I’m Tired Of Covid & Herd Stupidity

This is a cull post. If this post offends you, please unfriend me and never speak to me again. I want you to. Seriously. Herd stupidity is flourishing because people are too tolerant, too kind, too compassionate. Especially during Covid.

I’m out of all those traits.

I’m suffering under a crushing depression right now. What’s interesting about it, is that I don’t think it’s because I’m off my antidepressants because I can’t afford them anymore.

My brain chemicals aren’t unbalanced.

I’m depressed because ignorant, selfish, fairly unintelligent, compassionless a*holes surround me. My depression is a situational response to the world around me, not an internal chemical issue.

I’m tiiiiiiiiiiurrrrrrrrred. That’s a whole other level of tired.

Anti-maskers make me tired. The conspiracy theorists. The Kyles who didn’t graduate high school but they’ve done their (Facebook) research about epidemiology and pandemic response. I’m heartily sick of the pansies who can’t sit their asses home and be alone with their thoughts or a book so they need to have house parties. I’m fed up with the even bigger pansies who want to whine and cry about wearing a fabric mask over their face to go to the grocery store.

Do you have a medical condition that prevents you from wearing a mask? No you don’t. You might have a medical condition that gives you an excuse that no one will call you on, but there’s not a single medical condition that I can think of (as a medical professional for nearly 20 years) that prevents you from wearing a mask for the hour it will take you to go to Walmart.

Does wearing a mask make you anxious? You can get over that, you just don’t want to. Even to protect people around you, you just can’t be bothered to be even slightly uncomfortable for a short time. That’s really all anxiety is. It’s uncomfortable. It’s not life-threatening.

That so many people are so uncaring towards others, even at times downright mean, depresses me.

The fact that so many people are so self-absorbed that EVEN TO PROTECT OTHER PEOPLE by doing something so simple as wearing a mask in public, they have to rail against it and complain and spout nonsensical conspiracy theories? That depresses me, and a pill isn’t going to fix it.

I can’t even imagine being such an inconsiderate, selfish baby.

The level of hypocrisy is stunning, in some instances. I know people who are extremely ‘peace, love, light.’ They want all the homeless housed, they support safe consumption sites, universal basic income, free healthcare, caring about every other human being, kindness above all else….

But they aren’t letting the government tell them what to do by wearing a mask or not having social gatherings indoors! They have rights, you know.

What’s even harder is what I’m learning about people I considered friends, friends who don’t care about people like me, it turns out. They think that as long as you’re not over the age of 80, Covid is no big deal.

If I catch Covid, it might not be a big deal. Or, my overactive immune system could launch a cytokine storm that kills me. Or, my overactive immune system could rid my body of Covid then turn its attention back to its favourite make-work project: my brain and spinal cord.

Getting Covid could leave me in a wheelchair or blind.

But hey, Rick needs to go to the gym.

It’s not that this is about me that depresses me. It’s the fact that people that I thought were decent human beings, aren’t.

People have called me cynical. Yes I am, but a cynic is just a disappointed idealist.

I don’t understand how people can just walk around not giving a crap about anyone else but themselves. How their perceived minor inconveniences are more important than anyone else, or the community as a whole.

No one is sending you to storm the beaches of Normandy, guys.

I don’t get how people are upset they can’t be out drinking past ten pm for two weeks.

I don’t get people who think those who support another lock-down just want to ‘sit at home and collect CERB.’

I’m so done with this bigger person garbage. I’m out of compassion. For months, I’ve told myself that people are afraid. They’re not coping well. Folks are stressed and acting out. They’re ignorant about infectious disease and how they work.

I have none of that left. I don’t care how scared or stressed you are, you can stop being a dick to everyone around you. You can learn some coping skills that don’t include….being a dick.

Put your mask on and shut up. You aren’t depriving anyone by covering your face anyway, you’re not that cute on a good day.

To the a*holes who thinks people like me are stealing their taxes….I promise that in my lifetime of work, in which at times I was very successful, I paid more in taxes than they have. Which is fine, because I think that when you make a good amount of money, you should pay a good amount in taxes to contribute. (FYI I’m not on AISH, disability, welfare, or any other type of government assistance. But even if I was, it doesn’t mean I’m the one keeping you from being a successful millionaire with your grade 10 education, Gary.)

