Dr. Gonzo

I agree with you that keeping national/ethnic identity alive is important and often times ethno-nationalism seems like the only option. I suppose it's a bit different in places like Armenia/Azerbaijan because they were once areas that were not so ethnically homogenous & are now... very ethnically homogenous. I think there's a thin little tightrope people/countries have to walk on with ethnic/nationalistic/both of those things mixed. Preservation of cultural identity is definitely something I think is important and it's something people and countries should value. But I do think it's very easy to push ethno-nationalistic views into some really evil things, not just things like ethnic cleansing either - in the Middle East and Caucasus there's now widespread misinformation campaigns and attempts to re-write history and erase some groups culture. And in some of those cases... I think it's just to create the pretext for land grabs and ethnic cleansing in the future. But I see what you mean regarding Lithuanian resistance to the Russian empire, Nazis & Soviets and feeling the importance of the Lithuanian ethnic and national identity and relating to people like the Ossetians. I'm also glad to hear there's no ethnic tensions between Samogitians & Lithuanians - and that's the way it should be for countries that have different ethnic groups that call the land home. Usually when you see a national identity isn't fractured along ethnic lines... I feel that those people who are nationalistic are a lot less hateful and negative (I dunno if that's the best word) with their nationalism. Whereas I feel many places that push ethnonationalism push their nationalism in a way that's divisive and hateful.

I dunno if we'll ever have a PM as bad as David Cameron, although Boris could run him close just because he was PM during big moments in our recent history (the man to lead us through Brexit, lol, and also the pandemic) and he's just fucking inept. But I will forever associate Cameron as the man who set the UK on the downward spiral we've seen for some time and will probably keep seeing for some time. The state of political leadership in the UK is an absolute joke, I dunno if there's any MP out there that I know of that I think would make a good PM. God help us if Gove ends up PM - he's as inept as they come and lacks any of the charisma (if you want to call it that) that BoJo the clown has. I feel it'd be the same as having Boris in charge, just more detestable.

I wikipedia'd them and learned they're considered an "Iranian ethnicity" - I had no idea, and tbh I'm not really sure what that means ... but that's cool! I listened to a bit of their language on YouTube too and... well, it's not like Dari where I can understand 98% of what's been said. Had no clue what the fella was saying! And I agree with you, I sympathise with ethnic groups that lack self determination... although I've got my own concerns about ethno-states with extreme ethno-nationalism (tbh, I dunno if Ossetians have extreme ethno-nationalism due to me knowing almost next to nothing about them - but I imagine the struggle for self-determination can lead to ethno-nationalism), especially in regions like the Caucuses which historically are home to LOTS of ethnicities. Because ethno-nationalism usually leads to the demonisation and dehumanisation of people from other ethnicities. And while all of these ethnicities have their own culture, history, languages, and traditions that make them unique... imo, there's a remarkable amount of cultural similarities between many of the different ethnicities that are closely geographically located. They're different enough that they can/should have pride in who they are as people and the history of their people - but they're similar enough to where shit like pogroms and ethnic cleansing shouldn't fucking happen. Going back to Armenia and Azerbaijan - I think both of those countries lands are also historically tied to Tat/Talysh people, who are an extremely small minority in pretty much every country where you can find them. And both countries don't have great records with their treatment of these people as well. So really Armenians and Azeris aren't the only victims of Armenian/Azeri ethno-nationalism. But uniting people around "the fear of the other" is sadly very effective and history has shown that leaders can utilise this to get people to participate in some horrific atrocities... pretty much all around the world. Are you Samogitian? I know fuck all about Lithuania, teach me!

Last year, historical Armenian land that has been occupied by mostly Armenians since… forever pretty much… but was within the borders of the Republic of Azerbaijan after the USSR fell. It was the second full blown conflict over that contested territory - the first war happened right after the Soviet Union fell and both countries gained independence. It ended with an Azerbaijan victory (basically) and a ceasefire agreement brokered by Russia. This year the conflict is a bit different - but related, Azerbaijan wanted Armenia to build a road connecting Turkey and Azerbaijan. That hasn’t happened yet, so Azerbaijan decided to take the land itself and build the road (and probably keep the land itself). The tensions between Armenia & Azerbaijan are rooted in ethnic divisions, but honestly it’s very strange because culturally they are so very similar. Ossetia’s a bit like Artsakh isn’t it? In that they claim to be an independent state within Georgia’s borders… but it’s not really internationally recognised. I dunno anything about them other than that

Yeah I thought his body was burned, but there's an absurd amount of bullshit written about what happened with his body for some reason. I think a part of it comes down to his cult of personality and the years of propaganda that so many people couldn't believe he died by suicide and was burned in a ditch/artillery crater.

