103 Comments

So, they are a bit like wearing white coats, or hanging a stethoscope around the neck.

The kind word is "tradition".

But when an alleged effect is associated, then a better word is "superstition".

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That stethoscope thing drove me nuts especially when the "pandemic" doctors were on TV spreading fear.

I have a stethoscope for listening to my HVAC equipment and can hang that on my neck to look smart too...

I also have a real respirator that I can use to remediate asbestos and that would protect me from COVID while I was wearing it. But it hurts after a while.

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I had a stethoscope for listening to hard drives whose health was in question. Never occurred to me to put on a white coat also.

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Really throw them off, wear that head mirror doctors used to wear.

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Just think of all the viruses you spread!

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Very few if any – I don't do Windows 😜

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Are you a UNIX guy?

I have recently become reacquainted with UNIX since deciding to host my websites on a non-managed server. And I love it.

Unfortunately, I cannot use it for my day job. Yet.

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UNIX? Except insofar as the macOS is UNIX based, no.

Guy? No ;)

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I once worked in a fabrication shop. One day they decided to shoot an informational commercial. We cleaned the shop from top to bottom, and, were given white lab coats to wear. 🤣

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Or wearing neckties. It was supposed to make the doctor look more "professional". Then solid evidence was collected to show that the ties were a vector to transmit infections, and now most doctors don't wear them.

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Here in Canada, nurses twice won court cases (2015,2018) against masking in hospitals based on evidence masks did not prevent spread of influenza. Strange how covid became the catalyst for the end of evidence based science. https://www.newswire.ca/news-releases/ona-wins-second-decision-on-unreasonable-and-illogical-vaccinate-or-mask-influenza-policies-692687881.html

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Yes, and Bonnie Henry was an "expert" witness for the nurses.

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Right you are! And that testimony will be used in her upcoming trial regarding the covid mandates she enforced. https://canucklaw.ca/cv-58-vaxx-or-mask-rulings-2015-2016-2018-bonnie-henry-testifies-bc-ombudsman-report/

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I'm sure glad you remembered to put " expert " in parenthesis.

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https://torontosun.com/news/local-news/warmington-new-hospital-video-of-patients-death-over-mask-dispute-raises-questions

Stephanie Warriner was brutally killed for not wearing a face diaper properly. Never forget.

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I assisted at surgery occasionally for 30 years and initially wore a cloth or later a blue or green mask like the covid items, but with ties. About ten years ago there became more and more insistence on using a mask with a shield. In orthopaedics the bone saws do splatter a bit, and occasionally one would get a bit of spray on the face, so aesthetically there was some benefit.

While hospitals are perceived as clean, in reality they harbour the highest concentration of harmful organisms short of a shared addict's needle. The most effective protection is diligent hand washing with soap and water, and avoiding the places whenever possible.

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Absolutely agree. Hand washing is far superior, IMO -- though that, too, can get, ahem, out of hand.

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especially the latter !

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yeah, if you really want an infection go to a hospital

nosocomial infections lead to roughly a 3.5 fold increase with mortality in hospitals....try that at home.

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Not to mention, like your photo, the dirty, old masks which will never totally decay that are now littering the entire world.

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As a matter of fact, this study published in 1982 showed that infection rates were much lower when no masks were worn:

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2493952/pdf/annrcse01509-0009.pdf

But hey, why save lives and avoid suffering as long as you can maintain the image?

I'm a bit lazy to search for it, but you can find some interesting comments back and forth in later publications.

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indeed - that’s the study showing a 50% reduction in post op infections, that inspired tunevall to do his much bigger study in 1991. he also found more infections in masked than in unmasked operations, but results were not statistically significant.

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I keep telling my wife that the masks are useless; she won't believe me. When we go out to a doctor's office we're required to wear them. I don't know why.

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For the theater of it. Nothing more.

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Yes for that. But it's best for CONTROLLING time and space in society.

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I refuse. They tried to hand me one the other day. I turned it down and then the doctor came in maskless

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Last week, I visited an elderly friend in rehab. The guard / attendant asked me to please wear a mask ; I found box of them nearby.

Put it around my neck and walked down the hallway to the elevator, up to the patent's floor.

Ditched the neck mask when I went into her room and told her I was not into self-harm.

She laughed and by the way , wore no mask herself.

Contradicted by the odd nurse who popped in, and her husband and daughter who came in later and all were masked to the gills.

So I conclude that the patient was the only sane person there.

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Give her a belt sander for 5 min to see how well much bigger particles behave then take the mask off a few times & see what happens to anything that was on the mask.

