid, they could never understand something as complicated as "we need these masks for another purpose so try to not buy them right now" or "COVID is dangerous but not as dangerous as some other activities".
Boomer Doomers are followers in part because they are the enlightened. They have learned long ago that Americans are too stupid to ever think for themselves and must follow blindly and have adopted that ethos into their own personal consumption and beliefs.
Yep, another great piece here at HoS. I don't want to be a different kind of doomer, but I see very strong connections between the (exceedingly aggressive) push for "moral clarity" over objectivity to be a potent ingredient in a larger civilization-ending-level threat. I think you've alluded to a sentiment before, Ethan. Something like "how long can a country that hates itself remain healthy?" ( Sorry if I'm totally dreaming that up.) But let me add to it: "how long can a country remain healthy admist a trust epidemic?" Literally every Covid Vaccine skeptic I know is vaccinated against all the things we were supposed to get vaccinated against. They give blood. They'll walk into an ER for some ailment (or their kid is sick) and doctors will poke and prod and prescribe and do all kinds of things and there's this quaint trust that that's the whole point of doctors and hospitals. You show up with your problems, they do their best and try to get you healthy. Most people, like your boomers reading the NYT, don't have the energy or expertise to have a better shot at knowing the right health decisions. They just follow. And yet, suddenly, with Covid, everyone's a data scientist, or microbiologist, or policy expert. For those angry with vaccine skeptics, consider this: their trust in institutions has eroded so far that people are literally willing to die rather than take their medicine. They are in many ways, so mind-f**ked and disoriented that they will contort their thinking to explain away happenings that should be very strong evidence that the Covid Vaccine is not being thrust upon them as part of a massive conspiracy to do harm. Merck, who did not have a Covid Vaccine to profit from, released a statement that Ivermectin has not demonstrated efficacy to treat Covid and it didn't change a thing. Can you think of any entity that would be MORE inclined to taut the benefits of a drug than the company that makes it?! And yet, through some 4D chess-flavored explanation, this could also be explained away.
This trust problem predated Covid but I think it's a recent phenomenon at this scale. I believe the social and political situations (fueled by the internet and telepresence as the primary means of exchanging ideas/information) in this country created this situation. Activism has replaced honesty, pragmatism, and tolerance. So many institutions have willfully betrayed the trust of those they are meant to serve. And there are huge incentives for actors to exploit this growing rift. More incentive to throw gas on that fire than to start a "Well, actually..." themed substack.
And it's never been easy to overwhelm the sense of perspective. With the sheer quantity of information on the internet, we, as a society have no sense of denominator. We have amplification of every voice, anecdote, "lived experience", etc. We have smart phones and security cams capturing evidence of nasty things day in and day out. So for the vaccine skeptics, they've found plenty of doctors telling them they're right to be skeptical and they've heard plenty of testimonies. Against an existing dearth of trust, their numerator continues to grow gradually, and it staves off this massive denominator: a vaccine experiment unparalleled in scope. We have the conditions upon which any individual can easily ignore the latter in favor of the former. If you think LeBron is inaccurate for saying "We're literally hunted EVERYDAY/EVERYTIME we step foot outside the comfort of our homes!" he's just ignoring the denominator too.
In short, lots of people are feeling deceived, and they can find almost innumerable examples to validate their perceptions. And sometimes, when they decide to challenge the prevailing orthodoxy, they're cast out of polite society, one way or the other.
The way out of this vortex of fear is more Joe Rogan-like experiences, more curiosity, more House of Strauss thoughtfulness, more water cooler talk about these (suddenly) taboo subjects, more honest and replicable science. But most important is that these organizations start cleaning up their houses. How the medical establishment and the hard sciences are now following DEI, CRT, etc is literally a believable plot for a dystopian novel about the unraveling of the scientific revolution (and perhaps modern civilization itself). As we literally Ctrl+Z the scientific method and replace it with Science!-ism in service of moral clarity or activism...we may be doing some real damage to our future. (note:we'll probably be fine! Everyone predicting ruin should reflect on how terrible we are at predicting the future...)
To be fair Merck didn’t want to promote the use of ivermectin because it’s no long under patent protection and is available in generic form. Anybody can make it. They were also advocating against ivermectin in the lead up to the launch of their new antiviral - molnupirivir which will be patent protected.
This is a totally plausible explanation and to say people are crazy for believing that Merck has ulterior motives is silly a helping fuel distrust in media and their messaging.
