Facebook is a menace. COVID-19 is a menace. Conservatism is a cesspool. Together, those three ingredients have created a toxic stew of malevolent death and devastation. We can talk about all those things in the abstract, look at the numbers and statistics, and catch the occasional whiff of seditionist right-wing rhetoric. But I hadn’t really fully understood just how horrifying that combination of right-wing extremism, Facebook, and a killer virus was until I became a regular at the Herman Cain Awards subreddit. This series will document some of those stories, so we are aware of what the other side is doing to our country.
Today’s cautionary tale is a Canadian ironworker.
A Canadian … posting a QAnon American-flag meme.
From the start, the ironworker’s wife didn’t mince words.
She's talking about the stuff no one wants to talk about—the effect of the disease on loved ones, on the medical professionals trying to save lives, and on those who survive COVID with new, severe disabilities.
There’s no sugar-coating things here, no “prayer warrior” bullshit, no sanitizing of the situation. This is the reality, and it’s horrifying.
“FREEDOM,” yell the assholes. This is the actual cost. How much FREEDOM does our ironworker have with tubes shoved into every orifice?
Poor woman.
“BUT 99.8% SURVIVE,” they scream.
Aside from bad math and bad-faith statistics, no survival rate accounts for the long-term issues that survivors can endure with long-haul COVID. The physical disabilities range from shredded lungs and organs, to heart damage, to COVID-onset diabetes, to brain damage, to who knows what else we’ll find out in the coming years.
He tested positive on Sept. 7. Removed from life support on October 17. Six weeks of hell for everyone involved.
If I was benevolent dictator of the world, I would force every person resisting the vaccine to read this story.
Brace yourself...
This woman, alone and grieving in Alberta, is my hero.
This is all so brave, so poignant, so raw, and painful, and loving, and angry, and everything it needs to be to hopefully get her circle of friends and acquaintances and family to rethink any opposition they may still have to vaccination.
And now it’s Memorial Day.
“He was scared in the beginning,” she wrote, “he was genuinely afraid of getting sick.” They were watching the news, getting truthful information, and taking the necessary precautions. But by late July, he was in the clutches of QAnon mis- and disinformation, and that spelled his doom.
The end.
Today’s cautionary tale is a Canadian ironworker.
A Canadian … posting a QAnon American-flag meme.
From the start, the ironworker’s wife didn’t mince words.
She's talking about the stuff no one wants to talk about—the effect of the disease on loved ones, on the medical professionals trying to save lives, and on those who survive COVID with new, severe disabilities.
There’s no sugar-coating things here, no “prayer warrior” bullshit, no sanitizing of the situation. This is the reality, and it’s horrifying.
“FREEDOM,” yell the assholes. This is the actual cost. How much FREEDOM does our ironworker have with tubes shoved into every orifice?
Poor woman.
“BUT 99.8% SURVIVE,” they scream.
Aside from bad math and bad-faith statistics, no survival rate accounts for the long-term issues that survivors can endure with long-haul COVID. The physical disabilities range from shredded lungs and organs, to heart damage, to COVID-onset diabetes, to brain damage, to who knows what else we’ll find out in the coming years.
He tested positive on Sept. 7. Removed from life support on October 17. Six weeks of hell for everyone involved.
If I was benevolent dictator of the world, I would force every person resisting the vaccine to read this story.
Brace yourself...
This woman, alone and grieving in Alberta, is my hero.
This is all so brave, so poignant, so raw, and painful, and loving, and angry, and everything it needs to be to hopefully get her circle of friends and acquaintances and family to rethink any opposition they may still have to vaccination.
And now it’s Memorial Day.
“He was scared in the beginning,” she wrote, “he was genuinely afraid of getting sick.” They were watching the news, getting truthful information, and taking the necessary precautions. But by late July, he was in the clutches of QAnon mis- and disinformation, and that spelled his doom.
The end.