On Vaccine Passports

Vaccine passports.

A modern phenomenon emerging in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic. A not-so-modern problem of limiting individual rights on the basis of some feature of individuals that ought not to have bearing on their right to participate in society fully.

I would like to examine the arguments for and against the use of vaccine passports. Unfortunately, it seems at this point unavoidable that any discussion of vaccine passports also be accompanied by a disclosure of one’s views about the vaccine itself: its efficacy, its potential side effects, and the role it may or may not play in moving past the pandemic that has ailed the world for the past nearly two years. Certainly, some arguments against the use of passports do not depend on any particular view of the vaccines, but it is undeniable that one can usually predict a person’s opinion about the vaccines based on the position they take and the arguments they use to condemn the use of vaccine passports. In part, this is because those who are broadly in favour of the vaccine and have themselves gotten it will almost always disclose this fact when they make their case against proof of vaccination measures, presumably to signal that not everyone who opposes the passports fits the image in the common imagination of a radical “anti-vaxxer.” Those who do not disclose their vaccination status when arguing against the use of passports are assumed to be unvaccinated, and this is almost always a correct assumption.

It is sad to observe the rapidity with which it has become normalized to inquire into a person’s private medical decisions over the course of the pandemic, particularly since vaccines became widely available. One cannot sidestep the all-too-commonly asked question “are you vaccinated?” because to refuse to answer, whether based on privacy concerns or a stance on the ethics of passports, is to answer in the negative. There’s no denying this. Asked to provide verbal confirmation of one’s vaccination status, to give no answer is in fact to answer, because the assumption is that anyone who has received the vaccine would of course willingly reply with a prompt ‘yes’, while anyone not yet jabbed is bound to become flustered and mutter some reason or other why they have so far abstained, if they are not confident enough to expressly say they are not vaccinated - which only the boldest are. Vaccine passports formalize this tendency into policy.

Further, the presumption (or knowledge) that a person has not received a vaccine for COVID-19 has become a ready excuse to classify them as anti-vaccine in general, which is a ludicrous fallacy that should not go unchallenged. Having concerns about a particular vaccine with many relevant differences from other widely administered vaccines is very clearly not the same thing as opposing all vaccinations, or many vaccines, or vaccines in general on principle. In addition, having reasons to refuse the COVID-19 vaccine personally, meaning for oneself, does not indicate anything about one’s opinion about their existence and use in general or for others. This is an important distinction to keep track of if we wish to avoid oversimplifying the matter, as is being done all around us and has become a trademark of modern political discourse. Unvaccinated people are as diverse a group as vaccinated people, and we do ourselves no favours by viewing either one as homogenous. Not every unvaccinated person thinks illness caused by the COVID-19 virus is trivial or that we are undergoing some kind of authoritarian takeover. Not every vaccinated person is a blind supporter of whatever the official messaging is that week, or a loyal consumer of mainstream media who mutters “follow the science” in their sleep. Moreover, the widespread and shameless use of the slur “anti-vaxxer” demonstrates with devastating potency how far our culture has fallen from one that values constructive disagreement and balanced discussion of complex issues. “Anti-vaxxer” has taken on the status of a label that, once applied, ends any and all argument and utterly discredits the person receiving the label from having anything valuable to say. Many versions of this exist in modern politics as a means of shutting down debate; this is just the version that plagues the debate around vaccines, and it is no more helpful than any of its counterparts.

The point has been made many times by those far more articulate than I am, so I will not dwell on it at length here. But I must at least remind citizens of liberal democracies that if you believe you are are right about something, it is within your power to demonstrate the inferiority of another position through the use of effective argumentation. This is, in fact, the best way to persuade people of your position, as well as the best way to ascertain whether you really are as right as you think you are. Name-calling is childish, and any respectable, intelligent person should not denigrate themselves by partaking in it in place of reasoned argument. This includes both those who name-call and anyone who hears a name applied to a person and begins treating them differently as a result. You are weak for doing this, and it must stop. The fact that it is a natural psychological tendency to seek simple answers rather than to live with uncertainty is no excuse.

On to the actual arguments for and against vaccine passports.

Granted that we are in a global pandemic caused by a highly transmissible virus that leads to serious disease in a significant proportion of those who contract it, it was clear from the start that something must be done to combat both the transmission of the virus and the negative effects on the health of those who contract it. To do nothing would be to accept the sure death of millions and immense suffering of millions more, through serious and often prolonged illness, as well as through the loss of close family and friends. I will assume that most people are with me so far; if not, the rest of my arguments will be futile.

