America's Smug Elite Is Harming Our Kids: The push to decouple skepticism from science turns schoolchildren into victims
Russell and Patterson published an essay on the warped discourse that led to extended school closures:
[Elites have openly embraced the notion that the public is better served by exaggeration, downplaying uncertainty, or even deception (such as in official estimates of herd immunity). This disdain for healthy skepticism, a normal part of functioning science and democracy, is corrosive to public trust and impedes the accumulation of knowledge. A climate of overconfidence makes it both more likely that we will adopt bad policy and harder to fix our missteps. …
America’s schoolchildren have been one of the primary victims of this toxic climate. … Many opponents of reopening questioned the motives of those advocating it, rather than their actual arguments. … It is very difficult to defend a reasonable position about school reopening when one is being accused of murderous intent, or playing “Russian roulette” with respect to children or teachers.
While it is tempting—especially in the wake of a presidency that showed a keen disregard for facts—to suggest that elite culture is simply tamping down misinformation, this is a self-serving myth. Most who study scientific communication have found that admitting uncertainty doesn’t harm public trust.
Read the full article, “America’s Smug Elite Is Harming Our Kids,” Tablet