Developing the Capacity for Rational Choices

"As the world falls around us, how must we brave its cruelties?" -- Furiosa 

Imprisoned climate activist, Roger Hallam, recently wrote about the necessity of expanding emotional well-being as we face bleak events happening around the world. While climate scientists try to "help people through the horrific information that they are being given," they also need a way to manage their emotional reactions. We can no longer afford to merely distract ourselves from the inner turmoil. Beyond climate, we could very well be entering into a period of much greater conflict at a time of even more viruses, some destructive to our food system. When the watering hole gets smaller, the animals look at one another differently.

To move forward with compassion, at a time when divide and conquer strategies have created polarization and infighting, seems to require an effort from each one of us.

Hallam writes,

"We might want to think about why saint-like people are enormously influential, even powerful. . . . They see the world as dependent upon the mind. . . . They are not enslaved by the world; their minds are intent, driven even, to change it. They do not see this as an end in itself."

He explains the journey toward collective action as beginning with exploring the self as it relates to reality. The part of interest to me is this: 

"Some people are so into themselves that they find it almost impossible to get out of themselves. They are stuck, enmeshed. Children are often like this. They are literally overwhelmed by their emotions. . . . You see it a lot in prison--people so full of their distress, their anger, and rage, they cannot see themselves at all. . . . The ability to reflect on yourself, on your emotions and your behavior, leads on to a more general idea, and that is transcendence. This might be described as a deep ability to move outside of oneself, to look at oneself from the outside, simply to watch. . . . The more you practice doing it, the stronger you get at doing it. . . . The essence of being human is nothing to do with our being in this world--it is to do with having a choice."

The ability to choose to be responsive instead of reactive can be developed and refined through intentional introspection. This isn't anything new; it's an old truth ignored until it becomes crucial to our survival.

 IN PHILOSOPHY 

When we feel unmoored, it helps to be able to find some center inside. Noticing emotions is not a matter of seeking out a hidden traumatic moment, or making healing an element of identity and boring all our friends to death about it, but taking a bit of time here and there to notice what's going on with us. It's not a new age hippy-dippy thing; we need to look inward and know thyself in order to avoid making a bigger mess of things. Philosophers have been telling us to do this for millennia, but most of us thought it was optional.

Plato, Aristotle, Stoics were all about self-control, advising us to contemplate to improve the ability to act from reason instead of being tossed around by the passions. 

Epictetus seems to have the most direct route to CBT that espouses to notice that you are outraged by something that others aren't bothered by because it's your interpretation of the event that's the problem. Change the interpretation to change the emotional effect:

"But straightway make a distinction in your own mind, and be in readiness to say, it is not that which has happened that afflicts this man, for it does not afflict another, but it is the opinion about this thing which afflicts the man."  (Enchiridion)

However, there's a common theory being espoused today of processing emotions, which, as far as I understand it, is less about control and more about being released from the power of emotional baggage. In that case, to me it's more reminiscent of the story Descartes told of falling in love with a girl with a squint. In 1647, in Letter to Chanut, (6. vi.) he wrote about his feelings for a girl from his childhood colouring his further judgments for decades:

"When I saw persons with a squint I felt a special inclination to love them simply because they had that defect; and I didn’t know that that was why. But as soon as I reflected on it and saw that it was a defect, I was no longer affected by it. . . . so a wise man won’t altogether yield to such a passion."

This experience resonated to me when I first read it. I was enamoured with a man who really didn't make sense for me, yet I couldn't shake that desire for him. Then one day it dawned on me that he reminded me of a childhood friend, not in his looks or attitude, but from just a few specific, familiar gestures he used when talking. As soon as the connection was made, the longing disappeared like magic! So it seems to follow that a less pleasant emotional response could also be subdued once we connect it to where it started.

What I really like about this illustration of processing theory, even if it's not as the theory was originally intended, is that it applies beyond any parenting mishaps or abuses. We've mainly bought into the idea that we get stuck in life by emotional barriers because of some childhood trauma. Something seriously bad had to happen for us to have any problems as an adult. But there's so much buried stuff in there, from a tiff with friends or disappointing a teacher or not making the team, on top of all the things we wished were different in our home lives. The very necessary socialization process alone is going to lead to buried emotional experiences that colour the rest of our lives. Mom's sudden stern rebuke of, "Don't hit the baby!" that one time, amid all the forgotten times she gently told us "ta ta," could have been what provoked us to swallow our anger. We don't need to have been traumatized to have had some needs go unmet; we just need to have had some barriers placed on our behaviours, which is necessary.

