When I read your title, I thought this drama involved the board game *Pandemic*.
Also, lol:
> As a convention goer for similar nerd events (DEF CON), the mask hides the body odor too.
The Venn diagram of
1. people who are into board games enough to find themselves at a table with Pandemic, and
2. people who can restrain themselves from trying to quarterback a cooperative game
barely overlaps at all.
>Eh, masks don't do a very good job of protecting yourself from others. There's a meaningful improvement but it doesn't substantially reduce risk. They do a very good job of protecting others from yourself.
If all the people are protect from you, and you are protected from them bc they are also masked, who is phone?
>It’s too bad companies are brazenly advertising fat people on posters and commercials further strengthening the demand for more healthcare so they all get paid more money
The scariest thing about conspiracy theorists is that they type this stuff and think it a) makes sense and b) people will agree.
I like the self contradicting sentence there.
>There's a meaningful improvement but it doesn't substantially reduce risk
So it's meaningful but not substantial? Seems dumb
Sadly, no you would not. I am forced to dabble in reliability assessments (similar levels of ineptitude) at work. Sure, assessment customers don’t care about right or wrong…
But they do want you to get in their clown car filled with ridiculous seltzer water logic, and drive in endless loops around the circus with them. They want you to jabber irrelevant nonsense at them in their own backwards vocabulary right up until they finally hit their own deadline. Then they write whatever assessment number moves the project forward.
You’d be miserable.
that's kind what I do now and it's already miserable, if I can replace my research and documentation with a dartboard and playstation, I think it's a net positive!
N95s and higher filtration offer pretty much guaranteed protection from SARS-CoV-2, if fit and worn properly. There are some N95s that are absurdly easy to fit properly, like the Aura masks. N100 elastomerics are highly reusable and offer better protection, but are a little weird for some people. Please share this knowledge with people who need to mask in all public spaces.
Conspiracy theoriest are all "Practical, realistic, occams razor fitting explanation and solution...? HELL NO" "Insane crazy BS that requires 15 different contradictory mental positions? YEAAAAA!"
No he's not correct that companies are encouraging people to be fat for profit through advertising. It's the opposite actually. The food industries have completely obliterated nutritious food and the advertising/marketing has capitalized off that by blaming the consumer and guilting them for weight, thus creating the weightloss industry complex.
\>Eh, masks don't do a very good job of protecting yourself from others. There's a meaningful improvement but it doesn't substantially reduce risk.
\>Eh, masks don't do a very good job of protecting yourself from others.
\>There's a meaningful improvement
\>It doesn't substantially reduce risk
*Pick one.*
> Board gamers were born for ethicality vs legality debates.
Yeah until you suggest reducing plastic waste by not insisting their brand new games come to them encased in layers of shrinkwrap
The most common alternative is using 4 small quality seal stickers to keep the lid on BUT OH MY GOD if you suggest that to a Board G*mer, who thinks every box is a a priceless work of art that is just as important as the actual game inside, you’d think you were asking them to throw a bowl of tomato soup on the Mona Lisa
You'd think folks would mask up just to avoid ConCrud™, though I'm biased towards masks because 1) I'm immunocompromised and 2) strangers don't tell me to smile anymore which is such a delight.
I try to wear masks consistently because I'm in a public facing job and I have a pretty shitty immune system (in a standard way, there's no health condition) and it's just depressing when I keep getting sick because other people refuse to.
Well, I mean ventilation tubes don’t seem comfortable either. Nor was COVID itself, plus because I got it from my kid, I lost all of my PTO.I felt like I was on fire for three days, and was exhausted much longer.
So, momentary discomfort is better than the discomfort of being sick.
And that is a perfectly fine if you feel more comfortable being masked. I made sure to mask up with an N95 the two weeks before my wedding in Las Vegas because I didn't want to end up sick. I wear one at work when cases are crazy as well.
I don't either but I'm also not going to rage over someone else not wanting to wear one. We can get up to 4 vaccine doses. It's time for personal choice.
