How do we explain the worldwide overreaction to Covid-19?

Hubris

Safetyism

Thanatophobia (fear of death)

The world is currently dealing with a pandemic, unprecedented in the lifetimes of most of the current population, but certainly not unprecedented or the worst in history. However, we are seeing overreaction on a scale unprecedented in history: countries going into lockdown, everyone forced to wear masks, schools closing and unnatural degrees of social distancing. The results are starting to become clear: economic collapse, massive increase in social and psychological problems, increasing poverty and hunger.

One has to wonder what the cause of this unnatural overreaction is. If one or two countries did this, one could potentially blame the politicians in those countries. However, this phenomenon is almost universal, with only a few exceptions. The political ideology in a country doesn’t seem to have any bearing on this. In many countries this overreaction is driven by the population and governments are criticized for not implementing even stricter measures.

If not political, the next possibility to consider is that of a global conspiracy, something I did consider for a while. However, not being a natural conspiracy theorist, this did not sit well with me. A better explanation had to be found.

An article about thanatophobia, or death anxiety (https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fmed.2017.00011/full) gave a clue to what I now believe to be the most accurate explanation for this overreaction.

The combination of hubris, safetyism and thanatophobia, in a world where most countries are experiencing population ageing, resulted in a perfect storm, just waiting for a triggering event like Covid-19.

Hubris has led to a situation where modern humans have replaced religion with a god-complex. We have become our own idols. Since the 1950’s humans have experienced an unprecedented growth in technology, resulting in power never before known to mankind. We have become superhumans, knowing more, seeing and hearing more, traveling further and faster than any human before. Suddenly these god-like creatures were faced with a new and unknown enemy they could not defeat and could barely even characterise, whose behavior they could not predict with any degree of certainty. This is an affront to our god-like, all powerful status. We have to control this virus to reestablish our position in the universe.

The culture of safetyism, which has developed in recent time, has resulted in a population who believe that they have a right to physical and emotional safety at all times and in all circumstances. Although described in relation to the modern youth, the origin of this culture can be found in their parents, who raised them with this belief. Those same parents, the middle aged people of today, are the ones driving the overreaction to Covid.

Added into this mix, is the concept of thanatophobia, which is at its peak in middle age and decreases after that. The interesting point about this, is that middle aged people experience higher levels of death anxiety on behalf of their elderly parents than the elderly themselves experience. In a world mostly controlled by middle aged people and with an ageing population, we are suddenly faced with a virus which is killing our elderly. This ramps up the levels of anxiety. Furthermore, death anxiety has been shown to be more severe in those without humility and, as we have already seen, hubris is a feature of modern humans.

Thus, combine the replacement of religion with a god-complex, the safetyism culture and thanatophobia and, in hindsight, there could really never have been any doubt that a triggering event like the Covid-19 pandemic would lead to the degree of overreaction which we are seeing.

The only question we are left with, is how long it will take for humankind to recover from this. Will science and logic prevail in this generation or will the recovery only happen in the next generation? Will religion return to replace our hubris or will we become slowly and pathetically less god-like in our failed attempts to overcome our own mortality?