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Admin edit: I moved this post and those that followed into this new thread in order to avoid derailing skill's thread - Teevster
Just keep in mind, the COVID-19 death rate in the U.S. is what it is because huge amounts of deaths get counted as COVID deaths if there's any interplay with COVID at all:
That means heart attack deaths, stroke deaths, cancer deaths. If you die with COVID, regardless of comorbidities, you're a COVID death. And because COVID is highly infectious, if you're in the hospital, you're getting COVID.
In other words, if you are dying and go to the hospital, you're getting noted down as a COVID death.
The U.K. is doing something similar by counting all deaths by anyone who's ever contracted COVID as COVID deaths.
uk.reuters.com
A friend went through the CDC website data. Here's the U.S. death rate this year compared to prior years based on what the CDC's recorded:
So... either the rise of COVID coincides with an unprecedented 10% drop in mortality from all other causes... or people are dying the same as ever, except in 10% of cases instead of writing "heart attack", "cancer", "stroke", or "natural causes" they write "COVID-19."
It's like some kind of death hex. Imagine if anyone who ever got a sunburn then died later for any random reason like a fall or old age was recorded as an "ultraviolet crisping death."
Anyway... that aside...
The real question is if the old way of life is actually coming back to the West, or if the "new normal" is here to stay.
I'm starting to bet on "new normal = permanent normal", more and more.
Does it make sense to take this harmless-if-infectious disease, play it up as some frightful pandemic, talk about how we're just going to lock down to "flatten the curve" so hospitals aren't overwhelmed, then when the hospitals are empty ditch the "flatten the curve" talk and instead talk about how we need to stay locked down anyway now because "not one life for the economy", and then after giving all that control over society to the already-powerful (who, by the way, made out like absolute bandits during this thing... billionaire wealth increased by 25% -- $845 billion! -- as the middle class closed its businesses and went on the unemployment line), just turn that off again and go back to how things were before?
This is a common thing in late stage civilizations. Read Joseph Tainter. Here's a good introductory article:
www.peakprosperity.com
As states lose their grip on power, they become increasingly coercive and authoritarian.
They always need a reason to justify it, of course.
In the case of the relatively low-T and womanly West, the justification is "We're just doing it for your safety. We're only doing it because we care."
Meanwhile Alek's telling me that in France if you get caught outside after curfew (9 PM) three times, you get six months in jail.
Does that sound like the kind of measure a government takes because it is just trying to keep people healthy?
It sure doesn't to me.
It sounds like some THX-1138, 1984, The Giver shenanigans, if you ask me.
So the real question is, assuming the folks in power don't plan on giving up this power over their subject's lives... what happens next, and how do guys who want to be able to still play the field in these places adapt?
Do they just have to move somewhere that isn't doing all this (and there are a bunch of places that aren't doing any of this stuff at all)?
Wish I had answers for guys.
That said -- I will also say I know a guy who's in one of these heavily locked down cities, and he is day gaming, and reports his close rates have gone up a ridiculous amount. This is a guy who's been approaching for 15 years and his rates are always steady, and suddenly he is getting almost double the phone numbers, dates, and lays from the women he approaches.
His theory is most other guys simply aren't approaching at all... so it helps him stand out.
Generally right now what I am telling guys in locked down places to do is "Do day game." Because the dating apps are all flooded and the nightlife these places is closed. But women are still out during the day. You can approach them with masks on. That's not illegal yet -- though they're working on it in the U.K. ("No household mixing") and France ("No interaction with people outside your social bubble").
For guys in the heavily-locked down Western European countries where they are planning to lock it down further and talking about that openly, my best advice, if you can't move to a part of the country that isn't as locked down, or move to a different country that isn't as, is go hard on day game, get yourself a great girl, and make her your girlfriend for the duration of this -- which might be a while.
One more thing I'll say... the level of control these societies are trying to enforce only works so long as they can get a large chunk of the population to go along with it. If that starts to falter, they are simply not going to have the manpower to enforce all these bizarre and anti-social rules and practices they've been pushing so hard.
Chase
Just keep in mind, the COVID-19 death rate in the U.S. is what it is because huge amounts of deaths get counted as COVID deaths if there's any interplay with COVID at all:
That means heart attack deaths, stroke deaths, cancer deaths. If you die with COVID, regardless of comorbidities, you're a COVID death. And because COVID is highly infectious, if you're in the hospital, you're getting COVID.
