[kgwxd]

Jon Stewart didn't get shunned for talking about it at the time. One might think it's just because he's lefty, but that's only partially true. It's specifically because he wasn't also giggling at the phrase like Kung-Flu, or attempting to give medical advice to anyone for anything, or entertaining countless conspiracy theories.

He was also able to question mandates, and big pharma, and Fauci, and Biden because he has as a huge history of arguing in good-faith and doing proper interviews. Joe has a history of smoking weed, looking stonedily at his guests like they just made the most mind-blowing convincing arguments he's ever heard, no matter what they just said, then babbling endlessly without adding anything new to the discussion.

I still watch both shows.

[lilsoso]

I think you've missed the point, and I've been downvoted for venturing to make it, nevertheless let's try the same point in a different light: ideas that were first widely broadcast (ie, before Jon Stewart) by perhaps a dangerous, irreverent, clown which were previously considered disinformation have now been accepted, at least in op-eds, by not only the WSJ ("wrong team") but now the "paper of record", the NYT ("correct team").

What happened?

[DiogenesKynikos]

What happened is that both political parties in the US have become steadily more hostile towards China. As a consequence, the lab leak conspiracy theory has become much more politically and socially acceptable in the US, and is being expounded upon in major media outlets.

This is despite the fact that the theory has virtually no support in the scientific community, as every piece of evidence we have points ever more strongly to the initial outbreak having occurred in the Huanan market, where we now know wild animals that can carry SARS-CoV-2 were being sold. This is, by the way, exactly the same way that the original SARS outbreak occurred in 2002-2003. It's almost 100% identical.

[lilsoso]

Since your comment there has been a new update from the intelligence community:

https://www.dni.gov/files/ODNI/documents/assessments/Report-...

Maybe if we shut down all discussion as a society we wouldn’t have to confront the uncomfortable.

[DiogenesKynikos]

The new update confirms that the US intelligence community has no evidence of a lab leak.

The most prominent lab leak supporters are so upset with the lack of evidence in the new release that they are now accusing the US government of being part of the cover-up. To quote the most prominent lab leak theorist, Alina Chan:

> It's getting very difficult to believe that the government is not trying to hide what they know about #OriginOfCovid when you see a report like this that contains none of the requested info.

The other leading conspiracy theorists, like Richard Ebright, are echoing Alina Chan. So now, the conspiracy theory involves the Chinese government, the US government, and most of the world community of virologists.

All of this is based on no evidence, and each time evidence fails to materialize, the lab leak theorists argue that this just proves that more people are involved in the conspiracy.