Manners Enter Into It

'It': 1) constructive living and a healthy society; 2) an alternative to indifference and barbarism.

manners (n.)

external behavior (especially polite behavior) in social intercourse, late 14c., plural of manner in a specific sense of proper behavior, commendable habits of conduct (c. 1300). Earlier it meant "moral character" (early 13c.).

For all the talk of a 'new norm', there are few details about it and much myopic blathering by wannabe pundits who seem far too eager to acquire another 15 minutes of fame at the expense of clarity and reason. Let's investigate the 'new norm', shall we, as some are anticipating will characterize the post-covid19 experience.

Non-prediction

What is the 'new norm'? Who... can say? No, not the WHO, i.e., the World Health Organization that in the early stages parroted China's dubious narrative that the Virus could not jump from animals to humans, or from humans to humans, but then joined the chorus of researchers that have clarified the origin and progress of the disease [https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/32007145]. The Who, the rock group, stands a better chance of correctly signaling the 'new norm' than the political hydra.

Won't Get Fooled Again - by The Who

We'll be fighting in the streets
With our children at our feet
And the morals that they worship will be gone
And the men who spurred us on
Sit in judgment of all wrong
They decide and the shotgun sings the song

I'll tip my hat to the new constitution
Take a bow for the new revolution
Smile and grin at the change all around
Pick up my guitar and play
Just like yesterday
And I'll get on my knees and pray
We don't get fooled again
Don't get fooled again

Change it had to come
We knew it all along
We were liberated from the fold that's all
And the world looks just the same
And history ain't changed
Cause the banners, they all flown in the last war

Of course, few involved in the relativistic enterprise of identifying the 'new norm' are willing to venture an actual description of the much anticipated neo-narrative. So, we may have to fire more than a few arrows at fleeing vermin contending for the title.

The very concept of a norm should be unpalatable to the relativist mind, a mind which demands that there are no absolutes (save the abolition of all absolutes), no authority to which one can trustingly appeal (save the absence of any trust; suspicion rules!), and certainly no moral North Pole to which one must allow oneself to be oriented by one's provisional moral compass.

Because relativists all but hate the idea that anything of lasting value may entrench itself in societal discourse and behaviour, let's dismiss the prognostications of relativists - i.e., of so many politicians and journalists - as useless chatter, mere flannel, with little concern that its loss will inhibit rational people from engaging in more profitable and enjoyable ventures.

We are passing into a social phase in which unless a heroic effort is made for human dignity and freedom, gold will be the sole method of government and therefore the sole standard of manners. - G.K. Chesterton

We are witnessing an intensification of the losses Chesterton charted. The rate at which those losses are progressing has leap-frogged to lower lows than the prescient GKC could have stomached. The current virus crisis has enabled governments to shut down churches and any other form of public gathering deemed a threat to the health of a population. Disturbing is the glaring contradiction that has liquor stores open and churches closed, and disturbing, too, is the ease by which many acquiesced at the selective closures.

The price of gasoline/petrol, the canary in the coal mine, is one of the "golds" by which a restoration is being measured and effected. There are health professionals who sincerely want to protect people from harm. Unfortunately, with extraordinary naiveté, doctors high and low are preaching a gospel with little appreciation of the real motivator in all the changes made - economic utility. What is the motivator that conditions the prescriptions in place to protect people? Is the purpose of the restraints to mitigate pressure on healthcare systems? Realistically, the restraints are secondary to the need to control the engine of every economy: people. A healthy workforce means economic advantage. But, of course, the economy must be threatened in order to provide a catalyst for change.

R.R. Reno, editor of the respected First Things magazine, identified that

(d)ata are coming in, and their import is clear. The coronavirus pandemic is not and never was a threat to society. COVID-19 poses a danger to the elderly and the medically compromised. Otherwise, for most who present symptoms, it can be nasty and persistent, but is not life-threatening. A majority of those infected do not notice that they have the disease. Coronavirus presents us with a medical challenge, not a crisis. The crisis has been of our own making. 

On March 16, Neil Ferguson of Imperial College London predicted a coronavirus death toll of more than two million in the United States alone. He arrived at this number by assuming that infection would be nearly universal and the fatality rate would be high—a terrifying prospect. The next day, Stanford epidemiologist John Ioannidis sifted through the data and predicted less widespread infection and a fatality rate of between 0.05 and 1.0 percent—not that different from the common flu. The coronavirus is not the common flu. It has different characteristics, afflicting the old more than the young, men more than women. Nevertheless, all data trends since mid-March show that Ferguson was fantastically wrong and Ioannidis was largely right about its mortal threat. 

