The futile mask debate

I have been hassled a few times over wearing a face mask. They came at me angrily over misunderstood and debunked ideas around harm from Co2. They question my intelligence and claim it's not going to protect me.

I try to clarify that I'm not advocating that anyone should be masked from the time they leave home until they return home. Wearing one for confined public spaces or anytime you are within 6 feet of other people not of your household is more than sufficient.

As for whether it helps I completely understand that unless you are using an N95 (and you probably shouldn't be) your mask is likely only helpful in preventing others from getting something you may be carrying unwittingly, it doesn't do a lot for personal protection.

It's about stopping you from spreading SARS-Covis-2 specifically. You can have it and not know and you don't have to be symptomatic to spread it. This virus is more contagious and more dangerous than other respiratory viruses and we haven't had time to develop sufficient vaccines or treatment. I wouldn't recommend masking for flu or other less hazardous yet similar threats.

People then question my education because I am not a doctor in an effort to discredit what I'm saying. No, I'm not a doctor or even a medical professional, but I did work for 4 years as a caregiver for someone with a terminal illness which included training in hygiene and preventing the spread of disease to the vulnerable. I have extensive training in cross-contamination and PPE. I have 8+ years of past restaurant management experience and have worked in a supervisory capacity in a manufacturing environment processing vegetables and meats for restaurant, deli, and grocery distribution. Much of my workday involved preventing the spread of disease and other contaminants. You don't have to be a doctor to receive education in a subject and your google search for results that confirm your bias is not the same as my training and work experience.

2Darin Byrd and Sherry Taylor

Hayden Beaulieu Needs to Come Clean

I am not well. Every day is a struggle to just live. Medical treatment is a full-time job at this point. I suffer from multiple serious conditions that all have the same result if not managed very carefully. I don’t have time for the fiction spread by those that just don’t have all the facts and I have been silent about this long enough. I'm frustrated that after attempting to forgive and trust this nightmare continues.

If you are connected to my oldest son via Facebook you may have seen a post to his wall regarding his current situation with a Gofundme link to raise money for a legal defense. What you may not realize is that the person sharing the link and those that may currently support him believe a false narrative in regards to his back story and legal standing. The person sharing the post has not actually interviewed the people affected by his actions or done any journalistic due diligence to verify what she has written or posted about him in the past.

While I generally I tend to support the ideals of the organization he has been working for and want to encourage their efforts, I am frustrated that he got there by painting a picture of half-truths and demonizing people that were victims to his crimes all while shifting blame for criminal and immoral behavior on his part to others. I don't think he belongs in an AZ jail or that he should undergo the kind of treatment he has received there in the past, but I do think he should accept responsibility for his very real actions that put him in this situation, to begin with. He has written and said many things in his legal filings, support of causes he believes in, and to people, he has befriended or worked within recent years that paint a very dishonest, disrespectful, and downright harmful narrative about his family and how he got where he is today.

He had supportive family and friends that gave up more than anyone can imagine to help him and he returned that support with theft, dishonesty, assault, and property destruction. I don’t believe in caging adolescents like animals and I think authorities that abuse prisoners are reprehensible. I am not questioning the validity of his claims regarding how he was treated there, but I am stating that his version of the events that got him there, or at least the version that those he has been working with seem to believe is false. If you choose to dig into any of this please look at the facts and not just the emotional appeals by people that came into his life in the last few years. Talk to me, talk to the extended family that almost sacrificed career and home over him, talk to the victims of the crimes he was initially charged with. Talk to the trail of people in Washington state that he harmed before ending up in Arizona, to begin with.

Yes, his situation is dire, yes he probably suffers from abuse at the hands of authorities, yes he has been through traumatic and stressful events. No, he was not ever abused by his family, he was not abandoned, and everybody tried everything they could to get him help before he did the things that lead him to be in Arizona and eventually jail.

He needs to be honest about everything he has done, with himself, and with those, he has become friends with in recent years. He needs to make a real effort to make things right with those that he hurt along the way. After he has decided to do these things he may be successful with some of his recent ventures and be able to build a good life making a positive impact on society. Until that happens nothing is going to change.

