AR is a great test case for the do-your-own-research myth. I trust AR to do his own research on QB mechanics or NFL offenses. There is no reason to think he is capable of doing his own research on safe and effective vaccines and/or treatments based on the idiotic quotes coming out of him.

I'll just pick one - fertility - because it's the one in the post above me. AR is correct, there is no long term study on the impact of the COVID vaccines on fertility. Guess what numbnuts, there is no long-term research on the impact of COVID on fertility either. And for that matter, how is anyone going to accomplish "long-term" research on a novel virus with new treatments? You have to be a special kind of stupid to think that questioning long-term research is a useful construct this early in a pandemic.

And lest you say - oh, don't worry, AR is protecting himself from COVID as well, we need to acknowledge that he's now had COVID twice. So, he didn't barricade himself and protect his precious semen from anything.

There has been some long-term research on previous coronaviruses and it's not good, to say the least, but that's a risk that Aaron has been more than happy to assume by choosing not to protect himself.

I eagerly await the day that AR blasts a reporter for "doing his own research" rather than accepting one of AR's explanations for an in-game decision.

there's only one cal alum who you should listen to regarding the vaccine pic.twitter.com/lIIboQ6OfW

— Kong (@awkong90) November 5, 2021

GMP said:

---

hanky1 said:

---

He also said this (and he is 100% correct with this statement):

AARON RODGERS: "When Trump in 2020 was championing these vaccines, what did the left say? Don't trust the vaccine. Don't get the vaccine... What happened? Biden wins and everything flips. Shouldn't that give you a little bit of pause?... Isn't this about health, not politics?" pic.twitter.com/z2d9lnIiP5

— Greg Price (@greg_price11) November 5, 2021

---

LOLLLL. No, he's wrong.

---

What is he saying that's inaccurate? When Trump was President, leading Democrats were calling into question the exact same vaccine that they are now championing. The point is the hypocrisy of the left. What's inaccurate about it?

BREAKING: A dumbass jock who knows fuck all about science and medicine has been given a worldwide media platform to spew dangerous conspiracy theories about vaccines because he can throw a football.

— Middle Age Riot (@middleageriot) November 5, 2021

Over 750,000 Americans have died, and COVID coverage is currently dominated by the imbecilic ravings of a quarterback and a podcaster

— Jason Campbell (@JasonSCampbell) November 6, 2021

CalLifer said:

---

there's only one cal alum who you should listen to regarding the vaccine pic.twitter.com/lIIboQ6OfW

— Kong (@awkong90) November 5, 2021

---

I love Marshawn

Aaron Rodgers is the person to finally break the woke mob's back. I never thought it would be him. But he's trying to be the hero we need, but don't deserve.


He's still an idiot though.

sycasey said:

---

CalLifer said:

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Aaron Rodgers is flat-out lying.

1.If he had an allergy to the vaccine the NFL would have granted his request for a medical exemption.

2.Experts say there is no "mechanism" to connect vaccines to fertility issues. It's a myth.

It is anti-vaxxer BS. https://t.co/rBnJLWl2Cd

— Ralph Vacchiano (@RVacchianoSNY) November 5, 2021

---

I don't like any of his stupid medical opinions, but the fact that he's constantly lying about it shows you that Rodgers doesn't actually believe in any of this. It's all just selfish actions intended to avoid public criticism. (And all very stupid since there's no way anyone as famous as Aaron Rodgers can avoid public criticism.)

---

He's just making sh*t up.

hanky1 said:

---

Aaron Rodgers is the person to finally break the woke mob's back. I never thought it would be him. But he's trying to be the hero we need, but don't deserve.


He's still an idiot though.

---

hanky1 is experiencing a condition that my doctor friends call "hanky derangement syndrome."

He hated Rodgers when Rodgers was more progressive.

But now that Rodgers has been hankyized, hanky1 doesn't know what to feel. His immediate reaction is to embrace him but his natural tendency to hate him kicks him.

okaydo said:

---

hanky1 said:

---

Aaron Rodgers is the person to finally break the woke mob's back. I never thought it would be him. But he's trying to be the hero we need, but don't deserve.


