Ugh, who writes this shit?

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Frank

Frank

This is about Gamefaqs. It is not, however, video game related.

On the front page of Gamefaqs right now is a poll. This poll is titled: Are you worried about the H1N1 ''Swine Flu'' virus? Ok, kind of a lame-ass poll for a video game website, but kind of relevant due to the couple of cases to come out of PAX.

Now, the options for said poll are:

-Not anymore - I've had a doctor-confirmed case of it

-Yes, people I know have gotten sick with it

-A little, it seems to be spreading pretty fast

-Not really, I don't think it could happen to me

-I haven't heard anything about it, should I be worried?

What's my problem with this? The answers boil to down to yes, yes, a little yes, ignorance and ignorance. What kind of fear mongering shit is this? Where's the, "No, I'm not afraid, because I'm a healthy adult who will likely be able to overcome it regardless of if I catch it or not." or the less verbose, "No, because I'm not." No offense to people who are afraid of catching it for legit reasons (such as Zen).

I don't even really have a point, I'm just bothered by it.
 
drawn_inward

drawn_inward

They're hyping this to sell us something. I just know it. Why else would they get the public into a frenzy?

Anti-bacterial soaps are finally going away, but not fast enough. It's over-cleanliness that is a problem. Everything doesn't have to be sterile.
 
G

Gill Kaiser

I don't understand people's obsession with Swine Flu. Unless you've got AIDS or are elderly or an infant, why would you be worried about the goddamn flu? It's not like flu's that dangerous.

Also, calling it H1N1 seems a bit pretentious. H1N1 is the most common subtype of influenza and has been around since at least 1918, when it caused the Spanish Flu pandemic. People going around saying "H1N1" as if it's some kind of new phenomenon are ridiculous.
 
GasBandit

GasBandit

Staff member
Gill Kaiser said:
I don't understand people's obsession with Swine Flu. Unless you've got AIDS or are elderly or an infant, why would you be worried about the goddamn flu? It's not like flu's that dangerous.

Also, calling it H1N1 seems a bit pretentious. H1N1 is the most common subtype of influenza and has been around since at least 1918, when it caused the Spanish Flu pandemic. People going around saying "H1N1" as if it's some kind of new phenomenon are ridiculous.
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It does allow you the hilarity of calling it the "hiney" flu.
 
A

Abalistar

This isn't the first time they've done a poll worded that badly.

It seems like about half the time they're trying to get some sort of point across with the way they word the answers. It's always something along the lines of "Yes, Yes, kinda, I'm an idiot, lawlz"

It sucks too, because it causes me to not vote, and I like voting in meaningless online polls. :(
 
Gared

Gared

I think the big push to start calling it H1N1 publicly came from the pork industry, who saw sales and prices drop like a rock when they first announced the flu problem. I remember quite clearly being able to buy pork tenderloins for $1.49/lb shortly after the first scare this year; and shortly thereafter seeing something in the news about the pork industry being pissed off that people who didn't have information to the contrary thought you could catch it by eating pork and stopped buying pork as a result.
 
G

Gill Kaiser

ZenMonkey;253064][quote=Gill Kaiser said:
Unless you've got AIDS or are elderly or an infant, why would you be worried about the goddamn flu?
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:facepalm:[/QUOTE]

What's wrong with that? I don't follow...

Children and the elderly are both at increased risk from flu, and the majority of people who die annually as a result of flu, usually due to a secondary infection like pneumonia, are within those age brackets.
 
R

RealBigNuke

I actually went to PAX. Both of the people I road tripped up there with got the flu, I'm guessing since after all that contact and not feeling anything, I must have already had it.

Of course, that doesn't mean it was swine flu. Turns out they don't test you for it unless you're in serious danger from it. I never worried about it, although I was irritated that if I started getting flu symptoms I was gonna have to call into work sick for a week right after I took a week's vacation...

Anyway, the public reaction to swine flu irritates the hell out of me. Just like their reaction to the rise in youth violence that hasn't been happening for twenty years, the summer of the shark where shark attacks didn't go up at all, and every other supervirus they've touted as the end of the world in the last decade. The media just wants ratings and they're trolling to get it, and the general public still doesn't understand that what major corporations spoon feed them is not necessarily the absolute truth.

Now, there are people who should be concerned about the swine flu. Children, pregnant women, and people with compromised immune systems should always be taking precautions against the flu and should see a doctor if they're coming down with something. However, the swine flu is not some super strain of death. It's actually just about the same as the normal strains of flu in severity. Since the appearance of the swine flu the normal flu has killed thousands more people simply because the normal flu is already all over the place. Even if you're in extended contact with someone who has swine flu, like at PAX, and you now have the flu... odds are it's still just the normal flu anyway, because, again, it's way more common. So yeah, the flu can be something to be concerned about if you have cause, but seeing normal, physically(if not mentally) healthy people walking down the street with surgeon's masks - which aren't even effective at preventing it - makes me want to start liberally applying knives to people until their ignorance is fixed.

/breakfast rant.
 
C

Chazwozel

Gill Kaiser said:
I don't understand people's obsession with Swine Flu. Unless you've got AIDS or are elderly or an infant, why would you be worried about the goddamn flu? It's not like flu's that dangerous.

Also, calling it H1N1 seems a bit pretentious. H1N1 is the most common subtype of influenza and has been around since at least 1918, when it caused the Spanish Flu pandemic. People going around saying "H1N1" as if it's some kind of new phenomenon are ridiculous.
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Flu can be a dangerous virus, even if you're healthy. Especially in terms of lung damage and supplemental pneumonia.

As for your second statement, yes! H1N1 is simply the designation for the types of receptors on the surface of the virus. H1N1 subtypes are nothing new. I fucking hate the media and how it's covered the swine flu pandemic. Nothing but fear mongering.

I swear, if a real pandemic breaks out, the current state of the media is going to cause the world to go to hell in a handbasket.

---------- Post added at 12:15 PM ---------- Previous post was at 12:13 PM ----------
ZenMonkey;253481][quote=Gill Kaiser said:
What's wrong with that? I don't follow...
Click to expand...
I'm just wondering how many more times it has to be said here or in the media that the elderly are at lower risk from H1N1 than young people.[/QUOTE]


That's cause, 101 year old grandma's been cranking out H1N1 antibodies since the roaring 20's. :)

You know what I'm going to worry about? A massive outbreak of small pox.
 
Hailey Knight

Hailey Knight

What I found amusing is that during the Michael Jackson stuff, the Honduras stuff, the highlights in early days of Obama's healthcare plan, and a couple other high profile stories this summer, swine flu vanished from the Washington Post. As nothing new and big has come along in the past couple weeks, it's resurfaced to the front page.

It's one thing to say the media is over-hyping and fear-mongering; it's another to actually see it in their printing patterns.
 
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