French Politics Thread I: Borne to be wild

[Kowani]

Total aside, but how tf do you pronounce rie

i believe it is [ʁi]

[Kubra]

Total aside, but how tf do you pronounce rie

i believe it is [ʁi]

yeah but like *how*
How doee one manipulate their tongue and mouth to make such a sound
It has confounded me for years and I will sometimes wake in the middle of the night drenched in cold sweat at the thought

[Kowani]

i believe it is [ʁi]

yeah but like *how*
How doee one manipulate their tongue and mouth to make such a sound
It has confounded me for years and I will sometimes wake in the middle of the night drenched in cold sweat at the thought

i aspirate over my tongue and drop it back away from my teeth

not the most scientific explanation but oh well

[Kilobugya]

Macron sues billboard operator for depicting him as Hitler in a banner

Well, I guess that's "public injury" and "defamation". Political figures have a huge bar to clear to win such a trial since the right to satire is protected, but only to a limit, so not sure what will happen.

[Kilobugya]

i believe it is [ʁi]

yeah but like *how*
How doee one manipulate their tongue and mouth to make such a sound
It has confounded me for years and I will sometimes wake in the middle of the night drenched in cold sweat at the thought

Hum... maybe it's because I'm a native French but I don't find it hard, and I don't do anything special with the tongue, it stays near the bottom teeth, the "r" is mostly down with the throat, and the vowels are easy (and the "e" is silent).

[Kubra]

yeah but like *how*
How doee one manipulate their tongue and mouth to make such a sound
It has confounded me for years and I will sometimes wake in the middle of the night drenched in cold sweat at the thought

i aspirate over my tongue and drop it back away from my teeth

not the most scientific explanation but oh well

That's what I do but it is not quite right

yeah but like *how*
How doee one manipulate their tongue and mouth to make such a sound
It has confounded me for years and I will sometimes wake in the middle of the night drenched in cold sweat at the thought

Hum... maybe it's because I'm a native French but I don't find it hard, and I don't do anything special with the tongue, it stays near the bottom teeth, the "r" is mostly down with the throat, and the vowels are easy (and the "e" is silent).

Well, yes, and I assume you'd had been at least bit confounded with how r's are used in english.
I tell ya what, I feel like r is the most divisive letter in europe. It has to be the hardest letter involved with nailing the sound of a language.

[Kilobugya]

So, today is first day of class in France. Kids and teens from 3 to 18 are all going back to schools.

The real issue is that nothing was done regarding to the ongoing pandemics. Older kids, age 12+, can be vaccinated, but only around 60% of them are, and younger kids can't get vaccinated yet. And while Covid is much less dangerous for children than for adults, there are already about 150 minors in hospital for Covid right now, including over 20 in intensive care, and about 5% of Covid case among children leave long-term issues. And of course, children can spread the disease to other, more vulnerable persons, like their family.

For example, it has been more than one year that some teachers and parents are calling for the state to buy CO2 detection devices for every classroom and install air purification devices wherever needed, but the government doesn't want to spend money for that.

So what does the minister of education (JM Blanquer) do, to shift the focus from "once again, children are sent to unsafe school because the government just doesn't want to spend money" ? He creates a polemic out of thin air, based on lies, to stigmatize and insult the poor. We have "allocation de rentrée scolaire" which is paid by the state every year in September to families with medium-to-low incomes, to pay for the costs of school material. So Blanquer starts saying on TV that those families are cheating and « using the money to buy flat screens TV, as everyone knows, there is a hike in sales in september ». Apart from showing he's from a bygone era (no one ever says "flat screen TV" anymore, we just say "TV") it's just a plain lie - statistics show that september is actually one of the months where the lower amount of TV are sold, and several polls show that over 95% of the money of "allocation de rentrée scolaire" is indeed used to buy school furniture.

It may seem anecdotical, but it's very significant of how this government operates. Don't do anything to solve the real issues (and who cares if hundred of children end up in hospitals, if tens of thousands have long-term health problems), then create a fake polemic, built on plain lies and spreading the assumption that poor people being irresponsible is the main reason our country is sliding backwards. Disgusting.

[Thermodolia]

So, today is first day of class in France. Kids and teens from 3 to 18 are all going back to schools.

The real issue is that nothing was done regarding to the ongoing pandemics. Older kids, age 12+, can be vaccinated, but only around 60% of them are, and younger kids can't get vaccinated yet. And while Covid is much less dangerous for children than for adults, there are already about 150 minors in hospital for Covid right now, including over 20 in intensive care, and about 5% of Covid case among children leave long-term issues. And of course, children can spread the disease to other, more vulnerable persons, like their family.

For example, it has been more than one year that some teachers and parents are calling for the state to buy CO2 detection devices for every classroom and install air purification devices wherever needed, but the government doesn't want to spend money for that.

So what does the minister of education (JM Blanquer) do, to shift the focus from "once again, children are sent to unsafe school because the government just doesn't want to spend money" ? He creates a polemic out of thin air, based on lies, to stigmatize and insult the poor. We have "allocation de rentrée scolaire" which is paid by the state every year in September to families with medium-to-low incomes, to pay for the costs of school material. So Blanquer starts saying on TV that those families are cheating and « using the money to buy flat screens TV, as everyone knows, there is a hike in sales in september ». Apart from showing he's from a bygone era (no one ever says "flat screen TV" anymore, we just say "TV") it's just a plain lie - statistics show that september is actually one of the months where the lower amount of TV are sold, and several polls show that over 95% of the money of "allocation de rentrée scolaire" is indeed used to buy school furniture.

It may seem anecdotical, but it's very significant of how this government operates. Don't do anything to solve the real issues (and who cares if hundred of children end up in hospitals, if tens of thousands have long-term health problems), then create a fake polemic, built on plain lies and spreading the assumption that poor people being irresponsible is the main reason our country is sliding backwards. Disgusting.

Not to detract from the main point of your post but if we where able to get 60% of the 12 to 18 age group vaccinated id be over the moon. Right now we are barely topping 24%

[Kilobugya]

Not to detract from the main point of your post but if we where able to get 60% of the 12 to 18 age group vaccinated id be over the moon. Right now we are barely topping 24%

On that aspect we did quite well - the exact data aren't very easy to find, because official statistics give the percentage for 0-18 not for 12-18 and kids younger than 12 can't get vaccinated, but when you recompute on the 12-18 demographics you get around 60% who had at least their first dose, 40% fully vaccinated (but those who only got their first dose will hopefully get the second one soon).

