1174: Lessons learned in Europe and America from surrendering liberty to medical experts and executive authority. @RussellBermanSF

Published: Feb. 17, 2021, 3:19 a.m.

Image:  An April afternoon with Lady Liberty   Russell Berman, @RussellBermanSF,director of Stanford's Thinking Matters program; Hoover, in re: The pandemic, worldwide,.  German philosopher: we gave up liberty, commerce, sociability, in March 2020. Why?  Is this the right way to go about this in future? Where I worked, everybody went away.  We weren’t ordered to do that; we gave it all up voluntarily.  A rapid renunciation of the core values that make up our lives—freedom of assembly, of religious practice, even speech.  I recall the New York governor on TV telling me what I was going to do and what not. Yeah? Who are ya?    What’s frightening is how rapidly we did this.  Renunciation of fundamental freedoms – what makes us human is freedom.  In previous epidemics, we didn't shut the economy down. Why this time?   Absolute authority was given to notional scientific expertise, and never balanced by economics, [and all the other aspects of humanity].  The conversations should not have been solely about medicine, but abut all the other central factors.   The other aspect: the legislature should have been involved, and perhaps the courts when individuals th9ught their rights were being infringed upon.   In future, executive authorities cold declare emergencies for climate, guns, anything.  This time, the people who are worst affected financially—the poor—are the most damaged all ways. Penn Station was shut down by police power, but there’s not enough police power to shut down fifty million people.  Macron just decided against a continuing lockdown, partly because of resistance against it.  We need democratic legitimation of [these behaviors].  Robust debates in Germany, the UK, the Netherlands.  The difference between dissent and disinformation.  http://www.telospress.com/state-of-emergency-and-the-fragility-of-liberty-facing-covid-19/?utm_source=Hoover+Daily+Report&utm_campaign=5015aa7496-EMAIL_CAMPAIGN_2019_09_05_04_36_COPY_01&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_21b1edff3c-5015aa7496-72527561