It has touched us all: commentary on the social implications of touch during the COVID-19 pandemic

This paper considers the political implications of the COVID-19 pandemic through a focus on the sense of touch. It begins by briefly outlining current sociological and philosophical theories of touch as an empathetic, pervasive, and social sense. Taking lead from news media, it then suggests how touch and virus-enforced touchlessness intersects with issues of race, class, gender, ableism, and technology. Action taken by governing bodies in the face of the pandemic, such as the introduction of lockdowns and the emphasis on working from home, signals and protects privilege while exacerbating oppression for the marginalised and Othered. The ability to both deny touch and simultaneously flaunt advice surrounding distancing clarifies a point of departure that separates the lower classes and the racialised, the non-male and the less abled, from the male and able-bodied, the white and wealthy.