The Frog in the Cooking Pot

 

January 11, 2024

 

 

Somebody was complaining today that her company was mandating masks again because of a COVID surge. Naturally, that led to complaints of overreach, etc. among her friends and family.

 

It reminded me of the saying about frogs and boiling water: If you put a frog in water and gradually turn up the temperature, the frog will stay in the water and boil to death.

 

But in this case the frog isn’t the case of reluctant mask-wearers gradually being worn down into submission to government mandates. It’s the people who have grown so accustomed to catching the flu, and to other people dying from it, that they won’t jump out of the boiling water, even when somebody builds them a ramp—the masks, in case I’m being too cryptic.

 

Take the lifeline, folks. It’s simple, it’s effective, it’s cheap…

 

Or you can keep getting sick and exposing other people and getting them sick, too (because you have sick days available, but you don’t want to get behind, or appear weak, or like a slacker), because it’s what you’ve always done.

 

Jump out of the water.