I suspect it's in huge part because some extrascholar activities will require to be vaccinated if above 12, and that the "sanitary protocol" states that in case of a Covid case in a school, non-vaccinated children attending that school will have to stay home for 7 days.

[Michel Meilleur]

Not to detract from the main point of your post but if we where able to get 60% of the 12 to 18 age group vaccinated id be over the moon. Right now we are barely topping 24%

On that aspect we did quite well - the exact data aren't very easy to find, because official statistics give the percentage for 0-18 not for 12-18 and kids younger than 12 can't get vaccinated, but when you recompute on the 12-18 demographics you get around 60% who had at least their first dose, 40% fully vaccinated (but those who only got their first dose will hopefully get the second one soon).

I suspect it's in huge part because some extrascholar activities will require to be vaccinated if above 12, and that the "sanitary protocol" states that in case of a Covid case in a school, non-vaccinated children attending that school will have to stay home for 7 days.

It's not limited to just schools. Turns out that bullying people out of having a life if they don't get the vaccine works better than asking them nicely when it comes to pumping them vaccination numbers.

[Kilobugya]

It's not limited to just schools. Turns out that bullying people out of having a life if they don't get the vaccine works better than asking them nicely when it comes to pumping them vaccination numbers.

Preventing people from endangering others isn't "bullying" by any stretch. And while the "pass sanitaire" did boost vaccination numbers, it didn't radically change them either, and more pushed procrastinators to stop waiting and finally do it, which is good in itself, but doesn't fit our narrative.

As for "asking them nicely", it would have worked much better if the government didn't throw lie upon lie since the beginning of the pandemics (and even before) and didn't react with rubber bullet and tear gas to every kind of social protest. And if they used pedagogy, like airing on TV small videos done by professional science educators explaining how the vaccines work.

[Michel Meilleur]

Preventing people from endangering others isn't "bullying" by any stretch. And while the "pass sanitaire" did boost vaccination numbers, it didn't radically change them either, and more pushed procrastinators to stop waiting and finally do it, which is good in itself, but doesn't fit our narrative.

In other words, it forced peoples (who made up quite a bit of the population) who didn't want the vaccine to get it because the alternative was being made to pay to get an intrusive test every time they wanted to do anything, even if they're wearing a mask and respecting protective measures.
That is bullying. It's not a judgement of valor, just of fact. Making the vaccine mandatory wouldn't be bullying, but making peoples lives' miserable until they take it make it very much so.

As for "asking them nicely", it would have worked much better if the government didn't throw lie upon lie since the beginning of the pandemics (and even before) and didn't react with rubber bullet and tear gas to every kind of social protest.

You're preaching to the choir in that regard. I'm probably just as, if not more, disgusted by the government's behavior than you because I have family in the medical sector and I saw just how abandoned and betrayed they were, not only by the government but by society at large.
Clapping is nice and all, I'd much rather that they stop closing beds and not re-hiring nurses when the hospitals are already working way over their maximum capacity.

And if they used pedagogy, like airing on TV small videos done by professional science educators explaining how the vaccines work.

The reason why the situation is so shit politically speaking is because the working class is sick and tired of being treated like infants by bourgeasses who think they know better than everyone, even when they clearly don't.
Adding another layer of infantilisation is not going to make things better, far from it.

[Kilobugya]

Preventing people from endangering others isn't "bullying" by any stretch. And while the "pass sanitaire" did boost vaccination numbers, it didn't radically change them either, and more pushed procrastinators to stop waiting and finally do it, which is good in itself, but doesn't fit our narrative.

In other words, it forced peoples (who made up quite a bit of the population) who didn't want the vaccine to get it because the alternative was being made to pay to get an intrusive test every time they wanted to do anything, even if they're wearing a mask and respecting protective measures.

Most who got the vaccines after "pass sanitaire" was instored were not people who didn't want the vaccine, but people who were procrastinating "yeah yeah I'll get it done one day", and it just pushed them to stop waiting. Very few who didn't want the vaccine at all finally got it. As for "respecting protective measures" you know as well as I do how many people wear their masks incorrectly, ... so we can't rely fully on that. And masks aren't 100% efficient either, they do help a lot, but they aren't enough against a very contagious strain like delta.

That is bullying. It's not a judgement of valor, just of fact. Making the vaccine mandatory wouldn't be bullying, but making peoples lives' miserable until they take it make it very much so.

No, bullying would have been to make their life painful on purpose. That's not the main point, if it were they wouldn't allow PCR tests instead of vaccine, for example. The main point is preventing people for endangering others. Unvaccinated people spread the virus 4-6x more than vaccinated one, it's an enormous difference in epidemics control. Allowing unvaccinated people to concentrate in indoor places endangers the whole population, saturate the healthcare system, and increases the risk of new, even worse, strains appearing. There is a very legitimate reason to prevent that, so it's not bullying.

You're preaching to the choir in that regard. I'm probably just as, if not more, disgusted by the government's behavior than you because I have family in the medical sector and I saw just how abandoned and betrayed they were, not only by the government but by society at large.
Clapping is nice and all, I'd much rather that they stop closing beds and not re-hiring nurses when the hospitals are already working way over their maximum capacity.

On that we definitely agree - I was protesting the government closing hospital beds even before Covid-19 appeared.

And if they used pedagogy, like airing on TV small videos done by professional science educators explaining how the vaccines work.

The reason why the situation is so shit politically speaking is because the working class is sick and tired of being treated like infants by bourgeasses who think they know better than everyone, even when they clearly don't.
Adding another layer of infantilisation is not going to make things better, far from it.

Explaining how things work isn't "infantilisation". Most people don't know what mRNA is, how it relates to DNA, how mRNA virus and vaccines work, ... Explaining it to them isn't about considering them to be children. I'm not saying we should show them "il était une fois la vie"-like cartoons. And yes, biologists and doctors know more about how the immune system work than "everyone", like a plumber knows more about pipes and a farmer knows more about growing crops, isn't it pretty normal for people having different jobs to know more about their speciality ?

[Michel Meilleur]

Most who got the vaccines after "pass sanitaire" was instored were not people who didn't want the vaccine, but people who were procrastinating "yeah yeah I'll get it done one day", and it just pushed them to stop waiting. Very few who didn't want the vaccine at all finally got it. As for "respecting protective measures" you know as well as I do how many people wear their masks incorrectly, ... so we can't rely fully on that. And masks aren't 100% efficient either, they do help a lot, but they aren't enough against a very contagious strain like delta.