He's still an idiot though.

---

hanky1 is experiencing a condition that my doctor friends call "hanky derangement syndrome."

He hated Rodgers when Rodgers was more progressive.

But now that Rodgers has been hankyized, hanky1 doesn't know what to feel. His immediate reaction is to embrace him but his natural tendency to hate him kicks him.

---

His original criticism was also about Rodgers as a player, but now that he's without a leg to stand on there he's going to pivot to this.

Cal89 said:

---

bearister said:

---

" He's a smart guy,"
Football smart.

---

Indeed, football smart for sure. Smart overall too, always has been, and we know it. He thinks for himself, not a lemming type of guy... If he was vaccinated, I'd feel the same. I (vaxed) don't choose to impose upon others, respect unique situations and choices we have with our bodies, as I have consistently.

---

You sound like a true Cal Bear!

hanky1 said:

---

GMP said:

---

hanky1 said:

---

He also said this (and he is 100% correct with this statement):

AARON RODGERS: "When Trump in 2020 was championing these vaccines, what did the left say? Don't trust the vaccine. Don't get the vaccine... What happened? Biden wins and everything flips. Shouldn't that give you a little bit of pause?... Isn't this about health, not politics?" pic.twitter.com/z2d9lnIiP5

— Greg Price (@greg_price11) November 5, 2021

---

LOLLLL. No, he's wrong.

---

What is he saying that's inaccurate? When Trump was President, leading Democrats were calling into question the exact same vaccine that they are now championing. The point is the hypocrisy of the left. What's inaccurate about it?

---

Before the vaccine came out and was approved many were questioning it in order to get the public to adopt the immediately available measures of mask wearing and social distancing. Doing so would have saved hundreds of thousands of lives. Once the vaccine actually came out and was tested as safe and received emergency and now full CDC and FDA approval, many of those same people embraced the vaccine with continued mask wearing and social distancing as our only hope of getting past this.

That is the way science works. As evidence comes in you change your position based on the current evidence.

Millions have now taken the vaccine. It is safe, it is fairly effective, though not 100% individually, but collectively it achieves herd immunity like other vaccines before it. Japan is now eliminating COVID, they are down to a few cases in Tokyo after a huge surge in August following the Olympics. They are achieving this with vaccination and almost universal mask wearing.

The vaccine and mask wearing are the now proven, safe solution to ending this, and ending it quickly. We could be getting on with life. The only reason we are not is due to those who have been working to undermine any measures to stop this all along. They are responsible for hundreds of thousands of deaths in this country and millions worldwide.

Rodgers talking about homeopathic treatments is a gigantic red flag also. So much respect lost for him this week.

calumnus said:

---

hanky1 said:

---

GMP said:

---

hanky1 said:

---

He also said this (and he is 100% correct with this statement):

AARON RODGERS: "When Trump in 2020 was championing these vaccines, what did the left say? Don't trust the vaccine. Don't get the vaccine... What happened? Biden wins and everything flips. Shouldn't that give you a little bit of pause?... Isn't this about health, not politics?" pic.twitter.com/z2d9lnIiP5

— Greg Price (@greg_price11) November 5, 2021

---

LOLLLL. No, he's wrong.

---

What is he saying that's inaccurate? When Trump was President, leading Democrats were calling into question the exact same vaccine that they are now championing. The point is the hypocrisy of the left. What's inaccurate about it?

---

Before the vaccine came out and was approved many were questioning it in order to get the public to adopt the immediately available measures of mask wearing and social distancing. Doing so would have saved hundreds of thousands of lives. Once the vaccine actually came out and was tested as safe and received emergency and now full CDC and FDA approval, many of those same people embraced the vaccine with continued mask wearing and social distancing as our only hope of getting past this.

That is the way science works. As evidence comes in you change your position based on the current evidence.

