Compliance – It is hard not to!  

When asked, “Which of these people do you think you would be?” somewhere between 80 and 85% of people said they would be the lone, dissenting man with his arms crossed. Psychological studies show that not even 10% of us are likely to be that man.

In a 2016 Harvard Business Review study, people were asked, “What would you do if someone cut in front of you in line?” Most say they would promptly and politely ask the person to go to the back of the line. When researchers ran the experiment, only 1 in 25 did so. The rest were too afraid of what others would say or do.

Today, we face rewards for compliance; compliance with the government’s pandemic response measures (masking, distancing, lockdowns, and now the ever-increasing and nebulous vaccine rollout), we are granted the conditional privilege of reentrance into society; and the penalties for failing to comply. Being bullied, shamed, excluded, canceled, fined, and arrested has made it difficult for the courageous to dissent.

We hear that the vaccine is the only defense against COVID-19. Accusations that this is a “pandemic of the unvaccinated” have gone unchallenged. We are vaccinating 5-year-olds when the vaccines give them at most a 1% absolute risk reduction. While the Director of the CDC, the Chief Scientific Advisor to the UK Government, Israel’s Director of Public Health, Bill Gates, and even Dr. Fauci have all stated that the COVID vaccines do not, cannot, prevent transmission.

We have lost our moral compass and, with it, the moral and civic virtues on which we have built our health care system, our legal system, and communities. However, the despicable leaders instruct us to hate, divide, shame, dismiss or cancel. This narrative should not be the price for admission into the new American club.

So many today are choosing a life in a cage, blind to the restrictions that surround them. Their vision is impaired because they have voluntarily allowed their confinement. Government stimulus checks and mortgage moratoriums act to sedate fear. They have the essentials that most zoos for animals have. The zookeepers have worked diligently to keep its fold fed, safe and comfortable. 

Is there any sense in trying to emancipate those that don’t realize they are caged? Talking about rights falls on deaf ears or is dismissed as irrelevant or even selfish. There is a frightening majority in this country that doesn’t believe that they have lost anything. They have decided that a life of comfort, security, and conformity is possible and worth the price of freedom. 

Some amount of fear is the stress of living free. Freedom sometimes comes by being cold, hungry, and constantly afraid of being someone else’s meal. The choice is clear, between being fed or being free? Emancipation begins with the caged accepting that they are not free. Courage is moving ahead through fear, despite fear.

I am not your enemy because I do not feel the need to comply. A choir in which everyone sings the one part is bland and pathetic. The beauty of their sound comes when people sing different but complementary notes. This blending creates unity in the harmony of an enlightened and diverse choir. A choir in which we respect each other’s sound is a liberated society.

We Just Disagree – Dave Mason