"I'll get it one day" is the polite way to say "I don't want to get it at all", tho. Most peoples I know (which fair enough might be younger than your own circle of friends and it might explain the difference in attitude), me included, didn't get it it because we wanted to or because we trust the vaccine's actual effectiveness (which is already showing to be rather shit, to say the least). We did it because we wanted to still be able to go drink a pint, sweat a bit at the gym or see the new Kaamelott in theaters; without those measures.
Personally, I would have rather waited one more year for two or three more variants to emerge and be taken into account before getting my shots, rather than the current situation where the vaccine has about 3/5 efficiency against Delta and probably even less against the Mu that is coming meaning that we're going to need a third and probably fourth shot anyway.

No, bullying would have been to make their life painful on purpose. That's not the main point, if it were they wouldn't allow PCR tests instead of vaccine, for example. The main point is preventing people for endangering others. Unvaccinated people spread the virus 4-6x more than vaccinated one, it's an enormous difference in epidemics control. Allowing unvaccinated people to concentrate in indoor places endangers the whole population, saturate the healthcare system, and increases the risk of new, even worse, strains appearing. There is a very legitimate reason to prevent that, so it's not bullying.

Painful isn't a requirement. Annoying is already enough. Again, what I don't like is the lack of balls. Either have the honesty to make the vaccine actually mandatory for the non-immuno deficient peoples, or just leave it to peoples' choice. Don't go the passive-aggressive way of making it annoying just for the sake of trying to push peoples to do it.

On that we definitely agree - I was protesting the government closing hospital beds even before Covid-19 appeared.

It should have been a wake-up call. Instead, it probably was the glas of our health system.

Explaining how things work isn't "infantilisation". Most people don't know what mRNA is, how it relates to DNA, how mRNA virus and vaccines work, ... Explaining it to them isn't about considering them to be children. I'm not saying we should show them "il était une fois la vie"-like cartoons. And yes, biologists and doctors know more about how the immune system work than "everyone", like a plumber knows more about pipes and a farmer knows more about growing crops, isn't it pretty normal for people having different jobs to know more about their speciality ?

I'm not arguing against vulgarisation. I'm arguing about """small educative videos on TV""" and the clear message you're giving to peoples that you think them too dumb to listen to the actual news and that they need a dumbed down version of C'est Pas Sorcier.

[Kilobugya]

"I'll get it one day" is the polite way to say "I don't want to get it at all", tho.

No, it's more "yeah yeah I should get it but I didn't take the time to". Like my other chores you know you need to do but keep pushing.

Most peoples I know (which fair enough might be younger than your own circle of friends and it might explain the difference in attitude), me included, didn't get it it because we wanted to or because we trust the vaccine's actual effectiveness (which is already showing to be rather shit, to say the least).

It's actually very, very efficient, both at slowing down significantly (4x to 6x) the spread of the virus and to prevent the worse forms of the disease. Very, very few of those dying or in intensive care are vaccinated, even if 72% of the population (and more among the most vulnerable) are fully vaccinated.

Personally, I would have rather waited one more year for two or three more variants to emerge and be taken into account before getting my shots, rather than the current situation where the vaccine has about 3/5 efficiency against Delta and probably even less against the Mu that is coming meaning that we're going to need a third and probably fourth shot anyway.

That's a very irresponsible behavior, both for you and for the population at large. For yourself because Covid isn't just a flu, it's a very dangerous virus, that can bring even healthy young people into intensive care and even death. And that can have long-lasting consequences, "long Covid", many people getting it and still not being able to climb stairs normally 6 months or 1 year later.

And for the population at large, because by not being vaccinated you endanger everyone around you. Those who can't be vaccinated or on whom the vaccine is not very efficient due to pre-existing health conditions. Those who are too young to be vaccinated. Those on which the vaccine is only partially effective. And more than anything, the more the virus spreads, the more it mutates. By allowing the vaccine to spread, by not being vaccinated, you increase the risk of an even more dangerous strain to appear.

As for needing a 3rd or 4th shot, it's not like it's a big deal. There are vaccines like tetanos that need regular shots, just get it and it's over. The flu needs a new shot every year, not really a problem either. Get the best protection you can get now for you and all the ones around you, and if it needs to be "updated" with another shot later, then so be it. Much better than having that deadly disease spread, send people to ICU, kill some, cripple others for months or years, and keep mutating into more and more dangerous strains.

Painful isn't a requirement. Annoying is already enough. Again, what I don't like is the lack of balls. Either have the honesty to make the vaccine actually mandatory for the non-immuno deficient peoples, or just leave it to peoples' choice. Don't go the passive-aggressive way of making it annoying just for the sake of trying to push peoples to do it.

I would have made vaccination mandatory - but the main point of "pass sanitaire" is not to be passive-aggressive or to bully people; but to slow the spread of the disease, by preventing people who chose to be dangerous for others to be close to others. It's more like to "don't drive if you don't have a driving license". You don't want to be vaccinated, then we don't allow you to be in place where your own choice will endanger others.

[Michel Meilleur]

No, it's more "yeah yeah I should get it but I didn't take the time to". Like my other chores you know you need to do but keep pushing.

For most, it was not procrastination but really just polite refusal.

It's actually very, very efficient, both at slowing down significantly (4x to 6x) the spread of the virus and to prevent the worse forms of the disease. Very, very few of those dying or in intensive care are vaccinated, even if 72% of the population (and more among the most vulnerable) are fully vaccinated.

Because by the time most of those statistics were collected, most peoples were not vaccinated and the Indian variant had yet to become as prevalent as it is now.

That's a very irresponsible behavior, both for you and for the population at large. For yourself because Covid isn't just a flu, it's a very dangerous virus, that can bring even healthy young people into intensive care and even death. And that can have long-lasting consequences, "long Covid", many people getting it and still not being able to climb stairs normally 6 months or 1 year later.

I'm not in a position where I'm either at risk nor exposed. I was taught proper safety and know how to put it into practice. I'm still applying both even after my shot because it doesn't protect efficiently against the variants that are now starting to become the norm, and they did much more to protect me (and are still doing much more to protect me) than a vaccine rushed into the market by pharma companies who spent more of their budget on marketing than on research.

I would have wished to wait for Pasteur's work to be done but, alas, my laziness won out and I got some Pfizer shit instead.

