CDC announced no mask for the fully vaccinated

[Gadianton]

Anyone get sick from the vax? My wife and I are so, freaking, sick. Muscles ache. Balls hurt. Woozy and winded.

- Doc

Moderna #2 seemed less intrusive than the first does until about 24 hours later, and then I was in pain for the next day and a half. Never looked into it, but the shot guy insisted I don't take meds if possible, and if I have to, just Tylenol. So I took one pill of extra-strength I bought at the Walmart that day before bed for 2 nights so I could at least sleep. With the first dose, for days after I got it, I took naps constantly. The second was more intense pain but I was totally fine after 2 days; no constant drowsiness.

[Chap]

There is one obvious reason for this: as the share of wealth going to capital increases, and the share going to wage earners decreases, a shrinking proportion of the working population feels secure enough to have kids.

Lol! If low wages and lack of opportunity meant low fertility rates there would be no children born in Africa, Latin America, or the Phillipines. In fact it's the opposite, lack of economic opportunity is where fertility rates are the highest. Women in developed countries have the option of a career as opposed to children and often choose to forego children or at least delay marriage and family until later in life.

Let's see. I actually said:

Birth rates certainly are falling, and will continue to fall in countries like the US and Europe. There is one obvious reason for this: as the share of wealth going to capital increases, and the share going to wage earners decreases, a shrinking proportion of the working population feels secure enough to have kids.

Did you notice that? I specifically spoke of advanced economies like yours and mine. You deliberately left that out, of course. We both live in countries where people who took it for granted that they would have good jobs that enabled them to buy a home and raise kids comfortably now find that those kids can't earn enough to live and raise families like they did. But the share of the national wealth owned by the very very rich is steadily increasing.

Do you deny that is happening? And what is the reason, do you think

[Gunnar]

Yeah man, I was hella-sick from the first shot. I don't care though, because I'm told being sick is the vaccine working.

Get it in the left arm though (assuming you're right-handed, of course).

I experienced nothing worse than a dull but tolerable pain in my arm for a few days after both shots and a very mild fever for a day or so after getting the second shot. Other than that I experienced no discomfort - not even the mildest of headaches or noticeable fatigue, as some have reported. Should I consequently be worried that the vaccine may not be working for me?

[Themis]

Should I consequently be worried that the vaccine may not be working for me?

No. Most have mild to no side affects. Vaccines may not be as effective if you have immune compromising conditions like some cancer treatments. If you don't have any health related conditions you wouldn't have to worry about whether the vaccine is working.

[ajax18]

Do you deny that is happening?

If share of wealth going to capital as opposed to wage earners is happening, that's not why women are choosing not to have kids. I evidenced this by the fact that women with the worst job prospects have a lot more kids than educated career oriented women. They start earlier. They don't need a stable relationship because they're essentially married to the government. The more they have, the more money they get. The more kids a working woman has, the less she can work and the more it costs to provide for her kids.

And what is the reason, do you think

But I think we could agree that wealth and money should be going to working people. But for true leftists, redistribution of wealth isn't dependent on willingness and ability to work. It's according to need. This election and the blowout spending that has resulted is why inflation is starting to take off and the stock market is plummeting.

[Jersey Girl]

OK. So that's Paracetamol for pain, plus some antihistamine that will make you sleepy, and a cough suppressant.

Good luck: soon be over, and think how much worse the virus could have been.

Thanks! We’re feeling much better today, just a little under the weather. The upside is now I get to “viral shed” and cause women to become infertile. <- Yes, that’s the latest conspiracy making its rounds. Apparently Bill Gates and other billionaires have manufactured this pandemic to reduce the global population in that those who get the vaccine will become infertile in the next few years. So. You know. I’m just doing my part.

- Doc

Oh good! You both are recovering!

[Gunnar]

But I think we could agree that wealth and money should be going to working people. But for true leftists, redistribution of wealth isn't dependent on willingness and ability to work. It's according to need. This election and the blowout spending that has resulted is why inflation is starting to take off and the stock market is plummeting.