The first stages of the pandemic consisted of lockdowns for most of the world, with stay-at-home orders and forced closure of virtually all business other than grocery stores, pharmacies, and the like (“essential businesses”). This certainly made sense in the early days when our knowledge of the SARS-COV-2 virus was minimal, and most people readily complied. Focus quickly turned to studying the virus: how it transmits between individuals, how it affects the body and causes disease, who is most vulnerable, and so on. Vaccine development then took centre stage as the presumed path out of the pandemic long-term. Again, as I understand it, most people were agreed on this in 2020. One can easily see how the urgency of wanting to move past the pandemic as quickly as possible and get back to normal life would make Emergency Use Authorizations and heavy funding for vaccine research necessary steps. I won’t get into the debate about the relative amount of resources devoted to producing vaccines versus towards developing effective treatments and prevention measures, though this is an important discussion to have.

Then the first mRNA vaccines providing protection against the illness caused by SARS-COV-2 emerged in late 2020. No one anticipated that a promising vaccine candidate would appear so soon after the onset of the pandemic. It seemed to demonstrate the amazing power of science and our public institutions that something so complicated could be accomplished in such a short time. But then, division and controversy over the safety and efficacy of the vaccines began to emerge. I will not go into detail about early reports of adverse events, or the suspicious elimination of vaccines like Johnson & Johnson and AstraZeneca from the scene for some time based on a minuscule number of reports of blood clotting - again, another important discussion to have, but one that is well beyond the scope of this piece.

So, our society began to sort itself into two broad positions over the course of 2021:

1) The vaccines are the way out of the pandemic. Any small risk of side effects does not outweigh the collective (and individual) benefit provided by them. The vaccines are safe and effective, and overcoming the pandemic relies on most or all* of the population being vaccinated. The unique circumstance of a pandemic warrants the overriding of individual rights in order to serve the collective good.

2) The vaccines are probably not our way out of the pandemic, whether because they are not effective enough, or the risks associated constitute a valid reason for an individual to abstain (and individual rights must still be respected), or practically and ethically speaking we will never achieve a high enough rate of vaccination to eliminate COVID-19, or the introduction of a vaccine mid-pandemic will accelerate the emergence and spread of variants that are able to penetrate the protection provided by the vaccines, making the situation worse rather than better, or some combination of these reasons.

Which of these two broad classes a person falls into predicts with high accuracy where they stand on vaccine passports and mandatory vaccination policies, and it is not difficult to see why. Group 1 effectively operates under the belief that being vaccinated means you won’t contract Covid, or if you do, you won’t get sick or need to be hospitalized, and certainly won’t die. The degree of certainty in these assumptions has decreased radically over time, however: at first, vaccination was said to confer very strong immunity to the virus, meaning virtually no one who had received the vaccine would get sick with Covid. Then, it just meant that you would spread the virus less easily and wouldn’t get as sick as an unvaccinated person - a non-negligible benefit, to be sure, but certainly nothing like perfect protection. Now, at the group level, it means about a 40% reduction in hospitalization and death and some small reduction in chances of spreading the virus. This number has been steadily dropping. Meanwhile, studies on potential harms done by the vaccines have been proliferating, many with significant findings. So, the basis of group 1’s argument has been crumbling over time and shows few signs of stopping. The best hope of salvaging this position seems to rest with ongoing booster shots. Even so, the goal has very clearly shifted in recent months from eradicating the virus and disease caused by it to learning to cope with it as a part of life going forward.

Aside from all this shifting data, we can clearly see why a member of group 1 would be in favour of vaccine passports and/or mandates. If the vaccines protect a person from spreading SARS-COV-2 and from being hospitalized with it (even if imperfectly), and it is in the best interests of our society as a whole to have 0 or as few as possible* cases of COVID-19 at a given time, then a clear way to achieve this is for as many people as possible to be vaccinated. If we have set our goal as having as many people as possible vaccinated and have ascertained that this is the best/only way to contain the pandemic, then certainly any measure which is expected to increase vaccination rates is favourable.

Group 2 has no reason to support vaccine passports since they don’t believe vaccination is the way out of the present predicament, if there is to be a ‘way out’ at all. Dividing people based on vaccination status is not an effective way of combatting COVID-19 according to this view, not to mention the fact that it poses a moral and political disaster. I don’t have space here to elaborate on each of the different reasons listed above that one may find themselves in group 2, but each of them constitutes significant reason to doubt that widespread or universal vaccination will be a successful strategy in moving past the pandemic, and as a result vaccine passports are a useless proposition.

Here is a summary of the pro-vaccine passport position in what I take to be its most convincing formulation:

• Vaccines are a good way to protect an individual from contracting, spreading and falling ill with COVID-19.

• The more people are vaccinated, the lower the rates of COVID-19 will be in communities.

• COVID-19 is known to spread indoors. So, a room full of vaccinated people is safer with regards to likelihood of transmission if positive cases are present than a room of both vaccinated and unvaccinated people, or entirely unvaccinated people.

