avatarColby Hess

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Don’t Spread on Me (But Don’t Tread on Me Either)

Liberty in the time of COVID

Plague victims as depicted in the Toggenburg Bible of 1411. (Public Domain) via Wikimedia Commons

The problem with COVID is that it’s a tweener. It’s not bodies-littering-the-streets savagery like the Black Death or Ebola, but nor is it “just a bad flu.”

With a mortality rate ten times or more that of the regular seasonal flu, with over five million dead globally since it first emerged — eight hundred thousand in America alone —it’s definitely nothing to sneeze at. This shit is real.

But at the same time, is it way-of-life-ending real? Compared to the Great Plague of the 14th century, which struck down between a third and a half of the entire population in some places, COVID has killed less than one quarter of one percent of Americans. That’s brutal, but hardly bubonic.

And it’s clearly not been brutal enough to convince many of our fellow countrymen to take it seriously; to get them on board with the basic, commonsense measures science has shown will help reduce its spread and its impact.

But could these people have a point, a method to their madness? Is it possible, like we’ve seen previously with America’s massive overreaction to 9–11, that our pandemic response, on the whole, is merely “hygiene theater” writ large? Could the masking and the mandates be nothing more than empty gestures in a bid to assuage mass panic, akin to patting down little old ladies at the airport and taking away bottles of baby formula?

The Black Death ravaged Europe for centuries. Image credit: Wikimedia Commons

Throughout the course of the pandemic, there’s been plenty of science, and plenty of misinformation. And there’s certainly been plenty of opinion. But what there’s been far too little of is philosophy.

There’s been far too little thoughtful, civil discussion and discourse, rationally weighing pros and cons, rights and restrictions, the good of the one versus that of the many. Far too little putting things into their proper perspective.

It’s all just hyperbole in the now. In so many ways, every response — by government, by the public — has been consistently amateurish. Everyone’s just guessing. Fake it till you make it.

And I know part of the reason for all the flip-flopping, beyond cold political calculations, is that the science is constantly evolving. And that’s not what I take issue with.

Science is amazing. I love science. I trust in science to the utmost. I practically worship it. (And it’s fine if you wish to accuse me of scientism.)

I mean, science produced a miracle vaccine from scratch within less than a year of discovering this new virus — a virus it was able to fully genetically sequence within just days of it being isolated.

Science has landed people on the moon and a robotic probe on a comet. It’s detected ripples in the fabric of spacetime itself, emanating from across the universe. Science enables you to be reading this story on a supercomputer you can hold in your palm. There is almost no end to its wonders.

Yet science doesn’t preclude philosophy. Facts, by definition, are true. But you’re still entitled to make your own choices based on those facts.

Science can tell you what’s true, but can only advise on what’s good or right or sensible or practical. It can arm you with accurate information with which to make wise decisions. But it can’t tell you what a wise decision is.

That’s precisely where philosophy, the ancient “love of wisdom,” comes to the fore.

A U.S. gold Liberty Head coin (Public Domain) via Wikimedia Commons

As far as I’m concerned, the gold standard of eloquence when it comes to defending liberty philosophically, is skullet-rocking, lambchop-sporting, 19th century Englishman, John Stuart Mill. In what’s undoubtedly my favorite passage among the abundance of riches found in his seminal work, On Liberty, he states (emphasis my own):

The only purpose for which power can be rightfully exercised over any member of a civilized community, against his will, is to prevent harm to others. His own good, either physical or moral, is not sufficient warrant.

So far so good. Murder? Bad. War on Drugs? Just as bad.

He then continues:

He cannot rightfully be compelled to do or forbear because it will be better for him to do so, because it will make him happier, because, in the opinions of others, to do so would be wise or even right. These are good reasons for remonstrating with him, or reasoning with him, or persuading him, or entreating him, but not for compelling him or visiting him with any evil in case he do otherwise.

So, no nanny state paternalism here. B.A.S.E. jumping, boozing, tattoos, prostitution — whatever you fancy — that’s your prerogative. It’s your body; it’s your life. And if you don’t own your own life (and your right to endanger it as you choose), then you’re a slave in the most profound sense of the word.