And for the population at large, because by not being vaccinated you endanger everyone around you. Those who can't be vaccinated or on whom the vaccine is not very efficient due to pre-existing health conditions. Those who are too young to be vaccinated. Those on which the vaccine is only partially effective. And more than anything, the more the virus spreads, the more it mutates. By allowing the vaccine to spread, by not being vaccinated, you increase the risk of an even more dangerous strain to appear.

Spare me the 1ère bio lesson. I'm not an anti-vaxx. I just don't put my trust on vaccines who already proved they were rather shitty and ineffective, and neither do a lot of peoples. I would have rather we had waited longer for a better vaccine, and ramped up the isolation measures in the mean time, then force peoples to take inferior product just for the sake of rushing a "return to normalcy".

As for needing a 3rd or 4th shot, it's not like it's a big deal. There are vaccines like tetanos that need regular shots, just get it and it's over. The flu needs a new shot every year, not really a problem either. Get the best protection you can get now for you and all the ones around you, and if it needs to be "updated" with another shot later, then so be it. Much better than having that deadly disease spread, send people to ICU, kill some, cripple others for months or years, and keep mutating into more and more dangerous strains.

Every ten years, yeah. Because your body's immune system is not set in stone. Not every two months, because pharma companies as nice little capitalists that they are prefer to go for the cash grab by making them specific to particular variants despite COVID mutating so quickly that they're practically obsolete by the time you get your second shot already.

I would have made vaccination mandatory - but the main point of "pass sanitaire" is not to be passive-aggressive or to bully people; but to slow the spread of the disease, by preventing people who chose to be dangerous for others to be close to others. It's more like to "don't drive if you don't have a driving license". You don't want to be vaccinated, then we don't allow you to be in place where your own choice will endanger others.

But when that place is "everywhere", then it is an issue.

[Kilobugya]

Because by the time most of those statistics were collected, most peoples were not vaccinated and the Indian variant had yet to become as prevalent as it is now.

That's just factually wrong. That fully applies, both in France and in other countries, about the current wave which is by the delta variant. And it applies to the current admissions to ICUs which are with 80% vaccinated and nearly all of the delta variant.

I'm not in a position where I'm either at risk nor exposed. I was taught proper safety and know how to put it into practice. I'm still applying both even after my shot because it doesn't protect efficiently against the variants that are now starting to become the norm, and they did much more to protect me (and are still doing much more to protect me) than a vaccine rushed into the market by pharma companies who spent more of their budget on marketing than on research.

Vaccine and safety measures aren't opposite or exclusive. It's a fallacy to oppose them as you do. In order to slow the spread of that deadly virus and save people from suffering, being crippled and dying we need to use all the tools we have, and vaccines are a very powerful tool. As for pharma companies being crap, that doesn't mean their vaccine don't work or aren't safe. That's another fallacy, to look at the general behavior of a big entity to spread distrust instead of the scientific data we have on the vaccines. And the scientific data of all kind show that the mRNA vaccines are both very safe and very efficient.

I would have wished to wait for Pasteur's work to be done but, alas, my laziness won out and I got some Pfizer shit instead.

mRNA vaccines are actually much more efficient and have much less side-effects than "traditional" vaccines. Their only problems are the cost and the fact they need more complicated logistics, but those aren't really issues for a rich country like France (and shouldn't be at all, but here we enter the realm of geopolitics and world economics and leave the one of French politics).

Spare me the 1ère bio lesson. I'm not an anti-vaxx. I just don't put my trust on vaccines who already proved they were rather shitty and ineffective

But again, that's just factually false. They are very efficient and very safe.

, and neither do a lot of peoples. I would have rather we had waited longer for a better vaccine, and ramped up the isolation measures in the mean time, then force peoples to take inferior product just for the sake of rushing a "return to normalcy".

There is absolutely no reason to believe a better vaccine will be developed any time soon. As for ramping up the isolation, do you know what's the cost of that, and I'm not saying just economical cost, but on people's mental healthcare, on time lost, on children development being stunt ? And even a relatively high level of isolation, with all its disastrous side-effects, like we had from October til May, didn't prevent 300 death per day (one airbus/boeing crashing every single day for 6 months) and countless people crippled for life, and all the suffering that comes with that. That's really what you want us to continue going through, for one more year at least, when we do have a very efficient vaccine, that cuts risk of serious forms by over 90% and slow spread by a factor 4x to 6x ? That's just insanity.

And the more the virus spreads, the more it mutates and risks being even more dangerous, or resetting to zero all efforts made in developing a vaccine.

Every ten years, yeah. Because your body's immune system is not set in stone. Not every two months, because pharma companies as nice little capitalists that they are prefer to go for the cash grab by making them specific to particular variants despite COVID mutating so quickly that they're practically obsolete by the time you get your second shot already.

I've no sympathy for big pharma, I would have broken the patents in vaccines and nationalized Sanofi since long. But that's not the point, at all. First you're being ridiculous in your claims, no one is speaking a shot every two months, and the vaccine is definitely not obsolete that fast, it's still very efficient against the delta variant even if less than against the original strain. And then even if they do make a cash grab, it doesn't mean their vaccine aren't efficient, aren't saving lives and preventing countless suffering.

In our capitalist world everything is done for money, you won't buy food anymore to not enrich big agribusiness ? Not wear clothes to not enrich big industries ? And how are you posting in this forum, if not by using capitalist hardware and telco industry ? Why does that "oh no it's evil capitalists" only apply to life-saving vaccines, and not to anything else ?

I would have made vaccination mandatory - but the main point of "pass sanitaire" is not to be passive-aggressive or to bully people; but to slow the spread of the disease, by preventing people who chose to be dangerous for others to be close to others. It's more like to "don't drive if you don't have a driving license". You don't want to be vaccinated, then we don't allow you to be in place where your own choice will endanger others.

But when that place is "everywhere", then it is an issue.

Because it's "everywhere" that by being non-vaccinated you endanger others. Not something neither me, nor Macron, nor Pfizer have decided.

[Michel Meilleur]

Vaccine and safety measures aren't opposite or exclusive. It's a fallacy to oppose them as you do.

To the absolute majority of the population, they are. You're fooling yourself gravely if you think otherwise. The vaccine lulls people into an idea that they're immune to the virus, which they very much aren't.