I don't think you have a clue about what "true leftists" really believe, and even less about what progressives really believe and stand for. Nor do you understand or even try to understand what is meant by democratic socialism. What democratic socialism and progressivism is about is learning to really understand, help and care for each other and our environment, maximize both our collective and individual potentials, and minimize our self-destructive tendencies to hate and hurt each other. Real progressivism is far more in tune with the Christian ideals of love and charity than what currently passes for conservatism. I am convinced that Jesus Christ would be absolutely horrified by today's hard right conservatives and their ideology and self-serving aims and actions. As for Trump, he can not even be reasonably called a "conservative." He has no ideology other than "what's in it for me, me, me!"

A growing number of Republicans are beginning to realize that continuing to follow him will only lead them to destruction and grief!

[Jersey Girl]

But I think we could agree that wealth and money should be going to working people. But for true leftists, redistribution of wealth isn't dependent on willingness and ability to work. It's according to need. This election and the blowout spending that has resulted is why inflation is starting to take off and the stock market is plummeting.

I don't think you have a clue about what "true leftists" really believe, and even less about what progressives really believe and stand for. Nor do you understand or even try to understand what is meant by democratic socialism. What democratic socialism and progressivism is about is learning to really understand, help and care for each other and our environment, maximize both our collective and individual potentials, and minimize our self-destructive tendencies to hate and hurt each other. Real progressivism is far more in tune with the Christian ideals of love and charity than what currently passes for conservatism. I am convinced that Jesus Christ would be absolutely horrified by today's hard right conservatives and their ideology and self-serving aims and actions. As for Trump, he can not even be reasonably called a "conservative." He has no ideology other than "what's in it for me, me, me!"

A growing number of Republicans are beginning to realize that continuing to follow him will only lead them to destruction and grief!

Agree. 1 Timothy 6 covers that just fine. I'd bold a couple or three pertinent statements but then no one would read the rest if anyone reads this to begin with. Anyway, it's all right here as follows.


1 Timothy, Chapter 6

1 Let as many servants as are under the yoke count their own masters worthy of all honour, that the name of God and his doctrine be not blasphemed.

2 And they that have believing masters, let them not despise them, because they are brethren; but rather do them service, because they are faithful and beloved, partakers of the benefit. These things teach and exhort.

3 If any man teach otherwise, and consent not to wholesome words, even the words of our Lord Jesus Christ, and to the doctrine which is according to godliness;

4 He is proud, knowing nothing, but doting about questions and strifes of words, whereof cometh envy, strife, railings, evil surmisings,

5 Perverse disputings of men of corrupt minds, and destitute of the truth, supposing that gain is godliness: from such withdraw thyself.

6 But godliness with contentment is great gain.

7 For we brought nothing into this world, and it is certain we can carry nothing out.

8 And having food and raiment let us be therewith content.

9 But they that will be rich fall into temptation and a snare, and into many foolish and hurtful lusts, which drown men in destruction and perdition.

10 For the love of money is the root of all evil: which while some coveted after, they have erred from the faith, and pierced themselves through with many sorrows.

11 But thou, O man of God, flee these things; and follow after righteousness, godliness, faith, love, patience, meekness.

12 Fight the good fight of faith, lay hold on eternal life, whereunto thou art also called, and hast professed a good profession before many witnesses.

13 I give thee charge in the sight of God, who quickeneth all things, and before Christ Jesus, who before Pontius Pilate witnessed a good confession;

14 That thou keep this commandment without spot, unrebukable, until the appearing of our Lord Jesus Christ:

15 Which in his times he shall shew, who is the blessed and only Potentate, the King of kings, and Lord of lords;

16 Who only hath immortality, dwelling in the light which no man can approach unto; whom no man hath seen, nor can see: to whom be honour and power everlasting. Amen.