We can connect this knowledge that mom putting down her foot can lead to some repressed stuff to some newer questionable parenting choices. The fear of ever causing problems in our own kids sometimes leads well-meaning parents to avoid giving kids any kind of boundaries or ever saying "no" to them. We don't want them to repress any feelings!! But this path just makes kids rudderless or worse! Kids need to be given limitations, and then it's our task, as adults, to work through the pieces keeping us stuck. There's just no getting around that. Growing up is messy and fraught.

This is not about old traumas, a word that has experienced some serious definition creep. This is about old narratives that are subconsciously driving the bus down roads we've seen before and haven't found fulfilling. Once we notice the connections, once we realize what makes us react so strongly to a stimulus, then those connections begin to dissolve, and we're free to make a choice: to respond instead of just react.

 "Emotion, which is suffering, ceases to be suffering as soon as we form a clear and precise picture of it." ~ Viktor Frankl in Man's Search for Meaning 

 IN PSYCHOTHERAPY

Freud followed the footsteps of Plato with elevating self-control, but Jung had a more all-encompassing approach. Like Hallam, Jung viewed psychoanalytical exploration not just as a way to help individuals, but as pivotal to reducing evil in the world (in Psychology and Religion):

"Unfortunately there can be no doubt that man is, on the whole, less good than he imagines himself or wants to be. Everyone carries a shadow, and the less it is embodied in the individual's conscious life, the blacker and denser it is. If an inferiority is conscious, one always has a chance to correct it. Furthermore, it is constantly in contact with other interests, so that it is continually subjected to modifications. But if it is repressed and isolated from consciousness, it never gets corrected, and is liable to burst forth suddenly in a moment of unawareness, thwarting our most well-meant intentions. . . . Mere suppression of the shadow is as little of a remedy as beheading would be for headache. . . . The shadow is merely somewhat inferior, primitive, unadapted, and awkward; not wholly bad."

The less we open it up to have a look, the more it affects our decisions and behaviours. That inner stuff isn't pure evil; it's just anything we don't want to look at. Because much of it was stored away as children, it's primitive and a bit wild and chaotic. It's not just the bad stuff, but also normal reactions that weren't seen as appropriate by someone along the way, or creative impulses that weren't appreciated. It can be unnerving to think we have parts of us so socially embarrassing, but we're missing out on an ability to live with the entirety of ourselves if we keep them locked up. It can feel shameful to acknowledge the worst of ourselves, so it might help to remember that all the shiny perfect-looking people around us have to deal with this too.

It takes courage to get down to this crawl space in the mind.

The dark shadowy bits can sometimes be seen in dreams, but more clearly in our strongest affiliations and projections. When we're part of a group that feels unquestionably best (sports, politics, religion…), it points to something in us. When we really react to someone in a way that others don't, when we can't believe they're so stuck up or quiet or whatever, whenever it's unreasonably annoying to us, then it's likely part of us. We can ask people close to us what we're really like, and notice any defensiveness. "What do you mean I'm needy?!" Finding elements from the shadow can feel like being stung or being hit with a ton of bricks, and we instinctively fight them off; luckily, noticing that can be the start to resolving it.

Years ago I saw a Jungian analyst who told me to imagine a little bird on my shoulder. Whenever I would be irritated or enraged by someone, the bird should speak up and ask me, "What part of YOU is this?" Just paying attention to it at first is a good start.

Accepting that we're wounded, we live life differently than if our only concern is to overcome the wound. -- Thomas Moore in Care of the Soul

Whatever you've been led to believe is bad is likely stuck in the crawl space. Ignoring it just makes it stronger and sneakier. The work we do, or fail to do, shows up in our relationships with partners, neighbours, colleagues, communities, and our children. Whatever we don't address spills over into other people's lives. Opening this Pandora's box isn't about making us happy, though, but about making us whole and able to be more conscious of and accountable for our choices. If we can get curious about it, interview it, or step into it, imagine doing the very thing we hate, it can help resolve some of this content.

