zlacker

As a layperson whose activism only amounts to charitable donations, yard signs, and voting, why should I care whether this virus was a lab escapee or naturally spread?

This is an earnest question, not a blind "I don't care". I think this is interesting, and I can see some amount of merit in these claims, but at the end of the day it doesn't feel like it matters to me which one it was. It seems like the only change would be "China gets more bad PR" and maybe American racists use this as an excuse to be more racist.

>>the_je+(OP)
What does this actually change? If China did indeed release the virus, does that mean I should not take a vaccine? That I should stop wearing a mask?

If China knows and is hiding it, I'm still not clear what that changes. They'll still know to improve their safety practices

>>the_je+(OP)
History exists for a reason. It's there to learn from.

If we can establish that a lab leak lead to a worldwide pandemic, we'd place much more importance on lab security and better handling procedures.

If it was naturally spread then we'd look at the feasibility of reducing the chances of this happening again, like improving sanitation of wet markets, implementing regulations, or even banning them entirely.

Frankly the notion of it not mattering to someone how covid came to be is absurd.

If you don't want something to happen again, you first need to understand the circumstances that lead to it.

>>8note+y4
It means culpability. A better understanding of the dangers of experimenting with deadly viruses.

All of this contributes to the history and scientific corpus of what not to do, and lessons to learn from in the future that we can point to as what can happen in lab leak scenarios.

It's hard to accept in good faith the proposition that not knowing the truth of what happened is preferable to knowing the truth.