If it really is the case that doctors and researchers are afraid of appearing to be anti-protest, and that is why so much of Twitter has gone silent on #COVID19, I gotta say, I am a little disappointed.
Y’all spent so much time building up credibility in a moment when so many wanted to deny the pandemic was even happening. Why fight so hard for that voice and then stop using it?
I also find some of the “racism is a public health issue, too” arguments a little tortuous. Racism absolutely has wide-ranging effects on every possible health outcome, including #COVID19, but we are not going to end racism in the next few months or even years.
Long before we’ve even made a dent in the black-white health gap––a gap we can only close on intergenerational time scales—#COVID19 is going to sweep our country and the world. public.flourish.studio/visualisation/…
The reason to be out in the streets fighting police brutality is not chiefly “because it’s a public health issue, too.”
The reason to be out in the streets is that our democracy hangs in the balance.
The reason to be out in the streets is that our democracy hangs in the balance.
The voting enfranchisement of African-Americans, curtailed for years by policies that are the modern-day equivalent of poll taxes, is facing ever more blatant threats.
The impunity of the police has reached levels I never imagined possible, and by that I mean yes, beating white people, in broad daylight, on camera.
So many of our checks on the presidency failed, revealed themselves to be unreliable, or were never fit for the task. Norms, bureaucracy, Congress, the judiciary, old media, new media. We are uncertain of our state security forces. We are not confident in our elections.
When all of those institutions fail, the last check against authoritarianism is the streets. So, when I see large masses of people flooding our streets, it makes me think, “we’re going to be okay.”
And yet the streets are also under threat. Protesters’ 1st, 4th, and 14th Amendments are daily being blatantly disregarded by police (see: @greg_doucette). When all other norms and institutions have failed, all we have left is the Constitution, and that, too, is no longer safe.
@greg_doucette I got into some debates with @greggonsalves and @NAChristakis about all this, which is to say, I barged in on what is clearly a long-standing conversation between them.
@greg_doucette @greggonsalves @NAChristakis I made the argument that public health is a pretty weak frame for what is happening politically in our country, and that we shouldn’t see fighting police brutality by protesting and fighting #COVID19 as competing public health priorities. I failed to convince.
@greg_doucette @greggonsalves @NAChristakis Several times, @NAChristakis asked point blank, how many lives is protesting worth?
@greg_doucette @greggonsalves @NAChristakis Putting aside for the moment that there’s reasonably good evidence that protests held outdoors, with wide mask usage, are *much less risky* than, say, mask-less indoor church services, gambling or conventions.
I do not think this is a question that can be answered purely in utilitarian terms. How much is the First Amendment worth? How much is the Constitution worth? How much is democracy worth?
I believe the threats right now to our way of life are more serious than most people understand. Almost everyone is taking too narrow a frame. (I’m saying here nothing that Sarah Kendzior hasn’t said a million times before, I’m just *there* in a way I wasn’t four years ago.)
As someone who spent a lot of time studying political institutions across history and in other countries; weak states, fragile democracies, authoritarian transitions, etc., we are at a precipice I never thought I’d see America reach in my lifetime.
At the same time, it’s not that we haven’t been to the edge before. We have. America survived a civil war. It survived the 1960s and the assassination of multiple civil rights leaders and politicians.
Although frankly, at every moment of crisis, returning to “normalcy” has always meant throwing black people under the bus...
My point is this, what activists, organizers, and people in the streets are fighting for is NOT “public health.” It is something *even more fundamental* than public health.
Conflating the current movement’s concerns into “public health” undermines the credibility of public health leaders. It risks politicizing professions that frankly need to stay above the fray.
Your battle was and remains a battle to protect the role of science and expertise in a society that routinely devalues both. Three months ago, how many left-leaning public health influencers were arguing that jobs, economic security, were public health issues? That poverty kills?
I saw almost no one argue this. Rather, I saw a lot of people saying that public health was fundamental to the economy. That there could be no economy without public health.
I think a better frame is to recognize that public health is important, the economy is important, our democracy and the integrity and continuity of our institutions are important, the American experiment matters, and racism is a scourge that pervades it all.
And that these are all intimately *related* but distinct concerns, and that reasonable people can assign different values and priorities to each, and that racism is something to be fought everywhere, but especially where we live.
And so, what I want to offer to the mostly white MDs and researchers I’ve been following since the start of the pandemic, from whom I have learned so much: please, do not be silent on #COVID19.
By all means, this is a time to elevate the voices of black healthcare providers and researchers, to examine racism within the medical system and the academy. But it is not a time to be silent on the one issue on which you must lead.
There are basic public health messages people need to keep hearing. Twitter is where a lot of you all are, where the journalists are, where a lot of community leaders are, where a lot of the #HighRiskCOVID19 people are.
Speaking out about #COVID19 is not necessarily tantamount to critiquing the use of protest as a tool to fight police brutality and defend our democracy. If you don’t want to criticize the protests, then don’t criticize the protests.
And if we are at a place where we need to focus on risk reduction rather than quarantine, fine. We would have gotten here by now, regardless of the protests. We could not keep people indoors indefinitely, especially when we squandered so much of the time that lockdown bought us.
Public health officials are being physically threatened, attacked. In this pandemic, which has still only just begun, doctors and researchers have a crucial role to play in defense of science and expertise more broadly. Hold that line.
Your silence does not help us fight racism or defend our democracy, much less reduce #COVID19 morbidity and mortality. Your silence helps no one, least of all black people.
Transmit, contextualize, and amplify the truth, even when it is hard or inconvenient. Even when it is in conflict with other important priorities or values. Then, people will make up their minds. That is all you could ever do, anyway.
One last thought, from my perspective as an ex-political scientist: I think all scientists and people whose professions are based on science should think of themselves as constituting another, vital institutional pillar of our democracy.
Science is an institution that is as much under threat as journalism. Over time, the sum of the choices scientists make when they communicate with the public can strengthen or undermine this institution.
It doesn’t mean that scientists should be overly cautious about how they use their voice or blind to injustice.
It means that they should think not only about the needs of the present moment, but about the credibility and longevity the institution over time.
Failing to speak out against racism undermines that institution. Failing to deliver consistent public health messaging about the pandemic also undermines that institution.
Our society has become fragmented and polarized. We have very few social institutions left that are widely regarded as trustworthy or authoritative by “both sides.” The weaker our remaining centrist institutions become, the more dangerous the threats to our democracy.
So, act in the moment by all means, but please also keep the long game in mind.
