Thank you to all those essential workers who are putting their health on the line to make sure normalcy of some sort continues to happen in the tri-state area and beyond.
From transportation, medical, service, delivery people, supermarket, we thank you and we appreciate your efforts.
Now stay tuned for Off The Hook coming up. It is one minute past 7 p.m. here on WBAI New York 99.5 FM.
And you're listening to your radio station WBAI New York. The time is 7.01. Time for Off The Hook.
And yes, we're back. Another exciting edition of Off The Hook.
Emmanuel Goldstein here with you joined tonight by, let's see who we have. We have Rob T. Firefly.
Good evening.
Welcome. Gila.
Greetings and salutations.
And Alex.
Good evening, everyone.
And Kyle.
Hi.
Wow. So it's a miracle every time we make it onto the airwaves, but we did it again.
And we are on the air for an hour. We're not on next week.
So it's a fundraiser.
Yes, we're in fundraising mode, if you can believe that, even though we're spread out all across the place.
We have to keep the radio station on the air.
So I think that's the first thing to get across to people before we get into anything else.
So we will be getting into a lot of other things during this hour.
The phone number to call, 516-620-3602, and pledge whatever you can afford to keep WBAI on the air.
And it's particularly important now because we are a local radio station.
Even though we are not in the studio because of the health conditions that are pervading the entire area,
we are still broadcasting locally.
This is the dedication that you find in community radio.
We could easily just be broadcasting something pre-recorded, something canned,
like when they took us over last year.
We could easily be doing that, but we're not.
We have people coming in around the clock in various forms, doing local programming,
giving you a voice, giving you information.
And that is the kind of thing that is rare and in many places doesn't even exist.
So if over the last few weeks of hell that we've all been through, WBAI has meant anything at all to you,
please, I implore you, give us a call, 516-620-3602, and pledge for the radio station.
That is the best premium there is.
We've learned that over the past few months, how important WBAI is.
Keep us going. Keep us on the air.
Imagine if our listeners supported us in ways they've never supported us before,
if we were able to pay all of our bills and not be in debt and be strong for the future,
because people realize what an important asset community radio is.
516-620-3602.
Absolutely.
And as always, you can go to give2wbai.org to make your pledge online.
You can select the particular show you're donating in honor of or is your favorite show.
We would hope you would choose off the hook, as we would.
You can also look there if you're interested.
There are actually face masks, WBAI logo face masks that you can select as premiums for, I believe, $35 or more of a donation.
And, you know, face masks, they're something we all need now.
Lots of stores and other public establishments, the ones that are still open, won't let you in without them,
without some sort of face covering.
And if you're interested in a face covering, that shows that you are interested in keeping WBAI doing what we're doing.
And keep us alive. Keep the lights on.
Keep our staff, volunteers from all over the place, coming together to make this happen for you.
Go to give2wbai.org.
Wait, wait. Hang on a second.
So we could actually be walking.
I'm just hearing about this for the first time.
We could be walking around with bumper stickers on our faces pretty much.
Basically.
We could, yes.
But they're right on the front page of the give2wbai.org site.
You can get them in white or black, depending on your personal sense of style.
But whatever your sense of style, I think a nice big WBAI logo on the front really, really makes a statement.
And that statement is you're interested in keeping WBAI radio doing what we're doing.
And, yeah, you just think we're still important as we do.
And if you also think that we're important, don't forget you can also give to the station by texting WBAI to shortcode 41444.
I can tell you this because I just did it.
You'll get a link back that will take you to the donation site.
So if you don't want to go to give2wbai.org or to call the phone number, you can also text WBAI to 41444.
It's been an extraordinary challenge for everyone.
And we really give a lot of thanks to the people who have endured for operations and administrative duties as well as the on-air programming at WBAI.
So it's just totally crucial that people continue to contribute during this fundraising period
and throughout give as much as possible to this particular community station
so that we can keep providing as much news and public service good as well as entertainment to the greater New York area
and keep people company while they're maintaining their distance.
Once again, the phone number is 516...
Oh no, I lost my notes.
Who has the phone number? Here it is, 516-620-3602.
You have no idea what we're going through over here.
516-620-3602.
It's just such an honor to be able to play a part in broadcasting over the radio waves in New York City on a local basis,
something that we may have taken for granted in the past.
We lost it last October.
It's meant so much more to us, and I think so many listeners have realized that as well.
So if you are one of those listeners, please call 516-620-3602.