Some of us have been told to stop hitting or biting, and might have understood it as a rule to never be angry. Others have had opinions shut down so they learned to stop showing off. Others were told to get a grip when they pitched a fit at school, which stymied their sensitivity. From what I understand of this very complex theory, the problem isn't in the practice of setting up some boundaries for behaviours in children, although that can be done thoughtfully or carelessly for sure, but in later exploring the types of limits we blindly accepted long ago so that we can consider how reasonable they are at this point in our lives. The shadow is a functional and necessary part of ourselves. If we didn't inhibit behaviours, we'd all be in jail and society wouldn't be able to function. But some of what's been inhibited might give us some useful creativity or a much needed element of wildness or openness to our lives. There's certainly more to life than just being pleasant.

Most importantly, though, the more we hate on others, the more that bounces right back at ourselves. The more we clean out the crawl space, the less we feel the need to judge and condemn harmless actions and attitudes. It would be really nice if everyone else could take the time to do some of this work, particularly some CEOs and governmental leaders who are driven by hatred or selfishness. But all we can control at this juncture is ourselves. If we make an attempt, then, just maybe, we can trudge through the next few difficulties with some well deserved empathy for ourselves and others.

Jung conceptualized the idea of an inner child in us that can be helped by being acknowledged; the child archetype informs our actions. John Bradshaw took us further down that road in the 1980s, adding another way to process it all, and Richard Schwartz seemed to turn the shadow into the exiled self in the 1990s with Internal Family Systems therapy recently gaining more popularity.

 "Whatever cannot obey itself, is commanded. … I am that which must ever surpass itself. … All suppressed truths become poisonous." Nietzsche in Thus Spoke Zarathustra: 34

IN SCIENCE 

There's a science to it as well: In the 1970s, Peter Lang started exploring reducing the intensity of emotional responses, specifically fear, through "mindful experiencing" of prior events. In the 1990s, Jaak Panksepp looked at finding emotional responses in the brain. Then many people flew with it in slightly different directions. Teasdale (2000) worked with depression and reactivate patterns of thinking to develop new relationships with the thoughts and feelings; Solms (2001) wrote on neuro-psychoanalysis and getting stuck in old neural pathways, and Engelhard et al (2010) hit on exploring emotional events while doing simple mental subtraction (but not complex subtraction) to reduce the vividness and intensity of negative images. More recently Perl et al. (2023) found that in an MRI, most memory retrieval lights up the hippocampus except emotionally intense memories light up the posterior cingulate cortex instead, where we assess current threats. We can physically see that some memories stick with us and behave as if they're happening now and that working with them can decrease their effect on us.

From all the examples of what it is, the art of processing appears to be anything that gives some room to emotional experiences, possibly by merely bringing them into the light or finding connections to older experiences, challenging our older beliefs to develop new neural pathways with new belief systems, exhausting the memory when feeling the experience, developing empathy and compassion for what our younger self endured, or getting our parts to talk it out.

It's a bit of work, but instead of compulsively attending to our inner crap by ruminating and then escaping the discomfort by scrolling online, the theory suggests that an active investigation of some kind can reduce that badgering from our brain. We're only unburdened longterm by opening it up. I like this factory metaphor: Our old emotions sit in boxes on a conveyor belt. If we get sidetracked and ignore them, they just come around again later. We have to take the box off the conveyor and open it up to see what's inside. We're unlikely to completely clear off the conveyor belt, but we can definitely reduce the number of boxes coming round and round at us.

Looking inward is not a hobby, and it's also not an analgesic to calm us in the midst of so many tragedies. This turn may be able to help us quiet the noise enough to better think and to muster a useful reaction when we are failed by governments and other leaders, whether around Covid, climate change, or conflicts. It appears necessary to find our better nature in order to reduce polarization in our societies and to tap into our common humanity to re-discover solidarity and forge a better path

Viktor Frankl concluded his famous book with a discussion of decent people that calls to us to rise to the challenge:

“It is true that they form a minority. More than that, they always will remain a minority. And yet I see therein the very challenge to join the minority. For the world is in a bad state, but everything will become still worse unless each of us does his best. So, let us be alert — alert in a twofold sense: Since Auschwitz we know what man is capable of. And since Hiroshima we know what is at stake.” 