I’m not an ivermectin advocate by any stretch but there is a playbook here to downplay medication that isn’t profitable. Fluvoximine is arguably a better example of this though - it’s shown to be more effective in better quality studies than ivermectin.
yeah it's definitely a rant though. But thanks. I appreciate that. One thing I didn't really express is my sentiment that it's actually very hard to have a firm understanding of what to do / should have been done about Covid even if you were sincere and had no strong priors. So while I'm ranting on and on about lack of trust because people are nefarious or paternalistic, it's also just hard in this case because medicine is hard, people are hard, and the intersection of biology, the public, and difficult decisions was always going to be really hard. I tried really hard to cut through the noise and figure out what the actual risks were. It was hard. It is hard. I do think growing safetyism, paternalism, and heavy handedness made this worse and will make us worse in the future and certainly further eroded trust for many people. Also, I would like someone smarter on these issues to explain to me how the medical community can postulate that Covid has very dangerous long term effects but is certain beyond a reasonable doubt that mRNA vaccines cannot have any negative long term effects. I can trust the instinct, but I just don't understand how you can know for a fact that something can and can not have long term effects before you've had a chance to observe it. unless Covid isn't novel and mRNA vaccines aren't new and we have enough comparables to suggest we know how this will affect people in decades. But like Zach described, a wait and see approach has always seemed very reasonable. To quote Richard Thaler: "People aren't dumb, the world is hard."
this has been the best outlaid perspective I have heard on vaccine skepticism. It is the author reading his piece and after 7 min or so has no Jordan Peterson in it at all (in case you're not a fan and he would turn you away). Very long but I thought he laid out numerous points that I had not heard before.
I really appreciate when you call yourself out on giving Kerr a pass. It's understandable, but his stance on Hong Kong (I have to ask my professor brother-in-law) was weak given his zeal on other issues.
I hope you get around to media coverage of the Beijing Games particularly coverage around Eileen Gu.
Yeah, the Eileen Gu thing is crying out for some serious coverage and analysis. Based on what little I know it looks pretty gross, but I am open to other perspectives.
Great piece. You could copy paste SVG's tweets and substitute them for the texts I get from my dad. I work in PR, so I have a nose for what PR messaging looks like and that is basically what Boomers are pushing.
I appreciate that you don't follow the "narrative." That's why I'm here, obviously. You're in favor of vaccinations for adults (seemingly), but against masks for kids (again, seemingly). Curious where you stand on vaccines for children?
I'm personally sick of my kids having to spend 8 hours a day stuck in their masks when they're largely ineffective and my kids are at extremely low risk. We've all already had Covid and are unvaccinated, so I'm not willing to go down the vaccination route with my kids. With vaccination mandates imminent for schools and mask mandates seeming like they will never go away for kids I'm getting ready to flee California after living here for 30+ years.
This is spot on. The followers/listeners dynamic is a great way to label this phenomenon you see all over Twitter and in media. Can't wait to share this with a couple of ex-journalist friends
Well done by Ethan, his point about the NYT being far better than today's WaPo is correct, though that's not much of a yardstick to measure against.
I do wonder why so many NBA coaches fall into the Van Gundy / Popovich camp. Ethan's written about Popovich before I think, describing him as someone who helps strangers in their building who hurt their back in the elevator, so it's hard to dislike him but he manages to pull it off with his fire and brimstone pronouncements. Think it's worthwhile to discuss a border wall, or that CRT is going overboard? Then you're a Neo-Nazi who needs to be cast out of polite society. No wonder Kawhi left San Antonio-- imagine what gets said in the huddle if you question a play he's diagrammed.
Steve Kerr hurts even more. He's obviously a smart guy, likable and with a self deprecating sense of humor but some of his pronouncements are Popovich without the snarl, casting half the county into the Ignorant Rube pit if they disagree with him on issues of the day, but any conversation about China and the NBA gets an "it's complicated" dodge. Strange way to build the NBA brand.
The 2010 Arizona SB 1070 controversy is a good example. It required immigrants to have their paperwork on them at all times (sounds like a vaccine passport?) and law enforcement could ask to see it if they suspected you were in the country illegally.
When the bill passed the Phoenix Suns (GM: Steve Kerr) went in-your-face with the 'Los Suns' uniforms along with statements about valuing diversity and how misguided the law was. Agree with it or not, there were less incendiary ways of expressing opposition, and compared with his very quiet stance on China and the NBA, where far worse is happening and where his voice could carry some weight -- at a cost -- Kerr is giving the impression of someone looking for easy applause.