Millions have now taken the vaccine. It is safe, it is fairly effective, though not 100% individually, but collectively it achieves herd immunity like other vaccines before it. Japan is now eliminating COVID, they are down to a few cases in Tokyo after a huge surge in August following the Olympics. They are achieving this with vaccination and almost universal mask wearing.

The vaccine and mask wearing are the now proven, safe solution to ending this, and ending it quickly. We could be getting on with life. The only reason we are not is due to those who have been working to undermine any measures to stop this all along. They are responsible for hundreds of thousands of deaths in this country and millions worldwide.

---

Bingo, one thing I've noticed with a lot of people who claim a change in vaccine attitude pre- and post-Trump is a willful ignorance of facts changing. I think people on the right have devolved so much in this tribalistic thinking that they project their own thought-process onto everyone else.

"Well I would obviously support something if a R said it but if a D says it I'm firmly against it, so clearly the vaccine is an example of this hypocrisy."

But what they ignore is that situation that changed. All those things like vaccine trials, testing, CDC and FDA approval, all of those things happened to change the facts at hand. Not to mention that even during Trump it's not like they rejected the CDC recommendation. People who took COVID seriously still followed CDC guidelines pre and post-Trump and attitudes towards the vaccine did not buck that trend.

I personally know 10 people, friends and family members, that have died in the last year and a half most in their 50s. This includes friends from Cal, Including Cal football players from the 80s. My 22 year old nephew is now an orphan. His father, my brother-in-law, played basketball for Stanford in the 80s. He was found dead in his room in January.

We have the ability to end this, and end it quickly, as Japan is now doing, but it requires us working together, being the United States and not the divided states. What we do affects others, it is not simply an individual choice. It would be nice if it was, but it is not.

Watching a flat earth video and believing it does not make you a "feee thinker," quite the opposite, it proves you to be gullible and devoid of critical thinking skills.

calumnus said:

---

I personally know 10 people, friends and family members, that have died in the last year and a half most in their 50s. This includes friends from Cal, Including Cal football players from the 80s. My 22 year old nephew is now an orphan. His father, my brother-in-law, played basketball for Stanford in the 80s. He was found dead in his room in January.

We have the ability to end this, and end it quickly, as Japan is now doing, but it requires us working together, being the United States and not the divided states. What we do affects others, it is not simply an individual choice. It would be nice if it was, but it is not.

---

No, we don't have the ability to end it, that's the point. This is endemic.

StillNoStanfurdium said:

---

calumnus said:

---

hanky1 said:

---

GMP said:

---

hanky1 said:

---

He also said this (and he is 100% correct with this statement):

AARON RODGERS: "When Trump in 2020 was championing these vaccines, what did the left say? Don't trust the vaccine. Don't get the vaccine... What happened? Biden wins and everything flips. Shouldn't that give you a little bit of pause?... Isn't this about health, not politics?" pic.twitter.com/z2d9lnIiP5

— Greg Price (@greg_price11) November 5, 2021

---

LOLLLL. No, he's wrong.

---

What is he saying that's inaccurate? When Trump was President, leading Democrats were calling into question the exact same vaccine that they are now championing. The point is the hypocrisy of the left. What's inaccurate about it?

---

Before the vaccine came out and was approved many were questioning it in order to get the public to adopt the immediately available measures of mask wearing and social distancing. Doing so would have saved hundreds of thousands of lives. Once the vaccine actually came out and was tested as safe and received emergency and now full CDC and FDA approval, many of those same people embraced the vaccine with continued mask wearing and social distancing as our only hope of getting past this.

That is the way science works. As evidence comes in you change your position based on the current evidence.

Millions have now taken the vaccine. It is safe, it is fairly effective, though not 100% individually, but collectively it achieves herd immunity like other vaccines before it. Japan is now eliminating COVID, they are down to a few cases in Tokyo after a huge surge in August following the Olympics. They are achieving this with vaccination and almost universal mask wearing.