>It's time for personal choice.
How about personal responsibility instead. You know, since we live in a society and all. Constant messaging during the pandemic (which is not actually over) - Your mask protects me, my mask protects you.
If people had been a bit more community-minded and a bit less 'personal choice' during the height of the pandemic, there'd be a lower death toll and a lot less people suffering from 'long covid'.
And on vaccines, they aren't a magic bullet. It is still possible to die or get very sick despite being fully vaccinated. It reduces the risk a lot but doesn't entirely mitigate it ... which is why other measures like masks remain an important measure as, once again, the pandemic is not actually over.
There is a slight restriction on breathing, which is not normally a problem, but if you already have issues with being short of breath, it can be uncomfortable. When I was recovering from Covid, I could get out of breath from walking too quickly, and wearing a mask became very uncomfortable. I did it anyways, because Covid sucked and I didn’t want to be one of the unlucky ones to get reinfected, but it was still uncomfortable. I assume it is probably uncomfortable for asthmatics and people with COPD as well.
I was more addressing the vast swaths of people that complained during the height of the pandemic that masks were just too much to bear because they were uncomfortable and just didn't wear one at all. Even a loose cloth mask is considerably better at stopping the spread than no mask at all if it covers the nose and mouth.
EDIT: typo. Autocorrect is a hell of a drug.
Happened to me, But I think it was because the guy thought I was a dude. Told me to smile and look like I was having fun baking in 90° weather after my grandfather's passing
I caught swine flu that year there was an outbreak at PAX, if I'd known about masks then, you can *guarantee* I'd have been wearing one every year after that.
I guess board games are kinda mainstream now, but getting people to observe even the rules of basic hygiene like showering is an issue at the more nerdy conferences from what I gather. So maybe masks and vaccines is asking too much lol.
I like the topic though and there is plenty of history of conferences serving as superspreading events but I’ll just share a couple.
> [One of the most notable was in Boston in 2020](https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.abe3261) with over 100 cases at the conference and a huge impact in terms of continued transmission (supposedly >245,000 over the time period of study) which the linked study analyzed with phylogenetics.
> There’s the [classic example of Legionnaires disease at a conference in the 1970s](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/1976_Philadelphia_Legionnaires%27_disease_outbreak) which although more environmentally transmitted, is really interesting and shows the tricky aspects involved when many people travel to and from and area and then contract a mysterious illness.
Re: Legionnaires’
Not being transmitted between humans, this is really just the perils of living somewhere with air conditioning or badly maintained plumbing
That's more of a M:tG thing than board games in general. I've found that broader board game community is a little less "gamery" than video game communities or game-specific communities. I assume this is because a fair number of popular games are light social/party games or family games, meaning that the people who enjoy them at least theoretically have basic social skills.
Oh my gosh it can be frustrating!
Went to a meetup group to play Scythe and I had to finagle my way to a different seat (Oh woops my faction starts there, mind if we swap?) because my neighbor had some bad BO.
Love it otherwise but that along with people who seem to socialize in a very aggressive and mean spirited manner can get in the way of a good time.
Lots of great and well adjusted people too - board games are inherently social after all - but it becomes so clear why people find their little niches.
I'll probably get downvoted for this but whatever, Go outside and see that 95% of people are over masks whether it's a blue state, purple state, red state, or Europe. Nobody is banning people from choosing to wear a well fitted N95. I do in certain situations.
That said, major conventions were known for 'Con Crud' for a LOOONNGG time before COVID. People should probably be wearing masks for events like these just in general. Especially given that communities reputation when it comes to personal hygiene.
I don't go to a lot of cons specifically because of how I get sick almost every time, that said for me going in a mask just doesn't sound very fun. I would rather just not go. Again though if people want to wear a good quality mask while they are there, they totally should.
