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After vaccination (symbol picture)
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The good news first: the herd is growing, more and more people are vaccinated.
The bad news: This is not only accompanied by joy about the vaccinations, but also with envy and resentment, anger and reproach, with shame and insecurity - and it doesn't have to be that way.
What was "Flatten the curve!" At some point is sometimes just: "Why is THAT vaccinated now?"
Margarete Stokowski
Photo:
Rosanna Graf
Born in 1986, was born in Poland and grew up in Berlin. She studied philosophy and social sciences and has been working as a freelance writer since 2009. Her feminist bestseller "Bottom Rum Free" appeared in 2016 by Rowohlt Verlag. This was followed in 2018 by »The Last Days of Patriarchy«, a collection of columns from SPIEGEL and »taz«.
When a pandemic hits a society where there is a lot of inequality, it is first and foremost pretty natural that it creates various forms of envy. People who have to expose themselves to risk at work are often jealous of those who can sit in the home office. People without a balcony are jealous of people with a balcony. And people without a vaccination appointment are jealous of those who have been vaccinated. It probably makes little sense to explain to people who are vaccinated that those who are already vaccinated have, for the most part, good reasons, and that those who are vaccinees may not want those reasons themselves: chronic illnesses, risky jobs, dependents in need of care, and so on . But the envy is there and you have to deal with it.
And envy in itself is not bad or wrong at first, but rather human.
The author Teresa Bücker recently wrote: »› Vaccination ‹is a misleading term.
It is a legitimate wish not to have to be afraid any more.
A desire for protection. "
Perhaps it makes sense to distinguish between different forms of envy.
If envy only means that you want something that someone else already has, then it is not reprehensible, even when vaccinating.
Millions of people are waiting for their vaccination, so it is inevitable that they find out about the vaccinations of others and think: I want to.
But when envy is mixed with resentment, it becomes more difficult.
That would not only be "I want to", but rather: "I would have deserved this shot more than you."
I think it is more important that parents are vaccinated early than that police officers are prioritized
It is not very noble to research on Wikipedia, but there I found the distinction between "constructive" and "destructive envy", which corresponds almost exactly to the above distinction: in the constructive case you want something, while in the destructive case you want it want to take away.
There are both types of vaccination.
The collective task we face is to redirect the destructive form into the constructive form.
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I was vaccinated last week. Most of the time before that I didn't feel vaccinated, but maybe that was because I was a little fatalistic. Another point: vaccine envy is a good thing in that it shows that you have wishes at all and that is not a matter of course. In any case, my vaccination envy flared up one day when I heard from several people within a short period of time that they had surprisingly received a vaccination invitation and did not know why. While I was waiting for my long overdue code. I didn't want to take people's appointments away, I just wanted to get this stupid number to make an appointment.
Then the code came and I got an appointment very soon and a new feeling flared up: vaccine shame. May I? Wouldn't it be better to somehow - illegal, give a shit? - to pass it on to a person who needs him more urgently, someone with more contacts, someone with children, ...? - Or would that be stupid? There wasn't much time to think about it, the appointment was the next morning and I went. And posted a photo of my arm with a band-aid on Twitter and Instagram.
It was only about half an hour before a stranger wrote that it was "questionable" to "pose" a vaccination while his mother and many people with asthma had not yet been vaccinated. I'm sorry for my mother, but it was funny about the asthma, because I happen to have asthma too. A woman, who was also a stranger to me, wrote to me shortly afterwards saying that she was surprised that people like me are now being vaccinated. That surprises me again, because it is common knowledge that it is no longer only people who are older than 100 who are vaccinated. You don't necessarily look at people's illnesses and you usually don't see whether they are the contact person for someone in need of care. Or whether they had time to telephone 20 general practitioners' practices, because that is also possible. There are people who don't dareTelling others about their vaccination because they don't want to justify themselves when someone comes up with stupid comments, and that's bitter because every vaccination makes us all safer and a cause for joy.
There are good reasons to criticize the current vaccination prioritization here and there.
If you were to ask me: For example, I think it is more important that parents in so-called patchwork families (not just patchwork, but above all) are vaccinated particularly early than that police officers are prioritized, because the police can wear a mask when on duty , but you can hardly ask parents to wear masks at home, because when in doubt about the children they have daily contact with dozens of households.
The possibility of getting vaccinated by the family doctor means that prioritization matters less, but the next problem with vaccination starts again: if you want to be vaccinated by your family doctor, you need the right mix Knowledge, time and luck.
more on the subject
Corona vaccination: The darned second spade by Christoph Seidler
If the prioritization of the vaccination sequence is soon to be canceled completely, this mixture will be even more important: First, you have to know where to contact in order to get an appointment.
Second, you have to have the time and energy to take care of it.
At the moment, for example, some people have not yet understood that you have to report to your family doctor yourself for a vaccination.
Or: that you don't necessarily have to go to the regular practice, but can also go to another doctor.
Or: You got it, but you can't do it, and there can be many reasons for this.
Those who have already been vaccinated have knowledge that others may not have: How exactly does the vaccination code work, what do you have to bring with you to the vaccination, should you make the appointment by phone or online? None of this is classified as secret information, but not everyone can find it quickly. If we want to get away from destructive envy, it would be helpful if as many vaccinated people as possible share their skills, if they can: by helping others to book an appointment (look for numbers, formulate emails, or translate if someone cannot speak German enough) , or by trying to take away people's fear of vaccination. Or by doing other tasks for the unvaccinated, if that is possible (doing something with the children, doing the shopping, that sort of thing).This aid could also be government organized, but ... LOL.
If, hopefully, in the last few meters of the pandemic, people quarrel or despair, because the impression arises that mainly privileged, well-connected hustlers with fast WiFi come to appointments, then that's bitter. But it doesn't have to come to that. Only sticking together helps against breaking apart.