[Desk Column] COVID-19, After That Day

That day changed everything. Losing his beloved father, the world was filled with fear. Nine-year-old boy Oscar Sel. The 9/11 terror shook the boy's life to its core. "For some reason, I still found it incredibly difficult to take a shower. Taking the elevator was even more so." There were other things that scared Oscar: germs, airplanes, fireworks, Arabs in public places, unattended bags, men with mustaches, smoke, tall buildings, turbans...

The American literary prodigy Jonathan Safran Foer’s novel Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close is a coming-of-age drama about a boy overcoming terror. Oscar confesses the reason he obsessively chases after traces of his father: "I need to know how Dad died. So I won’t have to imagine how he died anymore."

Just like Oscar in the novel, countless Oscars outside the novel experienced many changes after that day. Even 19 years later, New Yorkers still sigh with relief at the sound of small fireworks and remain wary of visits from unfamiliar neighbors. Foreign visa issuance has become more stringent, the New York Police Department (NYPD) has become rougher, and anti-immigration policies have intensified. Thus, American history is divided into pre-9/11 and post-9/11.

In another sense, for us too, everything changed on "that day." The sudden onslaught of the novel coronavirus disease (COVID-19), as terrifying as terror itself. School openings were postponed, churches closed, and unprecedented crises like working from home emerged. The words of the quarantine authorities fighting COVID-19 for over two months are therefore meaningful: "Just as the 9/11 terror changed perceptions of security, COVID-19 will change everyday life." (Kwon Jun-wook, Deputy Director of the Central Disaster and Safety Countermeasures Headquarters) COVID-19 did not bring down the Twin Towers, but it laments that it is dismantling the existing order.

Jung Eun-kyung, head of the Central Disaster and Safety Countermeasures Headquarters, gives a more specific directive: "We must change the culture of 'coming to work even when sick' to 'resting when sick.' Flexible work arrangements that allow working from home to become routine must be established." In other words, whether we like it or not, we now stand at a crossroads of change. From handwashing to working from home, from small habits to industrial landscapes, some things will change naturally, others inevitably.

Yuval Harari, who defined COVID-19 as "the greatest crisis of our generation," also emphasized "inevitable change." "We must also consider what kind of world will emerge after the storm (COVID-19) passes. The storm will eventually pass, and most of humanity will survive, but the world we live in may be very different." (Financial Times op-ed, March 20)

What is noteworthy are the clues around us hinting at these changes. According to a recent report by the Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM), 69% of surveyed companies last year adopted remote work (fully or partially). This is more than three times the figure from 20 years ago. It is obvious that COVID-19 will fuel this trend. The market for "untact (contactless) services," born from fatigue with over-connection and over-communication, is also significant. The "right not to connect with others," symbolized by eating alone (honbap) and drinking alone (honsul), is an extension of the "social distancing" advocated by quarantine authorities. Along this line, the online video conferencing service Zoom is booming, and food delivery orders are surging.

Looking at it this way, remote work and untact services are disconnections for another kind of connection. Because technology replaces physical distance between people. Because as the physical distance between people grows, information, communication, and entertainment fill the gap. Ironically, COVID-19 is testing that possibility. In this way, we are facing another kind of terror.