Yeah that's when the NBA finally lost me. Kerr's "no comment." Morey finds himself at the center of a international controversy for expressing his opinion on a geopolitical matter. If there was one person on planet Earth that should have something to say about this, it was Steve Kerr. Kerr was an NBA GM, like Morey. Kerr's father was a political scientist that worked in the middle east. His father was described (by his mother) thusly "He spoke the truth as he saw it". He was murdered, probably for saying things that people didn't agree with.
Against this personal history, and given his penchant no holds barred social commentary, he responds by saying he doesn't have anything to say. More:
“You’re not used to me saying that, are you? No comment. You’re all stunned.”
“What I’ve found is that it’s easy to speak on issues that I’m passionate about and that I feel like I’m well-versed on,” Kerr said. “And I’ve found that it makes the most sense to stick to topics that fall in that category. So, I try to keep my comments to those things. So, it’s not difficult. It’s more ... that I’m trying to learn.”
His comments got even worse and more vindictive, but seriously can anyone come up with a more appropriate individual to weight in on this than Steve Kerr?
There's definitely a special place in hell for all the boomers with grown children who want to pretend like two years of masking toddlers is no big deal.
I've only paid a little bit of attention to this Rogan topic, but has there been much elaboration on what exactly is the "Misinformation" being used? Just from the NYT article SVG referenced, the "Misinformation" is apparently 1) quote about being in shape is more important than the vax, 2) ivermectin, and 3) he had Robert Malone on as a guest. I don't see what is false/incorrect in those, so maybe I'm missing something.
But as far as I see it, "Misinformation" is basically the same thing as "Fake News" just from a different political tribe.
Great read though, and I'd be very interested to know more about these Slack channels for media companies. They seem so fascinating in how they may be contributing to editorial influence.
I think one of the reasons the internet (or should I say Internet? Are we still doing that?) is so annoying is that, regardless of age group or political leaning, everything is just so damn CATASTROPHIC.
Everyone likes to say that "we have never been more divided", but to me it seems that we have never been more upset about whatever it is we don't agree with. Maybe I'm wrong, and maybe the only difference is that these days the extreme rhetoric is simply more readily available for consumption rather than more prevalent in what we call mainstream media. In any case, I find that being exposed to so much anger about everything - whether justly or not in my view - is an exhausting and occasionally numbing experience.
I should add that, as an overseas reader, I find the American variant of this type of outrage and online activism to be extremely extreme, and thus singularly annoying.
(Also, for the record, I find SVG to be an overall funny and enjoyable character, and I probably share many of his views. I'm not sure about the Rogan thing, and I'm not sure why I felt the need to add this disclaimer in the first place.)
You struck another nerve Ethan. I can't get over how these buffoons always assume that we are just a group of lemmings and aren't capable of rational thought. If anything, Rogan's audience is probably more grounded and intelligent than these so called experts. Probably are afraid of them/us. That's all I can come up with. He is obviously a threat to the system and must be removed.
I really enjoy your writing and have been a fan for a while and am a subscriber. I also strongly agree with the thesis of this article. What disturbs me is your repeated distaste for kids wearing masks in school. With 2 young kids myself I don’t see this as such a burden or terrible thing in life. Masks mitigate the spread and seem like a reasonable measure to take in schools. Sorry to trod over this lame 2 year old argument but I’ve seen the Asher reference a number of times and just fundamentally disagree with the concern. Overall though thanks for your articulate and well thought out essays and podcasts, I greatly enjoy it.
Well written and hit the nail on the head. My in-laws are genuinely nice people. They are very progressive and read the NYT daily and as gospel. I don't discuss politics much at all, besides a few joking comments from time to time. I was wondering why they are ok with the way the paper distorts stories or leaves out very important parts of a story if it makes their "side" look bad. I've come to the conclusion, they have no clue whats going on if its not reported in the NYT or CNN, MSNBC, etc. They didn't even know what the 1619 project was and they subscribe to the NYT.
When the vaccines came out my wife was pregnant and we decided she would hold off as we saw more potential cons than pros (we had already had covid in Nov of 2020). The not so gentle pressure she got from her OBGYN was pretty crazy. She asked the OBGYN if she has seen a lot of babies or mothers have serious issues with COVID and she was told "that information is not important".
