Read on Twitter
hypothesis: part of the issue w/ young ppl not taking the covid response "seriously" isn't a failure of messaging ("only old ppl get sick!") or a lack of compassion ("yolo assholes!") but rather that we have the most to lose if/when the world economy self-immolates
confession: I have not infrequently found myself falling into the magical thinking that we can right this ship this summer and get on with our lives, b/c without that I am looking at potentially years of destroyed job prospects and lost income
add to that a feeling that, b/c the covid response is so focused on individual behavior rather than systemic action, the young are being asked to sacrifice their futures on behalf of the old who have already had a future—I can wrap my head around (even as I resist) the distaste
(caveats of course that ppl up and down the age ladder have so much to lose, that the "loss of a future" a feeling always inflected along race/class/gender/ability, and that all of what I describe above *is to be actively resisted* b/c ultimately life > profit)
to conclude: the challenge I am struggling w/ rn is learning how not to let these feelings curdle into resentment, particularly as I see a particular class of my elders—for whom I am stopping my life for the benefit of their health—yoke this crisis to their further advantage
this is a pretty stark illustration of what I'm trying to think through in this thread https://twitter.com/katejulian/status/1249683960025710592
