The way civilized society should operate is for everyone to work toward a common goal of making life better for everyone. The word “should” is emphasized because human nature goes against the common good.
A lot of assumptions go into all of us pushing the rock up the hill. The first assumption is that we all want the rock at the top of the hill. Often many people are content to let it sit at the bottom and walk around it.
There are others among us who will push the rock for awhile but tire or get bored and walk away, leaving those tasked with getting the rock to the top of the hill being forced to put in extra physical effort and try to persuade those who aren’t participating to come help.
We’ll all differ on how much we should carry the rest of society, cajole them to participate or even get them to agree with the goal that is best for society.
Our rock right now is COVID-19 vaccinations and the people at the bottom of the hill either fear the vaccine for ludicrous reasons, believe they won’t get sick, or (sigh) believe the vaccine is the government, or Bill Gates, shooting some tracking device into you. The people we know who believe this are not people anyone would be interested in tracking, other than to stay the hell away from them.
The government’s answer to everything is throw money at it. So we find our governor cruising the state, spinning wheels for possibly lucky shot recipients and entering their names in lotteries.
We submit that being 99.8 percent sure that you will not die from the virus is the winning ticket, not taxpayers’ money.
Rewarding people who are fine with putting their fellow citizens in danger is not right. We understand state and federal government leaders are desperate to get the percentage of fully vaccinated people over that 70 percent mark. And it is a Sisyphean task.
Leaders, the media, scientists, doctors have all tried reason. We’ve tried to reason with readers. This got us just so far and no farther.
The rush of those who desperately wanted the vaccine filled clinics, parking lots and sports stadiums turned make-shift vaccine clinics through late winter and early spring. Those who believed in the vaccine and wanted it but weren’t going to sit in line all night came next. That group got us past the halfway mark here in New Mexico and the country.
The last 40 percent will come kicking and screaming. The brutal truth is the longer that group waits, the more of them will die and decrease that pool. Vaccinated people are not in the daily statistics of those becoming infected, hospitalized and perhaps dying. The vaccination non-believers are the ones populating those categories now.
We don’t know how someone can live with themselves knowing they were bribed with taxpayer money to do something they should have done months ago out of duty to themselves, their immediate family and their community. However, surely many of them will live with themselves while spending our money, guilt-free.
Society should not operate this way and when politicians bend the tactics of paying people to do the right thing, they lower all of us.