March 13, 2021 - Freedomain Radio - Stefan Molyneux
21:27
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| My question to you is, if all that's true, and all the suppositions you've made are true, it doesn't excuse us not taking care of each other during the attack. | |
| It doesn't excuse not wearing masks. | |
| It doesn't excuse Trump's ridiculous doing nothing. | |
| I mean, if this is an attack on our country, people should be taking it seriously. | |
| I mean, that's common sense, Stephan. | |
| I see that. I don't know why that's an issue. | |
| Well, so if something's completely obvious to you, it's probably because you haven't heard much from the other side. | |
| I mean, if... | |
| Because this is a complex issue, right? | |
| So did you just say, like, Trump did nothing? | |
| Is that right? In terms of not calling it a hoax, saying, you know, masks don't do any... | |
| You know, not wearing a mask, not being a leader in a national time of crisis, basically. | |
| Okay, so you do know, of course, that Trump closed the borders very early, right? | |
| And against the opposition of the Democrats who called it racist. | |
| You do know... Not from the UK, he didn't, but go ahead. | |
| Okay, well, but he did close the borders and that was very early. | |
| There is also this little thing called a vaccine, which he developed under Operation Warp Speed, which if the vaccine turns out to be as productive as is hoped, then did a huge amount to turn the tide. | |
| If that does turn out to be a positive thing, which of course I hope it does, I mean, you've got to acknowledge that the vaccine is probably more important than wearing a mask, right? | |
| Yes, absolutely. | |
| I mean, that's the next thing. | |
| But just because you call something warp speed doesn't mean it's zippy and amazing. | |
| What you do understand that the average vaccine takes 10 years to develop and has a 94% failure rate. | |
| And this was an entirely new class of vaccine that was developed in about eight or nine months. | |
| And one of the reasons that it was, was that he hammered the FDA For approval ahead of their normal, very slow, bureaucratic, cumbersome method. | |
| And I mean, you know, like Trump or Hayden, let's at least give credit where credit is due, that Trump did drive the vaccine that I assume you think is productive and positive for America. | |
| No, I would agree that the vaccine's a good thing. | |
| I don't think there's much plan beyond get the vaccine, but the vaccine... | |
| It's important. I'm not denying that. | |
| And what would the plan be? | |
| I don't mean to be hostile towards you at all. | |
| I'm genuinely curious. | |
| What is the plan that you would have liked to have seen from Trump, or I guess from anyone, or is there a plan that you've seen from Biden that you wish Trump had done? | |
| I just think the rolling out of the vaccine, and even still, it's a little slow, but we're picking it up to, what, like one and a half million a day, something like that. | |
| I do think there's a natural skepticism in the public, though, that's going to hurt any vaccine getting out because people just aren't... | |
| I mean, I've been all over on this thing, and I'm a liberal, but I'm going to take the vaccine because I believe it's the right thing to do. | |
| I think it will help us open up faster. | |
| This is going to sound like an odd question, but it comes from a scientifically valid place. | |
| Have you frozen your sperm? | |
| Have you been watching me? | |
| No, I don't understand the question. | |
| Well, I'll look this up just to make sure that I'm not speaking out of turn because, you know, memory, it's pretty good, but I wouldn't say it's perfect. | |
| All right. Let me just see here because the last I read was that there was a warning for men before you take the mRNA vaccine to freeze your sperm. | |
| Let's see here. Let me just make sure. | |
| Again, I don't want to have some sort of fever dream here. | |
| And let's see here. | |
| Yes, let's see here. | |
| University of Miami is conducting research into the experimental COVID-19 vaccine, potentially causing infertility, free sperm before getting COVID-19 vaccine because it may cause infertility. | |
| Again, whether that's true or not, that's from the University of Miami doing the research and so on. | |
| So just something to look up could be pure nonsense, but something to look up. | |
| Just, you know, I would hate for you to want to be a dad if you're not already a dad and miss out that opportunity because it's a great thing in life as a whole. | |
| So, the mask thing, you're down with the masks? | |
| You feel that the masks are a way to combat this thing and so on? | |
| I think it's had... | |
| I think when we've done it and done it properly, it's had a pretty reasonable effect. | |
| My thing is, I think we can open... | |
| Like, Texas is getting rid of the mask mandate this week, and I think if we just left... | |
| We could open the businesses. | |
| I'm all for opening businesses. | |
| People need to make money. | |
| People need to get out here and get their dollars. | |
| But why not just leave the masks on? | |
| It's not... I don't know, man. | |
