Make America Selfish
"You can’t build a 'no peeing' section in the swimming pool."
The images of a packed restaurant in Castle Rock, Colorado, shoppers in Arkansas, and crowded beaches in the midst of a spreading pandemic felt like a turning point, because, let’s be honest, they were.
The social contract is unraveling.
While most Americans continue to tell pollsters they are worried about re-opening the country, a substantial number have simply decided they are done with it. And by done with it, they mean done with it all: the social distancing, the wearing of masks, treating the pandemic as a BFD. We’re not talking about the protests or the politics here, but rather the jail-break-like decision by millions to defy the quarantines. ...
... This is understandable, because the social, personal, and economic costs of the shutdown have been extraordinary; and nothing this inconvenient can last forever. People want to get on with their lives, and really, who can blame them?
But there’s another undercurrent: We aren’t all in this together anymore, are we?
As Dr. Anthony Fauci will warn the Senate today, a premature return to normalcy “will not only result in needless suffering and death, but would actually set us back on our quest to return to normal.” ...
... The essential element in all of this is voluntary compliance. There are simply not enough cops, not enough bureaucrats, and not enough monitors for it to be otherwise.
But the problem now is not the lack of cops, it’s the erosion of a culture that calls us all to common purpose and sacrifice. In other words, a culture bound by a social contract that says we are in this together.
Conservatives used to understand this. Insisting on responsible self government is not the opposite of freedom, it is the essential predicate. Freedom-oriented conservatives used to argue that individuals and non-governmental institutions would act in their rational self interest and would do a better and more effective job than bureaucratic top-down fiats.
But this requires responsible and credible moral leadership to reinforce responsible conduct. ...
https://thebulwark.com/newsletter-issue/...merica-selfish/
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