In order to slow the spread of that deadly virus and save people from suffering, being crippled and dying we need to use all the tools we have, and vaccines are a very powerful tool. As for pharma companies being crap, that doesn't mean their vaccine don't work or aren't safe. That's another fallacy, to look at the general behavior of a big entity to spread distrust instead of the scientific data we have on the vaccines. And the scientific data of all kind show that the mRNA vaccines are both very safe and very efficient.

The data? You mean the same data that tells us that Pfizer is barely efficient 3/5 of the time against the Delta Variant already and that the Astrazeneca is following suite very quickly? And that this fall of efficiency is going to get worse and worse as new variants appear?

It's no fallacy to say that this is a cash grab. It's simply a fact that the current vaccines were designed in a way to generate more profit and rushed into the market. That doesn't mean they're useless, just that they're far from good.

mRNA vaccines are actually much more efficient and have much less side-effects than "traditional" vaccines. Their only problems are the cost and the fact they need more complicated logistics, but those aren't really issues for a rich country like France (and shouldn't be at all, but here we enter the realm of geopolitics and world economics and leave the one of French politics).

That's... a gross oversimplification and rather inaccurate. See, that's kind of the problem. You have no medical formation and are just regurgitating what you read in l'Huma or le Nouvel Obs. RNA vaccines aren't inherently worse or inherently better. They're different. In that case, however, the issue isn't their form but rather their specificity to one variant or another.

I'm much more interested in Pasteur's vaccine which is much more "generalist" and designed to be able to still be effective against new variants that have yet to appear. The last bit is what's truly important when you're designing a vaccine against a VIRUS which by nature MUTATE.

But again, that's just factually false. They are very efficient and very safe.

They're not efficient. They're really, really not. Safe? Yeah, kinda. There wasn't too many heavy reactions, tho it fuck you up for half a week if you're young. It's kinda pointless for it to be safe, tho, given that it's losing drastically efficiency.

There is absolutely no reason to believe a better vaccine will be developed any time soon. As for ramping up the isolation, do you know what's the cost of that, and I'm not saying just economical cost, but on people's mental healthcare, on time lost, on children development being stunt ? And even a relatively high level of isolation, with all its disastrous side-effects, like we had from October til May, didn't prevent 300 death per day (one airbus/boeing crashing every single day for 6 months) and countless people crippled for life, and all the suffering that comes with that. That's really what you want us to continue going through, for one more year at least, when we do have a very efficient vaccine, that cuts risk of serious forms by over 90% and slow spread by a factor 4x to 6x ? That's just insanity.

And the more the virus spreads, the more it mutates and risks being even more dangerous, or resetting to zero all efforts made in developing a vaccine.

There is tho. Medical personel was and is still mostly waiting on Pasteur's one. Meh regarding isolation. It's really not that bad. Annoying, sure, but not the worse.
But yes, I'd prefer either the option of proper isolation for those who'd rather wait on better vaccines or the crisis to pass and vaccination for those willing if we want to respect "free choice".
If you want a return to normalcy, then make vaccination compulsory. Don't go with half-measures and a rapidly obsolete vaccine to rush peoples back into the office just so you can pretend you did something because the presidentials are coming soon.

I've no sympathy for big pharma, I would have broken the patents in vaccines and nationalized Sanofi since long. But that's not the point, at all. First you're being ridiculous in your claims, no one is speaking a shot every two months, and the vaccine is definitely not obsolete that fast, it's still very efficient against the delta variant even if less than against the original strain. And then even if they do make a cash grab, it doesn't mean their vaccine aren't efficient, aren't saving lives and preventing countless suffering.

In our capitalist world everything is done for money, you won't buy food anymore to not enrich big agribusiness ? Not wear clothes to not enrich big industries ? And how are you posting in this forum, if not by using capitalist hardware and telco industry ? Why does that "oh no it's evil capitalists" only apply to life-saving vaccines, and not to anything else ?

No. There is actually new injections two months after the second shot already. I can tell you by experience because, again, I have family who work in the medical field and had to administer those aforementioned third shot to their patients.
And no. Stop bullshitting. 3/5 isn't efficient for a vaccine. 3/5 wouldn't actually be enough to get a vaccine for an illness on the market.

It's not a matter of being a bobo alter-mondialist. It's just a matter of stopping to pretend that the vaccine was made with quality in mind and that it can be trusted without second thought because it can not, and should not. That doesn't mean it's shit and useless, that means that you shouldn't believe companies that are only looking for profits to be looking out for you.

I recognise that fact and act with it in mind. You do not seem to be.

[Kilobugya]

Vaccine and safety measures aren't opposite or exclusive. It's a fallacy to oppose them as you do.

To the absolute majority of the population, they are. You're fooling yourself gravely if you think otherwise. The vaccine lulls people into an idea that they're immune to the virus, which they very much aren't.

That's very partly true, mostly due to another of Macron's numerous fuckups, saying that masks will no longer be mandatory in some places where "pass sanitaire" is required, which is utterly stupid. False sense of security can be an issue, but it's not really the case at the scale you pretend it is. People in public transports, supermarkets, ... still have roughly the same ratio of "wearing mask properly" vs "wearing mask incorrectly" vs "not wearing mask at all" as they did 6 months ago when most people were not vaccinated.

But no, most people are well aware that vaccines while very effective are not 100% effective and measures are still required. Most places where "pass sanitaire" is required actually still mandate masks despite Macron's claim, and people are ok with that.

Seen otherwise, the delta strain is much more contagious, and yet the R0 didn't spike for very long, despite mostly everything being open, and people not wearing masks better than they used to. Sure summer holidays played a role, but the R0 was higher in end of august/beginning of September last year, despite a much less contagious strain. Why ? Because the combination of vaccines + masks is much, much more efficient than just masks.

The data? You mean the same data that tells us that Pfizer is barely efficient 3/5 of the time against the Delta Variant already and that the Astrazeneca is following suite very quickly? And that this fall of efficiency is going to get worse and worse as new variants appear?

A single "3/5" number doesn't mean anything. Efficient 3/5 of the time against what ? Getting the virus ? Getting symptoms ? Getting into ICU ? Dying ? Having a long Covid ? The actual numbers vary widely depending on the question. Pfizer and Moderna are still more than 90% efficient against ending up in ICU, dying or having "'long Covid". They are less efficient are preventing to get the disease at all, but they still very significantly reduce the risk of getting it, the contagiosity if you do get it, and how long you're contagious if you do get it. Those effects stack multiplicatively, ending up in people vaccinated with Pfizer/Moderna spreading the disease 4x to 6x less.

