your not going to save the hardened people, but you might save people on the fence.
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Redditors Give ‘The Herman Cain Award’ to Anti-Vaxxers Who Die of COVID
- Thread starter Dalek
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your not going to save the hardened people, but you might save people on the fence.
The sub and the articles posted - especially of parents leaving kids behind unnecessarily - has been personally helpful in convincing a few friends. I'm sure I'm not alone.
If you put your hand on a hot stove you deserve to be burned.
If you spend months refusing a free and widely available vaccine and spreading misinformation, you deserve the consequences when you end up intubated in a hospital before dying.
Edit: Fuck you know what, you're right. I should have said, if you start a fire in your house and push away firefighters who try to rescue you while the fire spreads to your neighbors' houses, you deserve to burn while they prioritize your victims.
There are now several websites exclusively devoted to this.
My post to the sub was downvoted to oblivion, but not removed:
You were posting the equivalent of Bible passages to shame people. Of course you were downvoted.
User Banned (1 Week): Disingenuous Gaslighting of Other Member's Posts over a Series of Posts; History of the Same
Just to be clear, you apply this line of thinking equally among minorities, poor people, and people from countries with a lack of education? Also do you really think every unvaccinated person who is hospitalized ends up intubated and dead?
This is just disingenuous. The sub is very clearly pointi g at people who could easily have made different choices, and instead in fact spread anti vax lies (and a lot of the time, bigotry along with it).
Argue in good faith.
No one has brought in unvaccinated countries. the sub is almost entirely USA with some Canadians. And each post generally shows them sharing misinformation and hateful memes. It's just screen grabs from their facebook pages.
I really think this isn't the highground you think it is.
Herman Cain was a minority. That doesn't exempt him from guilt for spreading misinformation and a deadly virus, and burdening the healthcare system with his recklessness.
I think there's a difference between a stupid teenager and an adult that is still trying to spread false information and completely unrepentant on their death bed. The indoctrination question really could be applied on some level to just about every scumbag on the planet, even those such as Kim Jung Un, Donald Trump, and Hitler. It's a nature vs. nurture question that remains unanswered, but also one where nearly everyone on the planet draws a line on at some point.
Why people accidentally getting themselves killed while in the process of killing and inflicting harm on others should be on the empathetic end of that inflection point, I don't understand.
There are various kinds of people in that sub. There are racists, there are Karens, there are anti-maskers, I'm sure most of us can agree there's very little sympath lost for them. And then there are "if I fall sick God will help me", "Just wash your hands, I don't need a vaccine", "My friends caught it and they said it wasn't a big deal", "I'm scared of the vaccine side effects, I don't think I'll catch COVID" etc. these are misinformed people and victims of circumstance. You can't lump them all into one blob.
I partake in the HCA schadenfreude daily. Extremely cathartic especially when the recipient turns out to also be racist, xenophobic, misogynist, anti-lgbt, GOP Trump supporter.
I do like reading the redemption awards too, glad that some turn around and urge others to take the vaccine.
I do like reading the redemption awards too, glad that some turn around and urge others to take the vaccine.
There are different people in that sub, and there are different kinds of reactions to them as well.
I mean, positive things are said about people who come around to pro vax as well.
The sub probably does nothing to convert those who are deeply entrenched, but it definitely helps convince those who are the fence. I've already used it to convince friends and families. I've even linked to it from other subbreddits and had people message me that it has changed their minds for the better.
They deserve the post and I deserve the downvotes then. Dozens of people were affected.
Fuck those idiots. They've made denying reality one of the core facets of their lives, and endangered countless others while doing so.
Their family sometimes gets my sympathy. But the fuckers who are denying all the way to the end ? Posting racist and prejudiced shit while laid up with the very disease they downplayed ? Fuck em.
The difference between me laughing at them and them shitting on liberals is that even with all this, I still want them to get free healthcare, to be treated fairly under the law, and to have as comfortable life as modern society can allow for.
Their family sometimes gets my sympathy. But the fuckers who are denying all the way to the end ? Posting racist and prejudiced shit while laid up with the very disease they downplayed ? Fuck em.
The difference between me laughing at them and them shitting on liberals is that even with all this, I still want them to get free healthcare, to be treated fairly under the law, and to have as comfortable life as modern society can allow for.
Yup. I only have so much empathy to go around. I'm not gonna waste it on these people anymore. I'll reserve it for the people who are vaccinated or can't get vaccinated and are in danger from the idiots who refuse to.
Ya, I think some people are really missing the point.