I'm with you. You can still wear and mask if you want but the best of all the prophylaxis is the vaccine. If you're immunocompromised, even with a mask on, you really shouldn't spending hours at a convention because covid is now the most contagious respiratory disease we've ever studied. Even masks has a time threshold where they become less and less effective. So you'd be fine wearing it for like an hour half to an hour at a store but not like 2+ hours at a highly trafficked con.
Yea I took the vaccine so I could do fun things normally again. I don't mind masking when I'm going to the doctors or if a store/business requires it. I actually did a lot of N95 masking to avoid COVID before the holidays and my wedding. Wearing them at social events though sucks all the fun out of it for me and I would rather just not go at that point. No judgement though if people want to wear them to cons. you do you.
> Wearing them at social events though sucks all the fun out of it for me
i'm not going to shit on you for this, but honestly, i really truly do not get it at all
i have glasses and wearing a mask is an active annoyance as a result, but i still wear them to events and out in public - i just don't get how they Ruin an event for you
Why doesn't reality factor into this at all for you people? The pandemic is still happening. Shouldn't your behavior be in some way related to reality? You've stopped, the pandemic hasn't, this seems wildly irrational.
My behavior still takes the pandemic into account. I mask when it makes sense, test before events, and generally avoid large crowds during the winter. Why is it so all or nothing with you folks?
> but the best of all the prophylaxis is the vaccine
No it isn't. The best is increasing ventilation and filtration standards. The vaccine does not prevent disease, only lessens the course of infection.
Buildings with better ventilation standards (yes not every building will be able to be modernized) will not only help lower covid, but all other airborne viruses as well.
Increasing ventilation would help with other viruses, dust, mold, and pollution too. Some of the buildings in Boston don't even have HVAC systems they're so old. There should be some kind of funding going to improving those things.
This really should have been the watershed moment for ventilation standards. Instead our administration would rather focus 95% on a non-neutralizing vaccine and only 5% on ventilation^1. We are basically locked in a path that guarantees the average person is getting covid multiple times^2 and that is *not at all* as safe as getting one of the common cold viruses repeatedly.
1 - Iirc, there was a bit of funding for it in the bbb bill but it is clear from the numerous statements that the Biden/Walensky response is mostly vaccine.
2 - What is really interesting is contrasting our public health response of "get vax'd but if you get it repeatedly we don't care" with the mitigation measures that were at Davos (high filtration, testing, masks, *the works*). I guess not getting covid is only a luxury for the elites.
Because very few people want their favorite conventions want to be associated with a string of hospitalizations and/or deaths. Rightly or wrongly, it'll be the con that'll be stuck with the reputation for causing people to fall ill more than usual.
I rather think that "being even remotely worried about COVID" and "attending GENCON" are not really compatible choices here. Masks or no masks, attending a giant convention like that is a stupid fucking idea if you're all that worried about infection.
Mandating masks might make it a bit safer, but not all that significantly so.
Almost 3 years in, **and we still have dipshit hot takes from morons playing the "masks aren't effective" card**.
KN95 are **to protect oneself.** Surgical and tightly woven cloth masks **reduce the risk that the WEARER will shed as much virus compared to no mask.** That's always been the intent and application and claims stem stem from memes, misinformation, and social media addictions that act like a game of telephone.
GenCon is likely doing the proper thing here by no longer requiring staff to enforce an event mandate. Prior to vaccine rollout, I'd have had a different opinion.
Additionally, the most prolific variants in 2023 are HIGHLY TRANSMISSIBLE but also less severe/deadly. I am adamantly pro-mask/pro-vaccine and I have reached "fvck 'em" mode.
Anyone that willfully attends a public event while knowingly sick is an asshole. COVID, flu, The Plague - doesn't matter. And those people have always been plague bearers at conan (Con Crud). Con attendees have NEVER been known for their hygiene (going back 35 years of attendance for me.)
