Old habits die hard

By Ahmed Shihab

If it kills me to leave you

Then I will gladly die

Because with you I'm only surviving

And I have been destined to fly

— Ashley Hyde

Eating, drinking, social contact, community, possessions; these are legitimate human needs. And as I write this in May 2020, with the Covid-19 lockdown beginning to ease, it is obvious to me that we, humans, prior to the crisis, had maxed out on over-consumption. When the pandemic circumstances dictated, we did cut down; we did restrict ourselves. But then, our governments maxed out. On debt – because we had over-extended ourselves.

Later, these governments shall recoup the debts through increased taxes. We shall find our governments, private enterprises and, even, our friends telling us to work, to spend, to travel; "to live." The rich shall get richer, while most of us shall toil back and forth. Rising materialism, escapism and intoxication, shall return to be the order of the day.

Historical context

The so-called "Spanish flu" pandemic was a century ago; humanity lost millions to it. Ask yourself this: “Is there anything still with us today that our grandparents learnt from it?” If your grandparents were not of that generation, did they pass on anything that they got told by their parents about the pandemic? The answer is very likely: no.

Did we learn anything from Ebola, anything that is still with us? What about "Swine flu" (H1N1) -- what lessons still remain today? I remember the H1N1 days well, they were about ten years ago. There was a lot of advice on washing our hands and trapping a sneeze in our arms. The fallen were asked to stay at home; the well were told to keep a distance from those with the symptoms. None of this advice has stayed with us. They had to repeat it all over again with Covid-19.

In February 2020, while the epidemic was burning in Wuhan, China, people in London, England were getting on trains and buses, some of them looking rather unwell, coughing and sneezing. They neither stayed at home, nor did anyone stay away from them. They would blow into tissues and subsequently touch various surfaces on their way out; meanwhile the air-conditioning systems on the buses and trains circulated their airborne aerosols for hours on end. The lessons of H1N1, only ten years prior, had been forgotten. Neither government nor people had bothered to change their ways.

Illusory conditions

And what about the sheer madness of observing an epidemic sweep through Hubei, with the Chinese government putting the entire province under strict lockdown; and yet we just sat there and watched from London, New York, and Cairo. It was only a few weeks away from us; but we watched it from afar and said: "It would never happen here." Humans being are notoriously narrow-minded, obsessed with either their superiority ("This could never happen here"), or their inferiority ("The powers that be have decreed it, and we are helpless").

The chains of habit are too weak to be felt

until they are too strong to be broken.

— Samuel Johnson

Although the Covid-19 pandemic may yield an opening for well-intentioned changes at individual and government levels, it should also remind us that our needs and habits are very strong; that when our circumstances changed, our behaviour adapted to feed those needs and habits – because those needs and habits must reign supreme.

Young people, the drivers of economic growth, were first to break ranks; so desperate were they to carry on as usual: socialising and going out. Reports (though anecdotal) pile up of men going a little haywire in the parks, as they compensate for the lack of 'chatting up' time. Online dating apps reported a rise in their use. Some people even went against strict lockdown rules and had first dates in parks, or on the streets.

Yet another story (this one much-reported and evidenced) has been the increase in domestic violence. We might have been lulled into thinking that such behaviour was of an older time; but as soon as couples had no choice but to stay in, bullying and impatience reared their heads again. Can there ever be more evidence that human habits, even when we think they are done with, return again? The alcoholic calls himself that, for life – even when he has been sober for years. There is good reason that AA tells its adherents to always identify as addicts; because lapses can happen at any time.

Underestimating addiction

Staying cooped-up at home, while welcomed by millions, was the cause of depression for millions of others. Everyone is expecting a post-Covid mental healthcare pandemic. As government advice bore down hard on those of us who just could not handle being cocooned indoors, we found that the professor responsible for the UK’s most influential model of pandemic spread, had disobeyed the rules and gone to see a woman who does not live with him. The prime minister's most senior adviser took a trip to Durham from London, potentially transmitting the virus from both him and his wife to his parents, so that – allegedly – their son could get some care. The government is dealing with the public relations disaster of having to justify why its advisers lapsed into the usual, while the rest of us struggled to adapt.

Meanwhile, as soon as the lockdown was relaxed slightly, about two weeks ago, the Mayor of London reported that, on the first Monday afterwards, the numbers of people using trains at Waterloo station was at half its usual levels. Traffic on the roads spiked up in no time. People flooded the parks and seaside resorts, forgetting about social distancing and masks. And then Boris Johnson, on Spring Bank Holiday 25^th May, dodged and weaved at the press briefing, able neither to condemn nor reprimand people for going out in groups of more than two.

I do not think that when we come out of this pandemic, we will have changed. Many people say that the lockdown will change things irrevocably. Some say: “A few things will stay with us, at least a few.” I say: “I pray only one, only one thing, stays with us.”

Ahmed loves to write think pieces. By day, he is a computer science academic with many years’ experience teaching undergraduate and postgraduate students; he also conducts research in the field of Artificial Intelligence. By night, he has a passion for writing and performing comedy. You can email Ahmed on str82ais@gmail.com.

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