Jason Antic

The combination of selfishness and denial of reality being exhibited by -a lot- of people around the coronavirus has been truly mind-boggling. It really makes me believe that this Trump era has less to do with Trump and more to do with who we've become. I hope we learn.https://twitter.com/KimZetter/status/1238536417623429120 …

On the other hand, the onslaught of comments treating the guy like he'd just shot a school is exactly what you'd do if you wanted people to *not get tested* because once it's official that you have the virus you'll be treated like a murderer.

Well.....he is like a murderer. It's just that the impact is not immediate and he will probably not see it. And so it's easier to feel detached and think it's somehow different.

I know everyone is worried right now, but putting people at risk is not the same as murdering people, and by acting like it's the same all you will get is a lot of people refusing to get tested by fear of being treated like murderers.

Possibly...but I'd wager not wanting to know and the temporary relief of denying reality and living in fantasy is going to be the bigger factor there as to whether or not somebody decides to not take a test.

There's been enough documented epidemics in world history that we don't have to guess what drives people away from being diagnosed. Seeing how the diagnosed ones are treated is one of those factors.

That sounds extremely hard to quantify and prove: The net effect of dissuading the anti-social behavior vs the allowing that anti-social behavior to continue unchecked by social shaming. I mean...is there really some meta study that actually proves this?

The issue is that you think you're "dissuading bad behavior" by shaming the guy after he did something bad, with people calling for him to be imprisoned. But the reality is that shaming selfish people don't stop doing them doing selfish things, it just makes them hide it.