Because, California has declared entertainment industry workers essential... so they operate with a special permit, and they do "get tested regularly", but frankly this is still a bit outrageous.
This is where you can see the politics would be poor project managers.
Filming TV shows is certainly not essential but just a nice to have.
You can easily have a great life watching fictions that have been filmed a year ago.
The entertainment industry cannot let people realize we would live happily without its products. They have to keep the stream of shows and films coming so people don't realize that.
Government officials are being subjectively restrictive and hypocritical at times. Gavin Newsom, London Breed, San Licarrdo are violating their own guidance. Meanwhile people are unemployed and losing their businesses without getting any support. The stock market bailed out by the Fed reaches new highs.
The situation with these politicians you mentioned and others before is completely unacceptable in my view and should lead to resignations. The number one principle should be to lead by example. If leaders don't do this people will become cynical very quickly and society erodes. The same could be said for business executives receiving huge bonuses while running a company into the ground.
It's useless to go shooting at the nearby targets because the target you need to shoot at isn't convenient.
1) California is the way it is because a whole shitload of people won't take even simple precautions. The Bay Area shows what California could be. If everybody took the precautions seriously, things would be opening instead of closing. In particular, the restaurants are suffering precisely because of the kind of people who want to go to restaurants but won't obey restrictions.
2) The governors cannot print money and are looking at a budget Armageddon coming up--no matter WHAT they do it's going to suck. The Federal government CAN print money--and is shoveling it at the rich.
Go harass the Senate Republicans. History suggests tar and feathers are effective.
> The county health department noted in a statement that film crews are regularly tested for the virus and that, unlike at restaurants, people do not mingle for “extended periods of time without their face covering.” Audiences are not allowed at film sites under the county’s guidelines.
I work in TV, in an environment that's very strict. We're tested up to 4 times/week (I have friends who are tested daily), asked not to use mass transit, and many of us work so many hours that we have no time to do much socializing outside of the group of people working for the production who are all in the same boat. It's really the only place I go where I feel perfectly safe. Even when unmasked to eat, we don't sit together, we're always socially distant.
Contrast this with my friends outside the business...they're going out semi-regularly, have only been tested when they want to see their family or get out of quarantining for 2 weeks after travel, think nothing of eating in the outdoor huts that are slowly getting more and more enclosed as the NYC weather gets colder. I'm very sympathetic to this woman and all restaurant owners in general, but the situations are not the same.
Restaurants were never a major source of transmission and your industry isnt really more essential. The only fact you stated is that you get tested more, which is a good argument, but I dont really buy your anecdote that you guys go out less than anyone else and this somehow justifies your privilege. This is a very sensitive topic because small businesses feed families and are being destroyed across the country so you'll have to do better than say "We're totally more well behaved than people who go to restaurants"
Restaurants are majorly associated with spread. They’re unmasked, indoor environments where people talk.
Here’s an interesting report where two people were infected with just five min of overlap by an unmasked person. Extremely detailed contact tracing by the south koreans.
TV, by contrast, gets other people to stay at home in front of the TV and not be bored. A super vital service right now!
I have to object to TV being vital in any way, shape or form. Come on. Even if you accept that watching TV is somehow essential during this period, which it is not, there are enough archived shows and movies for people to watch for multiple lifetimes.
Then perhaps all the restauranteurs ought to get together and self-regulate. An industry practicing discipline is not "justifying" any privilege. In my city, many of the businesses forced to closed in the last week due to covid violations were restaurants
Figure it out and you too can enjoy that "privilege"
I never said TV was essential. Entertainment in NY and LA feeds families as well, however. My Broadway friends who are losing their homes and apartments with no hope of work until at least June (but most likely September at least) might want a word about feeding families.
The big difference between the two is that the film crew is likely tested each day before stepping on set and are also adhering to strict protocols. My best guess is that the seating is more separate.
> I work in film and can confirm that the cast and crew test 3x per week to be able to work. Only 2 people per 6 foot table while eating. Tables are actually 6 feet apart. Covid positive numbers in the LA film industry are about 1 out of every 3500 test. Also since filmmaker have to test negative to work most filmmakers, in their personal lives, don’t socialize with the outside world hence the very low positivity rate.
from /u/Alexis-in-Texas, https://www.reddit.com/r/CoronavirusCA/comments/k71v7w/outdo...
> My Roomate works on set for a network. He/everyone he works with are required to get rapid tested before they step on the set every single day. Anyone he comes in contact with on set has passed the same rapid test.
Have you just discovered that the one true religion of america is the sacrosanct dollar?
Movie productions are big money, they have the money to implement strict protocol and the money to acquire the relevant resources. Therefore they can do the thing which requires the strict protocol and relevant resources.