Alex, how are you doing? Are you still holed up in Pennsylvania?
I am indeed, and I have to say I'm missing New York quite a bit and wishing I was back there,
but I don't think we're going back any time soon.
My health is in good shape here.
I'm in fine fettle, as some would say, and I'm pleased to report, too,
that for the first time in six weeks I saw my wife and my children, which is amazing.
That was a very, very joyous reunion over the weekend.
I think we had been very cautious about doing that because it's quite likely
or impossible that about five weeks ago I may have had the virus,
for those of you who haven't been listening religiously, so to speak.
My wife and children are with my in-laws also in Pennsylvania, about an hour away from me,
and we were being extraordinarily cautious about potentially exposing my in-laws,
who are in their 70s, to the virus.
But having spoken to several doctors, of which my sister-in-law is one,
an anesthesiologist on the front lines at Mount Sinai in Brooklyn,
she seemed to give us the okay to have the reunion, and it was amazing.
Speaking of things like the radio station and this past October,
where you don't know what you have until it's gone,
well, that certainly is the case with your family.
I've got two children.
One is younger than two, and the other one is six years old,
and not having that physical contact with them every single day wasn't just difficult,
but it was absolutely painful.
When we got back together, it was just extraordinary.
We are apart again now.
That's primarily to facilitate both my wife and I being able to work,
but I'll see them again this weekend, and provided we can all stay healthy,
and God willing we all stay healthy,
that's, I think, the schedule that we're going to be on is, you know,
three days on, four days off, or vice versa.
But I think it's just so important to recognize what you have right now,
and WBAI is a sort of family here, and if we were to lose it again,
it would be I think we'd all feel the effects,
and especially feel the effects right now.
So I will try to make a pleasant segue over to 516-620-3602 if you can pledge
and get one of those face masks that Rob T. Firefly had just told us about,
which I had no idea existed as well.
I would definitely go for the black ones.
I don't know who would go for the white ones,
but you would definitely look much cooler in a black WBAI face mask.
You do know I'm wearing a white face mask, Alex.
I think they look pretty cool.
Well, I think, you know, I make it look cool.
It depends on what you wear with it.
Just to remind everyone,
the $25 level is our entry membership level to becoming a member of WBAI in Pacifica.
That is our barrier level.
But $35 will get you this thank you gift we're talking about,
which is the branded WBAI Keeping Community Radio Alive face mask,
which is really just a thank you, like many of the other items that we have,
to share with others that you've pledged support for the station.
There are really a myriad of ways,
but the gesture itself is that funding that you're giving,
and we're thanking you with this gift.
And plus, I think the logo would look better on the white, white in the background.
I just think it would stand out more.
They're both really charming.
I mean, I don't know.
I think they have a myriad of possibilities.
Maybe you get both so that you can mix and match somehow with your wardrobe.
516-620-3602.
Now, Alex, I'd like to segue right back to you
and ask you as somebody who has been through this
and has experienced the inconvenience probably more than any of us,
what do you say to the people who are expressing, I guess,
impatience and downright hostility towards continuing with the stay-at-home orders
and social distancing and wearing face masks?
You must be somebody who is sick of all of this.
Do you feel like they've got a point?
Is there something that you agree with them on,
or do you think they're missing the point?
I mean, I can empathize with them to a certain extent as well.
And, look, if you have kids and you're holed up in a small apartment in Manhattan,
Brooklyn, Queens, wherever you are in the city,
I mean, all the things that made New York City great
have essentially made it now a virus-ridden hellscape,
and you're stuck in your house, and you can't do anything.
You can't go out.
It's absolutely horrendous,
and I would be completely itching to get back out onto the streets and do something,
see your friends, get some fresh air.
I understand.
I can empathize with that entirely,
but it ignores, I think, the very fact that we are living in a time when that is dangerous,
and it's not safe to do this yet,
and that by going out and ignoring that risk,
you're putting so many others in jeopardy,
and that we all have to be in this together.
Some of us have it worse than others,
and for those of you who are really itching to get out,
stuck in those apartments,
I would say to you that I can empathize and I can feel your pain,
and it makes sense why you would want this to end,
but it's not there yet,
and to do so prematurely is only going to ensure that we have to reendure this kind of isolation,
reendure this kind of quarantine again sooner rather than later.
So we all have to be in this together,
and it's up to you to do your part to hold on for however many more weeks
or perhaps even months longer.
