The mask ban shit is unreal.

I always say conservatives have oppositional defiant disorder. How else could you constantly oppose things that everyone else thinks are a better way to live?
- Conservatives often answer polls in favor of positive things, but publicly state their opposition to Democrats trying to do those things and elect Republicans who actively tear down anything that works. It is madness.
- I have real issues with whether ODD is real, but I thought the same thing.
They're an opposition party that's prevented the people of the United States from passing any significant legislation since 2010. We don't have a country anymore.
Americans are a stateless people thanks to dark money. Buckle up.
- Since we're stateless I guess I'll go get an abortion and stop paying rent.
The way that people react to safety guidelines like rebellious teenagers would be almost hilarious if it didn’t get them killed.
I see so many “rebel canners” that are proud that they do shit like dry canning, because the FDA tells them not to. It’s so cool to get botulism because you don’t like daddy government telling you what to do.
The mask bans seem to be that same kind of childish reaction - “you made us wear masks! We’re going to make you not wear masks!”
The GOP's entire idiology is "trigger the libs" and "enrich the wealthy even more"
Ironically, people in the GOP cult are very easy to trigger, but they will never admit it.
they're all just children with severe behavioral disorders
I understand the intent of what you are saying, but please don't call them all children. They aren't. They are adults who should know better and should think critically and are fully responsible for their actions. I think it's important to call them out and describe them exactly as they are.
This is what being a reactionary actually is. It's not saying "completely tearing down the status quo will hurt a lot of people we wish to protect." It's saying"I have no ideology besides opposing you."
Well before covid, I knew Republicans would politicize almost anything. Covid made me realize I was wrong, because they will politicize literally anything, even a fucking virus.
Have you heard of the Abraham Accords?
This is true both ways.

Look I fucking hated the masks but also get why we needed them and wore mine. Why the fuck does anyone care if someone else is wearing one...that for them. It like being offended someone is wearing Jordans...it's not your feet.

Leave people be and if I'm afraid I'm going to catch the plague then I'm wearing a mask.

And people can say what they will about effectiveness All I know is for 2 years I wore one and didn't catch a damn cold.