Situation which will increase the disparity between the elite and the "dirty plebs". Since poor people have more risky jobs and lack the extra-care elites can afford, we will be the first ones to lose our jobs and go into debt in case we get sick. Unfortunately, inequality will only rise with COVID, especially in countries with poor social welfare models, like the U.S..
Alright, but why is it OK that TV and Film productions are allowed to operate and consume massive testing and PPE resources while other non-essential activities are prohibited?
Edit: I mean indoors in their own home rather than socializing indoors elsewhere. I’m a big advocate of walks.
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They produce shows that keep people inside?
The cost benefit is enormous. The same argument applies to things like vaccinations for sports. A fairly small number of people will keep millions of others indoors over the winter.
The virus dies almost immediately in sunlight. There's also a strong inverse correlation between Vitamin D levels and the severity of the illness. Keeping people indoors, breathing recirculated air with no sun all winter is practically the opposite of what we should be doing.
You can’t get vitamin D from the sun in much of north america right now. And people generally don’t socialize outside of their household when watching TV.
Sunlight is great! But socializing indoors is what spreads the virus. America is not reknowned for being a land where everyone was outdoors in the sunshine in normal times: vitamin D deficiency was already rampant.
And going for a walk is not exclusionary to TV. In places where it is present you can get enough vitamin D with 30-60 min sun exposure.
> You can’t get vitamin D from the sun in much of north america right now.
Not even in LA?
> And going for a walk is not exclusionary to TV.
No, it's not. But the argument was that TV encourages people to stay inside, which it does. If it's ok for people to go for walks, maybe it is not vitally important that we produce new TV shows right now.
Probably not that much in LA right now. My vitamin D app isn’t letting me change locations, but anywhere north of the 37th parallel gets zero vitamin D in winter, and even places like LA would get much less.
Plus people watch TV in the evening. You can’t get vitamin D in the evening.
I’m a huge advocate of walks and getting outside! My point is TV is a substitute for socializing, and America needs less socializing now.
Because the US has long ago decided that being a society wasn't something they were interested in, therefore the testing & PPE resources on the open market and handed out through the sole benevolence of the Invisible Hand of Having More Money than You, and TV and Film productions are able to acquire them, and operate.
"Other non-essential activities", not having the means to acquire these resources and implement these protocols, get to not operate.
Is that actually a fact? Are they outbidding everyone else - and potentially could be outbid themselves next time, by someone even richer? Or is someone allocating tests to them regardless of someone else's willingness to pay more? Is auctioning off tests even legal despite price-gouging laws?
I would think because the organizers of these typical activities lack the resources or customer compliance to pull off as strict a regime as described above.
No, it's because Hollywood can pull strings in Sacramento.
It's crazy how much weight Hollywood has in this country. Hollywood can open doors sometimes that even Apple and Google cannot, even though the entertainment industry is tiny compared to tech.
I believe it's because politicians get star-struck. Just look at how many celebrities visited the white house in years past. It's insane how much access they have to the highest levels of government.
No, it has nothing to do with star power or celebrity.
It's because the studios are willing to spend lots of money and implement extremely strict protocols so that they can keep filming, because if they don't they will literally go bankrupt and die. And because the studios and the crew depend on filming for their economic survival, everyone involved is willing to do what it takes.
I have friends who work in Hollywood. They're not allowed to socialize when they're working on set, nor for the two week period before they start working on set. They can't use public transportation. They can't visit friends or families for Thanksgiving or Christmas. They must get tested multiple times a week: a rapid test nearly every day (or every day for some sets), and the regular test at least every two weeks. The stricter sets won't even let crew go to the groceries when they're off set; they must use Instacart or limit themselves to eating at the crew stations on set. When traveling, they must stay in lodging provided by the studios, usually AirBnbs because hotels are too risky.
For starters, Hollywood's combined impact on state finances exceeds that of the restaurant and hair salon industries.
Why is Hollywood essential? It's basically the piggy bank keeping LA alive right now.
Hollywood isn't just the actors and studio executives. Hollywood includes over a hundred thousand specialists, ranging from tradesmen like carpenters and electricians, to caterers, stylists, and landscapers. Those several hundred thousand individuals further support smaller local businesses like restaurants, hair salons, etc. There are dozens of restaurants in LA that are still alive right now because a Hollywood shoot used them for catering and that money has kept thousands of restaurant employees employed. There are hundreds of stylists still getting by because of the one week they worked on a set, which paid more than they would have made working at their local hair salon for several months.
Hollywood directly supports more than 2 million jobs and 400,000 U.S. businesses, and those 2 million jobs and 400,000 businesses in turn support several tens of millions of other jobs and hundreds of thousands of other U.S. businesses.
