A better example would be the scientists warning that Covid was airborne and cloth face masks were not sufficient to stop the spread of an airborne virus.

That is not how it went.

The official line was that it was not airborne, and that if it were, masks wouldn't help. It turned out they were relying on a definition of "airborne" that only applied to tuberculosis. It really is airborne by an actually useful definition, in a way where masks can help. (And, incidentally, where those clear plastic barriers at stores don't.)

"Reasonable" is doing a lot of work there.

There were and are plenty of scientists critical of the CDC. Immediately after officials lied about masks being ineffective, prominent scientists voiced harsh criticisms. They were not harangued for being anti-science or conspiracy theorists.

On the other hand, people who fundamentally did not grasp what mRNA is, or who believed that COVID caused no more deaths than a flu, or who touted "medicines" that had no demonstrated efficacy—they were deservedly criticized. Unfortunately, the criticism wasn't enough to prevent many of them from making quite a bit of money peddling their beliefs.

Can you please share an US based study which shows that mask mandates are effective? I’m really puzzled but that part.

I can understand why you're puzzled, as my comment was not about mask mandates.

But in the spirit of helping, roughly 6 seconds of Googling in regards to your question turned up this https://www.healthaffairs.org/doi/10.1377/hlthaff.2021.01072

>They were not harangued for being anti-science or conspiracy theorists.

This is not the least bit true.

There was a PBS interview with one of the scientists on President Biden's Covid advisory council who spoke up about how disappointed he was with his colleagues in public health who would not speak out against the mob on the efficacy of cloth face masks to protect against an airborne virus.

https://www.pbs.org/wnet/amanpour-and-company/video/do-masks...

The problem here is that CDC did not want to acknowledge they might be wrong. Even a slight suggestion asking that we concduct a study (at least parse data from Californa and Florida) is considered as “conspiracy”.

we need to get humble scientists: the ones which do science with the goal to find the truth but not one which just want to be right and have too much pride admitting wrong.

I saw this comment coming a mile away...

Good for you. Maybe you should ask yourself why so many people are skeptical? Is it really that they are all crazy wingnuts, or is it perhaps that humans have shown for all of our existence to be untrustworthy, greedy, power-hungry creatures?

The corona vaccine was tested with more scrutiny and larger cohort sizes than other vaccines before. Are you putting doubt on other vaccines as well?

But there was one thing they couldn't have more rigor on testing - time.

I got the jab and the booster, but I think it is pretty clear the political pressure to call it good was higher than in any of those previous vaccines. The monetary pressure was probably also higher. I would not be even remotely surprised if we find it was more dangerous than most vaccines from an autoimmune standpoint simply because of the nature of the virus. I still think the risk-reward was good for almost all adults, and probably children too (my kid got theirs when it was approved), and I understand the paternalistic reasons for guilding the lily on its safety are well intentioned. But I also think it is naive to assume all that pressure had no effect.

It never ceases to amaze me how people can be shown fraud, agree it's everywhere then continue on their merry way as though nothing happened.

If this could survive for 15 years before anyone notices anything wrong then how is it not the sane response to wait for more mRNA studies before mandating it for billions of people?

The instinct to trust others is very strong in our species. I think this is because we needed to trust one another to survive thousands of years ago. The thing is, we lived in small groups where survival was directly dependent on the people immediately around you. Now, we have to "trust" far-off men who have not proven themselves trustworthy in the same way. And yet, our instincts to trust persist.

There appear to be few of us who are inherently mistrustful of others; in recent times, that instinct has proven to be quite beneficial.

Because 90% of it was not reasonable doubt, it was manipulative BS

(If you can discuss the fine points between "lab leak theory" and "result of genetic manipulation" without mentioning any politician or anything that came out of a fb page or entertainment channel with "news" in its name that's a good discussion to have

"Because 90% of it was not reasonable doubt, it was manipulative BS"

Yes, but the problem is, that the remaining 10% were treated the same way.

(but I think, the numbers are actually more like 98% BS and 2 % legitimate, fact based doubt)

... To balance your point, which tbf has some truth in it, 99% of coverage on that topic from so called respected sources was manipulative bullshit.

Dissenting opinions were censored by the millions across social media.

Meanwhile, anyone who felt the lab leak theory was at least worth investigating was accused of being a Russian, Trumpist, anti-science piece of shit.

Daszak's paper was obvious bullshit. Not in hindsight, not on close reading, but on immediate reading by anyone with basic experience and logic. Yet across government, media and academia it was cited as the definitive scientific position on the matter, case closed, stfu.

... So if you're going to blame people for mixing their discussion with corporate news and political stunts, then you're going to have to share that blame with all responsible parties. They've fully earned the ire and distrust which many across the political spectrum now hold them in.

And we still haven't had a proper investigation in Wuhan, there's been no accountability for Daszak's conflict of interest, there's been no one held to account for the unprecedented censorship across Twitter and FB. No corporate media have been held responsible for their bullying and their bullshit.

If you want people to have smarter discussions about this, I'd remember the above before accusing everyone of just 'getting their info from politicians and FB'.

If dissenting opinions were censored by the media why is everyone aware of them?

Delta t:. were, past tense, is: present tense.

And what was the period of time in which that information was unavailable in mass?

Around the last election.

What was censored?

I was banned from twitter for pointing out that a 95% efficacy in a 6 week clinical trial does not mean a 95% efficacy a year out in the real world.

Somehow that was anti-vaxx.

Prove that's the reason you were banned. What if you're lying to make a political point?

How?

I don't know, I'm not the one making the claim. You want me to just believe you with no evidence but I should scrutinize researches intensely?

If you don't know what proof looks like then trying to prove anything to you is pointless.

You're the one who made the claim, I'm not required to help you prove it or describe what kind of evidence might be valid. You should already be able to do that before you made the claim.

If you dont know what would convince you then nothing will.

The fact that you seem unaware of the censorship shows how little consequence there was for the deception.

Google it man: FB and Twitter deleted MILLIONS of posts. They flagged hundreds of millions more as potentially disinformation, reducing engagement by ~90%.

The NYT said themselves that the media failed us on this - eventually, in May last year. [0] Still, they didn't acknowledge their own role, and put it in the opinion section.

And here you are, a year later, carrying water for them. You're not alone - many seem oblivious to their manipulation. It's bizarre, and quite scary.

"How easy it is to make people believe a lie, and how hard it is to undo that work again!"

[0] - https://www.nytimes.com/2021/05/31/opinion/media-lab-leak-th...

The fact that you are aware of what was censored shows how little impact individual companies censoring information has.

Also how do you know those posts didn't have content that violated those companies rules?

> The fact that you are aware of what was censored shows how little impact individual companies censoring information has.

That may be your fundamental misunderstanding here.

Censoring millions of posts and drastically reducing engagement on hundreds of millions more has a very serious effect.

I'm aware, because I sought that information out - but most people I talk to still have lingering misinformation on those subjects. You yourself seemed to think there wasn't any such censorship, before the goalposts were moved. I'm reminded of the narcissist's prayer.

> how do you know those posts didn't have content that violated those companies rules?

Maybe many did violate the companies rules. But the rules were wrong-headed. Legitimate and necessary debate was stifled and perverted at a global scale, and up until half an hour ago you hadn't even heard of it.

By the company rules I meant racism for example. Show me a lab leak post that is simply information that was censored