every few days the horror strikes me: Americans are so wedded to their identities, certainties, and conveniences they won’t do a near-zero-cost minor annoyance thing like wear masks that could potentially save tens of thousands of lives...
you don’t need 100% certainty that it is effective... this is so cheap, the potential upside so high, and the downside so trivial, you should do it even if it’s only 1%
the dissonance is appalling... 20% of reported deaths from 4% of the world’s population... you should be willing to do any no-cost thing with even the slightest chance of helping
Florida and Texas are especially appalling. They SAW the disaster unfold in New York. Do they hate liberals so much they’ll kill themselves out of spite rather than learn a sobering lesson and act?
This is mostly, but not entirely, a red state thing. I do see a lot of non masking here in LA including among minorities. All of the US is a bit trumpie in this.
There’s also a Hobbesian streak in the US. The idea that some ongoing culling of the weak is a good thing. It’s not exactly eugenics or racism (though those sensibilities are present too at the margins) but a frontier morality. Comes from the same place as the gun fetish.
the virus is uniquely designed to inflict maximal damage on dystopian societies with selfish pricks who would rather let other people die than obey orders.
The engineering of the right-wing anti reality is amazingly thorough. I study it in detail. The ability to be in a bubble on think that you're the real world facilitates this. The right are like deluded Islamic fundamentalists or scientologists
Asymmetrical unearned power. I have a gun, so I win for that reason alone. I am immune, so I win for that reason alone.
...vs. winning because I deserve to on the merits.
It produces/covers guilt.
Except that this frontier bias is defined not only by imposing control on "nature" as was the case with the original "pioneer spirit" but rather imposing individual choice over institutional safety.
(Don't tread on me / Liberty or Death)
And we always look at the other when making that judgment. Somehow we won't be the ones to suffer. Until we are. Expect changes in behavior when everyone knows someone who has had covid.