Do you honestly believe that the states or cities have the ability to take over supporting those 2 million jobs and 400,000 businesses if they ban film shooting?
(On another note: Film/TV shoots can be managed in ways that eliminate the possibility of spreader events, because Hollywood can and does require cast and crew to agree to all sorts of practices and behavioral restrictions far beyond the simple and unburdensome restrictions much of the general public has refused to do. Half of the country refuses to wear a mask when they go outdoors; Hollywood cast and crew have agreed to give up dating, socializing, traveling, and pretty much every thing outside of work just so that they can work this year.)
Hollywood is not an "essential" business as defined for COVID restrictions, meaning that it is not automatically permitted to continue business operations during COVID lockdowns. (See https://covid19.ca.gov/essential-workforce/). Utilities, transportation workers, etc., are essential workers.
But that is also why Hollywood studios implemented such draconion covid procedures: they were necessary to get exemptions from the lockdown orders. They were the first industry to get these exemptions because of their outsized economic impact, and especially because of their importance to the LA area's finances.
Restaurants aren't food production. Farms are food production. Slaughterhouses and meat factories are food production. General Mills are food production. And all of these actual food production facilities and businesses are considered essential and remained open during the lockdowns.
16 million people work for restaurants. Many more are part of their supply chains.
True, in the entire United States, 16 million people work for restaurants, most of them in part-time positions. Hollywood employs more than 1 million people in California, and several hundred thousand in LA alone.
You may not consider Hollywood essential, but it absolutely is an essential industry in Los Angeles.
You should ask our politicians. They could have provided a means for non-essential businesses to have similar precautions but have yet to provide them relief.
Hollywood studios likely already has the means to implement this on their own.
> I believe it's because politicians get star-struck
Maybe that's part of it, but I believe it's because they know these filmmakers have incredible power to influence.
Remember "Sideways"? A fictional character in a fictional movie said one negative line about merlot and wiped out the market for that varietal[1]. People who liked the wine suddenly didn't like it, because a character in a movie didn't like it.
Now consider all of the semi-fictional movies that are made, like Citizen Kane was about Hearst (which destroyed Marion Davies' reputation as collateral damage). Or all of the movies glamorizing war, soldiers, FBI/CIA/police or politicians. This is something our government has needed and continues to need people to embrace.
[1] - I asked some winemakers about this and they said merlot in Napa "was being ripped up like crazy" after the movie came out. And that merlot often ends up in red blends because selling it as a single varietal still doesn't fly. It's only coming back in the last few years.
Because they pay for the testing. A restaurant will not (it would serve no purpose to find out 1-3 days later that someone had covid.) Furthermore the people working on films are employees of a studio that are contractually required to uphold the measures they agree to or they can lose their jobs. A restaurant has no such agreement with their customers.
I think we would be in a different situation if we saw people consuming massive testing and ppe resources while operating other non-essential activities.
As far as I know, there is nothing preventing them from doing that beyond cost and time.
Right, people put effort into figuring out how to keep film going.
What a lot of us are asking is why don't we do something analogous for small businesses? There does not seem to be political will to figure out how to get them through this as well. At the very least it shows a profound lack of imagination.
Let's stipulate that studios have money and are willing to spend it. That just raises the question why the state of California--or more generally we the citizens--are not compensating businesses that end up taking one for the team. Studios lose 0.5% off the bottom line but other businesses lose 100% or shut down fully.
There simply isn't any way to do what you suggest. Hollywood can do it because they exert a level of control over all participants in their business activities that no other businesses can outside of the military, and this minimizes the potential covid risks and makes the financial costs of dealing with covid feasible.
To achieve the same level of risk for restaurants or other businesses would cost billions, and that's assuming that the customers would go along with the safety procedures required, but half of this country won't even wear a $1 mask when they go into a store because they think that covid is a conspiracy and they'll be damned if they agree to a minor personal inconvenience.
That does not answer the question why other businesses don't receive compensation for their sacrifice. This is grossly unfair and will have long-term consequences for the economy as well as the welfare of individual citizens.
That's leaving aside the question of what the actual health risks are from the businesses California is forcing to shut down. Newsom has been very evasive on that topic.
That raises the issue of why should businesses receive compensation for their "sacrifice"? Businesses aren't people. I fully support and understand why employees should receive assistance, but you'll need to explain the logic of why noncorporeal legal constructs should receive assistance.
The film industry has participants that are willingly abiding by strict safety protocols. You couldn’t get the shopping crowds that serve small businesses to do the same.
Might be a market opportunity there for someone to familiarize themselves with all the latest best practices, pitch to the local health department "I'll be accountable for ensuring that restaurants follow all these best practices, will you let them open if they can produce a certificate showing current inspections from me?", then charge restaurants to produce such a certificate (and educate them on the best practices, and ensure that they follow them). Basically it's an outsourced compliance officer. Do the same job as the person on the movie set, follow the same regulations, and the business can open.
