How the "dancing nurse" meme fueled disgust and dissent

The “keep dancing Orlando” campaign of 2016 was an evident precursor to the “dancing nurses” operation four years later.

In both cases, a widely reported traumatic event was broadcast far and wide. The Orlando event was a local story, but it received nationwide attention; meanwhile, the “deadly global pandemic” which allegedly broke out in March of 2020 was ceaselessly and relentlessly hyped, with breathless news reports being hurled into in every conceivable nook and cranny of the whole wide world; one could scarcely escape news of it, even if one lived as a determined hermit in some far-flung, remote location deep in the middle of the vastest desert or the most impassibly thick forest or jungle.

In 2016 Orlando, it may be deduced, they were beta testing their newly-conceived “dance psyop” in a limited manner, but by 2020, they were going for broke. By April, the authorities of most states, provinces, and principalities had managed to put their citizenry under some form of “house arrest.” Businesses were forced to close, millions lost their jobs, children were taken out of schools, houses of worship were shuttered, and men, women, and children were sternly instructed to “stay home,” excepting the carrying out of certain absolutely necessary activities.

The world economy was thus effectively shut down, causing immense damage to the lives and livelihoods of those of modest means. Perhaps most insultingly, those who did not work in such fields deemed “essential” were implicitly dismissed as unimportant. The “essential” workers, however, were allowed to continue to report to their jobs.

Amongst those deemed essential were, of course, nurses. And in a sense, this made sense, given the notion of the “deadly global pandemic.” For a while, throughout March and April, the public was given to understand that hospitals had become “war zones,” and that hospital personnel were so swamped with patients that they had to work around the clock. Nurses and doctors were hailed as “heroes,” and the UK even instituted a ritual whereby the general public (those who had been stripped of their salaries and forced to “stay home”) was expected to applaud in unison—in a manner akin, it was observed by not a few skeptics, to “obedient seals”-- every Thursday night, for all the sacrifices being made on their behalf by those who, like soldiers during wartime, were feverishly at work, desperately laboring to save those who had been sickened by this new plague.

Indeed, a great deal of media coverage was produced which reinforced the above notions. But at the same time, the “dancing nurse” videos began to emerge, which strongly militated against such a presentation of events.

At first, the response to these videos was actually largely positive: people swamped with media-generated gloom, doom, and dread needed a lift, after all. It was nice to see our newly-minted “heroes” having some fun on the job. But as the days and weeks passed, with no forecasted end in sight for this unprecedented “health crisis,” many began to regard the dancing nurses with impatience, and finally, contempt.

In a Youtube video he posted in April of 2020, Matt Walsh articulates what many had begun to feel.

“We have been told that we needed to shut down the whole economy and embrace a Great Depression, because hospitals are being overwhelmed…. And now, while millions of Americans wait in line at foodbanks, because their jobs have been taken from them, we have hospital staff posting dance videos! I think a lot of people are going to look at that and they’re going to say, ‘Why did I lose my job?? They (the nurses) have got nothing to do, and they’re recording dance videos?? It’s wildly, insanely inappropriate!”

For many who had been forced out of their jobs (their livelihoods having been deemed “inessential”) and into their homes, the coordinated dances seemed almost like a taunt. “You took our fear-porn seriously, and were fecklessly compliant to your masters, and now we’re twerking in your face, giggling all the while.”

Gradually, the dancing nurses declined in stature in the public mind, passing from initial fame into something resembling infamy. The notion that their activities could be reconciled with hospitals supposedly becoming overcrowded “war zones” was viewed with greater and greater skepticism, especially as news emerged that hospitals had largely emptied, forcing many of the nursing staff to be laid off (having apparently lost their prior status as heroic and “essential” workers).

As many of the dances on display were coordinated numbers, with intricate moves (and sometimes even elaborate costumes), many reasonably asserted that these women clearly had time on their hands, which wasn’t at all consonant with the idea that they were constantly occupied with the task of heroically saving lives whilst being swamped and overwhelmed with hordes of gravely ill patients.

(to be continued)