Not quite. I’m arguing that they did the best that they legally could when constrained by bad policy. These are hard ethical calls. Do you continue working for an org that you think is heading in the wrong direction, or do you try to do your best from inside?

@Justfirenews I think about this a lot. For instance, my university brought back uni students for in-person learning last fall w no surveillance testing or modified housing. I thought that was a reckless decision. But I didn’t quit my job...
@Justfirenews Partially bc the balance of the work my colleagues were doing locally, nationally, & globally was so important and I could support that in a small way. Also income and longterm professional goals that I think will help public health beyond covid.
@Justfirenews I think my position is justified. I think the work of many of my applied public health colleagues has been heroic and harm-reducing.
@Justfirenews But I recognize that there are always ethical minefields. For instance, finders. My research is mostly supported by the federal government. I think it’s ethical to use that money for my work. But what about Department of Defense? They also...
@Justfirenews ...fund a lot of important work but I know some people who don’t think it’s ok to take that money. What about private foundations that support causes I find antithetical to my values? There’s at least two times I didn’t apply for something bc of the funders.
@Justfirenews ...but I understand why someone else would. And I understand that others may feel my own partnerships with government funders are not maximally ethical. These are real questions.
@Justfirenews But my interactions with low- and mid-level federal, state, and local applied public health folks don’t fall into this camp. From what I’ve seen, these people have behaved heroically in the midst of an awful situation...
@Justfirenews like medical providers forced to do triage bc they don’t have the staff, supplies and support they need, applied public health folks have been forced into situations with tradeoffs they should not have had to make. It’s very very heavy.
@Justfirenews But they are too busy working their a**es off to be on Twitter explaining good all themselves. So I feel called up give witness to what I’ve seen of their work. It’s moving. As bad as it is, it could have been even worse. They are the best of us.
@Justfirenews So many typos. But hopefully the message comes through.

More from For later read

Part of what is going on here is that large sectors of evangelicalism are poorly equipped to help people deal with basic struggles, let alone the ubiquitous pornography addictions that most of their men have been enslaved to for years.


On the one hand, there's a high standard of holiness. On the other hand, there's a model of growth that is basically "Try Harder to Mean it More." Identify the relevant scriptural truth & believe it with all of your sincerity so that you may access the Holy Spirit's help to obey.

Helping sincere believers believe and obey the Bible facts is pretty much all the Holy Spirit does these days, other than convict us of our sins in light of the Bible facts.

If you know you are sincere and hate your sin and believe the right Bible facts as hard as you can but continue to be enslaved to your pornography addiction, what else left for you to do? Just Really, Just Really, Just Really Trust God and Give it to Him?

To suggest that there are other strategies available sounds to those formed in this model of growth like one is also suggesting that the Bible is insufficient, but it also suggests something just as threatening- that there are aspects of reality that are not immediately apparent.

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