Why does the quarantine seem so scary after all?

Friday 13th of March Greece announces the lockdown of all dining areas and shops to curb the spread of CONVID-19. What followed is known to all. Many Greek citizens considered this self-isolation and self-monitoring as a punishment not to be accepted and as if by magic, parks and neighborhood squares –previously empty- were filled with people of all ages, enjoying the sunlight and having picnics. At first, I was enraged by the careless and irresponsible mentality adopted by some, who failed to take up their own share of responsibility for the greater good. After a while however, limited to stay at home and isolated from my loved ones and all the activities that I used to keep myself busy with, I faced the… scary truth about the quarantine: to a great extent, it wasn’t the Mediterranean mentality which overwhelmed and got the better of all those people who filled the parks and neighborhood squares regardless of the public danger. Above all it was a final attempt to avoid even in the last moment something that for many people seems scary, to spend time with themselves.
 
Marching forward into the 21st century, we may talk about the rise of a new type of mankind, who is characterized by oddity and contradiction. It is a person surrounded by information, who is constantly kept updated while full of fake news, who participates and yet is alone, who converses and yet remains silent.
 
We asseverate out need and desire for new acquaintances, we hunger for the discovery of others, for finding that key which will open the doors to their deepest thoughts, their insecurities, their agony and fear. Actually, we evenclaim to be eager to be there and be supportive of their attempt to cope and do away with these daily hardships. On the other hand, when the issue is ourselves, faith in the achievement of this ever-desired self-knowledge lacks behind and the explorations of the self stops being exciting. We have reached a point where we know others better than ourselves, we can easily see though their actions and life choices, we can advise them in difficult times, while we are mentally incapable to handle our own private sphere and find it difficult to reach to personal conclusions and decisions. The “unknown” has always been attractive but it has always been frightening and fear-provoking as well. Therefore, by perceiving the Self as a stranger, it isn’t strange at all the some of us dismissed the general guidelines and sought those they want close.
 
However, our difficulty to stay put and keep this self-restriction reveals another bitter truth which we do not easily accept; the weakening of the sense of belonging. Individualism and ungoverned neoliberalism have penetrated and embedded deceptive morals into the whole. As a result, we do not consider ourselves part of the broader social construction anymore. We keep forgetting that all of our actions reflect on society, and instead of liberating ourselves all together, we try to liberate one another. Having adopted a constitutional mentality of absolute renouncement and acting in the name of a pseudo-independence, we detach our actions from their social milieu and whatever problem may rise is dealt with as a personal matter, which affects no one else.
 
Undoubtedly, this quarantine period has been necessary. It was also (one more) indication to learn. It was a reminder to learn not to be scared to stay alone with our thoughts, learn not to hesitate to discover them. It is to learn the moral weight that our personal responsibility carries. It is here for us to realize that societies have produced a new cogito: I care for you, therefore I am – and so there is also the social whole.  Because the Other is a inextricable part of the self and if the Other is seen as unworthy of protection and care, then the countdown for the destruction of the Self has already begun.  Many a time we show the degree of our love to another by emphatically saying that we would die for them. I think it is a great thing to want to live for and with them instead. In this time and age when the notion of the social whole tends to become an empty rhetoric scheme, the need for co-existence is as necessary as ever.
 

 

Translation: Niki Saridaki

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