Open (More or Less) Post on Covid 24

[ecosophia]

The semi-open posts  I've hosted here on the Covid-19 narrative, the inadequately tested experimental drugs for it, and the whole cascading mess surrounding them have continued to field a very high number of comments, so I'm opening yet another space for discussion. The rules are the same as before: 

1. If you plan on parroting the party line of the medical industry and its paid shills, please go away. This is a place for people to talk openly, honestly, and freely about their concerns that the party line in question is dangerously flawed and that actions being pushed by the medical industry et al. are causing injury and death. It is not a place for you to dismiss those concerns. Anyone who wants to hear the official story and the arguments in favor of it can find those on hundreds of thousands of websites.

2. If you plan on insisting that the current situation is the result of a deliberate plot by some villainous group of people or other, please go away. There are tens of thousands of websites currently rehashing various conspiracy theories about the Covid-19 outbreak and the vaccines. This is not one of them. What we're exploring is the likelihood that what's going on is the product of the same arrogance, incompetence, and corruption that the medical industry and its tame politicians have displayed so abundantly in recent decades. That possibility deserves a space of its own for discussion, and that's what we're doing here. 
 
3. If you plan on using rent-a-troll derailing or disruption tactics, please go away. I'm quite familiar with the standard tactics used by troll farms to disrupt online forums, and am ready, willing, and able -- and in fact quite eager -- to ban people permanently for engaging in them here. Oh, and I also lurk on other Covid-19 vaccine skeptic blogs, so I'm likely to notice when the same posts are showing up on more than one venue. 

4. If you don't believe in treating people with common courtesy, please go away. I have, and enforce, a strict courtesy policy on my blogs and online forums, and this is no exception. The sort of schoolyard bullying that takes place on so many other internet forums will get you deleted and banned here. No, I don't care if you disagree with that: my journal, my rules. 

With that said, as more and more vaccinated people call in sick with the disease the vaccine was supposed to keep them from getting, and the euphemism "died suddenly" sounds like a repeated drumbeat in the media, the floor is open for discussion.

Comments

carpenter bees

[methylethyl]

I have to speak up for the carpenter bees! I know they're destructive, but they don't sting and they're adorable with their cute yellow noses and I love them. We have spent many hours hanging out with them on our porch. Yes, they're excavating the railings, but... stuff was starting to rot when the family bought the place, and it's all gonna have to be replaced anyway. My kids even built houses for them, which they moved into-- I wonder if that strategy might help others limit damage to their wood structures without killing the bees?

The kids took scrap boards a foot or more in length, measured the diameter of the existing bee holes, picked a matching drill-bit, and drilled a couple holes in the underside of each board-- then we attached the boards to the porch railing and the bees moved in. So cool!

Re: carpenter bees

[sinners4diseasecontrol]

What a nifty family you have! I love your solution to the problem at hand and wish I could come see your carpenter bees!

Re: carpenter bees

[open_space]

The image of your kids building houses for carpenter bees and they moving warmed my heart. Thank you :-)

Re: carpenter bees

[methylethyl]

We did a lot of encouraging with this, because the kids were freaking out every time an insect came near them, for fear of being stung (wasps really dig my middle child). Carpenter bees are a great way to train your kids not to be bee-phobic. The females are always either out among the flowers, or tucked away in the bee-holes. They *can* sting, but you practically have to trap them in your hands to make them do it. The males can't sting at all, but they're really territorial, so they hang out near the bee-holes hoping to mate when the females appear, hovering and buzzing, and any time another male gets too close, they dive-bomb each other. And when *you* get too close they come buzz around close to you. But there's nothing they can do to you! It's all a big bluff where this poor helpless, terminally aggressive bee is trying to scare you, but all he can do is buzz at you. He's unarmed. So you can get up and practically touch them with your nose while they hover, facing you. It's quite funny. We'd get up in their faces, while the kids were watching, and have little conversations with them, like "Hi Mr. Bee, how's it going?... Nice weather we're having. How are Mrs. Bee and all the little larvae back home? Yeah? Well, watch out for the lizards^^! Bye!"

And then we'd go back to reinforcing "the bees are our friends, look how nice the bees are! He was talking to me!" By the end of our first summer at "the bee house" the kids were not afraid of bees anymore, could instantly tell the difference between bees and wasps, and would even come out to the garden to watch the honeybees with me (they can sting, but are not aggressive). Carpenter bees are like the "training bees" for overcoming stinging-insect fears ;) And of course, as much as we emphasized "friendly" the boys mostly liked watching the WWI-style aerial "dogfights" between the male bees.

^^You have not seen "biting off more than you can chew" until you've watched an anole lizard catch and eat a carpenter bee! The bees are bigger around than the lizards!