I think customers may be part of the problem, though. No business has an incentive to say "You're not following the COVID protocols, I'm going to have to ask you to leave", and businesses that have actually done that get all sorts of abuse from the general public. Movie sets have a lot more leverage over their employees: if they don't follow the rules, they lose their income.
You could probably do something analogous for any business that satisfies these conditions:
1. The workers at the business only interact in person with other workers. Members of the general public are not present.
2. The business conducts frequent testing, which should include tests that give a rapid answer.
3. The workers agree to take steps outside of work to limit their risk, such as not going places where they can't maintain social distancing or where mask wearing is not near universal.
You could probably even open that up a little, relaxing #1 to:
1'. There are only a small number of members of the general public present throughout the day, only one or two at a time.
This relaxed rule would allow for things like dentists offices, barbers, salons, and similar as long as they kept the number of simultaneous customers down.
We also need mandatory condoms because we know AIDS is a killer.
We also need to ban all alcohol because we knows how it kills people both directly and indirectly.
We know how guns kill, we need to ban them all.
We know how knives kill we need to restrict their ownership.
Trying to have a disucssion with folks like you is pointless because rather than striving for balance you only take into consideration one half.
You are, as much as you may not enjoy it, just like an anti-abortionist or a religious person. No matter what point is brought up the responese is always the same:
Babies are dying.
It's happening because God willed it to.
People are dying and we cannot let another one die.
We'll find out Tuesday, when the LA County Health Dept is required to present any such scientific studies/evidence in court to defend the restriction on outdoor dining.
(While Newsom has issued a statewide order that would theoretically lockdown all of SoCal and moot the county order, he doesn't actually have the authority to enforce those restrictions; that is handled at the county or city level by local law enforcement, nearly all of which have said they will not...even in Sacramento. Notably, even in CA local law enforcement for the most part has refused to enforce the lockdowns imposed by their own local governments.)
This is really not just about outdoor dining. Here, they are comparing outdoor dining that is open against outdoor dining that is closed. We already know the circumstances of how they operate and the precautions they are taking are likely not equal.
Even if she could only open her restaurant for production companies whose employees are tested daily, it'd be a better situation. She probably can offer way better food than a trucked in catering can provide which is probably the alternative. The catering company probably suffers a lot as well from covid, so let both have their venues open, and make the people decide whose food they like best. As a benefit, the people would distribute between the two venues and would thus be further apart than if they used one venue.
This situation is incredibly unfair to her. She has to pay the rent but can't open. She has to pay no rent and gets customers.
She probably can offer way better food than a trucked in catering can provide which is probably the alternative.
This is in fact what a number of studios already do: they use local restaurants for catering or on-site meals. However, as a result of COVID procedures, in order for a local restaurant to be eligible for this, they would to adhere to the same restrictions as Hollywood crews do, meaning: daily/near-daily testing, quarantining outside of work, and importantly, no interaction with non-household members.
Hollywood has the guilds to help it enforce the covid procedures (and also pays very well). The same cannot be said of restaurants.
Every single person eating on the film set has been tested regularly and continuously and is not permitted on set if they have an ambiguous or positive result. In the event of a positive result, they're not even permitted on set for at least a week until after the last positive result, even when followup tests suggest that the positive result may have been false positive. When on set, all crew and cast must wear masks at all times except when filming, in which case cast but not crew may remove their masks for the duration of the take.
How often are the restaurant employees being tested? How often of the customers being tested? (For both questions, the answer is "not regularly, if at all".)
Testing is great, but that's not a measure of risk.
For every 100 people who eat at a restaurant, how many get the virus? For every 100 people working on a film set how many get the virus? These are the numbers we should look at to compare one vs. the other.
For the first one, it depends on the local population and the type of restaurant. There is documented evidence that dining in bars in the South have resulted in hundreds of cases of COVID transmission, while at the same time there are few documented cases of COVID transmission related to outdoor dining in CA over the summer.
For the second one: 0. There have been 0 known instances of cast or crew getting COVID while on set, because upon reporting a single instance of a positive result, they require the cast/crew member to quarantine. In some cases, they have even shut down production for the quarantine period to prevent spread, see, e.g., The Batman.
If there are reports of people testing positive on the set, how do you know it wasn't transmitted on the set?
People are saying they get tested every 3-4 days. If you get a positive test, that means there were up to 4 days the person was on set, potentially positive. 0, like absolutely no instances of anyone every contracting the virus on a set does not make sense with those circumstances.
Yes, if you start with the premise that everyone is only getting tested every 4 days, you would theoretically have that problem.
