What happened to free speech?

[jonasdry]

On 1/15/2021 at 5:10 PM, Rizzo said:

So I guess this is the question. Is Ford his boss? Or are the people his boss? I know many people feel the points Baber made are bang on. If many people feel this way why can that viewpoint not be expressed?

I think Ford being the leader of the party would be his boss in that sense. If Baber wants to continue representing the constituents he needs to appease them and if that means acting like an employee to the people, so be it. 

[LefroyFisherman]

17 minutes ago, porkpie said:

They probably are even at the cabinet level.  They certainly are privately. A lot of people feel the same way that politician does, including just about everyone  I know, friends, neighbours a lot of colleagues etc. Not much airplay is being given to anything other than the lockdown theory.  It’s clear by the roads alone that there is not a lot of buyin, but hey what do I know. 

Agreed, It seems like 85 percent of the comments on articles and on Twitter don't agree with much of what the government is doing, and are against this lockdown. I would be super pissed if I owned a small shop or restaurant and forced to close when I could easily space 10 people inside and follow protocols, yet every big box is open and has hundreds of people. It's also pathetic that they keep letting flight after fight come in to the country but I'm not supposed too see my close friends? It would be nice if the other side of the story the damage of locking everyone down was able to be out there and acknowledged. 

[AKRISONER]

its not free speech when you are an elected official using your platform to spew misinformation. The guy wrote the article based upon false statistics. There is a difference between his own beliefs and using his "job" and platform provided by it to publish an article full of misinformation using his "companies" header.

One of the first things you learn in business is that writing on company ledger has meaning and better reflect the values of the organization directly or it is grounds for dismissal. 

Edited January 18, 2021 by AKRISONER

[Norpiker]

You can have all of the free speech you want as long as they do not break the rules of this forum. This is a private club that you have asked to join with that in mind we ask that you follow our rules. if you can't follow them then you may go elsewere where the rules do not apply.  

Art

 

Since I never made any political comment here, not sure what rules I broke. 

[TJQ]

17 minutes ago, Norpiker said:

 

You can have all of the free speech you want as long as they do not break the rules of this forum. This is a private club that you have asked to join with that in mind we ask that you follow our rules. if you can't follow them then you may go elsewere where the rules do not apply.  

Art

 

Since I never made any political comment here, not sure what rules I broke. 

Umm  no one has said that you broke any rules.... as far as I know.

[SirCranksalot]

You have the right to say many things but no right to expect your words to have no consequences. 

 

[Rizzo]

On 1/18/2021 at 9:59 AM, AKRISONER said:

its not free speech when you are an elected official using your platform to spew misinformation. The guy wrote the article based upon false statistics. There is a difference between his own beliefs and using his "job" and platform provided by it to publish an article full of misinformation using his "companies" header. 

When I was in university taking statistics our profs made it very clear that you can prove basically any point (often opposite points!) by looking at the same set of statistics. For instance...you might say "there are 300 people on ventilators in Ontario due to covid, isn't that terrible"?  Someone else might say "there are 450 hospitals in Ontario, with only 300 people on ventilators. Isn't that great? Not even 1 person per hospital (on average) needing a ventilator".  The key is, you have to look at information with a critical mind. Don't just say someone has "spewed misinformation" and used "false statistics" simply because you prefer the message the other side says. Do you really know that their information is accurate? Have you been present at all the testing? Of course not. We just tend to "agree" with the information that suits are belief. But does that make your opinion correct and the other person wrong? We can't discount something as false if we don't really know so. Many prominent doctors agree with Baber. Shoot, even the previous Chief Medical Officer of Health in Ontario, Dr. Richard Schabas, who served for over 10 years in that capacity, has publicly stated that Baber is correct.  Who are we to say "one guy is lying" when you have real professionals on both side of the argument? Like most situations, the truth generally lies somewhere between the 2 opinions. But let's put it this way...real life, not depending on "information" that neither of us can prove. I am a funeral director and I have been partially laid off for almost a year. Every single funeral director I know has also been partially (or fully) laid off in the past year. 25 years I have been doing this, and NEVER in my career have I ever seen a single director laid off. Now everyone I know has? You don't think that is a bit ironic? Funeral directors laid off in a pandemic? That is real life...not a statistic. All I am saying is don't be so quick to discount an opinion simply because you disagree with it. Laid off funeral directors are living proof Baber and Dr. Schabas may have a point.  