No one is posting threads there for people who couldn't get the vaccine. No one is posting people who quietly sat back taking some precautions but didn't get the vaccine. No one is even posting people who quietly refused to mask and didn't get the vaccine. There's very little there to post.
What is being posted are hateful people who spread their hate and ignorance for a year or more before it finally caught up to them. Were they victims of misinformation? Sure. They also were the misinformation. They were actively a part of the problem, not just victims of it.
Reading the subreddit regularly, its also worth noting that I don't think the Slate article characterizes the reactions of the sub very well. Is there some schadenfreude behind it? Absolutely. Some feeling of "Glad I wasn't that stupid"? Sure. Its not the overwhelming vibe of the place though unless that's specifically what you're looking for. Some people make jokes and laugh at the ignorance these people were spreading, but few are directly laughing at their deaths and those are rarely the comments that rise to the top in threads. Its a lot more people being sad for their loved ones. Frustrated that their kids are now orphans. Disappointed that the ones who had finally seen the light and wanted a vaccine when they got out of the hospital never got the chance.
That's the biggest misreading some here are suggesting. Most of the people in that sub don't want anyone to die. I know I don't. If they did, you wouldn't see so much joy and excitement at the people who were finally convinced to get their shots.
People are dying regardless though. If it is going to be someone, I'd much rather it be the people who refused to protect themselves. Who actively endangered others. Who were vile, hateful bigots. And ya, sometimes the more vile and bigoted ones I think the world is probably a better place without them in it, but even then I didn't wish death on them. I would have far preferred if they just got a free vaccine so they could live. So we could all get back to living our lives. When I pull up a thread my thought isn't "ha ha, look at the dumb dead idiot." It's usually a sigh, with "what a moron." Or often "What a moron, their poor family." Sometimes even "That poor moron" in the better cases. That subreddit is mostly a hate read for me and it seems from the replies for many others that's a pretty common feeling. People aren't going there to feel good.
All the while though I think its actually doing a lot of good. For a lot of us, this is one of the more direct looks we've gotten at exactly how these people are dying at this point, directly narrated by them and their families. Not reliable narrators of course, but there's enough commonalities between cases that you can start to see some of how this really goes. We've hidden the deaths away to a degree that seeing it this directly in the words of those dead or dying is quite powerful and if the people showing their new vaccine cards are any indication, I'm not the only one who feels so. Some of the testimonials by family members, by doctors, and others have been really useful. And frankly, I think history will be fascinated by this period and how so many people actively killed themselves for political reasons. I think its important to document.
No one is posting threads there for people who couldn't get the vaccine. No one is posting people who quietly sat back taking some precautions but didn't get the vaccine. No one is even posting people who quietly refused to mask and didn't get the vaccine. There's very little there to post.
What is being posted are hateful people who spread their hate and ignorance for a year or more before it finally caught up to them. Were they victims of misinformation? Sure. They also were the misinformation. They were actively a part of the problem, not just victims of it.
Reading the subreddit regularly, its also worth noting that I don't think the Slate article characterizes the reactions of the sub very well. Is there some schadenfreude behind it? Absolutely. Some feeling of "Glad I wasn't that stupid"? Sure. Its not the overwhelming vibe of the place though unless that's specifically what you're looking for. Some people make jokes and laugh at the ignorance these people were spreading, but few are directly laughing at their deaths and those are rarely the comments that rise to the top in threads. Its a lot more people being sad for their loved ones. Frustrated that their kids are now orphans. Disappointed that the ones who had finally seen the light and wanted a vaccine when they got out of the hospital never got the chance.
That's the biggest misreading some here are suggesting. Most of the people in that sub don't want anyone to die. I know I don't. If they did, you wouldn't see so much joy and excitement at the people who were finally convinced to get their shots.
People are dying regardless though. If it is going to be someone, I'd much rather it be the people who refused to protect themselves. Who actively endangered others. Who were vile, hateful bigots. And ya, sometimes the more vile and bigoted ones I think the world is probably a better place without them in it, but even then I didn't wish death on them. I would have far preferred if they just got a free vaccine so they could live. So we could all get back to living our lives. When I pull up a thread my thought isn't "ha ha, look at the dumb dead idiot." It's usually a sigh, with "what a moron." Or often "What a moron, their poor family." Sometimes even "That poor moron" in the better cases. That subreddit is mostly a hate read for me and it seems from the replies for many others that's a pretty common feeling. People aren't going there to feel good.