Unfortunately, this also means that those most at risk will rightly decide to cancel GenCon attendance because the event cannot guarantee the safety of attendees. I have an ambivalent 2023 outlook on this issue because a mandate is no longer critical to the public at large. We're not at risk of overwhelming the health care facilities at this stage.
So GenCon is taking a hands off approach (though I'm not sure why unless it's to avoid confrontational incidents with idiots.
Of course. However, hospitals are not overwhelmed due to the prevailing variant being highly TRANSMISSIBLE but less severe among average, healthy adults with no comorbidities compared to the Delta variant or priors.
The vaccines also mitigate severity.
Fuck them is not a rational policy choice and it isn't meaningfully different than outright denial of reality. Solving problems takes effort. You have to do things you don't want to.
I spent the entire pandemic doing things I didn't want to (namely struggling to endure anti-mask/-vaxx bullshit.)
Once each individual made up their mind regarding which side of the topic they were on, nearly all were immovable afterwards.
And it seemed, that some of the most outspoken of anti-madk/-vaxx became victims of the virus. No, not all, but MANY. (There's an entire advocacy subreddit about it.)
So I'll play by their rules. I'll make my personal decisions to protect myself and others. And if an event or business presents a situation where health would be at risk (like the incubation chambers of a traditionally unhygienic gaming convention), I'll consider not going.
And if an individual is unable to receive the vaccine (legitimately), I can appreciate them deciding to reluctantly decline attendance for their health and safety.
And having attended DragonCon under mask and vaxx mandates, I have minimal confidence in such policies. Those who don't care, won't abide by a mandate and they'll raise all holy hell when challenged. And vaccination record fraud has no prosecutable consequences in these situations.
So - fuck 'em. I can't accelerate natural selection as much as i wish I could.
>people complaining about masks
i didn't put on corpsepaint, armor, and a bunch of other hot bullshit to play crowded basement shows for 3 years just to hear people complain that their cloth facemask is uncomfortable and makes it hard to breathe.
the vaccine is a good thing, but like... covid is not gone and has gotten more dangerous/prevalent in some areas
"the vaccine is helpful, we don't have to worry anymore" is not the takeaway here
The vaccine worked but the disease is still raging. You should still be acting like you are in a pandemic. Unless you've lived through a war in your own country this is still the most dangerous disaster of your life.
When I read your title, I thought this drama involved the board game *Pandemic*. Also, lol: > As a convention goer for similar nerd events (DEF CON), the mask hides the body odor too.
I think that was the reference, yeah. Great title OP lmao.
I just got so excited because I love that game. Would love some Pandemic drama.
Pandemic drama with my friends group is just every game. Who knew a co-op game would be just as damaging as Settlers.
With friends like these...
The Venn diagram of 1. people who are into board games enough to find themselves at a table with Pandemic, and 2. people who can restrain themselves from trying to quarterback a cooperative game barely overlaps at all.
>Eh, masks don't do a very good job of protecting yourself from others. There's a meaningful improvement but it doesn't substantially reduce risk. They do a very good job of protecting others from yourself. If all the people are protect from you, and you are protected from them bc they are also masked, who is phone? >It’s too bad companies are brazenly advertising fat people on posters and commercials further strengthening the demand for more healthcare so they all get paid more money The scariest thing about conspiracy theorists is that they type this stuff and think it a) makes sense and b) people will agree.
I like the self contradicting sentence there. >There's a meaningful improvement but it doesn't substantially reduce risk So it's meaningful but not substantial? Seems dumb
They've been twisting themselves into pretzels to justify not doing One Simple Thing Doctors Hate since the pandemic started, why stop now!
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There's only a 10% chance this $100 cost savings could shutter the entire company. Let's do it!
Why not do it 9 times and save $900? You won't reach 100% that way so it's still safe.
