The News Thread

[Krow]

My favorite part of that article is when he basically says the virus is some kind of chinese government bioattack.

“Well, they say it came out of China,” he answered, “and I’m not putting it past the Chinese government in communist China.” Meaning, to export a virus on purpose? “Normally, this kind of thing spreads slowly,” he answered, so “I put two and two together. I’ve been around a long time, girl.”

 

[rms]

They conflated that academic scientist who got busted for taking money from China and the disease for a long ass time haha

 

[Einherjar86]

Does he mean that Chinese people (regardless of where they live) have it automatically or is he implying that Chinese people are more likely to be in areas where other Chinese people cluster and where more Chinese people are the higher the chance someone recently returned from China with the virus?

The latter seems like an obvious thing to point out to me.

Whatever he means, the carelessness of his language and others' (the president included) has led to some pretty reprehensible behavior over here in the States. My wife and I both know people of Asian descent who have experienced racism since Trump started calling it the Chinese virus, specifically pertaining to their purported likeliness of being infected. It's disgusting. I don't care if Trump et al are doing it because that's where the virus came from (we also don't know that for sure; we only know that's where it was first discovered and reported); it's exacerbating racist sentiments, and they should stop.

The source of the virus was Wuhan, and it has been widely published that garment workers FROM WUHAN were working in the part of Italy which became the epicenter for the virus. There were even articles in February how a bunch of liberal Northern Italians were going around hugging the Chinese to virtue signal how non-racist those wops are. Do you think Hong Kong Fluey just spontaneously pops up in random parts of the planet in an EEOC-compliant manner? How fucking stupid are you?

See comment above. I don't give a shit about origins. Fuck this language. If you don't see any problems with it, it's because you're a bog standard white bitch (which I am too, I just happen to know it).

 

[TechnicalBarbarity]

ein just loves to pretend that he mingles with minorities. Last time it was the spaniards, persians and afghanis, now it's the orientals. I bet he's about as white as mayonnaise and has zero friends that come from other backgrounds.

 

[Einherjar86]

 

[Dak]

Remember when we were told by the media that racism was the real pandemic? Good times.

 

[Einherjar86]

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/03/28/...dFRa8cKAPHEhzXgcW0dOXTpD9ms6044sYUTJSttjAdppI

One anti-Fauci tweet on Tuesday said, “Sorry liberals but we don’t trust Dr. Anthony Fauci.”

We're fucked. Not all on Trumpophiles either, I know a lot of people in my circle who didn't take this seriously enough even at the beginning of this month, myself included. I heard from colleagues in microbiology way back in January commenting that this could be bad, but late-stage capitalism demands disciplinary attention and focus. Everybody's in their own bubble, even when we think we're not--not epistemologically, necessarily, but heuristically.

2008 marked the beginning of the end of the American experiment. There's a chance we could maneuver toward something sustainable, but it's not looking good. My wife and I won't be raising children in the same country our parents did, no matter how stupid the levels of MAGA-mania get. The goal now is to figure out how to imagine the future.

 

[Dak]

I've been taking it seriously since early February just like the rest of right (non-MAGA) twitter, but until the powers that be took it seriously I didn't have the option to isolate. I hope coronachan drives us towards a more patchwork world. There is no singular American experiment. America has never stopped experimenting. The current iteration has been underway since 1965 (and I don't mean the Civil Rights Act) demographically, 1971 monetarily, and ~1980 corporately. What we have been experiencing since the dotcom bust has been a series of cascading failures that have been papered over repeatedly (I mean that both economically and via distributed Ministry of Truth). This is just the latest, and it's taking more paper than ever (some irony that the primary meme of the coronapocalypse to this point is the lack of toilet paper). Good times create weak men, and weak men create hard times. This is the Turning we live in.

 

[HamburgerBoy]

Nah the Civil Rights Act was far more impactful (and deadly) than the immigration reform. The latter ended a diracial nation, the former ended a monocultural nation. We had mass immigration before Coolidge but (Jews aside) could at least more or less assimilate them.

See comment above. I don't give a shit about origins. Fuck this language. If you don't see any problems with it, it's because you're a bog standard white bitch (which I am too, I just happen to know it).

Only an English major could think that there is a meaningful difference between "a lot of Chinese" and "a lot of people from China".

