How do we change the public conversation around people who violate mask restrictions?

The Quarantine Zone
1

This week, I finally went in to the office for the first time for the job I started last September. I normally take the train (or possibly a bus and a train). I hadn’t set foot on public transportation since early March 2020, the longest stretch of my life. But it’s normally the most practical way to get downtown - I don’t drive to the Loop at rush hour except on very rare occasions (such as when I am leaving town straight from work), the traffic makes me want to throttle people, and I don’t have the urge to spend hundreds of dollars a month to park in a garage. (Plus Tom Scud doesn’t work downtown and we only have one car, and we both like it that way.)

In general, mask compliance was solid: probably more than 90%, but I still had to restrain myself from throttling a few maskholes on the CTA the past couple of days. But I can’t help but wonder: what can we, as a society, do to shame people into following the clearly posted rules that are broadcast on loudspeakers, posted on fluorescent pink signs, etc. all over the CTA, that masks are required for everyone, covering your nose and mouth, even if you are vaccinated?

I am sure it’s much worse in other places, but is there anywhere in the world where they have figured this out? I saw news stories in the early days of the pandemic of Madrid transit workers handing out masks to anyone who didn’t have one; did that work, for example? (Although then I think the issue was mask unavailability rather than refusal of of people to wear them.)

(The way downtown hasn’t been horrible - mostly empty. But the way home has been much more full than I am comfortable with. On the bright side, my work badge is now configured for the bike room, so that’s my plan, weather permitting. And I will likely have a pretty expansive definition of “weather permitting.”)

Is anyone else unable to see how we will come out on the other side of this pandemic without another round of shutdowns, given how Delta is slamming everything? Almost everyone I know personally over the age of 12 has been vaccinated, except for a small handful who have legit medical reasons not to be. But then there’s a college friend, who has had a kidney transplant and will have to take immune suppressants for the rest of his life - he lives in NYC, so how exactly is he supposed to avoid public transit? The poor guy was essentially locked in his apartment for more than a year.

GAH. Sometimes I hate people. I don’t want to be the Mask Police myself, but surely there is a way?

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For what it’s worth…

3

Right, one of many reasons why my 5’1" self doesn’t want to be the Mask Police. But some of the people I saw not wearing masks in the CTA station were CTA workers. I’d hope that employers, at least, can enforce mask wearing even if they can’t enforce vaccination. (And my employer, a law firm with a significant employment law practice, has been sharing alerts that yes, employers can legally enforce these things.)

4

With people like my sister, there is nothing you can do to change anyone mind. Even though she spent 15 days in the hospital fighting Covid, she still refuses to wear a mask or get the vaccine. She is barred from entering a grocery store in the town she lives due to this, she has been cited 3 times now for trespassing. I have told her that won’t cry at her funeral if Covid kills her, I will just consider her a Darwin Award winner.

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I am hoping that not everyone is as hardcore as your sister. I know there is no way to reach everyone, but the more, the better.

6

I believe that this is essentially unwinnable as there is, sadly, a sufficiently critical mass of people who choose not to believe in truth, accuracy and logic. And many of those people are in government or other positions of power.

I’m not trying to be cool, ironic or cynical either - I genuinely believe this and worry about it.

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I don’t know that there’s any good way to do it at this point.

The people who have become vehement anti-maskers have, from what I can tell, made it into an expression of their personal freedoms, and allowed themselves to become convinced that masks are one or more of the following: (a) ineffectual, (b) somehow a plot to control us, and/or (c) unnecessary, because COVID is way overblown as a problem. They seem to truly believe that, by not wearing a mask, they are fighting the good fight against infringements on their freedoms.

If forced to wear a mask, they will either wear it over their chins or other ways that lets them say, “see, I’m wearing your damned mask,” or as @racer72 describes with his sister, dare stores and employers to take action against them for not wearing them.

Attempts to publicly shame or ostracize people holding these kind of views are, IMO, only going to further entrench their views.

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Products of the American education system(s).

9

It’s like when the landline would ring and someone would say, “If it’s Bill, I’m not here!” Sure enough it would be Bill, so you cover your eyes and rotate your head. “Betty? I don’t see her…”

OMAHA, Neb. (AP) — Several states scaled back their reporting of COVID-19 statistics this month just as cases across the country started to skyrocket, depriving the public of real-time information on outbreaks, cases, hospitalizations and deaths in their communities.

