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Comment by metamet | Hacker News Reader

I think there's some confusion and rewriting of history going on here.

The left wasn't denying the possibility that it leaked from the Wuhan lab. This was a theory very early on and it wasn't "denied" more that it wasn't substantiated.

It became political when it was asserted by people on the right, without any actual research or investigation, that was an intentional release from China.

Majority of that blame falls on Trump's inability to understand or articulate nuanced topics, particularly within geopolitical contexts. Instead of figuring out how to defeat the virus, majority of their energy went into pointing the finger at who to blame--a far easier task than being an actual leader.

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Candidly, I think that this comment is actually the one rewriting history. There absolutely, 100% was complete denial, all originating on the political left, that a leak from a lab in China was a possibility. No confusion about intentional vs accidental - total denial of the possibility in any way shape or form. Suggesting it was possible, much less plausible or even likely, was labeled racist. Attempts were made (with limited success) to suppress discussion about it, by removing the topic from social media feed recommendations and what not.

Someone else can look up sources for all of this if they want, but I don't feel the need to. It was just a couple years ago, and I remember it perfectly.

I presume you just spend your time consuming healthier discourse than I do, which probably means you make some better choices in your free time than I do, so I'm not accusing you personally of this - but the walking back of all the effort made to deny and suppress discussion about this issue and pretend it never happened feels a lot like gaslighting.

Odd, I remember it perfectly well, too.

> There absolutely, 100% was complete denial, all originating on the political left, that a leak from a lab in China was a possibility.

Well, that's just patently wrong. There was not "complete denial" by any means, as the majority of scientists were open to any and all possibility of origin. As such, the left--who was following those scientists--maintained the same position.

Saying that "there is no evidence that it was leaked" is not blanket denial. It is just that--there is no evidence, thus the possibility remains open but shouldn't be entertained as decisive.

Yet many politicians on the right, despite there being no evidence, dug their feet into the ground, convinced it was.

Not sure how you got the impression that not having evidence of something equates to "complete denial", but it's incorrect.

> Suggesting it was possible, much less plausible or even likely, was labeled racist.

We knew the virus originated in the Wuhan region of China. Don't pretend that suppression occurred because of simple discussion of the topic--it was predominantly due to politicians raging xenophobic wars by trying to rename it "The China Virus".

Trump did use the terms "Kung Flu" & "China Virus". That kinda sums up his capacity to handle the crisis. It felt very much like the initial solution was to just blame China so much it'd magically go away by Easter. This rhetoric did have a negative impact on Asian communities.

Reality is there is still no definitive evidence of a lab leak and China is never going to admit to it. Trump's racist finger pointing didn't actually tangibly help US citizens. Even if he did prove it was China's fault, what was he going to do? Go to war with China? Cutoff trade our economy is inextricably tied to? It felt very much like a dog chasing a car. The dog has no clue what it'd do if it actually caught the car.

> There absolutely, 100% was complete denial, all originating on the political left, that a leak from a lab in China was a possibility. No confusion about intentional vs accidental - total denial of the possibility in any way shape or form. Suggesting it was possible, much less plausible or even likely, was labeled racist.

You are ignoring a few simple facts here.

1. The left doesn't congregate and worship at the cult of personality like the right does.

2. The first cases were in Wuhan. The right/Trumpets immediately blamed China. And this blame had exactly zero to do with any facts at the time. And in blaming China, hate crimes against all Asians increased dramatically, not even just Chinese.

3. It wasn't being called racist just saying it. It was racist being racists. Most people admitted it was a possibility, but definitely not confirmed in any way

The fact of the matter is it was turned into a political talking point.

The right says "IT IS THIS WAY BECAUSE THAT'S WHAT I BELIEVE AND IF YOU DON'T AGREE YOU ARE RADICAL LEFT"

The left says "We can't say that yet"

Learn the definition of gaslighting

The "wet market" theory that was pushed oddly hard at the start is probably the most racist theory. If you strive to be the least racist you would have to go with "engineered in collaboration with west lab leak".

Er, both sides are saying the same kinds of things: "it is this way, I believe the science says so, and if you don't agree with me you are xxxxx, yyyyy & maybe zzzzz."

This isn't a both sides situation. There was no science indicating that the virus was leaked from a lab.

One side said "the virus was leaked from a lab! we should call it Kung Flu or The China Virus!" and the other side said "there is no evidence that the virus was leaked from a lab".

They're not equal and opposite positions. One was kneejerk and unsubstantiated, the other was scientific.

I'm certain there were some people out there who took the lack of evidence as proof that it wasn't, but those people were wrong and unscientific as well.

You're right, and it's not even hard to verify it, just look at this comment from December 2020:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25587409

In the US, it's because this claim, or rejection of it, is strongly tied to political identity. Because the US is highly polarized right now, once political identity comes into play, you've left the realm of rationality and entered the realm of tribalism.

Ther rest of the comments there are worth reading too, if for nothing other than to see what the discussion was like at the time: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25585833

Your cited comment doesn't back what the commenter you're replying to is saying. It's just making a generic political statement. It does not have an opinion on the claims they're making.

This is exactly how I remember things.

My stance has always been that Lab Leak required the least number of assumptions. Intent was never factored in, just that it seems awfully strange to so vehemently deny even the possibility of it being a lab leak and not want to investigate. Could it have been the wet market? Sure, but it seems less likely.

There may be some interesting reckoning happening in a few years, but probably not. Like safe and effective vaccines. It turns out, that if you did a RCT with two placebos and only called the people with placebo A vaccinated after two weeks, and called them unvaccinated if the got COVID in those two weeks. Placebo A would have the same efficacy numbers as the vaccines they rolled out.