In other words, if you are dying and go to the hospital, you're getting noted down as a COVID death.
The U.K. is doing something similar by counting all deaths by anyone who's ever contracted COVID as COVID deaths.
Reuters | Breaking International News & Views
Find latest news from every corner of the globe at Reuters.com, your online source for breaking international news coverage.
uk.reuters.com
A friend went through the CDC website data. Here's the U.S. death rate this year compared to prior years based on what the CDC's recorded:
- 2017 US deaths: 2.81 million (234,000/month)
- 2018 US deaths: 2.83 million (235,000/month)
- 2019 US deaths: 2.86 million (239,000/month)
- 2020 US deaths through October 1st: 2.13 million (236,000/month)
So... either the rise of COVID coincides with an unprecedented 10% drop in mortality from all other causes... or people are dying the same as ever, except in 10% of cases instead of writing "heart attack", "cancer", "stroke", or "natural causes" they write "COVID-19."
It's like some kind of death hex. Imagine if anyone who ever got a sunburn then died later for any random reason like a fall or old age was recorded as an "ultraviolet crisping death."
Anyway... that aside...
The real question is if the old way of life is actually coming back to the West, or if the "new normal" is here to stay.
I'm starting to bet on "new normal = permanent normal", more and more.
Does it make sense to take this harmless-if-infectious disease, play it up as some frightful pandemic, talk about how we're just going to lock down to "flatten the curve" so hospitals aren't overwhelmed, then when the hospitals are empty ditch the "flatten the curve" talk and instead talk about how we need to stay locked down anyway now because "not one life for the economy", and then after giving all that control over society to the already-powerful (who, by the way, made out like absolute bandits during this thing... billionaire wealth increased by 25% -- $845 billion! -- as the middle class closed its businesses and went on the unemployment line), just turn that off again and go back to how things were before?
This is a common thing in late stage civilizations. Read Joseph Tainter. Here's a good introductory article:
Joseph Tainter: The Collapse Of Complex Societies | Peak Prosperity
By popular demand, we welcome Joseph Tainter, USU professor and author of The Collapse Of Complex Societies (free book download here). Dr. Tainter sees many of the same unsustainable risks the PeakProsperity.com audience focuses on -- an overleveraged economy, declining net energy per capita...
www.peakprosperity.com
As states lose their grip on power, they become increasingly coercive and authoritarian.
They always need a reason to justify it, of course.
In the case of the relatively low-T and womanly West, the justification is "We're just doing it for your safety. We're only doing it because we care."
Meanwhile Alek's telling me that in France if you get caught outside after curfew (9 PM) three times, you get six months in jail.
Does that sound like the kind of measure a government takes because it is just trying to keep people healthy?
It sure doesn't to me.
It sounds like some THX-1138, 1984, The Giver shenanigans, if you ask me.
So the real question is, assuming the folks in power don't plan on giving up this power over their subject's lives... what happens next, and how do guys who want to be able to still play the field in these places adapt?
Do they just have to move somewhere that isn't doing all this (and there are a bunch of places that aren't doing any of this stuff at all)?
Wish I had answers for guys.
That said -- I will also say I know a guy who's in one of these heavily locked down cities, and he is day gaming, and reports his close rates have gone up a ridiculous amount. This is a guy who's been approaching for 15 years and his rates are always steady, and suddenly he is getting almost double the phone numbers, dates, and lays from the women he approaches.
His theory is most other guys simply aren't approaching at all... so it helps him stand out.
Generally right now what I am telling guys in locked down places to do is "Do day game." Because the dating apps are all flooded and the nightlife these places is closed. But women are still out during the day. You can approach them with masks on. That's not illegal yet -- though they're working on it in the U.K. ("No household mixing") and France ("No interaction with people outside your social bubble").
For guys in the heavily-locked down Western European countries where they are planning to lock it down further and talking about that openly, my best advice, if you can't move to a part of the country that isn't as locked down, or move to a different country that isn't as, is go hard on day game, get yourself a great girl, and make her your girlfriend for the duration of this -- which might be a while.
One more thing I'll say... the level of control these societies are trying to enforce only works so long as they can get a large chunk of the population to go along with it. If that starts to falter, they are simply not going to have the manpower to enforce all these bizarre and anti-social rules and practices they've been pushing so hard.
Chase
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