Covid-19 Discussion (moderated)

Its happened more than once  'its over' ridiculous thinking or rather non-thinking.
But try it from administrators' point of view.
Do they keep a regulation that they suddenly know they can't enforce because of recent changes ?
Most countries - over 200 countries didn't try to mandate vaccination nationally - because they knew it wasn't feasible for multiple reasons.
They'd have had to prosecute too many people for one thing.
For another they knew it would cause too much backlash -
For yet another - they know that some persons have allergies and infirmities and prior histories and senior related problems that make them poor candidates for vaxx. 
The failure to produce hypoallergenic masks for those allergic to masks - that's murkier.

On the contrary...you've simply moved from hounding Chamo to hounding me about not being able to hound Chamo .  I merely set you straight.  Hounding would be if I kept alluding to what I just said over and over and over (with your name or without).  This is a distinction you should internalize...

I'm going to warn you early...your excursions off topic are eventually going to get you blocked for spamming.  It won't be because I have it in for you, or that I can't handle your arguments, etc.  It will be because you are distracting from the thread topic on a consistent basis.

@btickler
You're just too convinced you're right.
Why did you demand I produce a bunch of evidence posts if you wanted to keep the forum on topic ?
That's your 'excursion' not mine.  Its like a baiting manoeuver.
Why didn't you agree to PM's?  Why don't you?
Because you've already judged.

I didn't mention your username in post 3866 and you chose to make it personal.
You chose to respond in a personal way.
So your policy will be to continue to hound me personally so that you have an excuse to block me because of your personal bias and judgement?
I"ve been interfering with Covid misinformation here -
why would you want to make it a personal thing ??
Keep insulting me so that you can block me?

"Maintain that vaccines 'don't reduce the spread of Covid'.  That kind of foolishness getting a lot of people killed.
People nodding at each other and asserting 'Yeah - the graphs and stats say so.  Seeeee ???'
How would one arrange for such people to think for themselves or to stop pretending they're not doing so - or more technically to get past their Awful Cognitive Disonnances and Cognition biases ?
'Learning' is much easier than unlearning.
That's if unlearning something false - is even desired by whoever.

How much thinking does it take to realize that at whatever rate Covid spread or variant spread could 'circumvent' vaccination - that in those vastly preponderant instances when vaccination causes the immune system to escalate its defenses against the disease ... and then Kill it - then that person is then less likely to spread the disease ?
How much thinking ?

The thinking that the misinformationers are unwilling to do - because that means Unlearning. 
It means a massive attack of disonnance and self-embarassment and even Public Embarassment.  
Add politics to that - ideology - the influence of the Raoults and the Mercolas and the terrrible desire to justify pathetic fear of Needles ...
and what do you get?  A pandemic that's worse than it had to be."

"then that person is then less likely to spread the disease ?"

Less likely, but how much less likely? Considerably? Numbers definitely don't suggest so. Definitely not numbers previously mentioned here about deaths per million in a country that's 83% fully vaccinated against one that's 65%. Deaths per million going lower in the latter, when the other country also has a majority of people fully vaccinated, but cases are still up there in both. Deaths don't represent spreading. Cases do. Because spreading implies catching COVID and passing it to somebody else, which would increase the number of cases, and not necessarily the number of deaths. (Having high vaccination rates would decrease the amount of deaths though).

One might suggest the averse vaccine 'refuse' to acquire the fact that vaccines stimulate an immune response which creates antibodies who act on the viral load and get rid of the virus quicker on the body. However, actual statistics do not show a great efficacity when it comes to that. Taking a simple look at worldometer shows that the countries with the most daily cases for numerous days have been ones with insane vaccination rates. Most countries in Africa have less than 50% of their population vaccinated, some less than 20%, some less than 15, 10. Somehow they're dealing extremely well with the pandemic. What is the individual exactly meant to believe? What seems more pertinent? "Less likely to spread the disease", or numbers?

"pathetic fear of Needles ..."

That's just insane, and misinformation too:

2 people out of 10,000 doses getting developing a severe/life-threatening condition or even dying is not a pathetic fear of needles. Non-COVID excess death is also going up. Some match vaccination campaigns. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YqTGD9LHe9g&t=745s Here around 17:30, firm data is being shown about excess mortality, in the regularly mentioned Australia.