I also thought RFK Jr was full of shit when he said the current childhood vaccines have not been tested against placebo. I was wrong there. Turns out they only test against previous versions of the vaccines, some of which are known to have serious side effects, and most of the time the previous version goes back to a time when they didn't do much testing either.

My recollection is closer to GP's than to yours, fwiw. Not exactly the same, but I do recall that a lot of the pushback from the left was because every publication on the right was busy hitching the "it originated as a lab-modified virus" motte to the "it was intentionally released/it was a bioweapon" bailey.

My memory was that it was being called a "genetically engineered" virus in a way that made it sound like the focus wasn't a lab leak (accident) but an intentional weaponization.

There’s indeed a spectrum of four possibilities:

1) wild virus, no lab involvement

2) wild virus, accidentally released from a lab

3) modified virus, accidentally released from lab

4) modified virus, intentional release

At the start of the pandemic, the conspiracy nuts embraced option 4, and the left by reflex embraced option 1 and accused anybody who believe in 2 or 3 of believing in 4. Only later did options 2 and 3 gain more acceptance

I think with the modified virus you don't just have the intentional vs accidental release dichotomy, but two additional items: (1) was the intent of the research plainly scientific or oriented towards weaponization, and (2) whether changes in virus traits are due to "genetic engineering" or not.

Because there are ways in which both of these can have answers less satisfying than a law of nature, they add another degree or yelling past each other to at least the range of 3 to 4.

Yeah that's what I remember too. Pelosi made a big statement about going to eat in Chinatown in response, and in general it was quickly an issue that the left pounced on so they could say Trump was an idiot and a racist.

> it was quickly an issue that the left pounced on so they could say Trump was an idiot and a racist.

Trump did that to himself with his response by trying to stir xenophobic hate by calling it "The China Virus".

I’m not on the left or the right, but I am an avid NYT reader and the paper was definitely equating lab leak with crazy conspiracy theory at the time.

Here is an example from 2020: https://www.nytimes.com/2020/02/17/business/media/coronaviru...

The title is “Senator Tom Cotton Repeats Fringe Theory of Coronavirus Origins”

It opens with:

> The rumor appeared shortly after the new coronavirus struck China and spread almost as quickly: that the outbreak now afflicting people around the world had been manufactured by the Chinese government.

> The conspiracy theory lacks evidence and has been dismissed by scientists. But it has gained an audience with the help of well-connected critics of the Chinese government such as Stephen K. Bannon, President Trump’s former chief strategist. And on Sunday, it got its biggest public boost yet.

It’s worth noting that the conspiracy they mention is that the virus was manufactured by the Chinese government. However, the only direct quote they provide from Cotton is this:

> “We don’t have evidence that this disease originated there,” the senator said, “but because of China’s duplicity and dishonesty from the beginning, we need to at least ask the question to see what the evidence says, and China right now is not giving evidence on that question at all.”

This was just the first result from a quick Google search: “nyt 2020 lab leak conspiracy”. There were definitely many other examples.

Man you are rewriting history for sure. Twitter was banning Wuhan lab theories as misinformation and Fauci's leaked emails show him asking the NIH to further "put down" the lab leak theories.

While Twitter, a private company, censored posts, Biden's White House said that they wouldn't rule out any possibility, including the virus being leaked on purpose.

He also ordered US spy agencies to do an investigation into the lab leak hypothesis.

"The left" wasn't denying anything. It just wasn't willing to jump to conclusions prematurely. Trying to rebrand it as "The China Virus" was a transparent attempt to focus blame and hate in a particular direction.

Interesting you just ignored the direct quote I gave of Fauci asking the NIH to put it down.

I'm pretty sure Twitter had pressure from the Virality Project which worked with Stanford and federal agencies so I think it's disingenuous to act as if they weren't denying anything or trying to play it down.

The China Virus thing has nothing to do with what I said

Your "direct quote" doesn't exist. So you may want to get your facts in order, especially if you're going to argue that it portrays something it clearly does not.

In fact, it's the opposite of what you were asserting.

Early on, virologists Michael Farzan and Robert Garry were on a call with Fauci and Collins about the potential that the virus could've leaked.

Following that, Fauci's released emails (another correction, since you called them "leaked") was part of a chain between him and Collins:

> Wondering if there is something NIH can do to help put down this very destructive conspiracy.

- Collins, April 16, 2020.

> I would not do anything about this right now. It is a shiny object that will go away in times.

- Fauci's response

What's more, Robert Garry clarified it further:

> One thing that could be misconstrued is that neither Dr Fauci or Dr Collins suggested in any way that we not write the Proximal Origin paper. Likewise, neither one suggested that we not mention the possibility of a Lab origin.

I hope that helps you put things in proper order.

At the time, it was absolutely misinformation. That it may actually be true doesn’t make it less so.

What? It was misinformation then but it might be true so its ok now? That means it wasn't misinformation then either.

Also who decides what is misinformation?

If I claim that aliens are manipulating our weather and that proof exists, when it doesn’t, that is misinformation. There is no evidence to support my claim, and it is wrong, even if I believe it to be true. If aliens show up tomorrow and announce they have been messing with the weather, then we have the evidence and it is true, but I was still spreading misinformation.

There was once this crank who claimed the Earth orbited the Sun, and not the other way around...

That was misinformation too, no?

No. He had evidence, based on direct observation. The claims made at the time with Covid and the lab leak theory had no evidence and were made entirely for political purposes.

Any unsubstantiated claims presented as fact are misinformation, and when that misinformation is causing mental and physical harm, keeping it off your platform is the easy, correct decision.

I'm not sure if you remember, but the early lab leak suggestions were leading to a lot of abuse, threats, and in some cases even violence towards people of Asian decent.

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