Academic

JAMES LILEKS? WEDNESDAY REVIEW OF MODERN THOUGHT FISKS A CNN ARTICLE ON ?THE NEW NORMAL,? whose auth?

By Ed Driscoll

JAMES LILEKS’ WEDNESDAY REVIEW OF MODERN THOUGHT FISKS A CNN ARTICLE ON “THE NEW NORMAL,” whose author believes “permanently severing ties with January is not necessarily a bad thing, psychologists say. The danger comes from hankering for normalcy again, rather than getting on with working out how to deal with whatever is ahead.” To which Lileks replies:

It?s as if January and Now are equally weighted as two possible modus vivendi, and our attachment to one over the other is irrational and counterproductive.

Well. No. I?m here to make a bold, counterrevolutionary assertion: January was better. And January is a standard we should hold up and remember and strive to regain. That doesn?t mean you don?t wear a mask tomorrow. It means you will discard it when it?s been a month since a case and the hospitals are empty, despite what the sign says. Despite what the sign says. It means you will not slump around in perpetual compliance for the rest of your life, and acquiesce with sad nods and shrugs when all the aspects of human interaction are forbidden and the world shrinks to a hive of bees in their cells. It means prudence and it means kicking the shins of those who revel in contraction.

It means being a Januarian.

As I have said: I have been masked up for a long time, and I carry hand sanitizer and keep my distance, but I will not live like this is Ebola. Live by the rules, for now, and regard every day as the penultimate day you?ll put up with the Wuhan fallout. Be safe, stay furious, and keep January in mind whatever you do and wherever you go. Anyone tells you to let it go, bark no.

Read the whole thing.

Full post as published by Instapundit.com on October 07, 2020 (boomark / email).