17 Charge them that are rich in this world, that they be not highminded, nor trust in uncertain riches, but in the living God, who giveth us richly all things to enjoy;

18 That they do good, that they be rich in good works, ready to distribute, willing to communicate;

19 Laying up in store for themselves a good foundation against the time to come, that they may lay hold on eternal life.

20 O Timothy, keep that which is committed to thy trust, avoiding profane and vain babblings, and oppositions of science falsely so called:

21 Which some professing have erred concerning the faith. Grace be with thee. Amen.

[Chap]

We both live in countries where people who took it for granted that they would have good jobs that enabled them to buy a home and raise kids comfortably now find that those kids can't earn enough to live and raise families like they did. But the share of the national wealth owned by the very very rich is steadily increasing.

Do you deny that is happening? And what is the reason, do you think

Ajax- could you actually answer those questions, please, rather than diverting into the tired old 'welfare queen' denunciation?

Why is there - in your country and in mine - a current generation of decent young people with the same ideals and aspirations as their hard-working parents, who nevertheless find that they cannot follow their parents in securing a suitable home and adequate stable income for bringing up kids to an acceptable standard, and thus decide they just can't have kids? And some can't even afford to move out from Mom and Dad's house, because ANY home rented or bought is beyond their grasp.

And all the while, very rich people get richer and richer and richer, while the real value of the wages of working people has stagnated or fallen for decades. Whose fault is this? What should be done about it?

As a sign of what is happening, try this:

Americans Aren’t Having Kids Because Nobody Can Afford Them
America’s Imploding Birth Rate is Another Sign of a Collapsing Society

(by the way, this is not just an American problem. My own country has it too (though at least we don't go bankrupt because of hospital bills.)

Here’s a tiny question: why has America’s birth rate imploded? When I say imploded, I mean imploded. It’s more than halved since 1960. That’s yet another shocking — if not altogether surprising — indicator of social collapse.

America’s birth rate is now so low it’s less than two kids per couple, which of course is what you need to keep a population growing, short of immigration. This fact plays into fascist fears of “white genocide,” which I’ll come back to.

(Of course, birth rates are falling around the world. And that is a good thing. It means we can invest more in each child. But America’s birth rate seems to be not just falling, but imploding, in the last few years alone. And that speaks to a deeper problem of economic collapse that America is facing.)

You already know the answer to the question, I suspect. The right wing, in a stunning display of how foolish it’s become, blames a plummeting fertility rate on a lack of…macho, macho men. Never mind the fact that the Trumpists don’t know that, hilariously, that Village People hit was written to be a gay nightclub anthem. There’s no lack of macho men in American society. American men are as violent and backwards as they’ve ever been, maybe more so. Biden didn’t exactly stop dropping bombs and putting kids in cages. And beyond that, there’s no hormonal deficit or other biological explanation for a plummeting fertility rate. So what is it?

It’s economics, duh. Having a kid in America is unaffordable, and for that reason, it’s nothing short of terrifying. Nobody can afford to have kids anymore. I mean that in the French sense, where we say “tout le mode,” meaning a change in cultural tides and social mores — not in the overly precise sense of American pundits, who are still mystified by America’s plummeting fertility rate.

Let’s think about it. The rate has been dropping steadily in pace with the decline of the Dream. The last generation, really, to have it good in America were the boomers. And their fertility rate was pretty high, about four kids per couple. That’s because they could afford them: the dream was within reach. They could go off to stable jobs, where one person could earn enough to rear a generous host of kids, even take vacations, retire, provide for the whole nuclear family on one income. And so Boomer life was dominated by the old division of labour — men go to work, doing symbolic violence, killing each other with money instead of arrows or bullets, and women stay home and raise the young.

But sometime in the 80s, or maybe 90s, the Dream dropped dead. Gen X was the first generation to really feel the effects. It developed a culture famous for malaise and ennui. And it had less kids, too. The reason was eminently straightforward. All those Gen X’ers complaining about their crap, low-paid office jobs, the pink collar stuff of downward social mobility, couldn’t afford to have as many kids as their parents.

