> have been quite good at communicating in the middle of a global pandemics
Have they? It's a horrible back and forth, not based on any evidence. New rules are announced and rescinded a week later (e.g. Germany not ending quarantine of infected after all this week). During lockdowns, people were allowed to work in the same offices if required, but meeting anyone from outside your household was forbidden. Couples were arrested for sitting at the beach. I personally experienced police harassment for leaving the house. Green pass validity is still jumping back and forth (Austria). Let's not even get started on the endless amounts of lies, inaccuracies and moving goal posts surrounding the disappointing covid vaccines, the blacked out contracts to buy BILLIONS of them and the rejection of natural immunity after infection. Our governments have absolutely failed us and lost the last ounces of our trust they had.
Agree with everything you said, but want to add one more point:
I have made my peace with all of these bureaucratic failures. Maybe a certain amount of contradiction and chaos is part of living in a democracy.
The scary part is that at the same time there has been an authoritarian push to crack down on "disinformation", you know, like the lab leak theory, or the conspiracy theory that vaccination will become mandatory. That has sent my trust from low into negative territory.
Yup. It is kind of a massive engineering failure. Everybody was doing exactly what they were incentivized to do. Everybody thought they were doing the right thing. But combined they drove the train right off the track. There was nothing in place to throw the brakes on and tell society to chill the fuck out. No amount of data or leadership could fix it.
The worst part is anybody who dared point this out was met with fierce vitriol, shaming and general hatred. We were all just expected to fall in line and those who asked questions got shunned by society.
In the first month or so it would have been possible for a good leader to chill things out. But eventually the thing grew legs of its own and nobody could put an end to it. Society would just have to wear itself out and one by one come to its senses. Two years later we are just now truly coming to our senses.
Unfortunately it will take quite some time for this event to be remembered for what it truly was: the first true mass hysteria of the internet age.
I agree about the engineering failure, but I'm not sure if mass hysteria is the right term. It was messier than that, we also saw a few leaders chilling out too much too early. My favorite: https://twitter.com/billdeblasio/status/1234648718714036229
And if anything, governments have been too relaxed about the origin of the pandemic (which has now officially killed 6 million!), while panicking about other details.
> Have they? It's a horrible back and forth, not based on any evidence. (...)
You're grossly misrepresenting the facts. If you take an objective look at recent history, you'll realize that politicians have been trying to juggle public health guidelines with economic and political topics. The bulk of these arbitrary measures result from politicians caving in to issues completely unrelated to public health guidelines.
Take for example how some countries mysteriously relaxed COVID restrictions during major public holidays like Christmas and new year's eve celebrations to afterwards hastily reintroduce additional restrictions to contain the expected hike in infection rates.
> Couples were arrested for sitting at the beach.
No they really weren't. People were charged for endangering public health by purposely violating mandatory lockdowns and social distancing requirements. Trying to frame this as punishment for sitting at the beach is like complaining that drunk driving is punishing people for enjoying a drink now and then.
If you’re in Austria, don’t forget about the mandatory vaccination for the general population which was passed during Omicron and then the enforcement was suspended as the politicians finally accepted what everyone else already knew.
> have been quite good at communicating in the middle of a global pandemics
Have they? It's a horrible back and forth, not based on any evidence. New rules are announced and rescinded a week later (e.g. Germany not ending quarantine of infected after all this week). During lockdowns, people were allowed to work in the same offices if required, but meeting anyone from outside your household was forbidden. Couples were arrested for sitting at the beach. I personally experienced police harassment for leaving the house. Green pass validity is still jumping back and forth (Austria). Let's not even get started on the endless amounts of lies, inaccuracies and moving goal posts surrounding the disappointing covid vaccines, the blacked out contracts to buy BILLIONS of them and the rejection of natural immunity after infection. Our governments have absolutely failed us and lost the last ounces of our trust they had.