Why the fuck does anyone care if someone else is wearing one
It's because all people are emotional first, and many people are stupid, too.
Seeing a mask makes them think about the pandemic, disease, mortality, death, all that heavy stuff. That feels bad. Rather than deal with that in a healthy way, they can just lash out at the thing that's bringing the bad-feels to the foreground. That is stupid. That's yelling at the smoke detector instead of doing something about the fire.
Accepting that wearing a mask is a reasonable choice means accepting a bunch of other uncomfortable things.
This can also go down the "in group good, outgroup bad" route. Belief is social. People do shit to feel like they're part of the group. Somehow wearing masks became political.
- Somehow wearing masks became political.
  It was Trump.
- Amazing summation, hit every point perfectly. Bravo.
- Yeah, as someone who still frequently wears a mask, I occasionally get comments, but telling the person off because they have no idea that my partner/child/sister/mom/grandparents may have compromised immune systems usually shuts them the fuck up.
All I know is for 2 years I wore one and didn’t catch a damn cold.
I've cohabited with someone with a major immunity problem and had to take normal, established-before-covid guidelines for making sure I don't bring back a virus that would kill someone I care about. I wore a mask for months going out, washed my hands, avoided crowds. Never got sick.
So that was before covid. Imagine how it feels seeing the whole world be advised to do the same thing, and absolutely losing their collective mind about it, while millions of people died.
It will never make sense. I mean, logically I have studied psychology and have come to understand the mechanics of people's irrational, emotional reactions. What doesn't make sense is how we elected a clown that led our nation in the direction of chaos and followed his example.
- Like for real what is the point of it it's like banning flip-flops that are blue it doesn't affect anyone of something person wearing the mask. If I'm not making you have to wear a mask when you go outside then shut up about it man. If I feel safer wearing when I feel safer wearing one it's not the end of the world I feel safe wearing a hat sometimes.... We're not going to ban all hats it's my choice to wear the damn hat... If I want to wear a mask I can wear a mask.
- Or how it's a coin flip if he gets a second chance.....
Cannot facial recognize the plebs if they are wearing a mask.
- Don't give a flying shit about that useless boondoggle homeland security their anit American goal or objective fu k them, they should be disbanded and sent to work at dollar general.
You have to get into the mindset: this isn't about making sense, it's about retribution/revenge. During the pandemic, there was a period where to go certain places you had to wear a mask and/or be vaccinated. That was because there was data saying those things inhibited the spread of the virus, but many conservatives felt they shouldn't have to because of personal freedom. Now they feel turnabout is fair play, and are saying you can't go certain places if you're wearing a mask. It doesn't matter that they argued for personal freedom, this is retribution.
It used to be that antivax people held those views because they thought vaccinations caused bad things. Those people still exist, but now there are a bunch for whom it's all about personal freedom, and only because they were told they had to get a COVID vaccine.
- Exactly it. My libertarian frienemy in one breath will tell you how he bought up a bunch of N95 masks before the lockdown, specifically going against the WHO's (or was it CDC?) advice to not horde masks back in 2020. Then in the next, he'll tell you how you're afraid of life if you wore a mask during the lockdown. And then he went out of his way to make sure his kid was the only kid not required to wear a mask once schools opened up again, forbid his wife from vaccinating their son, etc.
  It had nothing to do with science. He just went against whatever was recommended. For freedums or something.
It's so they don't look racist when they are afraid of being robbed and tell a black person to take off a mask.
- I mean, if this wasn't an airport restaurant maybe
- It's about a political as glasses, braces, crutches, wheelchairs, insulin pumps, or any other exterior medical devices. Fuck off with that false equivalency bullshit.
- Not to anyone except these crybullies. A crude hat would be crude for some visible reason other than being a hat.
  A mask is only political to these assholes trying to stop people from wearing it, and during the pandemic it was only political to the same assholes who couldn't recognize that their personal freedom didn't extend to increasing risks to the immunocompromised, elderly, and others who were at high risk.
  The freedom they demanded then would have had health implications for people around them, and the freedom they are trying to take away now has health implications for many of the people still choosing to mask up.
- i came here from the modlog and i just want to say that i think the removal is fine(ish), and the comment to which i'm replying is, basically, wrong, but the mod's explanation is also wrong and needs to be called out.
  everything is political, even birth control, and it would be even if no one was trying to ban it (though i think it was inevitable that this is the case). birth control is a means by which people who can become pregnant can actively choose to prevent that. pregnancy comes with a variety of political expectations and consequences, and so choosing to prevent pregnancy is political.
  as for the mask thing, i do think that there are some very-online right wingers who would have the same analysis as the user to whom i am responding, but, in fact, that reasoning is a desire to avoid political entanglement, so it is not actually an explanation of how masking is political. it's also not the case that wearing the mask is carrying a banner for fauci, although i believe there are factions on the right who see it this way.
  so, to reiterate, removing was fine (though probably unnecessary), the commenter is a dum dum, but the mod doesn't know what "political" means and that is a really bad omen for this sub.

Your personal right to not spread germs is being taken away.

And the idiots cheer for it. It really is unfathomable.

It puts the whole climate change “controversy” in perspective for me. It’s not controversial, these people just have a death wish. It’s best if we just move along without them, where possible, and don’t let them get in our way.
- You made a good point. There are definitely people who are actively trying to ruin the world, and that is a direct threat to mine yours and every one elses life. So then getting rid of these people should fall under self defense.
I'll never understand why they're so psychotic about masks. What do you care about someone else protecting their health if they see fit?
He has the right to wear the mask. He doesn’t have the right to eat at that restaurant.

I was at a theme park yesterday and got harassed because my wife and I were wearing masks while waiting in line for rides. I have a kidney transplant and my wife had cancer in 2016 so we're both immunocompromised. Just whose fun are we ruining?

People who identify with bullies
There was a little town next to where i work, and every year they have a "funny" theme. That year it was global warming, and they set up some mannequins that wore winter clothing, but also scuba gear. They were alse wearing masks, because it was middle of covid.
Even if i was just driving by or just stopped shortly there, i saw on multiple occasions how people ripped the masks of the mannequins angrily and threw it on the ground. Masks somehow are very offensive to people.
- God. I still think had Trump just said, "Listen to Dr. Fauci" and printed up a billion "Trump 2020" masks, he would have been elected again in a landslide. And we probably would have had far fewer dead people, too.
  Edit to clarify: I don't like him at all. He's an idiot, an asshole, a racist, and a bunch of other things. I'm just saying he had an easy path to reelection but his ego couldn't handle it.
- Masks somehow are very offensive to people.
  Somewhere deep down they know that they were wrong and that those death numbers are partly on them. Many of them knew people who died and are likely the potential connection in the chain that killed them.
  Rather than realize they were wrong and try to make up for it they turn incredibly hateful towards it in extreme denial. If they admit masks work then they admit they killed their friends and family for nothing
Similar story with my wife. She had cancer and should not catch something as serious as Covid. So, everytime we are among a lot of people, ecpecially in places with bad ventilation, we wear masks.
I haven't kept count how many times we were talked to about that. The amount of conspiracy mythics among them was rather high. And not always were people polite.
This is really idiotic. As if even other diseases, which required such precautions, haven't existed before. Too many stupid people around.
It's amazing how the people who are expressing their freedom not to wear a mask get really offended by people who express their freedom by wearing a mask.
It's starting to make me think it's not about freedom...
I live in Canada. Maybe it's different in the small towns, but I've only had one person bitch at me for masking and that's because he has a brain injury largely. I can't imagine what the US is like.