Enter the millennials. They’re the first generation in American history to be, as a majority, still living with their parents. Kids? A family? It’s out of reach. If you can’t move out of your folks’ house, at least in American culture, how are you going to have a family of your own? It’s not Italy or Spain, where communal living is common, and you can date and so forth under one roof. For Americans, doing so is profoundly uncomfortable. Millennials can’t afford to have kids — maybe that’s why their culture is about a permanent childhood, comic books and superhero movies and so forth.

You can trace America’s plummeting fertility rate through the generations as a clear consequence of the death of the dream. Let’s run a few numbers to prove it, though. The US government estimates the cost of raising a child at $233K, which is…pretty laughable. It’s a lot, lot more than that. How much more? There’s food and clothes and medicine and housing and utilities — I calculate that at $20K, at minimum. Then there are the biggies. How do you educate a child? If you want to do it well, you’re on the hook for tuition, at a good university, of maybe $50K a year. Maybe private school runs you that much. Then there’s healthcare, which is easily $5K to $10K a year. Add it all up, and raising a child in America can easily run into the millions.

But who’s making millions? Nobody is. The average American incomes hasn’t risen in half a century. Meanwhile, the costs of basics have exploded, to eye-watering amounts, that the entire rest of the world finds completely insane and absurd. End up in the hospital? Here’s a bill for a million dollars. What the? How do you pay that? On a credit card the size of a small country?

Healthcare, food, medicine, education, utilities — these are the very things whose costs have skyrocketed in America. But their burden falls disproportionately on the young. Maybe you can get by without that medicine, that operation, new clothes, a square meal — but your kids? They probably can’t. The hidden hyperinflation that America’s seen for the basics of life makes it nearly impossible to have kids anymore. And so fewer and fewer couples are having them.

Where people are having kids in America, the rise of “alternative living arrangements” is taking hold. And that, too, makes eminent economic sense. Can’t raise a kid on your own? Maybe his three gay dads are a good thing. Maybe having all those aunts and uncles who are really childless and relatively affluent friends nearby is essential. Maybe having three couples living under one roof is a pretty good way to split the burdens of childcare and realise at least some economies of scale and scope. Societies tend to revert to communal living when individualistic lifestyles become unaffordable — and that’s rarely been more visible in the case of Americans, and their inability to afford having kids.

Such arrangement are grass-roots substitutes for another thing America lacks: public goods. In every other rich country, and even many poor ones by now, childcare is offered publicly. You have access to daycare, or community centers, or other kinds of supporting institutions. They are just a fact of life. In America, though, you’re on your own, until you stumble — and then the system steps in and tries to get you for being a bad parent, even though it hasn’t supported you in anything. Even, for example, basics like milk and diapers and so on are subsidised generously in most other rich countries, and many poor ones. In America? You get gouged, mostly. America offers no support whatsoever to aspiring families — so is it any surprise that there are fewer and fewer of them?

The burden of childcare falls, as it always has, disproportionately on women. They’re left in a double bind, a dilemma. Should I give up work, and raise our children, so we can save some money? Or should I go to work, and make money, because we can’t afford to raise these children on one income? There’s no winning this game, and American women are simply left run ragged by the insoluble dilemma of having the burdens of childcare put disproportionately on them.

Women still do the bulk of the emotional and social and cultural labour of having kids. But in America, they can scarcely afford it. And so more and more of them are simply giving up. In that sense, you can also see a falling fertility rate, in a sense, as evidence of how misogynistic a society really is. (A phenomenon which seems to be similar in Japan, as well.) Are women given the support and freedoms to have children? Or are they simply forced into roles of motherhood that they can hardly afford to shoulder?

A “fertility rate” itself can be seen as a misogynistic concept — because inherently it places the burden on women, which is very revealing of how social norms still operate. All that adds up to: not having kids is emerging as a new millennial norm precisely because having them is completely and flatly unaffordable for far too many. (There’s nothing wrong with not having kids, it should be said, it’s simply not exactly a social norm that healthy societies tend to display to this magnitude.)