[dave524]

9 hours ago, Rizzo said:

When I was in university taking statistics our profs made it very clear that you can prove basically any point (often opposite points!) by looking at the same set of statistics.

Ancient saying  " figures don't lie but liars figure " BTW took a lot of statistics too, 1969 to 73, had to due with Forestry , sampling and estimating forest yields, Forest Mensuration was a b@tch in the pre computer days, even when we got Fortran all your data would be in big box of keypunch cards 🤓

[AKRISONER]

9 hours ago, Rizzo said:

When I was in university taking statistics our profs made it very clear that you can prove basically any point (often opposite points!) by looking at the same set of statistics. For instance...you might say "there are 300 people on ventilators in Ontario due to covid, isn't that terrible"?  Someone else might say "there are 450 hospitals in Ontario, with only 300 people on ventilators. Isn't that great? Not even 1 person per hospital (on average) needing a ventilator".  The key is, you have to look at information with a critical mind. Don't just say someone has "spewed misinformation" and used "false statistics" simply because you prefer the message the other side says. Do you really know that their information is accurate? Have you been present at all the testing? Of course not. We just tend to "agree" with the information that suits are belief. But does that make your opinion correct and the other person wrong? We can't discount something as false if we don't really know so. Many prominent doctors agree with Baber. Shoot, even the previous Chief Medical Officer of Health in Ontario, Dr. Richard Schabas, who served for over 10 years in that capacity, has publicly stated that Baber is correct.  Who are we to say "one guy is lying" when you have real professionals on both side of the argument? Like most situations, the truth generally lies somewhere between the 2 opinions. But let's put it this way...real life, not depending on "information" that neither of us can prove. I am a funeral director and I have been partially laid off for almost a year. Every single funeral director I know has also been partially (or fully) laid off in the past year. 25 years I have been doing this, and NEVER in my career have I ever seen a single director laid off. Now everyone I know has? You don't think that is a bit ironic? Funeral directors laid off in a pandemic? That is real life...not a statistic. All I am saying is don't be so quick to discount an opinion simply because you disagree with it. Laid off funeral directors are living proof Baber and Dr. Schabas may have a point.  

I’m not here to get into an argument, but as you mentioned, statistics are statistics, they aren’t something “opinions” get to decide. 
 

baber in his letter references a 99.98% survival rate. (This is the classic conspiracy theory survival rate) I have absolutely no idea where it derives from but it is false. 
 

the math is actually quite simple, you take the total amount of deaths in canada and you divide it by the number of cases. 2.53% of people that have contracted covid have died. 
 

I don’t need opinion based articles etc to calculate that. Go and look at the epidiomology reports and do the division yourself, it’s pretty easy.

[Rizzo]

44 minutes ago, AKRISONER said:

I’m not here to get into an argument, but as you mentioned, statistics are statistics, they aren’t something “opinions” get to decide. 
 

baber in his letter references a 99.98% survival rate. (This is the classic conspiracy theory survival rate) I have absolutely no idea where it derives from but it is false. 

I think you may have missed the point with your first statement. My claim is that depending on your opinion, you can use those statistics to prove it. People have a starting point (hypothesis) and then use that data to support it. So whether you want to be a fear monger, or whether you want to say it really isn't that bad, you can find a way using the same set of numbers. 

With respect to the survival rate -  I also don't get where this 99.98% comes from. Like you said, pretty simple math gets you to somewhere around 97.5 to 98% survival rate. Having said that, this is based on reported cases. I personally know around 15 people who have gotten covid...only 3 of them ever went in to get tested. So in this small sample size (people I know) the cases were actually 80% higher than what the statistics show! All the others immediately figured they had it and right away isolated from friends, family and co-workers. The point here, is that the number of cases is significantly higher than what is reported. As soon as you raise that denominator in the equation, guess what, your percentage changes...and possibly by a lot!  So is the survival rate 97.5% like the government shows? Or is it 99.98% like the others say? As I mentioned earlier...it is probably somewhere in between. 

 

p.s...if anyone is worried about those 15...they are all fine. 

