Media, CDC, "Scientists" Continue to Gaslight Egregiously on Monkeypox, Shredding Any Remaining Trust

I noted yesterday that 95% of monkeypox cases are diagnosed in gay men. Specifically, gay men who have lots of sex, usually anonymous sex or sex with randos or group sex or orgies.

Because the disease is spread by intimate contact, and you have to be intimate contact with an infected person to catch it, and then, in quick succession, in intimate contact with an infected person to spread it.

In other words: High-volume hyperpromiscuous sex of the kind practiced nigh-exclusively by gay men and paid prostitutes.

And yet the CDC and health "authorities" absolutely refuse to issue any advisory to stop engaging in high-volume multi-partner promiscuous sex during the pandemic. They have no problem recommending that churches and schools be shuttered, but they won't tell gay men to cool it on the orgies.

Orgies are obviously super-spreader events but the CDC won't say a thing about them. Motorcycle rallies are bad, gay orgies are good.

And they're also shrieking that it's wrong to claim that this is mostly a gay disease. I mean, 95% of the infected are gay, but The Science (TM) -- which, as usual, means "The Politics" -- says that we must claim that straights are just as likely to be infected with monkeypox, and that any claim to the contrary is "homophobic" and a "conspiracy theory."

Mother Jones was aghast that Alex Berenson looked at the statistics and decided that a 95% infection rate of gay men meant that monkeypox was almost entirely a disease associated with gay hyperpromiscuity:

[Berenson] then goes on to argue that monkeypox is strictly a disease of gay men. "Are you a gay man who likes sex with lots of other gay men?" he wrote. "Maybe in a bathhouse? Maybe names optional? Maybe with a meth bump on the side? No? Are you sure?... Okay. Don't worry about the monkeypox thing then."

With those two points--a supposedly overblown illness plus some homophobia--Berenson did what anti-vaccine activists do best. He managed to build upon his previous talking points and pivot to the current news cycle, neatly weaving the latest headlines into a grand conspiracy theory with necessary villains and egregious profiteering.

The MIT Technology Review agrees that statistics are just homophobia with decimal points.

Homophobic misinformation circulating about monkeypox on social media is hampering efforts to curb the disease's spread, research conducted on behalf of MIT Technology Review has found.

There have been 2,093 confirmed cases of the virus reported worldwide as of June 17. So far cases have mainly been identified among men who have sex with men, according to the World Health Organization. Its director in Europe, which is the epicenter of the current outbreak, sounded the alarm this week, warning that the authorities need to do more to contain the disease.

That job is being made harder by false, often homophobic theories that are spreading on all major social media platforms, according to research carried out for MIT Technology Review by the Center for Countering Digital Hate. These false claims are making it harder to convince the public that monkeypox can affect everyone, and they could dissuade people from reporting potential infections.

It can affect everyone.

It is affecting mostly gay men, because gay men are engaging in the bed-hopping that spreads the disease more than anyone else.

Some of this misinformation overlaps with familiar pandemic conspiracy theories, attacking Bill Gates and "global elites'' or suggesting that the virus was developed in a lab. But much of it is directly homophobic and attempts to pin blame for the outbreak on LGBTQ+ communities.

Here's the homophobic hate-site NBCNews.com:

We're back in 2019-2020 when the media was shrieking that if you accurately said the Chinese flu came from China, you were being "racist," rather than simply offering a true fact with very useful health consequences. Such as the need to limit travel to and from China.

And now they're trying to deny that the disease is being spread by behaviors prevalent in some sections of the gay community. Again, this isn't about blame so much as telling gays: You need to stop with the random near-anonymous sex and group sex for the next few months, okay?

Is that really so much to ask? Weird, the left didn't think it was a big deal to lock children up for two fucking years.

Some Twitter posts claim countries where anti-LGBTQ+ rhetoric is illegal are the areas where monkeypox cases are highest, or call the virus "god's revenge."

That has nothing to do with "the science." That is just emotional bait. The fact is, this disease is being spread by gay sexual behaviors, and gay sexual behaviors need to be addressed by the health authorities, whether or not some Twitter rando approves of the behaviors or not.

In a video shared on Twitter last month, Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia falsely claimed that "monkeypox is really only transmitted mostly through gay sex."

The statistics say that 95% of cases are in gay men. I think that qualifies as "mostly."

These assholes think that just by attaching Majorie Taylor Greene to a true fact, it makes the claim false.

Homophobic comments on articles about monkeypox that have been liked thousands of times on Facebook have been allowed to remain online, with one specific piece that garnered hundreds of disgusted reactions shared more than 40,000 times via Telegram.

That's what this "research" commissioned by the MIT Technology Review is all about, isn't it? Making the case for the next round of censorship.

Okay, Groomers.

A YouTube video on a channel with 1.12 million subscribers includes false claims that monkeypox can be avoided simply by not going to gay orgies, getting bitten by a rodent, or getting a prairie dog as a pet.

