Who are your Covid-Witches?

You might not know it, or want to admit it, but your subconscious has already started selecting your Covid-Witches. You have an instinct who they are, and deep down you are itching to lash out at them. Just like, in times of crisis, we humans always do.

Usually when we are attacked by an enemy, the enemy is tangible and is distinctly different to ‘us.’ This makes it a lot easier for ‘us’ to unite together in our mutual defence. Take World War Two for example. Our enemies were the Germans and the Japanese. This made it much easier for us to identify the ‘enemy’ and unite against them.

Of course this was incredibly dangerous for anyone who just so happened to look like the enemy, such as the Americans of Japanese decent who were living in the United States at the time of Pearl Harbour. Without a second thought they were rounded up and thrown in labour camps for the crime of simply looking like ‘the enemy.’

By ratting out and reporting these frightened civilians to the authorities, ordinary, otherwise logical citizens felt they were ‘doing their bit’ for the national war effort. They were doing something tangible in the defence of the collective ‘us.’ Yet with the benefit of hindsight we can see that it was pure xenophobic racism. In a similar vein in the 1930’s the Nazis had managed to get ordinary, caring citizens to do the same against their Jewish neighbours. We all know how that ended.