Now that society is looking at the covid-19 pandemic in the rear-view mirror, we need to reflect upon our errors and surmise ways that we can be better prepared for future crises. Let us explore ways that the most vehement supporters of the lockdowns, mandatory vaccinations, and mask mandates could do better the next time.
In the initial stages of the pandemic, it was unclear what it meant for us politically as a nation. As more cases began to be reported in the west, it became obvious which side of the debate the Democrats and Republicans each fell on.
There were nuanced individuals across the board who promoted the sane and reasoned idea of focused protection, where communities come together voluntarily to support the most vulnerable, while those likely to survive would continue to run our economy that hundreds of millions of lives depend upon.
Unfortunately, those people were never mentioned in the mainstream media. Loyal statists on the left became the accomplices of the media & busy-bodied power-hungry politicians who were taking orders from the top to execute countrywide lockdowns that had devastating ramifications.
Now that we all have had a chance to let the dust settle, let us examine some of the flaws that liberals regrettably supported during the pandemic and why they should not allow it to happen again.
1. Lockdowns and Curfews Promote Racism
It is understandable when somebody is frightened to death that they would look after themselves and their loved ones before caring about others, but the truth of the situation is that most middle-class suburban liberals perpetuated the very racism that they would not dream of doing any other time.
By agreeing to the draconian shelter-in-place curfews, the left unknowingly codified the rampant scapegoating of Asian Americans, rendering the source of all misery to free travel and unrestricted movement of people within the country and abroad.
Giving the government free reign over who to detain and question at our airports, bus stations, transportation terminals, highways, public places, etc, has proven to be an exercise of violence against minorities. Covid-19 was post-911 hysteria on meth, and the left lauded their support for such chaos by gracelessly being in lockstep with the media and authoritarians.
During the Ebola outbreak of 2014, right-wing outlets and politicians were calling for strict travel restrictions to prevent the virus from traversing the U.S. borders.
The left was quick to retaliate, insisting that travel bans were inherently racist; that fearmongering about a virus originating in Africa would lead to suspicion and harm visited upon the Black community in America. Public health officials claimed that travel bans would do more harm than good.
Sound oddly familiar?
The left surprisingly became the most adamant supporters of lockdowns and curfews after the media was able to paint the face of superspreaders as Trump and his white male voters.
The reality, however, is that despite the left having a new adversary to pin the blame on, the very idea of locking down society to keep people safe was a privileged self-indulged fantasy that put the countries’ most vulnerable minorities at the greatest risk of immediate and future collateral damage.
2. Collateral Damage Mainly Harms the Most Vulnerable
While the most advantageous and healthy of the lockdown supporters were housed comfortably in suburban neighborhoods with access to remote healthcare, America’s inner cities, and rural areas were severely restricted to far more detriment.
Resource centers, transportation, small businesses, churches, and community organizations were forced to close, putting the most vulnerable among us at unprecedented risk and leaving them at the mercy of the state which habitually neglects and abuses them.
Cancer, heart disease, diabetes, aids, and so on were left unchecked as routine screenings and doctors' visits were put on hold. The collateral damage, both economic and medical, harmed poor and working-class people the most. The lack of in-person learning was also tremendously burdensome for lower-income families.
Barring individuals from their places of employment and restricting their access to nutritious foods, removing their freedom to associate and socialize with others, ushered in a gruesome reality for people far removed from the scope of public attention.
The mental and physical tragedies that occurred and are yet to come are not as easily calculated. Numbers that cannot be swiftly put on a tv screen to confuse and scare the masses.
Outside of the U.S. where many impoverished communities rely on our greater economic activity to support themselves, countless innocent people will die from malnourishment, disease, starvation, violence, and suicide due to the impact of the lockdowns that liberals begged for.
The collateral damage is merely just beginning, as some experts illustrate that the negative consequences of the lockdowns could be felt for more than a decade.
While wealthier countries and citizens will have an easier time recovering their losses, the less fortunate domestically and abroad will suffer challenges unbeknownst to any armchair epidemiologist who raged for total lockdowns out of fear.
A luxury that is not apparent to those who were calling for more government control from places of privilege. As liberals constantly talk about the importance of not letting the most vulnerable among us fall into the cracks, it is extremely disappointing that they threw them under the bus to protect themselves.
Another casualty in the pandemic was small businesses. Your local community businesses, restaurants, bars, coffee shops, salons, service centers, schools, arenas, etc were forced to make massive layoffs and even close down completely.
All were thrown to the wayside to keep their biggest fans safe while the wealthy industries they hate, such as Amazon, grew their profits considerably.
Liberals also got to see their beloved socialism in practice, as rich beneficiaries got the lion's share of the so-called "paycheck relief" package that we will be paying off for decades. It was the absolute largest transfer of wealth from small businesses/employees to big businesses in human history.
Next time, liberals need to truly check their privilege and keep the needs of others in mind before blindly following everything the government demands of them. Think for yourself and stick to your principles.