I hate to say it and sound dramatic,
but it certainly is beginning to feel like the human race is dependent upon us
following these particular orders.
Yeah, I think that is pretty accurate,
and I want to say something as far as the things I've said in the past
concerning people in other parts of the country like Georgia,
maybe Oklahoma, maybe Arizona,
places where people were demonstrating,
Michigan certainly,
were demonstrating against the safety precautions against the pandemic.
I called them some bad names,
and I meant it.
I still do mean it.
I think people are idiotic if they walk around and create a health hazard and ignore science,
but what I wasn't aware of is that I don't have to look that far to find people like that.
We have people like that right here in New York.
Yeah, this is what happened last week in a Long Island village known as Comac.
This is a piece from our local news channel, News 12,
and I just want you to listen to what some of the people have to say
to justify what they're doing.
They gathered by the hundreds,
holding flags, carrying signs,
and shouting at the top of their lungs.
Long Islanders who say their rights are being violated by the coronavirus shutdown.
It's unfair for the governor to decide who gets to work and who doesn't.
The protest happened this afternoon in Comac,
most participants blatantly ignoring social distancing guidelines,
and many refused to wear face masks going directly against the governor's orders.
I've been reading that most of the time when you wear a mask eight hours a day,
most of the time when you wear a mask eight hours a day,
you're more susceptible to hurting yourself than helping yourself.
Where did you get that?
On the internet. Look it all up. It's all there.
Suffolk police watched the demonstration but did not enforce social distancing.
The county executive says those decisions are made on a case-by-case basis.
But despite protests like this,
Governor Cuomo says the New York On Pause program will remain in effect until at least May 15th.
But many of these demonstrators say they can't wait that long,
telling us they're more concerned right now about the economy
than the potential health problems the virus could cause.
Are you at all concerned that this demonstration could actually spread coronavirus?
Every single person here is responsible for themselves.
If there were a vaccine for COVID-19, would you take it?
No, sir.
In Comac, Kevin Vesey, News 12 Long Island.
Yeah, that happened. That was real.
Oh look, it's the intersection of stupid.
I don't like calling people morons and idiots,
but when you try so hard to prove it, there's really nothing left.
What do you guys out there think?
I mean, if you don't want to call them idiots, I sure will.
Where's that echo coming from?
A friend of mine asked me if there were protests out here.
And I said, I haven't heard of any in the city.
That doesn't mean they're not happening, but I haven't heard of any.
And I said, the thing is that when this is theoretical for you,
you feel differently about it.
I said, I can't think of anyone that I know in the city in some way
who doesn't know someone who's had it,
who doesn't know someone who's died from it.
I said, 25,000 people have died in New York.
I said, it's not theoretical for you if you live in New York City.
And yes, it's inconvenient. And yes, it's unpleasant.
But it has to be done.
And it is incredibly frustrating to me.
I was talking to my mother, who said that friends of hers were like,
I need to be done. I can't handle being in quarantine anymore.
What are you going to do?
And she said, I'm going to wait until I know that I'm not going to pass this to anybody.
They said, that could be a year and a half.
And she said, look, my daughter and son-in-law live in New York City
and I have a one and a half year old grandson.
Yeah, we all need to be careful.
And this idea that this virus is going to pay attention
to the strictures of free market capitalism.
I don't even know where to go with that.
Like, yeah, everybody's responsible for themselves.
If you want to say that, that's fine.
But there's also a certain element of being in community together
that requires us to be responsible for each other.
Yes.
Yeah.
If the people who were out there saying everyone's responsible for themselves
were only affecting themselves with what they were doing,
I would maybe not feel as completely angry about it as I do.
But as with matters of disease and pandemics like this and contagiousness,
you're not just putting yourself at risk.
You're putting everyone around you, everyone in your life at risk,
all the people you do encounter, your friends, your family,
anyone who's anywhere near you in some way,
you're putting all of them at risk with your decision.
And it's not your right to put others in danger like that.
And I think that also this idea that so many people who are out protesting
for reopening are wrapping themselves in the American flag,
like that's the patriotic thing to do.
I don't know.
I kind of think the patriotic thing to do is to keep the people
who are living in this country alive.
Maybe that's just me.
I don't know.
But I don't understand how wanting to go get your hair cut,
and I say this right now, my hair is longer than it's ever been in my entire life.
I would love to get my hair cut.
I can wait.
I can wait.
I think keeping Americans and those people who happen to be in America alive
might be a little more important than reopening the bowling alley.
