My siblings, a professor of medical sciences and a veterinarian, often get a chuckle from my lack of scientific knowledge. I always found the social sciences much more interesting, so I’ve chosen to focus on understanding human behaviour with the goal of building a kinder, more co-operative and functional world community.
One obvious truth is that we share a common humanity. Period. Yes, there are bad people and there are people with high-conflict personalities, but they’re always a minority and are present in every group, regardless of ethnicity, religion or gender.
If anything, certain professions tend to attract people with these personalities. The key is to be mindful of dysfunctional and manipulative behaviours. We need to recognize the patterns of speech and action of these individuals and avoid putting them into positions of trust.
Because of our common humanity, the most poignant threat to the world community is an us-versus-them mentality. Fear is an extremely powerful emotion, and manipulators are very aware of this. If we fear ‘the other,’ we become very easy to control. Colonizers used this method throughout history, as did factory owners who tried to crush unions by playing groups of labourers against one another, often using ethnicity to do so.
COVID-19 has proven to be another major threat to our humanity, from medical and social perspectives.
As one who has studied human conflict throughout history, I’m very concerned about the division that exists. People who choose to get vaccinated are characterized as mindless sheep and those who choose to go unvaccinated are seen as ignorant morons. Neither view is accurate, but someone is espousing these myths and telling us to hate one another.
Social media certainly plays a part. Their algorithms are designed to fuel confirmation biases. They also play on our psychology and favour posts that generate negative emotions. Their focus is on creating profit, not promoting truth. When I go online, I often find myself asking: Who is paying for all of this? How is it benefiting them to create this kind of societal chaos?
These questions are easier to answer in the mainstream media. We can observe the sited commercial sponsorships to get an idea of who’s paying for programming. Many advertisements are from pharmaceutical companies that are experiencing record profits. Given the sordid history of the drug industry, skepticism in the populace is quite understandable.
How does an ordinary person know who to believe?
No one is always right and even a broken clock is right twice a day. Information may be contradictory, but universal truths remain constant.
People are free to remain unvaccinated, but with that freedom comes the responsibility to follow other health advisories because the consequence of being wrong could be the death of other people. No one wants to carry that responsibility.
Some of my unvaccinated friends have shared with me information that, to them, proves that we shouldn’t get vaccinated. I can’t comment on the validity of the medical arguments made in these documents, but, as a social observer, I’m very suspicious of the anger and sarcasm that’s generated in many of these texts.
As far as civil liberties are concerned, we’re free to refuse to follow laws we consider unjust. In doing so, we consciously choose to accept the legal consequences of our actions, thus making an impactful political statement. Unwillingness to tolerate even practical inconveniences resulting from the choice not to follow health mandates, however, simply demonstrates a lack of moral credibility.
As much as they’re demonized in the mainstream media, many of those who choose not to get vaccinated are educated people who comprehend the importance of critical thinking.
What’s most important is that we’re all neighbours who walk this world together and are responsible for one another. We can’t allow anyone to manipulate us into doubting this essential truth.
Troy Media columnist Gerry Chidiac is an award-winning high school teacher specializing in languages, genocide studies and works with at-risk students. For interview requests, click here.
The opinions expressed by our columnists and contributors are theirs alone and do not inherently or expressly reflect the views of our publication.
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