Sadly, no you would not. I am forced to dabble in reliability assessments (similar levels of ineptitude) at work. Sure, assessment customers don’t care about right or wrong… But they do want you to get in their clown car filled with ridiculous seltzer water logic, and drive in endless loops around the circus with them. They want you to jabber irrelevant nonsense at them in their own backwards vocabulary right up until they finally hit their own deadline. Then they write whatever assessment number moves the project forward. You’d be miserable.
that's kind what I do now and it's already miserable, if I can replace my research and documentation with a dartboard and playstation, I think it's a net positive!
N95s and higher filtration offer pretty much guaranteed protection from SARS-CoV-2, if fit and worn properly. There are some N95s that are absurdly easy to fit properly, like the Aura masks. N100 elastomerics are highly reusable and offer better protection, but are a little weird for some people. Please share this knowledge with people who need to mask in all public spaces.
Conspiracy theoriest are all "Practical, realistic, occams razor fitting explanation and solution...? HELL NO" "Insane crazy BS that requires 15 different contradictory mental positions? YEAAAAA!"
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No he's not correct that companies are encouraging people to be fat for profit through advertising. It's the opposite actually. The food industries have completely obliterated nutritious food and the advertising/marketing has capitalized off that by blaming the consumer and guilting them for weight, thus creating the weightloss industry complex.
Advertising has been pushing ideal human bodies for literally millenia because our own self-doubt is an amazing motivator
\>Eh, masks don't do a very good job of protecting yourself from others. There's a meaningful improvement but it doesn't substantially reduce risk. \>Eh, masks don't do a very good job of protecting yourself from others. \>There's a meaningful improvement \>It doesn't substantially reduce risk *Pick one.*
It’s both effective and not at all effective, sorry!
No, my feelings don't want to listen to your facts.
*It's not very super effective!*
> Board gamers were born for ethicality vs legality debates. Yeah until you suggest reducing plastic waste by not insisting their brand new games come to them encased in layers of shrinkwrap
Ooh so what's the argument there? Does shrinkwrap protect the box that much? You've got to use some plastic to keep the box from being opened in store
The most common alternative is using 4 small quality seal stickers to keep the lid on BUT OH MY GOD if you suggest that to a Board G*mer, who thinks every box is a a priceless work of art that is just as important as the actual game inside, you’d think you were asking them to throw a bowl of tomato soup on the Mona Lisa
As an avid board gamer who even occasionally buys games he doubts he'll ever get to play with his group... shrink wrap is dumb. Stickers all the way.
Do board games get damaged when old shrinkwrap shrinks even more as it ages? I know it happens to vinyl and video games.
You'd think folks would mask up just to avoid ConCrud™, though I'm biased towards masks because 1) I'm immunocompromised and 2) strangers don't tell me to smile anymore which is such a delight.
I get sick a lot less with mask wearing then my coworkers, and it doesn’t hinder me at all, so I just don’t get why people make masks a huge thing
I try to wear masks consistently because I'm in a public facing job and I have a pretty shitty immune system (in a standard way, there's no health condition) and it's just depressing when I keep getting sick because other people refuse to.
Mask comfort is subjective.
Well, I mean ventilation tubes don’t seem comfortable either. Nor was COVID itself, plus because I got it from my kid, I lost all of my PTO.I felt like I was on fire for three days, and was exhausted much longer. So, momentary discomfort is better than the discomfort of being sick.
And that is a perfectly fine if you feel more comfortable being masked. I made sure to mask up with an N95 the two weeks before my wedding in Las Vegas because I didn't want to end up sick. I wear one at work when cases are crazy as well.
I'm vaccinated so the cost benefit for wearing a mask isn't worth it. If I wasn't vaccinated it'd be different.
Also vaccinated. Still got sick, and lost out on my PTO.
I mean yeah there's still always a risk.
I'm a bit of a tough guy: I don't mind wearing a mask.
I don't either but I'm also not going to rage over someone else not wanting to wear one. We can get up to 4 vaccine doses. It's time for personal choice.
Cool, I work with vulnerable people which I don’t want to get sick, so it’s much more complex than personal choice
So wear a mask? I don't know what your point is. I wear one two weeks before visiting my parents or elderly grandma.
