OPINION:
“Stupid is as stupid does,” as author Winston Groom’s Forrest Grump said.
Witness the spring break throngs that had collegians and young adults romping along the beaches of Florida, Texas and elsewhere this week as if fellow partyers had socially distanced themselves only to text or DM invitations to girls-gone-wild flash mobs.
One such red-cheeked male reveler in Florida said: “If I get coronavirus, I get coronavirus.” This, as coronavirus precautions shut down entertainment as we know it.
Young people already think themselves invincible, able to avoid student loan debt with the swipe of a pen and outrun bullets on urban streets.
And the media hasn’t done them any favors by taking China’s word as gospel that it has no new coronavirus cases. So that’s that.
Amid this crisis, young people have been partying like it’s 1999, congregating on basketball courts and soccer fields, indulging themselves at outdoor brunches and happy hours, and hitting the malls like they’ve already gotten coronavirus stimulus checks to spend.
President Trump, governors and mayors have been preaching and updating daily in their usual stilted styles. But there’s a generation (or two) out there that doesn’t read newspapers, hold magazines in their hands and couldn’t care less what’s really at stake.
We need to reach young people by deploying the right messengers and sending the right messages. As things stand now, they probably think COVID-19 is an “old people’s disease,” because that’s the messaging.
However, young people do pay attention to messengers — and that’s how grown folk can get the upper hand.
Educators and nonprofits should enjoin influencers (messengers) to deliver critical public service announcements, and the messengers should have easily recognizable faces and voices to grab their attention.
In other words, Meryl Streep, as talented as she may be, doesn’t fit the bill. Nor does Don Lemon, because as another Tom Hanks character said, “There’s no crying in baseball.”
You get the inference, though.
The unprecedented government shutdowns over the COVID-19 virus have countless Americans, Africans, Europeans and others around the globe asking a crucial question: Now what?
The pertinent answer to that question depends on the audio and the visual — not one or the other.
After all, that’s how countless young people are raised. Like the Florida party boy, they want to see and hear the action, and he stands as a perfect testament as to why the PSAs are needed — pronto.
• Deborah Simmons can be contacted at dsimmons@washingtontimes.com.
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