Virus vs Control: Two Fears of One Pandemic

Abstract

In the spring of 2020, online discussions revealed two conflicting views on threats posed by the pandemic. Some were very worried about the prospect of infection and mass deaths from the new virus, while others saw the main danger lying in restrictive measures and increased social control. This article is an attempt to answer the question as to why some Russians reacted more sensi tively to the epidemiological threat and others to the danger of increased control. Medically sensitive Internet users describe themselves and their opponents in terms of social and cultural differences. Covid dissidents distinguish themselves from their ideological opponents on the criterion of the presence or absence of agency. Sociological studies show that this or that type of sensitivity is determined in part by socio-economic status. The reaction to the pandemic is weakly related to political preferences, but it is influenced by the level of trust in the state and official institutions. In-depth interviews with COVID-dissidents and analysis of their rhetoric in social media show that sensitivity to the threat of control is determined by the personal “setting”, in which the experience of “agency panic” (Timothy Melley) plays an important role. In some people the “panic of agency” triggers the signal “danger of control” in a situation where others perceive the administration of necessary security measures. This signal either “overrides” the signal of a biological threat, or encourages a person who is busy asserting his own agency to cope with a biological threat without the participation of authorities and official experts, in the most autonomous mode.