• In order to reduce transmission, it is reasonable to limit access to certain spaces where transmission is more likely to people who can present proof that they are vaccinated against COVID-19.

• Forcing the use of passports in certain settings (restaurants, movie theatres, sporting events, concerts…) is a good way to encourage higher vaccination rates among those not yet vaccinated. It causes some inconvenience to these individuals, while not affecting their ability to work, get groceries, dine outdoors, etc.

• This is not a perfect measure, and perfect vaccination will never be achieved, but it is very likely to help keep cases low and therefore to protect individuals & communities against COVID-19.

• It also improves social cohesion and shows that one is willing to “do one’s part” to fight the pandemic. We’re all in the same position and coping with a great deal of uncertainty, even regarding the vaccines, but we have to do what seems best at the moment in order to move forward as a society.

• It is, and always was, a temporary measure.
  

Here are my point-by-point objections to the above argument in favour of vaccine passports:

• This is less and less true with every passing day. Immunity is now known to drop off significantly after 6-8 months. The vaccines are much less effective against variants. Furthermore, substantial immunity is conferred by having had the virus, making vaccination only an extra step and not necessary in order to protect against disease. So, as an argument for why we should use vaccine passports, this is a huge oversimplification that forces one solution where several are available. Notably, vaccine passport policies largely do NOT contain a caveat that one can present proof of vaccination OR a negative test result within 24 hours, which seriously raises the question of what the true goal of the passports is: to keep Covid cases low, or to have as many people as possible take a vaccine. These goals are by no means synonymous.

• Wrong. The more people have immunity and/or protection, the less transmission there will be, probably. Other measures like air circulation and PPE also have a role. The proportion of a group that is vaccinated is a poor proxy for the level of transmission that will occur amongst them. This point is further proven by the fact that the confidence vaccinated people express in their behaviour, wearing masks less often and attending more large social gatherings in indoor settings, means that they probably transmit more Covid than those who do not have the same confidence or who are not allowed in such spaces. This aspect is a byproduct of the policies in question, however.

• Replace the word vaccinated with protected, and this is true.

• Given that vaccinated people are still fully capable of spreading the virus, and the settings being forwarded as candidates for passport-requiring zones are those where transmission in general is more likely (indoor, unmasked settings), it is certainly not the case that transmission will be avoided through use of vaccine passports. We are speaking of an incremental benefit, if any at all. The cost of excluding people who haven’t received a vaccine but who are still protected against it, to the same or even a higher degree than the vaccinated, is probably higher than the benefit.

• The policies certainly will, and have, led many people to get vaccinated who originally hesitated for shaky reasons. They caved to the pressure. But it is not for us or the government to decide which rights are important to conserve and which ones are dispensable. The right to go to a movie or out to dinner of course seem trivial compared to the right to access healthcare or grocery stores, but that’s not the point — the point is that you are going along with a government that is prepared to take away the rights of its citizens in order to force them into performing a certain desired behaviour. This is manipulation, and it is not what a government is meant to do. The government is not a parent telling its children that they can have the candy they want only after they eat their vegetables. It is simply not the government’s place to dangle rights in front of its people like a reward for good behaviour. This is quite antithetical to the founding principles of our countries, actually. Government-as-parent is a dangerous philosophy to adopt.

• As I have already mentioned, the probability of vaccines providing this desired outcome has been falling precipitously as time goes on. There may certainly have been some truth to it at one point in time, but the force behind that argument is now quite weak. Even if it were true, it does not follow that vaccine passports are an acceptable way to increase vaccination rates in the population, for reasons already discussed.

• The purpose of a medical intervention is not to signal one’s inner feelings to those around them. It is a very intimate decision that one should not be guilted into making. Accusations of selfishness for not getting the vaccine are extremely unsympathetic and do not take the reasons the individual has for their decision into consideration. This argument displays thinking that values the purported collective good at the expense of the individual, which is morally corrupt in my view.

• One can hope that this is the case, but who knows? And even if it is and always was temporary, that doesn’t make it okay. A temporary evil is still an evil. So this is not actually a justification for the use of vaccine passports but an attempted excuse from the harms done by them, appealing to a supposed greater benefit than harm in the long run. This assumed benefit is unlikely to become actual, as I have already discussed.

Conclusion: the best someone who still believes that the vaccines will play an important role in a Covid-free future is to make them widely available to anyone who wants them, and leave those who have chosen not to get them alone. People do change their minds sometimes, but even so: it is not the government’s prerogative to decide what enters a person’s body, EVEN IF that thing were the certain answer to a worldwide problem. I am optimistic enough to believe that if the vaccines were as perfect an answer to the situation as many make them out to be, we would not have a problem convincing most of the population to take it. That said, a huge proportion of people were and are convinced of the vaccine’s vital role in ending the pandemic. From the pro-universal-vax perspective, this ought to be regarded the best that can be done without a serious violation of individual rights.