But again, that's just me.
I'm hearing all that.
And my reaction was basically the short-sightedness of it
and overlap of so many different rationales for what people desire
versus what's really important in the long run.
And, yeah, economy and people's households and livelihoods being okay and sound,
that's definitely an argument.
But if everyone's sick and there's cascading effects through the food chain,
through the transportation system, people that are truly essential,
what then of the economy if those things are affected in further waves
or as a result of people becoming too careless and not following the measures
or following them in such a haphazard way?
So I think our overall strategy nationally is perhaps not as rigorous.
This sort of horse race of everybody firing the pistol, the starting pistol,
and everybody racing to reopen.
It just seems like really not a very organized way to handle it.
I just don't understand the logic.
And it's begetting these kinds of opinions which, as I said,
are just this overlap of bizarre rationales for what people desire.
Absolutely.
I tend to agree.
If I could just jump in and bounce off what you had mentioned, Kyle,
and the man in COMAC whose interview you played, Emanuel, said something.
I thought that was kind of interesting too.
He mentioned that he got his argument off of the Internet.
And there's just so much suspicious reasoning.
It's all there.
It's all there on the Internet.
Well, of course, it's always, always all there on the Internet.
But it goes back to what we've been saying constantly for so long now,
that you really need to steel your minds against this kind of nonsense
because there is so much nonsense on the Internet.
For a couple of months now I've been talking about how I've been tracking
the coronavirus domain names that have been massive spikes
in those registrations.
For a while now we've also been tracking the reopen domain names,
and there are still massive amounts of reopen whatever the city is
or reopen whatever the state is or reopen whatever the store
or the venue or the resort is being registered every single day.
Just today alone there were 19 new domains.
I'm sorry, I believe it was April 25th.
I'm looking at my records right now.
There were 197 new reopen X, Y, and Z domain names out there,
and all of these are being used to pump out information
and specious arguments, and we do need to steel our minds against this
because one of the things you constantly keep hearing is this nonsense
about comparisons to the flu.
I don't even want to go into the substantive merits of that
because we all know this is not like the flu,
and the argument that Kyle had addressed as well,
which is that this is about freedom and personal freedom.
Well, as a lawyer, let me give you some legal advice here, everybody.
Dead people have very few rights.
They have very few freedoms, and liberty is not necessarily
on the mind of the dead, which is what you will be causing
and inflicting perhaps on yourself.
Alex, that's a good point in that there's assumed liability,
and that's why a lot of these big organizations and events and venues
shut down so quickly, and airlines as well,
because there's a certain liability there.
You're putting people at risk if you're purely making economic calculations.
I also just in the conversation realized that it's perhaps
the unintended consequence of what we imagined for ourselves
as being with ubiquitous connectivity and being so connected.
The free flow of information doesn't always necessarily mean
it's good information, and I think that's something a lot of people
who grew up becoming connected and being a part of that information age
are going back to the drawing board and saying,
okay, there needs to be counter-narratives now to really, as I said,
wild rationales that seem to permeate in these moments online.
I'd like to go back to something that Gila mentioned in that
we all know people who are affected by this, and that is true.
We do.
We might not even know who they are, but I guarantee you we do.
I'm just learning about people who I know who are affected
quite severely, in fact.
In 2007, I went over to Singapore, Malaysia and Singapore,
and I spent the night with relatives of a friend at their home,
and I was just so amazed by these people.
They were raising two kids.
They were American, but they lived in Singapore,
and they were just so conscious of multiculturalism.
I was so impressed by this because in Singapore,
they're all different cultures that are coming together,
and their kids were learning different languages.
I remember one of the things that the parents were very proud of
was that their two daughters were becoming very good global citizens.
I remember at the time thinking that is such an enlightened approach,
but how many people in this country would see that as a bad thing,
being a global citizen, because it means you're not American enough
or something stupid like that.
But I still had nothing but fond memories of that.
Well, they since moved back to the States.
They moved back to Illinois,
and unfortunately, the two parents were afflicted by COVID-19.
Here's something that was written on Facebook by their two daughters,
Mariel and Alexa Bowden.
Alexa and I both wanted to just take a moment to say thank you
to everybody who has reached out
or been there for Alexa and myself over the past month.
This was written in late April.
Thank you to our community, but also to the health care workers
working to keep our parents alive, the mailmen, delivery people,
and every essential worker that is putting their life on the line for all of us.