But Ferguson’s narrative has triumphed, helped by our incontinent and irresponsible media.

https://www.firstthings.com/web-exclusives/2020/04/coronavirus-reality-check

https://www.statnews.com/2020/03/17/a-fiasco-in-the-making-as-the-coronavirus-pandemic-takes-hold-we-are-making-decisions-without-reliable-data/

Reno continues:

We’ve been stampeded into a regime of social control that is unprecedented in our history. Our economy has been shattered. Ordinary people have been terrorized by death-infused propaganda designed to motivate obedience to the limits on free movement. We have been reduced to life as medical subjects in our condition of self-quarantine. As unemployment numbers skyrocket and Congress spends trillions, the political stakes rise. 

The experts, professionals, bureaucrats, and public officials who did this to us have tremendous incentives to close ranks and say, “It is not wise to tell people that the danger was never grave and now has passed.” Sustaining the coronavirus narrative will require many lies. It will be up to us to insist on the truth.

Experts, professionals, bureaucrats and public officials have traded the gold of truth for the pyrite of hyperbole and deceit.

Dr. Anthony Esolen, at Crisis Magazine, wrote:

I am not here recommending any single policy regarding the current virus. I am neither an epidemiologist nor an economist. I observe things around me. When this virus fades away, another virus will come. There will always be a virus. Mass entertainment demands it. The people must be heated to a fever—feverish envy, hatred, fear, obsession, filth, passion without a clear object, pride but in nothing tangible—the narcissism of people who read nothing, learn nothing, and build nothing, who hate and envy their own ancestors and plug up their ears against any lesson they might teach them. All these destructive sentiments are stoked by the machine of mass entertainment, which is also the machine of mass politics.

https://www.crisismagazine.com/2020/hatred-comes-first

Given the frequent imposition of false narratives via the mainstream media, and the recent ease with which public officials have bought into "a regime of social control", it is difficult to disagree with Chesterton, Reno and Esolen. If we are to recover from the false narrative which has emptied pews, busted businesses and driven people to the margins looking for solace, then we should propose a better alternative to the politics of fear and the normalization of socialist ideology.

Has there ever been a more glaring example of a global movement which placed the state in control of people's actions, ability to conduct business and freedom to worship. The real pandemic is the virus Reno identified as "a regime of social control".

You'll never find the solution if you don't see the problem. - Chesterton

As an antidote to the lingering effects of the so-called pandemic, i.e., the panic endemic among members of the mainstream media, et. al., let's untether ourselves from the subtle tyrannies that pluck away our freedoms and concern ourselves with promoting a well-reasoned calm informed by the facts. That calm will include tangible expressions of good behaviour that undermine the rush to rash judgement and irrational behaviour. Contrary to some vague 'new norm', the proposed response is comprised of tried and true ways, remnants of an old norm that might be better termed wisdom.

Manners

• politeness: behavior that is respectful and considerate of other people
• civility: formal politeness and courtesy in behavior or speech
• fairness: impartial and just treatment or behavior without favoritism or discrimination
• decency: the state, condition, or quality of being fair, or free from bias or injustice; evenhandedness

Those things enable people to committedly work and graciously play alongside one another. What we've seen in the midst of the covid19 is a series of evolving prescriptions which have a version of principles for "safe" human interaction sanitized of humanity.

humanity (n.) late 14c., "kindness, graciousness, politeness; consideration for others," from Old French humanité

Social distancing: another phrase for "Keep away from me you disease-ridden troll."

And, let's ignore and condemn what is likely to be the bloated waistline that forms around individuals who have swallowed hastily and repeatedly the tripe from the mouths of pretend pundits. That is, let's brush aside passive aggression, the emerging New Norm.

While passive-aggressive behavior can be hard to pin down, experts agree on the most common signs, which include refusing to discuss concerns openly and directly, avoiding responsibility, and being deliberately inefficient.

The passively aggressive person often leaves a job undone or “almost” complete. They frequently run late and are masters at subtly sabotaging others when they disagree with a course of action. They often resort to the silent treatment or the backhanded compliment to get their point across. - Psychology Today

The passive-aggressive person hovers at the mid-way point between internal (secret) monologue and external expression (worst poker-face ever...) to prevent himself from being exposed as a fraud, hypocrite and a bully.

Passive-aggression often stems from underlying anger, sadness, or insecurity, of which the person may or may not be consciously aware. Passive-aggressive behavior may be an expression of those emotions or an attempt to gain control in a relationship.

The passive-aggressive person thinks himself selfless when his behaviour proves self righteousness, compassionate but a tyrant, flexible but intolerant of anyone who dares to disagree with his ideology.

I don't need a church to tell me I'm wrong where I already know I'm wrong; I need a Church to tell me I'm wrong where I think I'm right.

When passive aggression saturates a population, the struggle for control and power will reach epic levels, and normal people will have to contend with extreme actors who attempt to usurp the mantel of influence.