Since I fear it has not been clear from what I have written so far, I do not think everyone who believes in vaccine passports is a ridiculous authoritarian operating on pure delusion. This is obviously not the case. Given the assumptions I outlined above and the group 1 perspective, reasonable people can certainly be convinced that vaccine passports are a rational and morally acceptable next step in dealing with the pandemic. Moreover, which of the 2 groups one falls into has quite a lot to do with the information one is exposed to through one’s media feed, which we all know tends to be highly skewed based on political leaning. Nonetheless, I do believe that too many people have been too unquestioning about policies introduced by our governments in the name of protecting public health that do not actually serve this end and actually come with significant collateral damage. And I believe that many people are being complacent about what something like a vaccine passport means for their ability to lead free and satisfying lives in the future. The chaos and fear produced by a pandemic of this magnitude and duration has led many to trust excessively in their government and to turn a blind eye to potential harms inflicted by its actions, whether purposeful or not. This is the main point I have been trying to make.

As I have already briefly touched on, many will be quick to point out that the requirement to provide proof of vaccination in order to enter certain spaces such as restaurants and gymnasiums is not the same thing as a vaccine mandate. True, in the sense that a government actively forcing people to get an injection (or risk losing their job / being expelled / facing legal action) certainly bears a more tyrannical air than the slow and creeping exclusion of unvaccinated citizens from selected spaces where some claim can be made that they place other citizens at heightened risk.* The distinction is not entirely useless, and may be useful to bear in mind for those despairing that we have descended into something akin to Nazi Germany with the introduction of vaccine passports. No, we have not, and this line of argument is frankly appalling. There is, however, serious and valid reason for concern over the ways in which vaccine passports and the normalization of asking people their status, as though this is not a private decision which reasonable and moral people may differ on, creates two classes of citizens which cleanly lend themselves to differential treatment. One cannot ignore the implications of a society divided into two classes where one class is lauded as the reasonable and moral one, while the other is deemed incontrovertibly deluded, irresponsible, and even cruel. Such a dichotomy is a dangerous precursor for a blatantly oppressive society. Or perhaps it is not a precursor, but a symptom of a society that has already fallen very, very far from its ideals of liberty and fairness.

*Of course, mandates have very much become a real thing as well, the arguments against which are numerous and I expect obvious to more people than those against passports.

The simple fact is that a new criterion for discrimination and exclusion is creeping into our society beneath the radar of our supposedly hyper-inclusive culture. While not equivalent to forcible vaccination, the difference is certainly not night and day. If citizens can be prevented from accessing certain places and services because of their vaccination status, and this prevention is supposedly based on the argument that unvaccinated people pose a risk to public health and safety that vaccinated people do not, what is to stop these policies from being applied to all public spaces - including grocery stores, pharmacies, and public transportation? Already, Canadians cannot board a flight, domestic or international, without showing proof of vaccination. We cannot take trains between cities and provinces without demonstrating that we have been “adequately protected against COVID-19”, where the only criterion accepted as adequate protection is having received one of the 4 approved vaccines in Canada. Proof of a negative test taken within 24-72 hours of the trip is not accepted, nor is proof of antibodies against the virus for individuals who have already been exposed to it. What? Beyond the ethics of the matter, this policy is blatantly irrational and very clearly does not serve the interests of public health. It is increasingly obvious that policies put in place in the name of protecting public health aren’t actually about public health, but are in fact the arbitrary - or worse, malevolent - moves of a government that is operating in the name of interests other than the good of the people it serves. I do not wish to sound conspiratorial and I do not wish to catastrophize about the political situation in Canada and other parts of the world; I am only pointing out the glaringly obvious about too many of the policies implemented to combat the COVID-19 pandemic that do absolutely nothing to serve this end.

It is my sincere belief that vaccine passports and threats of vaccine mandates for certain professions (ie healthcare workers and teachers) and institutions (ie universities) are simply attempts by the government and institutions to do everything in their power to get as many people to take the vaccine as possible, short of forcing needles into people’s arms. I do not believe these measures will be long-lasting, or that most threatened mandates will be actualized. I don’t believe the powers-that-be will stop at nothing to get 100% of the population to take a COVID-19 vaccine, and so I am not expecting an imminent authoritarian takeover. I do, however, very much resent the use of such manipulative and, yes, authoritarian measures in a country that calls itself a liberal democracy. This whole situation has laid bare the fact that both our government and our society in Canada fundamentally do not support individual liberty or the honest pursuit of the truth without constant politicization. Assuming I, and the many others who share my position, are right that vaccine passports are merely a political gesture to get vaccination rates up, this does not constitute a reason for relief. It means that we have become comfortable with our government blatantly lying to us. It means that we have given it the power to threaten us with the loss of our jobs, schooling, and access to public life if the cause being cited to justify it is important enough. This isn’t trivial. Not to mention that we could turn out to be wrong. Vaccine passports could be around for a long time, and the implications of that are much more frightening.

