Curtis Yarvin repeats false conspiracy fiction covid denial, 10 May 2025
The pandemic is not over and that's part of why outdoor recreation is more popular than ever.
The pandemic is not over and that's part of why outdoor recreation is more popular than ever.
Threats of the environment probably prompt many to be more appreciative of natural beauty being threatened. Virus outbreaks are actually part of that environmental threat of course, and I think people are going to see the benefits of avoiding crowded indoor spaces more as there are more looming risks of aerosol transmitted disease. More pollution in town will of course also must prompt people to go out to parks in the countryside looking for cleaner air.
It's odd how PA DCNR Secretary Dunn talked about the pandemic in the past tense, and when outdoor recreation and camping reservations have only gone up and up. And she neglects to specify that by "physical health" it is people avoiding spending time indoors where it's easier to contract a serious disease. I guess that's implied? I guess we should be glad she didn't say something foolish like "back during covid".
Hot on the Trails: Outdoor recreation drives local economy, preserves region's history WVIA | By Kat Bolus | WVIA News Published May 4, 2025 at 5:00 AM EDT "The COVID pandemic was a good indication to us, and the world really, about how essential time in the outdoors really is," she said. "People flocked to the outdoors during the pandemic; they needed that time in nature for mental health, physical health, to be with family or to get away from family." Equipment sales spiked. Bike purchases were up by 121%, camping gear by 30% and kayaks by 85%, according to the state.
Of course if you need or want to avoid covid, camping in your own equipment is a less risky option than staying in a hotel, exercising outside is less risky than inside a gym, and getting together with family for an outdoor barbecue picnic is less risky than a party at a restaurant. Parks are busier than ever, and we need more of them because people are often choosing them to yes, get away from other people.
Unfortunately the Trump regime is actually curtailing the amount of outdoor options and that's unacceptable. Outdoor recreation actually creates the economic activity these politicians always say they want.
My letter to reps:
It's been shown that parks are an important essential powerhouse of the economy in our society. So any cuts to the national parks system will harm the economy, so if anyone says it's for economic reasons I know they're just not being honest. There should be NO cuts to national parks, and no cutting down of the forests. I like parks and forests, I enjoy camping, I like trees, I like natural nature. So I'm opposed to anything that diminishes our parks. And you should oppose harming parks too.
Please feel free to copy or repurpose for your own letters to reps.
🗞️ In the news
CIDRAP - Delays in COVID antiviral receipt raised risk of poor outcomes after ED visits by 18%, data suggest Mary Van Beusekom, MS May 5, 2025 "It is the responsibility of emergency physicians to provide the best possible care, and they should not wait for specialist consultation to prescribe an antiviral if indicated for COVID-19 if this would result in a significant delay in the start of therapy."
Tech tycoon guru Curtis Yarvin repeats false conspiracy fiction covid denial at Harvard event.
Curtis Yarvin in the past has advocated for using covid style "lockdowns" in order to institute a forcible regime change to make America a monarchy. This goes along with the tech tycoons plans to have "network states" – fiefdoms ruled by kings like they were already trying to do in Honduras, and Peter Thiel reportedly wants to do after Trump seizes Greenland. And now he's repeating blatant Alex Jones Qanon conspiracy theory covid denial claims.
The Harvard Crimson - Far-Right Thinker Curtis Yarvin Argues for Remaking of Harvard at Faculty Club Debate May 6, 2025 By Elise A. Spenner, Crimson Staff Writer In his characteristically digressive mode — veering, at points, into the Salem Witch Trials, the trial of 20th-century fascist thinker Julius Evola, and a mix of debated and conspiracist claims on the origins of the Covid-19 pandemic — Yarvin made the case that American democracy had turned oligarchic and opaque. “Those institutions are quite unaccountable,” Yarvin said. “Nobody elected Anthony Fauci when he basically supervised the program to invent Covid. Nobody elected Anthony Fauci when he covered it up.”
Curtis Yarvin is Alex Jones for the uppity right-wing.
It's so ridiculous because a majority of people have now experienced covid, so many people know people who've died, been hospitalized, or become disabled from covid. It's amazing that these people are so privileged they don't realize just how blatantly obvious it is to most people that covid is definitely real. But monarchist tycoons and their propagandists will try to tell us that up is down, because that's what fascists do apparently.
Trump regime sticks it to the coal miners.
I'm not a big creator of fafo content, but this one hits close to home as both my grandpas were coal miners who died from black lung associated lung diseases. (They were old and therefore lucky, some coal miners with black lung die quite young.) And the Trump NIOSH cuts will affect me and so many workers, disabled, and seniors.
ABC News - 'I want to live': Coal miners speak out as Trump strips away health protections After 100 days, Trump's vow to boost coal belies cuts to miner health programs. By Dr. Mark Abdelmalek, Lauren Lantry, and Lucien Bruggeman April 29, 2025, 9:32 PM Black lung, the debilitating respiratory illness common in coal miners, has made a staggering resurgence in the past 25 years, particularly among the younger generation of miners as they cut through more rock to access deeper, hard-to-reach coal seams, exposing them to harmful dust particles called silica -- which experts say is about 20 times more toxic to the lungs than pure coal dust. And even as President Donald Trump vows to reinvigorate America's coal industry, critics say his administration has stripped away key protections for the miners. In his first 100 days in office, Trump's administration has decimated the National Institute of Occupational Safety and Health, or NIOSH, the federal institute that protects miners from black lung, and paused enforcement of a new safety rule that would lower the level of silica dust in the mines.
My letter to reps:
Because of the cuts at NIOSH the National Personal Protective Technology Lab in Pennsylvania will shut down and that can't happen because this is the place that certifies all the N95 PPE for the whole country, for workers and the public for all types of respiratory protection including viruses, allergens, wildfire smoke, air pollutants. This is reversing decades of advancements in this area. It will set up an environment where counterfeit masks will proliferate worse than what happened during the shortages early in the pandemic, and will likely lead to countless dollars, including taxpayer dollars, spent in preventable adverse health effects, healthcare debacles, lawsuits, and criminal proceedings. You must do something to ensure that NIOSH is functional.
Please feel free to copy or repurpose for your own letters to reps.
Quote:
“And those who expected signs and archangels’ trumps
Do not believe it is happening now.
As long as the sun and the moon are above,
As long as the bumblebee visits a rose,
As long as rosy infants are born
No one believes it is happening now.”A Song on the End of the World — By Czeslaw Milosz, Warsaw, 1944