COVID-19: Unwinding the Lockdown and Long Term Epidemic

[7Wannabe5]

I would note that almost everybody in the U.S. watched the “Roots” mini-series in the 1970s and “Sesame Street” started broadcasting lessons on multiculturalism when I was 4. IOW, culture was still largely de facto segregated racist, but educational effort was well under way 50 years ago. Thus, I attended an elementary school with zero black students, while learning from Sesame Street that racism was wrong. My third grade teacher also read “Diary of Anne Frank” aloud to all of us, including the one Jewish child. However, scariest indoctrination was film-strip on the topic of how to avoid being a victim of infamous, not-yet-apprehended child murderer. The image of a little red shoe left by the side of a creek bank is seared upon my visual cortex.

[Peanut]

It's really hard not to address this without becoming preachy but (1) those who forget history blah blah blah; (2) Woodrow Wilson had moral failings. Who doesn't. But can we at least have an intelligent discussion before tearing down statues, changing placards, spray painting BLM over Jefferson's face on Mount Rushmore? By today's standards, both sides who fought during The Civil war would be classified racist. To expect anyone during that time to hold the same views towards race as we do today is unfair, just as we will be judged to have come up short by future generations.

Don't think it is actually, because you can always find someone who rises above the muck of their historical moment. If you didn't nothing would have ever changed. Historical figures like Thomas Paine and Benjamin Lay should get more attention in this regard. Why should we hold anyone including ourselves to anything but the highest standards we are capable of? Of course we are and will and should be judged. Not that I am sure I agree with King on the arc of the moral universe.

I despise most hagiography, especially of the founding fathers. I visited Monticello once about fifteen years ago. It was a really effed up experience but what is curious is that I had almost forgotten that I was warned it would be a few weeks prior on the radio. In some interview an Af-Am history professor was talking about how historical domestic spaces like Monticello are presented to the public in a certain way. A cult of X dominates, and any unsavory facts about the person are never addressed inside the house, but only outside. There were other points that I've forgotten. I was only half listening at the time. But when I went on the tour, that spatial separation of knowledge sharing happened. Straight-up denial of the Hemmings bloodline connection to Jefferson was also made. Apropos of the German approach to preserving historical memory, perhaps what bothered me the most was actually the contrast between the long and detailed docent-led house and grounds tour and the provision of a flimsy self-guided paper tour of the non-existent, non-reconstructed plantations, slave quarters, foundry, and so on. Just complete erasure. And not for lack of money. I'm forgetting what else but I know there was more. I was so disturbed by the afternoon I spent there I wrote up my concerns to the only address I could find, for the webmaster, expecting no acknowledgement. Surprisingly and to his credit I got a long, frantic email reply from the head curator. He wanted to meet with me, wanted the name of my docent, etc. Unfortunately I was leaving town or I would have. And I'm no rat and anyway the bigger point was maybe their screening or training sucks for these volunteer enthusiasts. I remember there was some discussion of future plans to represent the unrepresented. I wonder if any of them have been realized yet.

So I love the fact that the master's face was spray-painted; they should have gotten Washington too. But like I said I don't appreciate most Great Men statues.

[horsewoman]

@jacob - oh dear, that's bad in the video!

As I got older I realized that we did not really get taught a lot about HOW it was possible to end up like this in Germany, but looking back I feel like all history lessons in grade 7-9 were centred exclusively on the horrors the Nazis perpetrated. It was too much and frankly somewhat mind-numbing, even more so considering that we were hormonal teenagers and more concerned with dalliances on the school yard than history! There is probably too much focus on the guilt of our nation, instead of understanding the how's and why's. What's more, you cannot really discuss this topic with your elders easily, because a lot of our grandparents were directly involved - either as perpetrators or at least sympathizers - so there is a lot of stone walling and shame involved that hinders understanding and a healthy discourse. My brother has the wedding photograph of my gran (with her first husband, who did not survive the war) in his living room, and I have such warring feelings whenever I look at it. OTOH I loved my Gran and I'm her spitting image - but she and her husband both wear some kind of uniform on their wedding. Not directly with Nazi emblems, but I never dared to ask her about it. I often imagined myself in this uniform, on my wedding day (with all that might entail) and what decisions I might have made, or what her feelings must have been... It's just such a mess! There is a growing body of research of how the structures created in WW2 still wreck family lives in Germany today, and I see it all around me. Our parents have been raised by traumatized people, unable to unpack their feelings of abuse and guilt even after the war was over, while still adhering to most of the devastating child rearing principles of Johanna Haarer.

