The End of the Pandemic and the Sadism of Normalisation

Abstract

The article discusses the structural dynamics of the Covid 19 pandemic and defines it as an essentially finite crisis. However, this definition does not simply come down to the abstract necessity that the pandemic must end at some point, but rather to the fact that the idea of an end has determined the entire course of the pandemic. From the outset, this idea took two antagonistic forms: From the first perspective, the pandemic can only be ended by eliminating the source of the intrusion; from the second perspective, ending the pandemic amounts to society finding a way to adapt to the intrusion. Apart from analyzing the often paradoxical implications of this essentially antagonistic idea for the “objective” evolution of the pandemic in its various phases, the article also demonstrates the inherently sadistic structure of the prevailing societal response. Precisely because this response was aimed at an impossible total normalization, it prepared the ground for the pandemic to possibly mutate into a genuine Anthropocene crisis, the endemic pandemic.