Merkel bans meetings of more than two people to slow coronavirus

Re:Merkel bans meetings of more than two people to slow coro... by saila on Sunday March 22, 2020 @04:09PM (#22658165)

Western nations certainly do protect people by force. There are a lot of circumstances where this is true--both protecting people from others as well as from themselves.

In the current circumstances, in a lot of places in the U.S. people are being told to stay home unless they have a specific, approved reason to go out. These are legal orders--not suggestions--that are ultimately upheld by the threat of force.

If things get really bad, we could see the National Guard deployed to enforce curfews and such. And there are other uses of force that are legal in emergency circumstances.

I assume things are similar in Germany and other European countries. The German government could order people to stay home under threat of fines or jail time, even if they haven't done so yet. (I'd be very surprised if this isn't the case.)

Now, I'm not saying the U.S. or Germany is equivalent to China or anything nonsensical like that. I just don't see why people need to keep saying we don't do this or that (e.g., use force) when we clearly do.

I don't have much optimism that people, on the whole, will do the right thing and self-quarantine. Being forced to stay home is probably the only thing that will work.

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Re:Merkel bans meetings of more than two people to slow coro... by mehrdadn on Sunday March 22, 2020 @05:36PM (#22658923)

> unless they have a specific, approved reason to go out

Which includes things like walking, running, & hiking with people at 6ft distance. Not sure how serious that is.

> These are legal orders--not suggestions--that are ultimately upheld by the threat of force.

They're also not getting enforced AFAIK, so not everyone's taking it seriously. I don't really have reason to think anybody's getting "forced" in the sense of threat-of-force.

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Re:Merkel bans meetings of more than two people to slow coro... by saila on Sunday March 29, 2020 @10:01PM (#22724549)

Sure, in the U.S. the cops aren't citing people, as far as I've heard anyway, but I do think the potential to get busted does impact a lot of or maybe most people's behavior. A lot of people would do the right thing anyway, but a lot of other people wouldn't without the underlying threat of force.

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Re:Merkel bans meetings of more than two people to slow coro... by fsh on Sunday March 22, 2020 @05:47PM (#22659012)

They are absolutely getting enforced by the police.

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Re:Merkel bans meetings of more than two people to slow coro... by mehrdadn on Sunday March 22, 2020 @05:52PM (#22659054)

Wait really? I've seen/heard no indication of such, but a fair bit to suggest otherwise. Is this a very recent development? (Any links you can share?)

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Re:Merkel bans meetings of more than two people to slow coro... by fsh on Sunday March 22, 2020 @06:19PM (#22659276)

In Bavaria very similar rules have been in force since Friday night already. Yesterday evening the bavarian police published a statement that they did "thousands of checks" and found "dozens of violations". They say that overall most people are following the rules.

This is the official statement, but some newspapers seem to have more details: https://www.polizei.bayern.de/news/presse/aktuell/index.html...

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Re:Merkel bans meetings of more than two people to slow coro... by mehrdadn on Sunday March 22, 2020 @06:23PM (#22659311)

...you're talking about Germany? The comment I was replying to was "in a lot of places in the U.S. people are being told to stay home unless they have a specific, approved reason to go out".

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Re:Merkel bans meetings of more than two people to slow coro... by fsh on Sunday March 22, 2020 @06:26PM (#22659338)

You are right, I misread your answer. Germany at least seems to be handing out fines.

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Re:Merkel bans meetings of more than two people to slow coro... by Izkata on Sunday March 22, 2020 @07:56PM (#22659963)

A Chicago neighborhood has this:

> The Oak Park order is in effect until April 3, which means local schools will be closed a week longer than the governor has commanded. While the order states that violations can result in a misdemeanor criminal charge, Mayor Anan Abu-Taleb said the goal is not to place people in jail, but rather to use the ordinance to explain the gravity of the COVID-19 pandemic.

https://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:I-uzFm... (google cache due to paywall)

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Re:Merkel bans meetings of more than two people to slow coro... by mehrdadn on Sunday March 22, 2020 @07:59PM (#22659980)

Yeah, exactly. It's similar in other counties. Instead of enforcing, they're basically telling people they won't enforce. It's actively making people not take it seriously.

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Re:Merkel bans meetings of more than two people to slow coro... by LocalH on Monday March 23, 2020 @02:04PM (#22666809)

Enforcement should be limited to congregations of people. If I am walking outside by myself, and nobody is nearby, then the government should not have the right to tell me I have to go inside. This isn't a disease you get by merely stepping outside of your home.

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Re:Merkel bans meetings of more than two people to slow coro... by saila on Sunday March 29, 2020 @09:54PM (#22724521)

I agree, to a point, and currently there are no such restrictions in the U.S. Hopefully things won't get bad enough that they become necessary--i.e., I hope people are finally starting to take this pandemic seriously.

But I think anyone can agree that if it becomes a question of, say, millions of people dying unless people stay home for awhile that it would be okay for government to exercise that kind of authority.

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