All the while though I think its actually doing a lot of good. For a lot of us, this is one of the more direct looks we've gotten at exactly how these people are dying at this point, directly narrated by them and their families. Not reliable narrators of course, but there's enough commonalities between cases that you can start to see some of how this really goes. We've hidden the deaths away to a degree that seeing it this directly in the words of those dead or dying is quite powerful and if the people showing their new vaccine cards are any indication, I'm not the only one who feels so. Some of the testimonials by family members, by doctors, and others have been really useful. And frankly, I think history will be fascinated by this period and how so many people actively killed themselves for political reasons. I think its important to document.
In other countries it's sad because they don't have access to any vaccines
In the USA you can legit walk into any pharmacy and they'll give you a vaccine
So when I hear stories of anti vaxxers die I go "welp" and move on, sucks but what can you do, they have all the info
I like to read the "leopards ate my face" subreddit
In the USA you can legit walk into any pharmacy and they'll give you a vaccine
So when I hear stories of anti vaxxers die I go "welp" and move on, sucks but what can you do, they have all the info
I like to read the "leopards ate my face" subreddit
This is not the equivilant of people dying in a car crash though, and it's an odd connection to make. The specific people being talked about are killing large numbers of other people and acting like they were in the right while they die from their own reckless actions.
If we're going to stretch this to a car crash analogy, it would be like a habitual drunk driver who killed people over and over and over in accidents without consequences before finally being done in from a wreck. All while be part of a club of like minded drunk drivers that encourage others to drive drunk, even from their death beds.
If the possibility of dying from a preventable disease doesn't convince someone to prevent it, but the possibility of getting mocked for dying from it later does...I guess that's a win?
A stupid win is still a win, right?
Just a quick glance at the folks that passed away mentioned on that sub. They were, like you said, anti mask and anti vaxx warriors. Hardcore. They were going ALL IN in having others be on board and make the same mistakes.
It must be so damn frustrating having such people be family and friends.
That subreddit is incredibly depressing to me. It sheds an unflattering light on the mean-spirited, self-destructive social media environments that people immerse themselves in. That's true of some posters there, but it's especially true of the pig-headed idiots digging themselves an early grave out of spite. These people had free access to their choice of vaccine. We could have effectively ended the pandemic in this country by now. But no, it's more important that they "prove" their favorite demagogue right by not taking any precautions and mocking those who do. They would literally rather die than take a democrat's advice.
It's worth noting that for every one of these people who die unvaccinated, there are ten more like them who recover and keep spewing hate online. This problem is not burning itself out. The subreddit is just a window for many of us to watch the country descend into paralyzing grievance and superstition.
It's worth noting that for every one of these people who die unvaccinated, there are ten more like them who recover and keep spewing hate online. This problem is not burning itself out. The subreddit is just a window for many of us to watch the country descend into paralyzing grievance and superstition.
I do hope so. It's hard to argue with the deterrent of all the examples hopefully having effect.
But all it's going to take is the development of a vaccine resistant variant to lead to the evil opposite version of the Herman Cain award: screenshot of "I got vaccinated" alongside screenshot of snarky comment on CovidAteMyFace, alongside sick-in-hospital post with "but I got vaccinated!," alongside thoughts and prayers post.
Herman Cain award recipients as well as impoverished countries will have bred that variant, if we don't get BOTH vaccinated more, but that won't prevent snarky laughter at our former arrogance, especially if our own calloused laughter is on permanent internet record.
If we don't feel sympathy we should at least feel humbled in the face of what is unquestionably nature's greatest weapon of human death (so far). But I can understand the urge to want to flaunt vaccinated immunity as example to motivate others. That was the same reasoning I had when declining to wear a mask after being vaccinated summer.
I guess I was hoping positive example would work. But the fools just took off their masks and faked it. Now here we are.
Just… remain aware that weapons continue to not care at whom they are pointed. That goes for viruses and hatred: both tend to have a life and a direction of their own.
this youtube channel also has something similar as the hermancain awards. i'll be honest i frequent that reddit and see nothing wrong with it. if some people can be scared into action then good. you shouldn't need to face tragedy in your life just so you can do the right thing.
Do we really need to play the Goodwin card? Like come on, have a little more imagination
It is. My mother and I have been pretty furious at my uncle for his anti-vax stance, especially since he got my cousin sick too. She's autistic in such a way that she is incapable of taking care of herself or understanding what's going on. Luckily, unlike the people being discussed, he didn't stick with his anti-vax stance after getting sick and proceeded to recover.
Also between the few anti-vax family members I have, and the people I used to work with, I can confidently say the ones I know aren't brainwashed. You dig down enough with them, and they're well aware of at least some their contradictory views.
