Sriad wrote:Themightytom wrote:Big Brother should keep secrets from the public about things that might scare them.
I'm sorry to be "fixed that for you guy" but that is seriously fucked up.
Har har har
I think we have different levels of confidence in our government's efficacy. The US government is not big brother, both because of it's level of competence, but more importantly, because of the complete lack of a cohesive agenda.
Let's talk about the context here for a second, because I think we're looking at this very differently.
Ideologically, you believe that people have the right to make informed decisions. We agree on that, but we do not agree that all people have the ABILITY to make informed decisions. I think you are inferring that this ability is derived from natural aptitude, I think it comes from a combination of socioeconomic factors. This is important because we are talking about FLORIDA, not anywhere else. Florida has demonstrated a conservative intolerance of the homeless, it exists in their policies and practices, policies which the public information office should be intimately familiar with.
I realize you might find the concept of a public information office distasteful, but it that more because you favor the right of people to make informed decisions, or because it's ridiculous to you that they wouldn't be able to.
People do stupid things, I'm looking at the ethics of disclosure and how it will affect the overall system at work. I'm looking at the decisions people will reasonably start to make, relative to their roles when introduced to information that pertains to situations beyond those roles. I think public officials have an ethical obligation not to put their constituents in a bad position by disclosing information they are entrusted to act on, inappropriately.
That's not big brother stealing liberty and freedom of thought, it's a public offical making appropriate decisions about disclosure. You tell people something when it will serve a purpose, or affects their role not because you don't want to take responsibility for developing an effective response.
I wouldn't expect a doctor to tell me my symptoms are consistent with tuberculosis unless that is
all they are consistent with and there is enough evidence to suggest a TB test. Likewise, I wouldn't expect a public health advisory to the general population, if the public health risk was to a specific population. there was clearly some risk of exchange here, but the broader problem seems to be with a lack of resource allocation to deal with the outbreak in the population it was found in. I don't ever want to see a public health department that concludes every outbreak possibility needs to be publicized because there is likely no capability to contain it, that's just admitting the system is broken and refusing to try fixing it.
Grumman wrote:Themightytom wrote:...mobilizing ignorance...
Funny, when
I think of things that would "mobilise ignorance", creating an environment where the Health Department cannot be trusted because they value political correctness more than doing their damn jobs ranks significantly higher than allowing people to make informed decisions about their own health.
Do people trust the Health department when they warn about a bird flu scare and it never happens because they pushed inoculations and prevented it? That is consequential thinking. I think we disagree about roles and expectations here, beyond just the political aspects of what's going on, here's the role of the state department of public health,
The role of public health is to promote and protect the health and safety of all Floridians. This mission is accomplished by:
identifying health risks in the community;
maintaining a safe and healthful environment;
detecting, investigating, and preventing the spread of disease;
promoting healthy lifestyles;
providing primary care for individuals with limited access to such care from the private sector; and ensuring that health care practitioners meet the requirements for providing adequate care;
informing the public on health issues.
http://www.doh.state.fl.us/Planning_eva ... phmain.htm
That mission includes considering the role that panic and disinformation plays in dealing with an outbreak. Do you see that second method? Maintaining a safe and healthful environment? It includes not screaming fire in every crowded building on the block. You call the fire department, and you assess whether or not the fire is a threat to everyone in the area. The FIFTH method is a little hard to accomplish when you flood the system with panicking hypochondriacs, and push the homeless further and further out of outreach range because they are afraid of public backlash.
I have not been advocating for
political correctness, I am advocating for a
pragmatic dissemination of information. I want people to do their jobs professionally, and not shy away from exercising their responsibilities because retroactively someone might doubt their decision making. I think the role politics played here can certainly be inferred, and I am not supporting that at all. That was irresponsible and unprofessional. Decision makers should have been aware of this information, however, decision makers are not John Q Public. They CHOSE the decision makers. They find out how those decision makers do, they decide whether to choose them again.
So, the public should certainly know what their representatives decide, but you know, they were elected, appointed, whatever, there's a point where you can't armchair quarterback. Advocating for full and complete disclosure, telling the public EVERYTHING and relying on public opinion to inform or justify their response is just another way to absolve them of the responsibility of acting on it, and that's a problem for me, these people are trained, educated, selected and compensated relevant to that training, to do a job, why are we going to do all that and not expect them to do that job? Why are we going to throw away that whole system based on specific instances without confirming a reasonable pattern of incompetence first, that's just an emotional response satirized by my tin hat picture..
HOW the public learns is an important aspect of this, we can write a nice big story about how the health department dealt with an outbreak of TB among the homeless,
after they have dealt with an outbreak of TB among the homeless. Most people will gloss over it, some people, like you, will probably read it and consider it for a few days, but at least no one will freak out an target the homeless unfairly. Half of the policy issues facing the homeless were never made for their benefit, but rather from getting people riled up enough to seek the protection of government policy. in this case, we wrote a story after they clearly did nothing, and that's fine, it will help the public recognize when decision makers AREN'T getting what they need to deal with this, it does NOT mean the public should ride herd on every issue of public health.
