Vandenberg Village resident and frequent Sun letter writer Jan Lipski asked a question in the opinion section of this issue (“Still scared,” page 10) that hit too close to home.
If I were in a generous frame of mind, I would figure that this is exactly what he intended to do—to ask a personal question with an open mind in hopes of obtaining more factual information to strengthen or refute his flimsy thesis that “we are not being given straight-shooting information.”
His question (well, questions; he asks several in the letter): “Has anyone in your immediate or extended family tested positive for COVID-19?” He goes on to answer that he’s had two: his son and son-in-law, who “had no symptoms and went back to work.”
“Did any of those people die?” he then asks.
He answered that question, too, saying that “I know the full age gamut and the answer is no.” He gave a couple of other personal examples
Well, we here at the Sun are straight shooters, and we’ve got some information for Mr. Lipski.
One of our editorial staffers lost her uncle and aunt in January and February, respectively, to COVID-19. Her uncle died on the way to the hospital, and her aunt died after being hospitalized for more than a week. They were both in their late 50s. She and her family have been devastated. A couple of months ago, their family held a memorial over Zoom.
I couldn’t help but think of our staffer when I read Mr. Lipski’s letter. He sounded so smug, safe in the reality of his own choosing. He could pick and choose from his own tiny experience and extrapolate out to cover the rest of the country with his fantasy bubble of fear.
Yes, fear. He’s looking at the flip side of the same fear that he’s trying to preach against.
“The media did a real good job scaring everyone,” he wrote.
I maintain that writers like you, Mr. Lipski—who are published in the media, I might add—are doing just as much of a “job” of riling up one side of the republic into a tizzy about who’s right and who’s wrong and why we shouldn’t wear masks and how overreaching the government has been in trying to protect us from a virus. A virus that is real. It’s not influenza. It’s not made up. This is reality, and we invite you to stop peddling your own brand of fear and writing it off as enlightenment.
Until there are zero more deaths from the very real COVID-19, no one should be saying whether any measures—extreme or not—haven’t worked. Wait and see and thank your lucky stars that no one close to you has died.
We respect your right to free speech; that’s why we publish your letters. But it doesn’t mean that you’re right, it doesn’t mean we agree with you, and it doesn’t mean we won’t respond.
The Canary sends condolences to anyone who has lost a loved one to COVID-19. Send thoughts to canary@santamariasun.com.
This article appears in Jul 22-29, 2021.