> I've since turned more cynical and believe that greed is as essential to humanness as empathy, if not more, and without a strong moral code (and fear of being ostracized for breaking it), selfishness wins.

It's not the baker empathy that brings you bread, but his greed

> The pandemic has violently dispelled any remaining expectation I had for a future cosmopolitan society.

The pandemic makes me hope more people will see governments for what they are: restricting their freedoms for no good reasons, so it's better to starve the beast.