War and Trauma

I’m finding it harder and harder to imagine what the future looks like. For me and for the world and humanity. If there is any luck, it isn’t as grim as its past, or mine. They say everyone is going through the same trauma, except that’s impossible, and all of the realities and traumas and perceptions in the world right now seem to be having the hardest time agreeing on a baseline. To say everyone’s trauma is the same is ridiculous. What of all the other traumas leading up to it? They have to count for something. 

The fun thing about trauma is that it rears it’s true face long after you think it’s safe to come out. And when it does, you realize that the best of times were during its original infliction, because then you knew what it is that was being taken from you, and you remember having it and feel the loss. But when it shows itself again, you don’t know what you are without it anymore, you don’t remember yourself before it’s arrival, and the empty space from where something of you was taken doesn’t feel wrong - it’s a permanent vacancy. And then you’re forever bonded with your trauma, a lifelong partner that has a voice in all decision making, a perpetrator that moves in, and you make friends with it, and have tea together, and chain smoke, and discuss worldly matters like politics and the stock market. Because that’s the only way to move forward. You are either its friend or its prisoner. 

The pandemic is often compared to a war, in the media and in friendly conversation—so many dead, so many affected. It’s an interesting frame of reference for us, western world types, most of whom haven’t experienced a war, although we hear about it and fund it constantly. The other day was what’s called Victory Day in Russia, the day WWII officially “ended”, and unlike in the US, this day is still celebrated by most people in the country. The war was much closer, and it’s proximity stays with the people to this day. The end of the war didn’t mark the end to the trauma, the hunger and the poverty and propaganda and prison camps persisted for many more years, and the offenders were the country’s own leaders, but they still celebrate the day. Most Russians probably agree on the baseline importance of the day. So many died protecting the right of the people to be killed and oppressed by their own government, instead of the Nazis. My own family members, even. 

The pandemic isn’t like the war at all. Of course, in hindsight, our statistics of the war are more accurate, but we now know 27,000 people died every day (on average) during WWII. Right now, with all our testing and abundant information, it looks like we peaked at just over 7,500 deaths a day due to the coronavirus. Of course, I don’t think these numbers account for all the deaths caused by suicide, hunger, neglected care of other diseases, human trafficking spikes, etc etc. It is just too early to tell, we don’t know the true human cost of this pandemic yet. But to compare it to a war is to compare traumas, and therefore compare the cost of lives, compare the pain suffered, compare a concentration camp and a quarantine, and I just don’t think this is a good practice. It can’t possibly serve any of us. I realize that we learn by comparison, it gives us perspective and sense of scale. But I think, in the case of “traumas”, and in the case of human experience generally, these  comparisons dwarf our ability to empathize. Even if we were losing 27,000 people every day to the virus, how can we compare the suffering of WWII to a global pandemic. There are too many variables unaccounted for, in every trauma. And within the pain of every trauma, there are already other resident traumas helping you process and cope, and there aren’t any statistical systems in the world to produce a formula to measure the grace with which you overcome.