If you see the levels of stupidity out there surrounding COVID-19, you might be inclined to think that this virus has caused a brain disease. That in itself would be a stupid inference or conclusion! How?
Stupidity was always present in the human race. It lives alongside intelligence as a separate and independent force. This means even the very intelligent are also afflicted by stupidity! Contrary to popular belief, if you put a bunch of intelligent people in a room - and present them with a crisis - a majority of times you'd get a decision that is not better than the average of intelligence in the room. In fact, you're more likely to get a decision that is far less than the average of the room. How this is possible at all, is explained in the domains of social psychology and mathematics - NO VIRUS REQUIRED!
This post has been triggered by responses to Israel Khan's letter in TT Express of 29th March 2020, in which he calls for a State of Emergency. He reasons very well about this.But then you have other 'folk' who have reasons for saying things like 'It eh go help' or 'It eh go work'. The letter of response in TT Express 4th April 2020, is a fine example. Importantly it relies on a sort of quasi-logic leading to a statement, "Secondly, the absolute restriction of movement of people theoretically may only cure our country of the pandemic in the short term." I'll deal with this one only because I don't have time to waste debunking the brainlessness of the other items of supposed 'reasoning' in that letter. One does not argue with stupidity.
'Theoretically' - yes - of course - because nobody knows 'actually' or will be able to see into the future.
'Cure' - a totally nonsensical concept to apply in this.
'In the short term' - well hello: nobody is aiming for a short-term cure. The world and T&T needs (to aim for) a long-term lock down of the virus to facilitate its death. If it can't spread - and humans are the main vehicle - then those who survive and develop immunity will cause it to die.
In other words - we are the long-term CURE (a word I don't like) or CONTROL. I'm not even going into vaccines and treatments, because that's estimated by the best scientific minds to be at least a year away. We can't wait a year and act lethargically about this because thousands in T&T - millions worldwide - could be dead by then.
So - for people who do not comply - mainly those whose stupidity will come to the fore - and we only need about 20% of them, there is no point arguing and educating them while thousands locally are killed. Why? Because stupidity is not something one can 'educate' away! You have to treat it with brutal force. In other words: LOCK DOWN EVERYBODY! SOE IT IS.
And I would go even further to suggest the declaration of martial law - where people can be beaten into submission.