I have several dozen friends in Hollywood working in broadcast, cable, streaming, and film. They are all being tested at least every other day using the rapid test (results within minutes), with a second rapid test within minutes if the first test is positive for covid. The last time any of them was tested as infrequently as every 3-4 days was back in September before cases started surging again. Right now, almost all of them are being tested daily. Compared to the costs of shutting down production for 2 weeks or more, daily testing is cheap.
So, for someone to have caught COVID on set, someone else on set would have had to have (a) been infected, (b) been asymptomatic, (c) received multiple false negatives from the rapid-result test without any positives,(d) and received a negative on their most recent slow test.
Can that happen? Sure. Has it happened? No. There are no reported incidents yet of multiple cast or crew members developing covid once they started working on set. While there have been incidents of multiple cast/crew members testing positive for covid, in all situations to date this involved cast or crew traveling to non-local filming locations, with symptoms showing up during the mandatory quarantine period for traveling cast/crew.
The tables may be the same distance apart but is the seating? In the video I can only see one chair per table. It is also possible they don't allow people to sit at adjacent tables. I'm not saying this is the case, I'm just pointing out that a picture may not tell the entire story.
How come people in Sweden don't use masks, run their lives normally and their Covid statistics are better than the ones in the USA?
Turns out the Swedish declared they didn't know how to deal with Covid, and by not knowing they decided the best course of action was to do nothing as far as lockdowns and other authoritarian measures were concerned.
Turns out Sweden has completely abandoned their Laissez Faire attitude in the face of a >4x death rate and very little economic improvement compared to their neighboring countries. They’re instituting large gathering bans, closing schools, instituting curfews on bars and clubs, they’re just doing it months later than was reasonable.
Alternate perspective is that their excess mortality has been average since the middle of summer, and is not spiking as of right now. This site https://www.euromomo.eu/ lets you compare all this data by country.
They didn’t do “nothing”. They gave guidance based on the data that was available and allowed individuals to make their own decisions on what course of action was best for them.
A large subset of the population in the US is (rightly IMO) not okay with their state or local government dictating what businesses are forced to close or imposing restrictions that effectively put them out of business.
By approaching the situation in this way it’s only further politicized the issue. I worry what will happen when something worse than COVID-19 comes in the future.
I can't read the article, but I listened to Adam Savage's podcast where he talked to one of the principles of BattleBots. He described the steps they had to go through to run/film during CoVid- it included dedicated compliances personnel, with continual enforcement and daily testing. So my guess is that the film company is facing a higher set of standards, and is allowed to operate because it does so.
The problem with the "we're tested all the time" explanation is that we've been told for months now that you can still be contagious even if you test negative and are asymptomatic.
"Although there is a lower risk of transmission from asymptomatic people, they might still present a significant public-health risk because they are more likely to be out in the community than isolated at home, says Andrew Azman"
That depends on the test. It's specifically antibody tests that lag, PCR and antigen tests do indicate a lot earlier, and have a good chance of catching an infection early, because they directly detect presence of the virus. cf: https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-020-02661-2
People in this thread seem to be justifying it since the film industry reportedly does more testing. I don’t know if I really believe it’s better (actors take flights and likely don’t wear masks for filming, lots of catered food, tests aren’t perfect by any means, etc.), let’s assume that it is.
The point still stands that it’s unfair. If the film industry is able to get a pass to operate by meeting some standard then that should be formalized and extended to these small businesses. Let them decide if it’s viable.
Back room deals and private special exceptions are no way to operate.
It is not fair and this is a reminder that life is not fair.
We can't forget that outdoor dining was just shutdown again and Hollywood has been taking these precautions for months now.
Telling restaurants they need to start testing every individual walking into their place of business really just does not seem feasible in immediate short-term given the current situation, unfortunately.
I don’t care what anyone says, at the end of the day the pro-lockdown crowd nowadays is largely able to afford sealing up in their apartment and work from home while they dispatch some immigrant to deliver them food. It’s inhumane and sanctimonious.
These restrictions amount to a wealth transfer to the rich and unmitigated suffering to anyone struggling.
Outrageous. Another example of 'Shutdown for thee, but not for me'.
The list of politicians who have been caught vacationing, going to grooming appointments, etc. is appalling. (These are politicians who have made strong statements condemning everyone else to stay home.)
But the pols are small potatoes in comparison to the business edicts like this article is about. People's entire livelihoods are at stake.
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[ 2.7 ms ] story [ 234 ms ] threadhttps://zeenews.india.com/world/relief-for-indian-it-profess...
Into the arena for the glory of Rome, I guess. (“Competition”)
1) California is the way it is because a whole shitload of people won't take even simple precautions. The Bay Area shows what California could be. If everybody took the precautions seriously, things would be opening instead of closing. In particular, the restaurants are suffering precisely because of the kind of people who want to go to restaurants but won't obey restrictions.
