By David Futrelle
One of Reddit’s Men Going Their Own Way, a gentleman known as Donald-Hump-Jr, has convinced himself that zinc is the magical coronavirus cure-all, and that everyone who doesn’t have enough of the magical mineral in their system will likely die from the virus.
This last bit, evidently, makes Mr. Hump happy.
If Coronavirus is really hurting those with Zinc deficiency (old people, high carb diets, Soy Boys, possibly vegan), wouldn’t it be hilarious if all those who eat red meat (high levels of Zinc absorption/retention) remained at the end?
I am no expert at this, but would it be a great male reset if all this virus was due to poor eating habits that created a generation of pussified men?
Yes, what better punishment for eating a lot of vegetables than horrific death?
Setting aside Mr.. Hump’s inhumanity for a moment, his zinc fetish isn’t borne out by the scientific evidence. It’s true that one of the results of zinc deficiency is a weakened immune system, which could leave those without enough zinc especially susceptible to pneumonia. But zinc deficiency is relatively rare in the developed world — in which Mr. Hump presumably lives — and can be remedied with supplements and relatively small changes in diet. If zinc deficiency does indeed make getting the coronavirus a bigger risk, the people it’s going to hurt aren’t western “soy boys” but poor people in the developing world, where zinc deficiency is much more common.
Also, “soy boys” aren’t really a thing; memes aside, there really isn’t a subculture of “pussified men” whose pussification is due to the excessive intake of soy. Meanwhile, vegans, who do run the risk of zinc deficiency, don’t need to start eating red meat; they can instead add things like sprouts, baked beans and wholegrain bread to their diet, if they don’t eat them already. (Soybeans are actually high in zinc; it just doesn’t absorb well.)
And if Mr. Hump really thinks that high doses of zinc are some sort of coronavirus cure — as he seems to suggest — he should think again. While zinc can help to shorten the length of a cold, it doesn’t help with flu, and too much zinc can cause an assortment of health problems and potential drug interactions.
So, no, there won’t be a “great male reset,” and drinking a soy latte won’t mark you for death.
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I know that if I hear certain public figures die from COVID-19, I will find it difficult to mourn them. But I’m not gonna rejoice in it.
FWIW I have some zinc cough drops which I use when I’m sick, plus I take vitamin supplements.
IIRC having more than needed of most vitamins doesn’t confer much in the way of benefits, unless you are deficient it won’t make much of a difference. Linus Pauling towards the end of his life believed that massive amounts of vitamin C would make him live forever, but he was wrong.
I don’t think MGTOWs have noticed that their peer group—that is, conservatives—are the ones who are refusing to social distance so they can “own the libs” and who are insisting on going to church. If they want to avoid getting sick, maybe they should think about actually following social distancing recommendations.
Why do they hate the elderly? Do they really think they’re a burden? It’s generally people older than like 40 or 50 who tend to share values similar to theirs too, so if all the old people died, there wouldn’t be pricks like the Republicans who depend on people like the elderly to stay in power.
This guy must have really liked the fake PSA in that one Simpsons episode.
“Come back, zinc!”
Soy appears to actually boost immunity…
https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s12026-012-8331-5
Omg – if the whole world would be “vegan soyboys” we wouldn’t have so many diseases that jumped from animals to humans, including this one. Without factory farming, there would be much less antibiotics-restitant bacteria, making it far more easy to treat the secondary infections…
I’m not even vegetarian that is pretty clear to anyone who understands how having many animals in cramped spaces, close to humans affects diseases.
Somehow I feel that if this jackass dies, it’ll probably be alone.
Environment contaminated by synthetic estrogen is actually a thing. And it’s not from soybean, but plastic.
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3222987/
Quite contrary to caim that using alternatives to plastic bags is unmanly…
@gijoel
Though isn’t that kind of the goal of MGTOW—to die alone? It sounds much grimmer that way, but if they want to avoid relationships and families that usually means dying alone.
I’m vegan. Sometimes my diet is trash, because I’m in it for the ethics not the health. So I take a zinc supplement, £1 for a bottle of sixty 10mg tablets. Easy peasy, well over daily zinc RDA.
@Naglfar – I’ve talked with a few proud MGTOWs. What they actually mean by leaving women is leaving Western women. They always either have or are about to get (or both) wives and mistresses that are from the “pure, unsullied by feminism” places – Central and South America, most of Asia and Russia and former states of the Soviet empire. Basically, anywhere that’s poor. (The poverty angle is just something I’ve noticed, not something they will ever admit to.)
There was actually a rumor going around social media a few weeks ago that Cold-eez was the magic bullet cure for COVID19, since zinc inhibits the replication of the other coronaviruses that infect humans (Covid19 is actually closely related to the viruses that cause colds and not closely related to the virus that causes the flu). Snopes even wrote about it!
