iNow

“The death of one man is a tragedy. The death of millions is a statistic.“

You don’t have to be a scientist, or even confirm you accept basic scientific understandings, to join and become a member. Also… There is no debate. Just corrections of creationist ignorance and education of the misinformed.

From the Economist article cited within:

The only thing being denied is an exemption to their clearly outlined and clearly defined policies for entry to the country. I’m genuinely surprised this requires such forceful and repeated clarification with you given your regular passion for things like constitutions. Yes, the lack of equity in granting an exemption caused the public to say this type of hypocrisy is not okay. Are you a fan of and advocate for hypocrisy in general, or just on the topic of public health and vaccines? So you believe all laws and policies should be selectively enforced, or only when a celebrity is involved?

It’s frankly irrelevant, but you’re the one claiming Australia is trying “to exile him from all tennis tournaments” and subsequent exchanges responded to that. The country said: These are our requirements for entry. He did not meet those requirements, and thus was prevented from entering. This isn’t exactly rocket surgery.

No, they’re not. They’re determining / have determined he’s ineligible to enter the country as an unvaccinated foreign citizen. Perhaps your position isn’t quite as strong as you believe since you must continue setting up strawman to knockdown.

Much like we do when requiring clothing in public spaces, proof of residence when voting, valid identification when purchasing firearms, taxes to own property, vaccines to attend school, age thresholds to purchase alcohol and tobacco, proof of minimum skill when operating motor vehicles, and on and on and on ad infinitum. Voting is your mechanism to amend these policies our representative legislatures have the authority to pursue, but you’re badly mistaken when suggesting that authority is absent. These kindergarten level caricatures of freedom in the face of a global threat that’s already killed millions and millions of people were tiresome long ago, and are even more so now. Got polio?

You seem to have the impression that vaccinated people cannot get infected and die. You do realize that’s false, don’t you?

Consumers of the programs demand it. Few people want to eat their broccoli unless it’s swimming in cheese as a soup. Same with news. Folks will watch something that rewards them with laughter more than they’ll tune into C-Span to see firsthand what the joke’s about. They’d rather watch opinionated outrage on Fox and easy conspiracies on Newsmax than sit down for PBS Newshour. Civics not being taught in schools is another matter entirely. With the way the GOP and small minded small government ideologues keep cutting funding and taxes, schools can barely continue teaching arts, music, etc., let alone pay teachers well enough to encourage them to choose to even if such classes were offered.

Except in this analogy Trump is Longshanks

Britain says Moscow is plotting to Install a pro-Russian leader in Ukraine and US intelligence agrees

I think you may want to re-read the quote. Looks like maybe you missed the joke ✌️

“There are two novels that can change a bookish fourteen-year old’s life: The Lord of the Rings and Atlas Shrugged. One is a childish fantasy that often engenders a lifelong obsession with its unbelievable heroes, leading to an emotionally stunted, socially crippled adulthood, unable to deal with the real world. The other, of course, involves orcs."

I’d agree with you, but then we’d both be wrong.

https://newsroom.ucla.edu/releases/vaccinated-workers-shed-less-covid-virus https://www.newscientist.com/article/2294250-how-much-less-likely-are-you-to-spread-covid-19-if-youre-vaccinated/amp/ https://www.healthline.com/health-news/vaccinated-people-can-transmit-the-coronavirus-but-its-still-more-likely-if-youre-unvaccinated https://www.businessinsider.com/nba-vaccinated-people-less-likely-to-spread-covid-to-others-2021-11?amp There are others, likely better ones too, and I could go on, but at the end of the day you either accept the validity of this rather self-evident premise (that unvaccinated people are more likely to spread virus and infect others than vaccinated people) or you don’t.

And here again the argument revolves around personal liberty vs public safety. It’s safe to say that far fewer millions of people would’ve died from this virus if only more of their neighbors were less selfish and ideological.

Entirely valid point.

You’ve just won two medals! One for being a dumbass, and a second for when you lose the first one.

You keep saying this, and yet you keep failing to even try doing so. It feels like I'd have better luck picking up a turd by the clean end than engaging in an intelligible conversation with you. Please... prove me wrong.

You claim evolution is wrong. I engaged you maturely and asked you to please elaborate on your reasoning. In response, you said "finches." That was all. I then recommended you elaborate further. Your response this time was "fossils." Are we to believe you're not just trolling? That's what the current evidence strongly implies... that you're a pathetic little troll. Now... We're perfectly willing to have our minds changed and to align with your conclusions. The remaining question is: Are you willing/able to join us in that type of meaningful exchange of ideas? Thus far, sadly all available evidence is that you're merely here to be a childish pest and I'd very much like to be proven otherwise.

I might amend this to say it shouldn't be "trusted without question," but offering a provisional trust once questioned and surviving any criticisms seems to be a more appropriate path, IMO.

I'm overwhelmed by the force of your intellect and convinced of the error of my previous conclusions. You have successfully pulled the proverbial sword from the rhetorical stone, sir. Bravo! Go get yourself a cookie! Looking for well formulated points in your posts is like searching for a tootsie roll in a septic tank, and I've had diarrheas that were better formed than your position. And people wonder why we laugh at evolution denying morons creationists. My little brother once ate all the Scrabble tiles and his poop made stronger arguments than you seem capable of making.

You’ll need to try harder than that, sir… or even at all