 

[Einherjar86]

I've been taking it seriously since early February just like the rest of right (non-MAGA) twitter, but until the powers that be took it seriously I didn't have the option to isolate. I hope coronachan drives us towards a more patchwork world. There is no singular American experiment. America has never stopped experimenting. The current iteration has been underway since 1965 (and I don't mean the Civil Rights Act) demographically, 1971 monetarily, and ~1980 corporately. What we have been experiencing since the dotcom bust has been a series of cascading failures that have been papered over repeatedly (I mean that both economically and via distributed Ministry of Truth). This is just the latest, and it's taking more paper than ever (some irony that the primary meme of the coronapocalypse to this point is the lack of toilet paper). Good times create weak men, and weak men create hard times. This is the Turning we live in.

I don't share your desires, but I don't disagree with your diagnoses. The success of Reagan was little more than an American flag draped over a kraken.

Nah the Civil Rights Act was far more impactful (and deadly) than the immigration reform. The latter ended a diracial nation, the former ended a monocultural nation. We had mass immigration before Coolidge but (Jews aside) could at least more or less assimilate them.

I think you could argue that what was deadly was two centuries of enslavement and homegrown terror against African Americans.

Only an English major could think that there is a meaningful difference between "a lot of Chinese" and "a lot of people from China".

I'm an English PhD. Bitch.

 

[HamburgerBoy]

Use your PhD to find a non-offensive term that encapsulates the nation of origin of the virus as it arrived in Italy

Daily reminder that the hundred year period between the civil war and 64 CRA had a lynching rate of blacks of approximately 5 per year. Additional reminder that most of those lynchings were facilitated by a Supreme Court decision to deny a right to bear arms for individual self-defense, a ruling still favored by left-liberals to this day.

 

[Dak]

I don't share your desires, but I don't disagree with your diagnoses. The success of Reagan was little more than an American flag draped over a kraken.

Reagan was very much the 80s Trump. Did some good things, but mostly papered over bad things. Not surprising Trump copied him. Same energy. Clinton didn't really improve much but got a dead-cat-bump from the disintegration of the USSR and the financialization/parasitisation of America. While the S&L crisis was the first canary (post Reagan), the dotcom bust was the next, and the canaries are dying faster as the proverbial oxygen gets ever more depleted.

I think you could argue that what was deadly was two centuries of enslavement and homegrown terror against African Americans.

No one has killed more African Americans than Africans and African Americans, by a long shot. The only homegrown terror against African Americans in numbers that matter is gang violence.

I don't even get mad about how wrong people are on this stuff anymore. There's simply too much going on out there, and access to it all, for people to be able to handle it all. Plus, we didn't evolve to handle this environment. Patchwork is my hope because it's the only way we can move forward as a species at this point. Ein needs his little patch, and I need mine.

 

[HamburgerBoy]

Clinton didn't improve anything. Opioid epidemic, pharma-gov't revolving door, decimated the manufacturing sector by giving China most-favored-nation status, committed the foreign actions that would inspire bin Laden to defend Islam against Western aggression, expanded speculation in the finance and real estate sectors. Best thing he did was by accident, in signing the assault weapons ban which more than anything empowered the NRA and turned the Republicans into a pro-2A party. That his successor was even worse just shows what absolute garbage America has turned into.

EDIT: Forgot the one redeeming aspect, that being his appointment of a majority-ruling federal judge in a 2-1 decision that decided that video game mechanics were not copyrightable. If that had gone the other way, we'd probably be living in a world where the gamers would have had no choice but to rise up.

 

[Dak]

Clinton didn't improve anything. Opioid epidemic, pharma-gov't revolving door, decimated the manufacturing sector by giving China most-favored-nation status, committed the foreign actions that would inspire bin Laden to defend Islam against Western aggression, expanded speculation in the finance and real estate sectors. Best thing he did was by accident, in signing the assault weapons ban which more than anything empowered the NRA and turned the Republicans into a pro-2A party. That his successor was even worse just shows what absolute garbage America has turned into.

EDIT: Forgot the one redeeming aspect, that being his appointment of a majority-ruling federal judge in a 2-1 decision that decided that video game mechanics were not copyrightable. If that had gone the other way, we'd probably be living in a world where the gamers would have had no choice but to rise up.

I was thinking about the budget surplus. But you're basically right otherwise; I did say deadcat bump (bounce*).

