The past few weeks have been a whirlwind of unbelievable events I never thought I would see in America. Not the pandemic, because most people expect that diseases will come and go even on a larger scale than normal. But the absolute willingness of my fellow Americans to be ordered about by their state governments as if they are nothing but subjects of a king, with no rights other than those conferred by the monarch, has thrown me for a loop.
Where is it in the Constitution that says our rights of liberty and the pursuit of happiness, freedom of religion, freedom to assemble, freedom to redress grievances, right to a speedy trial, etc. are all void in the case of a pandemic? I assure you, it isn’t there. What has happened to America in a few short weeks is the scariest scenario I could imagine. Dystopian novelists couldn’t come up with this plot.
When did we become a nation of mice, hiding in our homes scared of a sickness? I have spoken with elderly people who lived through multiple pandemics who are as confused as I am. They told me stories of how they went on with their lives while people with the sickness quarantined in their homes with signs on the outside warning neighbors that they were infected. Commerce did not stop. Rights were not violated. Pastors were not arrested.