Matthew 7:15 

Beware of false prophets, which come to you in sheep's clothing, but inwardly they are ravening wolves.

If the secular pundits preaching at us knew anything of virtue, and of the price of vice unchecked, they would repeat what Chesterton understood:

The coming peril is the intellectual, educational, psychological and artistic overproduction, which, equally with economic overproduction, threatens the well-being of contemporary civilisation. People are inundated, blinded, deafened, and mentally paralysed by a flood of vulgar and tasteless externals, leaving them no time for leisure, thought, or creation from within themselves.

Once the viral menace fades, how long with the appreciation last for the "front line" healthcare workers? The last two visits to the emergency and ambulatory wings of a local hospital to attend to a serious condition taught me that most people are unable to muster the discipline to be understanding when faced with a six to nine hour wait for a follow-up examination. A nurse goes from being a saint to a [insert expletives here] in an instant for those whose sense of entitlement trumps manners.

https://www.ncregister.com/daily-news/covid-19-restrictions-reopen-old-wounds-of-the-catholic-church-in-france

The state has proven that it can compel people into conformity with ease. People have allowed themselves to be herded, six feet apart, into makeshift corrals. The imagery could hardly be any more striking, and more apt.

https://www.ncregister.com/daily-news/false-profits-and-the-truth-rediscovering-solidarity-and-subsidiarity-in-a

Manners and an organized effort to ensure fairness make for healthy order. Ronald L. Jelinek at the NCRegister brings forward a vital and reasonable argument for

Solid Catholic Principles 

Yes — solidarity. From its roots in pontifical statements about social justice and the common good, most especially in Pope Leo XIII’s 1891 encyclical on capital labor Rerum Novarum, through the papacies of Popes Paul VI, John Paul II, Benedict XVI and Francis today, this important principle has long been heralded. We are all in this together and we should work together for the common good. 

But the crisis does not just provide insight into authentic solidarity, it also offers crystal clarity on the importance of its co-equal partner: subsidiarity. 

First introduced in Rerum Novarum, emphasized in Pius XI’s 1931 encyclical Quadragesimo Anno and further developed in John Paul II’s 1991 encyclical Centesimus Annus, the principle of subsidiarity consistently makes clear: It is gravely wrong for large, powerful entities to take from and do for the human person those things which the human person has been designed to do for himself. The individual does not exist for the state or for the corporation. These entities exist for the individual. And the individual exists for the family. 

And during this crisis, when everything else in this world has been stripped away, it is important to remember with whom we are hunkering down. 

We are not locked down with our corporate parent company. 

We are not quarantined with the company’s public relations team or the suits in the legal department. 

We’re not even with the kids’ soccer league or dance team. 

Or with the Joneses at the country club. We are weathering this storm with our families. The human family is the domestic church. It remains the vital cell of human life.

Freedom for the family; freedom to worship God as God (not the state) requires.

We must remind unredeemed society that it is a fundamental right to be able to celebrate authentic freedom and to oppose any lingering pressures on freedom.

Jelinek continues:

(C)ompanies that seek to corral Catholics into chasing after their own degenerate causes deserve an emphatic “No.” These false prophets come to us like wolves in sheep’s clothing. Claiming the banner of social responsibility, they use language as subterfuge. They seek not the common good but the power to dismantle society around their selfish ends.

If we are to navigate around the shoals of deceit, we must promote a logic or wisdom that truly serves and protects the human family. We can help hearts and minds embrace that logic by modelling virtue. Manners, the daily practice and expression of virtue, should be reclaimed during a time when people need a necessary scaffolding to help them recover their humanity, their sense of direction and civility born of respect for the fundamental dignity of all human beings from conception to natural death. Otherwise, as GKC reminds, we will continue to pass

[...] into a social phase in which unless a heroic effort is made for human dignity and freedom, gold will be the sole method of government and therefore the sole standard of manners. - G.K. Chesterton

If good manners typify the behaviour of the redeemed, then bad manners are manifestations of the spirit of antichrist. How so? Manners - good manners - embody and promote respect for the dignity of the person created in the image and likeness of God. Ill-mannered people show contempt for others and God Who made us. The spirit of antichrist is present when people demean each other by reducing one another to mere utility.

The image at the beginning of this post concerns human sacrifice. There is little separating us from cultures that condone(d) human sacrifice and cannibalism when the weakest among us are terminated because their humanness is in question, because their humanness is measured by their utility and their intrinsic worth as human beings is denied by the same health professionals who care oh-so much about keeping people healthy by advocating social distancing. Social distancing takes on a whole other dimension when we consider that people, by keeping physical distance from other people, seem to be losing their ability to sympathize and empathize with others. In brief, we may very well become the thing we practice.