Self-care as political resistance - or how (not) to sacrifice humans to 'save' the economy

In this kind of landscape – with more than 50,000 confirmed deaths from COVID-19 in the United States and an estimated 26 million people laid off or furloughed since mid-March – it’s nearly impossible to assert confidently that one life matters, and that this one valuable life belongs to you and me and to people decidedly unlike either you or me. Despite the hyper-individualistic American ethos, asserting the inherent sacredness of a person’s worth divorced from their assets or future earning potential is an inherently theological, if not deeply prophetic, pronouncement – especially when this worthiness sacrifices the supposed short-term and long-term flourishing of “the Market.”