93238
  • Log in
The Daily Sceptic
No Result
View All Result
  • Articles
  • About
  • Archive
    • ARCHIVE
    • NEWS ROUND-UPS
  • Forum
  • Donate
  • Newsletter
The Daily Sceptic
No Result
View All Result

The Tyranny of the Risk Averse

by Toby Young
9 January 2022 8:00 AM
The Tyranny of the Risk Averse

We’re publishing a guest essay today by Nick Comilla, a writer based in New York, about why so many apparently sensible, intelligent people have embraced the restrictions on their freedoms that states have imposed the world over. He thinks a clue may be found in the work of psychologist Sarah Schulman, who writes about why students seek emotional safety rather than stimulating debate on campus and why victimhood has become so appealing. In a nutshell, this is Nick’s hypothesis: “Quite simply, it seems to me that the Covid hysterics are taking up the mantle of victimhood and then construing any resistance to their pathology as abuse, when really it’s the opposite.” Here is an extract:

Last winter, a familiar refrain I noticed in New York amongst myself and many others was “stay safe”. It became the new “have a good night”, it was instinctual and communal. I even started saying it without realising it. It is meant as a compassionate slogan, but it’s also an imperative. You’re being told to do something: stay safe, which suggests the possibility of danger or threat. But why were we suddenly all saying that to each other? I chalked it up to the strangeness of those times: a new ‘Covid wave’, extreme uncertainty, the city still felt emptied out, and crime was up. “Stay safe” and the little things we could do for each other were like linguistic pacifiers, offering us a reprieve from the endless media reminder that we were in ‘unprecedented’ and ‘uncertain times’ and that, despite this, we were ‘all in this together‘.

I started to think about the other phrases that encapsulate an overabundance of caution which masquerades as compassion. And at what point does overemphasising caution become its own form of harassment? Certainly, we are seeing rising incidents of shunning and neuroticism since the start of the pandemic. These are notions favoured by the laptop-class: people who want to live in March 2020 in perpetuity, clamouring for more lockdowns and ‘stimulus’. Some people in the United States seem convinced – quite literally – that they are going to die. This is a problem. They perceive themselves as being in great danger when they aren’t, and view others as a threat in an overstated way. This is dangerous. I noticed that they also seem to take a strange sort of glee in telling others what to do – adult hallway monitors run amok. There was something fundamentally pathological about the sheer pleasure people – usually women and men who seemed off the deep end into over-socialisation – took in events being cancelled for ‘the greater good’. When LCD Soundsystem announced, due to public pressure, that they were abruptly cancelling the last three shows of their reunion performance here in NYC everyone started talking about ‘the greater good’. Those who voiced their disappointment in various comment sections were ostracised, while those who were sanctimoniously, righteously having their ‘concern for safety’ met seemed pleased to have their virtue reaffirmed. To be clear, I don’t necessarily think they enjoy the ongoing restrictions: I think they enjoy the righteousness of their perceived sacrifice.

The chorus they kept repeating was ‘this was a tough call, but it’s the right thing to do!’ and ‘see you when it’s safe’. The issue is that for these people, it will never be safe. And they are holding the rest of us hostage in the meantime. What struck me as odd was that if anyone dared to complain about this over-zealous and overstated concept of risk, if anyone pointed out that these people were beginning to make life seriously miserable, the neurotics would double down and accuse us of that which they were guilty of: ‘Stop throwing a fit’, ‘Oh poor you, little baby, you can’t go to a concert’. Sadomasochistic glee. Anyone who has spoken out against restrictions knows that the social ostracising is rampant: you’re either accused of ‘lacking empathy’ or of actively ‘wanting people to die’. It is bizarre to me that a civil conversation can’t be entered into under the shared assumption that neither of us want people to die and that you can be simultaneously against lockdowns and in favour of reducing suffering in general.

Worth reading in full.

Tags: Covid HysteriaSarah SchulmanVictimhood

Donate

We depend on your donations to keep this site going. Please give what you can.