2) The governors cannot print money and are looking at a budget Armageddon coming up--no matter WHAT they do it's going to suck. The Federal government CAN print money--and is shoveling it at the rich.
Go harass the Senate Republicans. History suggests tar and feathers are effective.
If office restaurants are opened that seems logical.
It’s not logical at all.
Contrast this with my friends outside the business...they're going out semi-regularly, have only been tested when they want to see their family or get out of quarantining for 2 weeks after travel, think nothing of eating in the outdoor huts that are slowly getting more and more enclosed as the NYC weather gets colder. I'm very sympathetic to this woman and all restaurant owners in general, but the situations are not the same.
Here’s an interesting report where two people were infected with just five min of overlap by an unmasked person. Extremely detailed contact tracing by the south koreans.
TV, by contrast, gets other people to stay at home in front of the TV and not be bored. A super vital service right now!
https://zeynep.substack.com/p/small-data-big-implications
But your comment seemed about dining generally. If you only mean outdoor dining I agree that’s fairly low risk if spaced out.
I love older stuff but that’s not what most people watch. You have to deal with the world as it is, not how you want it to be.
Restaurants were some of the earliest known sources of mass spreading locations.
Figure it out and you too can enjoy that "privilege"
> I work in film and can confirm that the cast and crew test 3x per week to be able to work. Only 2 people per 6 foot table while eating. Tables are actually 6 feet apart. Covid positive numbers in the LA film industry are about 1 out of every 3500 test. Also since filmmaker have to test negative to work most filmmakers, in their personal lives, don’t socialize with the outside world hence the very low positivity rate. from /u/Alexis-in-Texas, https://www.reddit.com/r/CoronavirusCA/comments/k71v7w/outdo...
> My Roomate works on set for a network. He/everyone he works with are required to get rapid tested before they step on the set every single day. Anyone he comes in contact with on set has passed the same rapid test.
from /u/buffyscrims, https://www.reddit.com/r/LosAngeles/comments/k6y5f5/bar_owne...
Movie productions are big money, they have the money to implement strict protocol and the money to acquire the relevant resources. Therefore they can do the thing which requires the strict protocol and relevant resources.
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They produce shows that keep people inside?
The cost benefit is enormous. The same argument applies to things like vaccinations for sports. A fairly small number of people will keep millions of others indoors over the winter.
Sunlight is great! But socializing indoors is what spreads the virus. America is not reknowned for being a land where everyone was outdoors in the sunshine in normal times: vitamin D deficiency was already rampant.
And going for a walk is not exclusionary to TV. In places where it is present you can get enough vitamin D with 30-60 min sun exposure.
Not even in LA?
> And going for a walk is not exclusionary to TV.
No, it's not. But the argument was that TV encourages people to stay inside, which it does. If it's ok for people to go for walks, maybe it is not vitally important that we produce new TV shows right now.
Plus people watch TV in the evening. You can’t get vitamin D in the evening.
I’m a huge advocate of walks and getting outside! My point is TV is a substitute for socializing, and America needs less socializing now.
https://www.health.harvard.edu/staying-healthy/time-for-more...
"Other non-essential activities", not having the means to acquire these resources and implement these protocols, get to not operate.
Any links?
It's crazy how much weight Hollywood has in this country. Hollywood can open doors sometimes that even Apple and Google cannot, even though the entertainment industry is tiny compared to tech.
I believe it's because politicians get star-struck. Just look at how many celebrities visited the white house in years past. It's insane how much access they have to the highest levels of government.
It's because the studios are willing to spend lots of money and implement extremely strict protocols so that they can keep filming, because if they don't they will literally go bankrupt and die. And because the studios and the crew depend on filming for their economic survival, everyone involved is willing to do what it takes.
I have friends who work in Hollywood. They're not allowed to socialize when they're working on set, nor for the two week period before they start working on set. They can't use public transportation. They can't visit friends or families for Thanksgiving or Christmas. They must get tested multiple times a week: a rapid test nearly every day (or every day for some sets), and the regular test at least every two weeks. The stricter sets won't even let crew go to the groceries when they're off set; they must use Instacart or limit themselves to eating at the crew stations on set. When traveling, they must stay in lodging provided by the studios, usually AirBnbs because hotels are too risky.
I can't think of a more "non-essential" business than Hollywood movie production.
Why is Hollywood essential? It's basically the piggy bank keeping LA alive right now.
