No, I actually don’t know how to spot the Delta variant from 100 yards away. I wish I did.
I can, however, spot people who are fearful of the Delta variant from approximately that distance. They are wearing face masks.
And I’m assuming the people who are not wearing masks don’t fear the virus… but are perhaps just as fearful… of losing their liberty?
On the subject of fear, there’s a curious story that I came across in a non-fiction book by Malcolm Gladwell. The book title is David and Goliath, and the book begins unveiling its theme by suggesting that David — the Israelite shepherd boy who entered into combat with the champion of the Philistine army, a giant warrior named Goliath — appeared to be the underdog in the contest, but may, in fact, have had an overwhelming advantage from the git-go. (If you want to read that particular part of Gladwell’s essay, you can find the book on the shelf at our Sisson Library as soon as I return it.)
The book goes on proposing that, in certain situations, the person or organization that appears cursed with a disadvantage in the beginning sometimes — maybe often — comes out on top, so to speak.
For example, some people who suffer trauma never recover to live what we think of as ‘normal’ lives. But some people come through trauma to live extraordinary lives.
The part of the book that made be think about our various perspectives on the Delta variant threat starts on page 128.
“In the years leading up to the Second World War, the British government was worried…” The British military command issued a report, predicting that the country would be bombed by the Germans and 600,000 people would be killed, causing mass panic in the streets. The country’s industrial production would grind to a halt. As a result, Britain would stand every chance of losing the war.
Several psychiatric hospitals were set up outside of London to handle the expected flood of PTSD patients. (Except the term, in those days, was “shell shock”.) The government feared people would enter the city’s bomb shelters and then refuse to leave.
The German ‘Blitzkrieg’ bombing of London began in September 1940, and the city experienced two and a half months of almost daily bombardment, before the German bombers shifted to attacking other industrial centers and ports.
The expected civilian panic never came. An American witness wrote, “By every test and measure I am able to apply, these people are staunch to the bone and won’t quit … the British are stronger and in a better position than they were at its beginning.” People referred to bombing raids as if they were weather, stating that a day was “very blitzy.” People left the underground bomb shelters when asked, instead of refusing to leave, although many housewives reportedly enjoyed the break from housework. Some people even told government surveyors that they enjoyed air raids, if they occurred occasionally, perhaps once a week.
The Blitz did not undermine the spirit of the British people, as the Germans expected it to. On the contrary, the British people seemed to grow more courageous with each passing week, and the country’s industrial output steadily increased all through the war, in spite of the damage to over 1 million buildings.
From Mr. Gladwell’s book:
In the midst of the Blitz, a middle-aged laborer in a button-factory was asked if he wanted to be evacuated to the countryside. He had been bombed out of his house twice. But each time, he and his wife had been fine. He refused.
“What, and miss all this?” he exclaimed. “Not for all the gold in China! There’s never been anything like it! Never! And never will be again…”
Mr. Gladwell proposes that the people directly touched by the loss of family members suffered severe trauma, in some cases, but the people who were not directly harmed by the Blitz generally came through the experience feeling emboldened and fearless.
Mr. Gladwell suggests that this psychological effect — coming out of a dreadful experience feeling stronger and more courageous than before — is not peculiar to the Londoners who experienced the Blitz, but can be found among people all around the world. He quotes Canadian psychiatrist J.T. McCurdy:
“We are all of us not merely liable to fear; we are also prone to be afraid of being afraid, and the conquering of fear produces exhilaration…”
Generally speaking, we haven’t been able to conquer the fear, and there’s probably a number of reasons why.
One reason is that there’s no clear enemy. The people in London in 1940 were in pretty much unanimous agreement who the enemy was. The Third Reich. Germany. Adolph Hitler. The bad guys, who were cropping the bombs. (A small minority believed the enemy was Corporate Capitalism, but that’s a topic for another day.)
We don’t have the benefit of a clearly identified enemy. There are enemies lurking pretty much everywhere, depending on your personal perspective.
Anti-vaxxers. Public health officials. Republicans. Democrats. People who won’t wear masks. People who wear masks. Big Pharma. Facebook. Google. Businesses that demand vaccinations. Businesses that won’t demand vaccinations. Government leaders issuing mandates. Government leaders not issuing mandates. Donald Trump. Joe Biden.
And of course, the Little Big Man himself, the SARS-CoV-2 virus, in all his permutations.
I sense that many people, here in Pagosa, are suffering from depression and feelings of isolation and separation as a result of the COVID pandemic and the resulting economic hardships and political polarization. Folks we may have considered ‘friends’ have ended up on the ‘other side’ of the public health controversy, and that can generate deep feelings of loss and alienation.
Differing opinions clash uncomfortably, in private and public settings, and judgements and blame get dished out — and that can create a sense that the danger is coming, not from the Delta variants, but from our next door neighbor. A sense that we’re unsafe, socially as well as biologically.
But in a sense, we’re grappling with our fears openly, rather than hiding them.
I would never presume to compare the experience of Londoners during the Blitzkrieg, with what Pagosans have experienced during our 18 months of COVID confusion.
Nevertheless, I look around and see, not only discord and disagreement, but also courage. People openly expressing their opinions, in the face of inevitable judgement and blame coming from their neighbors, and from people who were once ‘friends’.
Hopefully, that courage will remain with us, as the Delta variant crisis eventually rides into the sunset.