As we said in the Tribune,
we truly would not have survived this past month without everyone's support.
We both have been so touched and overwhelmed,
both through the in-person support as well as through the support on our GoFundMe.
We both have tried multiple times to put into words what this has meant to us,
and we honestly couldn't express our gratitude enough.
Now, Alexa and I did want to share a bit about the past month
in a bit more honesty than is typical for us in general,
but especially so publicly.
In light of everything that's going on in other states
as well as other people truly understand the insidiousness of this virus,
we felt it was important to share.
And by the end of this week, it will be a month
since both of our parents were put on ventilators in the ICU with COVID-19.
A month ago, Alexa and I had just come home from school,
both a little disappointed to be finishing our spring semesters at home.
I was disappointed that my graduation had been canceled.
We were all disappointed that baseball season was delayed
so we couldn't see all of our teams play,
Alexa and me insisting the Yankees are the best,
and my dad staunchly supporting the Twins
while we kind of just all also cheer for the Cubs
because, well, Chicago, well, my mom and her Mets were just minding their own business.
Our family, who religiously watches the Olympics,
were disappointed that they're going to be delayed a year.
We had made a list of movies that we needed to watch
through this quarantine that Alexa and I had never seen before.
Alexa and I also knew that we were coming home to two parents that were sick
but had been told it was the flu and a sinus infection, not COVID.
Don't worry, they asked.
They had lived through SARS in Singapore, we all had,
so they were strict about following public health guidelines.
In the days after we arrived home, everything changed, though,
and here we are a month later.
In the past month, Alexa and I have gone through a crash course in being real adults.
We've had to learn how to run a household, make medical decisions,
and manage our mental health while finishing up school.
We've been forced to figure out the ridiculous bureaucracy
of trying to get names added to phone accounts
and gained extensive knowledge of health insurance.
We've also seen the lessons our parents taught us about community being global
and how that's incredibly accurate,
and the inherent goodness of humans to be on full display.
We have been so touched and appreciative for everything that has been done for us
over the past month, so again, thank you.
Both of my parents are COVID negative as of yesterday,
but Alexa and I now have to deal with the consequences of what this virus did
and continues to do to their bodies.
They both will be in long-term care hospitals before, hopefully, they can go to rehab.
That is the best case scenario.
There are still so many unknowns that go along with this.
Our dad, who loves music and his guitarist more than anything,
might never improve from the stroke that he suffered because of this virus,
and even if he does, the likelihood that he will ever play guitar again is up in the air.
Our mom is still on a ventilator coming up on the fourth week,
and we don't know when or if she's coming off.
They put in a trach today to hopefully help the weaning process.
Our mom, who taught Alexa and I not just how to bake and cook before we could walk,
but also to love food, she might not get to cook us dinner again
or help us in our annual Christmas cookie adventures.
I might never get to talk to her about Hallmark movies or The Bachelor
or those other terrible reality TV shows that we all love.
Our family might never get movie nights or game nights.
Trivial Pursuit might never again get banned from our house
because my dad and I are super annoying to play with.
We might never get to actually finish a game of Risk,
as we've been promising to do since I was 11.
There's more here.
Our futures are a huge question mark because of this virus.
So every time I hear idiots out there that don't take it seriously, think about this.
Think about what this means to other people.
Think about what your actions mean to other people.
Because this is something that truly affects everybody in the world
and certainly everybody in New York.
And we need to be able to stick together.
We need to be able to be strong and hold our resolve
and get through this so that there aren't more stories like this.
And admit that you don't know everything.
I think that unknown really hits home in that experience that they're having.
It just is so incredibly difficult to have people acting as though they know better.
We know that's not true because people who are going through this don't know certain things about it.
So how could someone out protesting it
because they have a sense of deserving to be out and about
versus the rest of anyone else in society?
It's really an ignorant way to be, to say you know better.
I respect their opinions. I respect their passion and all that.
But they don't have the knowledge that scientists and doctors have.
And you have to listen to people like that in a situation like this.
If you can't do that, you are really hurting people.
And you're certainly going to hurt yourself, but you're going to hurt other people as well.
In addition to that, the reason that we've gone through everything we've gone through
for the past two plus months with our lockdowns, with our quarantines,
with our social distancing and isolation and everything we've been doing,
ending all this and going back out there and acting like everything's better too soon
undoes anything we might have achieved.
It makes it for nothing that we've been suffering through this.
It makes it completely meaningless.
