Could Covid Bring Us Closer Together?

One of the key takeaways from the Netflix documentary ‘The Social Dilemma’ is the argument that social media is acting to endlessly reinforce and polarise the opinions that we believe we have formed ourselves. Increasingly, we are living in a world of rigid binary opposition, where any opinion held is automatically adversarial. Tentative opinions voiced on Twitter, by the unwary, unleash the dogs of war. Rather than recognising stereotypes and deconstructing them, social media endlessly reinforces them so that each of us is, to someone else, an abhorrent incarnation of all that is hateful. Shared values are as endangered as our climate; we are choking in a toxic atmosphere of blame and hatred.

And then Covid came along. At first, it was just another problem on the other side of the world, like famine, flood or war, just something that happens far away, a brief headline soon forgotten, swiftly supplanted by the news of a celebrity’s baby. We watched with mild curiosity as the Chinese death toll climbed steadily and all the while the jets continued to fly and our relentless scurrying, the toing and froing of our global ants’ nest carried on as before. The trickle turned into a torrent. By April 2020, the U.K.’s Prime Minister, who had publicly demonstrated his lack of concern for the virus by shaking hands with Covid patients, was in intensive care. Around the world lockdowns smashed our complacency, slamming shut our lives, like city gates against the plague.

The skies fell silent, untarnished by vapour trails. Our city streets became science fiction film sets, terrifyingly empty. And in the still air, we heard Spring, as if for the first time. Around the world mountains and unseen vistas revealed themselves with hyper-real clarity. Suddenly our mortality was no longer abstract. We all had time to wonder.

Lockdowns come and lockdowns go. We watch as our economies wither and die. We debate a devil’s bargain, the death of the old in exchange for a return to prosperity. We live in hope of a cure, there’s always a cure. Our governments make decisions, reverse those decisions, make other decisions. With the football gone, we concentrate on the global league table of deaths and infections. We mouth phrases like ‘herd immunity,’ without an understanding of what that might mean. And there is no sign of an end.

So, has Covid brought us closer together? Are we sharing a universal deprivation which transcends class and ethnicity and unites us in the commonality of our human condition? As in all things, your experience of Covid lockdown will have been shaped by whether you are rich or poor. For the affluent: spending time in the garden, talking to old friends on Facetime, reading, listening to music, watching films, preparing elaborate meals, dusting off the clarinet…oh yes, you’re keeping your spirits up, lockdown’s not so bad; but for the poor, lockdown is not an enriching experience, it is not a time for reflection, it’s a high-rise prison cell with crying children, an abusive partner and no money.

It is comforting to think the legacy of Covid will be a renaissance of empathy, a mutual appreciation of the miracle of life, new-born respect for our planet, a re-evaluation of how we live our lives, a recognition that nurses and carers are more important than junior account executives or premier league footballers. It would be nice, but. But we can’t wait to get back to the way it was. Let’s get the pubs and restaurants open so we can forget all about it.

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This article was contributed by Dick James – a satirical gifts creator and comedy writer at Lemon Loco - a ‘zero contact’ gifting company!