| It gets to me too precious of this my rights situation. | |
| Well, we're all connected in a way. | |
| and wearing if wearing a mask is going to prevent the spread of a disease I'm for that much like were you saying Taiwan Taiwan was it Taiwan that did an excellent job or was it Chinese type a I forget the exact thing I feel like they done just Eastern culture forget the Chinese Communist Party all that stuff They've done better with the virus than we have in America. | |
| And I think it's because they took it seriously, and they wore masks, and they were very diligent about the situation. | |
| Well, okay. I mean, comparing America to China, it's pretty rough on a wide number of bases. | |
| It's like the people who compare America to New Zealand, right? | |
| Yeah. There's a lot of countries that did better than America. | |
| This is it. I mean, that's not widely debated. | |
| No, I get that. But have you normalized that by race? | |
| Because unfortunately, and it's very tragic, of course, as you know, but blacks and Hispanics are suffering significantly more than whites and East Asians from COVID. And that seems to be common across the world, right? | |
| Whether there's a genetic susceptibility, whether it's, I don't know, a lack of access to better health. | |
| I don't know what the cause is in particular. | |
| But if you're not going to normalize my ethnicity with regards to looking at how a country's doing, I don't think that you're comparing apples to apples, if that makes sense. | |
| So, wait, so you wanted to break it down between, like, this is how white Americans are doing compared to... | |
| That seems strange to me. | |
| I'm sorry, I'm not sure what seems strange to you. | |
| That you would break it down racially and say, okay, well, this is because we have more black people. | |
| It's because Japan has no black people. | |
| I'm sorry, are you not aware of the data that blacks are, unfortunately, and it's really tragic and horrible, and I wish it were different, but are you not aware that blacks are suffering greater ill health effects and mortality in Hispanics than whites and East Asians? | |
| No, that's a given. | |
| I'm not denying that, but there's no... | |
| You're kind of doing the correlation versus causation thing, and that's kind of a dangerous box to put yourself into. | |
| I'm not sure how you get to define what dangerous boxes are for me, but you're very uncomfortable about this and I'm just trying to deal with facts and you want to compare like to like, right? | |
| Let's say that there are particular reasons why blacks and Hispanics might suffer more from COVID, which again, we all regret and wish we're different. | |
| But it is important if that population is suffering more from a particular illness. | |
| And we do know that there are illnesses that are ethnicity-specific, right? | |
| There are Jews who suffer from particular Tysax disease and so on. | |
| Blacks suffer more from hypertension, high blood pressure and so on. | |
| East Asians, lactose intolerant. | |
| I mean, we know that there are I mean, that's… A fact that we, I think, have to, you know, you seem like a very reasonable science. | |
| You're a science-based guy, right, because you're talking about this kind of stuff. | |
| So that is a factor when talking about these things. | |
| Now, I didn't say anything about the cause. | |
| I mean, it could be genetic. It could be environmental. | |
| It could be racism, for all I know. | |
| It could be any combination, probably a combination of some of these things. | |
| But it is nonetheless, if you're going to compare populations, I think that is an important factor to take into account. | |
| And just saying, well, there is a relatively high population of blacks in America relative to, say, New Zealand. | |
| And of course, New Zealand is an island where it's much easier to control the borders. | |
| And of course, America has had porous borders, particularly in the South for decades, but particularly during COVID and human traffickers and so on. | |
| And so that's an issue as well. | |
| So All of these complicated factors, which I think bear closer examination, and I'm not saying which one of them is the most important, but they're all causal, I think. | |
| But just saying, well, it's Trump not wearing a mask, I think that reduces it a bit. | |
| I mean, yeah, I guess the Republicans are... | |
| I don't know how you self-identify libertarian or whatever. | |
| But my thing is... | |
| Some of that just seems like a cop-out for Trump. | |
| Like, wear a mask. What's the big deal? | |
| It's just not being a leader, and it feels like you're being an apologist for that. | |
| If the whole country is under attack, and you're the leader as a symbol of the president for that country, You should do it. | |
| Regardless. Let's not... | |
| Don't make it a political thing. | |
| Just do what's safe for the people. | |
| But how so? But how do you know? | |
| I mean, and I'm genuinely curious. | |
| Again, I really, really appreciate the conversation and the pushback. | |
| You know, I always tend to learn a lot from people who oppose what I say, and I appreciate that. | |