And really, I have not suffered through everything over the past couple of months
that just the inconveniences to my own life, let alone that of the people around me.
I did not suffer all this just so some idiots out in wherever can go out there and go bowling again
and mess everything up and undo anything that we may have achieved.
The words that come to mind to describe how I feel about this, I cannot say on the air.
I hear you.
It's super frustrating because as you said, the numbers are going down.
They were going down.
Now we're being told to expect 3,000 deaths a day.
And I feel like that's just sort of being shown to us to see how the populace will react to that.
Can we handle that?
Okay, then maybe we can open the stores again and get the economy going and the stock market and all that
if we can kill 3,000 people a day because that's basically what we're doing if we move too quickly on this.
You see the callousness of people like Chris Christie saying that we're going to have to just get used to all these people dying every day.
You see people who literally do not care about those who are more vulnerable, the elderly.
They certainly don't care about minorities who are facing this more than anybody.
And that is what we're talking about here.
That is what we are being faced with.
And it's disgusting because we have proven that this thing can be contained if you do it right.
Look at New Zealand.
Look at how it's been contained in New Zealand because they had an effective policy of putting people in quarantine if they had been outside the country.
They didn't just base it on their ethnicity or their religion or the color of their skin.
No, everybody was treated the same.
And as a result, it's gone down to practically zero in that country without all kinds of hateful policies being put into place
and without all kinds of really, really painful realities having to be faced.
So yeah, it can be done if you're intelligent about it.
If you're not, though, and if you just think this thing is not going to affect you because you don't want it to,
that's when things turn 1918 all over again.
And we're talking millions.
We're talking a huge amount.
So yeah, it's really disturbing to see people thinking that doesn't matter.
The story I read, that's one story.
That is one story.
There are so many stories like that.
And if we don't feel it directly ourselves, then we are lucky.
We had a close call with Alex.
But guaranteed, there will be more stories down the road, especially if we don't act intelligently.
Yeah, and in that story, those were people that were taking absolute precautions, extra measures,
doing anything they could think of, having been through the SARS in the Southeast and other parts of Asia there.
It shows you that if you are careless, you're a prime vector for this, whether you're symptomatic or not.
And I cannot stop reminding everyone when we talk about this just how contagious this is.
It's an extremely contagious virus.
And that's something that I think gets lost in a lot of the comparisons and in how people feel about it.
And if you haven't caught it, you're doing something right.
Congratulations.
It doesn't mean that you're not susceptible to it, though.
It doesn't mean that you put in enough and okay, that's it.
You've done your bit.
Now you can go back to normal.
No, it doesn't work that way.
All it takes is one mistake.
And it doesn't matter how many times you got it right.
That one mistake is the one you'll be paying for.
So, yeah, it sucks.
We might have to do this for a while longer.
But we will come out of it if we stick to what we're doing.
And that will feel great.
Go ahead, Gary.
Well, you know, I think the story that you told, Emmanuel, about your friends from Singapore was very moving and touching to think about these two girls that could be without their parents or whose parents could be irreparably harmed here.
And in recapping that, you mentioned something that really touched a nerve with me.
And I'll take a moment to tell a personal story about this virus in my life as well, outside of my own personal experience.
Many of you know I went to Stony Brook University.
And I studied philosophy and classics there.
And my Latin professor at Stony Brook was Professor Aaron William Godfrey.
And he was one of the reasons why I stayed at Stony Brook and, in fact, got through school.
I was his Latin TA for, I think, three years.
And to say he was like a father to me while I was in college would have been inaccurate, an understatement, because he was very much a father to me while I was going through college.
To give you an indication, he came into my TA's office one day, and he saw that I was kind of distraught about something.
And I had expressed to him that, well, the Stony Brook registrar screwed something up.
It turns out they undercharged me last semester, and now they just hit me with a $600 bill.
I can't afford it.
I was working full time, going to school full time, trying to support my family, working in a software company.
I just didn't have the money, and I didn't think I was going to be able to register for classes for the next semester.
About two minutes later, he called me into his office, and he gave me a blank check so I could continue going to school.
He just retired two years ago from Stony Brook.
He was 92 years old, still teaching.
And the virus took him two weeks ago.
So it's kind of rough, and there's real consequences here, everybody.
I'll stop and get myself together here.
The thing is, and thank you for sharing that, and it's amazing to me because there are so many of these stories out there.
