NYT columnist: We were “badly misled” about the pandemic

Zeynep Tufekci is a professor of sociology and public affairs at Princeton University and a New York Times opinion columnist. Her latest Times article is headlined “We Were Badly Misled About the Event That Changed Our Lives.” In it, she describes in great detail the lengths taken to discount the possibility that the COVID-19 pandemic began in a research lab in Wuhan, China.

For example, a paper in the journal Nature Medicine written by five prominent scientists declared that no “laboratory-based scenario” for the pandemic virus was plausible. However, Tufekci writes, “While the scientists publicly said the scenario was implausible, privately many of its authors considered the scenario to be not just plausible but likely.”

She adds:

To this day, there is no strong scientific evidence ruling out a lab leak or proving that the virus arose from human-animal contact in that seafood market. The few papers cited for market origin were written by a small, overlapping group of authors, including those who didn’t tell the public how serious their doubts had been.

If you’re thinking that this issue is relegated to the past, think again. Tufekci refers us to a recent paper in Cell, a prestigious scientific journal, reporting that researchers have taken samples of viruses found in bats and experimented to see if they could infect human cells and pose a pandemic risk.

Many of these researchers work or have worked at the same Wuhan Institute of Virology where many now believe the COVID-19 pandemic originated. The scientists did this latest work under conditions that are “insufficient for work with potentially dangerous respiratory viruses.” According to Tufekci, “If just one lab worker unwittingly inhaled the virus and got infected, there’s no telling what the impact could be on Wuhan, a city of millions, or the world.”

From farmers to consumers

This story combines two issues, both foundational to the flourishing of our nation.

The first concerns trust in our media, which the Founders considered vital to a functioning democracy. In 1972, 68 percent of Americans told Gallup they had a “great deal” or “fair amount” of trust in the mass media. Today, only 31 percent express such confidence while the percentage who have “none at all” has grown six-fold.

The second concerns trust in our government, which is clearly foundational to a participatory democracy. In 1958, three-quarters of Americans said they trusted the federal government to do the right thing almost always or most of the time. Last year, 16 percent said the same.

In both cases, a significant factor relates to the capitalistic system by which our economy functions.

There was a day when much of what Americans consumed and owned came from their own hands. At the time of the American Revolution, 95 percent of us were farmers; today that figure is less than 2 percent. Today, we purchase nearly everything we own and use, which makes us consumers in nearly every dimension of our lives.

And consumers are conditioned by advertisers to want more than we have and to tie happiness to consumption. As advertisers utilize ever more sophisticated algorithms to target customers, this materialistic message has become ever more effective.

As a result, Gallup reports that the percentage of Americans who say money is “extremely/very important” to them has risen from 67 percent in 2002 to 79 percent today. At the same time, the percentage who say religion is “very” important to them has fallen from 70 percent in 1965 to 45 percent today. And the percentage who say they are “extremely/very proud” to be an American has fallen from 87 percent in 2002 to 67 percent today.

What is “end-stage capitalism”?

An Atlantic article describes “end-stage capitalism” as the cultural devolution to the place where “nothing has any value or meaning other than its sale price.” A secularized “post-truth” society has no measure of meaning beyond what we happen to want today and are willing to pay for it.

This citizen-as-consumer trend ties directly to today’s conversation in that both media and politics now function through this lens.

As I have written, a media that exists to “sell” consumers what they want to consume is transactional rather than informational. Its purpose is less to report the news as objectively as possible than to appeal to the specific demographic it targets and its advertisers seek to reach.

Similarly, in a deeply partisan democracy, leaders are elected and empowered by appealing not to the broad electorate but to their specific demographic base. When each side sees the other side as the enemy, the purpose of government is less to serve the common good than to advance what “our side” wants.

And, once again, we become consumers more than citizens.

One of Satan’s most subtle strategies

This issue applies not just to media and government, but to evangelical Christians as well.

We believe that all people need to trust in Christ as their Savior to receive eternal life and spend eternity in heaven. However, such a decision can be transactional at its heart: Have faith in Jesus not so much because of who he is but because of what he will do for you. Read Scripture not simply because it is “God preaching,” as JI Packer described it, but so God will bless you. Pray, worship, give of our time and money, serve in the church—each can be our attempt to earn God’s favor and provision.

This is one of Satan’s most subtle ways of leading us away from an intimate daily communion with the living Lord Jesus. In Screwtape Letters, CS Lewis gives voice to the tempter’s strategy:

We do want, and want very much, to make men treat Christianity as a means; preferably, of course, as a means to their own advancement, but failing that, as a means to anything. . . . “Believe this, not because it is true, but for some other reason.” That’s the game.

The antidote is to focus on the foundational fact that “God is love” (1 John 4:8). By definition, his love for us has nothing to do with what we can and cannot do for him. His Son has already died for every sin we have ever committed and will ever commit (John 10:11). No religious transactions can make him love us any more or less than he does at this moment.

“The things of earth will grow strangely dim”

As a result, you and I are free to love God because he loves us, not so he will. We are free to love our neighbor whether they love us or not because we are already loved unconditionally and passionately by our Father.

This changes other people from commodities into sisters and brothers for whom Jesus died. It changes the material world from commodities into creation to be used to glorify and serve our Creator.

When we make this shift, as the old hymn says, “the things of earth will grow strangely dim in the light of his glory and grace.”

This is the invitation, and the promise, of God.

Quote for the day:

“Believe God’s love and power more than you believe your own feelings and experiences. Your rock is Christ, and it is not the rock that ebbs and flows but the sea.” —Samuel Rutherford (1600–1661)

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