Marie Antoinette — Susan Corso's Blog

Day 47 Meeting in the Middle; or, The Sanity Equation

I remember the progression well. First, it had no name. Then, it was the plague. At one point, the gay plague, graduated to GRID, gay-related immune disease. Eventually, AIDS, Acquired Immunodeficiency Syndrome. You might think it stopped there, but it didn’t. As research continued, a distinction was made between HIV and AIDS. Just because someone was HIV-positive, it didn’t mean they had AIDS. Time wore on. AIDS patients got a big dollop of humanitarianism and were changed to PWAs, people with AIDS. At that point, it was still a game of Russian roulette. Most who had it died. The process eventuated to PLWAs, and I recall taking a deep, deep breath when I learned what it signified: People Living with AIDS. Implicit was, of course, that they weren’t all necessarily dying. It was a huge mental shift that, once it occurred, took its place immediately in the collective mind. Mostly because it was a relief. Almost everyone knew someone who was positive, whether consciously aware of that fact or not. PLWAs. Well now, we have come to the same stage with SARS-CoV-2 a.k.a. the coronavirus.

Day 46 Priorities; or, Profits and Prophets

What is a true priority in this dystopian dream we’re living? In today’s Coronavirus Outbreak news aggregator, I read this: “Early in 2018, 30 microbiologists, zoologists and public health experts from around the world gathered at the headquarters of the World Health Organization in Geneva to draw up a priority list of dangerous viruses—specifically, those for which no vaccines or drugs were in development. It included “Disease X”: a stand-in for all of the unknown pathogens, or devastating variations on existing pathogens, that had yet to emerge. The coronavirus now sweeping the world, officially SARS-CoV-2, is a prime example.” Once again, I’m relegated to basic math. 2018? It’s 2020. What did we do, or what did the 30 worldwide wizards do with those two years? It wasn’t because they didn’t want to do something. They did.

Day 45 The Abdication; or, Tolerating the Intolerable

Well, I think that each of us carries an aspect, and serves the rest of us, of the collective emotionality of humankind. Because of my own personal experience with death and grief, I default to Sad. I know people whose default reactivity—especially to collective experience—is Mad. I know others who default to Bad a.k.a. Fear. You take my point. That’s why when Opinion columnist Jamelle Bouie writing in “Mitch McConnell Is Not as Clever as He Thinks He Is,” opined, “When banks, corporations and wealthy individuals need bailouts, the Republican Party is there, pen in hand. ... But when ordinary Americans need help to pay their bills, and when states—which can’t run deficits—need help to avoid fiscal collapse, the Republican Party is much less interested,” I was utterly astonished that I defaulted to Mad.