After she gave birth she still didn't get the vaccine because that was when Omicron was starting and everyone around us who was vaccinated was still getting it. So again, we decided, whats the point. I got two shots but have no intention of getting a booster. My father in-law, out of the blue, sent this text (with a link to an article) to my wife: "Maddie, just listen to this ABC report on the facts supporting you getting your COVID shot, compared to people who do not get a shot. One last note, if you get sick from a bad case of COVID and die because you do not believe in science, when your children grow up they will ask all of us why you did not protect yourself during this pandemic."
Mind you, we already got COVID a year earlier and just recently easily recovered from a second COVID experience. I'm not aware of a single instance where someone got COVID a 2nd time and died from COVID.
His text perfectly summarizes the BOOMER position and their complete lack of awareness that people make decisions based on many factors. It has never occurred to him that we actually weighed the pros and cons and she decided to not get it based on her own reasons. In his opinion, she is just someone who "doesn't follow the science".
We’re facing a group of people who act in extremely immoral ways through a personal lens of ultimate morality. "Your kids are going to ask all of us why..." is a horrific thing to say to your daughter. "That information is not important" is medical malpractice in my book. These people have oriented themselves 90 degrees towards this ultimate morality, blinding them to the dehumanizing effects of their behavior. There is a never-ending cohort who don't see things through this lens, which seemingly emboldens those who do - those who don't partake in this sort of behavior become the endless fodder for their moral crusade.
If faced with a situation like this, I may explain to a family member or medical practitioner that I can no longer have a relationship with someone who behaves in these ways. Clearly stating that these people have crossed moral boundaries around how they treat other human beings - informing them that this is a barrier that will prevent you from having a close personal relationship/medical relationship/etc. with them - would be the high road in my estimation once these sorts of emotional extorsion and dehumanizing comments start to come your way.
This isn't something I would do lightly – you want to have a discussion about making students at a local school board meeting, wonderful! My opinion is no, but we should definitely be respectfully and honesty be having robust conversations about policy at the local, state, and national level- but when someone told me they hope I (26 years old, not fully vaccinated) learn my lesson when I kill my elderly family members (unfortunately, a true story), the time has come for me to rethink my ability to trust, sympathize with, and be in relationship with them. These people are addicted to the ideas that make them feel safe, so focused on one fear that all other threats become secondary. Attacking their fears is not productive but directing their attention to the core values of a life worth living - hope, meaning, community, family, the pursuit of happiness, etc. - may shake them from their panic and confusion.
Fentanyl killed nearly 40k in 2020 in the 18-45 bracket. COVID - 20K. When is the last time Fentanyl made the headlines of the NYT and WP.
Sorry something similar happened to you. While I agree that separating myself from people who say things like that, I have 3 boys who love their grandparents. I can't sour the relationship for their sake. The irony is, by him sending that text, it made her less likely to get the vaccine, not more. People don't like being told what to do, hence the major issue with a vaccine mandate. I did tell her this morning (this text was sent weeks ago with no follow up nor does he mention it when they see each other in person) that it really soured my feelings towards her parents. She said she completely understands.
They truly are good people but lost in their own bubble where nothing can be questioned. I want her to 100% get a different OBGYN but that her choice, not mine.
Feel that. This discussions are hard, and nuanced, and resolution tends to be based on compromise for the well being of all involved - having kids is universally credited as life changing in this respect. Deferring to their best interest is honorable especially when difficult. Way to be a good dad and husband.
"The irony is, by him sending that text, it made her less likely to get the vaccine, not more." This gets to the root of my sour feelings towards these people. YOU'RE NOT HELPING. While a heterodox community is having a discussion about your in-laws in good faith by trying to steelman their position through a lens of generational cultural differences, I highly doubt they are doing much self reflection, or, to be fair, would assume that based on my own experience with people who hold similar views. If we have a SINGLE opinion on vaccines, masks, lockdowns, mandates that don't alight with their own, they call us dumb, mouth-breathing, and dangerous, make assumptions about our political leanings and personal beliefs such as religious affiliations. I don't like to have strong opinions, and I've done by best to keep evolving as better information is made available, but talking to those who wish to consolidate every data point into one narrative just makes that harder, and so I made the decision for myself to prioritize different relationships.