As for AZ vaccine, it's less efficient and has more side-effects than mRNA ones, so we should use the mRNA ones as much as possible, but if there were no mRNA ones, it would still have been much better to vaccinate everyone with AZ than to wait 6 months or one year.

It's no fallacy to say that this is a cash grab. It's simply a fact that the current vaccines were designed in a way to generate more profit and rushed into the market. That doesn't mean they're useless, just that they're far from good.

Everything in capitalism is a cash grab. It's fallacy to say that since the companies selling the vaccine do it for profit the vaccine can't be good and can't save countless lives and prevent even more suffering.

That's... a gross oversimplification and rather inaccurate. See, that's kind of the problem. You have no medical formation and are just regurgitating what you read in l'Huma or le Nouvel Obs.

Ad hominem won't get you anywhere. (And btw I don't read Nouvel Obs, and while I do occasionally read l'Huma it's definitely not where I get most of my info about Covid and vaccines).

RNA vaccines aren't inherently worse or inherently better. They're different. In that case, however, the issue isn't their form but rather their specificity to one variant or another.

That's "inherently better" in the sense that they are simpler, with less parts and components involved than "traditional" vaccines which use modified/dead/weakened virus. And "simpler" means lower risk for side-effects and foreseeing consequences. But sure it's more of an heuristic than anything else, and what matters at the end are the real life data. And those show that the current mRNA vaccines (Pfizer and Moderna) are more efficient and have less side effects, including on the delta strain, than the non-mRNA ones (AZ, J, chinese, russian, cuban) ones.

I'm much more interested in Pasteur's vaccine which is much more "generalist" and designed to be able to still be effective against new variants that have yet to appear. The last bit is what's truly important when you're designing a vaccine against a VIRUS which by nature MUTATE.

So far that's only theory, a nice declaration of intent, which isn't followed by results. Maybe they'll succeed, maybe they won't, but it's utterly irresponsible to let hundred of thousands of people die, millions of people to suffer, a whole country living under heavy restrictions, and risking the raise of ever more dangerous strain just to wait for an hypothetically better vaccine. If that better vaccine ever comes to life, we can just re-vaccinate everyone.

They're not efficient. They're really, really not.

Really, if you continue denying facts I'll have to report you to moderation - Covid disinformation is banned on this site.

Safe? Yeah, kinda. There wasn't too many heavy reactions, tho it fuck you up for half a week if you're young. It's kinda pointless for it to be safe, tho, given that it's losing drastically efficiency.

Not, it doesn't "fuck you up for half a week if you're young", few people have more than 1-2 days of side-effects, or side-effects that are more than a small headache/fever/pain in the shoulder that goes away with a paracetamol. If that was your case, well, sorry for you, but it's definitely not a general case.

Meh regarding isolation. It's really not that bad.

You're again denying reality. It made depression, suicide, anxiety and all other kind of mental illness to skyrocket. It was sure better than letting the virus spread and a half a million to die, but it is that bad.

But yes, I'd prefer either the option of proper isolation for those who'd rather wait on better vaccines or the crisis to pass and vaccination for those willing if we want to respect "free choice".

Proper isolation for those who'd rather wait is exactly what the "pass sanitaire" does, so what are you claiming about ?

As for the "the crisis to pass", it won't, without massive vaccination.

No. There is actually new injections two months after the second shot already. I can tell you by experience because, again, I have family who work in the medical field and had to administer those aforementioned third shot to their patients.

Current scientific consensus is that a third shot is only required for patients with a very weak immune system (grafted people taking immunosuppressent, cancer patients under chemotherapy, very old people affected by immune system senescence, ...). And that has nothing to do with variant, mutations and the vaccine being "obsolete" but everything to do with them having a much weaker immune system.

Macron decided to give a third shot to everyone above 65 "just to be safe" but that's Macron being silly, and nothing to do with the vaccines themselves.

And no. Stop bullshitting. 3/5 isn't efficient for a vaccine. 3/5 wouldn't actually be enough to get a vaccine for an illness on the market.

But 3/5 is just a meaningless number that you pulled out of thin air. Attempting to reduce vaccine efficiency to a single number is meaningless, as I explained above.

It's not a matter of being a bobo alter-mondialist. It's just a matter of stopping to pretend that the vaccine was made with quality in mind and that it can be trusted without second thought because it can not, and should not. That doesn't mean it's shit and useless, that means that you shouldn't believe companies that are only looking for profits to be looking out for you.

Nothing in capitalism is made purely with quality in mind. The transports you enter in, the food you eat, the water you drink, the clothes you wear, the roof over your head. And yes, often enough there issues and scandals, in which companies have endangered people by being greedy and sacrificing safety for income - from airplane constructors to food to fire safety in building to ... but that doesn't mean that absolutely nothing ever can be good quality, especially when there is a high level of sucrinity and regulations (as it's the case for the vaccine) and even less that they can't be much, much better than nothing.

Calling to intent, who made the vaccines and what were their ulterior motive is a fallacy when we have actual data on their efficiency and safety.

[Michel Meilleur]

A single "3/5" number doesn't mean anything. Efficient 3/5 of the time against what ? Getting the virus ? Getting symptoms ? Getting into ICU ? Dying ? Having a long Covid ? The actual numbers vary widely depending on the question. Pfizer and Moderna are still more than 90% efficient against ending up in ICU, dying or having "'long Covid". They are less efficient are preventing to get the disease at all, but they still very significantly reduce the risk of getting it, the contagiosity if you do get it, and how long you're contagious if you do get it. Those effects stack multiplicatively, ending up in people vaccinated with Pfizer/Moderna spreading the disease 4x to 6x less.

As for AZ vaccine, it's less efficient and has more side-effects than mRNA ones, so we should use the mRNA ones as much as possible, but if there were no mRNA ones, it would still have been much better to vaccinate everyone with AZ than to wait 6 months or one year.

My bad, it was 66%, not 60% so 2/3 instead of 3/5. What a glorious victory. :^)

Everything in capitalism is a cash grab. It's fallacy to say that since the companies selling the vaccine do it for profit the vaccine can't be good and can't save countless lives and prevent even more suffering.

At this point, you're arguing against yourself, not against anything I said anymore.

Ad hominem won't get you anywhere. (And btw I don't read Nouvel Obs, and while I do occasionally read l'Huma it's definitely not where I get most of my info about Covid and vaccines).