Underneath there was always an element of narcisism, cruelty, and bigotry (just not as over the top openly displayed like Trump). They seek out media that confirms these aspects of themselves, and are exposed to misinformation through there, some of which they don't actually believe. A lot of their anti-vax/anti-mask stances basically boiled down to a combination of being anti-liberal/pro-bigotry and playing the odds that it wouldn't happen to them personally. It was those "other people" that were being hurt. 600,000+ people dying just wasn't that big a deal to them.
Me too, shit is tragic but I can't look away. The redemption posts are good for my soul at least.
A lot more than that. Current estimates for the lethality of COVID fall somewhere between .5% and 2%. So even if you assume the worst, for every one that dies 49 live. The problem is that this thing is so contagious that even if only one in 200 dies in a best case scenario, that's still a whole lot of dead people.
I subscribe to the subreddit and read it occasionally, but it's pretty much just page after page of:
- Sometimes bald, usually fat, always white, 'Christian' person posts tons of extremely racist, antivax shit on Facebook on Twitter
- Said person gets Covid
- Said person goes to the hospital, 'Christian' family asks for Ts and Ps
- Said person dies, with announcement from 'Christian' family that said fat, white racist is 'with Jesus' now, often accompanied by a link to a Gofundme
It's not particularly novel anymore, just sad. I don't take joy in the deaths of these people - I just don't understand their stupidity. They literally kill themselves to own the libs. If Trump had promoted a treatment actually backed by the (real) science, I'd use it and not care whether I was being owned by the right. Sadly, all they can muster is horse paste and hydrogen peroxide nebulizers.
- Sometimes bald, usually fat, always white, 'Christian' person posts tons of extremely racist, antivax shit on Facebook on Twitter
- Said person gets Covid
- Said person goes to the hospital, 'Christian' family asks for Ts and Ps
- Said person dies, with announcement from 'Christian' family that said fat, white racist is 'with Jesus' now, often accompanied by a link to a Gofundme
It's not particularly novel anymore, just sad. I don't take joy in the deaths of these people - I just don't understand their stupidity. They literally kill themselves to own the libs. If Trump had promoted a treatment actually backed by the (real) science, I'd use it and not care whether I was being owned by the right. Sadly, all they can muster is horse paste and hydrogen peroxide nebulizers.
Well, some of the people posted on that sub were pretty much nazis
Yes. They were specifically saying every single life without exception, and we're talking about people that were directly contributing mass death. There's no reason to be "creative", as Hitler is among the most blatant examples of that idea being bullshit, and a baseline pretty much anyone can agree on. It's directly applicable to what they said.
Godwin's law is mostly bullshit anyway, especially in a world where Nazis and Nazi adjacent people are conceiving these memes and conspiracies directly.
Even if a variant comes around that is fully vaccine resistant, getting the vaccine won't be the reason for people dying, so it won't be at all a logical conclusion. Half of them are already convinced that the vaccine is killing people and laughing at people for getting it anyway so not sure that makes any difference. If a significantly vaccine resistant variant comes along we also will likely be able to create a booster targeting it quickly thanks to MRNA technology.
Also, "unquestionably nature's greatest weapon of human death (so far)" is more than slightly hyperbolic. COVID is certainly very bad, but it pales in comparison to some of the pandemics of the past such as the bubonic plague. That thing wiped out half of Europe. Case fatality rates are estimated to have been between 30-60%. That thing ran wild for around 7 years too.
I can't believe a poster in this thread actually comparing laughing that a virus followed its nature and killed someone to carrying out state-sanctioned violence.
I also find it interesting that, aside from calling it ghoulish, no one has actually presented any evidence that the Reddit does harm. There's plenty of examples in the Reddit, as well as the articles, of it saving lives. But those complaining have yet to document One. Single. Example. of that Reddit (and the gallows humor of belligerent racists dying) causing harm. Instead it's all sanctimony about how we should feel sorry for the assholes without a single suggestion of how to deprogram them or prevent them from harming others.
It's not fooling anyone.
I also find it interesting that, aside from calling it ghoulish, no one has actually presented any evidence that the Reddit does harm. There's plenty of examples in the Reddit, as well as the articles, of it saving lives. But those complaining have yet to document One. Single. Example. of that Reddit (and the gallows humor of belligerent racists dying) causing harm. Instead it's all sanctimony about how we should feel sorry for the assholes without a single suggestion of how to deprogram them or prevent them from harming others.
It's not fooling anyone.
