So Covid Is Over

At least, that's what I hear, and what I am likely to be told - again - at several sites on my sidebar when I go over today. 

The two people in my family who just tested positive might say differently of course. Perhaps I should call them and tell them that they can't possibly have covid.  Covid is over. All the best people are telling me that. Fortunately, my two are both young and starting from good health, so we are more in a "let's keep checking in on how they feel" rather than "worry about them" mode.  Either way we pray for them. Less fortunately, this involves one of them exposing an unvaccinated household member to the disease. Her biological father is schizophrenic and believes terrible things about the vaccines, because of course he does.  He believes all the crazy things. My friend from work who believed in the New World Order and Trilateralist conspiracies and offered a couple of different nominations for who the Antichrist is, including (of course) one of the popes and (of course) Henry Kissinger at one point, of course believed something else was afoot when covid came upon the scene. In her case, she believed it was a coverup for all the people that 5G is killing. So you tell me. What does she believe about the vaccines? Yes, of course she does. I don't know it in detail as I only got it secondhand from a coworker I still occasionally hear from.

Whatever comes along next she will have a paranoid conspiracy about as well, as will the schizophrenic dad, above.  The only question will be whether it is the standard common conspiracy or some variant picked up from their idiosyncratic circle. I used to feel relieved that my friend at least had not descended to making the Jews one of the centers of the conspiracy, but of course that was too good to be true.  She later married an older independent fundamentalist preacher from Georgia who had that old-line set of ideas about Jews. (Jimmy Carter had them as well, but modified them to fit modern liberal sensibilities.  He never lost them, though. Jews are supposed to succeed only when they are holy and righteous and let God do their fighting for them.  They shouldn't be warlike.  That's why they need to be dragged to the negotiating table over and over and made to give stuff up.) Anyway, she decided after listening to him that the current Jews aren't the real Jews that we read about in the Bible.  He believes the Khazar Hypothesis, which I spent some time shooting down before. 

It's not just paranoia, of course.  We believe what we believe in general and then force whatever comes along to fit into it.  It's easy to see in others. No matter what happens, she believes America is/was wrong. Everything is imperialism, or racism. And of course some things are, and some things are mixed, and some things aren't those at all.  No matter. Or, people believe that They just delight in making other people do things. So they find it everywhere and it is their go-to explanation. They believe it about everything new that comes down the pike. It has some truth, of course. People who go into government tend to believe that it's okay for governments to tell people what to do. But sometimes, just maybe, people go into public health because their main goal is for the public to be healthier.  Just a thought. They might be wrong.  They might be too willing to lean on people or hedge them in or make it hard not to go along, and thus need to be reined in. Sure. And here's the tricky part. Keeping people alive might be more valuable than reining those folks in. Maybe they aren't just waiting to rule the world and giving them an inch means they will take a mile. It is at least a view that many people in this democratic society hold. You can make an argument for it. Even if these are competing values that must be balanced, as most of us think, there's no guarantee you've got the right balance yourself. 

Some folks are just cynical about anything, others are too willing to embrace something new. Some believe hard work will solve most things, others believe it's all luck and connections. Just know who you are and try to make allowances.

The latest popular idea is to make fun of those who still want to wear masks, and this from supposed libertarians who think that people should be able to do what they want.  I don't mask much myself, but I am fine with those who do.  They may have medical compromise, or be in frequent contact with others who have no freedom to just get sick. One of the families that still masks at church (including a young person! How ridiculous! Because everyone knows there's no real danger...) is the family of an Urgent Care doc. Oh. Gee. Ya didn't think of that, didja. Or maybe some maskers are just nervous sorts. Please do not protest to me that these are people who are trying to make you do things like wear masks. Mostly not. Some of them are, but that's not who you are making fun of. I did very well on those SAT questions of reading a paragraph for its main idea. We are so much better than all you fools in other places.  We're just smarter. I am not impressed with the argument "But I'm not making them do anything.  And we should make fun of foolishness.  I am free to do that. It's good for them and for society." Well yes you are of course free to do that, but that doesn't make it good that you are childish and petty. It's social pressure to make them get into line with what you like.

I'd just let it go, but you're going to do it again next time as well.