Wading Through the Fetid Swamp

Charlie Angus is on a role. The NDP MP has a book excerpt in The Walrus explaining the rise of neoliberalism starting from Reaganomics.     

The rules of the neoliberal game advise to take advantage of or create a crisis in order to shrink governmental oversight, bust any strikes, lower marginal tax rates so the wealthiest pay very little, reduce or obliterate corporate regulation or allow dubious self-regulation, and privatize the shit out of public services. Naomi Klein did a great job explaining it all in The Shock Doctrine, which he mentions. 

Mr. Angus says, 

"The crisis of the 2020s is something different than a lingering cultural stasis. The reality is that the political, environmental, and economic forces unleashed in the 1980s have finally caught up to us. . . . Operation Break the Working Class has created a generation of billionaire oligarchs form the stolen wages of the American working class. . . . To find our way out of this mess, it is necessary to confront the false history of the 1980s. Historical amnesia is not accidental--it is a political construct. If you scratch the sheen of '80s nostalgia, the underlying socio-economic fractures are readily apparent. These contradictions in the popularized narrative constitute a dangerous memory."

Trump's Tariffs

Yesterday Trump threatened, 

"'On January 20th, as one of my many first Executive Orders, I will sign all necessary documents to charge Mexico and Canada a 25% Tariff on ALL products coming into the United States, and its ridiculous Open Borders,' he wrote on social media, complaining that 'thousands of people are pouring through Mexico and Canada, bringing Crime and Drugs at levels never seen before,' even though violent crime is down from pandemic highs. He said the new tariffs would remain in place 'until such time as Drugs, in particular Fentanyl, and all Illegal Aliens stop this Invasion of our Country!'"

Lots of people are starting to understand how these tariffs will play out for them. Six years ago, Ben Stein revised his Ferris Bueller bit to teach more of the lesson. Tariffs imposed in the 1930s made the depression worse for the US.

Some people, like Anonymous, think,

"Mexico and Canada are the biggest trading partners for the US. Starting a trade war with the people who provide nearly half the food or water you consume is suicidal."

Then, six hours later, they added, 

"Trump and Musk have already stated that their plan is to crash the economy. Picking a trade war with China, Mexico, and Canada will do that. They have no plan to restore the economy. This is how they plan to cull part of the population and pummel the rest into subservience."

I can't help but wonder if it's a provocation to get just enough of a reaction that would enable him to justify (weakly and likely illegally) taking measures against Mexico and Canada in some throwback to Manifest Destiny. He's already looking at a "soft invasion" of Mexico. The fact that he is also demonizing Canada points to the start of a movement towards, I believe, coming for our water and other resources. Is that what Musk meant when he said a Trump win would bring temporary hardship?? Trudeau is hoping the premiers stick with him in a united front, but several of them might be more interested in the IDU than Canadian interests, in a shift to "authoritarian populism," a weird kind of oxymoron.

I have no concrete ideas about any of this, but I do believe greedy people don't like when anyone has something they don't have. They have to have all the things. The rest of us are collateral damage.

CAN-PCC Survey

CAN-PCC has put out a survey on its draft of recommendations for Long Covid (PCC = Post Covid Condition) that anyone can comment on. They're asking us for evidence of any claims we have, and it closes Wednesday night (Nov. 27).

Their recommendations are a whole lot of diet, exercise, and CBT and virtually nothing promoting any type of tests to help determine if someone has Long Covid, not even a d-dimer test, or any kind of medications to try. It explicitly says NOT Taurine based on a study that tests hand strength with and without use, completely ignoring studies that show a significant improvement in tinnitus, with some implications for neurological improvements after Long Covid. It's a curious inclusion in the survey. Nothing about Metformin or Paxlovid. And definitely nothing about prevention with N95s or cleaner air.  

I commented that offering CBT to someone with a physical illness is patronizing. Would they suggest it to heal a broken leg, too?? Long Covid is a PHYSICAL illness. The body is invaded by a virus wreaking havoc in so many different places that it will take a concerted effort to create a simple and effective test for it. So, apparently, they're just going to skip that initiative.

Brian Hughes posted his comments - and some of the questions - in The Science Bit. Check it out, then craft your own responses. They're asking for feedback, so we should chime in. BUT isn't it curious that an official body financed by the Public Health Agency of Canada is seeking out random public comments through Cochrane Reviews instead of, you know, getting the best scientific advice possible from teams of scientists?? Public policy on health initiatives for a serious illness shouldn't be determined by a majority rule by the public, but, if it is, then we have a duty to comment.