It's an easy conspiracy theory to spread because of all the Nazis that ended up fleeing to South America & because I don't think Hitler and Eva Braun's remains were ever confirmed to be found. Seeing as how other high profile Nazis were successfully hunted - I suspect if he was alive, they'd have found out about it. There's been a Russian brokered ceasefire. The situation between Armenia and Azerbaijan sort of highlights the problems of intense ethno-nationalism and demonstrates some huge failures of diplomacy. After the first Nagorno-Karabagh war there was an international coalition, the OSCE Minsk Group - made up of the US, France, and Russia to encourage a successful and peaceful resolution to the tensions over Nagorno-Karabagh... ... and they didn't negotiate a successful or peaceful resolution. They just sort of let the situation simmer and hoped that both countries, who don't have diplomatic relations with each other and rely on the Minsk Group to act as mediators of diplomacy, would just accept the status quo from 1992 forever. And it seems Azerbaijan spent decades trying to modernise it's military, while Armenia sort of got complacent and I think also was happy to just accept the status quo. So while there were flare ups of violence every so often over a few decades, nothing was quite like the sustained period of warfare they were involved in last year. And Armenia's military found itself outmanned, outgunned, and really unable to stop Azerbaijan from claiming the contested territory. The ceasefire negotiated said it would allow for a corridor to connect Turkey & Azerbaijan crossing through Armenia... but as the 2 countries don't directly talk to each other, the progress on that concession by Armenia stalled. Now Azerbaijan knows that Armenia can't really stop them with their military... and since diplomacy continues to fail, they know that force will get them what they want. So ultimately, I think the bloodshed of last year and this year sort of falls squarely on the Minsk group and it's failure to mediate better relations and a peaceful resolution between both countries. And ultimately, I think Armenia's a bit fucked if they're hoping for help from the international community. Because Azerbaijan's got a lot of natural resources, whereas Armenia doesn't have so much (although it does have rare and valuable metals). Armenia is valuable to Russia as a counterweight to Turkey/NATO interests in the Caucasus - but I think it's probably not as important to Russia right now as what it's doing in pressuring the EU through it's actions in Crimea/Belarus. Azerbaijan is considered an important to the EU because of natural gas pipelines - which sort of puts France and the US (because it's got a strong interest in keeping the EU happy) more on the side of the aggressor in this situation. Do other post-USSR states have the same kind of ethnic tensions as Armenia and Azerbaijan? My wife, who's of Armenian-Iranian descent, grew up with lots of Azeri-Iranian friends and her social group has tons of both Armenian and Azeris in it, albiet different to Armenians and Azeris from Armenia and Azerbaijan respectively because of their Iranian background. So to her, it's all very bizarre to her that this has happened... and she recently (well last year) learned of anti-Armenian pogroms in Azerbaijan & anti-Azeri pogroms in Armenia and she was totally shocked. But both Azerbaijan and Armenia were both part of the USSR and both nations are pretty big on ethnonationalism, so I'm wondering if that Soviet connection has anything to do with it?

Those are all good points and I don't dispute any of them. And I also agree with @nudge that peer review is a deeply flawed process that could/should be improved - or just be left the way it is... but should be better explained to the public - and that many scientific research studies/reports are highly political in nature. Having said all that, despite the flaws, when there's a scientific consensus on something it means there's reasoning based off things that were observed to achieve that consensus. So it's always worth looking at what the scientific consensus has to say about something because there's something backing those ideas. I'm not saying we should just blindly believe every scientist we hear

Turns out Senegal's coach is more trustworthy than Gareth Southgate (although, not surprised tbh). Mane should be available for our next match... Henderson's doubtful though.

Azerbaijan is attacking Armenia again - this time not contested territory, but “Armenia proper”

Robertson injured as well.

Tbh I don't trust international teams when they say they've left players out for "precautionary" reasons given their history of returning players to us injured after we've been told they didn't play because of a precaution.

