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Comment by briefcomment | Hacker News Reader

Who was saying that?

The lab leak origin is the subject of a popular conspiracy theory that failed to put forward evidence and served mostly as an expression of hatred and political side-taking (and therefore predictably engendered similar attitudes against the theory). This is irrelevant to its status as an actual theory in good faith (sort of like how mask wearing has a left-vs-right flavor independent of legitimate arguments).

Yep. Just taking a 50:50 bet on the popular side doesn't mean anything, unless backed up by something substantial. There's no meaning to saying you were right or wrong, unless how you got there can be followed by facts and verification.

As far as I remember, the prominent people who were talking about this a year ago did not say "it definitely was a Chinese lab's fault", just that it was seriously suspicious and needed further investigation, and that they were upset that people who were bringing it up were getting prematurely dismissed. Who exactly (other than random conspiracy theorists) was saying it was definitely a Chinese lab?

Maybe English isn't your first language. They were using the "some people are saying" Trumpian rhetorical technique of blaming the Wuhan labs and Chinese leadership directly for the outbreak.

The virus had TWO names and instead they wanted to refer to it as the China Virus and Kung Flu because they didn't want to take responsibility for the lack of political leadership by this country during a time when we could have limited the spread and effects of the virus. The result is that Asians were being assaulted because "they brought it here."

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