I’m Vaccinated and I’m Angry

I am growing weary of claims by unvaccinated people that vaccine mandates are a limit on their freedom.  Freedom is such a tricky concept and Americans are woefully ignorant of how freedom actually works when we all must live in the same society.  We wave the flag and shout the word freedom as if it gives us the right to do whatever we damn well please.  But that is not what freedom means; nor has it ever meant that.  In otherwise free societies, once human beings live with one another, freedom is necessarily bounded so that we can live safely and well alongside one another.     

All day long, your freedom is restricted.  Consider just one day in my life.  I must drive on the right side of the road because the law demands it.  Worse than that, I must follow a speed limit because safety and order for other drivers is important.  I must stop at red lights, signal before I turn, and abide by speed limits.  I’m barely out of my house 15 minutes and already my freedom has been restricted.  How do I bear it?  Well, those restrictions apply to all of us and they keep me - and you - safer as we drive our cars.     

Most limits on freedom fall into this category - restrictions made to benefit the safety of us all.  They don’t endanger my life, neither do they put me at risk.  They do set limits on what I can do - limits on my freedom.  They do that to keep me - and everyone else - just a smidge safer.  Vaccines - and masks, these days - fall into this category.  A vaccine against a potentially fatal and airborne illness helps to prevent me from contracting it.  And vaccinated people keep all the rest of us safer as well.  We have been using vaccines for years — smallpox vaccines were common in the 1700s - and we know that vaccines, including the COVID-19 vaccine, is safe and effective for the vast majority of us.     

There is, of course, an enormous amount of vaccine disinformation, propagated by ignorant people who are afraid.  Fear and ignorance is a potent combination and for some of us it will be deadly.  But the fear of some of us must not prevent our government (a government by the people) from taking action to protect the health and safety of all of us.  

I make it a life habit to avoid anger and hate.  They are emotions that kill joy and I want no part of them.  But my fury at the unvaccinated and the risks they create for all of us is a potent force right now.  I am not proud of it, but I find myself not giving a damn about unvaccinated people who are dying of COVID.  I don’t even care about the suffering and pain of their families at this largely preventable loss.  The willful choice of some of us to keep a pandemic alive when we could stop it is unethical, immoral, and the height of selfishness.  To claim freedom as the reason for exposing us all to a greater probability of illness and death is beyond ignorant, it’s just plain stupid.     

If you want true and absolute freedom, then go where there are no other people, in a place where your actions can never affect any of us.  That’s going to be hard to find because it is an impossible goal in a planet occupied by people.  Until then, your freedom is limited by the freedom of the rest of us.  Roll up your sleeve and get the fucking vaccine.  You’ll be safer and so will everyone else in the world.  In a world in which we must live with other people, that is a really good thing.