> the general public has gotten more ignorant, more conspiratorial, more belligerent, and more defiant
If the response to COVID was more appropriate we wouldn't be in this situation.
Which - by the way - was predicted countless times early on in the pandemic. That, if the public health response was too overboard, people will just ignore it the next time around. Crying wolf and all that.
What was too strict, wearing masks in public? Not being able to eat in restaurants for a couple weeks? Pathetic. People could barely be bothered to do the bare minimum.
In the 2020 I experienced, it was over 6 months of literally everything in a major city being shut down except absolute necessities, and people being told to stay in their homes and away from any contact with other humans unless absolutely necessary. I'm not sure if we live in the same reality if you think that is the "bare minimum."
The 2020 I saw (small town USA) were people out ignoring stay-at-home (because it was utterly unenforced), horsing around, buying their Khakis, eating at their restaurants… and protesting, ridiculing, and belittling the people actually trying to help. The “COVID restrictions” everyone complained about were largely ignored, to the entire population’s detriment.
I guess we don't. I live in the Midwest and was mocked for wearing a mask. Other than restaurants being shut down for a couple weeks, no one did a fucking thing differently. I almost lost my job for refusing to work from the office.
The things I think of as peak irrationality were not being able to hike alone on a trail. not being about to swim outdoors at a beach. making it a crime to drive in my own car to go to my partners house for a romantic evening. My mother had a stroke and I wasnt able to visit her bedside.
If the response to COVID was more appropriate we wouldn't be in this situation.
Which - by the way - was predicted countless times early on in the pandemic. That, if the public health response was too overboard, people will just ignore it the next time around. Crying wolf and all that.
So like, congratulations.