In my last post I tried to argue for a pro-active approach to "living with Covid." What I mean is something different than this discourse often means which, it seems to me, amounts to doing nothing in an effort to turn back the clock. What is the problem with this approach? Why not just turn back the clock and eliminate public health measures and restrictions? After all, Covid (we are told) is endemic and so we might as well "get on with our lives."
To me, this is an irresponsible approach to living with Covid. It is an approach that abrogates our responsibilities to provide safety and security for citizens. The security of citizen, in liberal-democratic thought, is, in fact, a fundamental requirement of the state and states that cannot guarantee this security, in fact, abrogate their power and authority.
That sounds vaguely ominous but if we stop to think about it, it makes a certain level of sense. It is an idea embedded in the western liberal tradition (a tradition with appreciable strengths and weaknesses) and, hence, is not new. It is not some sort of "woke" (another word I don't fully understand nor seem to know what it actually means other than lefty) plot or discourse. It is a foundational element of western liberal democracy.
It is also irresponsible on an ethical level because it is, often, a way of unloading costs. Let's think about Covid as an economic problem. I don't mean the effects of state spending during Covid and government deficits. Costs are born in a number of ways. They are born through taxes, prices that we pay for masks, lost time from work, extra expenses at the grocery store, and they are born in health. Those who suffer from ill health (or, worse) from Covid are paying one of the prices of the disease. What I am asking who bear the costs of Covid? We know that Covid affects different populations unevenly. It tends to have more deleterious effects on older people, people with pre-existing conditions, poorer people, and minorities, more than it effects others. Anyone can be negatively effected by Covid, but the chances are much higher that if you are younger and in average shape, you'll get through Covid without dying. You may be laid up for a couple of weeks or you might have at worst cold-like symptoms. Others, however, are not so lucky.
What happens when we accept (too quickly) that Covid is endemic and continues to circulate in society? We make a judgement about who will pay the health price for this endemic circulation. If I were to say that I don't want restrictions because I want to "return to normal," there is a good chance that I'll get through it. The chances for others are less, however, and what I am actually doing is asking someone else to pay the health price for my liberties. Because I don't want restrictions, I am willing to let other people become sick and, potentially, die, particularly those from vulnerable populations. Is that fair? That can be a tricky question to answer because we can have different definitions of fairness. A better way of putting it is this: should someone else pay the price for me? If all we meant by "returning to normal" is that I would have to pay my own price, then that might be acceptable. At the least, in my view, it would be a stronger position than asking someone else to pay the price. What do we think about a healthy twenty year old asking an ill sixty year old to pay with their health so that the twenty year old can go to a pub without restrictions?
I have phrased the question this way because the supposed "right" to avoid health restrictions (to not mask, to not take vaccinations, to not isolate, etc.) is often phrased as an individual right: "I have the right to ...". Individual rights are important. But, we should also not forget that all rights are bounded. In western liberal thought, for example, no right is absolute. It exists to the extend that it does not harm another or limit the rights of others. Thus, for instance, I have a right to walk to down the street, but I don't have the right to push people out of my way and injure them so that I can walk. They have the exact same right as I do and so have the same right to be walking down the street. The price of my right is recognizing that others have the same rights. They cannot interfere with my rights, but I have to also not interfere with theirs.
This is important for a range of reasons. Personally, I think it is a more mature and accurate perspective. When I see people asserting "I have a right to" without considering who pays the price of their rights (potentially with their lives), it has always struck me as an immature approach to rights. It reminds me of a kid screaming for a cookie or yelling at their parents to watch a TV show. Surely, our political philosophy and the organization of state and civil society, I think at such times, should rise to a higher level than that?
But, even if you don't like my analogy (and that can be a matter of personal taste), asserting rights as if they were some sort of trump card is inaccurate because it neglects the fact that we live in a society and that society is required for the exercise of our rights. What do I mean? Let's go back to the security of the person argument. Most of us like security of the person and we should. I'd argue that it is necessary for a good life and that good societies (and we can talk about what a good society is another day), provide for it in one way or another. Have you thought of all the things that are needed for your security of person? We have fire departments, and urgent care facilities, ambulances, and laws, courts, police departments, coast guards, and health regulations. And, that is just the short list. Without the police, we are subject to predation and crime, without fire protection and urgent care we are at the whim of fate, without laws people could break contracts with us without recourse, and the list can go on.
You can see what I mean: the full realization of our rights requires an apparatus of state to make it meaningful. I would argue that the meaningful part of right is that it can be operationalized, that it is guarded, protected, enhanced. Asserting rights without this recognition -- with the recognition that society plays a vital role in the protection and preservation of our rights -- is to make an inaccurate statement about the character and nature of rights. It is to misapprehend society and believe something that is not true.
I want you to note something. I am not, here, asserting that "society" has rights, which is something I also often hear. I've not given it a lot of thought and so don't have a view on that particular perspective at this point in time. What I am saying is something different: society is necessary for the realization of our rights. It is how we know that fires are put out, criminals are apprehended, that the food we eat is safe. Far from being a drag on our rights, we need society to create the conditions for the full and meaningful exercise of those rights. I am not saying that society does this well, or perfectly, or that it could not be made better. As my friend Mark says, "don't hear what I am not saying." With regard to Covid, however, what I am saying is that assertions of rights that ignore the significance of society and social context begin from an inaccurate perspective. They begin from the assumption that society (almost) does not exist.
This is important because "living with Covid" will involve collective social action and, if I am even close to being right, some sort of new restrictions. It is these restriction against which many people rage. I do understand that people want to "get back to normal" because "normal" for them signifies a whole bunch of nifty things (safety, lack of anxiety, being able to see friends on the spur of the moment). I would that it were true, but I also don't want a society that builds my normalcy on someone else's life. I want a society that works to enhance and make rights meaningful and that, I suspect, will require that we accept some level of restrictions (masking, directionality in grocery stores, restrictions on the numbers of people in buildings, etc.). Maintaining these restrictions is a way of ensuring that we accept the idea that one person should not have to pay the price of another's rights.
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