WHEN one thinks about it, it’s really quite sad that the backdrop of all that we have gone through during the past year, even continuing up to now, had been nothing but the pandemic, quarantine and lockdown.
Despite all these, however, we’ve gotten used to the situation somehow, even though this does not apply to those people who, from the start, have refused to even bow down to distancing and defied protocols every step of the way.
Clearly still, the rest of us appear to have moved on, though grudgingly so. After all, the instinct to survive is a powerful drive and to pick up the pieces of your life from the old normal, is no mean feat.
From friends whom I have casually checked online, the main vibe had always been the same. Usually the convo goes like this… “How are you?” with the reply, “I get by.” or just plainly “OK.” Then almost always, the nitty-gritty of the whole situation that we’re presently lost in, is reduced to reminiscing good times, as if it were a natural shift, and I guess that is “OK,” especially among friends.
However, as one ventures outside this safe periphery of family, friends and even acquaintances, the story of others do not seem so hidden by mere “OKs at all.
Sadly, one needn’t even look too far ahead because conveniently nowadays, both mass media and social media will do that for you. Everything is a scoop these days and they seem to just love sensationalizing tragedies and misfortunes as though they were the latest buzz and craze.
Dwelling on this a bit further, the reading public on the other hand, by their comments, appear like approving coliseum audiences, the ones immortalized in old paintings.
For one, there may have already been materials that talk about the desensitizing effect generally brought about by these, our modern times. As example, it’s been proven that the existence of social media and the access to it has practically made everyone a bit more open and bolder in voicing out not only our concerns, but also even our most primal reactions and feelings.
At the same time, one suspicion exists that this is so because a certain kind of empowerment exists for some, whenever one is behind the relative safety of a LED screen.
While many have already discussed this, their voices are hopelessly lost in the millions of opinions put out today in all our information outlets. A friend in the US had recently asked, why all the hate? Is this answer enough, Pol?
In the end, the what-to-do-what-to-do poser is out once again, like a fresh 2021 calendar. Which way we headed in our transit? Where no man has gone before. We can do this.
