A short conversation I had with fellow blogger 
, as well as a new book from Dutch philosopher René ten Bos, titled "The Corona Storm - How a virus wiped out our minds", inspired this post. Before reading it, I invite you, dear reader, to read 's poem, Stand Closer, in which words are used in a way I never could, and in which a deeply felt and widely shared desire is expressed. Go read that beautiful poem and then come back here :-)
Image by iXimus - source: Pixabay
In my country of residence, The Netherlands, the prime minister some time ago said about the measures taken to contain the spread of Covid-19, that we, the people, should stop philosophizing about it and just follow the instructions issued by his administration; keep your distance, wear a mask plus some other additional directives. This is something that's happening all over the world; we're being asked to not think for ourselves, to let the government do our thinking for us. This outrageous advice, to stop thinking critically (in a democracy, mind you), was the direct inspiration for Dutch philosopher René ten Bos to write a book about the socioeconomic twilight zone we find ourself in right now. He divided the book in 26 Chapters, each with a topic starting with one of the 26 letters from the alphabet, in alphabetical order of course. I would like to shortly discuss two of them; the second chapter titled "Beelden", which is Dutch for "Images", and the sixth chapter, "Fascist". The first chapter is titled "Angst", Dutch for "Fear"; I believe my readers are informed enough to understand how all other chapters, as well as the "new normal" that's being designed by the governments of the world, are all predicated on an appeal to this most basic of our instincts...
In the second chapter René ten Bos discusses how imagery is used to embed new ideas and new norms in our subconscious minds. We are emotional and visual creatures first and foremost. As hard as we find it to admit sometimes, we are driven by emotions much more than by rational thinking; I've said it many times before, but rational and critical thinking takes real effort, it's not something that comes naturally. While we like to believe that we vote based on programs, study after study shows that we vote on appearance much more than on actual programs or proposals; charisma and a stately or distinguished posture wins more than half the political fight. And we are visual creatures as well; we navigate our surroundings by sight mostly, and we're masters at some highly specialized visual feats. Although faces are all made up of the same components, eyes, nose, mouth, eyebrows and so on, we can distinguish between hundreds of them, and besides that, we see faces everywhere; we see them in cloud formations, shadows and so on, everywhere where there's a semblance of two dots (eyes) and a line (mouth), we immediately see a representation of a human face. Another basic human trait is that we anthropomorphize everything, that is we assign human characteristics to star formations (zodiac signs), animals and so on. This combination of being driven by visuals and emotions, and to project our own human characteristics on almost everything, is often used to make us internalize emotions and ideas.
As an example, René ten Bos uses a picture we've all seen in relation to climate change; the polar bear that hangs on to the last bit of a melting sheet of ice, surrounded by nothing but water... Irrespective of your belief in, or denial of anthropogenic climate change, it's important to know that this image is deliberately used to invoke in us a feeling of empathy toward the unlucky polar bear. We're being confronted in this picture with two things that will soon exist no more: first the ice sheet will disappear, and soon after that the unlucky polar bear will share the same sad fate, as it will most certainly drown. This is the appeal to fear that's common in all uses of imagery by the powers that be. But it's a lie. Not the climate change, that's true, but it's a lie that this particular polar bear will most certainly die; polar bears can swim, and they can swim many, many miles with no problem:
Polar bears (Ursus maritimus) are capable of swimming incredible distances, according to a new study published in Zoology, which recorded polar bears regularly swimming over 30 miles (48 kilometers) and, in one case, as far as 220 miles (354 kilometers). The researchers believe the ability of polar bears to tackle such long-distance swims may help them survive as seasonal sea ice vanishes due to climate change.
source: Mongabay
With the COVID-19 situation, again irrespective if you believe the disease is real or not, we're saturated with imagery of overcrowded IC units, ill people and so on. Whatever you think about the measures dictated by your government (and I'm not saying you should stop keeping physical distance or wearing a mask in public spaces), you should stop and think, and ask if this heavily coordinated international campaign is really done with your best interest in mind. I personally keep distance and wear a mask in public spaces, but I do so on my own accord, simply because for me it's not clear yet if the disease is the cause of the very real deaths, or something else. But when my government, as well as many other governments around the world tell me I should stop philosophizing about the almost inhuman quarantine measures, I get mighty suspicious. Here's a comment I saw recently under a Dutch video on this topic, translated for you all:
My mother-in-law died last Saturday, she was terminally ill. Her husband - to whom she was married for 58 years - has been staying in a nursing home for some time. They have seen each other only 1 time in the past 3 months, do you have any idea how FURIOUS I am with the despicable hoodlum-government in The Hague?!?
It is pure physical and psychological punishment to not allow people to touch each other in such circumstances, when they need each other the most; this is the gist of
Which brings me to the sixth chapter about fascism, and to this quote: "Who falls asleep in a democracy will wake up in a dictatorship." That quote says everything there is to be said about all governments who say that we, the people, should stop asking questions and blindly follow these new rules given to us. Again, I must stress that this is not a call to arms against distancing or the use of masks, not until the science is clear and not until we can be reasonably sure that the science is clear. Personally I find the right wing protests against distancing and masks laughable as they stem from the same uncritical following of "authorities" as the people who wear masks only because their government says so. No one says that there are easy answers here; not even the scientists have definitive answers yet, they can only speak in terms of probabilities. And scientists are as human as the rest of us, so some of them will bend results or cherry-pick statistics in order to further some personal or political goal; of this we can be certain. But the call to stop asking questions, to blindly follow orders, as well as the punishment behind the veil of quarantine measures, have a suspiciously fascistoid smell. René de Bont warns in his book for what he calls "fascism without fascists", which is essentially what also happened with the people of Germany in the run-up to the Second World War; without every individual being a fascist, a society can become fascist if those individuals unthinkingly answer to an unreasonable call for solidarity.
Well, I believe this should give you enough to think about, and that's all I want; never stop asking questions, never stop thinking and never blindly believe what "authorities" tell you to believe. Too often they've shown us that they are perfectly capable of lying to us, and too often too many of us believe those lies. I haven't been able to find a video on this exact topic, not in English anyway, so below I share with you a video about the fallacy of the idea of reopening schools in America. I hope this post has shown that it is possible to not trust your government while still wearing a mask; this is why I think it's unreasonable to protest against closing schools and against wearing a mask, simply to show that you don't agree with the government. As long as there's no definitive proof that this virus is not the cause of the deaths, not wearing a mask and reopening the schools might mean you have, or will have blood on your hands. That might sound harsh, but this is my genuine opinion in this moment in time (subject to change as information keeps rolling in)...
Reopening Schools is a Terrible Idea
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