Comment by psyc | Hacker News Reader

Comment by psyc | Hacker News Reader

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Wearing masks whenever possible doesn't bother me in the slightest. I've been loving it that COVID has normalized wearing a mask in public because I'd like to do it all the time for the rest of my life without being judged for it.

But I don't want anybody mandating it. I've been trying to work out in my own mind why I switched to being more, uh, 'deontologist' if you will, several years ago. I'm just starting to almost be able to articulate it. If you take a consequentialist stance, then any catastrophe sufficient to put your chosen 'utility' at risk instantly justifies literally any measure that mitigates that risk. As long as the measure is outside the realm of the thing you regard as 'utility'. Is free speech for its own sake not part of 'utility' but only a means to increase it? Then out the window it goes when it causes problems. Same for privacy, leaving your home without permission from an authority, pretty much anything we think of as freedom.

It greatly disturbs me to find the Overton Window in a place where I see smart Americans debating every day whether strongly authoritarian and invasive measures are OK, if they save lives.

> Americans debating every day whether strongly authoritarian and invasive measures are OK, if they save lives.

In Europe seatbelts are mandatory, and it is forbidden to smoke in most places. I think that these are reasonable measures. I think, for the exact same reasons, that mask mandates are reasonable.

In public transport is mandatory to wear at least a t-shirt, as skin to skin contact gets unhealthy fast. And restaurants require to clean your hands after going to the toilet.

What does not fit with my idea about the USA is that you can go naked in the street, as it seems quite a Puritan country. And books being censured in schools for mildly nudeness also seem to be the norm. Is not that worse that mask mandates?

Edit: seatbelt

The US is not as different as you think. Seat belts are mandatory in 49/50 states, restrictions on smoking are common, restaurant employees generally need to wash their hands after going to the bathroom, "no shirt no shoes no service" is the general rule, nudity in public places is generally against the law. I don't know where you are getting your impression of US laws from, but it's just wrong.

My take was not that the US does not have same/similar rules, but that the US does have same/similar rules while thinking mask mandates as somehow different from those.

> restaurant employees generally need to wash their hands after going to the bathroom

I struggle to grasp a society where that has to be mandated

>I struggle to grasp a society where that has to be mandated

You're probably unaware of the high prevalence of fecal bacteria on public surfaces, then.

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/16134485/

https://www.cnbc.com/2018/11/29/mcdonalds-touchscreen-kiosks...

"A study by U.K. newspaper Metro found gut and fecal bacteria on touchscreens in all of the chain’s restaurants it surveyed. It took samples from the screens in eight branches and found that they contained coliform bacteria, a group of microorganisms found in people’s intestines as well as in soil and on plants."

After the restaurant waiter or cook is done texting and then flushes the toilet, they wash their hands. Do they wash their phone? Or do they put phone in pocket, go back to kitchen, and proceed to finger the phone for the next hour and contaminate everything while playing their role wearing a mask?

In most of Europe masks for schoolchildren aren't mandatory.

https://www.newsweek.com/cdc-school-mask-guidelines-fuel-cul...

In Europe belts are mandatory

I'm having a hard time understanding this one... Are you literally saying that belts that hold people's pants up are mandatory?

It's probably a reference to seatbelts

Duh, thank you, that is completely obvious and why I didn't get that reading it is beyond me!

Yes. Down with with the Big Apparel

I've been to Europe and never wore a belt, so they must mean something else.

Count your blessings, my friend.

Seat belts.

seatbelt?

> it is forbidden to smoke in most places.

I've always felt Europeans had no trouble throwing the cigarette smoke to your face, and that Americans were conscious this is extremely rude and went out of their way to prevent it

If you haven't stumbled upon it already, you may enjoy reading about rule utilitarianism: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rule_utilitarianism

> Rule utilitarians argue that following rules that tend to lead to the greatest good will have better consequences overall than allowing exceptions to be made in individual instances, even if better consequences can be demonstrated in those instances.

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