Um, well, the spread of the disease does require intimate contact with an infected person and then an uninfected person in rapid succession. Other than Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu studios, where do you think adults are touching each other like that, one after the other?

It has been viewed more than 178,000 times. Another video, from a channel with 294,000 subscribers, claims that women contract monkeypox by coming into "contact with a man who probably has some other contact with another man"; it has been viewed close to 30,000 times. Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube did not respond to requests for comment in time for publication.

How dare you permit this accurate but hurtful information to remain available!

Such stigma has real consequences--infected people who may not want to discuss their sex lives are less likely to report their symptoms, making it harder to trace new cases and effectively control the disease.

This "stigma" might also save lives, if people of whatever sexual persuasion, whether gay or straight or bisexual or whatever, can be pressured, Fauci-style, into giving up random/group sexual encounters for a few months.

But, once again: The demands of public health are important enough to require that normies give up the things that normies like doing, like seeing their families are barbecues, but never important enough to require that protected leftist constituencies give up the things that leftist like doing, like rioting and gay urine orgies.

You know what's really weird? Despite the CDC's formal claim that straights can get monkeypox just as easily as gays can, and despite the CDC's absolute refusal to issue even a "guidance" about sexual practices known to spread monkeypox, Anthony Fauci says that gays should get the monkeypox vaccine first.

Why is that? If straights can get monkeypox just as easily as gays, then it's outright discrimination based on sexual orientation to make it available to gays first, no?

Dr. Anthony Fauci, chief medical adviser to the president, has said men who have sex with men (MSM) should be among those prioritized for the monkeypox vaccine in the United States.

Monkeypox continues to spread around the world, with nearly 17,000 cases reported globally as of July 22, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). Over the weekend, the virus was declared a global health emergency by the World Health Organization (WHO).

The surge in monkeypox cases has caused concern since it marks the first time the virus has ever spread significantly outside of West and Central Africa, where it is endemic.

It's possible for anyone to catch monkeypox, though one feature of the current outbreak is that cases have been concentrated among men who have sex with men, and particularly those who have multiple sexual partners, WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said on Saturday.

Oh, it's especially prevalent with gay men who have multiple partners?

Praytell, is there any actionable public-health medical advice you can give to affected communities based on this key fact that the disease is prevalent among gay men who have multiple partners?

Or nah?

"Nah," right?

"It's therefore essential that all countries work closely with communities of men who have sex with men, to design and deliver effective information and services..."

Oooh, ooh, pick me, pick me! I have an effective information strategy you seem to haven't even considered!!!

"... and to adopt measures that protect the health, human rights and dignity of affected communities," he added.

Oh, we're protecting the "human rights and dignity" of the affected community over the health of the community-- and over the health of the communities that haven't been affected yet.

Like I said: It's about the politics of protecting the feelings -- the "dignity" -- of protected leftwing constituencies.

@JackPosobiec - 50m

The DC major just announced that a child visiting the nation's capitol now has monkeypox.

By the way, monkeypox is a bad disease for adults, but a possibly fatal one for kids.

What do you think the public reaction will be when kids start dying and the public realizes the CDC could have nipped this in the bud but decided not to in order to "protect the human rights and dignity" of gay orgy enthusiasts?

Flashback: While Fauci was advising us all to avoid unnecessary human contact in the early days of covid, he did carve out an exception: We could still have random sexual hook-ups if we were willing to take the risk.

A confused Dr. Fauci was asked about hookups at the tail end of an interview with Snapchat's "Good Luck America" news program and was forced to give advice on how to handle being particularly lonely -- and unwilling to simply stay home -- in the age of coronavirus.

"If you're swiping on a dating app like Tinder, or Bumble or Grindr, and you match with someone that you think is hot, and you're just kind of like, 'Maybe it's fine if this one stranger comes over.' What do you say to that person?" the host asked Dr. Fauci, apparently channeling the burning questions of Snapchat's users.

"You know, that's tough," Dr. Fauci answered, according to the New York Post. "Because that's what's called relative risk."

He then tried to explain the concept of weighing the satisfaction of a coronavirus lockdown-defying hookup against the possibility of contracting the novel coronavirus, which causes COVID-19 -- a disease that, while primarily problematic for the elderly, is plenty risky for those of the age to use social media dating applications.

"If you're willing to take a risk -- and you know, everybody has their own tolerance for risks -- you could figure out if you want to meet somebody," Dr. Fauci replied. "If you want to go a little bit more intimate, well, then that's your choice regarding a risk."

Strange that he never allowed church-goers or beach-goers or gym-goers or schoolchildren to gauge their own "relative risk" and decide if their personal satisfaction was worth risking covid.

Nope, the carve-out was just for promiscuous sex. Again.

Gotta make exceptions for those protected leftwing constituencies.

Thanks to Comrade Flounder for that very important flashback.

posted by Ace at 12:35 PM

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