Let me fix that for you doc: Signs you shouldn’t eat at a restaurant because it’s likely unsafe, getting banned from entering because you’re wearing a mask.

Nobody's gonna tell us we have to wash our hands before handling other people's food!
I forgot the comedian's name, but he had a bit about Confederate flags in the south. He said he found them useful because they told him which places he should avoid. That way he didn't waste time expecting them to act normal.
It's self-labeling... unfortunately similar to nutcases flying American flags on pickup trucks.

I'd question the food handling practices of such a place

In a effin airport where people are wearing masks everywhere

I was traveling recently and got so many dirty looks for wearing a mask, only one at O'Hare.
And then I didn't wear it enough and caught covid for the first time. (I should have known better in cramped tourists spots). Then I had a reason to wear it, especially while temporarily homeless.
- I don't care what anyone says I hated wearing the mask when I had to wear it but I didn't catch COVID when I was wearing a mask. I know people say masks don't work but I didn't catch so much as a cold for the two years I had to wear the damn thing so if wearing a mask is going to keep me from the plague I'll take the freaking ugly looks from the unwashed masses that are stupid as shit.
- -deleted-

I say it every day: I FUCKING HATE PROPAGANDISTS!

We have those assholes to thank for this... Gotta keep Republican voters, what better way than to make them frothing with rage at whatever Democrats suggest we do...

On the flip side, this is precisely why I say .ml needs to be dealt with swiftly. They protect hexbears, and hexbears openly state that they are engaged in information warfare with the rest of the fediverse. They are literally over here protecting right wing propagandists and everyone is like "well ok just don't click on their shit if you don't want to see it."
Yeah, I'm not worried about myself falling for this nonsense. I'm worried about my family and coworkers doing shit like this because they are taking the internet seriously.
Huh??
I share your hatred but that likely isn't what is happening here.
Put simply, someone fucked up. At an airport, the competing concerns of health and security are in their most extreme tension. For some reason, someone on staff skewed security when they should have skewed health.
There is no excuse for it, and guaranteed it has already been resolved or soon will be. This is in one of the busiest international airports in the world, and masks are still very common in air travel, particularly from countries like Japan - and I believe this restaurant is even in the terminal that ANA flies into. Restaurants simply cannot afford rent if they intentionally impose restrictions like that on their customers.

Can't wait for bird flu. Shit's gonna be wild.

Yes! It's cooking between cows and farm hands.
Little bit of pig and it's all over.
By the time the deniers realize that it's actually a threat..... Well, those progressive policies might actually become law.

This is what happens when you don't club fascist idiots with baseball bats whenever you see them. Now tell me about how we have to protect their "free speech".

How would you know who the fascist is unless their free speech is protected?
- Notice "free speech" is in scare quotes. The previous comment isn't suggesting that free speech should not be protected. But rather they referring to the fact that many fascists claim that to criticize them, or to refuse to promote their views is to stifle their free speech.
- The same way my ilk once dealt with organized scabs, torture out of the first few and them shootup thei meating place.
- Why would you want to know who the fascists are? If you do then that means you gave them power. In the US fascists not only have free speech protections, they have greater free speech rights than anyone on the left. They were given- through federal legislation- the power to control all media outlets. Fascists will never allow leftists to have a platform. Centrists will never allow it either. There is no practical reason at all for the left to defend free speech for Nazis, yet they continue to do so.

Yeah, taking precautions to protect your health and the health of other does sound like anti-freedom. Is it still legal to wash your hands in the USA, or are they cracking down on that too? It's surprising that kind of stuff was allowed to continue for so long.

Only thing that is approved is full spectrum light bulb up the ass, and Lysol shots with a Clorox chaser.
- If you can't afford Clorox, store-brand bleach is fine.

Stop posting shit without visible dates...

