A Disaster Groundhog Day

A few decades ago I watched a video in a class about a Black female musician answering the question how to stop all the racism and sexism in songs at a time when Eminem was using the "N" word liberally. 

She said she doesn't waste her efforts on stopping others: "I just make sure to put something else out there in the airwaves." That quote is from memory and likely pretty accurate. I can't find that specific interview, but I was able to coax out the details from my brain with google's help: the band is Sweet Honey in the Rock, and the woman in the video was Bernice Johnson Reagon. I was looking for the "Messages of Hate" portion of Bill Moyer's interview with her, but it costs $100 to access on a page titled "The Songs are Free"! Oh, the irony!

The course was with Dr. Carol Duncan, in her first year teaching there, and it's one of those courses that has stayed with me forever. It was also where I learned about The History of Mary Prince, and tried to use it as a reading in my history class but was dissuaded from talking about the Black experience as a white woman. So it went untaught by anybody.

As I was leaving her classroom after watching that powerful video, another professor in the program stopped to chat with me. He motioned to Dr. Duncan, a Black woman, and said, "Too bad she wasn't in a wheelchair or we'd get a three for one!"

Unbelievable. 

Recent to this time, in 1995, the Employment Equity Act had just been amended and strengthened. That type of comment was the pushback. 

The racist and sexist messaging is everywhere. And we can't chase it all down. We have to just keep putting something else out there. It's pretty much what Tolstoy was on about. 

I can't fight all the messaging that says climate change is going to benefit us or that Covid is mild or just a cold. There is no end to that nonsense. It would use up all my energy to try to combat it, and it would also have very little effect. So instead, I just keep trying to put something else out there. And I find and highlight the good stuff that other people are putting out there too, like these: 

From PeteUK7 - a very similar message that reminded me of that day in class.

I've always thought that infectious diseases are best avoided. I feel sure most people felt this way too prior to Covid. Now it feels most are happy to ignore them completely. So what changed for the majority? Quite a puzzle really but here are some thoughts: 

I'd say first has to be that people assume that those in power: a) Inform them truthfully about risk b) Care about them. Reasonable assumptions but both are false, and whilst that is demonstrably the case, people still believe both a) and b) to be true. Secondly, I think people have accepted illness now as inevitable; beyond anything that it's possible to do anything about. A bit like the weather - it's often bad and sometimes with disastrous effects, but it's nature and we have no choice but to accept it. Learn to live with it. Next is a complete misunderstanding and downplay of the actual harm and risk posed. This became the mainstream narrative when Omicron arrived. That message stuck. It's mild. It's like a cold. That also brought the idea that it's beneficial to get infected; as if no consequence. Beneficial based on the notion that lasting immunity would result. One and done. No risk involved. Then there is the idea that doing something protective has worse consequences than becoming infected. Any type of measure blamed for almost everything that's happened since. 

But there's also the fact that people don't want to alter behavior at all. So anything that allows a return to 'normal' is welcomed. Any kind of preventative action is seen as a threat to what is considered normal. Anyone suggesting such things is an unwelcome voice. I also consider that people are in denial. They don't want to think about the fact that the may be recklessly endangering themselves, their loved ones and especially their children. They can square their choices with themselves by claiming not to know. That nobody told them. All of this is reinforced by the media. Whilst there are some true things that make it to our screens, most of what is shown is minimising the risk and downplaying the harm. The same old faces are wheeled out at every juncture with the same tired old inaccurate nonsense. It's further reinforced by the actions of 'everyone else'. It's pretty hard to feel that something very considerable is wrong and a danger when it appears everyone is acting normally. Turn on the TV - see a sporting event or concert - everything appears as it was in 2019. 

I'm sure there are lots of other reasons. Feel free to add-in but I'm just jotting a few down. The fact is we've arrived in a place that I could never have envisaged possible. A dangerous pathogen in constant high circulation and most folk not caring at all. Just not bothered. They are unaware of how it is transmitted and the potential harms, and, worse still, they are provided with incorrect information about both. What is clear to me is that Gov's only care about the economy and the 'appearance' that everything is being dealt with and under control. As long as they can maintain that 'appearance' - things are unlikely to change. So if they can make it seem as if healthcare is not overwhelmed and as if these effects are inevitable but we're coping and that nothing out of the ordinary is happening; all good. No action needed. They can write off excess deaths, more disability, more long term sick, more co-infections, more opportunist infections etc. using some other explanation. Usually lockdowns. Immunity debt. Insert next bad argument here ______ to keep that cycle going. Year after year. 

This is why it's important to keep getting the right info out there. Every action we take - whether it's a tweet, a video, an air filter, a billboard, T Space, wearing a respirator, talking to people, a newsletter, a substack article, a news piece & so on...these ALL matter. Inaction will be our undoing. We're fewer in number than we really need but there are very determined people and groups that can help build strong grassroots movements to change minds. There's no other option. Keep speaking the truth and unsettle 'the appearance of normal'

And from UpfrontBricks,

"Imagine you're in a sudden disaster like a burning building, sinking ship, airplane crash, where your goal is to get out quickly before you die. Now, you would think that everyone around you would have the same goal, right? Researchers in disaster behavior know otherwise.The most cited proportions (from Why People Freeze in an Emergency) are: 

1) 10-15% will have their wits about them, understand the danger of staying put, devise a plan to escape, and act on that plan. Covid-aware folks are in this small minority, but may be doubting their sanity.
2) "The second group, comprising approximately 75% of the population, will be stunned and bewildered, showing impaired reasoning and sluggish thinking. They will behave in a reflexive, almost automatic manner." This is the maskless majority of folks living their 2019 lives.
3) 10-15% will "show a high degree of counterproductive behavior adding to their danger (uncontrolled weeping, confusion, screaming, and paralyzing anxiety). These are most similar to 'loud' minimizers who blame every post-covid complication on the 'jab' or 'face-diapers'. 

Rather than a single disaster leaving you perplexed why others are acting so irrationally, this has been ongoing for months/years, as more Covid protections are dropped. So, like some disaster ground-hog-day, you wake up daily wanting to escape a flaming/sinking structure, only to encounter indifference/hostility. Press on. You're not insane. Keep trying to escape."