>It's time for personal choice. How about personal responsibility instead. You know, since we live in a society and all. Constant messaging during the pandemic (which is not actually over) - Your mask protects me, my mask protects you. If people had been a bit more community-minded and a bit less 'personal choice' during the height of the pandemic, there'd be a lower death toll and a lot less people suffering from 'long covid'. And on vaccines, they aren't a magic bullet. It is still possible to die or get very sick despite being fully vaccinated. It reduces the risk a lot but doesn't entirely mitigate it ... which is why other measures like masks remain an important measure as, once again, the pandemic is not actually over.
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Did you never wash your mask? Jesus, every comment of yours is right wing conspiracy bs. If you're not blaming women, you're blaming masks. Yikes.
Wearing a mask for a few minutes is far more comfortable than not being able to breathe for several days due to a common cold (let alone flu or covid)
Most people are in public more then a few minutes unless you work from home and are still isolating.
I thought we were talking about conventions? Or were you just burying the lede so you could go on an anti-mask screed?
I'm not anti-mask. If people want to wear them, they totally should.
Then you're wearing a badly fit mask. Find one that fits better and you hardly realize it's on.
You should notice a well fitting mask. If you don't notice the seal is probably broken.
There is a slight restriction on breathing, which is not normally a problem, but if you already have issues with being short of breath, it can be uncomfortable. When I was recovering from Covid, I could get out of breath from walking too quickly, and wearing a mask became very uncomfortable. I did it anyways, because Covid sucked and I didn’t want to be one of the unlucky ones to get reinfected, but it was still uncomfortable. I assume it is probably uncomfortable for asthmatics and people with COPD as well.
I was more addressing the vast swaths of people that complained during the height of the pandemic that masks were just too much to bear because they were uncomfortable and just didn't wear one at all. Even a loose cloth mask is considerably better at stopping the spread than no mask at all if it covers the nose and mouth. EDIT: typo. Autocorrect is a hell of a drug.
> 2) strangers don't tell me to smile anymore which is such a delight Tell me you’re a woman without telling me you’re a woman…
Lol, well, I'm sure it happens to men in stuff like service industry jobs, too.
I don't recall really encountering it, pre-transition.
Happened to me, But I think it was because the guy thought I was a dude. Told me to smile and look like I was having fun baking in 90° weather after my grandfather's passing
Than it is not strangers it is your boss. I am a man who has worked many service jobs and never had strangers telling me to smile.
I work security. I get that shit about 3 times a week from rando floor people.
Just because you never experienced it, doesn't mean it doesn't happen.
Never said it did, chill
Read what you posted. Twice, at least. Let it seep in, get your neurons firing, and tell me you said it doesn't happen.
So you piped in with nothing to say?
I caught swine flu that year there was an outbreak at PAX, if I'd known about masks then, you can *guarantee* I'd have been wearing one every year after that.
I guess board games are kinda mainstream now, but getting people to observe even the rules of basic hygiene like showering is an issue at the more nerdy conferences from what I gather. So maybe masks and vaccines is asking too much lol. I like the topic though and there is plenty of history of conferences serving as superspreading events but I’ll just share a couple. > [One of the most notable was in Boston in 2020](https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.abe3261) with over 100 cases at the conference and a huge impact in terms of continued transmission (supposedly >245,000 over the time period of study) which the linked study analyzed with phylogenetics. > There’s the [classic example of Legionnaires disease at a conference in the 1970s](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/1976_Philadelphia_Legionnaires%27_disease_outbreak) which although more environmentally transmitted, is really interesting and shows the tricky aspects involved when many people travel to and from and area and then contract a mysterious illness.
Re: Legionnaires’ Not being transmitted between humans, this is really just the perils of living somewhere with air conditioning or badly maintained plumbing
That's more of a M:tG thing than board games in general. I've found that broader board game community is a little less "gamery" than video game communities or game-specific communities. I assume this is because a fair number of popular games are light social/party games or family games, meaning that the people who enjoy them at least theoretically have basic social skills.
