If you follow the Covid-19 standings (click here to access), you will find an interesting phenomenon. But before mentioning that phenomenon, I want to say a word about the site I am using. I am using it because its display of the states' statistics are easily accessible and its accuracy is adequate. Its statistics are close to 3.2% more coronavirus cases for the US than the John Hopkins site (click here to access).
The interesting phenomenon is that the states from the Civil War Confederacy are disproportionately represented in the top 5, top 10, and top 20 states with the most Covid-19 cases. Three of the top 5 states with the most Covid-19 cases, including the top 3 states, are from the old Confederacy. 5 of the top 10 states with the most Covid-19 cases are from the old Confederacy. And 9 of the top 20 states with the most Covid-19 cases are from the old Confederacy.
In contrast, 2 of the top 5 states with the most Covid-19 cases are from the Civil War's Union states. 4 of the top 10 states with the most Covid-19 cases come from those Union states. And 10 of the top 20 states with the most Covid-19 cases come from those Union states.
The representation of the old Confederate states on these top x number lists is disproportionate because there were only 13 states in the Confederacy vs 23 states in the Union during the Civil War.
The representation provides an interesting phenomenon because all of the states in the old Confederacy are also part of what is considered to be the Bible Belt of America and are generally conservatives states politically. In terms of being part of the Bible belt, fewer states from the Union states in the Civil War can be consider to be part of the Bible Belt and are generally conservative states in terms of political ideology.
What also makes this an interesting phenomenon is that states like New York, New Jersey, and Pennsylvania suffered large numbers of Covid-19 infections before the rest of the nation suffered any significant number of infections giving the rest of the states time to learn from the mistakes made by those 3 states. And yet, here we are.
Finally, what also makes all of the above an interesting phenomenon is that the political ideology of a state determines the emphasis that each state puts on individual responsibility. Those states that are more conservative put a higher emphasis on individual responsibility while those states that are generally not conservative in their ideology put less emphasis on individual responsibility. And yet, again, here we are.
And what confirms the fact that a failure of individual responsibility is largely, and seemingly counter-intuitively, a factor in the number of Covid-19 cases are the approaches that the states' leadership and people took to preventing the spread of Covid-19. Both showed significant failures in personal responsibility in how they acted to prevent the spread of the Covid-19.
Where is the sense of individual responsibility among those who make individual responsibility their battle-cry when battling non-conservative political agendas?
No comments:
Post a Comment