With the COVID-19 pandemic sweeping across the world, there have been innumerable new measures to keep people engaged. I feel pretty wrecked that there so many people who are facing a lot more hardship in already difficult lives. And by hardship, I am NOT talking about how you have to wash your own dishes, etc. because your cook or cleaner is at their own home now.
I am referring to the most hard-hit, the homeless, the daily-wage workers, those who are migrant labourers, the people who go out every day and pick waste, the roadside vendors, and anyone else who lacks the luxury to complain about boredom. The afterthought of our populations are now being villainised for not following physical distancing, and it’s the most shameful thing I’ve seen in a while. To blame certain people for the spread of this virus, when they have no option, and are as desperate to get home as all the Indians who wanted to be airlifted back is incredibly cruel and idiotic.
I’m not saying anything new, but I am saying it in a space where I can voice my thoughts coherently. The instinct to add, “But, what about…” is the hallmark of someone who cannot understand that two things can be true at the same time. Yes, the people at home who are feeling their freedom curbed are vulnerable to challenges to their mental well-being. But, those who have physical threats to their safety need to be taken care of as a priority. I’m going to bring in a bit of psychology, and a hierarchy of needs if you will bear with me. A person who is starving or without a basic form of shelter is facing incredible motivation to get out of this condition.
Can you blame people for trying to get home when the government is not providing for them sufficiently, and there’s a lack of clarity on the why, the when, the how of their entire existence? Even if you provide people with food and some shelter, would they not want to be home like everyone else? If the railways open bookings, will people not book trains for a particular day they see as their only chance to get home? Where is the planning? Where is the assurance that they will be provided with food and shelter during this time, AND in the months after when they don’t have money to support themselves or their families?
And this uncertainty applies to children who are being abused at home, because domestic violence rates are astoundingly high right now. Helplines are overwhelmed. Women and children are facing their abusers for so much more of the day now. What is their recourse? They can’t even venture to hospitals that are also overwhelmed.
So let’s not complain about having too free a day? Let’s focus on the things we can do? We can talk to our friends and families, we have the internet’s entire contents to go through, or more reasonably, we have the ability to try something new offline. Write, doodle, sing, play with a rubber band, who cares! If you’re reading this, I’m going to assume you have those options. You’re not the victims of this pandemic that we need to worry about, as long as you stay home and practise physical distancing.
I get it, your routine has been interrupted. But you’re unlikely to be facing the harsh battle with mortality that too many people are faced with now. And most worryingly, the section of the population that’s most underprivileged is likely to face the most significant mortality rates. Meanwhile, the couples doing relatively well are bound to have what we are joking about as corona-caused babies (born 9 months after lockdowns around the world). This is a real possibility, but the birth trends following epidemics and natural disasters vary. Is this virus just another way the privileged find to blame those whom they depend on for deliveries, for construction of their homes, for help with maintaining them, infrastructural construction, and more? Probably.
End rant.
Begin suggestions: try to be thankful for what you have, if it takes a listing exercise, write it down! Engage with people from different backgrounds on social media, and I don’t mean be a troll. Help others, it’ll make you feel better: call up your friends who might be struggling with things at the moment, talk to your domestic helpers too, check in on them. And perhaps most importantly, look at news as more than the source of outrage against the people who are not like you (in whatever way- religion, income, lifestyle).
Remember, this is not the flu or a simple cold. And we need to treat it differently, so remain calm at home, and kind.
Fictional Worlds 