[Goose]

We are at the point where people are going to do what people are going to do.  You can see it all over the place.  We lost the sense of shared sacrifice about 6 months ago, and no one is going to sacrifice their own activities if they don't see others also taking steps to follow guidelines.  This is particularly true for low risk (young otherwise healthy people) who will likely suffer minimally if they catch COVID-19, but have the potential to be a vector for the disease that could infect and and possibly kill someone else.

BC

While I agree with 100% of what you say above, I think it is important to realize that essentially NO society operates on a "shared sacrifice" principle. Social norms certainly play a role. People behave a certain way because if the do not they will be ostracized or the like. However, when a big change in behavior is required, social norms only help a bit, because the desired behavior is not ingrained in the population. In some societies, it isn't as big a change, because they have seen this before and there is an accepted social response. In the USA, it is a total change and we don't know, as a society, how to do it.

Some countries/societies have a social norm to follow governmental rules, whatever they may be, liked or disliked. We in the USA had a bit of that in the first half of the 20th century, but only a bit. It has steadily eroded to the point we now have almost none of it. As a result, even in WWII rationing didn't work because of shared sacrifice. It worked (to the extent it did) because they enforced it. While many people joined the military after Pearl Harbor out of a sense of patriotic duty, most people joined to avoid the draft and an infantry MOS. That didn't always work. Lots of draftees ended up infantry even though they thought by joining up they would avoid it. Didn't matter, nothing they could do. Unless and until our local, state, and federal government takes COVID-19 seriously enough to actually attempt compelling responsible behavior, we aren't going to get it.

[Goose]

We are at the point where people are going to do what people are going to do.  You can see it all over the place.  We lost the sense of shared sacrifice about 6 months ago, and no one is going to sacrifice their own activities if they don't see others also taking steps to follow guidelines.  This is particularly true for low risk (young otherwise healthy people) who will likely suffer minimally if they catch COVID-19, but have the potential to be a vector for the disease that could infect and and possibly kill someone else.

BC

While I agree with 100% of what you say above, I think it is important to realize that essentially NO society operates on a "shared sacrifice" principle. Social norms certainly play a role. People behave a certain way because if the do not they will be ostracized or the like. However, when a big change in behavior is required, social norms only help a bit, because the desired behavior is not ingrained in the population. In some societies, it isn't as big a change, because they have seen this before and there is an accepted social response. In the USA, it is a total change and we don't know, as a society, how to do it.

Some countries/societies have a social norm to follow governmental rules, whatever they may be, liked or disliked. We in the USA had a bit of that in the first half of the 20th century, but only a bit. It has steadily eroded to the point we now have almost none of it. As a result, even in WWII rationing didn't work because of shared sacrifice. It worked (to the extent it did) because they enforced it. While many people joined the military after Pearl Harbor out of a sense of patriotic duty, most people joined to avoid the draft and an infantry MOS. That didn't always work. Lots of draftees ended up infantry even though they thought by joining up they would avoid it. Didn't matter, nothing they could do. Unless and until our local, state, and federal government takes COVID-19 seriously enough to actually attempt compelling responsible behavior, we aren't going to get it.