The Trust Fall

Think, for a moment, of the most apt metaphor I could use to put this situation into perspective. Think, for a moment, of that nostalgic, thrilling childhood memory, of that essential feature of summer camp and team building exercises. Think, for a moment, of the trust fall.

Ever since this pandemic began, we’ve all been placed on a wooden beam (metaphorically—stick with me). Below us society’s spotters are positioned, interlocking to form a safety net: the elected officials who are supposed to make the choices we elected them to make, the experts and researchers who are supposed to point us in the right direction with their findings, the media that’s supposed to report accurate information. Everyone is supposed to be looking out for us—poised to catch. Waiting for our trust to be great enough that we fall. 

This is a crisis scenario, and we have a decision to make. 

The most difficult part of trust is that it requires some relinquishing of control. We have to give up a bit of our individual agency and say, Someone else might know better about this. Someone else has the public’s best interest in mind. Someone else is using their expertise to help me. Someone else is deserving of my attention and compliance.

Especially at this point in the pandemic, when daily cases in the US are higher than they’ve ever been, when the long-awaited shot hasn’t made COVID disappear, when we’re almost two years removed from “normal life” and are seeing signs that we’re not yet rounding the corner to the “other side,” it’s understandable that people are more hesitant to place trust in people they’ve never met, in faceless entities and impersonal facts and figures. 

The government has certainly mangled its handling of the pandemic at times. Information and guidance have changed, and that’s led many people to give up listening, to withdraw any trust they had in the government and retreat back into a chamber filled with people that tell them what they want to hear and paint a simple picture of a world that, in reality, isn’t so simple. 

Back up on the beam. Time is ticking, and indecision in this scenario can’t last forever.

The choices we’ve had to make have been difficult and uncomfortable. The faith we have been asked to place in actors and institutions that previously had smaller roles in our lives has been enormous.  

For those of us who have relinquished a bit of our control, who have chosen to lean back and bring the element of “trust” to a trust fall, the decision may have seemed like a no-brainer. But this metaphor hopefully puts things into perspective for the ones who fell backward without a second thought. With the clarifying power of hindsight, we can look back and see how much we’ve been asked to drastically disrupt our lives—mask-wearing, lockdowns, social distancing, virtual school and work. All plunges into the unknown.

The reluctance of some may make a bit more sense when we frame it this way. (Imagine making this choice when every TV personality you watch and article you read warns that your assigned spotters are going to drop you.)

We must have faith that our compatriots will all tackle the “trust” dilemma with reason and nuance, that when they’re up on that beam, the calculations they’re making are based in fact and proceed logically. 

Many have chosen to fall; a comparable proportion remains rooted to the beam, upright. It’s difficult to see how we can move forward in this way. 

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Editors’ note: All opinions expressed on The Uproar are a reflection solely of the beliefs of the bylined author and not the journalism program at NASH.  We continue to welcome school-appropriate comments and guest articles.