Let's talk about Baitcon....
Mar. 25th, 2021 04:22 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
chhotii posting in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png){kind=small}
baitconI wish to make a couple of points:
1) By this spring, a number of us will have been vaccinated.
2) Scientists say that one is much less likely to catch COVID-19 outdoors than indoors, all other things being equal.
Look: Last summer, there were massive George Floyd protests, thousands of people gathering to protest, and these caused no discernible blip on the COVID rates. Why? Those events were outdoors. People were not idiots. People tried to keep space between themselves and people they don't live with, and 99% wore masks correctly. OTOH, many other events, events attended by people in denial, were superspreader events. Why? People gathered indoors, hugged, shook hands, and didn't wear masks.
I believe we can have a Baitcon this year. It would probably have to look a little different. I understand that not everyone will have been vaccinated by late June or whenever. Here's what I imagine we would have to modify:
1) Social distancing as the default expectation. No getting within a couple of feet of people you don't already hang out with regularly without the kind of discussion and consent-giving that you would usually require before more intimate interaction.
2) Masks. We all know how to wear masks now, yes? Yes.
3) Servers in the food line rather than everyone touches the food
4) Dishes are drop-and-go, with volunteers taking dish-washing shifts, rather than we stand elbow to elbow to do our individual dishes (yes I am willing to do dish-washing shifts)
5) Orderly ice cream service, rather than the mosh pit of ice cream grabbing (some of us might actually like this change)
6) Probably fewer flavors of ice cream, to make this feasible. Some large batches of proven known favorites.
7) Up to the last minute and beyond refund policy (before saying "that's financially infeasible", talk to me, let's discuss ideas?)
8) Only one family group at a time in a shower area
If, as the time approaches, the numbers in the news are making us feel ooky about all this, we could step up the precautions even further:
9) PCR testing beforehand for anyone not vaccinated yet?
10) Close every other toilet stall?
11) Wait outside in line for sinks?
I know, ugh, I'm sure we all wish that things could be exactly the same as they always were. Might not yet be possible for us to party like it's 2019. But I'd rather do a Baitcon with the above modifications than have yet another weekend at home, looking at the same damn four walls as the previous 375 or so days of March so far.
Discuss?
1) By this spring, a number of us will have been vaccinated.
2) Scientists say that one is much less likely to catch COVID-19 outdoors than indoors, all other things being equal.
Look: Last summer, there were massive George Floyd protests, thousands of people gathering to protest, and these caused no discernible blip on the COVID rates. Why? Those events were outdoors. People were not idiots. People tried to keep space between themselves and people they don't live with, and 99% wore masks correctly. OTOH, many other events, events attended by people in denial, were superspreader events. Why? People gathered indoors, hugged, shook hands, and didn't wear masks.
I believe we can have a Baitcon this year. It would probably have to look a little different. I understand that not everyone will have been vaccinated by late June or whenever. Here's what I imagine we would have to modify:
1) Social distancing as the default expectation. No getting within a couple of feet of people you don't already hang out with regularly without the kind of discussion and consent-giving that you would usually require before more intimate interaction.
2) Masks. We all know how to wear masks now, yes? Yes.
3) Servers in the food line rather than everyone touches the food
4) Dishes are drop-and-go, with volunteers taking dish-washing shifts, rather than we stand elbow to elbow to do our individual dishes (yes I am willing to do dish-washing shifts)
5) Orderly ice cream service, rather than the mosh pit of ice cream grabbing (some of us might actually like this change)
6) Probably fewer flavors of ice cream, to make this feasible. Some large batches of proven known favorites.
7) Up to the last minute and beyond refund policy (before saying "that's financially infeasible", talk to me, let's discuss ideas?)
8) Only one family group at a time in a shower area
If, as the time approaches, the numbers in the news are making us feel ooky about all this, we could step up the precautions even further:
9) PCR testing beforehand for anyone not vaccinated yet?
10) Close every other toilet stall?
11) Wait outside in line for sinks?
I know, ugh, I'm sure we all wish that things could be exactly the same as they always were. Might not yet be possible for us to party like it's 2019. But I'd rather do a Baitcon with the above modifications than have yet another weekend at home, looking at the same damn four walls as the previous 375 or so days of March so far.
Discuss?
no subject
Date: 2021-03-25 09:14 pm (UTC)My main concern is around food. Not about handling shared utensils, since at this point I'm pretty well convinced that that's not a serious transmission mode, but about the dining area -- that's mask-off time, with a lot of people in a small area at the same time. If there's rain, how will we get enough space to spread out. Maybe there could be additional, fully open-sided tents?
My other big concern is transportation. A lot of people carpool, not necessarily with people who would be in their pod. Windows-open might be OK? Especially if people quarantine beforehand.
Other than that, yeah, should totally be doable in a safe way.
And yeah, by mid to late summer, I expect that basically everyone at elevated risk will have been vaccinated, and many of the rest as well.
The other thing to look into is what restrictions on gatherings New York state and the local town might be imposing.
no subject
Date: 2021-03-25 11:03 pm (UTC)Car-pooling might present difficulties in some cases. I don't imagine things will be feasible for everyone.
I am very interested in car-pooling if it doesn't require 120 miles on the turnpike with the windows down. Closer to the date, we should update re: vaccination status, risk tolerance, and vehicles.
no subject
Date: 2021-03-26 12:32 am (UTC)I'm inclined to stick with much smaller plans and vacations, but I know I'm lucky for that to be an option for me.
no subject
Date: 2021-03-28 04:13 am (UTC)My biggest concern is that there won't be a vaccine approved for kids by that time, so there will be a lot of unvaccinated kids running around, and not all of them are good about masks and distancing.
In all honesty, I think I'd find an entire weekend of having to manage masks and distancing for all waking hours more exhausting and stressful than enjoyable. I think I'd want there to be a strict rule that you can't go unless you're vaxed (as in, you have to send in a scan of your card showing your second shot the appropriate number of weeks previously). Probably have to push it off to August for that to work.
no subject
Date: 2021-03-28 06:04 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2021-04-28 02:38 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2021-04-29 11:24 pm (UTC)Personally I think it's all just ridiculous because
1) it's an outdoor event
2) seems like everyone who wants a vaccine (barring contraindications) is able to get one right about now
Having been vaccinated, I would go in a heartbeat, if it were possible, with minimal precautions. No non-consensual hugs and let's do away with the mosh pit of ice-cream grabbing. But that's just 99% ok, not 99.999% ok.
no subject
Date: 2021-04-30 02:33 am (UTC)yeah i don't disagree. I do see the problem with a bunch of unvaxxed kids around, but the other side of it is that exposure amounts matter too, so being unvaxxed doesn't automatically turn someone into an immediate menace. Kids could conceivably be kept home a while before travel, for example.
(yes I know this is academic. Watching people talk about maybe eventually doing some sort of picnic after they and all their friends are fully vaxxed is driving me nuts, because as long as Distance is maintained that's been fine ever since we realized aerosol vs droplet.)
https://www.avast.com/sig-email?utm_medium=email&utm_source=link&utm_campaign=sig-email&utm_content=webmail&utm_term=icon Virus-free. www.avast.com https://www.avast.com/sig-email?utm_medium=email&utm_source=link&utm_campaign=sig-email&utm_content=webmail&utm_term=link <#m_3329353021516327837_DAB4FAD8-2DD7-40BB-A1B8-4E2AA1F9FDF2>
no subject
Date: 2021-04-30 02:55 am (UTC)(It's not the decision I want to have to make—I wish they'd done the trials on kids alongside the trials on adults, a year ago—but I think that's where we'll be at in a few months.)