What I don't get is the cognitive dissonance of those who demand someone else get vaccinated to protect them.
Fear.
This is one of the rare cases when I agree with you. Fear, true. I feared Covid since that day when I was eating in my favoured pub and I heard at the radio "It has been confirmed that this new virus can be transmitted while the victim is still fully asymptomatic." It was one of those "where you were when you heard about the Challenger?" moments.
In these two years I have been accused of "living in fear", "panicking" and being a "fear monger", and all these accuses are true - my point being "you have to panic
before you get Covid, not after." Panicking after only generates harrowing posts on social media.
I lost my father to Covid before vaccines were available. My mother came to live with us (we have a big house) but that meant that for a long time I had her to think about. Last thing I wanted was to bring her the virus. She was and still is our local version of far-right and yet now she is fully jabbed. I guess that losing your husband of decades to Covid sobers you a bit.
I had two close friends who got Covid. One before vaxes were available. He ended up with months of conjunctivitis - not the best for a comic book artist. Another was anti-vax. When he got Covid the lab test said "our test detects the presence of all known variants of Covid" - something I didn't know was even possible. It was almost fun to read (OK, I laughed). Of course he panicked, started making lunatic demands (like asking to be vaxxed at once - of course he had the basic
knowledge of delusions about vaxes that you can find in many posts here) and peed in his bed for two weeks (out of fear, not Covid).
Now he is fine again - and it comes without saying that, since he didn't die, he is deriding Covid again (while searching on the internet when he will be able to get his first jab).
And... you know the fun thing? During these two years I was able to run a Call of Cthulhu campaign (*), go to the movies, eat again in my favourite pub, have a Summer vacation in France and, basically, have a semblance of normality in my life. Of course the pandemic sux and lockdowns and other restriction are not fun, and maybe you will get Covid anyway. But the precautions you have to take are exceedingly simple - as long as you are not an idiot.
And that's it. Yes, Pat, you are right. I'm fearing Covid right now. I look forward to the day I will not need to.
(*) An interesting side note from that campaign was that the investigators were involved in a car crash. The question "Did cars in the 1920s had seat belts?" spurned some research. It turned out that in the '20s you had to ask for belt as an optional. They became part of every car in the '50s. When this happened, screams of "seatbelts are against my freedom!" promptly arose and some smartos even cut them and made a point of throwing the seatbelt in front of the local Governor office (or mayor, or liege...) Note how their use wasn't even mandatory.
So, if precautions against caving your head in a car crash were "against freedom", imagine precautions against something much, much less dangerous - like a virus. Something out of Nazi Germany, obviously.