Now here’s the kicker when it comes to COVID (again, emphasis my own):

The only part of the conduct of anyone for which he is amenable to society is that which concerns others… Over himself, over his own body and mind, the individual is sovereign.

Once your actions begin affecting those around you, you’ve lost any claim to rightfully do as you please.

As Mill’s contemporary, John B. Finch, put it:

Neither in law nor equity can there be personal liberty to any man which shall be bondage and ruin to his fellow-men.

“The Destruction of Tea at Boston Harbor” by Nathaniel Currier, 1846 (Public Domain) via Wikimedia Commons

So all those refusing to vax, all those refusing to mask in indoor, public places; all those morons marching in the streets, cynically coopting their political rivals’ slogan of “My body, my choice,” such refusals are not some grand patriotic act of resistance. They are merely an expression of ignorant, childish, selfishness.

They amount to a claim to rights without the corresponding acknowledgment of responsibilities, like a drunk declaring himself immune to hangovers simply because he can’t be bothered with them. Sounds great — and yet the utterance of a naïve fool (and a delusion poetically and painfully dispelled by the morrow).

“Is not this a free country?” “Yes, sir.” “Have not I a right to swing my arm?” “Yes, but your right to swing your arm leaves off where my right not to have my nose struck begins.”

John B. Finch

I’m willing to buy the argument that masks shouldn’t be required in bars (if the owner doesn’t want to require them). After all, no one is forcing anyone into those places. Nor does any patron have to go into one of necessity to survive. I’d argue that as a grown adult, just as you’re choosing to risk your health by drinking, you can opt out, sign the waiver, and likewise choose to risk your health by entering a drinking establishment unmasked.

Of course bar workers should certainly have the same choice as to what kind of place they want to work at. Like smoking and no smoking sections of old. Or, “No shirt, no shoes, no service.” Options, choice, freedom.

And personally, I’m all for the notion of vaccine passports. To me it makes perfect sense. Rights and responsibilities, right? But if so, then off with the masks! It can’t be all sticks and no carrots.

As one meme puts it (in flowchart form): Are vaccines effective? Yes? Then vaccine passports are pointless. No? Then vaccine passports are pointless.

Like I said, I’m pro-vax and pro-vaccine passports as well. But it’s kind of hard to argue with that logic.

One could even make the contentious argument that it’s the at-risk populations—the old and infirm, the morbidly obese, the immunocompromised — that it’s they who should be the ones to lock down for their safety rather than pronouning the rest of society into doing so for solidarity. Why should a young, healthy college kid be denied a beach party on spring break? Just keep him away from grandma afterwards.

But then again, if it’s only the infirm who must self-isolate, then what about grocery stores? Surely that’s a place where it’s perfectly sensible and reasonable to ask everyone to mask up, to endure that small, temporary inconvenience while gathering your your basic sustenance in order to reduce the chances of infecting all your fellow shoppers trying to do the same. Is that so much to ask?

I guess, like a Facebook relationship status, “it’s complicated.” But just because something’s complicated doesn’t mean it shouldn’t be honestly debated.

Hospital nurses on the frontline: “Victims of an exhaustion that eats away at the body and the mind” (CC BY 4.0) Image Credit: Alberto Giuliani via Wikimedia Commons

Unfortunately, I’m beginning to think the time for such philosophical debates and discussions has passed. As has the time for workable solutions.

This pandemic may not have littered our streets with corpses, but through its politicization, it has torn our society further asunder than even our divisive former president. It has ripped a gash in our unity deeper than the wokest of wokeism or the most obscene acts of racist intolerance could ever hope to.

And even once the virus has finished with whatever ravages it yet holds in store for us, we’ll still be in shambles. We’ll still be more split, more polarized, more spite-filled and untrusting than ever. Untrusting of government, of institutions, of experts, of one another.

And what then? What will become of life? What will become of liberty? Will the pursuit of happiness become a laughable fiction (as many would claim it already is), subsumed under chaos, hysteria, ignorance, and stubborn selfishness? Or will we perhaps, if determined enough, emerge stronger and wiser for our tribulations?

Colby Hess is a freelance writer and photographer from Seattle, and author of the freethinker children’s book The Stranger of Wigglesworth.

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Pandemic
Liberty
Society
Politics
Philosophy
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