Which year was worse?

[John Dule]

Yet it still wasn't, in much of the world anyway, as big a "disruption" as WW1. Or indeed other more localised (but still major) events like the Russian Revolution.

That *is* a major reason why it was so quickly forgotten by most.

I'm trying to think of other pandemics that have become ingrained in the memory of successive generations, and I'm coming up dry. Pandemics can have big cultural impacts at the time they occur, but ultimately their effects are too diffuse and intangible for people to consider them major historical events once they've passed out of recent memory. The exceptions are the Black Plague and I guess the American plagues following the arrival of European explorers. Both of those led to long-lasting change, one with regards to social hierarchies, the other with regards to the demographic compositions of two entire continents. I fail to see how COVID reaches that level of impact.

Typically, things seem like bigger events at the time than in hindsight. I recall TikTok liberals talking about how they were "living through a major historical event" after they'd quarantined and worn masks for a couple of weeks. But ultimately, nobody will care about this once those who lived through it have passed on. Much worse plagues that have killed much larger percentages of the global population have been similarly forgotten, as have outbreaks of diseases with much more horrific and viscerally shocking symptoms. Sorry, I just find it hard to classify 2020 as "the worst year ever" when the biggest complaints we have about it are (1) staying indoors, (2) wearing masks, and (3) granny dying five years earlier than she would've otherwise. It wasn't a non-event, but it wasn't a particularly memorable one either.

[Property Representative of the Harold Holt Swimming Centre]

2022 has generally been quite good. 2020 was bad, but the people who act like COVID was a major historical tragedy are idiots. It will be forgotten within a couple of decades, while years like 2001 will live on in public memory.

Nobody outsides USA cares about 2001.

I mean of course it's a sad and disgraceful act what happened and I deeply sorrow the loss of human lives that day.

Covid impacted way more people, also had way more deaths and will have long-lasting consequences...

Ask our discord server where we still debate lockdowns. Putin also made use of Europes instability to invade Ukraine. And inflation rose by overdemand and less production due to these lockdowns.

9/11 was more of an American thing. Maybe for USA it's worse. But life in Europe continued in 2001 except for some wannabe Americans participating in Iraq, Afghanistan and war on terror. But I see the war in Ukraine partially as a consequence of the pandemic [partially, since there were other elements obviously].

9/11 was a big factor in anti-terrorism surveillance legislation being brought in in various countries around the world, arguably marking a big change in the relationship between the individual and the state.

[jamestroll]

2022 has generally been quite good. 2020 was bad, but the people who act like COVID was a major historical tragedy are idiots. It will be forgotten within a couple of decades, while years like 2001 will live on in public memory.

I agree – perhaps not forgotten but it will be irrelevant in a few years already. All those who declared that the world will never be the same and proclaimed a new post-COVID age really look like idiots these days.

There is no new age, no revolution, no system change, no global transformation. Instead, things have already gone back to normal, which makes COVID appear like a rather meaningless event.

That being said, 2020 was still a worse year than 2022.

That kind of makes Covid more tragic, that a horrible thing happened to us and there wasn't any big positive change that came out of it.

What kind of change were you expecting/wanting to happen?

[SnowLabrador]

2022 has generally been quite good. 2020 was bad, but the people who act like COVID was a major historical tragedy are idiots. It will be forgotten within a couple of decades, while years like 2001 will live on in public memory.

I agree – perhaps not forgotten but it will be irrelevant in a few years already. All those who declared that the world will never be the same and proclaimed a new post-COVID age really look like idiots these days.

There is no new age, no revolution, no system change, no global transformation. Instead, things have already gone back to normal, which makes COVID appear like a rather meaningless event.

That being said, 2020 was still a worse year than 2022.

That kind of makes Covid more tragic, that a horrible thing happened to us and there wasn't any big positive change that came out of it.

What kind of change were you expecting/wanting to happen?

Presumably more pandemic prevention efforts in the future, better public health infrastructure, etc. After 9/11, we made it a hell of a lot harder to hijack a plane. But there were days when more than 3,000 people died of COVID, and we're going to be even less prepared for the next pandemic than we were for this one.