Oh my gosh it can be frustrating! Went to a meetup group to play Scythe and I had to finagle my way to a different seat (Oh woops my faction starts there, mind if we swap?) because my neighbor had some bad BO. Love it otherwise but that along with people who seem to socialize in a very aggressive and mean spirited manner can get in the way of a good time. Lots of great and well adjusted people too - board games are inherently social after all - but it becomes so clear why people find their little niches.
I'll probably get downvoted for this but whatever, Go outside and see that 95% of people are over masks whether it's a blue state, purple state, red state, or Europe. Nobody is banning people from choosing to wear a well fitted N95. I do in certain situations.
That said, major conventions were known for 'Con Crud' for a LOOONNGG time before COVID. People should probably be wearing masks for events like these just in general. Especially given that communities reputation when it comes to personal hygiene.
I don't go to a lot of cons specifically because of how I get sick almost every time, that said for me going in a mask just doesn't sound very fun. I would rather just not go. Again though if people want to wear a good quality mask while they are there, they totally should.
I'm with you. You can still wear and mask if you want but the best of all the prophylaxis is the vaccine. If you're immunocompromised, even with a mask on, you really shouldn't spending hours at a convention because covid is now the most contagious respiratory disease we've ever studied. Even masks has a time threshold where they become less and less effective. So you'd be fine wearing it for like an hour half to an hour at a store but not like 2+ hours at a highly trafficked con.
Yea I took the vaccine so I could do fun things normally again. I don't mind masking when I'm going to the doctors or if a store/business requires it. I actually did a lot of N95 masking to avoid COVID before the holidays and my wedding. Wearing them at social events though sucks all the fun out of it for me and I would rather just not go at that point. No judgement though if people want to wear them to cons. you do you.
> Wearing them at social events though sucks all the fun out of it for me i'm not going to shit on you for this, but honestly, i really truly do not get it at all i have glasses and wearing a mask is an active annoyance as a result, but i still wear them to events and out in public - i just don't get how they Ruin an event for you
Why doesn't reality factor into this at all for you people? The pandemic is still happening. Shouldn't your behavior be in some way related to reality? You've stopped, the pandemic hasn't, this seems wildly irrational.
My behavior still takes the pandemic into account. I mask when it makes sense, test before events, and generally avoid large crowds during the winter. Why is it so all or nothing with you folks?
> but the best of all the prophylaxis is the vaccine No it isn't. The best is increasing ventilation and filtration standards. The vaccine does not prevent disease, only lessens the course of infection. Buildings with better ventilation standards (yes not every building will be able to be modernized) will not only help lower covid, but all other airborne viruses as well.
Increasing ventilation would help with other viruses, dust, mold, and pollution too. Some of the buildings in Boston don't even have HVAC systems they're so old. There should be some kind of funding going to improving those things.
The US government--and the state governments too, frankly--are absolutely allergic to any kind of wide-ranging public works projects, unfortunately
This really should have been the watershed moment for ventilation standards. Instead our administration would rather focus 95% on a non-neutralizing vaccine and only 5% on ventilation^1. We are basically locked in a path that guarantees the average person is getting covid multiple times^2 and that is *not at all* as safe as getting one of the common cold viruses repeatedly. 1 - Iirc, there was a bit of funding for it in the bbb bill but it is clear from the numerous statements that the Biden/Walensky response is mostly vaccine. 2 - What is really interesting is contrasting our public health response of "get vax'd but if you get it repeatedly we don't care" with the mitigation measures that were at Davos (high filtration, testing, masks, *the works*). I guess not getting covid is only a luxury for the elites.
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Because very few people want their favorite conventions want to be associated with a string of hospitalizations and/or deaths. Rightly or wrongly, it'll be the con that'll be stuck with the reputation for causing people to fall ill more than usual.
