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By Howie Soucek

With the dawning of our current pandemic has come a number of comments made in social media to politicize the issue in order to gain an advantage over an opponent; comments, too, that diminish and demean those who have expressed concern and even fear regarding the pandemic. In both, I see an insecure, egoic self at work behind the scenes, recognizing that often “the best defense is a good offense.”

In my studies of different religions, I have found a few common denominators acting as a thread that binds them all together. It is something bigger and more important than the human self; something that is truer and more real than the human brain can understand, and something that is really, really good.

And whatever we may call this thread (I call it “God”), it offers us the ever-present potential to be intimately unified with one another in a sublime, incomprehensible love — a love which is clearly manifest in our compassion for, in our practical co-operation with, and in an earnest and open sharing of our pleasures and joys, and of our sorrows and sufferings with one another.

Weary of attacks, of divisiveness, of hurtfulness, of blaming and of mean-spiritedness; weary of references to one hoax or another, to the fake news media, and to wimps and whiners; and weary of un-researched half-truths and outright falsehoods, I would like to suggest that everyone take the broadest possible point of view and understand the need for us all to work together, to help each other, to nourish, to be patient with and to sustain one another.

There are postings which serve the purpose of inciting an anger of agreement (“Damn right!”), coupled with a resentment of another individual or group or concept; or of inciting a defensiveness that also results in anger and resentment. This, no matter the veracity of the posting. Rather, the problem is why it is intentionally used and also the conscious, destructive (including self-destructive) behaviors that result.

COVID-19 being new to humans and with a high rate of contagion and lethality, is a dangerous virus. I have a loved one who, with leukemia in remission, has a compromised autoimmune system and is therefore vulnerable to serious harm from this virus; he and his wife are now self-isolated. There are others dear to me — some currently on chemo, one with diabetes, one with a blood disorder, and several who are among the elderly. People are suffering and dying from this disease, and it’s going to get worse.

And yet I have seen memes and comments on social media diminishing the importance of this calamity in comparison to others … or blaming it on Republicans dispassionate about human life or on Democrats as a hoax for political advantage. Indeed, social media is infused (no matter the topic) with hurtful, degrading memes and comments “innocently” (thoughtlessly) posted, shared and liked by friends.

As a personal responsibility, this is a time for deliberately seeking an understanding of the truth from reputable sources; it is a time for intelligent, practical, foresightful reasoning rather than an insidious submission to the destructive emotions of fear, of anger, of resentment, of righteous superiority, of worry, of division (us versus them) — anything self-ish; and it is a time to stop or at least turn away from social media postings (true or not!) that are degrading, mean-spirited (even though superficially “funny”), or deliberately off-setting. For they are like arrows shot from behind a fence high into the air and then into a crowd, resulting only in a de-spiriting dis-couragement; and this is certainly not what our precious freedom of speech was intended for. Everyone should reflect upon what it is to be “a responsible, good citizen” in a free, civil society — and also the difference between difficult but constructive, person-to-person candor versus “telling it like it is” in a destructive way in a public forum.

We must hold on to our common thread. It is a time for encouragement.

HOWIE SOUCECK is a resident of Franklin. Contact him at hownester@charter.va.