What the sub highlights is the pattern the nominees usually follow.
- Post bigoted memes
- Anti-vax/mask memes. They post the same 15 dumbass memes too.
- Contract COVID
- "COVID is no joke"
- PRAYER WARRIORS ASSEMBLE
- Death - usually announced by family/friends
- Post GoFundMe because these people usually don't have life insurance or any kind of savings.
If anything, the sub has done its job by pushing the fence-sitters into get the vaccine and that's all one can ask for right now.
- Post bigoted memes
- Anti-vax/mask memes. They post the same 15 dumbass memes too.
- Contract COVID
- "COVID is no joke"
- PRAYER WARRIORS ASSEMBLE
- Death - usually announced by family/friends
- Post GoFundMe because these people usually don't have life insurance or any kind of savings.
If anything, the sub has done its job by pushing the fence-sitters into get the vaccine and that's all one can ask for right now.
OP
OP
Wow there's a doozy here today:
old.reddit.com
Mark sh*tposts his way to an award, wife denies he won it and resumes sh*tposting.
Posted in r/HermanCainAward by u/MiniRedder • 28,329 points and 3,055 comments
old.reddit.com
I don't browse that subreddit actively but will read the stories as they pop up into all if I'm on at the same time. Early on there seemed to be a bunch of people tracking accounts or family members down and clowning them for it which was frankly gross
incredibly cathartic read though
incredibly cathartic read though
I mean, I'd still expect a fair amount of mean-spirited retaliation over any demonstrated hubris. But you're right that's hardly an increment over mean-spirited retaliation over... getting vaccinated to try and help everyone. And that's comforting about variants, but I hear more concerns than you're expressing over vaccine-resistant variants. So...?
Kind of a percentage versus volume argument, I guess. It was hyperbolic, though, sorry.
I don't think nature's quite done with us, though.
The vast majority of them tend to be homophobic, racist, transphobic assholes so I feel absolutely no sympathy for them
Especially as someone who experienced the virus and is taking any precaution to not have to experience it again.
Especially as someone who experienced the virus and is taking any precaution to not have to experience it again.
A lot of these stories are classic "fuck around and find out," but the one involving the mom with the 8 kids just infuriates me. Endangering people, especially other people's children, is truly awful, but doing all that and endangering your own children (and then dying and leaving them without one parent) is fucked up on a whole other level.
Ye had already responded that clearly was wrong on that front. However the sentiment still stands, lots of uneducated clowns getting caught on the wrong side of this that don't really need laughed at.
Variants are definitely a concern. Even in a best case scenario for a seriously resistant variant you're talking a month or two to fully understand and identify it, then at least a few months of testing (faster likely than the original vaccine testing since it would be a version of an existing vaccine but still needed) and then you have to produce and distribute them all over again (faster again this time since the production lines are in place, but still not something that happens overnight). It would be much faster than the original vaccines were, you could very possibly start getting shots into arms at the 4-6 month mark. That's still 4-6 months of it running free though. Its far from nothing and that's really a best case scenario. There's also the challenge of convincing people who have increasingly given up to stay home again or even get a shot again.
Even in volume the bubonic plague puts this to shame though.. It killed an estimated 45-50 million people. COVID isn't even to 5 million. Even if COVID lasted 7 years we likely wouldn't get anywhere close to 45-50 million with vaccines now widely available in many countries and becoming more available by the day.
There will certainly be more pandemics. Ones this bad in our lifetime? The law of averages and the rate they come along at says probably not but its certainly possible.
Wow there's a doozy here today:
Mark sh*tposts his way to an award, wife denies he won it and resumes sh*tposting.
Posted in r/HermanCainAward by u/MiniRedder • 28,329 points and 3,055 comments
This one is crazy. Especially the July 15-16 double post. July 15 he says that Covid is bullshit. July 16 he says that he's out working amidst all the danger. (Of course it's just to make some bullshit argument about unemployment checks)
Wife not believing he died from Covid a year later..... smh. And that "public service announcement" pin about being unvaccinated. "Stay away from me!" Trust me, Karen. We all want to, but the thing that's keeping this pandemic going is you won't allow us to leave you alone. You're still going out into public and getting into everyone's business.
Wow there's a doozy here today:
Mark sh*tposts his way to an award, wife denies he won it and resumes sh*tposting.
Posted in r/HermanCainAward by u/MiniRedder • 28,329 points and 3,055 comments
Oof... imagine believing that Mark and Tricia "deserve" anything more than being an eternal monument to homicidal levels of stupidity and indecency.
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