To those who think small business owners want another lock-down to get government money…

Does it hurt to be that dumb?

Businesses in Alberta aren’t getting a bunch of help or money from our provincial government. There’s some help from the federal government, yes.

I’m not getting any of it, and I’m sure I’m not the only business owner in the same spot.

I’d much prefer to try and rebuild my business (it’s in the event space) but because the ignorant a*holes that populate this province can’t stop throwing get-togethers and don’t want to wear masks and can’t figure out how to wash their hands properly…

I’m pretty sure there won’t be an event season next summer either, and even if there is, with these infection numbers, I won’t be there.

I’d love to leave my house more often, just like others like myself with chronic conditions but because there are so many ignorant, selfish a*holes out there, it’s not safe.

“But everyone is wearing masks so obviously masks don’t work.”

That is untrue. Everywhere I go, there’s people not masked. Is it the majority? No. Does it need to be the majority in order to spread a virus exponentially?

Also no.

If a dozen people in a store aren’t masked and two of them are Covid positive and our R(t) is 1.3….ask your Facebook friend who failed high school biology but is now a Facebook Medical Expert to explain it to you.

I’d love to get back to my life. Getting back to work would be fantastic. I could happily skip lying awake at night knowing the business that pays my bills is ruined and probably not coming back. It would be great to get past this phase where I have zero meaningful income coming in. I’d love to not feel frustrated that my year-old disabilities prevent me from getting a job outside the home, and feeling rage that some people actually think that I like living in poverty. That I enjoy fearing for my front-line husband working his two jobs as the numbers keep going up, as our healthcare workers run out of masks and other PPE, for no other reason that selfishness and stupidity.

But hey, Carol, I get how your ‘anxiety’ prevents you from wearing a mask at Dollarama.

I’d love to have some options, but because Redneck Ricks and Ritas are pouting about wearing masks and having (lame, do nothing) restrictions for two weeks (which they plan on ignoring anyway by having gatherings at their homes, according to what they’re posting online) I’m stuck. Because it’s just too much to ask that some people consider what’s good for the community as a whole.

There are many uneducated and unintelligent people with internet connections who cherry-pick bits of information, but they don’t know enough to properly interpret the statistics or the medical information. Then their fellow uneducated and unintelligent (and by that I mean those lacking critical thinking skills) glom onto these tidbits and share share share. Then we end up with herd stupidity.

Stupidity has a higher R(t) value than Covid-19.

If enough people believe something, then it becomes true for all intents and purposes. It doesn’t matter how incorrect, how illogical, or how wrong a piece of information is if enough people believe it.

It would be better for my mental health to not live in a society where the sick, the disabled, the poor, and the elderly are all expendable but here we are, aren’t we?

It’s a shame we don’t manage our society like our primitive ancestors. Long ago, if a person didn’t contribute to the benefit of the tribe or even did things that brought danger or risk to everyone, they were ostracized. The tribe cast them out and then they had to fend for themselves without the assistance of the group.

The ostracized often didn’t survive long, but the tribe was secure. It was the interests of the many over the interests of a few. That’s a tenet of evolved, civilized society.

We went wrong somewhere.

Here’s the thing. I’m not wishing that the anti-masker conspiracy theorists, who feel that the less than 3% mortality is totally acceptable and can’t be bothered to wear a mask, catch Covid and die. I don’t wish death on people.

I’m hoping Karma kicks in and they catch Covid through their own stupidity and I truly hope they survive it. Honestly, I hope they survive it and experience neurological deficits, like doctors are now reporting in young and previously healthy Covid survivors.

Hopefully they’ll develop the cardiac damage that’s now being reported in young and previously healthy Covid survivors. I hope they find out how difficult it is to hold a job with mitral valve prolapse and arrhythmia and an organ that doesn’t work efficiently enough to power a normal lifestyle.

I hope they find out how callous many people are.

