Day 96: Paging Dr. Whiteside...A voice from the Emergency Room

Tulsa World is a the daily newspaper for northeastern and eastern Oklahoma. It has a circulation of over 90,000 readers. I hadn't heard of it until I read about and watched President Trump's rally last Saturday.

On June 19, the Friday before the rally, Dr. Samantha Whiteside, an emergency room physician wrote an op-ed for Tulsa World, "I'm a Tulsa emergency physician and conservative, and the Trump rally is a terrible idea." In her piece, she notes the increase in new covid-19 cases, the 15% positivity testing rate (had been as low as 3%) and that the rally is "short-sighted at best and reckless and dangerous at worst."

She concludes, "As a physician, my oath is to do no harm, and to sit silently on this matter feels wrong. I was raised in a conservative, pro-life, Southern Baptist household and continue to have these values today with my own family. It’s not about President Trump. For me, it doesn’t matter if the rally is for a Republican, Democrat or Queen Elizabeth herself. It’s a terrible idea."

As part of the Rashomon series, I wanted to see how Dr. Whiteside would be treated on social media.

Rachel Maddow posted the op-ed on her Twitter feed. The tweet received 5,500 retweets, 17,400 like, and over 900 comments.

Some supportive...




A few concerned about the Dr.



Stupid...



And the inevitable Hitler reference..



And the equally predictable...



DeAnne Lorraine is a former Congressional Candidate vs. Nancy Pelosi. In the March primary, Lorraine received 4,635 votes or 1.8% finishing 5th in a 5 person contest. Yet, she has 307,500 Twitter followers. 

Take a deep breath lefties...Maddow has over 10 million. But still. Lorraine has a lot of followers. She isn't some lunatic in a basement somewhere.

This is her first response to Dr. Whiteside's op-ed.

Only a few commenters took that bait.



Most did the equivalency route.



Obnoxious.




Scary.




The Rashomon effect?

Maybe it's me but the only plausible explanation for Dr. Whiteside's op-ed is that she wanted to help people not get sick.

In recent weeks, I have found myself getting upset about "cancel" culture on the left. It doesn't seem  that "cancel" culture is owned by the left or right wing. It is a thought shortcut and doesn't reflect too well on anyone.