Did the COVID lockdowns make us look older?

The New Neo Posted on by

Commenter Rufus T. Firefly asks a question that I find interesting:

Has anyone noticed EVERYONE seems to have aged 5 or more years during the two years of lockdowns? I first started noticing this in myself, prior to the lockdowns most folks would guess my age 10 – 15 years younger than I am and think I was joking when I told them my actual age. Now, no one bats an eyelash when they hear my age. I, of course, noticed it myself. I see myself in the mirror every day. My appearance has changed more in the past two years than any other time in my life, except in infancy. But I started to notice the same thing with everyone I interact with. Even people I know who always looked very youthful… Everyone looks 5 – 10 years older.

Anyone else see this? Is it COVID? The vaccines? The stress of lockdowns? Many people gained a lot of weight, is that it? Is it the lack of social interaction?

I’ve noticed long before COVID that the aging process seems to proceed in a series of discrete leaps rather than a slow linear progression. I even wrote a post that dealt with the topic. In it, I wrote this:

I’ve noticed in my own life and among my friends, as well as for public figures, that visible aging doesn’t progress in smooth linear fashion. It advances in fits and starts and discrete bumps.

One year I look around at my friends at the Christmas party and everybody looks pretty darn good. The next year I wonder who all these old folk are. In their thirties and forties the aging process seems so slow and gentle as to be almost stagnant; most people seem to go on and on looking almost like they did in their twenties.

There’s a group who hit the aging wall in their mid-to-late forties, going almost overnight from young to oldish. They’re the canaries in the mine. Another bunch “turn” quite suddenly in their late fifties, with the early sixties a time of particular peril for many.

Well, I was younger when I wrote that, and the peril only increases.

So if the COVID lockdowns coincide with one of those “quantum leap” aging times for a person, that person is going to look more than two years older on emerging from seclusion. I think some of the observed aging is accounted for by that.

But not all of it. I haven’t observed accelerated aging across the board, but I have observed a certain amount. Some of it may be due to people getting out of the habit of preparing “a face to meet the faces that you meet.” For women, that can mean makeup and hair and weight and clothing. For men it tends to mean the latter two on that list. When we seldom see anyone but those we live with – or if we live alone and hardly go out – many people dispense with those things that as we get older are even more important in looking good.

There’s also a lack of exercise. Some people have used the lockdowns to get into great shape, but I don’t think that’s common. I know more people who say they’ve cut back on exercising, whether through inertia or for some other reason I don’t know. And of course, many health clubs were closed for a long time, and I doubt that everyone went back even when they opened again.

Don’t discount the effect of depression, either. The lockdowns themselves have been depressing, including the lack of concerts and plays to attend, things that tend to perk people up. Depressing also is the political situation, and I find that’s true no matter what side of the political spectrum a person may be on. And then there’s inflation – depressing, as well.

Depression doesn’t make people look good or make them look younger. It drags the face down and can make it sag. When my father-in-law died I noticed that my mother-in-law appeared to age a decade in what seemed like a matter of weeks. It can happen.

I don’t think any of this was from COVID itself, nor from the vaccines. It was the lockdowns, and the perception that we’ve been lied to and manipulated, and the resultant grinding social isolation. It hasn’t affected everyone to the same degree, nor is it the only thing that causes people to age more quickly. But I think it’s real.

Lia Thomas and objective vs. subjective reality

The New Neo Posted on by

Lia Thomas has been declared an NCAA women’s champion:

Penn swimmer Lia Thomas won the women’s 500-yard freestyle championship on Thursday to become the first transgender NCAA champion in Division I history.

She finished the race in 4:33.24, beating Virginia’s Emma Weyant by 1.75 seconds. The time fell short of Katie Ledecky’s NCAA-record time of 4:24.06.

Thomas had been competing as a man until last season:

Her eligibility has come under scrutiny with critics arguing that she has an unfair advantage in the pool after she went through male puberty. She met NCAA standards to compete as a woman after undergoing testosterone suppression therapy for more than two years.

Since joining the women’s team, Thomas has broken two school records and posted the fastest times in the country in the 200 and 500-yard freestyle events. Now she’s an NCAA champion.

Look at any photo of Thomas and the ludicrous nature of allowing this person to compete as a woman becomes crystal clear. As a male, Thomas was a decent college swimmer. As a female, Thomas is a star. Whatever the reasons for Thomas’ declaration of womanhood – which we can speculate about but don’t know – elevation to athletic prominence from obsurity has been the result. But it’s a result that never would have happened if Thomas had not been allowed to compete as a woman, which is what the controversy is about.

Look at any photo of Thomas and you can see that this is a person who not only looks like a man but like a very strong, large, and powerful man, with enormous upper body strength. Thomas went through puberty as a man and trained for years as a man. The only thing that makes Thomas a woman is that Thomas has said so, plus some testosterone-suppressing hormones that do not alter those basics about Thomas.

