@yoyoel Naomi Klein perfectly captures our present reality which every day feels more and more like that scene from Inception where Cobb and Mal argue about which one of them is living in the real world or in a dream state.
@yoyoel "Othering" and "projection" are pretty basic psychological phenomena. But some people are seemingly incapable of—or just stubbornly unwilling to learn—the self-awareness necessary to recognize they are doing it, and self-correct.
Cognitive bias is not an easy thing to admit to, especially when your entire self-image, and social-cultural context—demand that you don't. And yet, people can spontaneously notice the inconsistencies of their magical thinking, and self-correct.
wow... that's one fucked up so-called human being.... sounds like someone has long covid and no sense of smell and an extremists mental defect for the rest.
@yoyoel I'm shocked by the specific dehumanizing language being used. It can be used as justification for "culling" and other odious behaviors, because their chain of reasoning can lead to "if vaccinated people are not human, it would not be a crime against a human to just get rid of them."
@randy@yoyoel Yes, I was scrolling through all the responses talking about loss of smell from COVID-19 and thinking: "You're all missing the point; she's not talking about her actual sense of smell. This is clearly a metaphor, one involving precisely the kind of dehumanising of one's enemies required prior to almost all historical examples of mass violence."
Widespread use of dehumanising language by one group about another is (more or less) a necessary but not a sufficient condition for such violence. Researchers into historical instances of genocide point to it as a very concerning symptom of where a society is headed.
@yoyoel “That is not how lipid nanoparticles work. It is not how vaccines work. It is not how anything works. Also, and I can't quite believe I am typing these words, vaccinated people still smell like humans.”
It’s the “I can't quite believe I am typing these words” that is so perfect here. :chefkiss:
@yoyoel@lisamelton honey boo, the reason you can’t smell shit is long COVID and the reason you can’t shut up your uninformed ranting is that you are a self serving idiot… neither problem medical science currently has a cure for.
@yoyoel 🤯 the fact that this level or type of thinking has permitted every level of society is really scary. It’s so much easier to state a completely implausible string of ‘theories’ than it is for one to outline a fact based reality that will overturn the un based statements that reinforce fears or prejudice. What is the answer do you think? More regulation of media outlets, better education and civic engagement through school and community based education?
@yoyoel
Is this Naomi Wolf? She lost all credibility in the UK when she got ripped apart on Radio 4 by Matthew Sweet over historical fact in a book in 2015. She didn’t react well.
The book, Outrages, is now taught in universities here as an example of bad research.
This was before she became really vocal as a conspiracy theorist. I guess as someone who has only a weak relationship with the truth, she was only going to go one way.
@yoyoel We need to teach the axiom: “Extraordinary claims demand extraordinary proof” and the corollary “Claims without evidence can be dismissed without evidence.” More difficult is teaching people how to evaluate evidence - a skill that requires foundations of understanding probability, basic chemistry and physics, history, scientific method, research design, etc. At least teach approaches for evaluating expertise. A radiologist’s opinion on an epidemic? No. All doctors are not the same.
@yoyoel
That's actually pretty much how Omicron and SARS-CoV-2 work, though Omicron does it more than SARS-CoV-2 given the latter's preference for TMPRSS2. Omicron doesn't care if the cell has TMPRSS2 or not.
Best viewed from Minute 32, the start of post-presentation discussion.
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