There’s been a lot written about how much the economy has been negatively affected by the government’s Covid response. Lots of commentators make their careers talking “about the problem” – especially obvious ones.
Hey everyone, there’s a fire burning!! Everyone!! FIRE!!!! FIRE BURNING EVERYONE. FIRE!!!
But when someone gets a glass or a bucket of water and puts the fire out, then the commentary becomes how the glass was too small, or the bucket too big.
All of that crap just fills up the airways filling people’s focus with negativity. After a bit, it perversely teaches negativity and how an appropriate response is talking about the problem.
The Default Position
Its also slippery ground for establishing “the default position”: a presumption of “equilibrium” a subtext to the commentary, but not the focus of the conversation.
You can find yourself agreeing or disagreeing with the commentary’s thesis and key points. But while you’re explicitly thinking about the stuff that in your face, you come to implicitly accept the ‘default position’ underlying the commentary, which is undebated and unproven.
As more media moves from reporting on factual occurrences into reporting opinion and commentary, the default position remains implicit and unstated, and creates a form of brainwashing if you’re not too careful
Teasing out the Default Position
Just as a random example, from today’s Radio New Zealand website, here’s an report about the flu.
The burning fire in the article is not influenza, though, its actually residual worry leftover from covid-19.
But experts warn, unlike the coronavirus, influenza is already present and cannot be eliminated from the community.
So how do you stop the flu?
good hygiene practices and immunisation are still the most effective ways of stopping the spread of flu this season.
Who’s officially acting as canary-in-the-mine ?
ESR is responsible for coordinating the country’s influenza surveillance.
and
It said the Covid response had heavily impacted its ability to collect information about influenza-like illnesses in the community.
Part of its surveillance involves getting samples and information from family doctors. But because of Covid, it is only now starting to recruit GPs to do that.
What’s the default position underneath the conversation?
- The “equilibrium” position was every year New Zealand experienced high levels of influenza, which is now – post Covid – somehow something we shouldn’t accept.
- “Elimination” is the implicit public health objective now associated with influenza. Why is ESR recruiting GPs only now compared to previous years, where the article implicitly suggests this hasn’t been a focus?
- There’s an assumption in here that people need educated by experts for there own good. People, other people – not the reader or the writer – the other ones who were poorly parented. They need to practice good hygiene.
So if you disagree with me, try reading that article with all of the above bullet points reversed.
Think of the article’s relevance if it was written on February. Would it make the papers and would we care? Does the article make you implicitly think our elimination strategy now feels like the best strategy out of all those available to the government?
Just think if New Zealand adopted a Covid strategy of acceptance and directing health attention towards managing the illness in at risk groups. Would ESR have to jump around recruiting doctors? Why are they doing it this year, and not last? Has their risk management strategy changed?
And let’s say Doctor Jennings was instead telling us how to tie our shoes, instead of washing out hands. Would we care or listen?
The default position of the article of pro disease elimination without consideration of the cost. But that was never… … Said.