Faces Matter

Dear fellow humans one and all, left, right, and center, theists and atheists, libertarians and authoritarians, you are human and your face matters to me, just as much, or even more, than your voice. Facial expressions arguably communicate more to the human brain than words, and through our faces we connect to each other on many deep levels. It is rumored that Voltaire once said, “I might disagree with you with in what you say, but I will fight to the death for your right to say it.”

We are now being told that we might die of a virus if we don’t cover our faces in front of each other. With the vaccine out now, these risks of mortality are almost as remote as the risk of death by lightning strike, but I will tell you this. I would rather risk dying in letting you see my face and in seeing your face, then to live a rigidly walled off life at the price of keeping our faces separate in these face cages we call protective masks. 

Would we rather live longer lives living in deeper separation than live short ones together? Facial language connects us. As a philosopher of biology, I see the definition of life as connectedness, and I see the demand to sever our connectedness in order to maintain life as a false means to a fictitious ends by life’s definition. I do not accept that we are all asked to collectively die as social creatures a little more every day in order to keep on living.

Faces matter. Faces create living connection. Take off the mask and live again. Smile at everyone you pass whenever you can and bring community feeling back to life.