Women’s sports are about separating out a class of people who in almost every sport would be bested by men, but who have skills nevertheless and should be competing against each other. Anyone is free to take an interest in watching women’s sports or to disdain them, but women’s sports have a valid reason for existing. I’ve always considered them somewhat the equivalent of weight classes in boxing or wrestling, in which like competes against like and there are pluses and minuses to watching each group. Thomas threatens the entire existence of women’s sports, or at least makes a mockery of them.

What interests me most about this situation is the insistence by the left and the woke that we ignore it and applaud Thomas’ victory, pretending that Thomas has achieved womanhood and that there’s nothing wrong with calling the woman who would have been the actual champion the runner-up instead. And why? Because of a perception in Thomas’ mind rather than a reality of Thomas’ body.

I have no trouble respecting the wishes of trans people to be called by their preferred pronouns. But I think that’s a personal decision on my part, and I am against anything that would compel a person to follow suit. But I do not support Thomas swimming as a woman, because that is elevating the subjective to the status of an objective truth that is in this case a falsehood about Thomas’ body. Nor do I support changing a person’s birth certificate to conform with that person’s later chosen sex, thus creating a fiction that the new classification had actually existed from birth.

I first encountered this idea that a subjective perception creates an actionable objective truth when I returned to the university during the 1990s to get my Master’s degree. I’d been away for two decades, and hadn’t closely followed what had been going on in universities in the meantime. When I returned, there was a big brouhaha going on at the university involving accusations of sexual harassment against
a professor who had said something ever so slightly risqué in a classroom and several students had objected mightily and charged him, and as a consequence he’d been suspended and ordered to re-education class.

To me, the situation was an absurd and potentially damaging elevation of a subjective perception – that this guy had said something offensive – to the status of an objective truth. In fact, we seemed to be losing the whole concept of objective truth versus the subjective feelings of the listener, and the superiority of the former over the latter for the determination of actual guilt or innocence. I stood up in class and pointed this out, thinking that I was speaking a nearly self-evident truth by saying so. But no one in the class even thought my little speech worthy of response.

At the time I didn’t understand the full significance of what was happening. Nor did I get its political nature or exactly where it would lead. But I knew it was wrong, and I knew it was dangerous.

Lia Thomas may identify as a woman. But the person known as Lia Thomas has the body of a man. Sports are about what bodies can do, and a sports organization such as the NCAA should not be elevating Thomas’ subjective perception over the objective truth of Thomas’ body.

Ukraine and Biden family corruption

The New Neo Posted on by

Commenter “physicsguy” writes:

Many seem to have forgotten how close the Biden family is to the corruption in Ukraine. I have kept that in mind as I look at the administration’s response. I’m definitely not letting Putin off the hook; he’s risking starting WW3 and doesn’t seem to care. What a CF.

CF indeed.

This war was begun by Putin’s invasion of Ukraine, and the timing probably seemed right to him because of this administration’s demonstrated incompetence and weakness in just about everything. We don’t know how the Biden family’s Ukraine dealings factor into that calculation of Putin’s. But it’s certainly possible and even probable that both Russia and Ukraine have damaging information about Hunter at the very least, and probably Joe as well.

One of many reasons that we should not elect corrupt and compromised people – and that the MSM shouldn’t cover up what those people have done just because they like their politics – is that it makes them vulnerable to blackmail. As I said, Ukraine may have the goods on Biden and it certainly has the goods on Hunter. I would also bet that China has the goods as well. Perhaps even Iran has been given the information; I wouldn’t be altogether surprised if that were the case. But some of this information is in the public domain already, especially now that the NY Times has belatedly admitted the laptop is valid.

By the way, just to clear up the time frame: after Joe Biden was no longer vice president Hunter’s salary from Burisma was cut in half and his term expired right before Zelenskyy took office. So at least during Zelenskyy’s administration there’s no evidence of the Biden’s being on the take anymore in Ukraine, although it’s always possible that there’s something of which we aren’t aware.

Not only have I not forgotten any of this, but I think it’s important to remain aware of it. How it factors into this war is anyone’s guess. However, I think a lot more than that is going on, and the events of the Ukraine war have been a long long time in the making and have multiple causes that have nothing to do with Biden. But I also think that Joe Biden’s vulnerability – a vulnerability that includes his leftist politics, his cognitive decline, his recent history in Afghanistan and elsewhere, and his family’s probable corruption in Ukraine and many other countries such as China who are at best our rivals and at worst our enemies – all factor into it.

Good luck sorting out this CF.

[NOTE: By the way, yesterday I wrote that I had a big post on Ukraine brewing and that I’d try to publish it today. This one isn’t it, though. I’ll probably get the bigger one posted some time early next week.]

