Sounding off: How will you behave in the next pandemic?

How will you behave during the next pandemic if the virus kills children, adults and seniors equally? Would President Trump behave differently if his family was at risk? Would he treat preventable deaths as just part of doing business?

Would you insist on opening everything and not wear a mask if the virus killed children, adults and seniors equally? If it meant protecting your loved ones, would you behave the same way? Would you insist your rights are being infringed on when asked to make similar sacrifices if it meant saving your family members?

Before choosing not to care about others now, you better understand viruses are unpredictable, and like this one, a new one will come again without treatments or a vaccine. It is only a matter of time before the next “emerging” virus or pathogen spreads around the world, and the next time its deadly target may be all age groups.

Read up on the 1918-19 pandemic where the virus killed hundreds of thousands of men, women and children in the United States. Pennsylvania was one of the states with the most cases and most deaths, with businesses, churches, schools and large gatherings closed. I’m sure the majority back then agreed on these measures, as everyone in every family was at risk of dying. Remember, times were much harder back then, with World War I and its aftermath.

Be careful what you wish for: that next pandemic will probably be in your lifetime.

Robert Grottenthaler, Springdale

We need a moral compass

Over the last couple days I’ve been reflecting, talking with family, going down the proverbial internet rabbit hole to find a morsel of wisdom to cure an aching psyche as a result of George Floyd’s life being taken from him. I failed to find the antidote.

The one answer I have found is that everyone thinks what happened to Floyd was evil, pure and simple. Therefore, we should be able to all agree that our motivations to resolve this are well- intentioned, and isn’t this the essential ingredient for competing viewpoints to come together and resolve our most pressing challenges?

If we assume malicious intent, power grappling or any nefarious means on the other side, then any discussion is all about posturing and not about resolving problems.

The challenge is that one side must take a leap of faith. I pray that someone in power appeals to the better angels of our nature and brings people together to rinse away the final remnants of America’s original sin, not because we all agree on how to proceed but because we all agree that our hearts are aching as we replay the hoarse, fading voice of a 46-year-old black man being taken from this earth.

We need another Frederick Douglass, Martin Luther King Jr. or Abraham Lincoln to provide a moral compass for our country. Each one of them is within us, and if we find it, live it and spread it, that will lead us so that George Floyd’s gasps for breath are not lost in vain.

Greg Maita, Burrell Township, Armstrong County

War on virus is hijacking our liberty

The covid-19 threat is much more than just a viral pandemic. It’s the hijacking of normalcy for nefarious purposes. It’s a dark occult ritual taking place in plain view in the light of day. It’s a monstrous criminal consolidation of wealth and power. It’s version 2.0 of hijackers with box cutters.

Our neverending war on terror has just been complemented by a neverending war on viral contagions. No need to force total control and surveillance on the populace when you can frighten them, first with foreign terrorists and now with foreign viruses, into freely relinquishing their sacred freedoms, rights and liberties for the illusion of safety.

This is global, technocratic tyranny being enacted with little resistance, and letting it happen to our country is an indictment of the American people. Benjamin Franklin said, “Those who would give up essential liberty, to purchase a little temporary safety, deserve neither liberty nor safety.”

Emotions replace reason for those traumatized by media-driven fear and after a lifetime of educational indoctrination, television propaganda and news disinformation, most are conditioned into passively accepting Draconian measures.

The controlled demolition of the economy creating dependence upon government largesse, medical martial law and unprecedented surveillance, censorship and authoritarian control are quickly moving us toward an Orwellian dystopia. This psychological terrorism will soon destroy our constitutional republic, yet most will embrace it because in a Brave New World the slave is conditioned to love his servitude.

Will a mesmerized, masked America under house arrest let 250 years of hard-won liberty die with a whimper?

Steven Crichley, South Side

Students must return to school

It is imperative that Pennsylvania students return to in-school instruction in the fall without restriction. Everyone has an opinion on the effects of this current pandemic, but, based on statistics, children seem to be much less susceptible to this virus.

We need to stop focusing on the remote risks of this virus and start focusing on the certain risks our children face from a lack of education. I am an educator myself, teaching a graduate level course at Carnegie Mellon University. But even with that experience, I find it difficult to help my own children achieve the level of learning they deserve at home.

We are sacrificing our kids’ futures as a trade-off against our own worries that don’t affect them. It’s borderline abusive.

Few people need to be convinced that a good education is very important. Our children need school. Our children also need extracurricular activities to build character and fitness and to keep them out of trouble.

We all need to take a stand for our youth, who cannot speak up for themselves, and support plans that return Pennsylvania schools and school activities to normal operations immediately.

It’s time to stop asking our kids to sacrifice their future for a disease that probably won’t harm them.

John Shantz, Ohio Township

Now that we’ve gone ‘green,’ it’s up to us

Our government has told us precisely how to protect ourselves and our families from the likelihood of falling victim to the coronavirus. For our safety, leaders are instructing the various types of businesses precisely how they must operate to stay open. So now that we are “green,” continued control over the covid-19 outbreak is totally up to us.

So go to it, folks. You don’t want to wear a mask? Fine. Stay home. Or don’t go where masks are required. You think the whole thing is a fraud? You are entitled to your opinion. But please stay 6 feet away from the rest of us.

Meanwhile, if you want to work again, then follow the rules. If you think it’s “too soon” to be going back to work, that’s fine, too, but there’s probably not going to be any more “free money” available for you.

There is a tipping point in this pandemic business, and it is real. We came soberingly close to losing control of the coronavirus completely. If the coronavirus experience is any marker, pandemics will continue to come more frequently, and they will be increasingly more difficult to handle.

The problem is real and it is deadly. The government’s rules and suggestions are not designed to take away our freedom. Everyone is free to choose their own behavior. We can choose to be as cautious as we can and cooperate by behaving as suggested, or not. It’s up to us this time, really.

Ed Collins, West Newton

Divisiveness belongs to Democrats

Letter-writer Jim Hillebrecht (“We can’t take 4 more years of divisiveness”) is correct that every four years half of the country will be understandably upset by the results of a presidential election. And the election of Donald Trump was different because of the division and hatred. He’s wrong, however, to blame Trump.

When Barack Obama was elected, imagine half of the country turned on him and decided to delegitimize his presidency. Imagine his cabinet members were shouted out of restaurants or targeted by the previous administration’s FBI. What if a bogus charge was leveled against him that started a years-long investigation that included top officials from the previous administration appearing nightly on cable news denouncing him as a traitor?

Imagine over 90% of newspapers, network TV, universities, entertainment, the bulk of cable news networks, websites and search engines targeted him and called him a racist. Every statement twisted, every fault magnified, and every accomplishment lied about or buried.

How would Obama have fared under such all- encompassing opposition? Would you have blamed him for the anger in the country? When he argued his case, would you have called him divisive? Probably not.

Responsibility for the divisiveness and sheer hatred this country has been subjected to for the last few years belongs to Democrats.

Thomas Wagner, Murrysville

Both black, white must change

Ok, George Floyd was killed by a police officer. The officer and the other officers were arrested and charged. Who took the photos and stood idly by while all this took place?

I have another question. Why does the white police and community have to bear the responsibility to change? Does the black community not bear the responsibility to change also? We witness daily shootings, and there are no protests, violent confrontations or anything remotely close to what we are seeing now.

Isn’t it about time for all concerned to quit pointing fingers and take a look at themselves? Real change can only happen when both white and black realize we both are the problem. Change will not happen when you demand the police change without effective change on society.

Jim Russell, Frazer