[FRIAM] anthropological observations

[Prof David West]

I have been in Amsterdam for the past year and had the opportunity to put on my anthropologist's hat and observe cultural differences in reaction to the Covid-19 virus. I returned to the US two weeks ago and just completed a two-day auto journey from Wisconsin to Utah — also in full ethnographic research mode.

My "research methodology" is typical for anthropology, observation, conversations with as many people from as many different backgrounds as possible, reading newspapers — most importantly, small local publications — and, in the US, listening to radio broadcasts — again mostly local stations including lots of country western and even religious stations in addition to NPR, CBS, and Fox radio (I could not find CNN radio).  I was trying to gain insights into the population of those who listen to / read the different sources, as well as attitudes of media to their audience. Both country-western and religious stations reflect the mostly rural populations of Nevada, Minnesota, Wisconsin, Iowa, Nebraska, Colorado, and Utah along my route.

Some observations:

1) Covid-19 Numbers. Mainstream media in the US gives you opinion, analysis, and interpretation with just enough numbers to "justify" the conclusions. They are woefully short on "raw" or complete numbers. In contrast, European media and local media in the US provide numbers with no analysis or interpretation. And reasonably complete, e.g. total number tested, number tested negative, number tested positive, hospitalizations, available beds, used beds, available respirators, used respirators, specific outbreak loci, including jails and prisons.

CONCLUSION: mainstream media outlets in the US assume their audience is composed of idiots incapable of making sense of the data and in need of "guidance" and "leadership" while European and rural US information sources presume a basic level of competence in their audiences.

2) Models, projections and actual. In Europe I encountered almost none of the "the models predict and hence we are doomed unless ..." kind of articles that seem to dominate US mainstream media. Instead, "spreadsheet models" with data were published in tables by date, country, and raw number. European readers were left to make their own conclusions about how Netherlands data compared to Italian (for example) and make projections or draw conclusions as appropriate.

In local newspapers in Nevada, Wisconsin, Minnesota, and Nebraska I saw articles that compared projected numbers from the models touted by CDC, Fauci, et.al. with actual local numbers. Local numbers varied from national model projections by as much as -50% and never less than -20%. (That is actual was dramatically lower than projected.)

I saw and heard numerous editorial commentaries with regard the discrepancy between what the 'experts" were saying and what was locally observed and questioning why the variance. This leads immediately to questions about "hidden agendas" on the part of the Federal government and the "experts."

CONCLUSION: A population that already mistrusts the Federal government and the"intelligentsia" is given one more reason, backed by hard data, for that mistrust. Also very clear — the population is NOT anti-science but IS very mistrustful of "authoritarian scientists" — those prone to saying "you wouldn't understand, but I do and you should trust me."

3) Medical science. In the past two months I have seen around a dozen "treatments" advanced that have the potential to alleviate and/or treat Covid. I have seen at least five articles from companies that have developed tests and or testing machines (some of the latter capable of 15,000 tests per day). There have been at least six articles from Universities (including the one Frank shared from Pittsburgh) or companies/organizations that have developed potential vaccines. Oxford University has one that, they say, could be deployed as soon as September.

In Europe you see stories about the use of tests and testing devices, use of treatments along side data about effectiveness and heuristics for use, and optimistic projections of the availability of vaccines.In the US you do not.

CONCLUSION: Science, and in particular medical science, has become Fetishized in the US — that is to say that form and ritual is more important than substance. The use of hydrochloroquine, for example is widespread in Europe and backed by all kinds of information on indications for use, heuristics for determining dosage, contra-indications, and effectiveness numbers. Information is widely shared on all possible treatments along with all the caveats, and physicians are encouraged to use their best personal judgement. In the US, none of the above, because it is not "scientifically proven to be efficacious" mostly because we have not done a six-month double blind study.

4) Cultural ignorance, part one: non-medical masks. The use of ad hoc and home-made masks is an astoundingly bad idea in the U.S., for cultural reasons. In Asian cultures — for the most part — the wearing of a mask invokes non-conscious, but very real, feelings of "social solidarity," "conformance," and "consideration for others." In the U.S., even in medical settings where we know, intellectually, the reason for the mask, invokes non-conscious feelings of "threat," "mistrust," and "alienation." A simple test: ask 100 black males if they would wear a medical mask in public. Ask them is they would wear a home-made mask. Group responses by education and economics. Among those with high education/economic status, maybe 50% would wear a medical mast, but only about 10-15% would wear an informal mask. About 10-15% of those at the lower end of the education/economic ladder would be likely to wear a medical mask and 0-5% a homemade mask. Then ask why.

5) Cultural ignorance, part two: social isolation. Supposedly, social distancing is the best, perhaps only, means for "flattening the curve."  This is nonsense. Ethnographic (and,of course, therefore not "scientific") studies of two previous 'epidemics;" AIDS and STDs show that a far more effective means for controlling conflagration is the establishment of "communities of trust." Communities of Trust were self-organized communities of at-risk individuals, within which behaviors such as promiscuity and needle sharing were allowed, even encouraged and expanded, while such behavior outside the community was strictly forbidden and grounds for permanent banishment if violated.

Within such communities the transmission rate immediately dropped to near zero. Because everyone in the community knew everyone else, contact tracing, if needed, was also immediate and globally shared, leading to effective and temporary isolation. Communities could scale. There were at least two communities that were national in scope, using a kind of federated model with local communities assuming responsibility for local populations but allowing for individuals to participate in non-local communities. Woe to the local community that allowed one of their members to "infect" another community. It was pretty much a one-strike and you are out situation, and that translated into each individual establishing a local, long term, track record before being allowed to participate elsewhere.

I have seen this kind of community of trust in the Netherlands and Europe, with regards psychedelic drug users, BDSM groups, even Naturist groups. In the US is is very evident in the Mormon culture and in most rural communities.

OPINION: this possibility is not pursued because it is self-organizing and not amenable to centralized government control.

6) U.S. Federal Bureaucracy and antipathy to "Medicare For All." Conversations and editorial commentaries exposed a very pragmatic argument for not entrusting health care to the Federal Government. Using FEMA and the current situation as an example, people pointed out that FEMA has failed to deliver because it is implacably bound to "PROCEDURE" and "FORMAL PROCESS" to the extent that it cannot certify vendors and place orders for equipment. Imagine if health care was entrusted to the same kind of "brain dead" "lacking common sense" "exclusively by the lowest common denominator rules" bureaucratic entity.

7) Cultural divide. I won't go into this in detail unless asked at some point, but it is clear, to me, that the red-state / blue-state differentiation is fatally flawed, but underneath is a centralized-command-and-control-grounded-in-liberalism culture versus a local-self-responsible-independent-anti-centrism-anti-authoritarian culture. These cultures are implacably opposed and will be the basis for a "civil war" of some sort within the next decade.

davew