Thanks for the posts, Zach, and thanks for everyone here. This is a really cool community. I spend a lot more time than I would have expected reading through comments on the HoS. I expected top notch journalism from Ethan, but have been surprised by the thoughtfulness, honesty, and writing quality of the subscribers. I hope it stays that way : )
Woof man, people feel incredibly free to say awful shit as long as they are on "The Right Side". I don't think we would see exactly eye to eye on the merits of the booster if we discussed it for 20 minutes, but holy shit, there is a lot of space between "not seeing eye to eye" and being a callous prick.
Maybe we wouldn't see eye to eye on the merits of the booster but having the conversation is exactly how you get people to see your perspective. A Sam Harris podcast is what convinced me to get the vaccine to begin with. I don't agree with his opinion on most topics but I listen to his podcast to get a perspective from someone who I don't agree with on most political topics. Why do I listen to him? Because I trust him and he doesn't think just because I'm conservative, that I'm a racist, dumb ass.
That's what scares me so much about Rogan and the push to cancel him. Conversations are how you get people to change their minds and see different perspectives. It's very interesting how he hasn't had any shows this week. The conspiracy part of my brain thinks they are working on a buy out so both parties can go their separate ways.
Man, that is totally wild. If my in-laws did that, we would have some extremely serious problems with the future of our relationship. I admire you for keeping a cool head.
My MIL has asked me twice why I didn’t get the vaccine. I told her both times why and that was the end of it.
One simple rule I have: Don't ever react strongly to a text, particularly from people 40 and older who don't understand how to convey any kind of nuance in a text message lol
yeah and this is a great example of trust erosion. I made peace with getting the vaccine because I trust my doctor and he told me it was a good idea and laid It out as such: "you're not gonna die of covid, and you're not going to have more than a day of a sore arm or discomfort from the shot. It could keep you from being laid up for a week or two." But the government created a policy by which I had to get the vaccine to keep my job, and there was no accommodation for natural immunity. Last I checked, natural immunity showed to be more effective at reducing the effects of Omicron than vaccines. The government mandate of course, stated in it's executive summary that it's ruling were "science-based".
The midwives my wife works with have almost lost several later term pregnant Covid patients and have had to deliver infants at 35 to 37 weeks to make sure mom and baby stayed alive , so yeah they put a little pressure on pregnant women to get vaccinated.
Then maybe the OBGYN should have given that information?!?! Saying "that information is not important" does not actually help inform the patient of the pros and cons. Should OBGYN's "put a little pressure" on pregnant women to deliver their baby or get an abortion? A doctors job is not to "pressure" patients into a decision they feel is best for them. Some doctors offices are taking away scales so people don't feel bad about their weight. We know obesity is a leading cause for Covid deaths but we don't care about "pressuring" fat people to lose weight. We only "pressure" unvaccinated people. So yeah if the midwives your wife works with put "pressure" on their patients I think they suck at their job.
Of course they promote weight loss , eating properly and screening for diabetes and doing otherprenatal screening tests and testing for beta strep. That’s not sucking at their job . That’s called relating to the patient health measures that will promote a positive outcome in the delivery room . Nothing is more tragic than a patient with gestational diabetes losing a baby. Reminding a patient at each visit the importance of self care is good practice , not sucking.
I appreciate the anecdote, but in order to draw a single conclusion from this, there's would have to be a lot more information. When would be some very important (Alpha, Delta, Omicron), as well as health condition of the mothers. Without either, this is just a useless anecdote.
Zach brings up a very good point. A well trained medical practitioner knows that communication is equally important as medical science when dealing 1 on 1 with patients. If you give someone perfect medical advice in a way that makes them feel pressured, you risk undermining the potential good that the medical care could provide; that would be the definition of sucking at your job.
damn - that's a text. I hope Maddie responded with "new phone, who dis"
Haha she didn't reply, I'm not even sure what you'd say to a text like that. Though if she did that would have been a hilarious response.
One thing I think you leave out from the Boomer Doomer typology is the implication (and sometimes explicit declaration) that Americans are too irredeemably stupid to be trusted. It flows from all Boomer Doomer takes - this idea that Americans must be lied to, misled, or otherwise guided because if we give them a full view of reality they'll merely drown in their own stupidity. Complex policies cannot be explained; why bother? Americans are stupid, they could never understand something as complicated as "we need these masks for another purpose so try to not buy them right now" or "COVID is dangerous but not as dangerous as some other activities".
Boomer Doomers are followers in part because they are the enlightened. They have learned long ago that Americans are too stupid to ever think for themselves and must follow blindly and have adopted that ethos into their own personal consumption and beliefs.