Only When It is Darkest Out Can You See the Stars

These are my summary notes from this excellent podcast from Andrea Pitzer on Next Comes What, "How We Survive This Mess." 

Pitzer previous wrote a history of concentration camps, One Long Night, and she relates much of this new US admin regime to historical cases. Some similarities: first, Hitler rose to power through legitimate means, but laws were stretched to allow him to run. Pinochet's coup used similar rhetoric, and we need to be aware of the similar tactics already on display: terror, shock, making a show of force, and trying to seize more power than they have. And Putin, who was brought in as a useful stooge, then stepped out only to return to be more powerful by removing moderates. 

The benefits to the current situation include that we have a date. It's not coming unexpectedly, but in a couple months, which provides a window to play in. The US military is officially non-partisan, so won't necessarily follow Trump's orders. Governors in key states are standing up, and it's important to build that out of the gate. There's still a partially functional court system and civil bureaucracy that can slow down any legislation. And the odds of Congress being up for grabs in 2026 are still good as there will likely be a massive backlash. She also claims that "these people are not that bright" which can help anyone trying to subvert their agenda. They got in only because it's really easy to generate hate; "it's not a sign of genius but of money and the willingness to do tremendous harm," which provides an opening for resistance and a likelihood of infighting that could decimate their control. They ran on ideas, not on governance.

A Tale of Two Studies

I was confronted yesterday with the ubiquitous claim, "Lockdowns destroyed kid's ability to socialize. Now they're committing suicide because of it!!" Let's have a closer look again:

I posted this mini-thread a couple weeks ago that helps to understand the role media plays in propping up this claim:

"A tale of two studies: One study (October 2024 in School Psychology), picked up by the Toronto Star, gauged classroom incivility from anecdotal reports by teachers pre- and post-covid (handy they had data form Fall 2019) to conclude that lockdowns for three months in 2020 destroyed kids' socialization skills in 2022. The other study (October 2024 in an international medical journal), NOT picked up by the Star, assessed kids pre- and post-INFECTION, and against a control to find, 'more severe symptoms of inattention, hyperactivity-impulsivity, opposition, a wide range of emotional and behavioural problems, and poor school function.' Many studies have shown that SARS-CoV-2 affects the prefrontal cortex, which affects behaviour. Until mainstream media starts reporting on better studies, our children will suffer. A timeline of some studies on Covid's effects on the brain are here." 

On Trust and Justified Disgust

Pete Buttigieg gave a great interview last week. He believes that "in moments like this, salvation really will come from the local and state levels. . . that aren't captive to some wacky ideological project. They're just focused on getting things done." Then at 1:05, he addresses the issue of trust when asked what more he would add to his 2020 book: 

"One theme that was in the book that I think we need to spend a lot more time thinking about is how we get information. I wrote up a little about these studies on vaccine misinformation and the fact that Russia didn't just push anti-vax messages. Often what they would do is to push an anti-vax message and a pro-vax message at the same people because the point was just to get you at each other's throats. I think a lot of that's happened recently. Yes, they had a preferred presidential candidate, but their biggest objective wasn't to have for one side to win, it was to break down our trust. It turns out all the nuclear weapons in the world are not capable of doing what this information vector into our society did with shocking efficiency. And we're behind. I don't just mean those who are on my side of the political spectrum are behind. I think America's behind. 

New and Improved Propaganda Machines

We carry propaganda machines in our pockets. Propaganda isn't just to misinform, but to distract us and exhaust the capacity for critical thinking. When you're struggling to decide between 25 types of cereal or what colour to paint the kitchen, you can miss the bigger picture. Chomsky's been saying that for years. Propaganda destroys the quest for truth, and it's worse than ever.