Hollywood isn't just the actors and studio executives. Hollywood includes over a hundred thousand specialists, ranging from tradesmen like carpenters and electricians, to caterers, stylists, and landscapers. Those several hundred thousand individuals further support smaller local businesses like restaurants, hair salons, etc. There are dozens of restaurants in LA that are still alive right now because a Hollywood shoot used them for catering and that money has kept thousands of restaurant employees employed. There are hundreds of stylists still getting by because of the one week they worked on a set, which paid more than they would have made working at their local hair salon for several months.
Do you honestly believe that the states or cities have the ability to take over supporting those 2 million jobs and 400,000 businesses if they ban film shooting?
(On another note: Film/TV shoots can be managed in ways that eliminate the possibility of spreader events, because Hollywood can and does require cast and crew to agree to all sorts of practices and behavioral restrictions far beyond the simple and unburdensome restrictions much of the general public has refused to do. Half of the country refuses to wear a mask when they go outdoors; Hollywood cast and crew have agreed to give up dating, socializing, traveling, and pretty much every thing outside of work just so that they can work this year.)
I'm asking if that's how "essential" is defined.
But that is also why Hollywood studios implemented such draconion covid procedures: they were necessary to get exemptions from the lockdown orders. They were the first industry to get these exemptions because of their outsized economic impact, and especially because of their importance to the LA area's finances.
16 million people work for restaurants. Many more are part of their supply chains.
And it's hard to argue that entertainment is more essential than food production.
16 million people work for restaurants. Many more are part of their supply chains.
True, in the entire United States, 16 million people work for restaurants, most of them in part-time positions. Hollywood employs more than 1 million people in California, and several hundred thousand in LA alone.
You may not consider Hollywood essential, but it absolutely is an essential industry in Los Angeles.
Hollywood studios likely already has the means to implement this on their own.
Maybe that's part of it, but I believe it's because they know these filmmakers have incredible power to influence.
Remember "Sideways"? A fictional character in a fictional movie said one negative line about merlot and wiped out the market for that varietal[1]. People who liked the wine suddenly didn't like it, because a character in a movie didn't like it.
Now consider all of the semi-fictional movies that are made, like Citizen Kane was about Hearst (which destroyed Marion Davies' reputation as collateral damage). Or all of the movies glamorizing war, soldiers, FBI/CIA/police or politicians. This is something our government has needed and continues to need people to embrace.
[1] - I asked some winemakers about this and they said merlot in Napa "was being ripped up like crazy" after the movie came out. And that merlot often ends up in red blends because selling it as a single varietal still doesn't fly. It's only coming back in the last few years.
As far as I know, there is nothing preventing them from doing that beyond cost and time.
What a lot of us are asking is why don't we do something analogous for small businesses? There does not seem to be political will to figure out how to get them through this as well. At the very least it shows a profound lack of imagination.
To achieve the same level of risk for restaurants or other businesses would cost billions, and that's assuming that the customers would go along with the safety procedures required, but half of this country won't even wear a $1 mask when they go into a store because they think that covid is a conspiracy and they'll be damned if they agree to a minor personal inconvenience.
That's leaving aside the question of what the actual health risks are from the businesses California is forcing to shut down. Newsom has been very evasive on that topic.
I think customers may be part of the problem, though. No business has an incentive to say "You're not following the COVID protocols, I'm going to have to ask you to leave", and businesses that have actually done that get all sorts of abuse from the general public. Movie sets have a lot more leverage over their employees: if they don't follow the rules, they lose their income.
1. The workers at the business only interact in person with other workers. Members of the general public are not present.
2. The business conducts frequent testing, which should include tests that give a rapid answer.
3. The workers agree to take steps outside of work to limit their risk, such as not going places where they can't maintain social distancing or where mask wearing is not near universal.
You could probably even open that up a little, relaxing #1 to:
1'. There are only a small number of members of the general public present throughout the day, only one or two at a time.
This relaxed rule would allow for things like dentists offices, barbers, salons, and similar as long as they kept the number of simultaneous customers down.
What we do have is 3,000 dead Americans a day. That's easy to measure.
We know how the virus spreads, so it makes sense to try and prevent it as best as we can with the information we have available.
We also need to ban all alcohol because we knows how it kills people both directly and indirectly.
We know how guns kill, we need to ban them all.
We know how knives kill we need to restrict their ownership.
Trying to have a disucssion with folks like you is pointless because rather than striving for balance you only take into consideration one half.
You are, as much as you may not enjoy it, just like an anti-abortionist or a religious person. No matter what point is brought up the responese is always the same:
Babies are dying.
It's happening because God willed it to.
People are dying and we cannot let another one die.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eXWhbUUE4ko
(While Newsom has issued a statewide order that would theoretically lockdown all of SoCal and moot the county order, he doesn't actually have the authority to enforce those restrictions; that is handled at the county or city level by local law enforcement, nearly all of which have said they will not...even in Sacramento. Notably, even in CA local law enforcement for the most part has refused to enforce the lockdowns imposed by their own local governments.)