"Such a task could be carried out only by men who had been trained, body and soul, in those military virtues which make a man, so to speak, agile as a greyhound, tough as leather, and hard as Krupp steel."

People always make fun of the detached and cold manner of Germans, without realizing that a lot of that is still part of the aftermath of the Nazi regime. It was advised to touch your child as little as possible, to time feedings perfectly in infants, to be totally detached.... you get the picture.

But back to school, I also feel like they almost completely skipped over the first world war and the years leading up to WW2, which would be needed to understand a lot of the dynamics. I was in general an attentive student, so I don't think I just missed it.
Another important point to understand the mechanics of Hitlers genocide is the Armenian Genocide - the first time I learned about that was in my early twenties, when I became a fan of the band "System of a Down". They are Armenians and very outspoken about the issue, and it explains SO MUCH how Hitler ever thought he could get away with obliterating the Jews.

[Jason]

Don't think it is actually, because you can always find someone who rises above the muck of their historical moment. If you didn't nothing would have ever changed. Historical figures like Thomas Paine and Benjamin Lay should get more attention in this regard. Why should we hold anyone including ourselves to anything but the highest standards we are capable of? Of course we are and will and should be judged. Not that I am sure I agree with King on the arc of the moral universe.

You are referring to the Thomas Paine who was friends with the great slave fornicator Thomas Jefferson, correct?

[IlliniDave]

Those are some interesting perspectives from jacob and horsewoman. Thanks.

I was educated in a private church-affiliated school in the US, from approximately 1969 onward. Of course much of the history curriculum was focused on US history, or history contemporaneous to the US's existence through US perspective.

A decent amount of attention was paid to the two world wars, more the second than the first for due to the relative US involvement. No punches were pulled regarding Hitler, the Nazis, the Final Solution (and for that matter Japanese internment camps in the US). But the war wasn't made to be solely about racism nor demonizing nations, especially the descendants of those involved at the time. Until very recently the US has not even considered establishing the concept of blood guilt in the legal system. So not only were we not taught that Germans or Japanese or Italians were bad races/ethnicities, we were taught proactively not to view and condemn entire groups in that manner.

At the same time the US was immersed in the Cold War, and Communism was seen as the immediate external threat (even more so than the Soviet Union as a geopolitical rival). And the combined takeaway from world history from WWII onward was that elevating the State itself to be the ultimate good, and the goal to which all endeavor must seek to further, was a pathway to repeating what happened in places like the USSR, China, and Germany.

Also at the same time may of the landmark events in the US civil rights movement were recent history, and much discussed. Slavery, share-cropping, Jim Crow, Segregation, etc., were treated pretty harshly as ideas/systems, but not a lot of time was dedicated to demonizing the people of the time. Going further and assigning blame to an entire race was out of the question if for no other reason than because that's what the Civil Rights Movement was trying to get away from, and the Holocaust was not forgotten.

I suspect it was a more nuanced look at things (albeit US-entric) than how things are presented now in this country. There seemed to be an expectation that we could learn to recognize and understand societal- and national-level failures, and even those of individuals, and take lessons from them on which to base future improvement, without having to universally condemn and destroy everything that came into contact with the failures.

[7Wannabe5]

If there are any humans left in the 22nd century, they are likely going to be super pissed at all of us for shitting up the planet. My great-great-grand-daughter will likely burn the photo in which I am posed on the hood of a 1979 Corvette. To me, the essential moral quandary moving forward is how can we continue to afford the "progress" inherent in "progressive" policy while simultaneously not burning down the ecological house that supports us all?

