DeSantis Blasts Monkeypox ‘Emergency Declarations’ as “Move to Restrict People from Freedom”
“I am so sick of politicians, and we saw this with Covid, trying to sow fear into the population.”
I returned from my vacation to Central Europe to discover that the Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has failed to contain the spread of monkeypox, despite contingency planning for a response to the related smallpox virus for decades.
This is no surprise, as the variant has been closely linked to sexual activity in the gay community and the annual gay pride parades look like they may have been “superspreader” events. In fact, despite being one of the biggest epicenters of COVID restrictions and mask mandates in the country, San Fransisco allowed its annual Kink Festival to proceed.
The Up Your Alley Fair often referred to simply as “Dore Alley Fair,” is an annual festival held on the last Sunday of July in San Francisco. First held in 1985, it is today one of the most prominent BDSM fetish and leather subculture festivals in the world. In contrast to the Folsom Street Fair, the world’s largest festival concerning the same fetishes, the Dore Alley Fair is notably skewed more toward gay men.
The number of reported cases is steadily rising, and unless different personal behavior choices are made among the impacted community members, the numbers will continue to climb.
The U.S. had reported more than 6,300 confirmed cases as of Tuesday, per the CDC. Highly-populated states are leading the numbers – with 1,617 confirmed cases in New York, followed by 826 confirmed cases in California.
Legal Insurrection readers may recall that Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis followed the Trump administration’s guidance on the covid lockdowns and drew ire from the media and progressives (‘DeathSantis‘) for being one of the early lifters of the restrictions. As a result, Florida has been a haven for many fleeing Blue States, and DeSantis is often considered a strong contender in the 2024 presidential election cycle.
After seeing the harm covid lockdowns had on Florida, DeSantis is not rushing to declare a state of emergency over the monkeypox outbreak.
Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis on Wednesday attempted to downplay anxiety over monkeypox, saying that politicians and the media have overblown the severity of the disease and equated it to fears surrounding Covid-19.
Florida had 525 monkeypox infections as of Tuesday, according to a state database, which is an increase from the roughly 350 infections from late last week. Florida had the fifth highest number of cases in the nation as of Monday, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
“I am so sick of politicians, and we saw this with Covid, trying to sow fear into the population,” DeSantis said during a press conference near Orlando. “We’re not doing fear.”
….DeSantis also blasted New York Gov. Kathy Hochul, a Democrat, for declaring a state of emergency over the outbreak, saying he was convinced it was a move to restrict people from freedom.
“They’re going to abuse those emergency powers to restrict your freedom,” Desantis said. “I guarantee you that’s what will happen.”
RON DESANTIS ON MONKEYPOX: “Do not listen to their nonsense. I am so sick of politicians, and we saw this with COVID, trying to sow fear into the population." pic.twitter.com/TOHtorjxLh
— Florida’s Voice (@FLVoiceNews) August 3, 2022
According to recent reports, there are 525 monkeypox cases in Florida.
The bulk are in south Florida with Broward County leading the list with 237 cases. Miami-Dade comes in second with 135 cases.
Orange County has 32 known cases. And the numbers drop substantially for the rest of central Florida. Four in Seminole, three in Lake and Osceola counties, and Volusia, Brevard and Flagler have one.
DeSantis’ push for freedom over fear resonates with voters, as noted in a reelection campaign ad.
The one-minute ad features both adults and children, with narrators reading out segments of their “Dear Governor” letters. The caption shared with the video adds that “these stories are the ‘why’ behind Governor DeSantis’s leadership and his fight for Floridians each and every day.”
In the ad, Floridians thank DeSantis for his time in office as the Republican incumbent is seen reading the letters at his desk.
“Dear Gov. DeSantis, I wanted to write and thank you for working so hard for the citizens of Florida. Dear Gov. DeSantis, I’ve never written a political leader, but I’m writing to express my appreciation for keeping us Floridians free and thriving,” various narrators say.
I suspect DeSantis and his public health team will find the optimum approach for dealing with monkeypox long before California, New York, or Illinois. I also project he will earn another round of #DeathSantis hashtags on social media.
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Comments
So after weeks of educating the gay community about MunkyPux, the disease continues to spread? Must be due to stigmatization.
For what it may be worth.
https://www.newscentermaine.com/article/news/verify/monkeypox-verify/monkeypox-transmission-spread-through-contiminated-clothes-bed-linens-fact-check/536-3a4ea57d-bbd4-4d3b-9d35-9b264a440264
The main point is there is no evidence that this is happening. Very strong correlation to all the Gay Pride events in major cities.
Phil,
The gay pride event isn’t the issue. The issue is the individual behavior that occurs; high risk sexual and intimate contact.
If X City hosts a parade/concert/convention and everyone declines to engage in high risk sexual and intimate contact the likelihood of transmission is practically nil.
We shouldn’t be willing to adopt the language framework of the left regarding group v individual.
AIDS, part deux.
commo: that’s enough. You keep lecturing me by twisting my point into what you need to make your lectures. When did you turn into a Milhouse pedant?
