> So is smoking inside restaurants.

But not smoking in your car or at home. There are tons of American parents who hotbox their kids with cigarette or marijuana smoke on a daily basis which not only harms them with second hand smoke but increases their chances of smoking themselves by an astronomical factor.

Parents legally harm their children constantly by setting bad diet patterns (child obesity), or substance abuse patterns just to name a few ways. Should we make that illegal and have the state raise those kids?

Your argument is essentially that because we don't / cannot outlaw all ways to harm others, we cannot justify making other laws to avoid harming others?

You are also strawmanning to assume that laws that punish bad parenting would immediately skip to the state raising the kids.

It's not an argument but a question. Should we try to minimize harm in society at the expense of individual freedoms, and if so how far do we take it? Having the state raise kids is being seriously discussed in places like Harvard Law Review as an ideological harm reduction measure. Should any freedom that could possibly be abused to harm others (such as right to own a gun, right to refuse a vaccine, right to own and drive a car, etc.) be eventually outlawed, leaving only freedoms that let you harm yourself?

Cherry picking moments to ask targeted questions is more or less a form of persuasive arguing.

All laws restrict freedoms to protect the wider society. This isn't a novel concept. Not being able to murder is a freedom deprived of you. The question of "should any freedom that could possibly be abused to harm others be eventually outlawed" is obviously "No". Law is not the only tool to encourage better behavior.

But passing laws to outlaw any of your examples doesn't mean we're saying "Yes" anymore than outlawing murder does. Those are just specific laws. The question is "which freedoms should be restricted to prevent individuals from harming others". Your original framing of the question makes it an all or nothing case, but its not.

The state does deprive people of rights to raise their kids if they're really awful parents. That does not mean that making smoking in a car with kids illegal guarantees that this would be the associated punishment.

There is a great chasm between direct action resulting in tragedy and inaction for the preservation of autonomy having an infinitesimally small probability of directly resulting in tragedy.

Comparing choosing to drive drunk with not choosing to take a particular action that has an infinitesimally small probability of directly causing tragedy are not remotely comparable.

We’re talking about health guidelines at the state and national level here. What matters is the big picture not a single data point. No one cares if Joe has the vaccine, we care that X% percentage of the total population has been infected or that Y% percentage of people are vaccinated.

We’re in a tech forum do I really need to explain this? The probability of an individual hard drive failing is small. If you’re building a gaming rig, you don’t need to worry about it, if you’re building a data center that small probability becomes a problem.

How can you possibly believe those choices aren’t having an effect when we are living the consequences of those actions? The number of cases are going up, younger people are dying, hospitals are filling to capacity.

My state is essentially out of ICU beds. There are a handful left in Portland. That directly affects anyone that might get in a car accident, severe infection, etc. Most hospitals in this state stopped elective surgery. That effects anyone that has an 'elective' surgury like removing a tumor, delay means they will get much, much worse and have an increased chance of dying.

While I'm all for 'personal choice', I feel like COVID cases should be de-prioritized for ICU access.

Leaky vaccines provide a high degree of selective pressure on viruses. Who knew?!

Literally hundreds of renowned virologists and epidemiologists, that's who.

Renowned virologists and epidemiologists. You mean the same ones that are telling everyone to get the vaccine?

There are credible people on both sides of the argument.

Inaction is a deliberate choice. It doesn't matter if it's driven by some misguided notion of "autonomy". Deliberately choosing not to get vaccinated is about as close a comparison with drunk driving as you can get. People are deliberately choosing to behave recklessly, with possible deadly results for others. The only difference is one reckless choice is against the law and one is not.

> some misguided notion of "autonomy"

The way the discourse has evolved in the past two years is unbelievable. You see people deride fundamental concepts of democracy like freedom, the right to protest, and bodily autonomy.

No it really isn't a valid comparison and you're clearly more of an ideologue than someone interested in examining the entirety of the situation critically.

If the vaccines are effective, then the only people at risk are those that refuse to get it. Everyone is subject to the consequences of their autonomous choice alone.

The same is true for potential long term negative effects of the vaccines. Those that refuse to get it are subject to the potential long term effects of COVID, if they get it. And those that get the vaccine are guaranteed to be subject to the long term effects of having done so.

Either you believe the vaccines work or you don't. The variants dominated highly vaccinated places like the UK and Israel, so don't blame the unvaccinated for bringing it about. The selective pressure applied to the virus by leaky vaccines is far greater than natural immunity.

> If the vaccines are effective, then the only people at risk are those that refuse to get it. Everyone is subject to the consequences of their autonomous choice alone.

Vaccines aren't a binary 100% or 0% effective tool, it's somewhere in the middle. If my 10 coworkers all get the vaccine, it reduces the probability of me contracting the virus, even if I got vaccinated myself. There is a communal aspect to the vaccine that you are missing here.

Basically every other vaccine is, that's why they're not leaky.

That is simply not true. We were able to eradicate certain illnesses historically using vaccines by getting the vast majority of the population vaccinated, reducing the rate of spread, but they are never a 100% guarantee. I suggest doing some reading on "herd immunity."

It definitely is. I suggest you look up what a "perfect" vaccine is, and how they work. That's what most of the ones that have eradicated diseases are. They allow the body to completely eradicate and prevent infection and transmission. That's what leads to herd immunity.