You're nitpicking 

".the other is to castigate everyone who doesn't follow every measure.  My line in the sand in in a different location."
Which nobody has done here.
Who 'castigated' everyone who 'doesn't follow every measure'?
Somebody wants to say they're not vaccinated - that's completely legitimate to say so.
So is saying that they don't wear a mask these days.

But saying that one won't get the disease if one wears a mask and socially distances and washes hands ...
is Covid Misinformation.  Its an authoritative declaration that is negligent.
Interfering with such misinformation is not personal.
Personally attacking and slandering people who so interfere is personal though.  

'Covid-19 discussion'
That would include discussion of Covid disinformation.
Discussion of misleading and misguided information.
And objecting to such misinformation.  
If that's not to be discussed here -
then it should be set out in the opening post.
Further qualified.

Lol.  I have gone out of my way not to make it personal, nor have I really insulted you.  I've made some measured observations.  There's nothing I have pointed out that isn't true.  

Interfering with misinformation is not the goal.  Your verb choice is spot on here.  Debunking misinformation and providing better information is the goal.  There's no need to get on your bullhorn every time Chamo or anyone else gets on their soapbox...and if you find this analogy insulting, then I encourage you to review your posts of the past several weeks, imagine Chamo getting on his soapbox each time he posts, then read what happens afterwards (as an impartial observer, pretend you aren't you).

I did not demand a bunch of evidence posts.  I asked for examples, that you could not provide.  It would only have taken one post ...a small price to pay.

You are free to send me PMs.  Those that warrant a response will get a response.  If they amount to drama or gossip, they probably won't.

There's no policy of continuing to hound you, because as I just pointed out, I was not hounding you the first time you trotted that allegation out.

No, I made a valid distinction.  Nitpicking implies/requires initiation, not just a response to someone else's points.

"You always hold up the check out line when you are at the store"

"I wasn't at the store"

can be viewed here: 
 https://www.chess.com/forum/view/off-topic/covid-19-discussion?quote_id=68177427&page=179#comment-68177427

'you're not going to contract the virus'.
Is Covid misinformation.
I object.
Not personal.  Not Hounding.
I object to that post.
And I don't think the opening poster @btickler is doing enough about it.
Nothing personal in the objection nor in the complaint about not enough being done.
Perhaps nobody will support me in this objection. 
Perhaps somebody will.
It stands in either case.

That post was from 5 weeks ago, and Chamo has not repeated it.  That viewpoint was challenged by multiple posters at the time.  So, there's nothing to "do" about it.  Posters are able to express their viewpoint.  They are not allowed to push/evangelize a viewpoint that is unsupported repeatedly, nor are they allowed to push somebody else's unsupported viewpoint that is being linked.

    BTW.....I have no problem with how btickler is running his thread.....or how Elroch is running HIS thread......or Hession Warrior.  To keep a good thread running takes hard work and time. 

You asked him to delete at least one other post. 
Why haven't you asked him to delete that one ?
Somebody could read it and believe it.
'Other posters challenged it'  and rightfully so - 
There is something you could do.
You could talk to him about it.
Ask him why he'd make a post like that.

Its not the only one.  Regardless of who makes posts like that ...
this next objection does not mention a name.
I can get the name but that's not the point right now.

Posts to this effect:  'vaccination does not reduce the spread of Covid' ...
how could vaccination not reduce the spread - after such vaccination has caused the immune system to accelerate its defenses and has Killed the virus?
If instead posts were something like:
"Covid vaccination has effectively reduced the Covid death rate among the vaccinated although not guranteeing total protection nor that a vaccinated person couldn't pass the disease."
Vaccination wasn't meant to do either.
Vaccination was and is meant to fight the disease -

not to provide a bulletproof glass wall against it.
Asserting to people as if it was purported to do such - as part of a case for not getting vaccinated - is negligent. 

But posts asserting that it 'doesn't reduce the spread' are both false and misleading.
Its as negligent or more negligent than insisting one doesn't need to wear a mask once vaccinated.
Even saying that 'vaccination doesn't stop the spread of Covid' is irresponsible.
Because it is ignoring the fact of a killed virus not having the power of contagion.  
As to the motivations behind why anybody would try to spread misleading assurances about 'you're not going to contract' - or 'vaccinations don't reduce' 
why shouldn't that be discussed too?
I mentioned much earlier that most countries have not mandated nationally for vaccination ...  I mentioned why too.
Nobody got on my case for mentioning why.
These dynamics are all relevant to the subject.
As are the motivations of people like Didier Raoult and Joseph Mercola.