So you have a soft spot for defending the gay community no matter what! Munkey Pux is a GAY COMMUNITY problem. Okay? That behavior you are lecturing me about happens right during/after the gay events where they commune. Like with all communities, it isn’t everyone in the community. But around here in LA and other urban centers, they are big communities who not only celebrate that behavior, the celebrate it with festivals! What is wrong with you!
Write that down so you can get over your confusion over what I am saying. I am certainly not confused over you point. I’m just annoyed with your obtuse insistence of changing what I am saying by obsessing about an irrelevant point.
If you are gay and don’t participate nor approve of this behavior, You are being damaged by these idiots. It is up to YOU to speak up. Not doing so is what brings about stigmatization. It is utterly stupid that with all of the information and words of caution being directed to the source of Munkey Pux the spreading accelerates. What will it take to get these idiots change their behavior? Hangings?
Phil,
It’s not twisting language when your specific choices of language leave room for that interpretation. Especially when you adopt the group v individual language dynamics so beloved of the left.
Words have meaning as the late Rush Limbaugh often emphasized. Language choices reveal things out the motivations of the person who chose those words. Usually subliminally or unconsciously.
You are attacking a group instead of the individual members of the group who engage in the specific behavior that leads to higher levels of transmission.
Short version; hate the Sin but love the sinner and be wary of adopting the group/identity politics language used by the left.
Lets look at this objectively and not a circular situation.
PRIDE is all about gay and at the root cause level- gay is nothing but SEX.
The left tries all kinds of different wrappings but at the end of the day its all about sex. (same sex)
And at the most basal level, “sex” is the most physically intimate degree of “togetherness” possible depending on the individuals physical organ composition.
So, in reality, the “pride event” cannot realistically be separated from the physical act of the individual(s) who are operating under the auspices of the fact that “gay” is homoSEXual.
For them “not” to engage in sex at a pride event is asking for people to just have intellectual discussions at a swingers meet and nobody to pick up anyone at closing time or asking a fish not to swim in the water because it might drown. It isn’t going to happen because the “event” is the PLACE TO MEET ( and guess what they are meeting for?- it aint to exchange stories about the last fishing trip)
The argument about a “super spreader” event is a media created fallacy in and of itself because its a “super” ( more of) spreader but if those same people got on GAYDAR and met in the bushes, the end would be the same. ( they spread it)
They are still spreading a disease just with a different concentration.
taurus, you obviously have never been to a gay pride event. LOL
to add to the panic (I live in Maine) there is this.
https://www.bangordailynews.com/2022/08/04/news/3rd-case-of-monkeypox-confirmed-in-maine/
so we got to shut shit down asap just in case november does not go as hoped for Dems.
Same play from the same playbook as AIDS, “We’re all at risk!”
The left will NEVER leave us alone. They will hector us endlessly until we will comply with their endless demands. And even then, they won’t stop.
“It is the common fate of the indolent [keyboard cowboys only] to see their rights become a prey to the active [the left]. The condition upon which God hath given liberty to man is eternal vigilance; which condition if he break, servitude [taxation, regulation, compliance] is at once the consequence of his crime and the punishment of his guilt.” John Philpot Curran (1750- 1817).
“The makers of our Constitution undertook to secure conditions favorable to the pursuit of happiness. They recognized the significance of man’s spiritual nature, of his feelings and of his intellect. They knew that only part of the pain, pleasure and satisfactions of life are to be found in material things. They sought to protect Americans in their beliefs, their thoughts, their emotions and their sensations. They conferred against the government, the right to be let alone—the most comprehensive of rights and the right most valued by civilized men.” Brandeis, in Olmstead v. US (1928),
If you willing not to be numbered among the indolent, consider starting your own pro-Constitution chapter of the John Birch Society. Since coming to this country from a country where socialism ruled, my discovery of the JBS was both welcome and eye-opening.
Got to give DeSantis credit for his sanity. The number of cases of the disease is trivial, and it’s a disease easily avoided. Leftists politicians apparently refuse to consider the costs of restrictions on the public’s freedoms when they try to contain the uncontainable. These same politicians apparently have failed to learn from the destruction they wrought trying to contain the spread of the Wu flu.
On the contrary, the leftists learned two things: We are frightened and controlled with ease initially, then with difficulty subsequently. Let us also keep this in mind so we can fight back.
.
I disagree Hornet based on my observations.
They earned that a large majority of the SHEEPLE are ignorant of basic facts and easily manipulated and are too weak/unmotivated to actually do anything.
Exactly the qualities an apex predator looks for in his next conquest.
And they are rapidly learning that those that purport to guide us, our “betters” if you will, are not to be trusted anymore. The next “pandemic” is not going to fly so well, nor the bald faced lies of the next 50 or so “experts” that sign off on some unsupported “facts.”
See the most recent article by Victor David Hanson.
What they are learning and left is teaching is that there is no individual responsibility for their choices and actions. A bizzaro-world inversion of laissez faire where the Govt and therefore the taxpayers will bear the burden of their stupidity and ill discipline.
By what logic do crap decisions on their part which only effect them and their sexual partners constitute an emergency situation to the rest of us?
“The Up Your Alley Fair is an annual festival.” I believe the second n and the u in annual are silent.