Pat Loller has a quick explainer about how we're ignoring the huge shift in how propaganda operates now:

"Go make a new account or reset your algorithm on any app and see how many swipes it takes to get right-wing propaganda. . . . There are all these studies coming out saying Americans are functionally illiterate . . . you don't read, you don't get critical thinking skills, and then the propaganda that you're consuming, you don't think about. You just go, 'Oh, okay, I guess that's true,' especially if you've been consuming it since you were 15 years old. . . . These kids congregate around these figures and they play video games together. Go and look at any popular video game, and Control F search for 'woke' or 'DEI', and you'll see that the gaming sphere has been a cesspool for decades. . . .  There's all these angry young men with no critical thinking skills who are being fed a constant diet of propaganda that is literally dished up to them on their phones the moment they open an account. Is it any wonder that they're going to fall Pied Piper behind this guy who's just like, 'Hey, all of those complex challenges in your life? It's this guy's fault. Stop centering you as the protagonist in every single video game and every single movie and TV show ever made?? Girls say they'd rather meet a bear in the woods than you?? Get mad and vote for the guy who is going to hurt those people.' 

The Pandemicene

 Bird Flu is still not officially a pandemic concern, but there are some convincing arguments that it should be:

Lazarus Long wrote about the teenager who contracted H5N1:

"The Canadian BC teenager is in a hospital that barely uses surgical masks, under Bonnie Henry who screwed up SARS1, then COVID. She thinks aerosols only come in cans. Trigger warning: I am going to lay out the worst case for you. Going to get dark. 

Roundup of Election Views

There are tons of explanations for it. Here's a roundup of a few perspectives that helped me wrap my head around it all. 

Last January, British journalist George Monbiot predicted this possibility as a result of the American culture:

"People with a strong set of intrinsic values are inclined towards empathy, intimacy and self-acceptance. They tend to be open to challenge and change, interested in universal rights and equality, and protective of other people and the living world. People at the extrinsic end of the spectrum are more attracted to prestige, status, image, fame, power and wealth. They are strongly motivated by the prospect of individual reward and praise. They are more likey to objectify and exploit other people, to behave rudely and aggressively and to dismiss social and environmental impacts. They have little interest in cooperation or community. People with a strong set of extrinsic values are more likely to suffer from frustration , dissatisfaction, stress, anxiety, anger and compulsive behaviour. 

Everyone Seems Fine ≠ Long Covid is a Myth

Lots of people still really don't believe that some people have had their lives destroyed by Long Covid, and that they might too. And their loved ones. And sooner than they think!

Someone online posted this exchange: 

"I met a woman today. She started talking about Covid and how glad she is it's all behind us. I said, but it's not. Well it's mostly gone. No. She said it's not serious anymore. I said Long Covid is serious. She doesn't know anyone with Long Covid."

Me: "This is almost every single real life conversation I've had about Covid in the last two years."

Random dude popping in to argue: "I know no one with LC not in my crew, not with my wing. I work directly with nearly 1000 people. The way you all go on about 10-40% of society with long covid only makes you look more stupid."

Me: "There's an inability to understand science and stats. People look around to make an assessment of risk anecdotally instead of looking at the overall rate of Long Covid cases relative to the number of acute infections, which is pretty consistently showing that over 30% get Long Covid after three infections."

More Studies on Covid Harming Children -- How many do we need to act??

What do smoking, drinking, rollercoasters, and Covid have in common? They should all be avoided during pregnancy. 

One recent study found that when moms have Covid-19 during their pregnancy, their children have a significantly higher risk of serious growth and developmental delays and gastrointestinal malformations. They looked at children between 11 and 13 months (around their first birthday), and found a significant decrease in height and weight, a dramatic increase in the need for antibiotics in the first year (83% vs 10%), and the presence of malabsorption syndrome (can't absorb nutrients properly) in children whose moms had Covid while pregnant.

An RN commenting on the study online said,

"We have seen three babies born with imperforated anuses in the last year. That was something most nurses would maybe only see once in a 30+ year career."

Break the Chain of Transmission!

BC's deputy provincial health officer, Dr. Bonnie Henry, actually announced to the public, "If you've had Covid recently, you've had a boost to your immunity. So that's a good thing." Many scientists in the field are responding with, more or less, "No it absofuckalutely isn't!!" A recent study of marines supports the objectors.

Prognostic Chats wrote about the study:

"Are you a US Marine? Or as fit as one? Scared of a silly little thing like Covid? That nothing-burger of a mild virus, no worse than a cld or flu?! A super fit young adult with no co-morbidities, nothing to worry about, right? The Lancet has got some bad news for you (all). 

