You don’t have to look far to hear plenty of discussion about what a “new normal” would look like post-COVID-19. Permanent distancing, replacing handshakes with a formal bow, masks on everyone year-round. Everyone has an opinion, and none of them sound very normal.
A #NormalContact fan sent a cheeky meme. We wish we could give credit to someone for it. Yes, it’s an oversimplification of the situation, but one that’s a great illustration.
No, soda isn’t the same thing as a societal shift. And the point certainly isn’t to make light of a serious situation. The point is that we don’t need a “new normal” if the “old normal” (or, as everyone tends to call it, “normal”) worked fine.
In the case of COVID-19, of course, the entire point is that folks claim that the “old normal” left us open for disease. They’re right, of course. It did! The social behavior of people is undeniably a risk factor for disease, violence, social discord, and more. It is also a risk factor for art, social harmony, music, childbirth, understanding, and more. At this point in history we have people suggesting that we should reconsider our economic and social models and asking whether we need to reshape everything. #NormalContact isn’t going to argue that issue one way or another. What we do humbly suggest, however, is that we all intentionally remember what it means to be human, and what we require to flourish as humans.
If there really is to be a “new normal” we suggest that it means that we (re-)learn as a society how to be able to disagree strongly with someone and yet still be able to have fun together and like each other. Let’s make any “new normal” in society a way to be closer as a human society.