What we saw over the last few weeks – people openly behaving in irresponsible ways, mixing in public, taking chances with their lives and, more importantly, the lives of others – made me impatient, frustrated and just angry. But as a psychologist who has dealt with crisis situations for many years, I know there needs to be an explanation, a scientific reason why they behave this way and a scientific way to change that behavior.
What we saw was a total collapse of common sense. And while the latest restrictions have created fewer opportunities for this frivolous behavior to continue, we need to understand what to do if and when that same lack of common sense reappears on the flip side of this crisis, that is, when restrictions are gradually lifted.
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What we saw in a number of communities, but especially in religious communities, was a phenomenon of denial over reason and mindlessness over logic. While it appears that most people did indeed "get it," there was a stubborn and determined group who did not.
Endangering themselves is one thing, but putting others in danger is quite another. And while we can understand that some people may behave that way, when community leaders act irresponsibly, as they did, it is time to take a closer look.
We did see some changes. Some leading rabbis belatedly came out with strong messages urging people to stay home, avoid improvised outdoor services and pray individually. But while most of the ultra-Orthodox world finally woke up, other rabbis continued in a dangerous slumber, refusing to categorically prohibit the holding of public prayer services outdoors.
Well-meaning, intelligent people were organizing and participating in "pop-up" services, sometimes keeping to the 2-meter rule, but often not. And even those who kept the group to 10 and tried to keep 2 meters from each other could not guarantee that there wasn't any inadvertent contact, a passerby joining in or an accidental cough or sneeze that traveled beyond the 2 meters.
In other words, they took a chance, not only with their lives and the lives of their families but also with your life and mine. Even if they somehow felt the risk is small, why in the world would anyone play with fire in today's reality?
That reality is not pretty. Reports from Jewish communities around the world of people getting sick and dying in staggering numbers should have hit us all like a ton of bricks. It should have been a wake-up call, but instead, psychological denial continued. Ignorance may be bliss, but what of those that continued in that bliss despite not being ignorant?
Those that knew what was happening, knew what happened elsewhere, knew the risk factors, knew the chances they were taking but continued to march on as if they possess a spiritual immunity that sets them apart.
The Talmud tells us of the "pious fool" who insists on keeping religious stringencies even when these results in violating a more important value. The pious fool will not save a drowning woman who is scantily clad, and we saw those pious fools who wouldn't stop praying outdoors even though common sense and common decency said this was risky. Better to pray in a quorum than to save a life. Fools indeed, but they are not only pious fools, they are dangerous fools.
Psychologically, we always choose education over coercion and explanation over intimidation. That, however, requires time, something we do not have now as we try to clamp down on the carriers of sickness and death walking in our midst.
No one is immune. Not our friends or neighbors, not our families or coworkers, and certainly not those who aspire to be our spiritual leaders.
And as our sages have said (Avot 2:15) when the day is short and the work is plentiful, when the workers are lazy but when the reward is great, the master of the house, God, is insistent. Insistent on keeping the most important precept we have – the sanctity of life.
So while we would like to educate, now we need to coerce and while we would prefer to explain, now we need to intimidate. And that is why now have stricter restrictions.
Let's hope those who now see greater restrictions imposed on us, do not revert back to the same poor judgment if it is decided to eventually relax some restrictions. If they do it will be a mitzva to shame them. To shame those that are selfish. To shame those that are stubborn. To shame those who will be frivolous and to shame those who will be foolish.
If you do see this behavior again, decide that saving lives comes first. Decide to do the right thing. Do a mitzvah – shame someone.
