Silver linings -------------- The following will be all too obvious to anybody reading this here and now, but I'll establish some context first, so that this post makes some sense as a standalone document in the future: the world is in the grip of a pandemic. The novel coronavirus COVID19 has infected over a quarter of a million people world wide, and killed over 10,000. It's early days, and both of those numbers will get much higher. Most major developed nations are seeing sustained supermarket shortages of toilet paper, hand sanitiser and staple foods with long shelf lives. Many nations are imposing extreme measures to try to slow the spread of the disease - borders are closing, non-essential businesses are being forcibly closed, public gatherings above certain threshold sizes - in some parts of the world as low as 5 or 10 people - are being imposed. Most people's attention, understandably, is on staying healthy and slowing the spread of disease. I'm not an expert, but I strongly expect that, on a longer timeline, the *medical* aspect of this pandemic is going to be less of a big deal than the socioeconomic aspect of it. Obviously the travel, transport and tourism industries will be hit hard and fast. Some airlines have already gone bankrupt, others are begging for government assistance to avoid that. Many people have already lost jobs. But these industries are probably just the tip of the iceberg. It seems to me that a global recession is more or less inevitable. The modern world is built, in a major way, on deep supply chains and ideas like just-in-time logistics, and on constant, maximum speed growth and consumption. A lot of systems that rely on this are going to be demolished by the consequences of this pandemic and they will take a long time to recover. There's no doubt at all that this is a genuine tragedy. I feel kind of guilty even trying to suggest that we should try to perhaps find upsides to this. It seems trite, and like an easy thing to say as a relatively young and healthy person whose job is secure. Reluctantly, I proceed anyway... A small plus is that this experience might make "prepping" a little more normal. Even the simple practice of having 72 hours worth of essential supplies ready and on hand all the time is extremely sensible and reasonable, and is explicitly recommended by the civil defence or equivalent authorities of even the richest, most stable countries in the world - and yet, almost *nobody* does it, and people who do do it are liable to keep quiet about it for fear of being branded as weird or paranoid. This is ridiculous, but it's understandable, because most people have never had the direct, hands-on experience of needing this level of preparedness and neither has any living member of their family. After COVID19, this will no longer be true for most of the planet for decades to come. The fact that apparently reliable, stable aspects of daily life can disappear for unexpected reasons on short notice will actually be a concrete fact in everybody's mind. Basic preparedness might start to be seen as the common sense it is, instead of a delusional eccentricity. But truth be told, I am hoping for a lot more than this. In the coming months, many people would ordinarily start and end their day with a long and stressful commute, maybe driving through terrible traffic or maybe jammed into a train or bus, will not be having to put up with this extra dose of stress. Some of them may gain an hour of even more of extra time in the day, even if they are working from home for their usual hours. Maybe they'll be able to use that extra time to get a full(er) night's sleep, regularly, for the first time in years. Many people will also be eating a lot less fast food or junk food. If people are really forced to hole themselves up, and/or if supermarket supply chains really break down, they'll be eating a lot of simple, basic food like rice, pasta, beans and bread, and they'll be cooking it themselves, at home, with their families. On the weekends, people will have to entertain themselves at home, with things they already have. In short, a lot of people are going to undergo some fairly intensive involuntary downshifting[1]. I realise that this downshift will take place against a background of people dying, getting sick, losing jobs, losing businesses. I'm under no illusion that this will be a happy "back to basics" Kumbaya camp. But I kind of hope that a lot of people will notice that in some small but real ways their lives actually improve as so much of the "rat race" slows down or fades away. Maybe when the time comes for us to go back to normal, some of these people will question whether we actually want some parts of the old normal to be part of the new normal. Maybe people will realise that some of the "non-essential businesses" which were forcibly closed during the pandemic actually are, literally, not essential, and that if they cause human workers to lead miserable lifes, or have substantial negative environmental impacts (already - already! - we are seeing reports of positive environmental impacts of people staying at home more), maybe we should just leave them behind. Reading sloum's recent entry[2] on his early experiences coping with the pandemic make me think perhaps I am being ludicrously naive and optimistic about this whole thing. Maybe most people will be super relieved to go back to exactly what normal was three months ago. I guess we'll see. Best wishes to everyone in Gopherspace, and their loved ones, in weathering what is yet to come. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Downshifting_(lifestyle) [2] gopher://zaibatsu.circumlunar.space:70/0/~sloum/phlog/20200318-21.txt