Disguises

Observe that there are two groups of people in the public orbit. Group One arrayed in partial face coverings {PFCs} disguise themselves as potentially toxic entities deemed unfit for social contact. Group Two also adorns PFCs disguising themselves as prospective victims; perceiving social contact with others as chancy.

However, in the private domain, both groups find resolve amid family members, roommates and so forth. Spouses and couples even share the same bed; there is no PFC obligation in private. Logic dictates, however, that concern for others in shared public spaces equals concern for others in shared private spaces. Any reasonable person, in fact, would conclude that such concern becomes magnified in personal settings.

So, by comparing the public behavior with the private behavior of both groups regarding PFCs, we immediately realize contrast, an inconsistency regarding conduct. Why cover up when around strangers and not cover up amid friends, family, one’s spouse? Why is there more concern practiced among strangers than intimates? This is backwards. By deduction, it becomes abundantly clear that people fear contamination, yet not so much contaminating others.

What then are the actual motives for wearing PFCs in public? Government control, of course. Political authorities set public policy regarding PFCs under the mantra of public safety, and people are wont to conform. However, in private individual choice remains, and despite the outbreak people invariably choose not to wear PFCs in the most intimate of settings.

Therefore, donning PFCs is actually a public display of conformity, suspended as soon as we cross the threshold into our private sanctuaries until the next public excursion. PFCs disguise one’s true rationale regarding social conduct amid the outbreak.

Rising to the view of legislators, the central issue at hand is not the dreaded plague but individual liberty. Political leaders have employed measures that quash natural liberty under the mantra of public safety. One apt quote regarding political maneuvering is, “visible principles over invisible purposes.”

People go along with the public deception for two reasons alluded to in the first paragraph. The first group comprises contrarians primarily motivated by a need for material sustenance. The second group comprises conformists primarily motivated by a need for social acceptance. There are two commonalities of both groups. Both share the need for material sustenance. The second shared attribute is that the ultimate motives of either group will remain fixed even under duress.

Presently, political leaders are exerting pressure on all to conform through public policy measures, most notably, PFCs. PFCs have not proven effective as reports show an increase in confirmed cases of the plague compared to last year’s findings. Surely, if PFCs were effective in any measure, we would have witnessed a requisite measure of improvement. Yet, PFCs did not ease the situation. Perhaps PFCs only exacerbating the problem, as reports also show the appearance of more hostile strains of the plague.

The promise of the future is a vaccine that will cope with the outbreak, even to the extent of eliminating PFCs altogether. This proposal does not, however, deal with the fundamental issue of intrinsic liberty; it only increases the risk posed to all that began with PFCs.

Vaccinations are minimally invasive, while PFCs are non-invasive. Essentially, we can characterize this as a progression countermanding innate liberty. Naturally, one may expect a rise in disenchantment regarding this budding option versus PFCs.

The same two senses of approach: those concerned primarily about sustenance and those concerned primarily about acceptance will become more acute and inevitably clash; not in the current acquiescent manner, but in an active manner. Such clashes will cause government intervention in order to maintain order. The outcome for contrarians is bleak. For conformists, the result will be the cherished acceptance only at the expense of personal liberty which will continue to erode, dissolving at last into nothing.