Yep, another great piece here at HoS. I don't want to be a different kind of doomer, but I see very strong connections between the (exceedingly aggressive) push for "moral clarity" over objectivity to be a potent ingredient in a larger civilization-ending-level threat. I think you've alluded to a sentiment before, Ethan. Something like "how long can a country that hates itself remain healthy?" ( Sorry if I'm totally dreaming that up.) But let me add to it: "how long can a country remain healthy admist a trust epidemic?" Literally every Covid Vaccine skeptic I know is vaccinated against all the things we were supposed to get vaccinated against. They give blood. They'll walk into an ER for some ailment (or their kid is sick) and doctors will poke and prod and prescribe and do all kinds of things and there's this quaint trust that that's the whole point of doctors and hospitals. You show up with your problems, they do their best and try to get you healthy. Most people, like your boomers reading the NYT, don't have the energy or expertise to have a better shot at knowing the right health decisions. They just follow. And yet, suddenly, with Covid, everyone's a data scientist, or microbiologist, or policy expert. For those angry with vaccine skeptics, consider this: their trust in institutions has eroded so far that people are literally willing to die rather than take their medicine. They are in many ways, so mind-f**ked and disoriented that they will contort their thinking to explain away happenings that should be very strong evidence that the Covid Vaccine is not being thrust upon them as part of a massive conspiracy to do harm. Merck, who did not have a Covid Vaccine to profit from, released a statement that Ivermectin has not demonstrated efficacy to treat Covid and it didn't change a thing. Can you think of any entity that would be MORE inclined to taut the benefits of a drug than the company that makes it?! And yet, through some 4D chess-flavored explanation, this could also be explained away.
This trust problem predated Covid but I think it's a recent phenomenon at this scale. I believe the social and political situations (fueled by the internet and telepresence as the primary means of exchanging ideas/information) in this country created this situation. Activism has replaced honesty, pragmatism, and tolerance. So many institutions have willfully betrayed the trust of those they are meant to serve. And there are huge incentives for actors to exploit this growing rift. More incentive to throw gas on that fire than to start a "Well, actually..." themed substack.
And it's never been easy to overwhelm the sense of perspective. With the sheer quantity of information on the internet, we, as a society have no sense of denominator. We have amplification of every voice, anecdote, "lived experience", etc. We have smart phones and security cams capturing evidence of nasty things day in and day out. So for the vaccine skeptics, they've found plenty of doctors telling them they're right to be skeptical and they've heard plenty of testimonies. Against an existing dearth of trust, their numerator continues to grow gradually, and it staves off this massive denominator: a vaccine experiment unparalleled in scope. We have the conditions upon which any individual can easily ignore the latter in favor of the former. If you think LeBron is inaccurate for saying "We're literally hunted EVERYDAY/EVERYTIME we step foot outside the comfort of our homes!" he's just ignoring the denominator too.
In short, lots of people are feeling deceived, and they can find almost innumerable examples to validate their perceptions. And sometimes, when they decide to challenge the prevailing orthodoxy, they're cast out of polite society, one way or the other.
The way out of this vortex of fear is more Joe Rogan-like experiences, more curiosity, more House of Strauss thoughtfulness, more water cooler talk about these (suddenly) taboo subjects, more honest and replicable science. But most important is that these organizations start cleaning up their houses. How the medical establishment and the hard sciences are now following DEI, CRT, etc is literally a believable plot for a dystopian novel about the unraveling of the scientific revolution (and perhaps modern civilization itself). As we literally Ctrl+Z the scientific method and replace it with Science!-ism in service of moral clarity or activism...we may be doing some real damage to our future. (note:we'll probably be fine! Everyone predicting ruin should reflect on how terrible we are at predicting the future...)
Substack's defiant email amid calls for censorship was spot on: https://on.substack.com/p/society-has-a-trust-problem-more
To be fair Merck didn’t want to promote the use of ivermectin because it’s no long under patent protection and is available in generic form. Anybody can make it. They were also advocating against ivermectin in the lead up to the launch of their new antiviral - molnupirivir which will be patent protected.
This is a totally plausible explanation and to say people are crazy for believing that Merck has ulterior motives is silly a helping fuel distrust in media and their messaging.
I’m not an ivermectin advocate by any stretch but there is a playbook here to downplay medication that isn’t profitable. Fluvoximine is arguably a better example of this though - it’s shown to be more effective in better quality studies than ivermectin.
