The Way I See It, Two Years In
Food for Thought
INTOLERANCE
DIVISIVENESS
SELF-RIGHTEOUS INDIGNATION (I,D,SI)
These seem to be the flavours of the day………and I don’t much like these flavours. Maybe I’ll just stick with vanilla.
I am currently finding that everywhere I go these days, these are the topics of conversation: Covid, vaccines, mandates, and protests. These are conversations with friends, relatives, colleagues, and acquaintances. (FRCA) I’m finding that these conversations are full of I, D, and SI. So much judgement, so much vitriol.
No one seems to be able to, or even to try to see things from another’s perspective. A lot of the times, I “mostly” agree with the speaker, yet I find myself appalled at the I, D and SI. I find myself disappointed at their lack of understanding and compassion for another’s point of view; dismayed at the hatefulness and contempt. I’ve even tried playing “Devil’s Advocate” to no avail. As a result, I’ve spent a lot of time thinking about all my opinions on these topics. Pondering these topics of the day. And frankly, because of all this pondering, I’ve been able to start to “see” where “the other side’s” perspectives are coming from…………and perhaps “understand” a bit of why they are feeling and reacting the way they are.
This is what inspired my blog today; my first in a few years. There’s so many stories of families and friends driven apart by their opposing views on today’s polarizing topics.
Let’s start with MEDIA:
Oh, the media………what can I say? I just don’t know what to believe or who to believe. The internet has opened a whole new world of rogue “journalism” where facts don’t matter, opinions run rampant, and sources feed you more and more of what you want to hear. There are “fact checkers” but I feel like even they have been compromised by politics. I really just don’t know what to believe most of the time. There is a contingent of people who think “we”, those who are following all the rules blindly, have been duped by the mainstream media; fed a narrative…………and that it’s not all done with complete honesty………it’s done with the goal of compliance. I don’t know if I believe this or not; but it has planted a seed of doubt.
Back in the day, (haha, old person’s saying), we used to read newspapers. They had a certain degree of credibility. I think they couldn’t just print lies. Here you could buy the Vancouver Sun, the Province, maybe the Globe and Mail or the New York Times. Yes, you knew they all had their own slant a bit, but I think we all mostly felt that if you read something in one of those it couldn’t be complete rubbish. Yes, there was The National Inquirer and the Star, but I just assumed everyone knew they were tabloids and had no credibility………except for the odd little old lady who grabbed one as she bought her chewing gum and would later be telling her friends at the beauty salon about the woman who gave birth to the baby with the alien head.
So, what can we believe from the internet? I don’t know the answer. People stretch the truth, manipulate data, exaggerate and cherry pick facts, quote out of context and outright lie. Yet, they can print whatever they want and some people read it, believe it, never question it.
Now, there are those who feel that the WHO, Dr. Fauci and other big players in this game called Pandemic have not been completely honest with the public. I don’t know if it’s true; I don’t know if it’s false.
CENSORSHIP
So first came unbridled journalism and next came censorship. Somewhere along the line freedom of speech became a thing of the past and big players in the game decided they could censor media. I can definitely see why they thought this might be necessary when there was so much false information causing dangerous actions in response to Covid but it is undoubtedly a disconcerting thing to be happening in our free society.
There is also a contingent of presumably reputable, knowledgeable scientists who claim they have been censored (by the big players: the gov, WHO, Big Pharma, the ultra-rich) for having a different view than what mainstream media is feeding the public. Their claim is that any scientific ideas, data, or studies they’ve tried to get out there, that don’t follow the “narrative” are being taken off the internet. Again, I don’t know if this is true or false; fact, fiction or exaggeration.
IVERMECTIN
LOL, we can’t have a conversation about Covid without mentioning Ivermectin. It’s become the joke of the day. With an air of SI, we’ll belittle those who took “horse tranquilizers”. Belittling is right up there with I, D, and SI. Is that really how we should be treating our fellow human beings? The truth about Ivermectin is that it is a useful anti-parasitic drug that has been approved for humans since 1987 and is widely used in low and middle income countries. There have been studies for its usefulness against Covid but I don’t think there has been any conclusive results. There are those who think Big Pharma is not interested in re-purposed drugs as it doesn’t make money for them. It’s extremely unfortunate that some scared people were so desperate that they tried to get it from horse tranquilizers when the human form was unavailable. But to take that out of context and make it the joke of the day sure doesn’t show much compassion. Would any of you belittle a man who jumps from the 10th floor of a burning building??
VACCINES
OK, here we go……..on to the contentious issue of vaccines. I am triple vaccinated; I love my vaccine; I love that I’m not the least bit worried about Omicron now because it is unlikely it will result in severe illness or death.
Do I think we should be able to force others to get the vaccine? I don’t know.
Could we have compassion for those who are afraid of the vaccine? Yes, I think we could and I think we should.
If your best friend was terrified of heights, would you try to force them to cross Capilano bridge?
If your loved one had claustrophobia, would you belittle them for not getting in a small elevator?
If you were agoraphobic, would you like to be treated as the “anti-vaxers” are being treated now?
