It is a kind of death
December 21, 2021
By NZB3
Most people (even some Libertarians) want to be in the in-group more than anything. The prospects there are good. Access to markets and all that. That in-group has narrowed a fair bit of late. It got Woke.
At university we had a paper that taught us about this in terms of R.K.Merton’s theory of anomie. The in-group was called the Conformity. Nurses, doctors, midwives, even policemen who were in the Conformity only weeks ago have been made redundant. They are Deviants and branded so in very abusive terms.
Most people booted out of the Conformity try to make out they are still in it. Remember all those prospects and the access they get. And they would be stunned to be identified as a Deviant. What they really are is in Merton’s Ritualism group. They go through the motions of check points, MIQ, masks, jabs, nose tests, social distancing, checking in, lockdowns etc as the price of being in the Conformity group. They don’t really believe. Their hearts are not in it. They are performing rituals.
The likelihood of dying from covid is miniscule.
So why am I wearing a mask then taking it off to scoff that glass of lindauer I shouldn’t really be having? – Lindsay Mitchell
Why in the world would anybody put chains on me, yeah?
I’ve paid my dues to make it
Everybody wants me to be
What they want me to be
I’m not happy when I try to fake it, no, ooh
– Easy (Like Sunday Morning)
They don’t literally believe they’re going to die from COVID if they don’t perform these rituals. But they do understand that they will die socially and economically and politically etc. if they do not perform these rituals. That’s a very real death and the relevant one here.
I, for one, have been a non-conformist all my adult life. I’ve been deliberate in my choices not to form dependencies or connections that put chains on me. I don’t accept that we live in a universe where Conformity and obedience is required. We can’t be happy with we fake existence and violate our own conscience; Submit. It’s a hard life to live but for Anarchists like me, and characters like Paul Newman’s protagonist in Cool Hand Luke (1967) it’s harder still to ignore it.
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