What kinds of societies end up with imploding fertility rates — for so long they develop a norm of them? Economically stagnant ones do. Take Japan, as the textbook example. After its boom in the 80s, it went bust in the 90s, and has stagnated to this day. South Korea has taken over as the Asian Tiger. And Japan economic stagnation quickly produced a startling fall in fertility. There are of course cultural and social variables — some populations, especially those who’ve suffered genocides, see having lots of kids as an imperative. But by and large, falling fertility rates are a pretty good sign that a society is badly broken — it has lost its confidence, optimism, spirit, poise, because it has entered a period of stagnation, where the dream of a better future for its kids is dying.

A falling fertility rate, in some grand, abstract sense, isn’t a bad thing. We’re the most violent species on planet earth, by an incredibly long way. It’s a good thing the human race is set to peak, if it means more of the planet can live. Still, plummeting fertility has destabilising and deleterious social effects along the way.

In America, the falling fertility rate fuels fears of “white genocide,” a myth that’s at the heart of Trump’s neo-fascist movement. American whites feel badly persecuted as a social group — no, not all of them, but certainly the majority who voted for Trump and still backs him — and that persecution complex translates, as it tends to do in fascist movements, into a bizarre spectacle of projection. No, we’re not committing genocide by putting brown kids in camps where they’re tortured and sexually abused — we’re the ones at risk of genocide!

(Of course, if anyone is not at risk of genocide in today’s world, it’s white people. They make up the rich 15% of the globe. What is happening, though, is something startlingly perverse. Because white Americans are the most downwardly mobile, they are having less kids, and that translates into a feeling of shock, fear, and rage, which is expressed in paranoid fantasies like “white genocide.” There’s no genocide, but there is the fact that having kids is unaffordable in today’s America.)

Where does that leave America? Not in a good place. There aren’t going to be any large-scale changes to the social contract probably during this Presidential Adminstration, and so the fact of plummeting fertility will simply continue. Because it tends to hit already downwardly mobile whites hardest, it will feed their paranoia complex of “white genocide.” Fascism will continue to rise, and Trumpism will find fertile ground to plant its poisonous seeds in. The 80% of Republicans who back Trump — tens upon tens of millions — aren’t going away anytime soon, and the plummeting fertility rate only makes them more paranoid and hateful every single day, because they think America belongs to them, not anyone else.

There’s a very simple moral to this story, which Americans won’t want to hear. Capitalism destroyed their lives. It has destroyed their kids in so, so many ways. Making them suffer the trauma of “active shooter drills,” Making little seven year old girls set up lemonade stands to pay for brain cancer operations. Making little kids pay “lunch debt” — or go hungry. But perhaps the worst way of all that capitalism has hurt America’s kids is by making it impossible to have kids. Yesterday’s kids, who are today’s millennials, are on the cusp of an adulthood they can never reach. Their jobs don’t pay enough, they can’t afford homes of their own, where is there decent to work anyways — so who can have kids? Capitalism exploited yesterday’s kids so badly that today’s can’t have them, should they want them.
I wish Americans would learn that lesson, but you know and I know that when I say “capitalism” Americans, understandably traumatized, react with fight/flight/freeze— either they want to kill you, they bury their head in escapisms and watch the Kardashians, or they give you the blank, dead stare.

America should be a warning to the world. No, not every society needs to have or should have a skyrocketing fertility rate. But it is a warning sign when it has an imploding one. A warning sign of social collapse. That a dream has died, and left despair, ruin, and hopelessness in its wake.
Umair
March 2021

[ajax18]

Chap globalism has taken their jobs and given them to those who will work for less. That's capitalism. Unemployed people have plenty of kids in the US. I wouldn't have a job if they didn't. It's only working people that can't afford to buy their kids an eye exam and backup glasses for their contact lenses.