———

A note on the advent and impacts of vaccine passports.

When vaccine passport policies were being drafted and discussed by many Canadian provinces in the Summer of 2021, I read an article in a Montréal newspaper about Québec’s plan to implement such a policy beginning September 1st. Below is a quote from the article:

Geneviève Beaulieu-Pelletier, a psychologist and associate professor at the Université du Québec à Montréal, said the passport system could help overcome some vaccine hesitancy by giving hardened opponents an excuse to get their shots while saving face. “There are some people who don’t dare give up their position,” she said. Now, they can say they didn’t have a choice.

Firstly, it is concerning to say the least that academic psychology is being used by policymakers in order to better manipulate people. Our goal in studying the human mind and revealing its vulnerabilities should not be to develop sophisticated tools of manipulation. Of course, knowledge always bears this risk: knowledge is power, and power is always prone to being abused. What is shocking in this quotation, though, is the language used to describe vaccine hesitant individuals. Terms like ‘saving face’ and ‘excuse’ portray those who hesitate to get vaccinated as children throwing a temper tantrum, not as grown adults with developed cortices capable of making a rational decision. Beaulieu-Pelletier mentions that many vaccine-hesitant people “don’t dare give up their position.” She points out the obvious as though this basic feature of human psychology applies uniquely or more strongly to vaccine hestitators than it does to those vehemently committed to the official messaging that the vaccines are perfectly safe and effective. Human beings don’t often like to change their minds once they have arrived at a conclusion, and this is true regardless of what the content of said conclusion is. This article paints the picture that Beaulieu-Pelletier believes her knowledge of psychology permits her to use established psychological phenomena against everyone who disagrees with her on some aspect of the COVID-19 vaccines, implying that these individuals are uniquely obstinate, while not attributing the same psychological tendencies to those holding the same view. This is a double standard if ever there was one, and quite a nasty one at that - it is a product of the selective use of one’s expertise for political purposes.

The final sentence in the above quotation is quite something: “Now, they can say they didn’t have a choice.” As though it is a privilege being afforded to people who are compelled to get vaccinated if they wish to be allowed in restaurants and movie theatres, or even to keep their jobs, to be able to claim that they had no choice in the matter. As though it is lucky for their egos that the government is stepping in and forcing them to get a vaccine or else have their freedoms taken away. They didn’t have a choice, so they don’t have to admit they were wrong - they just have to get the vaccine without admitting their embarrassing folly in originally not wanting it. To suggest that you are compassionately helping those who do not wish to receive a vaccine by taking away their freedom to choose whether or not they get it is beyond condescending. The moral high ground one assumes by making a statement like this is difficult to fathom.

When this article was published in August of 2021, I thought that the introduction of proof-of-vaccination measures in Québec and and other Canadian provinces would not be a successful strategy for increasing vaccination rates in the population. It seems I was partly mistaken. Those who had not received one of the new COVID-19 vaccines prior to the implementation of vaccine passports seem to fall into two broad classes: those with a clearly established reason for not getting it, who had firmly decided not to be vaccinated and thus would not budge when the passports were introduced, and those who were undecided on the matter, either because they hadn’t had the time to research any stipulations or had simply delayed booking an appointment to be vaccinated, feeling no real urgency to do so. Members of this latter group seem to have largely conceded to the pressure to be vaccinated as a result of passport policies, or else were compelled by them to solidify their thus-far background reasons for not getting vaccinated, thereby entering the former group by the time the passports were implemented. This is a very interesting development because it means that as time goes on, the subset of citizens who have not been vaccinated are increasingly composed of those with a strong conviction about why they have abstained and will continue to do so. For the most part, the undecideds have caved and gotten vaccinated because of a failure to formulate a good reason not to, or because of an overriding desire not to be left out of some of their valued activities such as indoor dining and sporting events. This leaves only the most adamant objectors behind.

