Southern Seminary files petition against Biden Administration to Oppose OSHA Vaccination Rules

The belief that those in government are entitled to tell everyone what to do because they know best sure sounds a lot to me like “this is about control.” Is there really any significant difference here?

[G. N. Barkman]

The belief that those in government are entitled to tell everyone what to do because they know best sure sounds a lot to me like “this is about control.” Is there really any significant difference here?

Yes. In an article I posted earlier this week, I looked at a Tucker Carlson piece that characterized Biden et al. as seeking control for control’s sake… he characterized the motive for vaccine mandate as sadomasochism and sheer love of dominance for no other reason than turning us all into compliant sheep (last phrase is my language; the rest is his).

So, saying “the left are evil people who simply delight in oppressing everyone” is different from saying “the left are people who believe everyone’s good is best served by evolving society the direction they see as progress.”

The former is demonizing. The latter is recognizing errors of worldview and principle on the part of people who are just ordinary humans, not monsters.

We all believe in “control.” But we believe the why matters and that boundaries of control matter. So saying “it’s about control” isn’t even criticism at all unless what really mean is “it’s about power hungry oppressors trying to dominate just because they love to do that sort of thing.” … or “it’s about power extended beyond proper limits and in a misguided belief that this is good for society.”

OK, but since we are incapable of knowing the motives of the heart, in practical terms, increasing governmental control over our lives produces the same outcome either way.

The stupidity of people!

This is coming from a doctor. This is why you will not convince everyone to take the vaccine. There are too many stupid people in this world.

https://www.yahoo.com/news/covid-vaccine-holdouts-caving-mandates-11000…

I may be at risk of naivete but I think I’d rather be naive than join the perpetually suspicious—not that I’m accusing you of “perpetually suspicious,”

I don’t think it is about being perpetually suspicious. It seems to me it’s more about changing the goalposts and that has happened from day one of “15 days to flatten the curve.” And the constant misleading, outright false, or partially true information. It’s about the lack of transparency. It’s about the fact that everyone agrees (as Dave said above) that the “voluntary” numbers are what we were told was necessary to get back to normal. But now that we have that, it isn’t enough. Again.

So why? Sure there is stupidity. But people who reach this level of government usually aren’t politically stupid, or at least their handlers aren’t. So I think we can do away with that explanation. What’s left?

I found this to be interesting: https://churcheswithoutchests.net/2021/11/12/living-with-an-endemic-2/

There is a contrast of worldviews that cannot be missed. I would add to this that there is the feature of American freedom. Americans, to one degree or another, have always valued freedom over safety. That a great many should do so now is no change. We always accept a certain amount of risk in exchange for freedom. The change is the willingness of so many to give up some basic freedoms, even responsibilities, such as going to work, going to church, etc. While this is frequently compared to small pox or polio vaccines, it seems much more similar to flu shots that have to be repeated every year. Whether or not that matters to you, it is still a difference, it seems.

Think of the value changes: Gathering for protests was acceptable. Gathering for worship was not. Shopping at big box retailers was acceptable. Shopping at small mom and pop stores was not. These were not COVID decisions so much as the were value decisions. And the question is why? It isn’t “perpetually suspicious” to wonder. It seems naive not to.

[Larry]

I don’t think it is about being perpetually suspicious. It seems to me it’s more about changing the goalposts and that has happened from day one of “15 days to flatten the curve.” And the constant misleading, outright false, or partially true information.

The goalposts changed because the virus and knowledge about the virus has been changing. It is surprising to me that the general public felt that health officials should have had complete knowledge of every aspect of this virus back in January of 2020. That is not how this works. Ever!

[Larry]

Think of the value changes: Gathering for protests was acceptable. Gathering for worship was not. Shopping at big box retailers was acceptable. Shopping at small mom and pop stores was not. These were not COVID decisions so much as the were value decisions. And the question is why? It isn’t “perpetually suspicious” to wonder. It seems naive not to.

Lets be very clear here. This was not a consistent approach. This was a state by state, and municipality by municipality issue. You couldn’t gather in LA, but Florida had no problem. We tend to treat government as this big singular behemoath. And it isn’t. In addition, where there was overstep, government came in (courts) and corrected it. So were there overreaches? Sure. But to be honest there are over reaches every single day, and the government has numerous checks and balances, including elections to address when this happens. Again, somehow every feels that every individual at every level of government should somehow have the exact same worldview and view of government as they do. If they don’t, they use that single example and then paste it across the term “government”. Because LA restricted church, government as a whole is over reaching during this pandemic, despite the vast majority not over reaching in that area.

The goalposts changed because the virus and knowledge about the virus has been changing. It is surprising to me that the general public felt that health officials should have had complete knowledge of every aspect of this virus back in January of 2020. That is not how this works. Ever!

I think it would be difficult to argue that the changes were based on changing knowledge. If anything, it seems the opposite—that the longer it went, the more we knew that should have lessened the restrictions. Even with the vaccine the message changed and is still changing. Originally, it was to protect others around you: “Do it for others.” But then you could still transmit so it was “Do it for yourself so you don’t get as sick.”

It is a confused message and, IMO, it is confused because there was not an underlying foundation that was driving it. It’s hard to explain rationally.

And all of this is missing the point anyway. Even now, we are told by virtually everyone that the number of people currently vaccinated is more than enough for what was called herd immunity. There is no need for a mandate if that is the case. We have what we were told we need. So why enforce a mandate that we don’t need?