I have no intention of giving up on him, I have no intention of doing any of the things he has already falsely accused me and others of in the past, but I also do not intend to be a silent victim of a false narrative any longer. I have done and said enough real things in my life to cause people to dislike me or wish me ill. I don’t need falsehoods stacking up in addition to it. People that don’t actually know me, my family, or those who have been involved in raising and caring for him as a child should probably reserve judgment until they have gotten the whole picture. Go ahead, fight for his freedom, fight to remedy unjust laws and treatment of minors and young adults, but demand truth and acceptance of responsibility as well.

My Facebook Feed is Annoying Me

I keep my mouth shut about a lot of things that show up in my feed, but I'm feeling opinionated and feel the need to express it so here goes. It's completely okay if you disagree, I can be friends with people that don't agree with me. I don't really want to argue though, I'm more or less venting,

GMO food products are safe. They have saved millions from starvation and there is no evidence that GMO foods currently available are dangerous. Avoiding all GMO foods because there might be one developed that is unhealthy at some point would be like automatically avoiding all medications despite a need for them.

Essential oils are a marketing and profit-driven situation and they don't work as advertised.

Homeopathy isn't science. Any healing obtained is probably something that would have happened anyway or caused by the power of the mind, AKA the placebo effect. You may as well just drink water and convince yourself it's a cure because watering down active ingredients until there isn't enough of them to do the job is basically the same thing.

Multi-level marketing might work for you or somebody you know, but it won't work for me. I have to much social anxiety to be successful with sales or building down-lines. There have been multiple instances of companies making loads of money off the backs of participants by pushing motivational material and events at high costs without providing them with any direct or needed benefit to their business. Companies and key individuals made loads of money off of speaking events and motivational material sales but weren't really drawing in money from actual effective multi-level marketing. It was a sham. Any of you Amway folks remember Quixtar? That was a spectacular failure for people trying to build businesses online.

I have said it before and I'll say it again. I don't believe that gluten sensitivity even exists and I don't think it's the absence or reduction of gluten in your new diet that made you feel better. It was more likely the overall reduction of refined carbs and sugars that did the trick. Celiac disease is real, and certain wheat type allergies are very real but rare. Eliminating gluten from your diet if you have an actual allergy problem or have Celiac disease makes sense, but the rest of you have been swept up by a marketing fad fueled by book authors and food manufacturers that just want your money.

Vaccines are safe and absolutely necessary. Anti-vaxxers are effectively Pro-Plague. The study that started their whole movement was a fraud to begin with but that hasn't stopped them. Some lessons in basic high school chemistry should be enough to disprove most of the claims of dangerous chemicals in vaccines. Vaccines are medications and of course, there are instances where they are not safe or appropriate for certain people. There aren't enough problems for enough people for people to be avoiding all vaccines all the time though. Some people don't react well to specific blood pressure or heart medications. It doesn't mean that everyone should avoid all blood pressure and heart medications all the time. Pro Plaguers drive me nuts.

Black lives DO matter!

People that get offended by the saying "Black lives matter" are just not getting the point. Black lives matter because all lives matter and we need to state that Black lives matter specifically because they have a higher chance in America of being treated like they don't. Of course other races matter and police lives matter, but stating it for black people does not detract from that. Until people stop discounting people for being black, say it loud and say it proud! Black lives matter!

Linus Christmas Speech

image borrowed from wikipedia

It isn't our position to judge the needy but we often do. Many wealthy conservative people in this great nation do not believe they should pay taxes for social service programs and instead engage in judgment and oppression of the poor. They view the poor as a threat to their excessive wealth.

Proverbs 14:31 New International Version (NIV)

31 Whoever oppresses the poor shows contempt for their Maker, but whoever is kind to the needy honors God.

https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Proverbs+14%3A31&version=NIV

DACA

photo credit: Elvert Barnes

Every wall supporting Trump voter cheering the end of DACA that claims to be Christian could use a look at what the bible says about the treatment of foreigners. I don't consider dreamers to be foreigners, but since you likely do here ya go! This is NIV, but whatever version you choose the message is clear.