In this population of healthy young (median age 18) US Marines with mostly either asymptomatic or mild acute Covid, ONE QUARTER of those infected with Covid reported physical, cognitive, or psychiatric long-term sequelae of infection (PASC). The Marines affected with PASC showed evidence of long-term decrease in functional performance suggesting that SARS-CoV-2 infection may negatively affect health for a significant proportion of young adults. 

Propaganda vs Real Risk Scenarios: Sickness is health.

Arijit Chakravarty is a biologist who uses biotech and math to understand and write about Covid. He wrote a very long thread that I'll abridge here:  

"Over the last five years, we as a society have developed a set of norms about Covid. As someone who's been actively publishing on the subject, I notice it very strongly. People will ask, 'Why are you still masking?', then wince when they hear my reply. . . . My reply is obviously not what they want to hear, so I often get the 'that was too much' look from my wife and kids. This plays out in the public sphere as well. 'Expert' opinion that's soothing or reassuring is platformed, even if it's repeatedly wrong. This is a form of propaganda (calm-mongering) and distracts us from the reality. 

Calm-mongering serves to form an Overton Window about what futures are - and are not - discussable in polite conversation when it comes to The Virus That Must Not Be Named. 'Experts' have debated seasonality, herd immunity, hybrid immunity, and viral attenuation for years. Much of this is closer to fantasy in the context of Covid. The chance this virus will attenuate (evolve to become milder), to pick one example, is very low. . . . But still, the oft-baffled experts wax (and wane) lyrical about these possibilities.

Saving You Time

 ...but destroying the environment and likely killing some cyclists in the process. That's Doug Ford's new Bill 212: Reducing Gridlock, Saving You Time Act. 

Despite all research, knowledge and reality to the contrary, Ford is trying to convince people that RIPPING UP bike lanes will save them time on their way to work. This is, without question, another in a long line of tactics of pitting one group of citizens against another in order to get away with a giant grift, stealing billions from the province! He's giving us all $200 in hope we like him and take our rage and frustrations out on our neighbours!! Hate the cyclists, the maskers, the environmentalists, the science centre nuts, the tree huggers, but love the gov! 

But I digress.

Masking in Hospitals

Toronto's UHN hospitals (Princess Margaret, Toronto General...) are reinstating masking requirements. BUT medical masks. N95s are allowed, but not required. AND masks are not required in lobbies and common areas. So you're fine to go up the elevator with a crowd of people without a mask despite that elevators are one of the easiest places to catch Covid. But it's way better than this other tactic:

Amazing that we got to this place that hospitals turn away sick people!!

But we're still just getting breadcrumbs.

Barry Hunt commented on the new mask measures, 

"Hospitals have set a pretty low bar for protection. Mandating 'masks' instead of 'respirators' for respiratory protection is like recommending sneakers instead of work boots on a construction site. Yes, better than flip flops, but give me a break."

The hospitals also explain that it's about avoiding seasonal illnesses, despite also saying, elsewhere, that Covid is NOT seasonal. 

Capitalism's Effect on Bird Flu

If you think Covid is bad (or even if you don't), if H5N1 starts passing from human to human, it could be worse. It's not just about the virus's effect on us, but on our food supply. Another four agricultural workers caught it where 800,000 chickens had to be euthanized.

Here are some highlights from Katherine Eban's recent article:

"They stumbled upon hellish scenes out of a horror movie: Feverish cows in respiratory distress producing trickles of milk. Dying cats. enough dead barn pigeons and blackbirds to suggest a mass poisoning. Living birds with twisted necks, their heads tilted skyward. . . . This should be a story of heroism, cooperation, and an all-hads effort to defeat a wily virus. . . . Instead, it is a story of intimidation and obfuscation. The vets who sounded the alarm have been silences. . . . 

The interspecies nature of the outbreak makes combating it a unique challenge that requires a different response form that of Covid-19. We're focused on protecting human and animal health, as well as the food supply. Perhaps the biggest wild card has been the USDA's other mandate, to serve as the government's chief dairy lobbyist. . . . Looming over the USDA's reluctance to conduct a more transparent and proactive campaign against H5N1 in dairy cows are export agreements worth more than $24 billion each year. . . . Rather than moving forcefully to contain and eradicate the virus in dairy cows, critics say, the USDA has tried to control the narrative and spread the message that everything is just fine. . . . Dairy operators are essentially capital asset managers. It's so consolidated. For family farmers, there are only one or two buyers of your milk. If you don't go along with the playbook, your market access is cut off and you go bankrupt. And H5N! was not in the corporate playbook. Dairy farmers, afraid their cows would be quarantines or that they would not be able to sell their milk, simply opted not to test. Some forced veterinarians off their property. "Everyone is so scared shitless." . . . Meanwhile, the USDA was sitting on details about infected farms. . . . 