I decided to try…

The New Neo Posted on by

…to take the day off today from posting about the Ukraine war. I have a big post brewing and hope to get it published tomorrow, but today I thought I’d just put up this general thread for people who want to talk about Ukraine.

Wisconsin schools: keeping parents in the dark

The New Neo Posted on by

Remember back when transgender rights was about adults, and there was lengthy screening by the medical and therapy professionals involved to make sure that those adults were not making the choice because of other mental health issues?

Now it’s about keeping kids’ secrets from parents whose rights diminish every day:

“Parents are not entitled to know their kids’ identities,” Wisconsin teachers were told in a February training session. “That knowledge must be earned.”

Empower Wisconsin publicized the slide used in the Eau Claire district in western Wisconsin.

Superintendent Michael Johnson defended the training saying the district “has a responsibility to maintain an educational environment that is equitable, safe and inclusive,” reports M.D. Kittle on Wisconsin Spotlight.

“A district court in 2020 issued a partial injunction against Madison Metropolitan School District’s policy allowing children of any age to transition to a different gender identity at school — without parental consent,” reports Kittle. “The full case is now before the Wisconsin Supreme Court.”

That case is known as Doe v. MMSD:

The policy includes the following provisions:

–Children of any age can transition to a different gender identity at school, by changing their name and pronouns, without parental notice or consent.

–District employees are prohibited from notifying parents, without the child’s consent, that their child has or wants to change gender identity at school, or that their child may be dealing with gender dysphoria.

–District employees are even instructed to deceive parents by using the child’s legal name and pronouns with family, while using the different name and pronouns adopted by the child in the school setting.

The lawsuit alleges the district’s policy violates constitutionally protected parental rights. Transitioning to a different gender identity is a significant psychotherapeutic intervention that requires parental notice or consent, the attorneys said in a press release. “Public school districts, like Madison, do not have the right to make those decisions for parents.”

A case to watch.

With Iran Deal 2.0 we are fully in Looking Glass World

The New Neo Posted on by

I’ve read a lot about what might be behind this deal, and I’ve even written about what might be behind it (see this as well as this).

But I’m still having trouble believing it, because it is so terrible. In that latter post I quoted a piece by Caroline Glick, who explains the motives behind the Iran deal in this way:

The Biden administration justifies its pro-Iranian and anti-Israel/Sunni Arab policy by claiming it is a means to disengage the U.S. from the Middle East at a time that Washington is keen to concentrate its resources and attention on Asia and the rising threat of China…

Biden’s policies are the polar opposite of Trump’s policies both conceptually and substantively. Biden’s policies represent a reinstatement and escalation of Barack Obama’s policies for Iran and the wider Middle East. In contrast to Trump, Obama, Biden and their advisors believe that the U.S.’s Middle Eastern allies – Israel and the Sunni Arab Gulf states – maliciously worked for decades to entangle the United States in the wars of the Middle East. To disentangle America from the region and its pernicious “allies” the Obama-Biden doctrine posits the U.S. must realign itself away from its allies and weaken them, and towards Iran, which it must empower.

That’s probably as good an explanation as any, in the sense of logic. Nevertheless I still can’t wrap my mind around it, even as an explanation for behavior I think is stupendously unwise and destructive to US interests. The logic exists only as a surface logic, because even if one were to accept the “Israel and the Arab Gulf states have maliciously worked to entangle the United States” part of the reasoning, the “so instead let’s embrace a country dedicated to our destruction and the spread of Islamic terrorism around the world” part doesn’t really follow as a good alternative. The only explanation for taking that road, it seems to me, is the desire to destroy the US and the West or at least weaken it immensely, and to empower the Iranian mullahs as well as the terrorists they sponsor.

Everything I’ve read so far about this new Iran Deal – one that’s apparently set to be announced every day now – is frightening and profoundly disturbing. Here’s some of the latest:

Russia’s top state-controlled energy company is set to cash in on a $10 billion contract to build out one of Iran’s most contested nuclear sites as part of concessions granted in the soon-to-be-announced nuclear agreement that will guarantee sanctions on both countries are lifted.

Russian and Iranian documents translated for the Washington Free Beacon show that Rosatom, Russia’s leading energy company, has a $10 billion contract with Iran’s atomic energy organization to expand Tehran’s Bushehr nuclear plant. Russia and the Biden administration confirmed on Tuesday that the new nuclear agreement includes carveouts that will waive sanctions on both countries so that Russia can make good on this contract.

There’s also this:

Days after Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) fired missiles aimed at the U.S. consulate in northern Iraq, President Joe Biden’s administration is reportedly planning to remove the Iranian outfit from the list of international terrorist organizations.

The decision to drop the IRGC — Iranian regime’s military arm — from the terror list, appears to be yet another concession made by the Biden White House to restore the Obama-era nuclear deal with Tehran.

