I am lately running later and later in the day to get started on work projects. Today is a further expansion of my time at idle. The Covid conditions are affecting me as well as all the rest of us. It will take a long while for folks to understand and recover from this sense of isolation. Even the folks who have eschewed mask-wearing and staying home are feeling the effects. You can see it in faces you pass, the eyes tell the story. Some are frustrated, angry, blaming government, wanting government to do less than governments are doing world-wide. Some are subdued, fearful, wanting governments to do more than they have done. It is often said that ‘you can’t have it both ways’.
Are governments doing the right thing? I don’t know. I don’t think any one knows. There isn’t a history, there isn’t a precedent other than 1918. The plague doesn’t count because at that time, there was far less knowledge of the human body and diseases it is susceptible of. The plague was bad, the flu pandemic of 1917-18 or so was awful, too. Millions died. During the plague, governments tried to intervene but had no idea what to do, what measures would help. In 1918, governments reacted almost identically to what is happening now. Schools went outdoors or closed and there were various degrees of other lockdown measures. Our case is little different in that respect. No, so far Covid and it’s forbears, ‘sars’ etcetera have not destroyed millions of lives. The likely reason for that is the sets of precautions governments have put in place. The anti-vax and anti-mask crowd haven’t thought about that.
So. Here we sit, champing at the bit of Covid-19. We are eager to get back but unaware there is no getting back. Times have changed, for good. For better, for worse? Who knows. The only thing we know is that times have changed. Predictably, some folks roll with the changes, some rebel against them. How many of us do which one is a crucial matter. Since Covid has been politicized, I have a good guess at our immediate future. Judging strictly on the vast number of people who voted for Donald Trump – we are going to have some rocky road for a while. I have a suspicion that those folks are the ones less willing to accept the changes our world is traveling through. Those changes are more than Covid restrictions.
We have taken capitalism to our breaking point. The future, if we are to survive, looks more to be in the hands of some sort of democratic socialism. That is where we have to go. That is where we will likely end up, no matter what. It was rampant capitalism that cut down all the hardwood trees in North America. Capitalism flooded the air, the rivers and lakes with poisons, continues to do so.Capitalism and imperialism enslaved the dark skinned folks, stripped them of their cultures and heritage, robbed them of anything they owned. Capitalism destabilized the world, creating a huge underclass and a tiny upper class. Capitalism impoverished generations of folks. Capitalism drives it’s shiny new car down broad throughfares, leaving the majority of folks in the dust. Those folks are grim-faced and ready to explode.
Innovation, ambition are not bad things. Rewarding them is not a bad thing. Essentially, the idea of capitalism is not a bad thing. Yes, for effort expended a person should be rewarded. I should be able to sustainably make of myself what I can, do what I wish, live as I wish. That would be a pure Capitalism, taking what I have and building something better out of it. We have seen that our capitalist forms are not pure. They don’t advance us as a group. We are susceptible of a horrific corruption, where greed and any number of other base human traits drive us apart, imprisoning some and freeing others. We are marching toward destruction. We are not working together. We are not building together. We are working for ourselves, disregarding the group.
Covid and the Donald brought out who we are for all to see. We are cold, we are not community. The small businesses suffer, the large ones with political clout have enriched themselves. The mask fools are spreading Covid as fast as they speak. Those in masks become targets. Vaccines will subdue some of this but the evidence is clear that we are self-absorbed, gone shallow. We have weak politicians who are bowing to the multi-nationals and leaving the less moneyed and therefore powerless on the sidelines. We believe in tyrants of all descriptions, far-left, far-right.
Of course, only half of us do believe and behave badly. Only half of us are pro-right wing. Only half of us pro-left wing. Only half of us promote an indiscriminate individualism. Only half of us promote a restrictive groupism. Only half of us are pulling against the other half. If we survive, a sense of duty to the group will combine with a duty to the self. It will have to balance into a sort of social democracy, where we take care of each other and the planet before we build towers and monuments.
Robert On The Air 