Reminding you that you have no medical formation and that you should stop behaving as if you did isn't "Ad Hominem", tho. I could have done it more politely, but I don't think you're averse to a bit of friendly sass, given how you're talking yourself.

That's "inherently better" in the sense that they are simpler, with less parts and components involved than "traditional" vaccines which use modified/dead/weakened virus. And "simpler" means lower risk for side-effects and foreseeing consequences. But sure it's more of an heuristic than anything else, and what matters at the end are the real life data. And those show that the current mRNA vaccines (Pfizer and Moderna) are more efficient and have less side effects, including on the delta strain, than the non-mRNA ones (AZ, J, chinese, russian, cuban) ones.

Again, it's much more complicated, and you're ignoring and fumbling with some facts, especially in regards to side-effects. RNA vaccines tend to have more "predictable" side effects but they are by no mean "lower".
Honestly, even medical professionals are very heavily divided about their pro and cons which are both much more extensive than what you seem to think they are. They're not a miracle solution at all, far from it, nor are they better just "because they're new".

That particular point is quite above both of our heads and I feel that given we both lack the qualifications to not talk totally out of our asses, it's better to drop it.

So far that's only theory, a nice declaration of intent, which isn't followed by results. Maybe they'll succeed, maybe they won't, but it's utterly irresponsible to let hundred of thousands of people die, millions of people to suffer, a whole country living under heavy restrictions, and risking the raise of ever more dangerous strain just to wait for an hypothetically better vaccine. If that better vaccine ever comes to life, we can just re-vaccinate everyone.

Then make the current vaccine properly mandatory if you want to rush a return to normalcy rather than pussy-footing around and passive-aggressively "encouraging" peoples to take it by barring them from everywhere.
Or just reinstate a lockdown and continue working on better vaccines.

Really, if you continue denying facts I'll have to report you to moderation - Covid disinformation is banned on this site.

Mashallah, calm yourself Jojo la colombe, no need to call the Tchéka Guépéou over me telling you what studies have shown. That Pfizer is only efficient in 2/3 (and not 3/5 muh bad, muh bad) of cases against the Delta variants and that this number is very likely to continue decreasing as Astrezeneca's one are currently dropping too. That's not "disinformation". That's literally just "information".

Not, it doesn't "fuck you up for half a week if you're young", few people have more than 1-2 days of side-effects, or side-effects that are more than a small headache/fever/pain in the shoulder that goes away with a paracetamol. If that was your case, well, sorry for you, but it's definitely not a general case.

Out of 15 or so of my mates who got it, (most Pfizer) not a single guy wasn't shit-faced for at least three to five days. In my case, it was a full week. The worst was another friend who got Astrazeneca and vomited himself to sleep with extremely high fever for almost ten days.

In all cases, it's not "that bad" considering there was no need for an hospital trip. But, don't think that because you're older and had less side-effects, then your case is universal even less general.

You're again denying reality. It made depression, suicide, anxiety and all other kind of mental illness to skyrocket. It was sure better than letting the virus spread and a half a million to die, but it is that bad.

I'm in engineering. Literally business as usual for us, if not even slightly better.
I suppose that's the only advantage of thoroughly breaking the moral and self-esteem of peoples straight out of high-school for two full years before allowing them to even enter the school proper. After that you've got a spirit of steel. :^)

Proper isolation for those who'd rather wait is exactly what the "pass sanitaire" does, so what are you claiming about ?

It would be if the government didn't stop requiring businesses to continue allowing home-office to those wishing. It's actually a bit of an issue for more than those who don't want the vaccines, it's also a problem for those who can't get them.

Current scientific consensus is that a third shot is only required for patients with a very weak immune system (grafted people taking immunosuppressent, cancer patients under chemotherapy, very old people affected by immune system senescence, ...). And that has nothing to do with variant, mutations and the vaccine being "obsolete" but everything to do with them having a much weaker immune system.

Macron decided to give a third shot to everyone above 65 "just to be safe" but that's Macron being silly, and nothing to do with the vaccines themselves.

Fair enough on the last bit. I suppose it's better than his stance of "lmao, masks are counter-productive, nurses and doctors don't even need them" he adopted at the start of the shitshow.

Nothing in capitalism is made purely with quality in mind. The transports you enter in, the food you eat, the water you drink, the clothes you wear, the roof over your head. And yes, often enough there issues and scandals, in which companies have endangered people by being greedy and sacrificing safety for income - from airplane constructors to food to fire safety in building to ... but that doesn't mean that absolutely nothing ever can be good quality, especially when there is a high level of sucrinity and regulations (as it's the case for the vaccine) and even less that they can't be much, much better than nothing.

Calling to intent, who made the vaccines and what were their ulterior motive is a fallacy when we have actual data on their efficiency and safety.

[/quote]
I'm basing myself on that data to shit on it, tho.

At the end of the day, I'm honestly a bit surprised we're even having this debate. I'm not opposing peoples getting vaccinated if they so wish. I got my two shots out of convenience myself even if I don't think it's any sufficient protection. I'm just simply annoyed by the current politic and lukewarm measures regarding COVID and I'm not interested in sucking labos' cocks about how their shit is "how so great and good" when they're making a fortune making subpar products while they could do much better.

You need to stop confusing "not supporting the current decisions regarding COVID" with "opposing them 100% and being a dirty ANTI-VAXX who hates peoples being alive".

[Kilobugya]

My bad, it was 66%, not 60% so 2/3 instead of 3/5. What a glorious victory. :^)

Apart from the small difference in digits, you didn't answer at all to my "what kind of effectiveness are you talking about ?" Media making headlines isn't science. From that article it seems they are speaking about efficiency is getting the infection, and yes, it's about that - 2/3 on the delta variant. But just saying that isn't telling much, you're forgetting three very important things.

The first is about what this 66% figure implies. It means that if you've 100 people that would get infected without the vaccine, only 34 would get infected with the vaccine. Which means in turn that only 34 will spread the disease on the next "cycle". That 34% number is actually by how much you... multiply the R0, the base of your exponential function. A vaccine with a 66% effectiveness in preventing to catch the disease altogether means dividing the R0 by 3. After 4 cycles (around one month with Covid) it means you've... 80 times less people contaminated. Or said otherwise, if your goal is to maintain the R0 around (ideally below) 1 so the disease doesn't spread out of control, it means that by vaccinating your population you get "for free" with no restrictions a division by 3 of the R0. A division by 3 of the R0 is about what we got when doing a strict lockdown in March 2020 with no mask, or a semi-strict lockdown in Oct 2020 til May 2021 with masks. That's what you get "for free" just by vaccinating people with a vaccine with a 66% efficient. It's definitely a game changer.