3. Mask Mandates & Lockdowns Give Police More Power to Interfere With Disadvantaged Neighborhoods
It was easy for liberals to laugh when they saw the police throwing a conservative to the ground who would not listen to the mask orders. Their excitement was like a cannon of confetti being shot at the apex of “2 minutes hate”.
The reality is that these anecdotes were exceedingly rare. The police, on the other hand, were given immense authority during the emergency edicts to harass whomever they pleased.
Who are the police most likely to harass?
It appears contradictory that a group of people who want to defund the police would also give them unrestricted power to interfere with anyone not following lockdown orders, forced vaccinations, or mask mandates.
Nonsensical laws and curfews give law enforcement carte blanche to burden low-income neighborhoods. The more stupid laws liberals ask for, the more violence they are unleashing on disadvantaged, highly segregated areas.
It didn't seem to matter. Some of the left were so stubbornly and recklessly in favor of covid-19 measures that they simply did not care about who would suffer from its side effects.
It has become such an integral part of some liberal's identities that they were calling for the strictest lockdown and mask measures, even far beyond what was considered safe by health experts, well into the summer of 2021. To hell with the rest of the world, as long as they don't get sick, right?
Teachers in Massachusetts protest a school-reopening plan. (MediaNews Group / Boston Herald / Getty)
4. Unscientific Policies
Liberals pride themselves on being scientifically ethical. The ruling class knew that they could get liberals on board with supporting rigid pandemic authoritarianism (something they once disagreed with) by centering the entire debate around “following the science.”
The recipe for social control was tv scientists, images of white lab coats & syringes full of vaccines, and a sitting president and his followers who were viewed as being largely hostile toward science.
Ironically, that is all it took to get the strait-laced liberals to fall in line with an unscientific Orwellian agenda.
The Single Villain - If you would have forgone valuable screenings, medical examinations, and life-saving hospital visits to avoid getting sick from Ebola or Swine Flu, you would have been labeled a fanatic, and your resulting doom would be because you didn’t “trust the science” but were rather duped by Fox News. With all the media frenzies and politics around covid, everything other than covid-19 was simply ignored.
As long as you didn't die from Covid, nobody cared. The reality, however, is that it is unscientific to ignore all of the unhealthy and deadly ramifications of lockdowns just to stay safe from one killer.
Keeping People Germ Free - A popular motto in schools when the kids were finally allowed to go back into the classrooms was to keep them "germ free". Trying to sterilize the environment to the point where nobody catches a virus is absolute frivolity that ridicules decades of actual scientific theory on disease.
What's more, your body needs a healthy microbiota to function. There are more bugs that live inside of you than there are cells in your body. These bugs feed off of what you eat. Most of these bugs are symbiotic.
Having a healthy population of bacteria (or germs) in your body will prevent the formation of bad colonies.
When you use a lot of sanitizer and cleaning detergents on surfaces, you kill those good bacteria too. A good microbiome is also linked to having a solid immune system, which is necessary for fighting off the bad guys.
You don't want to be "germ-free", you want to have lots of germs that can act as an army assisting your immune system when invaders approach.
Wearing Cloth Masks - while good for hygiene theater, it isn't much good for anything else. While there are some medically significant reasons to wear some PPE in certain surroundings, it won't do much in the way of stopping a virus. If anything, it gave people a false sense of security to go near those who were most vulnerable, contaminating them.
Isolation Damages the Immune System - think about the Sentineli tribe off the coast of India. The Sentinelese is an indigenous tribe that voluntarily lives in total isolation. They are protected by India's government. You are not allowed to go there. You cannot visit or send packages there. If somebody from the city went there, they would destroy the population with diseases.
They must live in isolation completely for the remainder of their natural lives. A large economy cannot function the same. As you avoid people (and sunlight), your immunity will go down...and eventually, you will either get sick and die or die from the effects of the collateral damages of isolation.
There is no way to stay safe and avoid risk completely. Instead, liberals should have adopted the more scientifically valid theory of focused protection, which allows the healthiest groups of people to infect each other while keeping only the most immunocompromised isolated.
When you make a trade with the government, be very careful. Handing them all of your liberty in exchange for safety is a bad deal. You will indeed lose your freedom, but they will never be able to give you that safety you paid for.
Someone who has a truly scientific mind and follows science knows that politicians cannot give them freedom from germs.
Stay scientific, question everything, and don't fall for the hype next time.
While there are certainly more arguments the left could have made against the covid-19 measures had they stuck to their principles rather than buying into narratives, these are some solid considerations for what you might have heard if the tables were turned in 2020.
When all is said and done, know that life has risks. It is up to individuals, communities, and each of us to protect ourselves and our communities. It doesn't matter if you are a republican or democrat, liberal or conservative, the government is not here to protect you from anything.
If you enjoyed reading these arguments, check out 10 Libertarian Quotes Every Liberal Should Read!