Still we’re talking about bathing the back of your throat in something that may have antiviral properties, we’re not a talking about some dudebro’s fad diet. Considering that a very heavy red meat consumption is associated with several medical conditions that would make COVID19 all the more lethal, I’m not putting my money on their health if they’re anything over 40.
Men generally eat more meat than women do. So how does Mr. Zinc explain that the death rate from Covid-19 is higher in men? I really doubt most of the older men who died of it are vegans.
FeMiNiSM
@Rahu
I think there’s also a racial fetishism angle: they want the waifu caricature, not a real person.
@Moogue
Unfortunately, TERFs discovered this fact and now won’t stop harassing trans* women online by telling us we’re all going to die.
@varalys the dark:
I’d be careful about that. Excessive zinc can kill your sense of smell. I read about an incident in Australia some years back where a large number of people suffered permanent loss of smell, thanks to an unregulated supplement which contained far too much zinc.
1. Zinc by itself can’t penetrate cells. In order to ferry zinc into cells, you need to also be taking a zinc ionophore (quercetin, ECGC, chloroquine).
2. Zinc isn’t only found in meat. Plenty of vegan-friendly foods are also rich in zinc.
3. The immune system is very complex and varies from individual to individual. Zinc plays a role, but it’s not the one weird trick that’s going to protect you.
3. Red meat consumption is linked to heart disease, inflammation and type 2 diabetes, all of which are risk factors for adverse COVID-19 outcomes.
4. If anyone’s likely to survive this, it’s people who follow the healthy soyboy diet that’s being sneered at here.
5. You know who else is super at risk? People who think they’re invincible because of age, diet, and/or sheer manliness.
No argument here.
@gijoel – Unfortunately, just about everyone who’s dying of this disease is dying alone. Family aren’t being allowed in the ICUs.
@Moggie: Cheers, but I should be fine. I use an app to track my nutrient intake so if I am having a bad zing day, I pop one. it’s recommended vegans get a little more than the normal RDA (like 4mg over ten normal) because of absorption issues.
As for magic cures for COVID, I hear Forsithya is looking promising*
*hi five anyone who gets that obscure reference.
@Buttercup
Also people who follow social distancing, which MGTOWs and their ilk take pride in flouting.
@varalys
Regrettably, conservatives here actually think Jesus will cure them of COVID, and 14 states are allowing Easter services (and in other state sim sure people will do it illegally). I expect a massive spike in cases within the next few weeks as a result. Avoid conservatives even more than usual.
Why is it that almost everyone who starts a sentence with “I am no expert in this” then goes on to act as if they were?
It’s like a massive red flag for Dunning-Kruger syndrome.
I’ve not had much time to be here lately, but I hope everyone is staying safe and healthy – and coping with quarantine! The govt has really cracked down on social distancing rules here, and also shocked us all by actually helping people (e.g doubling unemployment benefits, banning evictions, offering financial help to casual workers, and so on).
@Naglfar Thankfully I am in the UK which has deemed church services non essential. And we don’t have those mega churches with pastors who’ll defy the law. Every service is streamed online here now.
Also bit of news, Boris Johnson has been admitted hospital after ten days suffering from coronavirus. I absolutely despise the guy, but as someone who has gone through respiratory distress herself (but mine was a embolism in both lungs) I wouldn’t wish that suffering on anyone. So I hope he recovers, same as his pregnant girlfriend who is also infected. (He probably shouldn’t have been shaking hands with COVID patients as late as early March, whoopsie).
@Varalys
Consider yourself lucky, those will be disease breeding grounds this year.
Was that part of his “herd immunity” plan? And is he still doing that plan?
I hope Boris Johnson recovers, too, and emerges with more humility and self-awareness. And has anyone heard from Rand Paul lately? He’s gone radio silent since testing positive.
In other news, Maine’s governor announced today that gun shops are considered essential and will stay open during the crisis. Essential for what, I don’t know. It’s not even hunting season. Are people planning to shoot at the virus with nanobullets?
Now that the apocalypse has finally arrived, guns, military gear, and martial arts training have turned out to be laughably irrelevant. Instead, the most vital survival skills have been things like sewing, cooking, teaching, growing food, baking, and tending the sick. You know, all those things that aren’t real hobbies because only women and soyboys do them.
@Mish of the Catlady Ascendancy
I think it depends on the context. I am not an expert 😉 … but I’ve noticed that many academic people, when speaking of a nearly-related field to their actual field of expertise will preface with “I am not an expert, but” as a sort of catchall disclaimer to prevent snippy jerks from getting verbal one-ups on them if they mistake some knowledge or have an error in logic in conversation.
However cases such as Donald-Hump-Jr, I believe you to be correct, it’s a red flag for incoming assholery.
@Rahu
It definitely can’t just be a poor countries thing, then, because you’ve left out an entire non-Western continent that, while not poor everywhere, has many countries with GDPs similar to the mentioned ones. There’s definitely racial fetishism for the submissive wife stereotype going on. (But not a Muslim one either, despite the stereotype, so more even than that.)