Gina Helfrich, PhDJul 24, 2023
Dr. Lucky Tran 
Looks like the media has finally reached peak #COVID minimization: Defining the end of the pandemic by movie ticket sales.
Jul 24, 2023 at 12:18amWeb
Show threadDr. Lucky Tran Jul 24, 2023
Stating the obvious, but movie ticket sales and economic activity can happen at the same time as a virus continues to spread and cause harm. It's called capitalism.
https://www.nytimes.com/2023/07/23/movies/barbie-oppenheimer-box-office-numbers.html
‘Barbie’ and ‘Oppenheimer’ Set Post-Pandemic Box Office High

With the biggest revenues since 2019, “Barbenheimer” gives the usual franchises a run for their money, selling out even predawn screenings.

The New York Times
Show threadDr. Lucky Tran Jul 24, 2023

It's worth pointing out that ‘Spider-Man: No Way Home’ sold a similar amount of tickets on opening weekend as ‘Barbie’ and ‘Oppenheimer.’

‘Spider-Man’ debuted in December 2021, which was the beginning of the second most deadly #COVID wave, killing ~250,000 people in the US.

Show threadDr. Lucky Tran Jul 24, 2023
The desperation of some parts of the media to keep declaring the end of the pandemic (which many have done over and over since the summer of 2020) is an example of manufactured consent. Many want to create the illusion that #COVID is over so they can profit.
Show threadSelJul 24, 2023

@luckytran

For some reason the acronym "SNAFU" comes to mind.

Show threadLinebyline→mastoart.socialJul 24, 2023
@seldear "Science not actually financially useful"?
Show threadSelJul 24, 2023

@linebyline

"Situation Normal: All Fucked Up"

Show threadthe 1998 Sega Saturn RPG, Baroque 🔞Jul 24, 2023
@luckytran ive been catching up on New Japan Pro Wrestling events from early this year and it caught me so off guard to hear the announcers repeatedly reference the pandemic and to remember that other countries take it a lot more seriously than the US does
Show threadDavid FarnellJul 24, 2023
@himbovoorhees @luckytran Though I will say, as a resident of Japan, that the govt here is really trying to move on from the pandemic. They make it very hard to get information on infection rates now, and masks are being worn much much less than last summer. (Granted, we also have record high temps.) It's not as bad as the US, I'm sure (I'll see for myself when I visit family for the first time in 4 years next month), but it's distressing seeing such a rapid abandonment of good sense.
Show threadthe 1998 Sega Saturn RPG, Baroque 🔞Jul 24, 2023

@azzageddi @luckytran people haven’t been wearing masks in the US since 2020

Yeupppp

Show threadDwight Williams (💉 x9)+😷🇨🇦Jul 24, 2023
@luckytran I am not playing along with manufactured consent games.
Show threadMichelleVJul 24, 2023
@luckytran Buckle up for the next blockbuster, parabolic Covid uptick hit, while flying blind. They even encourage double time indoors with a double feature.😖😫
Show threadsabikJul 24, 2023
@luckytran
Who is even profiting off it
Show threadcostrikeJul 24, 2023
@luckytran I've had a running, sardonic gag about this since March 2022.
Show threadChu 朱Jul 24, 2023

@luckytran

The Globe and Mail, Canada's newspaper of record, had more articles about the economic impact of COVID on the oil and gas sector in March of 2020 than they had about the disease. Half of their articles containing the keyword "COVID" or "coronavirus" in March, April, May, June, and July of 2020 were about business and economy, not health.

Corporate media is not here to inform. They are here to manipulate.

*source: Dow Jones' Factiva database.

Show threadMDKJul 24, 2023
@chu @luckytran G&M is trash, just like NYT
Show threadLynn DJul 24, 2023
@mattdkerr @chu @luckytran we call it The Mop and Pail (I think that I got that from Bob Rae way back when the former bird site wasn’t a complete hellscape).
Show threadLacunalinguaJul 24, 2023
@luckytran the film corporation CEOs making even more money is what they are touting as “back to normal.”
It’s always been the measurement of what back to normal is.
Show threadPrincess UnikittyJul 24, 2023

@luckytran

I feel like maybe making epidemiological assertions based on movie revenues is not the best way to do science or sociology.

Show threadTransitBikerJul 24, 2023
@luckytran the pandemic is officially over because movie tickets? Yikes.
Show threadTom ForsythJul 24, 2023
@luckytran I remember being o_0 at the Spiderman sales and thinking it would lead directly to deaths. Not exactly a Cassandra-level prophesy you'd think. But it happened anyway...
Show thread🙃Jul 24, 2023
@luckytran @currentbias great news Barieheimer Proves COVID Is Over
Show threadThe Evil MicrowizardJul 24, 2023
@luckytran The NYT spends a lot of time being stupid, recently, it seems.
Show threadNed YeungJul 24, 2023

@luckytran They'll literally say anything to make anything align with their ideology.

(But on another note: Go Barbie!)

Show threadkira :3Jul 24, 2023
@luckytran if only we knew in 2020 that buying movie tickets caused pandemics to vanish
Show threadSolomon SchulerJul 24, 2023
@luckytran and when you think about it: within the coming months; covid will resume, people will be dumbfounded, and hundreds of thousands will become sick (again), destroying their health even further.
Show threadFediThing has moved!Jul 24, 2023

@SolomonSchuler @luckytran

If long covid carries on becoming more and more common, minimisers will try to normalise ill health. Perhaps they'll cite how people lived in various historical times and say "they coped with it, we can too" or similar 🙄

Show threadDoctorOctothorpJul 24, 2023
@luckytran don't tell them I wore a KN95 when I saw "Asteroid City". Sheesh.
Show threadnedhamsonJul 24, 2023
@luckytran Media and much of the public is ok with one million dying so survivors can pretend it is over and won’t happen again… self-delusion today will cost another million or so people when the next pandemic hits or Covid does a u-turn and runs us down again.
Show threadProf Prachi SrivastavaJul 24, 2023
@luckytran The global public health remedy that was right under our noses. And there we were spending time and money on vaccines and drugs and other superfluousness.
Show threadshyduroffJul 24, 2023
@luckytran … sigh is not a big enough word …
Show threadLacunalinguaJul 24, 2023
@luckytran America is a business, not a country
Show threadPedro PierreJul 24, 2023
@[email protected] even today in Bangkok most people are still wearing mask doesn't matter if it's inside mall, streets, MRT/BTS etc
Show threadMathew SamuelJul 24, 2023

@luckytran
Obviously the message is:
No one else is worrying about COVID so you should stop too.

Don't need to repeat something is over, when it's obvious, only when you're doing propaganda: You repeat the lie.

#CovidIsNotOver

Show threadDJul 24, 2023
But if we can't use movie ticket sales what do you propose we define pandemics by the sales of?
Show threadHenriqueJul 24, 2023
@luckytran Thank god it doesn't has Spiderman or Marvel in it.
Show threadJohnbelitskyJul 25, 2023
@luckytran it's gonna be super weird when ppl find out most of the world's life expectancy has been meaningfully reduced and everyone's getting "unexplained" illnesses.