Lets be very clear here. This was not a consistent approach. This was a state by state, and municipality by municipality issue.

Of course; no one is suggesting otherwise.

I don’t think you can pass off the glaring inconsistencies as resulting from different states and multiple levels of government. Yes, vast differences did occur at that level. But the most irritating inconsistencies were those imposed upon similar situations by the SAME government. In North Carolina, attendance by several hundred people at an outdoors racetrack in Alamance County was shut down by state government, but large outdoor BLM gatherings numbering into the thousands were not only not banned, but encouraged. Is it incidental that NASCAR fans are mostly Republican, but BLM protesters are mostly Democrats?

That’s just one example. Actually, North Carolina was much less inconsistent than other states and cities. Most people could see for themselves that decisions seemed to be made for political reasons more than for public health. That makes people suspicious. How could they feel confident that vax mandates were not political as well? I am concerned that vax mandates totally ignore the differences between those who have recovered from Covid, and those who have not been infected. People who have recovered from Covid generally have a high level of antibodies, usually higher than those who have been vaccinated. Why so little recognition of this? Could some be reasonably suspicious that the goal of reaching a high vaccination percentage is more important that recognizing the science about antibody levels? Is the goal truly public safety, or political grandstanding?

[G. N. Barkman] Is the goal truly public safety, or political grandstanding?

I agree with your comments, but on this question, I think it might be that the governments think this is the way out. They have no exit strategy, they have to be seen to be doing something, and they can’t admit they were clueless in most of the pronouncements made previously. If they can get the vax rates high enough, maybe they can declare victory and then say we will have to live with Covid as an endemic risk forever.

Or am I too cynical?

(BTW, I am vaxxed and have gone along with edicts - but I am deeply suspicious of the governments and their constantly changing pronouncements)

That’s quite a harangue, especially since I don’t see anything that actually addresses what I said. So I will ask you directly, Who has the most antibodies? Those who have been vaccinated without having had Covid? Those who have had Covid, but have not been vaccinated? And I’ll throw in a third category, Those who have had Covid AND been vaccinated several months after recovering from Covid? (That would be me.) I’m looking for the science here, not another harangue. (The only source I’ve seen that address these questions is the Wall Street Journal.)

Was your answer above a response to what you assumed I said, without actually reading what I said?

You continue to avoid my questions. How many people who survived Covid, have died because of getting Covid a second time? None that I know of. (At least not any who were tested and certified to have Covid, not merely think they might have had it.) Do you have any evidence that those who have recovered from Covid and are not vaccinated, are in greater danger than those who have not had Covid and have been vaccinated?

These are the questions I have raised. You continue to ignore them, and instead harangue about the large numbers of unvaccinated people who die from Covid. Read my lips. I agree with you! But that’s not what I’m talking about. I desire an explanation for the near total silence regarding the necessity of vaccinating those who have recovered from Covid.

Per Joe’s comments, my thought on COVID at this point is that it seems to follow rather closely the habits of people, in particular whether they’re spending most of their time (especially social interaction time) inside. We might joke that the best prevention for COVID would be linen clothing in the South and wool sweaters and coats in the North.

There also seems to be something of a dissipation of immunity over time, both from vaccines and natural infection. Which immunity is stronger and longer lasting is in dispute, and it’s worth noting that my home, Minnesota, is apparently the nation’s leader (yeah Minnesota!) in infections these days. Not coincidentally, it’s cold here and we’re spending a lot of time indoors.

Minnesota is also strong in terms of vaccination, so we would infer that the efficacy of vaccination either never was that good, or is diminishing strongly over time. I’m leaning towards the latter because of how steeply infection rates plunged when vaccination started. That’s also what I infer from rising rates of breakthrough cases and deaths. Minnesota’s COVID-19 deaths among the vaccinated are (309 as last I knew) clearly rising.

Regarding the mandate itself, I’m still of the opinion that it’s really an admission that the NIH, CDC, state health authorities, and others have utterly failed to persuade, and a lot of that has a lot to do with the fact that these same health authorities have a pretty bad record in the past year and a half. They’ve lied in various places, failed to take action to prevent nursing home deaths, and in general practiced an absolutism in their proclamations that really doesn’t conform to the known data while refusing to take known courses of action that have been incredibly useful in the past (e.g. “quarantining the sick, not the healthy”).

The end result is that as people become aware of the ambiguities, the pushback is intense. The only way out for public health officials is to admit their mistakes and start talking straight with the public.

How’s everyone feeling about President Biden’s OSHA mandate now? Is it safe to say that the mandate was an overreach?

Or do we still have a few people condoning/rationalizing authoritarianism?

This was pretty significant news today. Gotta say I was not surprised that it was nowhere to be found among the Filings.

OSHA fell through, but the one for health care workers was narrowly kept. Still out there is the federal contractor one, and I work for a company that qualifies. The question is what extent of federal funding is necessary to make such a mandate legal.

And of course, you’ve got the question of whether the vaccines are doing anything vs. the preeminent version we have now. That’s at the very least debatable, and for the past few weeks, the majority of infections and hospitalizations appear to be among the vaccinated here in MN. That leads to the question “if vaccines are of dubious utility vs. what we’re seeing now, why are we making them a requirement for peoples’ employment?” Really, the end game here appears to be that our public health authorities are torpedoing their moral authority.