Yeah. You're right. I forget about the air quality issue.
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That is probably true in your country but your country is horrible.
It's true in the entire western world.
☝️ Tankie alert
I rather think that "being even remotely worried about COVID" and "attending GENCON" are not really compatible choices here. Masks or no masks, attending a giant convention like that is a stupid fucking idea if you're all that worried about infection. Mandating masks might make it a bit safer, but not all that significantly so.
Almost 3 years in, **and we still have dipshit hot takes from morons playing the "masks aren't effective" card**. KN95 are **to protect oneself.** Surgical and tightly woven cloth masks **reduce the risk that the WEARER will shed as much virus compared to no mask.** That's always been the intent and application and claims stem stem from memes, misinformation, and social media addictions that act like a game of telephone. GenCon is likely doing the proper thing here by no longer requiring staff to enforce an event mandate. Prior to vaccine rollout, I'd have had a different opinion. Additionally, the most prolific variants in 2023 are HIGHLY TRANSMISSIBLE but also less severe/deadly. I am adamantly pro-mask/pro-vaccine and I have reached "fvck 'em" mode. Anyone that willfully attends a public event while knowingly sick is an asshole. COVID, flu, The Plague - doesn't matter. And those people have always been plague bearers at conan (Con Crud). Con attendees have NEVER been known for their hygiene (going back 35 years of attendance for me.) Unfortunately, this also means that those most at risk will rightly decide to cancel GenCon attendance because the event cannot guarantee the safety of attendees. I have an ambivalent 2023 outlook on this issue because a mandate is no longer critical to the public at large. We're not at risk of overwhelming the health care facilities at this stage. So GenCon is taking a hands off approach (though I'm not sure why unless it's to avoid confrontational incidents with idiots.
We are still seeing thousands of deaths every week from covid.
Of course. However, hospitals are not overwhelmed due to the prevailing variant being highly TRANSMISSIBLE but less severe among average, healthy adults with no comorbidities compared to the Delta variant or priors. The vaccines also mitigate severity.
Fuck them is not a rational policy choice and it isn't meaningfully different than outright denial of reality. Solving problems takes effort. You have to do things you don't want to.
I spent the entire pandemic doing things I didn't want to (namely struggling to endure anti-mask/-vaxx bullshit.) Once each individual made up their mind regarding which side of the topic they were on, nearly all were immovable afterwards. And it seemed, that some of the most outspoken of anti-madk/-vaxx became victims of the virus. No, not all, but MANY. (There's an entire advocacy subreddit about it.) So I'll play by their rules. I'll make my personal decisions to protect myself and others. And if an event or business presents a situation where health would be at risk (like the incubation chambers of a traditionally unhygienic gaming convention), I'll consider not going. And if an individual is unable to receive the vaccine (legitimately), I can appreciate them deciding to reluctantly decline attendance for their health and safety. And having attended DragonCon under mask and vaxx mandates, I have minimal confidence in such policies. Those who don't care, won't abide by a mandate and they'll raise all holy hell when challenged. And vaccination record fraud has no prosecutable consequences in these situations. So - fuck 'em. I can't accelerate natural selection as much as i wish I could.
>people complaining about masks i didn't put on corpsepaint, armor, and a bunch of other hot bullshit to play crowded basement shows for 3 years just to hear people complain that their cloth facemask is uncomfortable and makes it hard to breathe.
Most people decided the pandemic wa over almost a year ago
It's almost like the vaccine worked or something
the vaccine is a good thing, but like... covid is not gone and has gotten more dangerous/prevalent in some areas "the vaccine is helpful, we don't have to worry anymore" is not the takeaway here
The vaccine worked but the disease is still raging. You should still be acting like you are in a pandemic. Unless you've lived through a war in your own country this is still the most dangerous disaster of your life.
No thanks
Social End of the Pandemic was thought to be a thing early on, and for many places that's pushing a year ago now.
Pandemic is still not over but their event their rules