[akaShag]

11 hours ago, Rizzo said:

I am a funeral director and I have been partially laid off for almost a year. Every single funeral director I know has also been partially (or fully) laid off in the past year. 25 years I have been doing this, and NEVER in my career have I ever seen a single director laid off. Now everyone I know has? You don't think that is a bit ironic? Funeral directors laid off in a pandemic?

Back to Rizzo...

This is VERY interesting!  And of course counter-intuitive.  It suggests there are less people dying, overall, on average, right now.  Amongst your professional colleagues, is there a sense as to why?

[AKRISONER]

3 minutes ago, akaShag said:

Back to Rizzo...

This is VERY interesting!  And of course counter-intuitive.  It suggests there are less people dying, overall, on average, right now.  Amongst your professional colleagues, is there a sense as to why?

My guess quite honestly is that people are not driving and are working from home with a lot less to do = A heck of a lot less stress. Heart disease and vehicle accidents 100% are major killers and there has to be a significant decline in both.

 

Rizzo...I 100% understand where you are coming from and I am not in any way attempting to come after you. My initial post was quite literally about Baber and his choice of action and why it resulted in him losing his job. The point is that the guy comes out using "company/government" letter head and utilizes incorrect stats (you agree his 99.8% survival rate is incorrect and has no basis in any statistics that we can see) to make a statement that is in complete contrast to all messaging we have received from his employer...That in every single case is going to be grounds for dismissal. Its not a matter of free speech but a matter of him losing his job for just cause.

I work in the recycling industry and if I wrote a letter to the chamber of commerce saying that the recycling system is a farce (a lot like a bogus CBC article that was written in BC about how only 5% of plastic is actually recycled was complete nonsense) then I would expect to be fired too.

[Rizzo]

7 minutes ago, akaShag said:

Back to Rizzo...

This is VERY interesting!  And of course counter-intuitive.  It suggests there are less people dying, overall, on average, right now.  Amongst your professional colleagues, is there a sense as to why?

No the death rate is basically the same as past years...each year it goes up a little bit as the boomers age. However, because of government restrictions people can't have the type of funeral they would want. So instead of having visitations, funerals, receptions etc we are quite often simply just cremating people or burying them. This type of service requires far less "man hours" and also generates  less revenue. So...less work to be done, less revenue available...something has to give. And that something is the job of the common guy.

[Rizzo]

2 minutes ago, AKRISONER said:

 

I work in the recycling industry and if I wrote a letter to the chamber of commerce saying that the recycling system is a farce (a lot like a bogus CBC article that was written in BC about how only 5% of plastic is actually recycled was complete nonsense) then I would expect to be fired too.

haha yes that would not go over well with those you work with. Having said that, if it were true, it would take a bold person to say it. You would have to REALLY believe you are right, because you know the backlash would be severe.

[akaShag]

29 minutes ago, Rizzo said:

No the death rate is basically the same as past years...each year it goes up a little bit as the boomers age. However, because of government restrictions people can't have the type of funeral they would want. So instead of having visitations, funerals, receptions etc we are quite often simply just cremating people or burying them. This type of service requires far less "man hours" and also generates  less revenue. So...less work to be done, less revenue available...something has to give. And that something is the job of the common guy.

Makes sense.  Thanks for the explanation.

Doug

[ckewley]

I'm not saying this is correct in any way, but through an argument with a buddy who is a somewhat anti-masker, this 99.98% is a US figure for one & second it is meant as anyone under the age of 65 has a 99.98% chance of survival. I may look into those numbers at some point but it is also used, I feel, in a very smug way which makes me discount it right off the bat! 

[porkpie]

On 1/20/2021 at 8:01 AM, AKRISONER said:

I’m not here to get into an argument, but as you mentioned, statistics are statistics, they aren’t something “opinions” get to decide. 
 

baber in his letter references a 99.98% survival rate. (This is the classic conspiracy theory survival rate) I have absolutely no idea where it derives from but it is false. 
 

the math is actually quite simple, you take the total amount of deaths in canada and you divide it by the number of cases. 2.53% of people that have contracted covid have died. 
 

I don’t need opinion based articles etc to calculate that. Go and look at the epidiomology reports and do the division yourself, it’s pretty easy.

