Masks and the Spiritual State of the World
Sep. 6th, 2021 09:46 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
sphagnumI believe the human face to be holy. I believe that children's smiles are sacred. It is deeply, deeply sinful to even consider their marginal value in any calculation of practical advantage.
My position is this: If not masking children increases risk for those around them then shame on you for even wasting a thought on that. The effectiveness of masks is a completely moot point. A masked world is a lost world, a dead, soulless world.
I am quite sure most people believe the same in the bottom of their hearths. But this is not how they talk.
The whole discussion about masks is instead dominated by utilitarian calculations. What this shows is that the vast majority of people on the planet have completely accepted as gospel (no metaphor here) the idea that everything should be ruled by practical considerations and science. This is absolutely amazing and terrifying for me, because it means that the human experience and poetry has been erased from wide areas of public awareness.
When I hear arguments against masking children made on the basis of the psychological effects on them I hear deep disorientation. That is as if you would argue against slavery by insisting that keeping it would be a burden to the welfare state. I hope you understand that this is not the point. When I hear arguments against masks on the basis of aerosols and nanowhateverness I can't but notice the absence of the human soul from the negotiation. I notice that people using these arguments often do not understand that arguing this way buys the form of the argument: if you contend that masks should not be mandated because they are ineffective, you accept that they should be mandated if they are. I don't think that this is an accident. It is a deeply ingrained way of looking at the world.
I wish mask opponents would stop to use such so called "factual" arguments and go back to the principled position. Arguing from this position is easy, short, and the right thing to do. The argument is unassailable. The opponent either quickly understands the wrongness of his position or, alternatively, quickly understands that there is no way that you will fold. Sure, this can lead to a situation where this becomes about overpowering you, but at least now it is about fellow human beings, and not something abstract any more. It becomes again about human beings, and that is progress.
Human faces are holy. Children's smiles are sacred. The holy and the sacred admit no compromise.
My position is this: If not masking children increases risk for those around them then shame on you for even wasting a thought on that. The effectiveness of masks is a completely moot point. A masked world is a lost world, a dead, soulless world.
I am quite sure most people believe the same in the bottom of their hearths. But this is not how they talk.
The whole discussion about masks is instead dominated by utilitarian calculations. What this shows is that the vast majority of people on the planet have completely accepted as gospel (no metaphor here) the idea that everything should be ruled by practical considerations and science. This is absolutely amazing and terrifying for me, because it means that the human experience and poetry has been erased from wide areas of public awareness.
When I hear arguments against masking children made on the basis of the psychological effects on them I hear deep disorientation. That is as if you would argue against slavery by insisting that keeping it would be a burden to the welfare state. I hope you understand that this is not the point. When I hear arguments against masks on the basis of aerosols and nanowhateverness I can't but notice the absence of the human soul from the negotiation. I notice that people using these arguments often do not understand that arguing this way buys the form of the argument: if you contend that masks should not be mandated because they are ineffective, you accept that they should be mandated if they are. I don't think that this is an accident. It is a deeply ingrained way of looking at the world.
I wish mask opponents would stop to use such so called "factual" arguments and go back to the principled position. Arguing from this position is easy, short, and the right thing to do. The argument is unassailable. The opponent either quickly understands the wrongness of his position or, alternatively, quickly understands that there is no way that you will fold. Sure, this can lead to a situation where this becomes about overpowering you, but at least now it is about fellow human beings, and not something abstract any more. It becomes again about human beings, and that is progress.
Human faces are holy. Children's smiles are sacred. The holy and the sacred admit no compromise.
