zlacker

My take is that this is something where most mainstream media outlets need to be saying "We got it wrong." Either they asserted covid was definitely not a lab leak without evidence, or they ignored major media outlets doing that without comment. The problem here is that this article spends a lot of time and text talking about how right wing cranks were kind of responsible and kind of wrong too, when, in this case, the right wing cranks actually seem pretty accurate.

When I'm wrong, I try to have the grace and maturity to say "I got this wrong. I got this wrong for reasons X, Y, and Z. Here is what I can do to prevent or mitigate X, Y, and Z in the future." I think an answer of that form builds credibility. People who see my mea culpa may gain confidence that I've learned my lesson and will do better in the future. If, instead, I were to say "A lot of people got this wrong. These people I hate were wrong too - kind of, I think they were wrong, they are pretty dumb. Anyway - a lot of people were wrong on this..." then that probably wouldn't inspire much confidence that I had learned my lesson. I read this article as more like the latter rather than the former.