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There’s a Fine Line Between Prudence and Panic…
…and we crossed that line a long time ago.
Over the weekend on Facebook, I repeated a line that I heard at the beginning of the COVID-19 freakout, “There is a fine line between prudence and panic” and commented that we are so far beyond the line that it is no longer funny and is now just sad. Someone responded that we obviously weren’t panicking because 100,000 people are dead and that I (and apparently I alone) am the reason that we can’t open up the economy. Sorry, but that guy was wrong — as a nation, we are in full-blown panic mode, and I think the latest fight over masks proves that beyond any reasonable doubt.
I think masks are mostly virtue signaling, but I’m on record as saying that if virtue signaling will make the paranoid feel safe enough to open up the economy, I will grudgingly virtue signal. I also view wearing masks when I’m in a store as a simple courtesy to the paranoid (and where I live, almost everyone seems to think the COVID mortality rate is 99% and if you get within 50 feet of another healthy person, you will die an instant and horrible death.) I’m all for courtesy, but just because I’m willing to virtue signal and be courteous doesn’t mean that we are not panicking.
But, it is worth saying if we let the paranoid among us dictate how normal people are required to act, it will end badly for all of us. All of us.
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I like your thinking!
I returned to Austin where I have noticed a stark divide.
At the Whole Foods downtown, everyone wore masks. Go to the HEB in the suburbs, they are almost completely missing.
These are not, actually, people from completely different socioeconomic backgrounds, and I do not believe that the politics of masks falls perfectly along progressive/conservative lines either. But the social pressures do seem much different–notably different–in these two places.
Per my own predilections, even though I find it an inconvenience, I will start driving to the suburbs for all large shopping trips from this point forward. If someone outside of Travis County feels masks are really a must, that person can drive into the city and find masks galore. We can all make our choices, and that’s the inconvenience I choose. If people want to wear masks, that is their affair.
However, when it comes to the people who are clearly under thirty and who are wearing masks in the middle of Zilker Park?
They can suffocate as they like in hot Texas weather, but they actually do annoy me. Like those people who put “Co-Exist” on their bumper stickers next to their “Humans against Ted Cruz” stickers.
I find them insufferable.
If it matters, I’m 55 years old. I figure I have about thirty good years left, so trading six months on house arrest to avoid a 0.5% chance of dying is a bad trade-off to me. Then again, I used to get paid $110 a month to jump out of airplanes in the middle of the night, so my risk tolerance is admittedly different than the people freaking out over this disease.
I’m anti what I call the face burqa for several reasons one of which is that we will never get a definitive all clear signal to return to normalcy. I’m naturally optimistic and see that in reality things flu-wise are going in the right direction but I had a conversation with a lady friend yesterday that disturbed me. Wherever she’s getting her information she thinks the thing is roaring back and that Brazil is in ‘bring out your dead’ mode and we are heading that way. She mentioned Montgomery Al. I didn’t have the information on hand and I didn’t want to end the conversation with something that would seem to be arguing. So afterward I just checked deaths per total population which to me is the only meaningful statistic, cases means little if over 98% survive, you could probably say the same about high school. Montgomery Al ( pop 205,000) has had an uptick in cases in the last two weeks but the total number of deaths is 35. Alabama itself (pop 4.89 million) deaths 575, Brazil (pop 208 million) deaths 26,622. Worse yet she thinks if she simply shows her face she will be responsible for killing someone. I don’t know what it will take to get such people off the ledge if she thinks all good news is just Fox/Trump propaganda.
I think businesses are in panic mode. They were prudent when asked to close to help “flatten the curve”. The curve was indeed flattened, but now there is hesitation (if not outright obstinance) by blue state governors to open all the doors. Imagine a business owner who puts his heart and soul into building up his business over the years, only to have it destroyed in three months. No one is counting the livelihoods lost, only the lives . . .
This parallels my observation yesterday about my time in FL in a Sam’s Club and a WalMart a mile and a few days apart.
