1\ An urban legend that refuses to die is the idea that "BIPOC patients are more likely to die in childbirth" and that this must reflect systemic racism
This idea is taken so seriously that it's now the subject of proposed legislation:
5\ So let's click (yet again) on a link to more granular data
What's this?!
Hispanic mothers have better outcomes than whites?
Asian mothers are about the same as whites?
How can "structural racism" explain these facts?
6\ Of course, structural racism *can't* explain those facts. But an even better question is: why is the CDC playing the race baiting game?
Why hide data? Why manipulate data?
Veterans of the COVID-19 info wars will perhaps not be surprised by this bad behavior
7\ As ever, know that "BIPOC" is seldom a term used in good faith
The differences *between* BIPOC groups (e.g. between blacks and Asians) are often larger than the differences between whites and *any* group
Race baiting is dumb. We should stop being polite to those who do it
8\ If "implicit bias" isn't to blame for racial differences in perinatal complications, what is?
It occurred to me that there are two topics our society is deathly afraid of discussing: race and obesity
It wouldn't surprise me if the answer lies at their intersection. Let's see
9\ Sure enough, obesity and perinatal complications are strongly linked, and this link is strongest among the morbidly obese (BMI > 40)
10\ But do races differ in propensity for morbid obesity?
Yup. Massively.
And the differences almost perfectly match the differences in maternal deaths in childbirth: blacks high, hispanics low, whites intermediate
(CDC prefers the euphemism "severe" over "morbid")
11\ Even the Asian anomaly (lowest in morbid obesity, second highest in maternal mortality) may have a solution:
The NHANES data the CDC uses for obesity appears to distinguish between Asians (skinny) and Pacific Islanders (fat), but the maternal data combines the two
12\ With perinatal complications as with COVID-19, we see the CDC subordinating science to politics: they would rather conjure up imaginary "systemic racism" than contradict the faddish notion that "big is beautiful"
Well, big also kills.
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1\ Been reading Gennep's "Rites of Passage", about the conserved forms of human ritual across time and space
One of the most primal concepts for the human brain is the "crossing of thresholds"
Thresholds are central to rituals of all types (birth, marriage, war, diplomacy)...
2\ And COVID-19 hygiene rituals are no different
This morning we breakfasted at a place where the Karens emerged from their cars already masked, walked masked to the hostess...then happily unmasked once past the door...
3\ After breakfast we went to a public playground with no obvious entry point or threshold. *Everyone* was masked on slide and swing
Later we drove to a private playground with an entry gate. Same Karen demographic, same masks, but they all unmasked once past the gate
Is the rabid zeal for other people to get vaccinated like anything so much as Old World missionaries dragging frightened natives into the sunlight and forcing them to kiss a holy book?
Andy Slavitt is the conquistador in shiny greaves spraying holy water on a virgin landscape and idly wondering where to put the silver mine
Gates is the earnest believer who erects a church on his encomienda and scrupulously counts out the royal fifth to be sent to Spain
1\ I just experienced a government clusterfuck so stupefying that, if I hadn't already watched the world shut down despite hospitals being empty, I wouldn't believe it was possible...
So, I need a PCR test for an upcoming int'l flight...
2\ Test can't be more than 72hrs old, but because our city is testing all school children multiple times a week, commercial labs can no longer do 72hr turnarounds
The lab tech helpfully suggested I check the airport
Turns out, the airport offers 48hr turnarounds on tests!
3\ Great! I even checked the airport website. It specifically advertises that tests are available for people who need them before they can depart
@rocket_jenross@Benshooter@wolfejosh 1\ Even if you deny the existence of objective morality or a creator, pragmatism still demands a delineation of rights that leads to the best outcomes in the world we inhabit
A libertarian, "negative rights" approach argues that sovereignty of one's body and property is best...
@rocket_jenross@Benshooter@wolfejosh 2\ Locke got there a bit mystically, Rothbard a bit speciously, Hayek and Friedman (Jr.) with arguments about how benefits and costs must be vested in the individual to allow economically efficient outcomes
@rocket_jenross@Benshooter@wolfejosh 3\ For me it comes down to the practical consideration that positive rights are incompatible with negative rights, so if you want to avoid the coercion that so often leads to tyranny, you have to pare rights down to a minimal set