We really screwed up the messaging on how this thing spreads and why a given measure might help to prevent that.

The masks, the six feet, the shutdowns, and the isolating. All of it.

It all got framed as concrete ends rather than abstract means, and so, of course, everybody curated their own bespoke loopholes.

Trump “didn’t know” the Brazilian guy he was exposed to, thermometers are definitely effective longitudinal sensors for infection, and you can’t catch it if you are singing in an airtight building for admirably deist reasons.

I get that effective risk messaging is difficult.

You tell a kid not to touch the stove because it will badly burn them, and they hear that you just enjoy making arbitrary new rules about the kitchen.

Just sucks that so many people who could have been told “avoid being near anyone you don’t live with” have operationalized the evolving public health concept salad as “Try to mostly stay near your house until you’re not that into it anymore”

Feels like 300 million oppositional children are each holding a slightly different part of the same very sick elephant.