So, the result of proof-of-vaccination measures has really been this: those who remain unvaccinated are those who have a true conviction that they do not need or want to be, and as a result, discovering that someone hasn’t been jabbed has become an even more potent excuse to cast them into the out-group of the deranged and uncaring with no possibility of repeal. In other words, these policies have escalated the flammability of the choice not to be vaccinated by ensuring that anyone making this choice is at the very least willing to make some sacrifices in the name of their decision, which suggests that something more than mere procrastination or uncertainty rests behind it. Undoubtedly, this is no accident: policymakers and other government officials knew what they were doing with the vaccine passport policies. They were simultaneously strengthening the ability of the media and much of the public to attach the label “anti-vaxxer” with all its connotations of deluded conviction to those who remain unvaccinated against COVID-19, and giving force and validity to the opposing argument that our society is descending into tyranny of an abominable sort - even fostering comparisons to some of the worst regimes in history. They were adding fuel to the already-raging fire of political polarization in the West, bringing our societal division to the level of a nearly all-consuming inferno.

A meagre attempt to reduce this polarization: if you are of the view that the vaccines aren’t all that they are being hailed to be, note that a) it is true that vaccination reduces chances of bad outcomes and transmission, b) even if adverse events are higher proportionally for this vaccine than any others in history, it is still true that the vast majority of people do not have a negative reaction, c) what alternative was there at the time these vaccines first appeared? If we didn’t have any vaccines, what would the situation look like today?

If you are of the view that the vaccines are the answer and everyone should get vaccinated, look at some of the reasons individuals are refusing the vaccine. They are not trivial or selfish or irrational or deluded. And if you are convinced of even one of the possible reasons, you will understand how damaging the one-size-fits-all approach of vaccine passport and mandate policies are.

We need to learn to live together, and to hear each other’s reasons for believing what we believe, even if we adamantly disagree. More importantly, we need to respect and defend the rights and freedoms of our fellow citizens, regardless of what it is they say and do, because the future depends on it.

On Virtue and Having an Opinion

One does not ordinarily hear the notion of virtue summoned in a discussion about opinions (in the simple sense of having them or not), yet there is an important relation to be noted between these two things. Many a reasonable person refrains from engaging in the controversial issues of their day, eager as they are to stay far away from impassioned disagreement, and perhaps more eager still to avoid committing to a view only to turn out to be wrong. There is good reason for such an approach: topics on which people widely disagree can be a source of unwarranted drama, a destructive force within relationships, and a path to ideological commitment that leaves one with a firm set of beliefs and no way out, once the ego has become involved in defending them. Such neutral parties may like to think of themselves as cognitively flexible, able to see the merit on both sides of a debate, and consequently make agreeable companions to a range of opinionated friends. Other neutral nellies may simply lack interest in the affairs of the world, believing that there is no point in attempting to learn about a topic and come to a conclusion that many others will disagree with anyway. These individuals are disengaged in a less deliberate way, steering clear of public discourse out of insecurity or accepted ignorance. They are unwilling to put any effort into forming an opinion; into asserting themselves as free-standing individuals. Both of these types live in fear of being challenged, of having others push back against their assertions, and thus live to protect themselves from self-doubt and conflict with others.

On the other end, vast swaths of people who 'have an opinion' do not actually have an opinion at all: they merely regurgitate the somewhat intelligent-sounding views of those around them, spewing platitudes about complex social issues and attaching their egos to the passion contained in the argument. These types often use their poorly formed opinions as a way to assert a kind of pseudo-enlightened, holier-than-thou attitude whenever the opportunity arises - and this tends to happen rather frequently when the opinion in question is on a pertinent topic. This tendency rests within all of us, of course, as a basic manifestation of our evolved tribalistic psychology. The difference lies in how actively each of us resists the urge to 'pick a team', so to speak, and begin defending its honour with vigour and passion. Some people are mostly reasonable and open to new information on the opinions they hold, while others are almost entirely ideological, taking on a predetermined set of opinions that fill them with fire and provide a sense of identity and purpose. These individuals are those whose entire sense of self is intertwined with a particular world view, and who will therefore behave most dramatically in situations of dissent. For them, an opinion being challenged is equivalent to an attack on their very sense of self, and so it is understandable that a strong reaction is elicited. But let it be noted that the majority of us probably enact this artificial opinionatedness on some topics while adopting a more reasonable or neutral view on others, such that the people we meet are not immediately cast into the crude categories of self-adjacent or other-adjacent, in-group or out-group. (At least this is my optimistic belief). I maintain that for most of us, though perhaps less and less every day, the world is not black-and-white but appears chiefly in shades of grey.

