What does shaming people who don't social distance actually achieve?
We are months into a global pandemic and on the internet, where shaming thrives, social distance shaming is at a high. Yesterday, Guardian journalist Amelia Gentleman highlighted some peak social distance shaming when she tweeted a photo of someone’s window plastered with posters revealing that their upstairs neighbor was a social-distance shirker. She asked a simple question: “Is this a bit mean?”
The answer is, it’s complicated. Many social distance shamers are simply trying to do the right thing. “Go home!” one New Yorker yelled from a fire exit recently, adding: “You could be spreading it right now, yeah, you with the gas mask,” above a crowded street in Brooklyn.
And so he should: because for every person who feels safe outside at the moment, there is another who is immunocompromised; who doesn’t have healthcare; or is just a good human being who worries about what happens to people if the curve of this pandemic is not flattened. In states like New York, where stay-at-home orders are advisory rather than enforced and people stretch their definition of “essential” to include hourly walks and buying cookies, couldn’t people do with a little reminding?
But of course, not everyone can work from home, which makes taking to the streets with a megaphone a pretty ambiguous task. How to pick out those in the crowd who are jerks, from those who are traveling to work so you can have your groceries this week? What about those visiting elderly family members to drop off medication; or going out for their first bit of fresh air in weeks?
“So Jen and I obviously have to walk the dog,” begins another recent viral post by vlogger Justine Ezarik, then, she points at some people playing basketball in the park “Can you not?!” she yells into her phone. Playing basketball is undoubtedly one of the silliest things you could be doing right now (think of the number of surfaces being touched!) but it wasn’t long before the Twitter pile-on began. People asked Ezarik how many times the dog had been walked today; where her face mask was; and whether she should even be out in the first place. Ezarik couldn’t get a mask in her local area, plus she had been trying to walk the dog less, she responded. But it’s a reminder that when we approach others with cynicism, everyone – even the finger pointer among us – could become a potential wrongdoer.
Some of the social distance shaming, it has to be said, is a symptom of another thing: Britain and the US do like their curtain-twitchers (the US created neighborhood watch, remember?). Since the Stay At Home badge was released on Instagram, my stories feed feels like a monotonous reel of people cycling through the park, pointing at all of the other people in the park, asking why they aren’t social distancing. People, after all, are very good at giving themselves the benefit of the doubt, but don’t extend the courtesy to others.
Others have taken to the neighborto-neighbor platform Nextdoor, AKA curtain-twitcher heaven, to point the finger at everyone, from joggers to children playing on the street. “PARENTS, WHERE ARE YOU?” a recent post asked. It seems that, in absence of opportunities to ask to speak to the manager, the Karens of this world must find an outlet somewhere. But is it necessary, or even helpful?
Take the case of a friend’s mother, who was recently reported to the police for making too many trips outside. She, in fact, was dropping off supplies to people who were sick and in isolation. Now she might feel less inclined to do so – but who cares, so long as whoever dobbed her in gets to post on social media about it?