IMO if you're offering a theory about the summer protests and/or events of 1/6 that does not have a prominent role for a global pandemic & knock-on effects (economic damage, food insecurity, corpses), then you're either unserious or an opportunist & should be ignored.

It's not just that so many of the theories being floated are monocausal -- that's bad enough in & of itself. Even more telling is that there's really no space in them for the pandemic, even if it's just as an accelerant for the one core factor you've blamed for this or that.

I personally find it shocking the degree to which the pandemic -- a global freaking pandemic! -- is being treated as part of the background now, & not worth even gesturing gesturing to in explanations of whatever alarming events.

E.g. here's an article attributing the scale & reach of the summer protests entirely to BLM organizing, w/ the pandemic being referenced only as an _obstacle_ to turning out the crowds. It's quite incredible to me. Just gobsmacking. https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2020/06/06/floyd-protests-are-broadest-us-history-are-spreading-white-small-town-america/

Nary a mention of the p-word in any of this material. It's like this massive exogenous shock to our entire society doesn't exist when it comes to analyzing what just happened and why. Amazing. https://twitter.com/Kathy__Gee/status/1349093720679972864

The double standard in this Serwer piece is typical. Violence from the outgroup is motivated by their beliefs & innate qualities, & violence from the ingroup is motivated by their material conditions & legit anxieties.

The idea that "middle class" rioters are overleveraged and are one or two missed paychecks away from the street, isn't admitted as evidence any more than the pandemic is, because materialist explanations for violence only get applied to the in-group.

I'm not tryna hate on Wasow, but this is another example of the genre. You might think the mass unemployment, corpses, overwhelmed ICUs, lockdowns, masks, emergency measures & disruptions at all levels of live might make an appearance, but you'd be wrong. https://twitter.com/owasow/status/1348670837176455171

I truly don't understand this. If years ago u said "imagine a global pandemic w/ <INSERT BADNESS> b/c of it. Then, after a summer of mass lefty rioting, righty insurrectionists will assault the capitol," most ppl would be like "yeah those all seem to fit together!"

This is like a milder version of the plot of every pandemic movie ever. But our eggheads are like "listen to the ways that my life's work and/or political hobby horse, which is BTW totally unrelated to pandemics, completely explains the events of 1/6."

I'm imagining a columnist like: "Back in March, in stark terror I fled the city w/ my family & my belongings, to a farm in the country to ride out the deadly pandemic. Now I shall write an alternate history take on the summer riots &/or 1/6 as if none of that actually happened."

To be clear, b/c I know some will be confused: I am NOT advocating you swap out the pandemic for whatever your thing is as the One True Cause of Present Events. I'm sayin', y'know, maybe SPARE A THOUGHT FOR THE PANDEMIC in your story of what just happened. Just a mention, even.