To those few who are creating gridlock in front of state capital buildings and trying to get your governors to “open the economy”:

I have three words for you:

KNOCK IT OFF.

Seriously. Knock it off. Some of you are showing a small amount of intelligence and are wearing masks, and maybe you won’t spread the virus or contract it. The rest of you are stupider than the paperweight on my desk, are wasting precious oxygen, and should be apologizing to the trees producing it.

This is not just a cold and it isn’t just a random flu virus. Doctors around the world who have degrees from actual medical universities (and not simply from just doing a simple Google search) are saying that this is similar to SARS, but is a whole other ballgame in terms of how infectious it is and the havoc that it is wreaking on bodies. It has overwhelmed medical systems of countries like Spain and Italy that are actually very good (as in, people get the care they need and don’t go broke trying to get it as they do in the dumpster fire of a system we have in the USA), and it has killed a scary percentage of their populations. We might have done the most COVID-19 tests in the world, but we are also the third most populous country and we have tested a smaller percentage of our population than countries like South Korea. The way Donald Trump has handled this entire situation is unspeakably horrible, and I burn with anger that good friends of mine are working insane hours and putting themselves at risk to take care of COVID-19 patients without proper protective equipment. The troll in the White House has doled things out to states based on who is kissing his large backside, and states are having to take measures like Maryland did and source things like COVID-19 tests from overseas because our chief executive can’t be arsed to care. This is completely inexcusable, especially as he is making asinine tweets cheering you morons on in the morning while making sweeping pronouncements about how we shouldn’t take unnecessary risks in the afternoon. The troll you dimwits voted into office in 2016 doesn’t give a rat’s ass about anyone other than himself, and I am stunned by your moronic hanging on his every word.

You all have put yourselves at risk of contracting COVID-19 with your ignorant protests, and you have done the opposite of what you intended: governors (like mine) who actually give a shit about their states are having to extend lockdown measures because you created a public health situation by refusing to listen to specialists (whose education took years to obtain instead of the paltry Google search you did) and practice social distancing. Do you honestly think your state officials *LIKE* having to cancel events or put a halt to business?!?!? Do you really think your governor sits around and thinks of ways to make you suffer?!?!? Stop acting like adult toddlers and suck up the fact that it would be catastrophic to go back to “normal”. The massive risk that said “normal” had on public health outweighs your “liberties”, and I’m positive that the Founding Fathers (who lived in a time when pandemics were a thing) would agree.

We are in a completely new situation here, and things will never fully be the same again. They can’t. Instead, we are having to learn a new way of doing things that we probably should have been doing anyway. We knew that e-learning would probably need to expand, and it just did. The way we used to do church was not working for many people, and putting everything on Zoom or Facebook Live is allowing people to attend church who could not physically walk in the door. We will go back to worshipping in person eventually, but it will take some time and we need to keep putting worship online for those who can only access it there. Many jobs that could be moved online now have been. We’ve also discovered that the way we were doing business was detrimental to others, and some of you are learning this firsthand as you experience how “wonderful” it feels to be worried about paying your mortgage because you suddenly lost your income or are earning significantly less than you did before. Most Americans are one paycheck away from homelessness, and those social programs you claim are used only by Reagan’s fictitious “welfare queen” actually serve a legitimate purpose. (Not to mention, it is incredibly hard to be approved for them. I should know as I have had to apply before and am on Medicaid right now.)

So what do we as a country do now? We need to make the best of a hard situation. We may not be able to physically shop at our local small businesses, but we can buy gift cards to use in the future. Those who can afford to do so can make donations to their local food banks. (I am fundraising for mine on Facebook for my 40th birthday. Click “Contact Me” up at the top and fill out the form if you want details.) We can help feed our neighbors or shop for elderly people in our lives. We can make masks for healthcare workers and others who need them using spare fabric that we have on hand. We can wear masks out in public to cut down on the spread of COVID-19. (If you need a cloth one, look on Etsy. There are a number of Etsy shops that will make you one to your specifications for $10-$15, and you are putting money in the pocket of a small business by ordering from them.) We can realize that we are not the center of the universe and that perhaps we have to do things that we don’t want to do in order to save the lives of other people.

Your haircut can wait. Your tattoo can wait. Your pedicure can wait. Your beach trip can wait. The health of your community is more important than all of those things.

And lest you think that I’m some random person who is unaffected by this, my hours have been cut, I am having to find creative ways to do my job, I’m having to postpone a desperately needed dentist appointment because the risk is too high, I have a kid who is having a hell of a time learning at home, and I’m lucky if I get to see my physical therapist in person once a month due to quarantine issues. (I’m recovering from an injury that affects my ability to weight-bear, so this is hard.) I really do feel bad for the students (not the parents who are living vicariously through their kid) who aren’t getting their high school graduation, a senior prom, to sing the last choir concert of their high school career, to letter in a sport, or their college graduation after four years of working their butts off. I feel bad for a coworker whose wedding has been postponed. I feel horrible for those who are dying in hospitals without loved ones present or those loved ones who can’t be with their patient. (A friend of mine’s son is currently recovering from a massive stroke, and they haven’t been able to be with him in almost a week.)

So please, while you’re in a holding pattern, go do something that actually benefits society and won’t land you in the hospitals where friends of mine across the country are trying to save the lives of people who didn’t do something completely stupid like you did.

Snuggles,

jen

PS: A friend of mine who was a firearms instructor in the Army thinks that you look like terrorist assholes when you’re walking around with your AR-15’s like that. Just because you theoretically can do something doesn’t mean you should.

PPS: Some of you might have noticed that the comments are closed. My blog = my stance is correct and I don’t want to debate with idiots who disagree with me. 😀 Go write your lame thoughts on your own blog!