If Karma exists they’ll eventually feel less than, but only to the degree they’ve done it to others. I hope people tell them they’re expendable and not valued. Folks hopefully tell them that they don’t contribute much to the world. I hope they end up needing a heart transplant and spend the rest of their life on anti-rejection drugs, which is a way bigger deal than having an auto-immune disease because wandering around in public during a pandemic with a compromised immune system is a terrible idea.

It will be devastating when they realize that nobody cares about their compromised immune system or heart problems or permanent breathing problems. If this current government delists the medications they need to manage their Covid-related health problems, faced with the knowledge that they’re now too poor to survive long-term? That sucks. How awful if people keep telling them that Covid-19 isn’t that big of a deal, sucks they’re one of the rare ones that got severe and long-term effects but oh well.

I hope people look at them and tell them it’s their own fault for catching Covid.

I hope people tell them that nobody wants to hear their sob story, and that they aren’t paying taxes so people like them can sit at home and collect government money. Why should I pay taxes to help someone too stupid to wear a mask and follow public health guidelines? That’s some bleeding heart Liberal bullsh*t.

I’m over being the bigger person. I have no more energy to muster compassion.

Now I’m just going to match energy. When the actions of the compassionless catch up with them, there won’t be an outpouring of sympathy from me.

I’m petty and I have a long memory. Every comment I see online, every ignorant post, I’m paying attention.

I’m noting every shitty thing people say about how ‘killing grandparents is okay, they had a good run.’

I’ll remember all of it long after this pandemic is over.

I see you, Rick.

By the way, memes are not actually medical information.

I’m capable of changing my opinions about things when confronted with new information. There’s lots of folks I thought were decent humans, but this pandemic has certainly changed my mind.

There’s also people I thought were hopeless jerks, who actually stepped up. They said while they don’t like wearing masks, if it might help someone else why wouldn’t they?

Indeed.

I’m paying attention and when people show me who they are, I believe them. We aren’t that tribal anymore, so we won’t cast the a*holes into the wilderness. But keeping track of who doesn’t care about others, who feels that some segments of the population are expendable, who feel that they’re superior to the vulnerable…

I’m clocking that. I hope they have a wide circle of friends who are nicer than I, because there’s a big long list of people who better not ever come to me for help, a favour, or a sympathetic ear.

We don’t cast those who threaten the security of the tribe into the wild anymore. The equivalent would be if we stop being the bigger people to let the ignorant and selfish among us experience how hard life gets when people won’t or don’t help you. When they don’t care about you or your family or can’t bear inconvenience or being put out in any small way….like wearing a mask at the grocery store.

Imagine being so arrogant with a high school education or less, or even a bachelor’s degree in the arts that you think you know better than infectious disease specialists.

Who are doctors and scientists.

Who went to school after high school for another dozen years minimum….

But Kighley on FB has an opinion about this new disease and her opinion is just as valid as an epidemiologist’s.

This herd stupidity makes me tiiiiiurrrrrrrred.

It’s been 9 months of this utter ridiculousness.

Guess what? It’s been exhausting. I have MS, generalized anxiety disorder, depression, cPTSD, asthma. Alllllll medical conditions that would exempt me from wearing a mask.

If I really didn’t want to wear a mask, I guess. But I wear one out in public because I’d rather not be the reason someone’s grandma dies. I don’t want to be the reason someone has an MS flare up. My friend going through chemo shouldn’t be terrified that if the cancer doesn’t get them the pandemic might if they go to the store to get some tea bags or a loaf of bread to make toast.

I wear a mask because it’s not a big deal.

I wear a mask and stay isolated because I don’t feel my individual rights and wants outweigh the public benefit.

Because I’m not a dick.

And before you call me a sheep, I have an IQ that’s been tested multiple times by actual psychologists (not on the internet). An IQ in the high 130s makes me pretty damn smart.

And I wear a mask.

And I stay home.

And I despise the human race.

Probably not a complete coincidence.

I’m angry, I’m fed up, and I’m over all the bullsh*t. If that bothers you, feel free to show yourself out. I doubt we’ll miss each other.

I understand that over the last several months, I’m getting to a point where some might think, she really only wants to associate with people who think like she does.

If that means I want to only associate with people who care about others, who view everyone as having value, and who are capable of tolerating a little inconvenience or hardship in order to benefit an entire community…

Guilty as charged.