| But... I mean, there's a test, right? | |
| So we've had more than a year's worth of data, right? | |
| And there are a number of states that have mask mandates, and there are a number of states that don't have mask mandates, right? | |
| So is it your understanding that the data between the two clearly shows that a mask mandate provides a better outcome with regards to COVID than not having a mask mandate? | |
| Because again, there's a whole bunch of states that have mask mandates and have had for a long time, a whole bunch of states that don't. | |
| And is it your understanding that the data clearly shows that the states that have mask mandates are doing much better with COVID? It's my understanding that in Texas when the virus was going out of control there was no mask mandate and then Abbott finally capitulated and put in a mask mandate and cases did eventually drop. | |
| That's my understanding. | |
| But to say that States versus states. | |
| It's hard because my brother lives in Yuma, right? | |
| In where? I'm sorry, I'm not sure where Yuma is. | |
| Yeah, you wouldn't. | |
| It's in the desert. | |
| It's right on the border of California and Arizona, right? | |
| So California is completely locked down. | |
| Arizona is wide open, so people from California can just come over I mean, it's very easy to travel interstate in America. | |
| It's not a problem. | |
| They could ban Texans in Louisiana, but I could easily go there. | |
| I mean, it's not an issue. | |
| So to say it doesn't work, well, when we're talking about something that's the entire collective, you can't just... | |
| Again, we're not an island, so you can't just take out Texas and compare it to Nebraska, or take out Texas and compare it to New York. | |
| When New York went on lockdown, people were flying to Florida like crazy. | |
| I don't know how you can say mask mandates don't work. | |
| The only way you can really be sure is If you're in a laboratory situation, everybody's wearing masks. | |
| Well, hang on. So hang on. So I haven't said mask mandates don't work. | |
| I mean, so let's stay with what's been said. | |
| But I do know this, that there's been a lot of statistical data analysis that has been done on the mask mandate states versus the non-mask mandate states. | |
| And the data is that you can't find more than one-tenth of one percent difference in the outcomes. | |
| And that's statistically relatively insignificant. | |
| As you quite rightly point out, there are a lot of variables. | |
| Now, again, I'm just telling you what the data is, whether mask mandates work or don't work. | |
| I'm saying this is a challenge to the argument that, well, it's just simple wear a mask, that the data doesn't support it with regards to the mask mandate states versus the non-mask mandate states. | |
| Now, I don't know We're good to go. | |
| Is that it can actually raise COVID transmissions because it's sort of an interesting argument. | |
| It's sort of similar to airbags. | |
| Airbags haven't saved any lives. | |
| And seatbelts haven't saved any lives. | |
| And the reason for that is that generally people adjust their behavior based upon a perceived sense of safety. | |
| So if there are no masks, people are more likely to keep the six-foot distance. | |
| But if people are wearing masks and they feel that the masks are keeping them safe, they may put themselves into situations that are less safe because they feel they're bulletproof. | |
| Because when people get airbags and seatbelts, all that happens is they drive less carefully. | |
| Our behavior, and so traffic fatalities have not gone down at all because of airbags and airbags. | |
| And seatbelts. What has happened, of course, is that pedestrians and motorcyclists, they've been more harmed because people are driving less well because they're not protected by airbags or seatbelts or anything. | |
| So I don't know if much data has been done on this, but I can certainly see the situation where if masks aren't as effective as people think, and it's kind of like a half joke, half meme, but it's the real truth in it, That if you can smell a fart, you can breathe in COVID. And I know the masks help reduce the prevalence of the viral load, and they also remind you to not touch your nose and mouth and all of that. | |
| But I can certainly see a situation where people say, oh, I've got a mask on, so I don't have to be quite as vigilant about social distancing. | |
| I can go to X, Y, or Z outing or gathering or whatever, which they might not do without the mask. | |
| But again, they can't find the data. | |
| You know, as you know, Sweden has had almost no response to COVID. They're like the real anomaly even in Europe as a whole. | |
| And their cases are way lower. | |
| As you know, Florida has been open pretty much for everything since March of last year. | |
| And they have some of the lowest COVID cases in all of America. | |
| And Texas also is very, very low. | |
| And so whereas places like California and New York, I have had really crazy restrictions on and their caseloads are very high. | |
| So, you know, I hear what you're saying. | |
| Like, I would love to have a magic thing where I say, well, man, just wear a mask. | |