Whoa. Great rant. You almost lost me at moral clarity but I stuck with it. Great use of Ctrl+Z.
yeah it's definitely a rant though. But thanks. I appreciate that. One thing I didn't really express is my sentiment that it's actually very hard to have a firm understanding of what to do / should have been done about Covid even if you were sincere and had no strong priors. So while I'm ranting on and on about lack of trust because people are nefarious or paternalistic, it's also just hard in this case because medicine is hard, people are hard, and the intersection of biology, the public, and difficult decisions was always going to be really hard. I tried really hard to cut through the noise and figure out what the actual risks were. It was hard. It is hard. I do think growing safetyism, paternalism, and heavy handedness made this worse and will make us worse in the future and certainly further eroded trust for many people. Also, I would like someone smarter on these issues to explain to me how the medical community can postulate that Covid has very dangerous long term effects but is certain beyond a reasonable doubt that mRNA vaccines cannot have any negative long term effects. I can trust the instinct, but I just don't understand how you can know for a fact that something can and can not have long term effects before you've had a chance to observe it. unless Covid isn't novel and mRNA vaccines aren't new and we have enough comparables to suggest we know how this will affect people in decades. But like Zach described, a wait and see approach has always seemed very reasonable. To quote Richard Thaler: "People aren't dumb, the world is hard."
this has been the best outlaid perspective I have heard on vaccine skepticism. It is the author reading his piece and after 7 min or so has no Jordan Peterson in it at all (in case you're not a fan and he would turn you away). Very long but I thought he laid out numerous points that I had not heard before.
https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-jordan-b-peterson-podcast/id1184022695?i=1000549585941
Hey man, great comment, I enjoyed it, and generally feel the same way. That is all.
thanks dude - appreciate that!
Never paid for a Substack subscription before, but this article was so well done I figured I owed Ethan nine bucks...
I really appreciate when you call yourself out on giving Kerr a pass. It's understandable, but his stance on Hong Kong (I have to ask my professor brother-in-law) was weak given his zeal on other issues.
I hope you get around to media coverage of the Beijing Games particularly coverage around Eileen Gu.
Yeah, the Eileen Gu thing is crying out for some serious coverage and analysis. Based on what little I know it looks pretty gross, but I am open to other perspectives.
Great piece. You could copy paste SVG's tweets and substitute them for the texts I get from my dad. I work in PR, so I have a nose for what PR messaging looks like and that is basically what Boomers are pushing.
I appreciate that you don't follow the "narrative." That's why I'm here, obviously. You're in favor of vaccinations for adults (seemingly), but against masks for kids (again, seemingly). Curious where you stand on vaccines for children?
I'm personally sick of my kids having to spend 8 hours a day stuck in their masks when they're largely ineffective and my kids are at extremely low risk. We've all already had Covid and are unvaccinated, so I'm not willing to go down the vaccination route with my kids. With vaccination mandates imminent for schools and mask mandates seeming like they will never go away for kids I'm getting ready to flee California after living here for 30+ years.
This is spot on. The followers/listeners dynamic is a great way to label this phenomenon you see all over Twitter and in media. Can't wait to share this with a couple of ex-journalist friends
Well done by Ethan, his point about the NYT being far better than today's WaPo is correct, though that's not much of a yardstick to measure against.
I do wonder why so many NBA coaches fall into the Van Gundy / Popovich camp. Ethan's written about Popovich before I think, describing him as someone who helps strangers in their building who hurt their back in the elevator, so it's hard to dislike him but he manages to pull it off with his fire and brimstone pronouncements. Think it's worthwhile to discuss a border wall, or that CRT is going overboard? Then you're a Neo-Nazi who needs to be cast out of polite society. No wonder Kawhi left San Antonio-- imagine what gets said in the huddle if you question a play he's diagrammed.
Steve Kerr hurts even more. He's obviously a smart guy, likable and with a self deprecating sense of humor but some of his pronouncements are Popovich without the snarl, casting half the county into the Ignorant Rube pit if they disagree with him on issues of the day, but any conversation about China and the NBA gets an "it's complicated" dodge. Strange way to build the NBA brand.
The 2010 Arizona SB 1070 controversy is a good example. It required immigrants to have their paperwork on them at all times (sounds like a vaccine passport?) and law enforcement could ask to see it if they suspected you were in the country illegally.