I’m reminded of an anecdote from a great course on complexity. It imagines what happens if you are in a mall and you see one person fleeing the mall, you don’t think much about it, but if you see 50 people fleeing the mall, you will probably think something is going on, and you must flee too. The point is, everyone has a different number in their head regarding how many people it will take to see fleeing the mall to make you flee the mall. The problem is, every additional person fleeing the mall raises the likelihood that an additional person will flee the mall. I will excerpt from the guide book.
“Let’s now turn to our second goal— understanding how diversity plus positive feedback produce tipping. Let’s model a system of 101 people fleeing a mall and see if this system can tip. We will consider two scenarios. In the first, everyone will have the same threshold, so only if the common threshold is one does one person leaving cause everyone to leave at once. If we add threshold diversity by assigning a different threshold to each person, the scenario has a tip. In complex systems, we often find that the tail (of the distribution of thresholds) wags the dog: The agents whose thresholds lie at the extremes have a large effect on the outcomes.”
I get the sense that something similar is happening with masks, the more people wear masks, the more likely other people are to wear masks, which will in turn cause more people to wear masks.
Occasional use of masks isn’t the end of the world or a mark of overwhelming fear. That I’ve seen, though, journalists have done a very poor job educating people on when and where masks help.
The germ spreads from the throat by prolonged exposure. That means:
— You won’t get it just passing by someone unless that person coughs in your face.
— You won’t get it outside or in any large space with good air circulation.
— You won’t get it from hugging or even from shaking hands if you wash your hands. Millions of packages and groceries have been exchanged without devastation.
I saw someone yesterday driving in a mask. That’s not only unnecessary but can make the driver drowsy.
Likewise, even when inside among people, wearing a mask during manual labor can be a risk because a hard working body needs more air.
Since the media has not been helpful in this regard, it is up to informed individuals to educate their neighbors and set sensible examples.
But that doesn’t address the problem of lawsuits, which is why many companies will mandate use of masks even when they know masks are unnecessary. Both political parties are to blame for lack of tort reform.
Yes, more than physical health must be considered. Commerce and work are necessary too.
It would be a mistake to say the curve has been flattened as if that challenge is over. It’s easier to flatten the curve from a starting point of few cases. The virus has only started.
The initial restrictions, wise or foolish, bought time to make useful preparations and studies before more widespread infection. But the more people infected the faster the virus will spread. That the curve was flattened early on does not mean it will remain so after we return to a bit of normalcy.
I don’t see any way around that. Flattening the curve ceases to be an option beyond an epidemic’s infancy. We can’t remain locked down for a year.
Ok, I take it back. You are not old.
What upsets me the most is the permanent effect this has on vulnerable persons. I know two people who may never be the same. They are both fairly young, one in her 30s and another in her 40s. Both of them have plans to stay quarantined for at least a year. And their children – forget about them, they won’t even consider taking them out of the house. Their fears are irrational but that’s what anxiety does to some people. I’m afraid the effects of this shut-down will be destructive and possibly permanent for a lot of people. It’s heartbreaking.
55 is old enough to get harassed by AARP.
When I was 49 years old, my son told me to not worry, you don’t get old until you are 50. The funny bit is, a few weeks later, we went to a friend’s 50 birthday party, and I had my son tell her what he told me about getting old. It got a laugh.
Our Tuesday morning “old guys from church” breakfast group re-started a couple of weeks ago. Several of the regular guys decided not to come for a while yet.
Yesterday the pastor who participates expressed concern that “Dan,” whose in his mid-70s and has had several heart health issues, was there. “Dan” responded that he was going to keep living his life, and was not going to give up living in order to avoid a small chance of an infection. But then our Texas county of 140,000 people has less than 100 reported cases, all but a handful having fully recovered, and only one death for which the virus was listed as a “contributing factor.”
Though “Dan” also noted that he spends most days on a tractor mowing ranch properties for customers of his son’s very busy landscaping business. So heart problems or no, “Dan” is no wimpy old man.
