No Thinking, No Touching

A friend in his 60s who escaped to Mexico during lockdowns five years ago and continues to reside there much of the year shared some disturbing observations about social interactions and relationships with me recently. He never married and has lived an alternative life, highly active among various communities like yoga, ecstatic dance, meditation, and tantra. His friend and romantic partner circle was quite large until 2020.

Since then, he’s struggled with building and maintaining new relationships, especially with women, that resemble what he had up until five years ago. “There are two things I enjoy sharing with women: cerebral connection with critical thinking, and physical touch.” When he returns periodically to Los Angeles, he never meets anyone who share both those interests. Even in Mexico, though (which happens to be filled with ex-pats), he hasn’t had much success. “I don’t find women who are interested in thoughtful conversation and sharing physical closeness.” He was puzzled why. 

I offered one possible explanation. “What were we all told to do in 2020? Stop thinking and hide from people.”

We were bombarded for two years with propaganda that insisted anyone questioning the lie that we were all going to die from a cold virus was not only wrong but a bad person who deserved scorn, ostracism, unemployment, imprisonment, and even death. Critical thinking was outlawed.