Now I know, some of you will rebut that with “This is different than those examples. They are being selfish; they are not thinking about the safety of others.” Well, my point here is, these are irrational fears and some may view the fear of the vaccine as an irrational fear, but we typically treat people with those other phobias with some level of compassion. I would like to see a little more compassion and a little less I, D and SI. As for the selfishness, yes, you can call it that if you want. I was selfish for having children in an overpopulated world. I’m selfish every time I fly to a foreign country for a vacation. I’m not perfect either. They are putting themselves at risk by not getting vaccinated but I feel their threat to the vaccinated population is minimal; the vaccinated are also spreading Omicron asymptomatically.
The next rebuttal with be “Well, they are filling our hospitals”. Yes, there is no denying that. I won’t argue that one. However, I will point out that our hospitals are also filled by smokers with COPD, lung disease and stroke. They are filled with overweight people with high blood pressure, diabetes and gallbladder disease. They are filled with accident victims who drive too aggressively. They are filled with people who don’t eat right or exercise and have heart disease. They are filled with broken bones of the brazen adventure sport community. We don’t treat any of those people with the type of disdain we are showing the “anti-vaxers”.
WHY NOT VACCINATE?
I feel that there are a few reasons why people don’t want to get vaccinated. Now, this is completely my own speculation. No facts here, just a guess by me as to why this is happening in approximately 16% of our Canadian population.
1) Fear of the Vaccine itself: I don’t know why but some people are very afraid of the vaccine. I’m not an expert on vaccines so I can’t really comment. I am typically a trusting person and I trust the medical authorities and basically I’m a pretty compliant person. For those who don’t trust and have heard bad things about the vaccines, it has caused a real fear for them.
2) Past experience: perhaps some people have had a bad experience with vaccines or some other medical procedure before that makes them vaccine hesitant
3) Distrust: some people just really distrust government and/or the medical community and don’t feel they should have to do what they say………….despite the fact that it is selfish not to think of the community as a whole
4) Defiance: some people just don’t want to be told what to do. I personally don’t think this is a good reason, but I’m trying not to be too judgmental, remember?
THE SCIENCE
We like to say to the unvaccinated, “Why don’t you follow the science.” While I agree with this, it’s of interest to point out:
---anyone my age grew up learning that Pluto was a planet but guess what, the science has changed and it is no longer classified as a planet
---science thought it was a good idea in the 1950’s to treat morning sickness with Thalidomide; we all know how that turned out
---the science of the 1980’s touted the low fat diet leading to the obesity epidemic we see in North America today
---I think you should see my point
WHY SUCH DISTRUST?
Well, it’s clear that governments/societies aren’t always right. There have been a lot of mistakes made by many past governments and some people are very distrustful and fearful of letting them get too much power over us. Like I said, I’m basically a very trusting and compliant person and mostly I like to think that the people with those jobs should know what they are doing but really, that’s pretty naïve. There are a lot of reasons to question governments actions.
---there was a time when they thought it was a good idea to bring different people over from across the ocean to fill the labour shortage in their cotton fields
---there was a time when they thought women shouldn’t have a vote
---there was a time they thought it was a good idea to put First Nations children in Residential Schools to educate them so they could get jobs in society
---there was a time they thought it was best to force a child to use their right hand if they were showing a tendency towards the left
---again, I think you get my point; the list goes on
THE PROTEST
Another contentious issue:
Do I agree with trucks clogging highways and downtown Ottawa?
No.
Do I understand at least some of the message they are trying to convey?
Yes, sort of. I’m pretty ambiguous but I “kind of” get the “freedom of choice” bit.
Do I need to get all I, D, and SI on them?
No, I definitely do not.
Do I respect that they are standing up for what they believe in?
Yes
Do I agree with how they are doing it?
No, but I don’t have a better idea to offer them. (write a letter and clog up their mailboxes? ;))
Do I paint them all with the same brush?
No
Do I recognize that the extremist element has jumped on their bandwagon?
Yes
Do I think that should reflect on all of them?
No
Do I think they should protest in front of hospitals?
Absolutely not.
I DON’T KNOW WHAT TO BELIEVE
It’s unbelieveable that humans exterminated millions of other humans in the 1930’s and 40’s, but it is true.
It’s believeable that toilet seats have 10X more germs than cell phones but that’s false
Sometimes the believable is false and the unbelievable is true. How do you know what to believe when there is so much conflicting information out there? How can you trust anything you read when anyone can post almost anything on the internet with no journalistic integrity and no responsibility to back stories up with facts. How do we trust information when some scientists are censored?
CONCLUSION
To those who are full of I, D, and SI in a discussion about any of these topics, please try to remember: you might not be wrong, but you likely are not 110% right like you think you are. If you can’t see that there is at least some shred of validity to someone else’s view, then you’re not looking hard enough.
The world is not Black and White
It is not Good and Bad
It is not Right and Wrong
The world is a very Grey place.
Now more than ever
Hey, did you hear about the lady in Florida who had the baby fathered by a crocodile?!
