Laziness is the ‘new normal’
By Victor Angula |
Yesterday, 30 July 2021, the President of Namibia announced new measures on the restrictions meant to fight Covid-19. Most of them were actually a relaxation on the strict measures imposed over the last few weeks.
So now things have been opened up a little. Since winter is also on the way out and Covid-19 infections will be going down over the coming weeks of scorching heat, then one would think that the economy will also be picking up.
The restrictions and other measures are still in place, though in a somewhat toned down severity, because the danger of Covid-19 is still around, and it will be around for some time to come.
But the greatest danger we face as a society is the danger of allowing laziness to become the new normal.
With this problem which we already have of lack of leadership across all sectors, industries, institutions, or structures whether political, legal, economic, religious, or academic, it will be easy for us as a country to let laziness become a new normal.
Of course the new normal imposed by Covid-19 is unavoidable. A lot of people will continue working from home, a lot will continue engaging in virtual meetings, some will continue doing business through digital platforms so that human interactions on a physical level will be reduced.
A lot more school children will be taught in online classrooms, and a lot of church services will be streamed live on social media platforms even when the restrictions are lifted.
But at the same time, laziness may also kick in. Government employees who work from home will be less productive than those who work in contact with supervisors and colleagues. Teachers who provide online lessons may not have the same motivation as when the teaching takes place in a real class where the children are participating in the activity.
Even business people may not wake out of the winter Covid-19 restrictions. They will be seeing restrictions everywhere in their minds. Salespeople who have seen several of their loved ones dying of Covid-19 will be affected to such an extent that they will no longer have the old motivation of meeting up and engaging with potential customers.
As a result laziness becomes part of the culture.
Over the last three months a lot of people were working from home, working from home doing little work but getting paid full salaries. People were working from home but they didn’t want to be called on their mobile phones.
That is the laziness of the new normal. And it will slowly kill the economy if we don’t wise up to it and get over it.
