Well, it seems as though we’re going to be stuck inside for a while. The situation is pretty scary, but moment-to-moment this frankly doesn’t represent much of a change in my life. However, like the clouds of smoke that wash down from the burning hills during Summer it is both a problem in its own right and a harbinger of greater problems to come. COVID-19 is going to kill a lot of people – it already has quite a few, but more so. No use beating around that bush. What’s scary to me, though, is what comes after – or during.
There’s an optimistic vision of the future here: We survive the immediate threat (except for those of us who don’t); we learn a harsh lesson in investing in the public good and invest in medicare for all and other forms of social welfare; we observe how much healthier the environment has been without ceaseless and mindless capitalistic consumerism scouring it, how the working class is really who keeps things running, how redundant the aristocracy of wealth is to an actual functioning society, and we restructure things for the better. It’s a lovely vision which is plausible only as long as you believe no one is actively working against it, which would require ignoring essentially everything that’s happened since at least the Reagan presidency, starting before I was born.
It could go any way of course, and I imagine it will be impossible to predict the real form of our absurd and stupid future, but here’s what I see right now: We survive the immediate threat (except for many of us who don’t). Popular support for medicare for all explodes – which has already been happening, but is accelerated. However, the democratic party still derides the idea as unserious with deficit scaremongering and drags their heels, regardless of whether or not they win the presidency, and frustration with and resentment of the party grows. Republicans come out with a medicare for all plan, one which excludes anyone who can’t meet whatever requirements they deem necessary to be a proper citizen – in effect, medicare for all whites. This is not a new idea: Last time we called it national socialism. We observe how much healthier the environment has been without so many people out and about, and conclude that people were the problem all along leading to a campaign of agitation for strict population control with an implicit focus on the global south. The continued disenfranchisement of the working class is, as is now traditional, blamed on immigrants – or, if that’s no longer trendy, on some other approved local enemy such as socialists or Jews – though, actually, at the moment, it seems most likely to target those of Chinese descent next, which with the pin-point precision of most forms of racism means it will probably actually target anyone who looks East Asian.
Whatever. I can’t do much about all that one way or the other except to play Cassandra and tell you one way it could go, which I’ve just done. I just wanted to plant this idea in your head so that you understand what the stakes are and why my jaw hurts from clenching it all the time.
Meanwhile there’s folks out here telling us all the cool shit that Shakespeare wrote while he was hiding away from a different pandemic. The implication is that we should take this opportunity to become great, that this is just another chance to Be Productive. I would implore you to, rather than consider what you can do for your art, instead consider what your art can do for you. Creation is expression, creation is comfort, creation is a way to prove your existence to yourself – these things are more important to your life than the opportunity to become a Great Artist. Art is an opportunity to create beauty, joy, thoughtfulness, and relief: If you can use your skills to help others or yourself get through this, then do that. That’s what’s important here, not writing the next King Lear.