I think probably each person in our broadcast radius, as you all said, knows someone or knows someone who knows someone.
Personally, I think I've lost count.
I'd have to start counting on my fingers to figure out how many people I know who've been directly affected by this disease.
But it's more than I want to do right now because the thing is that dealing with this is all of our responsibilities.
It's not about what you want.
It's not about what's inconvenient.
It's not about how bad your hair looks.
Everyone's hair looks bad right now.
Nobody cares.
It's about doing what's right, doing what's right for the people around you, for yourself, for the strangers around you, for anyone who meets anyone, who meets anyone who's in your life because of all the degrees of separation this thing can take.
It's about doing what's right, and it's about doing what's verifiably right.
We've been through pandemics.
We have medical data.
We know what will happen.
A leads to B leads to C.
This is not a mystery.
We are not facing something that we are completely clueless about.
We know what we have to do, and it's as simple as that.
Anyone who's been listening to this program and this radio station for any length of time knows that we are no fans of just going along with whatever authority says.
We are all about questioning the rules.
We are all about looking at the restrictions put in front of us and seeing, well, can't we just tweak this?
Can't we just tweak that?
But we are also about doing what's right based on the available data, and we have the available data here.
It is not a difficult concept, I think.
Yeah, science is our friend.
There is so much that we can learn by simply reading or listening or studying.
It all makes sense.
As Rob says, it's not a mystery.
It's working in a particular manner.
We have to figure things out.
It's a puzzle to solve, and we have more people working on this than ever before.
The thing to remember is that this is not something that just affects old people.
Yeah, old people are more susceptible, but their lives are every bit as valuable.
People with underlying health conditions, more susceptible, but also people with no health conditions have been struck down by this.
So if you think that it's an okay risk because it doesn't affect you because you're not in one of those groups, no.
That is the biggest mistake you can make, and you don't have to look far to find all kinds of people that have been victimized by this virus,
that did not think that they could possibly be victimized.
The people I read about before were not old at all, and until now, they were not unhealthy.
So it can strike anybody, and if you're careless, that's when the odds of it striking you increase tremendously.
And that's why I think the one-thing-at-a-time approach and methodic and intelligent, quote, reopening is the bare minimum.
I mean, we're still—this is the occurring, like this unknown event, and to be primarily focused on turning a corner,
just because we've looked at statistical curve change trajectories just slightly,
I mean, that just seems a miscalculation to try to handle both things at once.
And even, I mean, even the leadership's administration, I mean, there was a whistleblower this week that came out against
how they were treated when they pushed back on certain approaches that have been taken.
So the handling of this, this is perhaps not the A, B, or C plan, but we're working a certain plan.
And of course, we're all well aware, and we've talked about this on previous episodes,
where we discuss how privacy and the implications of moving everything online, the kinds of legislation we're seeing,
and where things are allocated.
I mean, they had the first oversight committee, one of, I'm sure, many meetings this week as well.
So there's going to be a time and place to go back and look at how various aspects of this reaction,
and the global as well as national and regional responses took effect.
But until then, we need to focus on the thing at hand, which is that primary plan of sheltering
or otherwise keeping a distance when you're around people because of the contagiousness
and uncertainties around treatment and vaccination.
And anything else is really, it's not, it's an ancillary part of this.
It can be looked at, it can be disassembled, deconstructed.
If it's something totally crazy or not, we can go through all of it.
But at this very juncture, it's really important that people don't get fatigue
from how much we've already sacrificed collectively.
Yeah, I mean, it's a sacrifice, and you should feel some semblance of reward for having made a sacrifice.
Know that you are keeping people healthier.
You're helping yourself.
You're ensuring that we'll get past this sooner.
It's not like we don't know how these things go.
If you go back to 1918, you see that people made fatal mistakes.
They didn't take it seriously enough.
They didn't have as much technology and medical advancement as we do now.
But even in the era that they were in, they still made some serious mistakes.
And that's why the second wave, which we have not yet experienced, was so deadly.
And we're talking about 50 million people died as a result, 50 million.
Think about that.
And that's in a world with far fewer people, the equivalent of that.
I don't even want to calculate that number, but it is an insanely big number.
And that's what happens if you make mistakes, if you don't take it seriously.
So listen to the people who know what they're talking about.
I'm not saying listen to politicians.
It doesn't matter if one politician says one thing, one says another.
The only people that matter are the ones that understand the science behind it,
that understand the medicine behind it.
That's not politics.
That is just common sense.