[Jason]

The Civil War was for the most part, fought over the issue of slavery. WW II was not a war fought over the Holocaust. It was not until the end of the war that the Holocaust began to be fully recognized as an event distinct from the usual atrocities of war. So although US slavery and the Holocaust are analogous as morally reprehensible acts, the analogy breaks down when viewing them through the prism of war.

The Holocaust occurred in the early 1940's. The first "realistic" Hollywood portrayal of it was the 1978 mini-series with Meryl Streep. With the slew of WW II productions created during the previous 30 years, the Holocaust was for the most part, omitted or not addressed in its full horror. One reason, is most likely residual guilt that the US as the government although notified it was going on, did not fully recognize it for what it was in real time. Therefore, there are no great "Holocaust" battles that could be memorialized like Normanday, Midway, The Bulge and subsequently create an analogy to Gettysburg. The Holocaust points to failure not only to Germany, but to the US as well. The uncovering of the camps at the tail end of the war was a a cause for revelation not celebration; (2) The survivors who came to the US did not want to talk about it as they wanted to assimilate and their first instinct was to protect their children so it was the grandchildren that started to delve into it. The technical term is Hanson effect. Recent scholarship from the likes of Timothy Snyder conflates the Holocaust with Soviet genocide occurring during the same time, which further complicates the war narrative as the US and Soviets were allied against Germany.

[IllustriousLord]

I've been lurking here since this start of the virus shenanigans to get some sober thinking. But this thread is filled with some pretty outlandish forecasting.

I was right in line with Augustus' line of thinking that this lockdown has basically been economic suicide for negligible safety gains. I guess I differ in that I think it's more of an attempted suicide where the desperate person will be saved with medical attention. The individual will come out the other side with some permanent scarring, reputational damage, and family members who are extra attentive/skittish for a period until sufficient time has passed. But more or less the individual will still be the same chronically dysfunctional person who lives their lives as before, better or worse depending on the effectiveness of the treatment received and self reflection conducted.

I'm highly skeptical there will be the kind of major changes that are being called for/feared.

If you're a white guy I could see why getting shat on for your demographic over the past 10 years or so would be unnerving. It's because you've never had to deal with constant, negative feedback about your personhood from popular culture. Welcome to the experience of the other.

But trust me, the world isn't about to change in any catastrophic way. It didn't after Rodney King, and it didn't after 2008. I can't see why this series of events is what breaks the camel's back and initiates communist revolt/secession in the most powerful and rich country in the world. You only get those things with deeply organized movements with years or decades of work. There is no leadership in these riots. It's just a bunch of people who have been cooped up/economically abused/racially subjugated who needed to let out some completely understandable anger.

I think 7wb5 is probably right that racist stuff probably will only really dissipate once there is a more diverse populace. I can say that the only times where racist bullshit had no sting were when I was in Toronto. Because when you were faced with it you looked around and the vast majority of tinted faces communicated to you an understanding that it was just some errant behavior and wasn't going to impact your standing in the group an iota. Like when a crazy homeless person starts yelling insults at you, it just rolls off because there is no power threat.

That being said, my guess is that as soon you remove racism, some other hateful distinguisher will take its place. I doubt queer theory will ever become a mainstream enough philosophical perspective to effectively remove all discrimination; I don't give care how many middle school kids you trek through death camps or plantations

[Jason]

(@) ZAF

I think it supports the case that BLM has purposefully remained leaderless. It does not connect itself to any previous civil rights movement or movement leaders with the exception of the typical Al Sharpton rehashed funeral speech. No MLK Jr. or Malcolm X or even Jesse Jackson will rise out of this. It is democratic to the point of anarchy. Maybe Trump has not come to preach calm. But I haven't seen anyone from their side either. It uses the portraits of victims, past and present, as dissection of deceased victims is generally perceived as offensive. It knows what will happen if some of their tactics i.e. villianizing/ad hominem discrediting the opposition are used against them. No one in the movement ends up on Trump's twitter feed. They are marching and protesting worldwide, but there will be no "I Have A Dream" speech to inspire today or tomorrow. I agree with them to some extent, on certain points. But I think this militantly anti-intellectual, anti-oration methodology ultimately hurts the cause and will explain why it can't sustain itself or will ultimately effectuate real change.

