When distancing matters our lives.

 

As a blogger, one can’t always highlights the happy & easy going matters. Sometimes realism should also be reflected through the writings of a bloggers as— it keeps us updated , help us reform and get ourselves ready for reformation of society .

You might be knowing what for I am suddenly mentioning this. Well, let me explain. I am going to jot down some facts during covid19. It might not be related globally with the same frequency but its presence can’t be avoided. What is it?

o.k before it let me highlight some incidents happened locally & let me tell you that extent of these incidents are increasing recently.

• A sick aged person was lying & his wife was trying to get him in ambulance but, could not. None including the ambulance driver extended their helping hands. That person died ultimately without reaching to hospital.
• There was an announcement in a district to avoid police force & their families(as some of them found +ve) in order to avoid any spread. Those police persons are finding it difficult even to access groceries.
• Barrier from the local people came in a place while changing a hospital by the authority into COVID care hospital.

These lists will be longer and reflecting towards mental distancing & lack of empathy.

WHO from the initial phase of this pandemic made us aware in maintaining social distances. For any type of communicable disease one of most important step towards it is- contact isolation so that there might be a halt in spreading.

As we know,Social distancing refers maintaining distances between various groups. Human being is social animal & need to survive in the society through forming of various kinds of relationship/groups & maintaining closer relationship. But with the terminology used, persons for the sake of saving their lives started emphasising on mental/psychological differences.

Thus all self images & related goals for e.g- creating positive self images of others,self esteem, cognitive structure gradually started changing. People with the new mental process started to store new information of “distancing” & it started reflecting through their motivation/wants/goals/attitudes in— inclusion of mental distancing within the parameter of social distancing.

“WHO” later in its press conference took the initiative to replace “social distancing” by “physical distancing”. We have to maintain 6 feet distances from other persons with whom we are not living together or who is +ve . Maintaining distance physically sounds better then social distancing as it is a more confused term for people.

I can’t take it granted that people is doing all these nuisance due to their sudden increase of awareness to protect themselves. You might say that they are doing for the sake of their life & as they are scared. we have seen, where people should be aware in wearing masks, sanitising hands/washing hands with soap,not gathering & roaming without any purpose, updating of information from Govt/health professionals ends– there they were surprisingly less active to the appropriate extent.

You know it very well, Increasing of mental distance is not only are effecting us during pandemic, it had its bad effect in our society in many forms & ways for e.g– discrimination based on race,class,caste,ideology from long years back in our society.

In Globalisation era, we all are living in a global village,connecting each others/sharing our values within the global community. our personal characteristics should not lead towards social distances affecting gender, race,group,class etc.

I liked the blog –“Raising Race conscious Children” where”Sachi Feris, a blogger” blogs( The Movement for Black Lives) for encouraging people to participate in Anti racist workshop for free. She facilitates anti racist workshops to make young people change agents in removing polarisation within societal structure.

All those problem due to the increased mental distancing in maintaining social distancing can be reduced . A path which would make people more convivial to be sociable. No– not sympathy but by “EMPATHY”. Yes, you rightly heard.

Sympathy can’t work better here because you will be feeling like them which would not be helpful in bringing any solution to the problem. But in Empathy, you would feel with the target people. Feeling a pain/stress/ with them would strive you in relieving that target group/individual from the adverse situation.

If you had not gone yet & reading it then I shall request you to go below, finding difference between the two with examples..

Suppose you are a health professional. If someone comes to you crying with a cut(might be minor or major) in one of his hands & it’s bleeding then what will you do? Will you feel like him/her & start crying? Then what will be the difference between you and that person? That is your sympathy. But through empathy, you will make him/her comfort,telling for not to be worried & that he/she will be ok. Simultaneously you might be providing first aid or medication and trying for referral for further treatment. That will make a sense & works better for the person.

I am not saying one should not think about protection of self. “Self protection ” is crucial & first most condition for saving the community. But there  are ways by which we can reduce the mental distances .

A little step of us towards-” be empathetic” as for e.g --will have wonderful +ve impact in our life.–

• Reduce mental distance & increase social affability, communicating by social network site/using mobile.
• Instead of being suspicious to each others during pandemic, we would enhance ourselves by accessing right information(from Govt) about COVID 19 in saving us & others.
• IR(Industrial relation) climate(relationship between employers & employees) will be ideal & mutually trusted where employer will not go for lay off or unnecessary closure and employees will not compromise with the standards through remote/ working at home facility.
• People recovered from COVID 19 would be agree for donation of Plasma to save others with respect to the present context.
• Racial discrimination will be diminished. “Humanism” will get preferred. No I am not an atheist. I want to mean humanism here to prefer human value,needs and priority not on the basis of polarisation /biased factors. In no religion even, there is any instruction of dividing human beings on the basis of race/class/caste or in any way.
• Elders will not feel alone anymore, even in pandemic because younger generation will be there for them ,may it be through phone,video calling to assure their well- being.
• People would not show poor manners to the health professionals/covid volunteers / warriors when found positive while rendering their service to save our life from COVID19.

Before COVID we had faced many adverse situations in pandemic like -Spanish Flue(1720),Plague(1820),Cholera outbreak(1820),Spanish flu(1920). Those also caused loss of many lives. But over time we won over the situation. In this pandemic- Researcher are working for inventing vaccine, in some countries, curb is flattening. It’s definitely a ray of hope that within forthcoming few months we might with us vaccine to fight against the virus.

But in no way increase in mental distances can be supported or appreciated. We should not overlap the concept of physical distances with mental distancing. Chinese corona crisis will be over by time. But remember we have responsibility towards our children in moulding their attitude,value, belief that will guide them in behaving as per the societal accepted norms/sanctions in their forthcoming days.

It is already mentioned earlier that “Epigenetics”- explains- influencing of children’s behaviour by interactions of both genes & environment. “Empathy” is partially innate which needs to be developed. This no doubt reflect training/learning/experiencing in proper environment & parents/guardians are responsible for that.

It does not need to mention that empathy deficit might lead towards sociopath( with limited ability of showing empathy)/psychopath(with little or no conscience)/autism. These psychopaths have a greater chance to be juvenile delinquents during teenage & criminals/antisocial in their later life.

“WE” including our kids are going through tough days. They should be nurtured carefully so that they can empower themselves in facing problems & finding solutions . For this We, should immediately take steps in shaping our attitude,interest, social behaviour in reducing mental distances & increasing social cordiality.

Equally we must have +ve self- image towards learning & accessing right information from approved sources to save us & others from the adverse situation but not to panic & spread false rumour. Needs for the adoption social affability /social cordiality really becomes unavoidable considering present context when–

“Distancing matters our lives”.

your feedback is most welcome. Your feedback will be encouraging me in blogging. Together we can grow up ……within the worlds bloggers society– a place to express our feelings.

Thank you.