Leaky vaccines work the same way antibacterial soap did to create MRSA. They leave enough virus present to mutate to evade the mechanism originally intended to fight against it, so only the most robust mutations remain.

Simplifying an efficacy percentage down to a binary "working or not" is a common disinformation tactic. When you do this, you are rounding 90% down to "doesn't work". This doesn't help the discussion. The vaccines reduce chances of death, reduce chances of severe symptoms, reduce chances spread, and reduce chances of infection. But none of them 100%. Boiling that down to "doesn't work" is kind of silly.

> You choice was to fund therapeutics that cure the disease, or try to enforce mandates. You chose wrong, now you live with the choice.

You do know that there's a ton of investment going into curing Covid, right? But you can't just "magic" a cure out of thin air.

When exactly did the manufacturers lie about efficacy? Be specific, and cite your sources.

From 1, page 42

> Among 3410 total cases of suspected but unconfirmed COVID-19 in the overall study population, 1594 occurred in the vaccine group vs. 1816 in the placebo group. Suspected COVID-19 cases that occurred within 7 days after any vaccination were 409 in the vaccine group vs. 287 in the placebo group.

Why are there suspected but not confirmed cases of COVID-19? The document doesn't say. But here's what we know: not all participants received PCR tests to confirm their status, only those that presented some set of symptoms.

1: https://www.fda.gov/media/144245/download

> Getting really drunk and driving home is also a decision about your body. So is smoking inside restaurants.

Smelly analogy is smelly. You're talking about the difference between very specific behaviors being prohibited versus blacklisting half of the population from participating in society with vaccine mandates (many of whom are black, by the way). It's not even close to a valid comparison.

I get the sense that the overlap of people who are pro-mandatory-vaccine and pro-choice is pretty high, being that they are both liberal positions. "My body, my choice" is just fine for women's reproductive rights, even if it meant taking away a baby's chance to live. All of a sudden "my body, my choice" doesn't sound so good?

I got both of my shots but I am so tired of people blaming anti-vaxxers. Give me a vaccine good enough that I don't have to worry about it. Today, I'm literally going to get a COVID test despite having both my vaccine doses. Why? Apparently my government isn't capable of providing useful guidance to keep me safe. We keep hearing about masks, but the mandate got dropped and there was never any talk about mandating the clearly superior KN95 or N95 masks.

Anti-vaxxers have been consistent from the beginning that they're not getting vaccinated. You know whose position keeps changing? FDA & CDC. Whether it's how effective the vaccine is, what the side effects are, do we need to wear masks, how much social distancing is required, whether or not a booster is useful...

You and everyone else blaming anti-vaxxers are letting the government redirect blame for its own failures.

> Why? Apparently my government isn't capable of providing useful guidance to keep me safe. We keep hearing about masks, but the mandate got dropped and there was never any talk about mandating the clearly superior KN95 or N95 masks.

> Anti-vaxxers have been consistent from the beginning that they're not getting vaccinated. You know whose position keeps changing? FDA & CDC. Whether it's how effective the vaccine is, what the side effects are, do we need to wear masks, how much social distancing is required, whether or not a booster is useful...

> You and everyone else blaming anti-vaxxers are letting the government redirect blame for its own failures.

Science adapts and adjusts based on new information.

The lack of willingness to adapt when confronted with new evidence has an unfortunate name.

Science does adapt. And as often repeated, we know little to nothing about COVID.

Lifting the mask mandate was a political move, and it was a poor one. Not pushing KN95/N95 when it was basically guaranteed to be increased protection was a poor move. Taking us out of lockdown, and failing to reinstate the lockdown, was a political move. Also a poor choice.

You're over here talking about science. Half of these decisions are being made based on politics. Wouldn't surprise me if the vaccine approval were also.

It's a mix of politics and science, though. You might argue about the US, ok. But what about Iceland? Singapore? Switzerland? Etc, etc, ad nauseam.

Not every government out there is super abusive.

The alternative is that they're all crazy (and/or malicious), and that's a <<very>> difficult thing to prove. So difficult that the simpler explanation is that they are following scientific processes, slightly mixed with politics and also... full of mistakes because we're all human.

Are you seriously arguing that politics is somehow unique to the USA? What kind of argument is that?

> The alternative is that they're all crazy (and/or malicious), and that's a <<very>> difficult thing to prove.

You don't have to assume the government is crazy or malicious. People are tired of lockdowns, they're tired of COVID, they're tired of wearing masks. Businesses, like restaurants, have been put in a tough spot. I get all that. So do our government officials.

That doesn't mean that there isn't room to criticize government for its mistakes. We already knew there were anti-vaxxers before the pandemic started.

> So difficult that the simpler explanation is that they are following scientific processes

They are _trying_ to. They're not. Lifting the lockdown just because things got better for a bit was a fucking stupid idea, and we're paying the price for that.

You would have been much better off maintaining the lockdown for some period and letting restaurants and other struggling businesses figure out how to pivot.

And for gods sake, the stupid shit like OSHA suspending vaccine side effect reporting requirements is just playing into the hands of anti-vaxxers (https://www.osha.gov/coronavirus/faqs#vaccine).

> Are you seriously arguing that politics is somehow unique to the USA? What kind of argument is that?

:-))

What I'm saying is that if large groups of people, of different dispositions, intentions, cultures, etc. all over the world are doing mostly the same thing, then that means that there are some forces in play that they all can't really control. In this case those forces are social.