This last point seems to have been what’s delaying the deal somewhat at the moment – but once again chances are that the Biden administration will concede on this, too, or already has done so. In fact, it may not even be over then, because there may be a continuing series of escalating demands from Iran, as it sees the utterly compliant Biden group willing to give them everything they ask for in order to get them to acquiesce.

It’s as though malevolent beings representing the US have hatched this plan in order to laugh maniacally at the world and to greatly harm the United States and the West. I don’t usually write in such extreme terms but that’s the way this appears to me, and I’m reduced to a desperate and almost certainly vain hope that the real thing will be nowhere near as bad as the advance reports predict.

So what happens if an administration – and the mostly unelected and unvetted by Congress “diplomats” who are doing the negotiating of a deal with a foreign power that is our enemy – are tantamount to Benedict Arnolds squared, on a global scale? Is there any recourse? The obvious one would be Congress somehow getting in the way or even impeaching and removing that president. But that won’t happen because it would need many Democrats to cooperate, and the requisite numbers will not be doing that. There are a few who will probably object, but they almost certainly can’t meet the 60-vote threshhold to invoke cloture. And wouldn’t Biden be able to veto any bill that might be passed, which would mean there would then be a 67-vote threshold?

What’s in it for Biden and company? What constituency does a deal like this appeal to, except for the Israel- and US-hating far left? How large is that group?

However large the public support may be – and I continue to think it’s significantly less than a majority – there are too many people in positions of power in this administration (just as in the Obama administration) who appear to be fully in favor of this insanity. Are they all moles? Are they all being blackmailed or paid off? And/or do they all want to harm the West and the US that much? Despite how cynical and skeptical and suspicious I’ve become over the years, I just can’t bring myself to answer “yes” to that last question, even though I think that’s likely to be the correct answer.

It feels like the crazy Queen of Hearts is president and that deck of playing cards her courtiers, and we – the American people – are Alice trying to wake from this nightmare:

Or maybe the president is the Mad Hatter and the rest of them are attendants at the mad tea party where logic gets twisted and things spin wildly out of control:

That’s funny. What’s happening now is not.

If Biden isn’t going to be removed, can he at least go back to not answering questions?

The New Neo Posted on by

I think it would be better that way.

The latest is this:

Biden on Wednesday called Putin a “war criminal” for the first time, upping American rhetoric and jumping ahead of a legal process that can take years.

“I think he is a war criminal,” Biden told reporters at an event at the White House….

The Senate on Tuesday unanimously passed a resolution backing a war crimes investigation into Putin and Russian forces.

The bipartisan resolution urged the International Criminal Court in The Hague and other nations to launch an investigation of war crimes committed by the Russian military during its invasion of Ukraine.

Actually, Biden initially seemed to say that Putin isn’t a war criminal, and then changed his mind:

The headline doesn’t mention that he first said “no,” then seems to have thought better of it and came back to change his answer.

The issue I have with all of this is that, in addition to the seeming vacillation within just a few moments, no good can come of it. The point isn’t whether Putin actually is a war criminal or not. He may very well be. But one of our goals should be to give Putin the opportunity for some sort of face-saving exit. Whether he would avail himself of such an exit is anyone’s guess, but it has to be something he at least thinks is open to him. That he has already been judged a war criminal can only have the effect of making him figure he may as well act that way even if he hasn’t already. Why not continue the war as brutally as possible, if he’s already going to be judged as a war criminal?

Biden’s remark also gives Putin the golden opportunity to accuse Biden of having been a war criminal, and his spokesman predictably did something of the sort:

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov called the Biden’s statement “unacceptable and unforgivable rhetoric on the part of the head of a state whose bombs have killed hundreds of thousands of people around the world,” according to Russian state news agency TASS.

I’m not even big on what Congress did in terms of asking for a war crimes investigation of Putin. At this point it’s premature and all it does is up the ante and make it harder for Putin to come up with an exit strategy. Maybe he doesn’t want one, but it’s worth it to give him a chance, and there’s nothing to be gained from screaming “war criminal” at this early date. Do people think he’ll desist from bombing civilians if we call him names?

Smollett released pending appeal

The New Neo Posted on by

Anyone surprised by this? Not me.

Smollett was granted a release on bond from the Cook County Jail in Illinois pending the appeal of his conviction. A panel of three appellate judges came down with the ruling in a 2-1 decision granting the former “Empire” star’s release after posting a personal recognizance bond of $150,000.

It is nearly the amount of the $120,106 restitution Smollett was ordered to repay after he was convicted of lying to Chicago police about being the victim of a hate crime in 2019.

The article goes on to discuss grounds for appeal – mainly double jeopardy – and the opinions of various lawyers on whether an appeal could work.

I predict that Smollett will not be seeing any more jail time.

The Babylon Bee observes: “Jussie Says He Fears For His Life As His Attackers Have Been Released.”