[7Wannabe5]

@IllustriousLord:

My solution for sexual orientation discrimination is the same/opposite. The fact is that there are already enough factors that differentiate humans in their sexual identity/orientation/behavior/experience/fantasy that the math works out to more unique sexual identities than humans currently on the planet. Therefore, the problem is mostly just the fact that humans don't talk openly enough about their sexuality. If we did, we'd all be wearing multi-colored "Kinky/I'm with Kinky->" t-shirts.

My experience teaching highly multi-cultural groups in both low income/working class and affluent/university settings was that racial tension was much less of an issue than in settings with clear minority/majority. In low income/working class setting, the kids would yell out all sorts of terrible insults and epithets at each other, but it was more jolly and mutual, as in "Yo, Cracker-Ass, catch you at the game tonight." In affluent/university setting, even very young children would speak to each other respectfully about their differences, as in "You speak Spanish and English. That's so cool! Our au pair is teaching us Mandarin."

[plantingtheseed]

Interesting discussion.

[IlliniDave]

For Sam Harris fans, he addresses some of the uncomfortable aspects of the present situation, more focused on the demonstrations than the virus.

"... and there is no question about it, the conversation itself has become dangerous."

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vmgxtcbc4iU

[thrifty++]

Following 23 consecutive days of no new cases the lockdown is well un-wound in NZ. Things have gone from one extreme to the other. From the most locked down country in the world to the least locked down.

NZ hosted both of the worlds most attended events over the weekend, a rugby game in Auckland with 43,000 spectators and one in Dunedin also.

Stingency index puts NZ and Taiwan as the most free countries at 22, although Taiwan still seems to have a lot more restrictions than NZ. NZ was previously up at 96 being very stringent on the scale of 1 being the least locked down and 100 being the most. Sweden is 46.3. Australia is 53.7. USA seems to be at 72.69 being much more locked down.

https://www.msn.com/en-nz/news/national ... ailsignout

"Lockdown map"" https://covidtracker.bsg.ox.ac.uk/stringency-map

[IllustriousLord]

@IllustriousLord:

My solution for sexual orientation discrimination is the same/opposite. The fact is that there are already enough factors that differentiate humans in their sexual identity/orientation/behavior/experience/fantasy that the ...

I wasn't specifically talking about sexual orientation when I referred to queer theory. More so the rejection of hetero-normative thinking writ large. So a more abstract application of queer theory. I think you'd have to have society that really rejected the idea that characteristic X as desirable/undesirable in order to remove discrimination.

So let's say you remove the prejudice around race and sexual orientation. Then you've got other markers to establish a pecking order like physical ability, body odor and weight. I just don't think you can ever truly rid society of discrimination because I don't believe people will ever totally buy into the notion that what is desirable/undesirable is a purely social construct that should be obliterated.

But this is pretty off topic, except insofar as I just don't believe we are going have this huge earth shaking revolution due to the combination of covid lockdown and widespread rioting in response to yet another murder of a black man by police. I think these are wildly intractable problems that won't cause the disintegration of the dominant super power. Even if creepy uncle Joe gets elected and institutes reparations.

For christ's sake the US just conducted the first successful private manned space launch - an event I think is far more significant for the history books than a few weeks of race riots. Yeah there is shit tier political leadership, but there's a lot of other resilient positives aspects to the US too. Maybe I need to think this way because a future dominated by the PRC is scary.

[7Wannabe5]

@IllustriousLord:

Gotcha, but I still don’t believe that I am the only female who ever got turned on by the homo-erotic scenes in the works of James Baldwin.

