The COVID-19 pandemic brings out many issues that have been swept under the rug or have been assumed to be settled once and for all. In particular, we see the extraordinary extent of individual liberty that people claim they have.
“I am free to do whatever I want; I am free not to wear a mask and not to get the vaccine” is the form of argument that we often see.
I was (and still am) appalled by some people’s stubbornness to not wear a mask but my initial reason for having this response mainly came from my upbringing and not necessarily for more philosophical reasons. My family and the society that I grew up in have always taught me to think about others or to think about the benefits of society as a whole. Even though I align myself with this value, the pandemic made me realize that I did not think more critically about why I should think about others.
No Pandemic Social Responsibility: Anti-Maskers and Anti-Vaxxers
It is when I observed anti-maskers’ and anti-vaxxers’ arguments that forced my brain to do some thinking about it.
The presence of these people shows that not everybody feels the same duty to think about others and I think it is understandable to a certain degree. Nobody is expected to be good but it would be nice if you are good. Nobody is expected to be altruistic but it would be nice if you are altruistic.
Even though some people might pull in religious commandments or objective moral values (that there are things that are intrinsically good and wrong) to justify altruism, not everybody subscribes to religions or moral objectivism.
For example, if we say that thinking about others is good because God loves or demands it or because it is simply good, I do not think this will move the seculars or moral subjectivists (the opposite of moral objectivists) that much.
They could ask us back: “But why–without using God or objective moral values–is it good to think about others? And even if you show me that it’s good, that does not mean that I should do it.” Therefore, it is arguably quite difficult to convince everybody why they should–if not must–care about other people. Conversely, it can be quite difficult to explain to somebody why we should think about others.
Thomas Hobbes’ State of Nature and Social Contract
As I think of an answer (if I ever have to confront an anti-masker or an anti-vaxxer), two people came to my mind: Thomas Hobbes and John Stuart Mill, both classic philosophers and political theorists from England. Hobbes argues that, before any form of civilization or society was formed, humans were in a state of nature that was akin to a state of war. In this state, there are no laws and everybody is free to do anything to preserve her own well-being and life.
This freedom includes killing others and exhausting resources as much as possible for one’s own benefit. While the infinite amount of freedom that one has seems heaven-like, Hobbes claims that the opposite is true, which is why he calls it the state of war. During this state, people cannot live in peace and they always have to be on the edge because anyone can kill them and take their food and shelter. It is an ugly fight for survival all the time and Hobbes famously describes this life as “solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short.” (This is perhaps Hobbes’s most quoted phrase) Therefore, in order to get out of this miserable state and still preserve one’s own life and resources, society is formed.
A society consists of people who agree to obey a set of rules or values for the mutual benefits of every member of the society. In other words, every member of the society agrees to forgo some amount of her infinite freedom in exchange for the security of her life and resources.
This agreement is commonly known as the social contract. One now has the right to life and the right to property possession. Killing and stealing then become terms that we use and assign negative connotations such as ‘wrongness’ or ‘badness’ to. This is different from pre-society or state of nature, where it is simply either ‘taking someone’s life’ or ‘taking unguarded resources,’ and it is neither right nor wrong.
The COVID-19 pandemic brings out many issues that have been swept under the rug or have been assumed to be settled once and for all. In particular, we see the extraordinary extent of individual liberty that people claim they have.
A society consists of people who agree to obey a set of rules or values for the mutual benefits of every member of the society. In other words, every member of the society agrees to forgo some amount of her infinite freedom in exchange for the security of her life and resources.
This agreement is commonly known as the social contract. One now has the right to life and the right to property possession. Killing and stealing then become terms that we use and assign negative connotations such as ‘wrongness’ or ‘badness’ to. This is different from pre-society or state of nature, where it is simply either ‘taking someone’s life’ or ‘taking unguarded resources,’ and it is neither right nor wrong.
Before we move on to John Stuart Mill, we have to first know the general stances of the political philosophers at the time. Hobbes’s ultimate goal is to show that living in a society, especially one that is under an absolute ruler (a monarch, for example), is much better than living a nasty, brutish, and short life in the state of nature a.k.a the state of war. Other philosophers like John Locke and Jean-Jacques Rousseau agree with Hobbes about the brutality of the state of nature but argue that a democratic government should be preferred instead.
John Struat Mill on the Limits of Governmental Control and Harm Principle
Compared to the others, Mill has a different point to say.
He believes that no matter which government we are under, monarchy or democracy (or other forms of governments), our freedom can still be threatened by either the tyranny of the monarch or the tyranny of the majority (i.e., when the decision of the majority oppresses the minority, which can be very bad if the minority is actually right).
He proposes that there must be limits to the control that the government has over the citizens because they have their individual freedom to live their lives however they want.
But here’s the catch. This freedom should always be granted to the individual as long as the individual does not harm other people, which is known as the “harm principle.”
Mill writes, “the only purpose for which power can be rightfully exercised over any member of a civilized community, against his will, is to prevent harm to others.” An individual’s act (and freedom) can be rightfully restricted if her act is harming other people. I believe many of us live by this principle that it does not seem that strange. We usually let one be if she does not harm other people, despite how unusual her acts may be. We practise this principle all the time.
Why Pandemic Social Responsibility Is So Important: Combining Hobbes and Mill’s Views
Despite the universality of Mill’s harm principle, we see that some people fought for the right to not wear a mask (excluding people who have breathing difficulties) without thinking that their interest not only harms their lives but also that it harms the right for other people to live, which is a bigger deal than the right to not breathe under a mask.
They cannot then complain that their individual freedom is not respected. Moreover, they fail to see that the more fundamental reason why they could even live to fight for their rights in the first place–their existence–should be attributed to the fact that other people limited their infinite freedom such that we all do not live in the state of war anymore as described by Hobbes.
It is through others’ willingness to sacrifice some part of their freedom that we exist and it is through our sacrifice that they too can exist.
If we do not consider the good of society as a whole and we harm others, then we should not expect ourselves to remain in the society and have our freedom to be equally respected.
Thus, if you have to deal with somebody (who does not believe in objective moral values, in particular) that claims that they have no responsibility to think about others and that they have the individual freedom to do anything, including harming others, remind them if they really do and how they can exist in the first place to argue with you. It may sound like a threat but all it really is is a short overview of the social contract and the limits of individual freedom. *peace out*