The vaccine and mask wearing are the now proven, safe solution to ending this, and ending it quickly. We could be getting on with life. The only reason we are not is due to those who have been working to undermine any measures to stop this all along. They are responsible for hundreds of thousands of deaths in this country and millions worldwide.

---

But what they ignore is that situation that changed. All those things like vaccine trials, testing, CDC and FDA approval, all of those things happened to change the facts at hand. Not to mention that even during Trump it's not like they rejected the CDC recommendation. People who took COVID seriously still followed CDC guidelines pre and post-Trump and attitudes towards the vaccine did not buck that trend.

---

No one was really skeptical of the vaccines, they were skeptical of the process. We had an executive branch that regularly asked people to break the law and was putting pressure on our public health institutions to shortcut the process in order to approve the vaccines to help save 45's presidential prospects.

Fortunately, we saw that other countries were able to apolitically approve the vaccines and that our institutions held, despite the dangerous pressure from an administration that had showed wanton disregard for public health and public trust.

Recharacterizing that as some sort of left wing vaccine hesitance is predictably misleading. Fortunately, the vaccines work and work well, otherwise we would be even worse off than we already are.

Literally they are laughing at him but trying not to actually burst out laughing. https://t.co/bJCTxdrJX0

— Soledad O'Brien (@soledadobrien) November 5, 2021

Packers QB Jordan Love is vaccinated. If he wasn't, he'd be out on Sunday as a "close contact" with Aaron Rodgers, and the team's starting quarterback would be Blake Bortles. https://t.co/QIMSWfpSVS

— ProFootballTalk (@ProFootballTalk) November 6, 2021

This is a great piece from poor @JuMosq who has presumably spent his day buried in medical journals to debunk all the falsehoods that Rodgers was attempting to spread https://t.co/VQJ2GdNS5C

— Computer Cowboy (@benbbaldwin) November 6, 2021

Overall conclusion for today (though we already had many examples with other athletes):

Charles Barkley was right. Athletes are not role models. Cheer for what they do on the field or the court; don't presume that a great athlete is also a great person.

Unit2Sucks said:

---

AR is a great test case for the do-your-own-research myth. I trust AR to do his own research on QB mechanics or NFL offenses. There is no reason to think he is capable of doing his own research on safe and effective vaccines and/or treatments based on the idiotic quotes coming out of him.

I'll just pick one - fertility - because it's the one in the post above me. AR is correct, there is no long term study on the impact of the COVID vaccines on fertility. Guess what numbnuts, there is no long-term research on the impact of COVID on fertility either. And for that matter, how is anyone going to accomplish "long-term" research on a novel virus with new treatments? You have to be a special kind of stupid to think that questioning long-term research is a useful construct this early in a pandemic.

And lest you say - oh, don't worry, AR is protecting himself from COVID as well, we need to acknowledge that he's now had COVID twice. So, he didn't barricade himself and protect his precious semen from anything.

There has been some long-term research on previous coronaviruses and it's not good, to say the least, but that's a risk that Aaron has been more than happy to assume by choosing not to protect himself.

I eagerly await the day that AR blasts a reporter for "doing his own research" rather than accepting one of AR's explanations for an in-game decision.

---

Relevant:
https://www.theonion.com/vaccine-skeptic-does-own-research-by-enrolling-45-000-f-1847556258

Aaron Rodgers Says Fatherhood Is His 'Next Great Chapter,' Worries COVID Vaccine May Cause Infertility https://t.co/ycsInkiLtS

— People (@people) November 6, 2021

Whatever CNN says these days, it's a safe bet to take the opposite position.

okaydo said:

---

Aaron Rodgers Says Fatherhood Is His 'Next Great Chapter,' Worries COVID Vaccine May Cause Infertility https://t.co/ycsInkiLtS

— People (@people) November 6, 2021

---

Protect deez nuts at all costs.