So, where does virtue figure in these various opinionated modes? I will take for granted that most readers recognize the moral implications of the second opinion-status described above, where one's tribal inclinations get the better of one and lead to a superficial commitment to one side or another on a given issue. I will also assume that we each have the self-awareness to identify at least one occasion on which we ourselves have adopted such an approach, committing before carefully considering the potential merits of each side and believing the choice to be so obvious that such deliberation is deemed unnecessary - even damaging - to engage in. In doing this, one oversimplifies their adversaries' views, feels justified in condemning them as ignorant and/or evil, and almost inevitably begins mentally to remove them of their status as human beings equal to oneself. It leads to a dangerously oversimplified view of human nature and the problems we face, and fuels the ego-driven emotional wreckage that immoral persons are reliably made of. In holding opinions as a source of identity defined by that which it is not, rather than by that which it is, the individual organizes their psyche in a war-like manner where their entire being is on the line in situations of conflict, and where change and compromise have passed beyond the realm of possibility. This is a death-like way of being in a sense articulated beautifully in the Tao Te Ching:

"Human beings are soft and supple when alive, stiff and straight when dead. The myriad creatures, the grasses and trees are soft and fragile when alive, dry and withered when dead. Therefore, it is said: The rigid person is a disciple of death; The soft, supple, and delicate are lovers of life. An army that is inflexible will not conquer; A tree that is inflexible will snap. The unyielding and mighty shall be brought low; The soft, supple, and delicate will be set above."

Let me note here that the necessity of being flexible in matters of opinion is not to be taken as an admonishment of having firm principles. We need to have principles as the moral and practical basis from which to live our lives, as a source of direction and of meaning. Moreover, these principles may carry profound value for individuals and communities, and this is not to be cast aside in the name of remaining open to alternative views. The purpose of principles, though, is to guide one through life in the best way possible, such that some good comes of our existence. Their purpose is not to provide an excuse to be rigid in one’s convictions to the point of looking down upon those whose principles differ, nor are they to be used as a yardstick for moral virtue so that we may compare amongst ourselves. The need for principles ought to motivate a desire to refine them into the best source of guidance possible, not a desire to be the one who ‘got it right’. This is the point I wished to make with regards to treating opinions as provisional positions rather than as a source of identity. This is to say nothing of the colossal dangers that come with expressing a view with which one is not fully acquainted simply to appear informed. Promoting ideas one does not genuinely support or understand, yet becoming responsible for them in expressing them as if they did, is an abominable but shockingly widespread form of immoral behaviour. Treating opinions like mere accessories to be used to augment a false sense of self-righteousness is perhaps the pinnacle of vice, leading to some very dark places indeed.

What I would really like to elaborate on, though, is the immoral nature of the first opinion-status described above: that of non-commitment. Make no mistake, I am a strong advocate for remaining flexible in one's positions as a topic becomes more and more deeply understood, and for continuing to demonstrate as much flexibility as one can muster even after developing a somewhat firm position. Furthermore, I believe it is wrong that we expect opinions to be permanent, like destinations one arrives at and never leaves. Mere opinions are just that - opinions - not hard-and-fast convictions. We must practise enough humility to admit that even our most closely-held beliefs could change, radically or moderately, in response to new information. The ego has no place in opinion, though the self is importantly implicated, as I will discuss further on. Such was the attitude Socrates took to the extreme in his resolution that he knew nothing at all, which he carried out through a keenness to discuss things openly and extensively in order to get at the truth (or as close to it as possible). My contention here is that there is a critical difference between non-commitment as a philosophy in-and-of itself, and a balanced approach to tumultuous topics where one accepts a particular view provisionally, with the project of refining this view as time goes on always in mind.

Of course, we humans are hardly capable of being so restrained as to plainly refuse to commit to any beliefs until all the details of a topic have been explored exhaustively. Not only is this something of an impossible goal, but it is not even in the interests of virtue to bring such an approach to salient issues. We must accept a degree of uncertainty in the knowledge we consider ourselves to have if we wish to live successfully in the world and avoid falling into a purely nihilistic, or hubristic, state. For this very reason, opinions ought always to have the form: "this is what I think, for now" if we wish to save ourselves from utter humiliation upon being proven wrong at a later date, and if we wish to regard ourselves as rational and humble people. Avoiding hubris in matters of opinion relies on a commitment to resist tribalism and remain open to dissent. This foundation crucially requires keeping the ego at bay so that we are able to receive criticism without it shaking our (superficial) sense of self and prompting defensiveness. Conversely, avoiding radical skepticism or just plain meaninglessness in its many manifestations requires actually having an opinion to begin with. We must assert ourselves in the world in order to be a complete person; without doing this, we are lacking a distinct sense of self and risk disappearing altogether in a fundamental sense. Taken as the inverse of overconfidence, meaninglessness strips us of all attempted knowledge and in so doing removes our very foundation for being in the world. The result is a kind of death without actually dying - a form of remaining dead by way of failing to assert a Self when one had the chance. In matters of opinion, then, we are left with an appealing middle path between arrogance and meaninglessness: the path of provisional opinion, genuinely believed in but never settled absolutely and for all time.

