Trust is Complicated: Person-First Safe Living in a Pandemic Part 3

Trust in COVID19 times depends on context: circumstances, historical identity, tolerance for risk, comfort with uncertainty, attitude about individual rights and social responsibility, critical thinking & more. Introducing a trust label.

Proem (Preface)

As we spending much of our time trying to absorb and filter some of the dirty water spewing from the cacophony of COVID-19 stuff, we keep asking, who wrote this? Who said that? When? Is it still true? So what? But what about xxx? It’s exhausting. Who to trust? What to trust? After draining, maddening calls with family and friends who clearly trust something different than us, we feel the cloudy mechanisms of trust, conscious or unconscious. Some people trust Dr. Fauci, others Mr. Trump. Some follow the CDC, others QAnon. What does trust even mean? What is trustworthiness?

In this piece, we will examine trust. We don’t have the chutzpah, the energy, or the resources to give Seals of Approval for trust. At best we can promote a bit of self-awareness about trust. Picture a family sitting around the breakfast table with a young person waving their tablet and exclaiming, ‘look what I found about mask-wearing!’ Imagine an adult responding, ‘Who wrote that? When was it written? Who paid for it? Did it cite any references? Does…