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The worst part is that masking all day long almost certainly causes harm. Ignoring the skin issues, headaches are a clear indicator of a problem. Not to mention you can see the increased levels of CO2 intake within 30 seconds on a brain scan.

That is doing something, and it's not anything good.

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How about smelling FEAR with every inhalation/exhalation.

It's effective in that.

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I have to wonder what mask proponents would accept as "evidence for the absence of effectiveness." Isn't the repeated failure to show effectiveness, ipso facto proof that masks just don't work?

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yes indeed, absence of evidence *is* evidence of absence

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In my view, the logic applies if the subject has been investigated to exhaustion. Let's consider the coelacanth. If researchers examined every nook and cranny of the planet without success, then the failure to observe this fish would mean that it was indeed extinct and no longer existed. But they hadn't inspected every nook and cranny of the Earth, and then the fish was found by chance in 1938. In this example, the absence of evidence was not evidence of absence, but merely evidence of insufficient investigation.

Masks, on the other hand, have been investigated six ways to Sunday (as Americans say) without anyone showing that they have more than a marginal benefit (on the order of 1-2%).

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what's the net "cost"?

it potentially leads to a furnace.

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They will accept nothing. They are ignorant to the "sunk cost fallacy".

I feel stupid for for falling for it myself, by wasting time trying to convince them it's modern day phrenology.

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When the other half of the pairodocs was researching his series of articles on masking for respiratory viruses, he was surprised to learn that they don't even work when it comes to reducing surgical wound infections and that, in fact, surgical outcomes were slightly WORSE in some studies when surgeons were masked. It's another one of those things we didn't even think to question in medical school--it seemed so obvious because everyone believed it. So many red pill moments these past few years!

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Masks are badges. Masks are the step before "vaccine passports." Think of the WWII movie stereotype of Nazi "Show me your papers."

Initial opposition to the US Social Security program--in 1930s--was fear of a national ID system. So look what's happened in the US: Social Security numbers are the de facto national ID system.

Masks identify who will obey.

Yesterday, I counted 8 "maskateers" at the supermarket.

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Maskateets (love that) come out in force at Whole Foods!

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Great post!

Every day, I am amazed at the # of people wearing masks, whether food shopping, or alone in their vehicle.

I am not confrontational, but I also do not suffer fools gladly.

But I do read, and research...

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I’ll be 83 YO soon and went to dental school in the 1960s. No one wore masks or gloves back then. I took my California boards at UCSF and no one wore masks or gloves. Then in the’80s HIV hit and everyone started to wear masks and gloves. Did masks and gloves make a difference? I don’t know. As far as getting the flu there was no difference for me personally. It was perceived to be the right thing to do so everyone wore masks and gloves.

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interesting that it was driven apparently by the HIV scare

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Fauci was saying back then that it was transmissible through air. Imagine how lonely things got just from that

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My dentist was taken in front of the General Dental Council because he didn’t wear gloves or a mask and I much preferred it. Eventually he was forced to give in. As they all are.

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"The practice of veiling is especially associated with women and sacred objects, though in some cultures, it is men, rather than women, who are expected to wear a veil. Besides its enduring religious significance, veiling continues to play a role in some modern secular contexts..."

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When Mask Hysteria started rolling out March 2020 my wife and her colleagues were the most skeptical of masks as, being surgeons, they knew exactly what they were and were not good for. Slicing someone open and not getting their blood all over your face? Masks worked great.

It was delighted to see Katelyn Jetelina "Your Local Epidemiologist" argue in December "I keep thinking of 'why does my surgeon wear a mask when I am in surgery' you know, it must do something, it has to work".

For some reason she never responded to my reply even though she reads all comments.

https://archive.ph/XLBwb#selection-563.38-563.161

archived picture I referenced

https://imgur.io/a/X2ePJIR

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I try to remember how I would think about masks back in 2019. All that comes to memory is 1) the dentist, which was nice so I wouldn't inhale his breath directly (smell) and 2) surgeons, who presumably did it as a matter of uniform, like their scrubs. Never thought much of it

Now... airports literally make my eyes hurt. I need to start flying private.

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I just re-watched the film "From Hell" the other day. SPOILER . . . This imagining of the story of Jack the Ripper reveals the culprit to be a psychopathic free-mason surgeon acting to protect the crown's secret of a syphilitic prince. Lobotomy procedures play a prominent role. When I have occasion to enter the medical / hospital setting, the mask wearing ritual seems reminiscent of the work of doctors--all members of a fraternal society--demonstrating the miracle of the lobotomy "cure" in a packed surgical theater.

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Did you know that mostly it was women who were lobotomized--for hysterical menopause, desiring a divorce or having sexual desires ?

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Now that is what I will be thinking 😳

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