Unit2Sucks said:

---

StillNoStanfurdium said:

---

calumnus said:

---

hanky1 said:

---

GMP said:

---

hanky1 said:

---

He also said this (and he is 100% correct with this statement):

AARON RODGERS: "When Trump in 2020 was championing these vaccines, what did the left say? Don't trust the vaccine. Don't get the vaccine... What happened? Biden wins and everything flips. Shouldn't that give you a little bit of pause?... Isn't this about health, not politics?" pic.twitter.com/z2d9lnIiP5

— Greg Price (@greg_price11) November 5, 2021

---

LOLLLL. No, he's wrong.

---

What is he saying that's inaccurate? When Trump was President, leading Democrats were calling into question the exact same vaccine that they are now championing. The point is the hypocrisy of the left. What's inaccurate about it?

---

Before the vaccine came out and was approved many were questioning it in order to get the public to adopt the immediately available measures of mask wearing and social distancing. Doing so would have saved hundreds of thousands of lives. Once the vaccine actually came out and was tested as safe and received emergency and now full CDC and FDA approval, many of those same people embraced the vaccine with continued mask wearing and social distancing as our only hope of getting past this.

That is the way science works. As evidence comes in you change your position based on the current evidence.

Millions have now taken the vaccine. It is safe, it is fairly effective, though not 100% individually, but collectively it achieves herd immunity like other vaccines before it. Japan is now eliminating COVID, they are down to a few cases in Tokyo after a huge surge in August following the Olympics. They are achieving this with vaccination and almost universal mask wearing.

The vaccine and mask wearing are the now proven, safe solution to ending this, and ending it quickly. We could be getting on with life. The only reason we are not is due to those who have been working to undermine any measures to stop this all along. They are responsible for hundreds of thousands of deaths in this country and millions worldwide.

---

But what they ignore is that situation that changed. All those things like vaccine trials, testing, CDC and FDA approval, all of those things happened to change the facts at hand. Not to mention that even during Trump it's not like they rejected the CDC recommendation. People who took COVID seriously still followed CDC guidelines pre and post-Trump and attitudes towards the vaccine did not buck that trend.

---

No one was really skeptical of the vaccines, they were skeptical of the process. We had an executive branch that regularly asked people to break the law and was putting pressure on our public health institutions to shortcut the process in order to approve the vaccines to help save 45's presidential prospects.

Fortunately, we saw that other countries were able to apolitically approve the vaccines and that our institutions held, despite the dangerous pressure from an administration that had showed wanton disregard for public health and public trust.

Recharacterizing that as some sort of left wing vaccine hesitance is predictably misleading. Fortunately, the vaccines work and work well, otherwise we would be even worse off than we already are.

---

I for one, give Trump credit for fast tracking the vaccines. It was the one thing on the virus he got right. However, we should have been taking measures: widespread testing and quarantine, shut downs, mask wearing, and social distancing to minimize the spread until the vaccines arrived. He refused to take action and actively worked to undermine state efforts to limit spread and as a result 750,000* Americans are dead, more than any other country and most of those deaths were preventable.

*The number of COVID deaths in the US appears to be very understated. In 2020 alone, there were over 1 million deaths more than the trend. Only about 25% attributed to COVID. There were dramatic increases in deaths attributed to heart attacks, flu, stroke, respiratory illness, etc that may well have been COVID. Most states did not perform COVID tests on people who died at home, for example. There were also people who died, not from COVID directly, but due to the lack of ICU beds taken up by COVID patients.

I disagree, I believe the number of covid deaths in the US are highly overstated. Since the start of this thing there has been no uniform description of a covid death. We've had people that died in car accidents as covid deaths. Some people were claiming Colin Powell is a covid death. I think these numbers we have right now are meaningless, especially since the CDC treats the VAERS system as the red headed step child.

MinotStateBeav said:

---

I disagree, I believe the number of covid deaths in the US are highly overstated. Since the start of this thing there has been no uniform description of a covid death. We've had people that died in car accidents as covid deaths. Some people were claiming Colin Powell is a covid death. I think these numbers we have right now are meaningless, especially since the CDC treats the VAERS system as the red headed step child.