I think it's a bizarre statement because science isn't a person - science is a body of knowledge that is built from testing predictions about the world and then observing and learning from those predictions. I don't think any scientist would claim that "science knows everything" because the very premise of science being a body of knowledge that grows as you continue to test hypotheses indicates that: 1.) scientists don't know everything; 2.) scientists not knowing everything drives science forward and keeps hypotheses coming, gets them tested, and observations are then reported. The body of knowledge grows constantly. We should trust science because it's made up of centuries of work from experts throughout time and is based on real world tested hypotheses and observable findings from those tests. Does that mean it's perfect? No, absolutely not... and we know that scientific findings can change over time. But it seems weird that with all science has done for modern medicine... and the modern world in general... we sometimes pick and choose what we want to believe from the scientific experts. We trust virologists when they present solutions to other viral infections. Why not COVID?

Anything Tucker Carlson says that is anti-vaccine should be taken with a huge pinch of salt. And really anyone on Fox News, tbh. Because out of all US employers, Fox News was one of the earliest adopters of mandating their employees get vaccinated and has rigidly enforced it for months. Tucker Carlson is probably one of the highest profile anti-vaxxers in the United States... and he's been fully vaccinated for months. Tbh, he's probably even received his booster jab.

The amount of shit the American right wing has said about Fauci, because he's taken the virus seriously and advocated that people alter the way they live (temporarily) so that the US can get over the virus, is absurd. A lot of people have made up their minds: they don't care how many people die or if they get sick/get others sick - they just want their lives to be like they were before the pandemic whatever the cost. So they are willing to vilify those that are telling them what they don't want to hear. I think EVERYONE wants their lives to be what they were pre-pandemic... but most people don't want to get sick or get other people sick. The way people can actually achieve freedom from the virus is if we've got enough people vaccinated worldwide. It's likely that COVID is here to stay - it'll be endemic and probably impossible to fully eradicate.

Tucker Carlson is an absolute moron and shouldn't be listened to by anybody. And Rand Paul isn't stupid, but he's a very dishonest man that is just using the virus and the reactions to things like being told to wear masks or get vaccinated to score political points. Rand Paul's most upset by the world being impacted by COVID but doesn't want anyone to do anything that would mitigate the risk of COVID or move society on. And despite being vaccinated is a very loud voice against people being vaccinated. He's a hypocritical arsehole playing up "freedom" for political points while offering no way forward to provide society with actual freedom from the virus.

Isn't that just the nature of science? You learn more things as you go - and this was a novel virus when the first outbreaks started spreading. We are honestly fortunate that there was vaccine work done for SARS and MERS that could be built on for the current vaccines we have available and that we weren't having to have our scientists make a vaccine from scratch. I don't think scientists changing their mind about things they uncover about what was very recently a novel virus is that much of a concern - I think it would be weirder if scientists positions weren't changing based off what they've learned from their observations. I don't think viewing "science" as a know it all is really the right way to be looking at it. Scientists make their decisions based off what they observe and what they learn - the more we observe and learn from COVID the better their guidance will be. Using science to back decisions made for medical health/public health is very reasonable because it's based off what experts have observed and learned from. I think it's certainly better than relying on business decisions for matters of public health (because when you put profits ahead of public health, it'll dictate that everything goes back to pretty much what life was like pre-pandemic without much concern for how many people die of COVID) or what's politically convenient (which I think Boris Johnson still hasn't really learned )

Legend.

I dunno if we can say that without proof linking the 2. Heart attacks at amateur matches things have been going up in lots of sports in the past decade. There’s a number of things it could be attributed to more than covid, like diet and the general healthiness of the population. We also don’t know who’s had covid and has long term effects of the virus, because it does target the heart, and then subsequently thinking they’re better as they carry long term effects. But it’s really just guessing without the data.

Um… it’s happened before way before covid was a thing

Henderson sent back to us to be assessed for his injury

Mane injured on international duty... leaves us pretty light up top with Bobby's injury as well.

I'll have several probably

Going to Hawaii in January. Never been, always wanted to go ever since I’d seen pictures of it on the internet when I was 12, never thought I’d actually go. Should be cool

Will be gutted to lose Michael Edwards.

Weirdly, in the US it's also looking like the states that have the highest number of vaccine skeptics and the most resistance to mandates are suffering a far higher rate of COVID deaths. I wonder if there's any correlation... It's also been sad to see that people are dying over what looks to be a mostly partisan divide. Which begs the question... why is public health being turned into a political issue? Did this happen with polio or the measures taken to contain the Spanish flu? It seems strange to me that in some places politicians are sort of taking the stance that's likely to kill some of the people that vote for them.