When the bill passed the Phoenix Suns (GM: Steve Kerr) went in-your-face with the 'Los Suns' uniforms along with statements about valuing diversity and how misguided the law was. Agree with it or not, there were less incendiary ways of expressing opposition, and compared with his very quiet stance on China and the NBA, where far worse is happening and where his voice could carry some weight -- at a cost -- Kerr is giving the impression of someone looking for easy applause.
Yeah that's when the NBA finally lost me. Kerr's "no comment." Morey finds himself at the center of a international controversy for expressing his opinion on a geopolitical matter. If there was one person on planet Earth that should have something to say about this, it was Steve Kerr. Kerr was an NBA GM, like Morey. Kerr's father was a political scientist that worked in the middle east. His father was described (by his mother) thusly "He spoke the truth as he saw it". He was murdered, probably for saying things that people didn't agree with.
Against this personal history, and given his penchant no holds barred social commentary, he responds by saying he doesn't have anything to say. More:
“You’re not used to me saying that, are you? No comment. You’re all stunned.”
“What I’ve found is that it’s easy to speak on issues that I’m passionate about and that I feel like I’m well-versed on,” Kerr said. “And I’ve found that it makes the most sense to stick to topics that fall in that category. So, I try to keep my comments to those things. So, it’s not difficult. It’s more ... that I’m trying to learn.”
His comments got even worse and more vindictive, but seriously can anyone come up with a more appropriate individual to weight in on this than Steve Kerr?
There's definitely a special place in hell for all the boomers with grown children who want to pretend like two years of masking toddlers is no big deal.
I've only paid a little bit of attention to this Rogan topic, but has there been much elaboration on what exactly is the "Misinformation" being used? Just from the NYT article SVG referenced, the "Misinformation" is apparently 1) quote about being in shape is more important than the vax, 2) ivermectin, and 3) he had Robert Malone on as a guest. I don't see what is false/incorrect in those, so maybe I'm missing something.
But as far as I see it, "Misinformation" is basically the same thing as "Fake News" just from a different political tribe.
Great read though, and I'd be very interested to know more about these Slack channels for media companies. They seem so fascinating in how they may be contributing to editorial influence.
Great point about the “misinformation” vs “fake news” Two sides of the same coin.
I think one of the reasons the internet (or should I say Internet? Are we still doing that?) is so annoying is that, regardless of age group or political leaning, everything is just so damn CATASTROPHIC.
Everyone likes to say that "we have never been more divided", but to me it seems that we have never been more upset about whatever it is we don't agree with. Maybe I'm wrong, and maybe the only difference is that these days the extreme rhetoric is simply more readily available for consumption rather than more prevalent in what we call mainstream media. In any case, I find that being exposed to so much anger about everything - whether justly or not in my view - is an exhausting and occasionally numbing experience.
I should add that, as an overseas reader, I find the American variant of this type of outrage and online activism to be extremely extreme, and thus singularly annoying.
(Also, for the record, I find SVG to be an overall funny and enjoyable character, and I probably share many of his views. I'm not sure about the Rogan thing, and I'm not sure why I felt the need to add this disclaimer in the first place.)
This reminds me of Scott Alexander and Zvi Mowshowitz's "conversation" about trust (or the lack thereof) of the media. Highly recommend:
Scott's Post: https://astralcodexten.substack.com/p/bounded-distrust
Zvi's Response: https://thezvi.substack.com/p/on-bounded-distrust
You struck another nerve Ethan. I can't get over how these buffoons always assume that we are just a group of lemmings and aren't capable of rational thought. If anything, Rogan's audience is probably more grounded and intelligent than these so called experts. Probably are afraid of them/us. That's all I can come up with. He is obviously a threat to the system and must be removed.
This is the best article you’ve ever written. Bravo.
Ethan - This is your best piece yet. The last paragraph really nails it in a way that I never considered before.
I really enjoy your writing and have been a fan for a while and am a subscriber. I also strongly agree with the thesis of this article. What disturbs me is your repeated distaste for kids wearing masks in school. With 2 young kids myself I don’t see this as such a burden or terrible thing in life. Masks mitigate the spread and seem like a reasonable measure to take in schools. Sorry to trod over this lame 2 year old argument but I’ve seen the Asher reference a number of times and just fundamentally disagree with the concern. Overall though thanks for your articulate and well thought out essays and podcasts, I greatly enjoy it.