Public health agencies and CDC etc have extrapolated many many more unconfirmed cases or very mild cases that don’t test.  Therefore true mortality is unknown at this point but is possibly lower.  How much lower remains to be seen.  I don’t know where the 98.5 percentage comes from but if you ask many medical professionals, my brother in law (ER Doctor) included, they anticipate many cases go undetected.  If you’ve noted the death rates continues to drop worldwide, with some locales having higher rates, but at the beginning the death rate was showing anywhere from 5 to 7.5 percent in some countries and has dropped considerably.

Edited January 21, 2021 by porkpie

[AKRISONER]

56 minutes ago, porkpie said:

Public health agencies and CDC etc have extrapolated many many more unconfirmed cases or very mild cases that don’t test.  Therefore true mortality is unknown at this point but is possibly lower.  How much lower remains to be seen.  I don’t know where the 98.5 percentage comes from but if you ask many medical professionals, my brother in law (ER Doctor) included, they anticipate many cases go undetected.  If you’ve noted the death rates continues to drop worldwide, with some locales having higher rates, but at the beginning the death rate was showing anywhere from 5 to 7.5 percent in some countries and has dropped considerably.

as should be expected with time. Treatment, detection etc.  has improved as the pandemic has rolled on. It truly is not as dangerous as it was when it commenced however the mortality rate in those over 60 years of age is still unacceptably high, hence the considerable concern with increasing case numbers.

Man I cannot wait for the vaccine to hopefully get this thing to a point where we can go about our lives again.

[DRIFTER_016]

On 1/20/2021 at 6:01 AM, AKRISONER said:

the math is actually quite simple, you take the total amount of deaths in canada and you divide it by the number of cases. 2.53% of people that have contracted covid have died. 

Actually you need to take the number of deaths and divide it by the total number of resolved cases (recovered + deaths) as the total case count also adds in cases that are still active.

[DRIFTER_016]

Here's more info to stick into your brains.

New studies have reported that a substantial number of those deemed recovered have been readmitted to hospital and died within 120 days of being released from hospital. This is a scary thought that a good number of people that were very sick with the virus and thought they were lucky to have survived end up dead months later because of complication from the virus.

The reported numbers only report deaths that happen within 28 days of hospitalization.

The death toll could be quite a bit higher if these deaths are included in the figures.

 

Earlier in the pandemic Those people that were still suffering the effects of the virus 120 days after initial infection (like myself) were reported to be about 2% of cases. Now it's reported to be about 10%. Also the percentage of people with long term symptoms (longer than 30 days) is reported to be 33%. 

As the pandemic continues I would expect the numbers to change.

The good thing is medical professionals have learned a lot and have new treatments to help preserve life.

The bad thing is this virus can cause life long issues and may very well shorten life expectancy of a number of those infected.

[OhioFisherman]

1 hour ago, AKRISONER said:

as should be expected with time. Treatment, detection etc.  has improved as the pandemic has rolled on. It truly is not as dangerous as it was when it commenced however the mortality rate in those over 60 years of age is still unacceptably high, hence the considerable concern with increasing case numbers.

Man I cannot wait for the vaccine to hopefully get this thing to a point where we can go about our lives again.

Will things ever get back to normal? I don't know how fast the flu virus mutates, every year? but they seem to have found multiple mutations in covid in less than a year? Hopefully the vaccine can provide a degree of blanket protection? but it does have to be available and administered first?

[AKRISONER]

4 minutes ago, OhioFisherman said:

Will things ever get back to normal? I don't know how fast the flu virus mutates, every year? but they seem to have found multiple mutations in covid in less than a year? Hopefully the vaccine can provide a degree of blanket protection? but it does have to be available and administered first?

this is my concern is that a mutation occurs that is vaccine proof. Then we are back to square one.

Difter, a good friend of mine is an avid runner, young healthy and is still experiencing lung issues when exercising months later. This is a guy who was in tip top shape healthy and young. He is genuinely concerned that he may never fully recover due to permanent damage caused to his lungs.

[OhioFisherman]

No idea how your system works, but here you follow your party leaders to a large extent or you may not get party support at election time, they may even encourage someone to run against you.

[dave524]

20 minutes ago, OhioFisherman said:

No idea how your system works, but here you follow your party leaders to a large extent or you may not get party support at election time, they may even encourage someone to run against you.

Same here, in fact they don't even wait till election time, the Conservatives just booted a previous leadership contender for being a bit too conservative.

[fishingwithbob]

Rizzo, laughed when I saw your Avitar...

Must have been a great photographer

 

Fun day.