The spread of Covid misinformation - has been part of the pandemic - making it much worse than it had to be 
whether it was from quacks like Raoult and Mercola -
or people rumoring misinformation on the internet.

I don't actually recall asking Chamo, or anyone, to delete a post directly.  Certainly not in my role as OP with some ultimatum/threat of blocking behind it.  It's been offered/done by posters, and I have definitely offered deletion as an alternative, as in "if you feel this way, you might want to modify or delete xyz".  I have blocked posters.  I don't believe in deleting real content.  I have asked mods to remove spam posts that were egregious a couple of times. 

This is not an echo chamber.  There's no requirement that everything posted here be factually correct...only that if something is being promoted repeatedly that it is backed up by reputable sources.  There are plenty of places where people are getting their misinformation.  I doubt that anyone would say "I felt like I would get vaccinated based on everything I read on the Internet until I came across this thread on Chess.com that convinced me otherwise"...

I've seen some bad disinformation on the site ... like:
"viruses can't spread diseases' and 
'Covid is a hoax' and 'Covid is a joke'.  
But people would have defenses against those ...
so arguably - during over two years of Covid - the worst misinformation I've seen on the website is in the last few weeks in this forum.

You spoke to him.  And he deleted.
But only after you told him 'don't post ...'.  

There are also defenses against what Chamo said, and those have been put forth...

This seems to be a double standard on your part from my perspective.  If a troll poster says something sarcastic and negative and tacks on "Covid is a hoax", then it's considered normal and can be summarily dismissed ("people would have a defense against those"), but when Chamo makes posts that actually go after various numbers and statistics with other studies/data (dubious or not), his conclusions are more dangerous somehow and must be "interfered" with.  Could it be because you find his posts more reasonable and credible, ergo more of a threat?

That is a challenge to refute them in kind, not to shout them down and drown them out.

As for characterizing the last couple of weeks as the worst misinformation you've seen on the site...I'm not buying.  

@btickler
not an echo chamber - 
'Somebody' has served notice that he'll practice various tactics against anything he disagrees with or that disagrees with him.  

'go after various numbers and statistics'
and then you tell him - don't post.
I could try giving you your own advice ('you need to examine your own ...')
but if you deny that you have a subconscious mind and can make mistakes - then that advice wouldn't work.
'you won't contract the disease if ...'   
but now you've admitted that got challenged by other posters.

In other words - you want to brush that off.
You've also tried to maintain that the post he 'apologized' for was a kind of solitary example.  That's now been refuted.  Its not 'solitary'.
Its not.  Regarding your 'perspective' - yes.  'Your'.
I repeat - the worst Covid disinformation I've seen in two years on the website is right here in this forum since around post 3400.  
For a while - you were opposing him.
You even gave him 'strike two' (you don't remember that one either ?)  
Want to see that one too ?
Suggestion: 
don't ask for these examples and then blame me for supplying them.
Should I say 'you need to ...' and then add an emoji ?
I'm not buying that.

Nobody could reasonably construe this as me asking Chamo to delete his post.  He decided to delete on his own.

You have yet to provide a single valid example of anything I asked for or even that you claimed I have asked for, for that matter.

Somebody has served notice that they will use various tactics?  That's all in your head.  You can't reasonably "serve notice" (something concrete) about using "various tactics" (something vague).  I have seen nothing of the kind in this thread. 

You have claimed that Chamo knowingly posted the opposite of your positions and tried to present them as your actual position, ostensibly to confuse people.  This, were it true, would be a horrible (as in ineffective) and transparent tactic.  You, for some reason, have taken great offense at this perceived machination and have been on a crusade ever since.  

I opposed his *misinformation*.  Note how you continue to conflate the poster with the actual content.  I am quite obviously still opposing his misinformation.  He did get a strike two.

You have gotten yours now as well.  No more going after Chamo (harassment), or badgering me about it (spamming).  Nobody could begin to say that I haven't given you enough leeway here.