YOU CAN'T FIX STUPID

If you believe coronavirus is overhyped, I wish you wouldn’t read my story. It will just piss you off. You’ll find it elitist, self-righteous, and condescending. Which doesn’t make it not true. Still, why put yourself through it?

~ ~ ~

I think I’ve figured out why so many people are ignoring public health rules about social distancing. Why the majority of people in the community where I live, and most other places, never wear masks. Why they think it is at the least, overhyped, and at most, a hoax. And really, really inconvenient.

It’s like a switch was flipped this past holiday weekend. The lunacy of packed pool parties, on the news, is obvious. But it’s everywhere. Simple things: Shoppers ignoring one-way aisles. People travelling to other states for trivial reasons. And no way are they going to wear a mask! Too this... Too that...

Yet, nothing has really changed. The virus is resident in far more people now than when this all got started. Four in five of those infected are asymptomatic. Eighty percent! Given the increasingly casual behavior of so many people, how can we not have another serious spike in infections? What biological explanation can avoid that inevitable fate for us?

Aha! There’s the problem. It’s science. 

Science? But on the other hand, “a lot of people are saying...” blah, blah, blah. In TrumpWorld, everyone’s entitled to their own facts, science be damned. Those scary stories about the pandemic are, to borrow Al Gore’s term, inconvenient truths. 

Why should I be surprised, however, at people’s irrational rationalizations of their selfish behavior? The ones poo-pooing health agencies’ warnings are the same people who believe that Noah’s ark was real (half of Americans). It includes the one in four who believes the sun revolves around the earth. Many of these ignoramuses are the same people who believe that the Deep State is out to get them. And their guns. 

How have other countries done so much better than us in tamping down the spread of infections? The immediate answer is obvious: people took social distancing dead-seriously. But why? Their people aren’t any smarter, or dumber, than our country’s people. I’ll bet lots of New Zealanders believe things as ridiculous as Noah’s ark. So why the startling difference in body counts?

It’s about leadership. And empathy. I’m willing to go out on a limb and say that having a moron in charge of a pandemic makes a difference. Our man is certifiable. The technical term is malignant narcissist. 

This crazed fabulist has contrived dangerous nonsense and displayed Orwellian incompetence at every turn. Never mind that each breath he takes is devoted to his psychotic vanity. His fans, that forty-some percent who love his flabby ass, they hear what they want to hear. He gives stupid people license to let their stupid flag fly.

Scientists are boring. They don’t really know. Their numbers are inflated. Trust your gut. And no matter what, never wear a mask. They’re for sissies.

That’s our president. That’s our leader. He’s modelling behavior for the narcissism now sweeping our country. The behavior I see in the aisles of the local Walmart starts at the top. 

These are the stupid people who are tempting fate, and putting people like me at risk. I’m damned lucky to live where I do. The infection rate here is minimal – just 67 cases so far in a county that stretches from the Cascades’ crest to the Pacific Ocean. But I’m not sure that good record can hold. We’re right on the I-5 corridor connecting California and Washington, both states with serious hot spots. 

While the chance of infection from the coronavirus may be low where I’m living, the costs would be severe. In our family, from our youngest to the oldest, we have underlying health issues that could make any infection fatal. And while the overall mortality rate from COVID-19 is low, that ignores the 20% of cases that require hospitalization, often resulting in terrible health consequences.

One of my hyper-religious acquaintances told my wife on Facebook that she was being self-righteous in her caution. As for her especially vulnerable family members (i.e., granddaughter, daughter, son-in-law, parents, husband), “I’d suggest you keep them isolated.”

It’s much like Jesus said, “Verily, verily, I say unto you, the strong shall inherit the earth. You have a right to party.”

It’s all about freedom. The freedom to be stupid, apparently. Sadly, you can’t fix stupid.

Take that ridiculous storming of the Michigan’s capitol building by AR-toting assholes. They’re going to teach “that woman” (Gov. Whitmer) a lesson:

That’s why I’d just as soon these fools not read my story. I know, with the certainty that I know the earth revolves around the sun, that nothing I write could change their certainty of their own facts and truths. 

Which brings me to my sad conclusion: we are fucked. This pandemic is going to be around for a lot longer than necessary. It’s just tragic. And stupid.

# # #