The shift to weekly instead of daily reporting in Florida, Nebraska, Iowa and South Dakota marked a notable shift during a pandemic in which coronavirus dashboards have become a staple for Americans closely tracking case counts and trends to navigate a crisis that has killed more than 600,000 people in the U.S.

If they stop hearing anything on the news, it “proves” every thing is under control, verdad?

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I try to sit in that seat in the back which faces to the rear of the car on the CTA, if so, I take the mask off. But, I’m fully vaccinated.

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I’m fully vaccinated, too, and have continued to mask anyway. With my crappy lungs, I don’t wat even a mild case of COVID. But on the way home yesterday, the train was packed - there was some kind of issue with someone on the tracks by UIC, so everything was backed up. I couldn’t get on the first train at all, and I had to go several stops in the other direction to even get on the second train. And it seems like the CTA is running on a weekend schedule because of low ridership; trains are more like 10 - 15 minutes apart, rather than every 3 - 5 during a normal rush hour. I’m going to re-up my Divvy membership, too, for those times when weather doesn’t make sense to bike in the morning, say, but might make sense to bike home, or vice versa. I am in the Divvy zone where you get 45 free minutes on an e-bike if you’re traveling to Zone A (which I would be). But on the way home, I don’t care if it takes me a bit longer to bike than to take the CTA. (On my own e-bike, I think it will actually be a faster commute than the CTA, because I have to walk or take a bus 3/4 of a mile to the nearest stop, and the stop where I usually get on is still under construction, so the buses aren’t passing it and I have to go to a different stop. But we shall see on Monday what the timing is like exactly.)

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Or who claim that they can’t breathe in one.

Hey, haven’t you heard about all those cases of surgeons collapsing from suffocation, in operating rules? Huh, funny, neither have I.

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I think the issue is that mask zealots refuse to acknowledge that they ARE uncomfortable and an inconvenience. Before I go was vaccinated and while it was the law. I did wear them indoors and dealt with the inconvenience. But as soon as it wasn’t required to wear one, I ditched it as it was well past the two weeks since second Pfizer. And, I am really gonna push back when the lockdown forever crowd demands mask mandates

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Very difficult to talk to people, who subscribe to the thoughts of others in a cult.

15

I would be careful about assuming that fully vaccinated means fully protected.

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Well, I’m not a mask zealot but I am an “I want this bloody pandemic to end despite the best efforts of the anti-vaxxers and anti-maskers” zealot.

The mask is not primarily for your protection, it’s for the protection of others from you, and this has been mentioned countless times over the last year or so. However there is also an element of self- protection as well and though not specifically and solely a mask issue, because of the various covid deniers and their I’ll, I fear that we will need all the protection we can get for the next while.

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I don’t necessarily consider myself a “mask zealot” and willingly acknowledge that they are awkward and uncomfortable. However, we still have a mask mandate on public transit. People need to follow it. If my asthmatic self could wear one for an hour and a half in a stuffy, hot subway station for an hour, and then on the train for another half hour, pretty much anyone ought to be able to. And yes, I am vaccinated, but the rule applies to everyone.

18

Which is precisely why I am continuing to wear a mask in public indoor places. I am taking mine off when alone in my office with the door closed, but my employer is requiring unvaccinated people to wear masks (including clients) and required those of us who have been vaccinated to provide HR with copies of vaccination cards. It’s a law firm with a significant employment law practice, so I am reasonably confident that anyone at work who isn’t wearing a mask has indeed been vaccinated.

That isn’t the case on public transit, at the grocery store, etc. - it’s completely improbable given local vaccination rates that the 80% of people walking around at my local Target without masks have all been vaccinated, and the unmasked children under 12 definitely haven’t been, so I will continue to mask there until we have reached the After Times. I tend to end up with bronchitis, asthma exacerbations, etc. after respiratory infections even in normal times, and I am sure as hell not interested in even a mild case of COVID.

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And believe me, people around you would have good reason to push you right back, as there’s a growing body of evidence showing reduced efficacy of the vaccines against the Delta variant.

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Hey, it IS awkward and inconvenient. But it is the GOOD and RIGHT thing to do. So the complaint about discomfort is worth dismissing.

It’s bear with the discomfort for a few more months AND make people get immunized, or bear with recurring waves and peaks and having to have lockdowns over and over again.