Canadians have a right to have an opinion
Episode Stats
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201.93716
Summary
In this episode of the podcast, I speak with infectious disease epidemiologist and author, Dr. David Perry, who has been involved in the fight against the coronavirus pandemic in Canada for years. He shares his thoughts on the idea that your voice doesn't matter unless you are an infectious disease expert, and that you can't have an opinion unless you're a scientist.
Transcript
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One aspect of the coronavirus conversation here in Canada that has really frustrated me is this
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idea that your voice doesn't matter, that you can't have an opinion on all these big things,
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these things of huge consequence that are being done to our daily lives, unless you are an
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epidemiologist or an infectious disease expert. Otherwise, pipe down, shut up, your voice doesn't
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matter. That's a problematic opinion for a number of reasons, and I've spoken about that before,
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but I'm now getting worried that there's the potential that that mindset is going to bleed over
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into other issues and other important matters of debate here in this country moving forward.
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Now, let's be clear on one thing. There are obviously highly technical matters that only
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people in their specialties can answer. The question of, oh, I don't know, genome sequencing the virus,
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which was a conversation back in 2020, or what drugs to give someone who's been hospitalized
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with COVID-19. I mean, that is obviously a technical matter, and we defer to the wisdom of the experts
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who deal with those questions, and well, hats off to them for having come up with some answers that
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have really helped us effectively grapple with this virus. So there's certainly a major place to
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acknowledge and value that expertise. But when it comes to something like what sort of lockdowns
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do we want? Well, is that not a whole of society conversation? Is that not about priorities and
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directions that the community as a whole decides that they want ahead? And yes, I think they are.
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And yet a lot of people are being told their voice does not matter in those conversations. It kind of
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makes me think, like about 20 years ago in Canada, we had the debate about whether or not we wanted to
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enter the Iraq war. And that was a huge debate. I mean, people took to the streets and protests for,
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and there were passionate opinions for and against and so forth. Now, one could say, well, hold on a
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second. This is actually a very technical matter. I mean, if you stop a guy on the street, and you put
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a microphone in front of them, and you show them a map of the Middle East, or you ask them to name
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different Iraqi cities, you ask them the history of Iraq, or you ask really detailed questions about
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military matters and so forth, you could find out that person can't actually hardly answer any of
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those questions. So you turn around and you can say, well, you're not a Middle Eastern affairs
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expert. You're not a military general. So you know what, buddy, your voice doesn't matter. Everybody
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doing those rallies and so forth. Now, go back home. We don't care about your opinion. But that's
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not how we took that. We acknowledge there are obviously technical matters there. But there are
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components to that conversation that are bigger than that. They are whole of society. And we acknowledge
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all of those voices. What are we going to do moving forward? I really see that the climate change
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conversation is one where increasingly we're already trying to push out the voices of regular
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folks. Carbon tax. You can't have an opinion on the carbon tax, yes or no, or what have you. What
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do you know? Are you a climatologist? Are you associated with this or that NGO or what have you?
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You're not? Okay, then be quiet. Your voice doesn't matter. Even you go, well, hold on a second,
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though. You're talking about all these major impacts on my life related to these climate measures
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you're bringing in. And you're telling me I can't have an opinion on my life. Yes, some people
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are telling you that. And I think we have to be on guard against that mindset, which has been very
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flawed during the pandemic. It continues to this day that these public health officials are not
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to be questioned, even though you're looking at some of these things and you're going,
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I don't know about this. Does this rule even make sense? What does this have to do with,
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you know, quote unquote, the science and all of this? And then you see that some public health
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officials in Canada are totally doing different things than other public health officials in
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different parts of the country or across the border and so forth. And you realize,
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I think this is actually a matter that's up for debate. So don't let them tell you not just on
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the coronavirus issue, but on other issues on climate change or any other big issue that affects
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their lives, that you don't have a right to investigate the issue yourself, come to your own
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conclusions and make your voice heard and lobby for the change that you want to see, because you do have