It’s a little disappointing to discover that 70% of Britons favour totalitarian ideas.
About seven in 10 Brits are in favour of location-tracking technology during the coronavirus pandemic – regardless of if it’s opt-in or compulsory, a study suggests.
UK researchers conducted surveys of more than 3,500 British adults last spring, during the grips of the virus’s first wave, on their willingness to use such tech.
70 per cent were in favour of having their location tracked via opt-in apps on their smartphone to help authorities identify if they’ve been exposed to people with Covid-19.
This figure declined only marginally – to 65 per cent, or nearly two-thirds – if this app was compulsory and enforced by the government with fines and arrests.
The findings suggest Britons are either coming to accept of privacy-encroaching technology or are just willing to allow exceptions to get out of lockdown as soon as possible.
I would never agree to this. It’s an obscene idea, yet people around me are happy with it?
While the study suggests the public supports tracking tech, the findings are not reflected in the number of people who have downloaded the NHS Test and Trace app, prompting calls for this issue to be addressed.
‘Attitudes were surprisingly permissive and this is good news for public health,’ said study lead author Professor Stephan Lewandowsky, chair in cognitive psychology at the University of Bristol.
‘But there appears to be a significant gap between what people say they’re willing to do and what they actually do, which needs further investigation.’
Lack of uptake is a big problem because such systems need more than half – 56 per cent – of the general population on board to be effective in helping control a pandemic, Professor Lewandowsky said.
Ah, so perhaps not as bad, then. Still too damned many, but at least it shows that revealed preferences present a somewhat different picture. I have never downloaded the app and never signed into anywhere as a consequence. Anecdotal, I know, but I see a significant range of people in my profession and the vast majority hate what is going on, haven’t downloaded the app and like me, don’t sign into premises when we stop for a lunch break. My faith in humanity is almost restored.
As of the end of last month, nearly 21 million people in the UK had downloaded the NHS Test and Trace app, which is more than 10 million below target for it to work properly.
Oh dear, how sad, never mind.
Meanwhile, HMG is trying scare tactics.
A new series of terrifying TV ads urging Britons to stay at home will air from tonight, as ministers face accusations of ‘scaremongering’ with claims that the UK’s Covid variant could be more deadly.
The shock tactic adverts will feature close-ups of patients who have had Covid wearing oxygen masks accompanied by bold thought provoking messages.
In accompanying posters, Britons will be told to look into the patient’s eyes and ‘tell her you never bend the rules’.
This is bordering on the puerile as far as propaganda is concerned. Smokers had this bullshit for years. As it is, this kind of emotional blackmail simply doesn’t work on me as I am immune to such shallow psychological trickery – my usual response to attempts to manipulate me in this manner merely strengthens my resolve. That and I don’t watch TV adverts anyway.
“Meanwhile, HMG is trying scare tactics”
In a small ray of light – considering what a bunch of pro government toadies infest the ASA – this is quite surprising:
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2021/01/21/government-discontinue-covid-ad-accusing-joggers-exercising/
I thought the NHS app failed (as usual with NHS IT) even with a low number taking part. Maybe a faraday box will become a common accessory
Longrider
Google ‘Germany Masks’ – Bloomberg is behind a paywall but apparently the German Government is mandating surgical masks rather than just any face coverings now!
Also planning to put people who won’t quarantine into detention camps – apparently historically blind to the optics of such a measure…
The lights are going out all over the world (save for Sweden, Tanzania and Belarus) – we may not see them lit again in our lifetime
I always thought that trying to identify everyone that you had contact with in the two weeks that you were supposedly incubating the virus was an absurd proposition. Even if you only met ten people, you then have the hundred or so people that they met and the thousands and tens of thousands that they met and so on. How could anyone think that it could possibly work? Interesting gulf between what people say and what they actually do. Usually people are very much in favour of draconian rules that only apply to other people.
I think the disconnect is not so much “Expressed versus revealed preferences” as that people surveyed think other people should be forced to do this but not themselves. A bit like those surveys were people say taxes should be raised on other people.
As for practicalities, if any form of compulsory tracking was implemented, I’d simply go without mine where ever I go and wear my hearing aids. “Where’s your phone sir?” would be simply responded to with “Can’t you see I’m deaf? What use would I have for a phone”.
Use their own bullshit and Disability Rights Act against them.
I was just about to post with this exact view. Thanks, John, for saving me the time- I thoroughly agree with you. My boy is currently at Oxbridge. He says it’s a common view in his age range- a rather totalitarian view coming from the Millennials, but when pressed they seem to think it will affect others, rather than themselves…
Revealed preference are what matters. Surveys biased questions can achieve whatever result payer wants
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j3I6hcuzMVY
Some good news
Why on earth do we trust polls run by the vaccine minister? See who owns yougov……
The polls will say whatever they are paid to say.
Blojo is a politician, lying is all he knows.
Funny how none of these polls ask me what I think. Must be the same bunch of totalitarian fuckwits they ask every time.
‘Attitudes were surprisingly permissive and this is good news for public health,’ said study lead author Professor Stephan Lewandowsky, chair in cognitive psychology at the University of Bristol.
Ah, the incomparable Lew Paper, notorious for his psychobabble in the realm of climate ‘science’. His paper “NASA faked the moon landing – therefore (Climate Science) is a hoax: an anatomy of the motivated rejection of science”, tried to show that climate ‘deniers’ are all whacko conspiracy theorists. He cooked what little data he had bothered to gather, to come up with the number he first thought of – of course. A weapons grade charlatan – so of course the powers that be fawn over him Ugh.
‘But there appears to be a significant gap between what people say they’re willing to do and what they actually do, which needs further investigation.’
Never! What a revelation! So stump up some more taxpayer cash to enable Lew Paper to do some ‘further investigation’. Did I mention that he’s a charlatan? Sickening.