Exodus 22:21-24 NIV
21 “Do not mistreat or oppress a foreigner, for you were foreigners in Egypt. 22 “Do not take advantage of the widow or the fatherless. 23 If you do and they cry out to me, I will certainly hear their cry. 24 My anger will be aroused, and I will kill you with the sword; your wives will become widows and your children fatherless

http://www.biblestudytools.com/exodus/passage/?q=exodus+22:21-24

Don't Blame left or Right, Blame Nihilism.

Image credit Johnny Silver Cloud

Historically there have been atrocities committed by leaders on the left that could be equivocated with the evil coming from the alt-right today and the various hate groups fueling it. Some even surpassed it.That said, none of them are American, none of them were evil simply because they were on the left part of the spectrum or relevant to this situation with opposition of hate groups coming from the left in America today. 

They were Authoritarian's and nihilists and used the doctrine of the left to support their acts and could have just as easily done so from the right given the proper political climate. Authoritarians are loyal to themselves, not a party or ideology.

Nazi type movements come from the extreme authoritarian right. They are nationalist in nature. Hitler used some socialist measures when it suited his purpose (it's actually called populism which works from both sides), but you could hardly call him a left wing tyrant. My history teachers in college usually placed him on the extreme end of the authoritarian right (as opposed to libertarian right or either end of the left).

Let us not try to disqualify the arguments of Democrats or Republicans solely on the basis of what historical figures have done around the world. If you look at the spectrum properly you will see that no politician in power today has become extreme enough in action to be place near  Mao, Stalin or Hitler. 

The Alt-Right, White Nationalists, Neo Nazis, and KKK have given their aid and support to the election of #45 and the Republican party, they are making a lot of hateful noise, and they are actually getting violent. This is a problem. It doesn't make moderate Republicans or even #45 Nazis, but it needs to be addressed. 

Being complicate with these groups is almost as bad as joining them, but not all or even most Republicans are complicate with them. Many prominent Republicans have rightly and justly spoken out against these groups. The alt-right may have appeared to hijack the republican party for now with the last election, but #45 hasn't shown any loyalty to any particular group or ideal to be honest. The danger in #45 is his nihilist nature, not the alt-right supporting him.

Personality testing doesn't work.

Borrowed from Wikipedia

The Myers Brigg test is junk pseudoscience cooked up by unqualified individuals and its adoption almost worldwide by corporations and experts that should know better is appalling. Personality testing in general has not been proven to be accurate or effective. Personality is not static and people can't be lumped into arbitrary categories. Please consider the sources below:

• https://books.google.ca/books?id=Njh9KgwSjs0C&dq=The%20Cult%20of%20Personality&source=gbs_navlinks_s
• https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/give-and-take/201309/goodbye-mbti-the-fad-won-t-die
• http://www.businessinsider.com/myers-briggs-personality-test-is-misleading-2014-6
• https://www.theguardian.com/science/brain-flapping/2013/mar/19/myers-briggs-test-unscientific
• https://books.google.com/books?id=OrrCBQAAQBAJ&source=gbs_navlinks_s
• https://www.washingtonpost.com/national/on-leadership/myers-briggs-does-it-pay-to-know-your-type/2012/12/14/eaed51ae-3fcc-11e2-bca3-aadc9b7e29c5_story.html?utm_term=.6e7e92232616
• http://www.newstatesman.com/martha-gill/2013/12/why-personality-tests-dont-work
• http://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-18723950
• https://www.wsj.com/articles/are-workplace-personality-tests-fair-1412044257

Polygraph testing is a lie.

Image borrowed from sketchport.com

I'll just leave this here. Polygraph testing is junk pseudoscience. Governments, corporations, and police organizations should stop using it. Read the sources below and consider them if ever asked to undergo a polygraph.

• https://www.apa.org/research/action/polygraph.aspx
• http://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-22467640
• http://www.amazon.com/The-Lie-Detectors-American-Obsession/dp/0743259882
• http://www.vox.com/2014/8/14/5999119/polygraphs-lie-detectors-do-they-work
• http://www.businessinsider.com/how-to-pass-a-polygraph-test-2015-5
• https://fas.org/sgp/othergov/polygraph/ota/contro.html