Those fringe theories have now embedded themselves into the government itself and directly have contributed to the rot of our public health institutions. So in many ways yes, they do.
There has been a massive uptick in anti-vax rhetoric over the last decade. As a result some Americans have decided to not vaccinate, and we are seeing a resurgence in diseases that should be eradicated.
I have a three month old son. At the time he was being born, in my city, there was an outbreak of one of those diseases that killed more then one kid. Don't tell me this stuff doesn't have a direct impact on people.
Experts have a worse track record than open debate and the COVID censorship was directed at even experts who didn’t adhere to political choices — so to my eyes, you’re saying that you’d give in to authoritarian impulses and do worse.
That’s not at all how you’re taught to handle emergencies.
From health emergencies to shootings to computer system crashes to pandemics — doing things without a reason to believe they’ll improve the situation is dangerous. You can and many have made things worse. And ignoring experts shouting “wait, no!” is a recipe for disaster.
When we were responding to COVID, we had plenty of time to have that debate in a candid way. We just went down an authoritarian path instead.
God forbid someone hinder some retarded organized action before enough peoples’ lives are ruined that our majestic rulers notice and gracefully decide to stop.
I would put my trust in the people I knew were trained for this and adjust from there.
I suspect many of these opinions are born from hindsight.