At 50 I started hearing from AARP.
At 55 I started getting letters from cemeteries about “pre-planning”.
I do worry there will be permanent changes to our culture because of how media, politicians, and corporations are addressing this. I don’t want America to become like Tokyo, where masks seem to be normal every year. People need to see each other’s faces.
Agreed. I tend to think that the universal adoption of masks would destroy our society (not that our rejection of religion and traditional values hasn’t done that already)… it simply isn’t who we are. But beyond that, it shouldn’t be who we are.
This is one of my big problems with the mask brigade. Their argument, masks don’t hurt and might help, therefore everyone needs to wear them. OK, sure – never leaving your house won’t hurt and might help, so let’s force everyone to do that too. I can’t think of a thousand things that I think won’t hurt and might help, but that isn’t the standard we should accept.
This idea that some small segment of paranoid people get to use their belief that something won’t hurt and might help to get to force their desires on everyone else will end badly for all of us.
If we are going to force everyone to do something using the power of government, the benefit needs to obviously outweigh the costs to all but the most ardent critics. Mandatory masks don’t come close to that standard for me, even if I am willing to be a bit more courteous in a time where people are afraid of dying. But there are limits to my willingness to be courteous to people that aren’t willing to return the courtesy.
One of my big problems with the anti-mask brigade is the tendency to turn the discussion into a referendum on tyranny, despotism, and “the future.” As I’ve said elsewhere, I wear a mask to shopping locations because I’ve made a personal cost/benefit analysis. If that’s the overused suggestion of “paranoia, so be it. I’m of a certain age and live in a certain area. While I do not believe the wearing of masks should be governmentally imposed, I have no issue with a private business determining how they want to run things and who they wish to admit.
I’m not anti-mask.
I’m not “Anti-anti-mask” as Jonah described himself in the podcast that precipitated this post.
I’m probably more anti-anti-anti mask.
I agree, businesses can do what they want, but in my state, it is the law imposed on the order of one person and not based on a law passed by the legislature. That is problematic. If businesses want to compete on their mask policy, I’m fine with that. I will simply shop at places that don’t expect me to wear a mask. Or, they could have specific hours for people that are paranoid, that’s fine too.
I still think there is a tyrannical impulse in expecting everyone else to bow to your wishes simply because you are afraid. Lots of people are afraid of lots of things, we shouldn’t allow the fearful to dictate actions to the non-fearful. We will probably disagree on that, I can live with that.
My 84 year old mother is of the same view. She is not going to live the rest of her already long life hiding in her basement wearing a burqa to ensure that millions of working people can lose their jobs, business’ and whatever life savings they have just to make certain politicians and frightened people feel superior to the rest of us.
Yes, even the arguments in favor of masks contradict themselves. But that’s not the issue. Masks are a placebo… I just put this in a post. It is probably no more enlightening than this comment.
I am very much anti-mask – but mostly because I understand how these sorts of fads become law. I live in Washington State, where we are currently suffering through paper straws and plastic bag bans. If we don’t push against this stuff on the social level, we will be dealing with it as laws. As it happens, I don’t care if people want to wear masks. I will never wear one – they hamper my breathing and I’m already pretty claustrophobic. It is not my responsibility to make people feel better, and it is not my obligation to play into people’s delusions. The problem with being anti-anti-mask because you think allegations of tyranny, despotism, and “the future,” are conspiratorial or overblown, is that it falls a bit flat with those of use who see our local governments proving those allegations correct.
In all fairness, where you and I live, it’s all over but the shouting.
If I stay here, I will be mandated to wear masks in public in this state until I’m dead and they will probably force my dead body to wear a mask at the viewing.
If it saves one life, it will be worth it.
Well, Yakima remains a “hot spot,” so we are not allowed to enter phase II.
A while back, they announced 5 new drive-up testing facilities! Then, today, there was the scare piece about how there were 100 new cases just today (Tuesday after memorial day, hmm…)