Lifestyle

By Mark A. Leon

The narrative has changed. Several months ago, New York, New Jersey, and Connecticut were the apex of the COVID-19 spike. North and South Carolina required anyone coming to the Carolinas from one of these hot spots to self-quarantine for 14 days by the state government agencies.

Last week, all that changed, and now anyone coming from the Carolina’s to New York requires a self-quarantine for 14 days. Why did this flip? Was it strength in leadership, better protocols, or hundreds of years of history? To put some context around this, we must look at the numbers first:

• The population of New York State is 19.45 Million
• North and South Carolina combined population is 15.64 Million (80% of New York’s population
• In the last 7 days, the number of new confirmed cases daily in New York is 20% of the number in the Carolinas
• Based on raw numbers and percentage of the population, the apex of the spike has shifted

Back to the question of why? Why is New York trending toward recovery and the Carolina’s setting us back? The answer rests in the value of community and cultural origins

Community

Western Europe is a melting pot of cultural and religious communities each with unique traditions, values, and beliefs, but when the pandemic became a global issue that affected everyone, each and every country bonded together for the common good of minimizing the risk of spread. It was not about wealth, status, or economics, but sustainability for the future of the whole.

While Western Europe is trending in a positive direction due to collective isolation and adhering to a collective principle of a sense of community first, the United States is trending in a negative direction.

We now have to look at origins and how New York has closely carried the ideology of Western European life into the framework of their daily existence today.

Cultural Origins

New York City built its roots from communities seeking freedom from religious persecution and cultural bias. Most were poor and disenfranchised who sought a place where they can value freedom and work hard to rebuild. New York became individual pockets of communities, proud and rich in tradition, hope, and faith with the common goals of sustaining their roots and building a home free from adverse surroundings.

The central theme of each neighborhood was that the whole was stronger than the parts. In times of need and adversity, it was the collective sense of the whole greater than the parts that maintained that strength and passion for perseverance. From the Gangs of New York to Harlem Nights to Jewish roots on the Lower East Side, New York City has co-existed in its differences and thus its unspoken commonalities.

Now let us move 600 miles south.

The Carolinas began to lay a foundation very differently. It was a land vast and pure with untapped resources and land for all the eye to see. It caught the eye of rich proprietors that purchased land unseen and utilized capitalistic thinking to build empires centered around wealth and fortune.

The early settlers of the Carolina’s did not escape persecution or seek a community-based sense of belonging. These were wealthy land owners that settled lands through the slave trade system, cropped natural resources, and built the new empire stained by greed. There was no common struggle that brought a sense of community.

Why is the South failing while the North is beginning to recover from the spread of COVID-19?

Both New York and the Carolinas have implemented protocols, though some less strict than others, but the cultural make-up of each region is the underlying variable on why one region is succeeding while the other is struggling.

Families, neighborhoods, churches, temples, and cultural traditions are all factors that contribute to an idealogy that in times of need, lead a collective action to stick together to overcome adversity. Throughout history, the world has faced enemies head-on and it is those pure of heart that put the greater good ahead of themselves that come out victorious.

The Carolinas and other parts of the country must release themselves from the roots of their “me first” traditions and find a way to seek out community in order to overcome this latest enemy. We have a common adversary, so we must have a unified front to see a pathway that leads us back to a life of normalcy.