The spectre of one's mortality that a global pandemic raises can be a
needed and sobering opportunity to reconsider and reorder our lives, if
we're granted them longer.
I read this article and decided to share some of what I believe is good thinking.
1. Massive Shift in Education
As
schools and universities attempt to maintain learning through screens,
it’s an opportune moment to consider whether one’s schooling is really
ideal if it can be credited in half the time, through worksheets and
video clips, and without in-person contact. Many people who never
questioned the U.S. education conveyor belt are now filling in for it,
suffering through mediocre, haphazard assignments.
Parents are getting a taste of what exactly their kids do all day.
Some will discover that if a layperson can do the job of a credentialed
teacher in half the time, maybe that’s an indication of serious lack.
Families may discover that learning outside the default is more
refreshing, less stressful, and less propagandistic.
We’ve discovered that many Americans value it mostly as a babysitting
service. Many governors immediately disbanded classes for a third to a
half of the school year — possibly to be renewed this fall — then
continued collecting children in the same buildings for daycare and
government feeding, even though congregating people like that is
supposed to be too dangerous to hold school itself. Then they take
billions
of “emergency” dollars from the generation they aren’t educating to pay
for…millions of public employees getting vacation for two to three
months while parents try to do their jobs using badly designed filler?
2. Prepping for Emergencies
Lots of people just discovered they might go hungry without a weekly
shopping run and open restaurants, and can’t manage common illnesses
without using medical resources that might be needed for people with
worse problems. Emergencies happen, and unprepared people make them
worse for themselves and others. The more unprepared people we have, the
greater a society’s dependency on government and propensity to panic.
Hopefully the shock of realizing these things will encourage at least
some people to upskill. Keep a few weeks of food in your pantry at all
times, and rotate supplies. Keep basic medicine on hand, and
learn how to help people sick with common illnesses that won’t need a doctor if well-managed. And keep more than one roll of toilet paper in your bathroom.
3. More Flexible Work Environments
Speaking of government dependence, a free people does not let
government control the half of their lives they spend earning their way
in the world. Free people manage their own lives, and passive-aggressive
people use government force to get stuff from others instead of
negotiating directly for it.
The coronavirus offers workers an opportunity to do just that by
forcing many into work-from-home arrangements. Many people, especially
working mothers, would like to work from home more or completely, and
have been either afraid or unable to leverage their employers into it.
Showing their capability during this time gives them more leverage for
this kind of negotiation in the future.
This is also a time for employers to stop forcing employees to
sacrifice their families and health for employment. Because women are
the child-bearers, the weight of being forced to work on an Industrial
Era 9-5 hits us harder, but men also love families and need to have some
ability to care for them outside of bringing home a paycheck.
4. Better Social Norms About Sickness
We all have heard people at some social event talking, as their kids
stick fingers in the snack bowl, about how their family has been sick
all week and they just ditched the fever yesterday. We all know people
keep working while they are sick, and keep their kids in school although
the kids are sick, because they want to bank their sick leave for
vacations.
Now this kind of petty selfishness is widely recognized as such,
hopefully people will continue to take more care about spreading germs
to others. We’re all having a crash course in endangering the elderly,
the young, and immune-compromised by going out while still contagious,
not washing hands frequently and thoroughly, and touching.
5. Basic Financial Responsibility
Congress just sent billions of dollars to Americans they stole from
the next generation without their consent because neither Congress nor
Americans prepare for emergencies. It is a crying shame that we live on
borrowed money and have nothing stored away against inevitable
disasters, so dip our hands into the next generation’s pockets every
time “something comes up.” This will lead to an unstoppable national
financial disaster sooner or later.
Half of Americans
say they couldn’t pay for a $1,000 emergency out of cash or savings. Excluding their mortgages, the average American
has $38,000 in debt.
That’s just plain irresponsible. This irresponsibility just cost the
next generation $2 trillion plus interest for precisely zero government
services to them, and the bailouts aren’t even close to ending.
6. Learning How to Live in Deprivation
Let’s face it: Most of us have pretty good lives. Even Americans who
are poor are better off, materially speaking, than just about every
other poor person in the world. There are many obviously great things
about America’s affluence. There are also some bad things about it that a
crisis like coronavirus can strip away.
The uncertainty we all are facing about our jobs, health, and the
nation’s economy can prompt some empathy and constructive help for
people who live in these kinds of circumstances every day. It should
prompt all of us to reconsider our life priorities and how we manage the
bountiful resources God and our wonderful country have made possible
for us to acquire. If you still have a job, give to someone who doesn’t.
7. Revitalization of Community Relationships
When our governments failures, it finally will end the pretense that it’s
someone else’s job to solve our personal problems.
Solving personal problems often requires a community.
There are many problems so big that one person, family, or even
community cannot handle it alone. This is called social capital, when
relationships are as good as (or better than) money. Social capital is
especially important to impoverished people and situations.
In my neighborhood, people are rallying around our local mom ‘n pop
restaurants and buying more from them in hopes of keeping them afloat
past the lockdowns. Of course, this is wonderful. But what are each of
us doing right now to make sure this
nascent neighborhood revitalization continues
past
the coronavirus crisis? Like restaurants that face closure when starved
of customers, relationships and local organizations face closure when
starved of time and attention.
Trading favors and volunteering is one essence of community, and lots
of us haven’t given much of our resources to making sure these tiny
social safety nets exist and preclude the need for massive, ham-handed
government ones that will bankrupt us and our children. This moment is
an opportunity to change that, and start investing our time and money in
our communities for the long-term.