 

[TechnicalBarbarity]

Clinton didn't improve anything. Opioid epidemic, pharma-gov't revolving door, decimated the manufacturing sector by giving China most-favored-nation status, committed the foreign actions that would inspire bin Laden to defend Islam against Western aggression, expanded speculation in the finance and real estate sectors ...

.... broke the California jail/prison system with his 3 strikes law.

 

[CiG]

Whatever he means, the carelessness of his language and others' (the president included) has led to some pretty reprehensible behavior over here in the States. My wife and I both know people of Asian descent who have experienced racism since Trump started calling it the Chinese virus, specifically pertaining to their purported likeliness of being infected. It's disgusting. I don't care if Trump et al are doing it because that's where the virus came from (we also don't know that for sure; we only know that's where it was first discovered and reported); it's exacerbating racist sentiments, and they should stop.

I'm sure it sucks for Asians right now, but if I have to choose between avoiding Asian clusters and being considered a bigot, and getting infected, infecting everybody I know and potentially killing people/myself, I'm going with the former.

It's perfectly rational considering the increased chances of 3 things; an Asian being Chinese vs a non-Asian, a Chinese being infected vs non-Chinese, a Chinese being recently returned from/around others recently returned from China vs non-Chinese.

 

[Dak]

The entire liberal/neoliberal (eg postmodern) project is a war against noticing. It's not going to survive itself. Humans will all die out before they realize their utopia (unless they admit that being their utopia).

 

[Einherjar86]

Use your PhD to find a non-offensive term that encapsulates the nation of origin of the virus as it arrived in Italy

Why does the nation of origin matter? That's what's really troubling here. We don't need to specify anything about where it supposedly came from. The desire to do so already betrays anti-Asian sentiment.

Call it COVID-19. That's its name.

Daily reminder that the hundred year period between the civil war and 64 CRA had a lynching rate of blacks of approximately 5 per year. Additional reminder that most of those lynchings were facilitated by a Supreme Court decision to deny a right to bear arms for individual self-defense, a ruling still favored by left-liberals to this day.

You have no argument here, so you distract from the issue.

Your numbers mean more than the actual math (which I don't believe is accurate to begin with). This fact doesn't speak for itself, and says nothing about the atmosphere of terror cultivated by the very threat of lynchings. Also, lynchings hardly account for all the crimes committed against African Americans during that time--so why would you act as though they do?

The second amendment means nothing here. Were African Americans allowed to own firearms to defend themselves, it wouldn't have changed the cultural atmosphere. In fact, it would have made it worse--can you imagine what would have happened if a black man murdered a white man?

Honestly, I can't express enough how little gravity there is to your response.

No one has killed more African Americans than Africans and African Americans, by a long shot. The only homegrown terror against African Americans in numbers that matter is gang violence.

This is a) irrelevant and b) false. Since the seventeenth century, white people on American soil have killed more Africans/African Americans than 20th-century black men have. I realize my thoughts on race in America seem to make people think that I'm the racist one (somehow), but what strikes me is that there's no effort here to understand what it's like to be a black American today.

I'm sure it sucks for Asians right now, but if I have to choose between avoiding Asian clusters and being considered a bigot, and getting infected, infecting everybody I know and potentially killing people/myself, I'm going with the former.

It's perfectly rational considering the increased chances of 3 things; an Asian being Chinese vs a non-Asian, a Chinese being infected vs non-Chinese, a Chinese being recently returned from/around others recently returned from China vs non-Chinese.

It's actually not rational. You're as likely to catch COVID-19 from a non-Asian person in America (maybe more likely). Specifying the country of supposed origin doesn't actually make one any safer, and stigmatizes those who present as Asian because it leads people to believe that those of Asian descent are somehow dirtier or more susceptible to infection. The only purpose it really serves is to cultivate animosity toward Asian Americans.

 

[TechnicalBarbarity]

what strikes me is that there's no effort here to understand what it's like to be a black American today.

what amazes me the most is that a gated community white boy like yourself is the one who thinks "he understands" what it's like to be black. Clearly you are nothing more than a product of this countries broken college system.

 

[Dak]

This is a) irrelevant and b) false. Since the seventeenth century, white people on American soil have killed more Africans/African Americans than 20th-century black men have. I realize my thoughts on race in America seem to make people think that I'm the racist one (somehow), but what strikes me is that there's no effort here to understand what it's like to be a black American today.

Nope, not at all.