Donate Today

Comment on this Article

You’ll need to set up an account to comment if you don’t already have one. We ask for a minimum donation of £5 if you'd like to make a comment or post in our Forums.

Sign Up
Previous Post

End Covid Vaccination Campaign, Says Ex-Head of Vaccine Taskforce

Next Post

A BBC Complaint

Subscribe
Login
Notify of
Please log in to comment

Profanity and abuse will be removed and may lead to a permanent ban.

96 Comments
Oldest
Newest Most Voted
Inline Feedbacks
View all comments

NEWSLETTER

To view today's newsletter click here

To receive our latest news in the form of a daily email, enter your details here:

DONATE

LISTED ARTICLES

  • Most Read
  • Most Commented
  • Editors Picks
Age-Adjusted Excess Mortality Since January of 2020

Excess Non-Covid Deaths Top 12,500 in 14 Weeks As Oxford Professor Joins Call for Government to Investigate Alarming Trend

10 August 2022
by Will Jones
Restrictions to Be Scrapped in Denmark as Covid No Longer “A Critical Threat to Society”

Denmark Ends Vaccination For Under-50s as it Shifts to Treating Covid Like Flu

11 August 2022
by Nick Rendell
Anthony Fauci Booed as He Throws First Pitch at Baseball Game

Anthony Fauci Booed as He Throws First Pitch at Baseball Game

11 August 2022
by Will Jones
News Round-Up

News Round-Up

12 August 2022
by Will Jones
Tavistock To Be Sued By 1,000 Families

Tavistock To Be Sued By 1,000 Families

11 August 2022
by Toby Young
Restrictions to Be Scrapped in Denmark as Covid No Longer “A Critical Threat to Society”

Denmark Ends Vaccination For Under-50s as it Shifts to Treating Covid Like Flu

35
Minister Confirms Government Not Ruling Out Barring University Students From Lectures and Halls

One in Three Vaccinated Teenagers Suffer Cardiovascular Side-Effects, One in 43 Suffer Heart Inflammation – Study

28
News Round-Up

News Round-Up

27

News Round-Up

34
Tavistock To Be Sued By 1,000 Families

Tavistock To Be Sued By 1,000 Families

23
Ivan Katchanovski Responds to Ian Rons

Ivan Katchanovski Responds to Ian Rons

12 August 2022
by Noah Carl
Restrictions to Be Scrapped in Denmark as Covid No Longer “A Critical Threat to Society”

Denmark Ends Vaccination For Under-50s as it Shifts to Treating Covid Like Flu

11 August 2022
by Nick Rendell
TWICE as Many Vaccine Deaths as Covid Deaths in U.S. Households, Poll Finds

How Many Lives Did the Vaccines Save and How Many Did They End?

10 August 2022
by Will Jones
Age-Adjusted Excess Mortality Since January of 2020

Excess Non-Covid Deaths Top 12,500 in 14 Weeks As Oxford Professor Joins Call for Government to Investigate Alarming Trend

10 August 2022
by Will Jones
Are There Any Conservatives Left at Harvard?

Are There Any Conservatives Left at Harvard?

9 August 2022
by Noah Carl

POSTS BY DATE

January 2022
M T W T F S S
 12
3456789
10111213141516
17181920212223
24252627282930
31  
« Dec   Feb »

SOCIAL LINKS

Free Speech Union
The Daily Sceptic
  • Home
  • About us
  • Donate
  • Privacy Policy

Facebook

Twitter

Instagram

RSS

Subscribe to our newsletter

© 2022 Skeptics Ltd.

No Result
View All Result
  • Articles
  • About
  • Archive
    • ARCHIVE
    • NEWS ROUND-UPS
  • Forum
  • Donate
  • Newsletter

© 2022 Daily Sceptic.

Welcome Back!

Login to your account below

Forgotten Password?

Create New Account!

Please note: To be able to comment on our articles you'll need to be a registered donor

Already have an account?
Please click here to login Log In

Retrieve your password

Please enter your username or email address to reset your password.

Log In
wpDiscuz
You are going to send email to

Move Comment