What about the long term brain damage of isolating everyone for years straight, massively strained social connections, eroding mentoring opportunities at work, not allowing babies and children to see faces or socialize, and the overall cognitive load of adapting to a large sector of the population acting like a bunch of anxious cowards over what is largely a cold for 99% of them?
Firstly, as of January, 11% of people infected with covid still have symptoms. I'm one of them. Personally I wish I'd been more paranoid, maybe I'd still be able to drink a coke without wanting to vomit from the taste or fuel my car without the smell of gasoline making me dry heave. Secondly, that value is derived from reality, i.e., a world where people did "act like anxious and nervous pansies". They tried to avoid being infected. They tried to avoid infecting other people, especially vulnerable people. Covid killed a million people in the US. How many would it have killed if we hadn't acted like pansies? How many vulnerable people would have died before we could vaccinate them? How many dangerous variants would have evolved with an infection pool twice as large?
If you don’t want to wear a mask, just do all of that outdoors, or keep an indoor space very well ventilated with fresh air from outdoors
Sounds like you need to learn to be more adaptable. I've had no problem meeting with friends to walk outdoors, maintaining friendships throughout the pandemic, all without ever catching COVID.
a large sector of the population acting like a bunch of anxious cowards
Are you a coward for wearing a seatbelt in a car? How about a helmet when riding a motorcycle?
Let this be a lesson: this is what privilege sounds like.
It's very easy to say "just be more adaptable" when your well-paying job is to sit at home, posting on reddit and occasionally resolving a bug ticket. Meanwhile, tens or hundreds of millions of people worldwide who work in hospitality, music/theatre/other live performances, conferences and events, tourism, etc. had their livelihoods absolutely crushed by COVID restrictions. They got government handouts and still barely survived.
But yeah, nobody cares about those people; they don't matter since they're not FAANG employees. They should just adapt and learn how to code red-black trees on a whiteboard to get a job at Meta.
Are you suggesting that other people don't have access to the outside, or communication technology?
Aside from very few places, there was never any actual lockdown. Everyone in America had the right to walk in a park with friends while social distancing.
when your well-paying job is to sit at home, posting on reddit and occasionally resolving a bug ticket
That's quite some projection.
nobody cares about those people
I guess that's why I always wear a mask when in an enclosed area...? Why I always respected personal space of workers and always had patience with them, knowing what they're going through.
Yep, I'm just a privileged meanie. Can't possibly be that I behaved like a responsible, caring adult, using methods available to all Americans.
No, it most certainly could not. This is just the slippery slope fallacy.
Incidentally, nobody forced you to wear a mask. You always had other options. You are, however, forced to wear a seatbelt (aside from NH) and, in almost all states, a helmet while on a motorcycle. Other than a few overconfident fools, everyone understands the benefits of these precautions.
Somehow, though, taking reasonable precautions against COVID is tantamount to bubble wrap life. Why? Because it's new and you're so indignant that you can't see you're the wrong side of history.
It absolutely could. This is just the "slippery slope fallacy fallacy": assuming that all slippery slope arguments are fallacious.
Another mistake you make is assuming that everybody you talk to on this site lives in the US. I can assure you that not only I was "forced" to wear a mask, in many parts of the world people lost their jobs for refusing to do so.
But I see I am talking to someone who not only believes that he is "on the right side of history", but also that the history has "the right side".
I deeply regret to say that I will not modify my way of interacting with others, especially now that we know that the pandemic is over.
I hold a strong conviction that face-to-face communication has been a successful method for thousands of years, and I am not inclined to adopt a technique of uncertain effectiveness and potential unknown consequences, solely due to the influence of a minority of individuals who suffer from health anxiety (and I don't use the word hypochondriasis as a gesture of good will here).
Complete nonsense. Reasonable precautions aren't a slippery slope. They never have been and they never will be, yet every time one comes up we get people screaming about it.
Another mistake you make is assuming that everybody you talk to on this site lives in the US. I can assure you that not only I was "forced" to wear a mask, in many parts of the world people lost their jobs for refusing to do so.
The vast majority do live in the US. If you choose to refuse requirements of your job, that's on you.
I am not inclined to adopt a technique of uncertain effectiveness and potential unknown consequences
You're literally afraid of change. You see something that requires adaptation and you recoil in horror, and make up a bunch of nonsense to rationalize your fearful reaction. Grow up.
The long term brain damage is going to be a massive impact on companies who are forcing RTO and causing their employees to deal with repeat exposures to Covid from co-workers.