Republicans and Democrats See Covid-19 Differently. Is That Making People Sick?
fivethirtyeight.comAs more of our existence moves into the virtual realm, the virtual realm carries more weight than the physical reality. This was foreseen with the rise of mass media decades ago - long enough to have been forgotten - and now we're just living it out. This is combined with post-truth - the world is complicated, and we're swamped with conflicting expert opinions. So we fall back to solipsism - nothing truly matters until it affects you.
I had been hoping this article was going to be about actual psychosomatic effects based on peoples beliefs. Like say if the people who didn't care about the epidemic actually had lower fatality rates. That would be interesting, alas.
The fact that, back in June, 61% percent of republicans thought that the worst of the crisis was behind us explains how the epidemic picked up so much pace. That was an increase from 42% in April. I wonder what the current figures are.
The problem is that many conservative/Republican areas are more rural. So you could see these opinions being related to the fact that these rural areas had fewer people getting infected, and these areas have never had as big a problem with covid-19. So for them, it's entirely possible the worst was behind them in their location in June.
I think a big problem is that people assume that everyone is experiencing the pandemic the same way. So then they think how can anybody think things are okay, when they may have been relatively untouched in their location.
It also probably depends on your definition of "crisis", no? If republicans view the crisis as "government forcing businesses to close", maybeprobably we're past it. We're not even close to done with (unnecessary) death, but I kinda think that the US red party doesn't really care about that figure at all.
>If republicans view the crisis as "government forcing businesses to close"
Isn't that an entirely roundabout approach to viewing the issue though? They are targeting the treatment rather than the cause. And because the treatment being the problem in their eyes, they don't adhere to it, making the problem worse. It's like getting a 3 month treatment of anti-biotics, taking 2 pills, throwing the rest away and saying that anti-biotics don't work.
I mean, yes, but that's not stopped anybody. The reds want people back to work, not to live a long and healthy life. The reds are getting what they want.