The Plague of Heroes
26th April 2020
ZMan jerks back the curtain.
Given the facts emerging about the Chinese flu virus, the panic should be subsiding, but too many people are too invested in the panic, for personal and political reasons, to let this thing go away quietly. Instead we have a new round of drama as the heroic politicians listen to the heroic TikTok workers about when they can safely stop tormenting people over what is looking like a real life example of this famous quote. If it ever was, it is no longer about public safety. Instead it is about the drama queens.
Here in Lagos, the local dictator has issued an edict requiring everyone to wear their underwear over their heads if they go outside. That’s a slight exaggeration, but not that much of one. The requirement to wear masks, something unavailable for months, means people are wearing all sorts of outlandish get-ups. More than a few times I have seen women with what looks like feminine napkins on their face. There have undoubtedly been men wearing briefs on their heads just to go outside.
At this stage, demanding that people wear masks is nothing more than a punitive measure to humiliate the public. That move may have made some sense two months ago, but at this point there is no health reason for it. Instead, the politicians and TikTok heroes have got to justify what is turning out to be something closer to the infamous War of the Worlds panic than a legitimate public emergency. To admit reality at this point risks bruising their tender psyches, so we suffer on.