The second fact your forget about is that it's not just "how likely you're to get the disease", but also "how contagious your are" and "for how long". The vaccine also lowers how contagious you are if you're among the 1/3 who still got it and for how long you're contagious. So it's more like a 4x to 6x reduction of the virus spread that the vaccine does.

The third fact you forget is that the vaccine protects against doing serious forms of the diseases. The numbers from beginning of August show that about 80% of the people in ICU, 76% of the people hospitalized and 73% of the deaths were non-vaccinated, compared to 13%, 17% and 23% of those fully vaccinated. But in that period 51% of the people were fully vaccinated, only 35% not vaccinated at all. So if you scale for the population size, you get the vaccine effectiveness from 85% to 90% in reducing hospitalization, ICU and death. And that's not considering that "at risks" persons (elderly, comorbidity, ...) have a higher vaccination rate than "less at risk". If you correct for the demographics of the populations, you get between 90% and 95% reduction of hospitalization, ICU and death with the vaccine.

Reminding you that you have no medical formation and that you should stop behaving as if you did isn't "Ad Hominem", tho.

That's exactly what an ad hominem is. Address the content of what I say, the numbers I give, the reasoning I make, not who I am or who I am not.

Then make the current vaccine properly mandatory

I already that's what I would have done. But the "pass sanitaire" still does more good than harm, primarily by preventing people at large risk of transmitting the disease to mass in closed spaces, secondarily at pushing procrastinators to finally do it.

Or just reinstate a lockdown and continue working on better vaccines.

Yeah, let's destroy the economy, make people live as prisoners for an undefined period of time, drive them to mental illness, deprive kids of sane conditions for growing up, prevent people for spending time with their loved ones just to... not have a shot and a most a few days of discomfort. Very, very smart policy proposal.

That Pfizer is only efficient in 2/3 (and not 3/5 muh bad, muh bad) of cases against the Delta variants

That's disinformation when you don't mention it also reduces how contagious, for how long, and how likely you're to have a serious form.

Out of 15 or so of my mates who got it

Lecturing me about my lack of "medical training". Then giving anecdotal evidence on 15 "mates" as scientific truth. Fun to watch.

You're again denying reality. It made depression, suicide, anxiety and all other kind of mental illness to skyrocket. It was sure better than letting the virus spread and a half a million to die, but it is that bad.

I'm in engineering. Literally business as usual for us, if not even slightly better.

The world doesn't reduce to yourself, you know. That lockdown wasn't that bad for yourself doesn't mean it wasn't massively damaging to lots of people. In term of quality of life, in term of lost opportunities, in terms of mental health, in terms of increase of domestic violence, ... that you didn't suffer doesn't mean lots of people didn't, and public policy shouldn't be based solely on your little self (nor on mine).

It would be if the government didn't stop requiring businesses to continue allowing home-office to those wishing.

It actually stopped doing that... on May 11st 2020. Way before we had vaccines. Yeah, Macron handling of the pandemics is a complete disaster. But that doesn't mean we shouldn't get vaccinated, nor that the "pass sanitaire" isn't doing much more good than harm (even if it's not a perfect solution).

At the end of the day, I'm honestly a bit surprised we're even having this debate. I'm not opposing peoples getting vaccinated if they so wish.

Considering that vaccination is a personal health issue is a very serious problem. Being vaccinated or not isn't just about you, but about everyone else around you too, especially the vulnerable who can't get vaccinated (or on whom the vaccine won't work well). It's more akin to not driving when drunk, or respecting speed limits, or wearing masks. It's a matter of not endangering others.

You need to stop confusing "not supporting the current decisions regarding COVID" with "opposing them 100% and being a dirty ANTI-VAXX who hates peoples being alive".

Saying things like "nah the vaccine is very bad and only 2/3 efficient" is very close to disinformation, for how it doesn't consider all the other aspects than initial contamination and how it misrepresents what a 2/3 reduction of R0 means in term of epidemic control.

[Michel Meilleur]

Considering that vaccination is a personal health issue is a very serious problem. Being vaccinated or not isn't just about you, but about everyone else around you too, especially the vulnerable who can't get vaccinated (or on whom the vaccine won't work well). It's more akin to not driving when drunk, or respecting speed limits, or wearing masks. It's a matter of not endangering others.

Saying things like "nah the vaccine is very bad and only 2/3 efficient" is very close to disinformation, for how it doesn't consider all the other aspects than initial contamination and how it misrepresents what a 2/3 reduction of R0 means in term of epidemic control.

Yeah, at this point, you're only arguing against the little voices in your head, not anything I ever said or even thought.
I don't really see any point continuing further, pélo, because you're clearly just itching for stroking your petit-bourgeois righteousness and it's becoming increasingly out of touch with not only the discussion but even the situation with every new reply.

[Kubra]

Considering that vaccination is a personal health issue is a very serious problem. Being vaccinated or not isn't just about you, but about everyone else around you too, especially the vulnerable who can't get vaccinated (or on whom the vaccine won't work well). It's more akin to not driving when drunk, or respecting speed limits, or wearing masks. It's a matter of not endangering others.

Saying things like "nah the vaccine is very bad and only 2/3 efficient" is very close to disinformation, for how it doesn't consider all the other aspects than initial contamination and how it misrepresents what a 2/3 reduction of R0 means in term of epidemic control.

Yeah, at this point, you're only arguing against the little voices in your head, not anything I ever said or even thought.
I don't really see any point continuing further, pélo, because you're clearly just itching for stroking your petit-bourgeois righteousness and it's becoming increasingly out of touch with not only the discussion but even the situation with every new reply.

This is a strange epithet to use for a person admitting to be in engineering. Perhaps there is a problem of translation?

[Kilobugya]

This is a strange epithet to use for a person admitting to be in engineering. Perhaps there is a problem of translation?

Well, it seems like another case of "accusation is admission of guilt" I would say

[Kubra]

This is a strange epithet to use for a person admitting to be in engineering. Perhaps there is a problem of translation?

Well, it seems like another case of "accusation is admission of guilt" I would say

Oh, I dunno, I thought maybe "engineer" covered technical roles not normally called engineers in anglophonic countries or something.
Don't look at me, I don't know shit about French, a fast food employee spoke numbers and I ran away.