[nomadscientist]

So let's say you remove the prejudice around race and sexual orientation. Then you've got other markers to establish a pecking order like physical ability, body odor and weight. I just don't think you can ever truly rid society of discrimination because I don't believe people will ever totally buy into the notion that what is desirable/undesirable is a purely social construct that should be obliterated.

Pointing to the real purpose and intent of these movements: to create perpetual, irreconcilable social conflicts on whose tides the tiny handful of elite leaders can float.

[C40]

If people focus on fixing the core problems things will go back to normal. We had BLM from 2015-2019 with zero chazs or riots. The economy and lock down pushed people to the breaking point and created a powder keg. The thing everyone needs to realize is that we're still in the top of the first inning of the covid/economic crisis. This is month 4 of at least 12 months of crisis, the 1930s crisis lasted 10 YEARS, children were hanging themselves in 1937 because they felt guilty asking their parents for food (real story, google it). There is a lot of time for us to go off the rails in the coming years. A cascading failure is what should be scaring the shit out of people. If we stop the cascade, everything should be fine. If we let it continue, things may get worse.

You are misremembering those previous years. There were riots. Not nearly as bad as now, but there was definitely violence, looting, burning of cars and buildings, etc. https://www.google.com/search?q=2015+BL ... 00&bih=872

I agree with your overall thoughts in this post, except that I think the cascade cannot be stopped. Only slowed. (I think we'll get through the current stuff.. I mean that with the way 'we' are living, more problems will continue popping up. These kind of things are only symptoms.

[7Wannabe5]

Co-sign on mistaking symptoms for the underlying disease.

[Peanut]

(@) ZAF

I think it supports the case that BLM has purposefully remained leaderless. It does not connect itself to any previous civil rights movement or movement leaders with the exception of the typical Al Sharpton rehashed funeral speech. No MLK Jr. or Malcolm X or even Jesse Jackson will rise out of this. It is democratic to the point of anarchy. Maybe Trump has not come to preach calm. But I haven't seen anyone from their side either. It uses the portraits of victims, past and present, as dissection of deceased victims is generally perceived as offensive. It knows what will happen if some of their tactics i.e. villianizing/ad hominem discrediting the opposition are used against them. No one in the movement ends up on Trump's twitter feed. They are marching and protesting worldwide, but there will be no "I Have A Dream" speech to inspire today or tomorrow. I agree with them to some extent, on certain points. But I think this militantly anti-intellectual, anti-oration methodology ultimately hurts the cause and will explain why it can't sustain itself or will ultimately effectuate real change.

Well I dunno what would qualify as "real" in your book (to me that just sounds like a pseudo bar) but BLM has already caused changes that would never have happened if recent events hadn't unfolded the way they have. Garcetti clawed back 150mil from the LAPD (8% of their budget) and redirected it to programs aimed at helping at-risk youth among others. Police are being phased out of public schools across the country. These are just the headlines I've seen in the last couple when I wasn't even looking for them. The movement seems to have grown almost as exponentially as Covid in the last few weeks, and I doubt it's going anywhere anytime soon either. Cop is probably the second most undesirable job in America today now, after ER doctor.

BLM uses images of victims because it is victims of excessive police force that are its focus. Why would it be appropriate to dissect deceased victims? Whatever the crimes of any of the victims, capital punishment was not the just penalty for any of them.


@Zafc: People have a warped view of MLK Jr. He wasn't Santa Claus; he was a self-described extremist, but nobody wants to engage with that rhetoric today. As for MeToo, yes he's been known to have been a terrible husband since the 80s. We'll know if those FBI tapes are credible in 2027. I think it's a good thing to reckon with the dark complexities of historical figures. Hero worship is for children.

[George the original one]

We had BLM from 2015-2019 with zero chazs or riots.

You're forgetting "Occupy Portland" and a few other incidents, possibly because you're coming at this from a California perspective?