This brings me to the chief argument I wanted to make: refusing to have an opinion is an exercise in cowardice and laziness that undermines the very foundation of what it means to be alive. The aforementioned element of uncertainty in knowledge is not to be taken as a free pass to exist in a purely uncommitted state where one refuses to engage in matters of opinion and to adopt a particular view, even if only tentatively. Being uncertain and flexible in the views we hold is fundamentally different from failing to adopt particular views in the first place, thereby choosing to exist in a vacuum of meaning. To exist in such a manner is to live as a dead person; it is not only to be ignorant, but to accept and fall in love with one's own ignorance, having no desire to escape it. It is to be an undifferentiated, unthinking, cowardly, virtually non-existent shell of what might appear superficially to be a person, but in fact is not. It is to refuse to be a living, breathing, self-asserting human being. To be unopinionated in this sense is thus to choose not to be a person at all. And such a state is, in every important way, the antithesis of virtue.

I should clarify that by ‘virtue' I mean having a character and a life that has chosen an absolute meaning for itself, such that there is a concrete ‘good’ at which one is aimed and an established set of commitments through which one realizes this aim. To be virtuous is to model oneself after the good, to promote and embody it to the greatest extent one can manage. The inverse is drifting about aimlessly with no direction or meaning, and it is from this state that what we commonly understand as ‘vice’ typically develops. It is virtually never the case that vice is deliberately pursued as an end in itself, but far more common that it comes to be in an individual when he or she lacks some clear and worthy aim to work toward. Without an accepted concept of the good, and of the meaning of all sorts of other important phenomena, one is left empty and vulnerable to any number of terrible ideas taking over and occupying one’s soul - bad ideas, cruel ideas, ideas not purposefully taken on but randomly received by a wide open soul, a soul available for taking over because it lacks any devotion to the good. To remain uncommitted to a particular point of view on any such important matter is thus to choose not to be good - to purposefully be the opposite of good through failing to commit to a definition even of this basic term. More generally, in neglecting to have an opinion, one evades the responsibility we have to live out our existence in as resolute a way as we can. Echoing Jean-Paul Sartre’s existentialist principles of intentionality and bad faith, our responsibility as conscious beings is to make meaning out of things in the world - to form an opinion, in other words, and to assert it confidently. Evading this responsibility by claiming not to be the consciousness that we are is to operate in bad faith, which is rightly construed as immoral if we take ‘the good’ to reside in fulfilling our duty as human beings, and accept that our duty is to make meaning of the things we encounter in the world. The freedom of our consciousness is worth nothing if we fail to do anything definite with it, to decide on one thing over another and to act accordingly instead of drifting about like a feather in the wind.

Bad faith may be compared to the death-like modes of being discussed previously, wherein we either assert identity with some particular view in a superficial, egotistical manner, rigidly clinging to a specific meaning as though the world depended on it, or we claim to be an absolute non-identity, a disembodied consciousness with no sure thoughts or opinions; a ‘being’ with no real being-in-the-world. To avoid bad faith and to live in an authentically life-like manner requires that we assert a Self through making genuine meaning out of things, by committing to particular opinions while not taking them to be absolute or universally true by virtue of our having arrived at them. Meaning is flexible and transient, accepted in one moment but open to being recreated completely in the next. We do ourselves great harm by attempting to make ourselves permanent through identifying with a singular meaning, or by attempting not to exist at all by identifying with nothing. These two modes of bad faith are, as expressed by Sartre, in direct contradiction with the existentially authentic life. If we are to exist in the world as a definite Self, we must choose ourselves, we must have opinions, and we must be both adaptable and discerning enough to avoid the two modes of vice elaborated throughout this piece.

Expanding from the relatively small-scale matter of opinions, there is an analogous point to be made about committing to a particular path in life over and above ‘keeping one’s options open’ and feeling liberated by the presence of such extensive choice. An abundance of choice is not a good thing in and of itself without the sense of responsibility to actually choose amongst the choices, to commit to one among many and produce something valuable and profound out of this chosen course. Failure to choose, to commit, results in a pervasive emptiness of spirit and flatness of experience that is the enemy of a virtuous life. Jose Ortega y Gasset wrote of the youth of his day: “By dint of feeling itself free, exempt from restrictions, it feels itself empty. An ‘unemployed’ existence is a worse negation of life than death itself. Because to live means to have something definite to do—a mission to fulfil—and in the measure in which we avoid setting our life to something, we make it empty.” It is an incontrovertible fact of life that we must choose a particular mode of existence, including our character traits, opinions and values, the people we surround ourselves with, and the passions we fill our time with. Carving out these specifics from a sea of possibility is the fundamental activity we exist to engage in. To the extent that we fail to do this, we fail to be a complete person.