| It's so simple. But, you know, the data is not as clear as I would like it to be and I think as you would need it to be to maintain that position. | |
| So, like, and I understand the seatbelt argument, but if everybody's out there, like, driving the way they are right now, I want a seatbelt and I want an airbag. | |
| Period. For me, personally, I think it's safer to have one. | |
| You could argue that if we didn't have them, people would, you know, people wouldn't drive faster. | |
| Okay, but people are driving faster now, so I want my seatbelt and I want my airbag. | |
| And listen, nobody's going to say to you, don't wear a mask. | |
| I mean, I don't think anybody is going to say to you, well, certainly no one's going to say to you, you can't wear a mask. | |
| You know, I mean, I was in Hong Kong at the end of 2019 doing a documentary on the dangers of China, or Chinese communism, and there were people still wearing masks there, and this was like 18 years since SARS, like 16 years since SARS, and nobody says you can't wear a mask. | |
| So if you want to wear a mask, that's fine. | |
| Technically, I'm an anarchist. | |
| So I don't believe that the government has any legitimate reason to initiate the use of force against you, so I'm against mask mandates just as a whole. | |
| I think it doesn't work and it doesn't help. | |
| And it's funny because, you know, you sound more mad at Trump than you do at China. | |
| It just seems kind of funny to me that the guy who came up with the vaccine and closed the borders is the guy you're mad at, not the people who released the virus internationally, so to speak, right, by not closing their borders and by shutting it all down, so... I just, my concern would be, and oh, the last thing I wanted to say, and this sounds like a little bit personal, but it just struck me when looking at your picture, you know, handsome looking dude, fine head of hair, but do you still keep your beard? | |
| Yeah, I mean, yeah. | |
| But doesn't that interfere with the effectiveness of your mask? | |
| Because, I mean, when I had a beard, man, I mean, it creates huge gaps for your mask, doesn't it? | |
| I suppose it could. | |
| Oh, no, no. Come on. Let's be fair here. | |
| I mean, I'm not trying to beat you over the head with a point here, but of course the mask is not as snug to your skin if you have a big beard, right? | |
| Well, yeah. No, but the thing is I have a fat face. | |
| Oh, so your vanity is more important than keeping other people safe because you don't want people to think that you – I think, firstly, I don't think you have a fat face. | |
| I'm just myself. I think you're a good-looking guy. | |
| But if you're going to say to me, well, Trump is really bad because he didn't do all that he could to protect people and you're like, well, but I don't want people thinking I'm having a fat face. | |
| I'm more than happy to wear a mask far less sufficiency by keeping my beard. | |
| You understand that it's a little troublesome to maintain that perspective, at least for me looking in from the outside of that. | |
| And I mean this with all affection. | |
| No, no, there's a scale. | |
| For me, I understand that I can't do everything. | |
| I understand I go to a restaurant, I take off my mask, I eat, and there's probably people coming within six feet of me. | |
| I'm not naive to think this is magical. | |
| There's some huge way to completely do it right, like you said. | |
| Listen, shaving a beard for a pandemic is not asking you to cut off an arm, right? | |
| And if you're not willing to shave your beard, it just seems, well, the government's got to force people to wear masks, but I don't want to shave my beard because I have a fat face. | |
| That's not a huge sacrifice. | |
| This is not saying, go storm the beaches at Iwo Jima, right? | |
| No, no. I mean, if there really was data for that, I would shave my beard because I think that's important to not spread the virus, yeah. | |
| But I legitimately did not know How tight a mask are you? | |
| Because my mask, you're not like extremely restricting. | |
| My mask goes over my nose and my mouth. | |
| Right. And the beard facilitates greater airflow, right? | |
| So if you have COVID, you'll be breathing out more viruses if you have a beard and a mask, right? | |
| I mean, maybe some big face-clamping, like the thing that lays eggs in John Hurt's belly in Alien, maybe some big face-clamping thing, not so much. | |
| But for sure, a regular old mask is going to be riding off your skin when you have a beard. | |
| I mean, I don't even know what to say about it. | |
| I don't need a study for that. I hate to say common sense because that sounds like... | |
| But I think that's... | |
| Like, listen, you have a very fine head of hair... | |
| I could wear a beanie closer to my head than you could. | |
| That's all I'm sort of pointing out. | |
| So anyway, I'm going to close off here. | |
| I appreciate the conversation, man. | |
| I really do. I really do want to hear these perspectives, and I'm really, really glad that you called in. | |
| I do want to thank everyone for dropping by this afternoon. |
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