Thread by @AzieDee

After going thru 2 years of this pandemic, I’m starting to wonder in the Black Plague can explain how particularly and outrageously violent Euro colonizers/slave traders were in the New World. Watching people fall dead around you every minute maybe made life feel less valuable.

It never ended in England. It came back every 10 yrs for 300 yrs. Each new iteration took 20% of the London population. They started killing dogs and cats en masse. In 1665, 100,000 Londoners died in 6 months. All entertainment was shut down and people were locked in their homes

They may have literally been crazy. Like psychologically damaged with a very skewed perspective. Live recklessly and get what you can - get rich and enjoy life - before blood and pus seep out of your lymph nodes, you cough once then drop dead suddenly and without reason.

A lot of people joke that the Black Plague was bc Europe was so dirty. But we now know first outbreaks were on ships in India/China/Persia and thru trade routes. It passed via fleas (like malaria via mosquitoes) yes, but it was also airborne which is why it hit big cities hard.

I personally can’t imagine a disease where you could go to bed fine and then be dead by morning. And no one knew why. Or when. Or after it was over, when it was coming back.

It took 75-200 million people in 7 yrs in Eurasia/NAfrica. And from then on could pop up any time.

I don’t know about y’all, but I’d be on a boat to a New World too.

It also explains to me this prevalent notion that “this is what God wants for us.” Most saw these plagues as a punishment from God (how could you not). And then there was this hope of an escape, a paradise of sorts, and they rationalized taking it as God’s gift.

Look, I’m no psychiatrist, but I’d consider it collective generational trauma. And we know trauma creates all kinds of mental/emotional illness and abusive behaviors.

Not excusing anything. As I don’t excuse any abuse. Just, their psychology has always felt so abnormal to me.

Also could explain unusual level of “individualism”. It must’ve been hard to maintain community bonds when 1. “Community” was tenuous when people died constantly and unexpectedly, 2. You literally couldn’t get close to people - you had to FEAR fellow humans as harbingers of death

Anyways, it’s 5am, and I can’t sleep bc my sister’s snoring. She finally made it here and then Copenhagen immediately closed everything interesting bc of Omicron. And it feels like there is no escape. 300 years of this and I predict we genocide a new planet and enslave another.

But seriously, it might not be the best idea to continue to base societal norms on that of a people with entrenched annihilation-anxiety, mass paranoia, and an irrational fear of other members of their species. Maybe we choose a healthier cultural framework? Just a thought.