---

What did your autopsy of Colin Powell determine the cause of death to be?

I've said it before but do you believe deaths are overstated like R. Kelly believed he could fly or do you have a reasonable basis for your belief? You talk about anecdotes of car accident victims being coded as COVID deaths but there are plenty of anecdotes of families pressuring MEs to code obvious COVID deaths as natural causes.

MinotStateBeav said:

---

Some people were claiming Colin Powell is a covid death.

---

He was.

Dying with COVID, dying from COVID, produces markedly different numbers...

Cal89 said:

---

Dying with COVID, dying from COVID, produces markedly different numbers...

---

Please share your work with the class. Would love to see the analysis behind the "markedly different numbers."

Unit2Sucks said:

---

Cal89 said:

---

Dying with COVID, dying from COVID, produces markedly different numbers...

---

Please share your work with the class. Would love to see the analysis behind the "markedly different numbers."

---

I'm an EU citizen also, and I forgot what I read most recently, maybe it was Italy (Italian), but the numbers dropped, I seem to recall as much as 95% between the two. I'll see if I can find the article, and if in Italian, translate it.

The providing of financial incentives in the States for hospitals to report more COVID cases/deaths is a factor, and the CDC admitted such drove up the numbers. There are accounts of people who died with gunshot wounds, car accidents, and who happened to be positive for the virus, were flagged as COVID.

MinotStateBeav said:

---

calumnus said:

---

I personally know 10 people, friends and family members, that have died in the last year and a half most in their 50s. This includes friends from Cal, Including Cal football players from the 80s. My 22 year old nephew is now an orphan. His father, my brother-in-law, played basketball for Stanford in the 80s. He was found dead in his room in January.

We have the ability to end this, and end it quickly, as Japan is now doing, but it requires us working together, being the United States and not the divided states. What we do affects others, it is not simply an individual choice. It would be nice if it was, but it is not.

---

No, we don't have the ability to end it, that's the point. This is endemic.

---

Taiwan pretty much has. Japan is about to. New Zealand is doing well. Canada would be better off it it didn't share a long border with the most infected country on Earth.

The US has a very large group of people, many very powerful politically, who have worked, and continue to work against simple protocols that have worked elsewhere and have worked in the US in the past.

The stated, but mistaken belief that nothing can be done is just an excuse to do nothing and let millions of people die horrible deaths unnecessarily.

Vaccines work, not 100% individually, but 100% collectively over time. And it can be a short time, as Japan is now demonstrating.

Cal89 said:

---

Unit2Sucks said:

---

Cal89 said:

---

Dying with COVID, dying from COVID, produces markedly different numbers...

---

Please share your work with the class. Would love to see the analysis behind the "markedly different numbers."

---

I'm an EU citizen also, and I forgot what I read most recently, maybe it was Italy (Italian), but the numbers dropped, I seem to recall as much as 95% between the two. I'll see if I can find the article, and if in Italian, translate it.

The providing of financial incentives in the States for hospitals to report more COVID cases/deaths is a factor, and the CDC admitted such drove up the numbers. There are accounts of people who died with gunshot wounds, car accidents, and who happened to be positive for the virus, were flagged as COVID.

---

The fact that many if not most US insurance companies would not cover COVID lead to extreme pressure not to code as COVID, both from families and hospital administrators.

The fact that the US had a huge shortage of COVID tests meant that in many states you were only tested if you were admitted to a hospital and only coded as a COVID death if you died in a hospital. Those who died at home were not tested and were coded as "heart attack" or "natural causes" in many states.

Governors all wanted to show their numbers as low and many put pressure in their states to code as other than COVID. Texas and Florida were most egregious. Throughout the South, ICUs were overflowing while they claimed low COVID numbers.

COVID deniers begged their families not to list their deaths as COVID.

The number of deaths from "heart attacks" for example, was very consistent for years but skyrocketed in 2020 and 2021.