Most cows that contract H5N1 eventually recover with treatment. The same cannot be said for chickens. . . . With poultry being treated as less important than dairy, the mental health issues that come with killing animals for disease control, the substantial economic impact--to just allow it to continue with no end in sight, that's an untenable situation. . . . It is unclear whether the virus, as it continues to spread and evolve, will ultimately pose a serious threat to human health. But if it does, thre could be a battle no less intense than the one still being fought over who should be held responsible for Covid-19. Looking back at the events of 2019, one thing almost everyone agrees on is that China should have been much more transparent about what it knew and when it knew it. . . . Now only have we not learned, we have regressed.

Leafs are Falling

There's a lovely man that works where I rent a car to go camping in the summer. When I walk in with my N95 in place, he starts wiping the shit out of the counter and applying sanitizer liberally to his own hands and the car keys before passing them over to me in order to keep me safe. So thoughtful! 

But he doesn't wear a mask. 

That's what bad public health comms does to people. It keeps people unaware that Covid lives in the air more than the counter.

And that's what's happening to the Leafs, as they succumb, one by one, to a mysterious illness. 

Mark Ungrin gives us a good analogy for the baffling nature of officials and media today: 

"Remember that kids' show where there's always a mystery and it's totally obvious but the townspeople can't figure it out, and then after half an hour of a toddler shouting clues at the TV, the dog finally puts it together and solves the mystery?"

It's not just from bad comms, although that's where it started. At this point in the game, shifting sides on this means letting in some pretty painful shit. 

Whenever acknowledging what is true can provoke feelings of guilt or shame for what we believed was true in the past, we will fight to stay ignorant. 

Long Covid Resources

Three -- SIX Covid resources to bookmark. 

This Educational Toolkit for Long Covid has a series of videos explaining Long Covid in children, how to return to school safely, the impact on the family, and how to support kids in the classroom. There's also a 31-paged handbook with scripts for the videos and more to help walk parents through having kids with Long Covid. 

A group of scientists created an interactional infographic on how Covid becomes Long Covid, who's likely to get it, and all the ways it can affect the body. 

And filmmaker, a scientist, an artist, and a father got together to make this 16 minute film, The Unravelling. They discuss the problem with how we understand it and what Long Covid is really like. The Vimeo embedding isn't working worth shit here, so check it out at the link!

AND, UC Davis College of Engineering created a series of videos about Indoor Air Quality and disease prevention and control!

AND Dr. Lucky Tran wrote a really concise Covid explainer that can be easily shared: Why it's still a good idea to avoid Covid!

AND Maria Gillespie wrote a FREE book about masking in class.

Masks or Longterm Illness in Children - It Shouldn't be a Difficult Decision

Sara Novak recently wrote about the study that found 20% of children have Long Covid, aka PASC (Post Acute Sequelae of Covid) that I discussed in August, but Novak brought in further backing from additional studies:

“In the most expansive study of its kind, researchers have for the first time shown serious and prevalent symptoms of Long Covid in kids and teens. The August study, published in the Journal of the American Medical Association . . . which followed 5367 children, found that 20% of kids (ages 6-11) and 14% of teens met researchers' threshold for Long Covid. . . . By enrolling children who had been infected with acute COVID-19, as well as those who had not, researchers were able to isolate Long Covid symptoms in kids and teens. 'It allowed us to separate symptoms related to Long Covid with those that may have resulted from changes in a child's environment during the pandemic.' . . . For example, learning loss and mental health changes that were caused by the pandemic vs those that were caused by prolonged symptoms associated with Long Covid. . . . The new research found Long Covid affected nearly every organ system in kids and teens. And experts contend that pediatricians need to be on the lookout for GI complaints in kids as well as complaints of extreme fatigue and cognitive deficits or perceived changes in mental acuity in teenagers. . . .