This situation is incredibly unfair to her. She has to pay the rent but can't open. She has to pay no rent and gets customers.
This is in fact what a number of studios already do: they use local restaurants for catering or on-site meals. However, as a result of COVID procedures, in order for a local restaurant to be eligible for this, they would to adhere to the same restrictions as Hollywood crews do, meaning: daily/near-daily testing, quarantining outside of work, and importantly, no interaction with non-household members.
Hollywood has the guilds to help it enforce the covid procedures (and also pays very well). The same cannot be said of restaurants.
https://twitter.com/SpencerKlavan/status/1335007535070253057
You can see the tables. They're about the same distance apart. There's also like 10x more of them for the film set than for the restaurant.
Every single person eating on the film set has been tested regularly and continuously and is not permitted on set if they have an ambiguous or positive result. In the event of a positive result, they're not even permitted on set for at least a week until after the last positive result, even when followup tests suggest that the positive result may have been false positive. When on set, all crew and cast must wear masks at all times except when filming, in which case cast but not crew may remove their masks for the duration of the take.
How often are the restaurant employees being tested? How often of the customers being tested? (For both questions, the answer is "not regularly, if at all".)
For every 100 people who eat at a restaurant, how many get the virus? For every 100 people working on a film set how many get the virus? These are the numbers we should look at to compare one vs. the other.
For the second one: 0. There have been 0 known instances of cast or crew getting COVID while on set, because upon reporting a single instance of a positive result, they require the cast/crew member to quarantine. In some cases, they have even shut down production for the quarantine period to prevent spread, see, e.g., The Batman.
People are saying they get tested every 3-4 days. If you get a positive test, that means there were up to 4 days the person was on set, potentially positive. 0, like absolutely no instances of anyone every contracting the virus on a set does not make sense with those circumstances.
I have several dozen friends in Hollywood working in broadcast, cable, streaming, and film. They are all being tested at least every other day using the rapid test (results within minutes), with a second rapid test within minutes if the first test is positive for covid. The last time any of them was tested as infrequently as every 3-4 days was back in September before cases started surging again. Right now, almost all of them are being tested daily. Compared to the costs of shutting down production for 2 weeks or more, daily testing is cheap.
So, for someone to have caught COVID on set, someone else on set would have had to have (a) been infected, (b) been asymptomatic, (c) received multiple false negatives from the rapid-result test without any positives,(d) and received a negative on their most recent slow test.
Can that happen? Sure. Has it happened? No. There are no reported incidents yet of multiple cast or crew members developing covid once they started working on set. While there have been incidents of multiple cast/crew members testing positive for covid, in all situations to date this involved cast or crew traveling to non-local filming locations, with symptoms showing up during the mandatory quarantine period for traveling cast/crew.
Turns out the Swedish declared they didn't know how to deal with Covid, and by not knowing they decided the best course of action was to do nothing as far as lockdowns and other authoritarian measures were concerned.
http://www.foxnews.com/world/swedens-pandemic-experiment-end...
Or more directly, a chart that says more than most articles: https://si-wsj-net.cdn.ampproject.org/i/s/si.wsj.net/public/...
A large subset of the population in the US is (rightly IMO) not okay with their state or local government dictating what businesses are forced to close or imposing restrictions that effectively put them out of business.
By approaching the situation in this way it’s only further politicized the issue. I worry what will happen when something worse than COVID-19 comes in the future.
Outstanding thinking by the Swedish government! /s
(Worth noting I was trying to find this link with Google and had a hard time. I had to switch to a foreign search engine)
https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-020-03141-3
"Although there is a lower risk of transmission from asymptomatic people, they might still present a significant public-health risk because they are more likely to be out in the community than isolated at home, says Andrew Azman"
Did you read my study? It's based on direct evidence. "There were no positive tests amongst 1,174 close contacts of asymptomatic cases."
The point still stands that it’s unfair. If the film industry is able to get a pass to operate by meeting some standard then that should be formalized and extended to these small businesses. Let them decide if it’s viable.
Back room deals and private special exceptions are no way to operate.
We can't forget that outdoor dining was just shutdown again and Hollywood has been taking these precautions for months now.
Telling restaurants they need to start testing every individual walking into their place of business really just does not seem feasible in immediate short-term given the current situation, unfortunately.
These restrictions amount to a wealth transfer to the rich and unmitigated suffering to anyone struggling.
The list of politicians who have been caught vacationing, going to grooming appointments, etc. is appalling. (These are politicians who have made strong statements condemning everyone else to stay home.)
But the pols are small potatoes in comparison to the business edicts like this article is about. People's entire livelihoods are at stake.