Or at least the source https://x.com/AmmahStarr/status/1804608613916328334 June 22, 2024
Probably a repost account. They do that crap on purpose.
I don't use Twitter and this is what I have access to.
- The post by Lucky Tran is from Bluesky and is right here.
  https://bsky.app/profile/luckytran.bsky.social/post/3kvkfhxmmuu2u

I can't even imagine being so insecure that I am threatened by someone else wearing a medical mask.

I would appreciate the warning to absolutely not eat in that restaurant.

Exactly. I'm fine with avoiding it forever.

Take off the mask and start coughing on every meal you pass

I've done something similar a couple times I've been sick and masked up while (unavoidably) out. People stfu real quick if they hear that deep, rattling cough that sounds like you have TB.

They told them they don't what the business of non delusional people and they were very upfront with that at least.

The doctor should have rambled about facial recognition

Idk, she's black?

That’s because it’s not. America is a brain dead billionaire, a struggling wage slave, and a fascist in a trench coat.

https://youtu.be/FO0kRE5OTZI?si=4oQaQIVkQYjWorR0

DR TRAN

Does anybody actually know what the restaurant's policy is on masks and why they have it in the first place or are people just assuming things to rage over?

- Well, I mean before COVID plenty of places banned wearing anything that obscured your face. Like if you walked into a bank wearing a ski mask, you're probably gonna have a bad time.
  It's a restaurant anyway... You gonna eat with a mask on? The ban is kinda unnecessary because it would resolve itself once the mask wearer has their food.
- Actually it turns out I was right, you people did not bother to verify anything about this story and you're just assuming stuff to rage over.
  The restaurant in the picture is the La Tapenade Mediterranean cafe. This is a real restaurant in the O'Hare airport. This restaurant is a chain that is owned by a company called HMSHost, which a subsidiary of the big Swiss company Dufry. If you go to their website and look up their policies, you'll notice that there is zero mention of masks ANYWHERE. Here is their website, you can verify it yourself:
  https://www.hmshost.com/
  I thought that my search was flawed, so I tried to look up articles reporting this story but I couldn't find anything. The one and only source to this story is that Tweet. Which means that it's very likely that this story is a hoax made up by some Twitter rando who wanted rage bait.
  Which makes sense because it is highly unlikely for a big corporation running a company that runs chain restaurants in international airports to have a policy against masks, especially when the airport in question is in Chicago, which is one of the most liberal cities in America. You simply fell for the bait without questioning it.
Could be that they're worried that the people who got through security and had their luggage and bodies checked for weapons and identity confirmed may rob the place if they wear a mask
- Actually after doing some research on this story, there's a very good chance that it is fake.
Does anybody actually know what the restaurant’s policy is on masks
Yes, the owner of that restaurant is a conservadpshit moron. Thats the policy.

I get it, but if you're worried about covid, why are you eating in a restaurant?

Guessing she needs to eat and is away from home.
- Takeout has been a thing for tens of thousands of years, not sure how you missed it
It's called being sensible. Like... We all take risks when we go out, but it's like wearing a seatbelt. Does it eliminate risk? No. Does it reduce risk and is low risk in of itself by wearing it? Of course.
And ultimately, the insensible thing is banning masks.
- It doesn't really reduce risk much because you're literally about to take it off anyway in that same space.

Edit: To clarify, it would be best if anyone that feels they should wear a mask in the restaurant while they wait for the food, be allowed.

As someone that thinks masks work, I got a few takes on this.

In the USA, a private company can legally refuse service to anyone for any reason except a legally protected reason. If a company doesn't like your shirt they don't have to serve you. But if they don't like that you are gay they have to say they don't like your shirt, if they don't serve you because you a gay, thats illegal.
While it's stupid that they won't serve the doctor wearing a mask, wasn't the doctor going to take their mask of like immediately after sitting at the table to drink something while looking at the menu? At the very most, they would take it off to eat the food right? So they were denied service so that they could at most wear a mask for like 15 mins while they wait for the food to be made.
If you have to take you mask off to eat, is it really worth it to keep you mask on for as much as possible? Assuming your intention is not to spread disease from yourself to others, how much more harm would an additional 15 mins cause? I honestly don't know but if it's non-trivial, perhaps eating at a sitdown restaurant (which normally takes longer) is morally wrong. Although, not as morally wrong as denying service to someone wearing a mask.

