People Have Gotten ‘Institutionalized’ by COVID

It is time for everybody to embrace their liberation from COVID-19 prison.

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Dr. Anthony Fauci testifies at the House Select Subcommittee on the coronavirus pandemic on Capitol Hill, April 15, 2021.

Susan Walsh/Pool via Reuters

In the film The Shawshank Redemption, an elderly character named Brooks gets released after 50 years in prison. Instead of celebrating his release, however, he is tentative — and shortly after experiencing the freedom of the outside world, he hangs himself.

“These walls are funny,” Morgan Freeman’s character Red explains to his fellow prisoners as they process the news. “First you hate them, then you get used to them. Enough time passes, you get so you depend on them. That’s ‘institutionalized.’”

Philip Klein

About the Author

Philip Klein

Philip Klein is the editor of National Review Online.

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