Listen to what those people say.
And when they say, yeah, it's safe.
Everything is fine now.
Okay, that's when I'll start believing it.
But I'm not going to believe it when somebody who has a vested interest in making a profit in some way says,
yeah, you know, I've done this long enough.
We're losing money.
We can get used to losing some lives as long as we make a profit this year.
No, never, never.
Yeah.
No amount of money is worth, I think, even one life that didn't need to be lost.
And right now we're at a point where we've lost thousands and we're going to lose thousands more.
And it's obscene.
Like, I, sure, I would like to be able to go out and shop for things.
I would like to be secure in, you know, where my next meal is coming from, whether I'm going to have a roof over my head.
But if it means that it's something I need to do to preserve the health of myself, my family, and the people around me,
I will watch the economic system collapse and I will dance on the rubble if it's the healthy thing to do.
And, you know, I honestly do not care that much if someone else gets a paycheck if it means that it will cost a life.
And there are concessions for that necessity.
But as I've said, essential workers will still have to work if we retract this phase, this initial phase or test phase of opening.
So if it doesn't go well, there's going to be even more difficulty and economic strife,
but also essential workers who just have to continue if there's another shelter-in-place phase of this.
But I think that reopening as well as continuing the efforts that have been made are in conflict.
So it's very hard to swallow.
I think people really need to pay attention to the fact that this is a test.
This is an initial phase of that, and we really have to be extremely cautious if we're going to be able to succeed in the long run.
Hey, can I just give out the phone number again for pledging to the radio station, keeping this channel of communication open?
And I am so happy that it is here for all of us to participate in, 516-620-3602.
When you call that number, somebody on the other end will pick up and ask what you want,
and you'll basically hopefully say to them, I'd like to pledge to keep WBAI going.
And for a pledge of $35, you can get one of our BAI face masks, which sounds pretty amazing.
But there are all kinds of other levels that you can pledge at.
The important thing is to pledge to the radio station, to keep the radio station on the air,
to keep it at 99.5 FM as it has been since 1960, 516-620-3602.
And you know what? There's another number you can call, the number of your friend.
Call that person and say, why don't you call 516-620-3602 and get sort of a phone chain going.
Get a lot of people calling in.
Imagine if 99.5 was just playing canned material right now without live voices,
without interaction with our listeners.
We'd all be the poorer for that.
And in times like this, boy, do you need local voices.
Do you need to know what is going on around you and a way for you to participate as well.
516-620-3602.
And just another shout talking about lines of communication and that sort of thing.
I just want to shout out to everyone who came to the virtual 2600 meetings last week.
And we had one for New York.
And I went, and it was great.
It was great to see everyone again and catch up.
And we are all just doing what we can to keep in touch with each other
and keep our collective spirits up.
As far as interaction, please write us, oth at 2600.com.
And if you're interested in submitting an anonymous note to us,
you can contact us with SecureDrop, 2600.com slash SecureDrop.
Yeah, if you have something to leak perhaps.
And it's certainly a lot.
Health commissioners are leaking information
because they're being suppressed by the Trump administration.
All kinds of things are happening.
The truth needs to get out.
People need to be able to know the facts and not be intimidated.
So, yes, our SecureDrop box is one way of doing that.
But just standing up, standing up to authority and speaking your mind,
that's the right thing.
Yeah, it is the right thing.
Being stupid, that is not the right thing.
And I hope people are able to recognize the difference.
Okay, hey, Rob, I understand we have some more sad news,
if you don't have enough of it, of somebody that we have lost,
not to COVID, but just I don't know what to exactly,
but you want to tell us the details?
We do, yes.
If you're listening to this music and you're enjoying it,
Florian Schneider was one of the founders of the group Kraftwerk,
pioneers in electronic music.
He passed away at the age of 73 to a short cancer.
The man was a genius.
His work is well worth checking out.
If you're not familiar, it's spelled K-R-A-F-T-W-E-R-K,
and start yourself on that journey.
Yeah, hacker favorites for sure.
I thought they'd be around forever, so I'm really saddened by this as well.
So we're going to go out with this, and, again,
please give a call to that phone number, 516-620-3602,
and write to us, oth at 2600.com.
We're not going to be on next week, I understand,
but we will be back in two weeks,
and hopefully the world will be a better place then.
We'll see.
Hey, good night, folks.
Good talking to you again.
And you.
Stay healthy.
Stay safe.
All right.
Bye.