Awww… that’s cute. How long did it take you to work that one out?
Easy, it’s only hard for the nances who work one in.
Gay Orgies are what the left finds sacred, not prayer, not education, not funerals, not weddings but gay orgies because that is what they determined can’t be shut down (and unlike the classroom gay orgies are vectors of transmission).
The state of course CANT shut down gay orgies but they could discourage them by giving honest advice on what the risks are, and by asking overtly sexual events to either lose the sex stuff or reconsider showing up.
They can’t do those minor things related to the pride/sex events however because they value the gay orgy (unlike education of children).
It would be more accurate to state that the left prefers libertine actions to have the consequences and accountability for those actions to be removed or mitigated. This is true of the refusal to delay or defer these events just as it is for libertine heterosexual actions leading to an abortion.
The left /progressive seems to despise the concept of individual accountability or responsibility for individual decisions, choices or actions. See also student debt,
But they did discourage promiscuity as a covid prevention method they actively called abstinence “your safest option”
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7373209/ .
As I said I don’t think they could shut down the orgy events but they could ask the organizers to make them rated G, or discourage attendance (just as they told everyone abstinence is best during the covid panic).
Thanks for being a fellow adult in the room…
If we approached the monkey pox problem the way we do other problems there would be:
1. An Executive Order to stop it
2. Legislation to ban it
3. Provide free linens to go along with the free needles
3. Teach Critical Monkey Pox theory in schools
4. Social distancing – keep your butt 10 feet away
5. Fist bumping instead of fisting
6. Require all military and school children to be Monkey pox vaccinated with 3 boosters.
7. Daily White House Briefings by POTUS and Fauci to update on vaccine and medical equipment availability
8. And last ,but not least, people in New York who test positive should be placed in Nursing Homes
Where’s St. Fauci? Given the incubation period is up to 3 weeks and it lasts up to 4 weeks, all we need is “two months to flatten the curve”. If non-monogamous gay men can just keep their hands (and other body parts) off each other for two months this will be over. Come on Fauci!
DO NOT give them any ideas
As Covid-19/20/21/22 before. But, will he go full California et al. and enforce interstate restrictions.
Again, it perplexes me how they can avoid the whole “OMG, DON’T BE HOMOPHOBIC!” Thing by JUST saying, “Hey everyone, no multiple partners people. Keep it to one partner for, say, 2 months.” But no, sex is the one thing they won’t try and limit. Schools? Pols don’t like them anyway. Jobs? Kick those to the curb. But sex parties? Hell no, you have to draw the line somewhere.
Unlike Covid, monkeypox does not transmit quickly or easily, but usually requires intimate contact. That makes it susceptible to control by testing, contact tracing, and by a brief period of abstinence from intimate contact by parties who have been identified as exposed, at least until they get tested, and up to a few weeks if they test positive.
That is as much restriction as is needed, along with a general advisory not to participate in orgies until the outbreak is contained.
The question is whether the gay community is capable of even that minimal level of self restraint. If not, some external efforts to control the most reckless behavior might be necessary to preserve public health, but those would be very narrowly targeted restrictions.
Monkeypox would have to mutate considerably for any kind of widespread restrictions to be the least bit rational.
There isn’t a single “gay community,” just as there isn’t a single “gun owner community.” Blaming all for the stupidity (or worse) of some is a big mistake.
You are right of course but there are common threads of the wreckless behavior and they are instead political rather than based on orientation.
Those political beliefs stem from a childish denial of consequences of ownership of personal responsibility for the ramificafio.ns of ones own actions.
I’m very far from being the ambassador for reckless behavior, but I have enough miles on the tires to say that sex ain’t political. Never has been for me, and I don’t know of anyone for whom it is, various “personal is political” screeds I’ve read over the years, mostly by people who have lots of politics and hardly any sex. LOL
^ oops, forgot to stick “notwithstanding” before “various” above
While I’ll refrain from prognosticating about what they may do in the future, I would like to point out that, up to date, the public health response to monkeypox has been carefully avoiding any measures that might infringe on personal freedom. They haven’t closed bath houses or gay bars. There are no vaccine passports for attending Pride parades. Hell, they fear even whispering the word “monogamy”.
Indeed, the contrast with the response to COVID is striking.
Monkeypox is a lot harder to get than covid. R0 is 0.8 for monkey v 1.75-4 for the ‘rona.
That’s true, but for that reason it should also be much easier to stop with a few limited, narrowly targeted, short-term measures.
It’s also considerably less deadly, all of which points to less of a need for extreme measures for containment. But the question then becomes, if it’s really so much less of a concern, where does all this talk of national emergencies come from?
How difficult is it to put out a strong but not-gay-focused public health message? “This disease is primarily spread by very close personal contact with others and current outbreaks have been traced to events where many participants had sexual contact with multiple partners. We strongly advise everyone–everywhere–to avoid these types of sexual encounters.”
Don’t attend orgies until this disease is under control. Don’t have sex with strangers until we have this disease under control. I don’t go to orgies or have random hookups but for those who do: Wouldn’t you chill your jets on that front for a few months regardless of how hetero you may be??