The main point is to minimise the risk of infection of others. Masks do that by limiting the amount of virus you spray info the environment with every breath. The longer you have the mask on, the fewer virus-laden droplets get out, the lower the viral load is for everyone around you.
So to answer your question, yes, keeping the mask off the whole time would have been measurably worse than keeping it on before and after eating. No, getting a meal at an airport is not ethically wrong even if you have to take off the mask to eat and drink. Wearing the mask for as long as possible is the right thing to do because it offers the best chance of not getting other people sick; taking it off to eat balances your needs with the safety of others.
If everyone masked like this (even if it was just when they know they're sick, instead of always), many fewer people would get sick when they go flying.
- Yeah that makes sense.
- Well, science has also shown that environments devoid of pathogens tend to produce people with allergies and autoimmune disorders. So maybe if everyone wore masks and nobody ever got sick, we’d have a society of people with allergies and autoimmune disorders.
What if the doctor was just going in to get takeout? Or just plain wants to wear a mask while they're not eating? Whose business is it but theirs? I thought Americans believed in freedom.
- Half the country's definition of freedom is their right to impose their will onto everyone else.
- Yes I agree, they should be allowed to wear a mask when ever they want. And I'll always avoid a business that has some kind of terrible policy like this.
  I'm more honestly asking, as someone that does wear masks and avoids going out if I feel sick or know I've been exposed. How much benefit is the 15 min wait it will take to prepare the food?
Great example of actively harmful rhetoric that attempts to undermine the fact that masking works.
- I don't see how. Since the covid pandemic I wear masks if I'm sick or know I was around someone that's sick and I have to be somewhere with people. But it would be so much less possible harm if I just stay home during that time. So like if I felt like I needed a mask, I would either not go traveling or I would wear a mask and not eat in public.
  The point is that you can't wear a mask while eating or drinking so it's literally 10-15 minutes you're actually talking about wearing a mask in the restaurant.
To your first point: the person could be wearing a mask because they see immunocompromised in some way, which would be a protected class (disability). You can't refuse to serve someone because they're disabled and wearing a mask as medical equipment to supplement their ability to move about in crowds, just like you can't refuse to serve a person because they're disabled and using a wheelchair as medical equipment to supplement their ability to move around in crowds. That's a lawsuit waiting to happen.
- Hey that's a great catch.
  A store shouldn't deny entry based on something someone does for the benefit their health.
With regard to your point 1, I think a business y should give up some of its freedom to filter patrons, if it’s doing business in a place like an airport.
Just like a vendor at a stadium shouldn’t be able to individually discriminate, because they’ve made their business part of a larger system.
- Yeah it would make sense if it worked that way.
That was my first thought. Isn't indoor dining the riskiest thing you could do during the pandemic?

You seem to have fundamental misunderstandings of how both masks and vaccines work. I recommend reviewing basic materials to avoid further embarrassment.
Since you're getting downvoted, I'll explain.
Mask don't stop anything, they slow it, drmatically. Why do you think medical professionals have been wearing masks for 100-years?
The vaccine doesn't guarantee immunity and viruses mutate. Any given vaccine is good only against a particular strain. And some people can't take the shot. By wearing masks, we were helping protect them a well.

The covid junk was 4 years ago.

Just so you're aware, friend... Lemmy is auto-translating all your posts for all other users - This is what we see wherever you post:
"I was kicked in the head by a horse 4 years ago"
Hoping you get the help you need, bud. Sure, you shouldn't have been playing with that horse's bunghole, but you didn't deserve all this.
- This is brilliant hah!
- That's some idiotic shit. You really need to see a doctor for your mental health delusions.
So does it brother you when other people wear masks? If so, why?
- I don't want people forcing me to wear a mask when covid was a problem 4 years ago.
As everyone knows, covid is the only infectious disease facemasks can reduce the spread of. Before covid masks were just decorative.
- covid is the only infectious disease facemasks can reduce the spread of
  And as usual the conservamorons are like "mAsK WaSnT 100% eFfEcTiVe!!!" In their backwards universe if something is only 85% effective, its the same as it being 0% effective.
Just because I'm curious: I have chronic sarcoidosis in both lungs, and lifelong asthma. I've by some miracle survived 4 years, but at the cost of almost all the stamina I used to have. COVID still circulates around the daycares, youth clubs and workplaces here and I have children.
I don't have an option to not wear a mask when I leave the room I've spent these 4 years in. Does that bother you?
Be honest and tell us you don't give a shit about the people around you.
Edit: Not surprised at your lack of an answer.
Dad! come now, I told you 15 minutes ago it was time for bed.
yeah, you know how infectious diseases completely stop infecting people after one outbreak. swine flu was 50 years ago, and famously never came back.