The Masking Of America

Here we go again. Seems America’s insufferable micromanagers have moved on from spying on neighbors to shaming strangers for not wearing masks at the supermarket.

You know who you are.

I feared this would happen the moment the CDC recommended that when out in public, folks should consider wearing fabric face masks.

What’s voluntary one day during this pandemic has a way of becoming mandatory the next.

After weeks of telling us that masks don’t help prevent the spread of COVID-19 and that social distancing is the only way to stop it, the CDC announced Friday that it was now recommending the use of cloth masks for ordinary people. You know, the kind that offer even less protection than those cheap paper masks they sell - rather, used to sell, they’re all out - at CVS.

Oh, and the experts tried to make it clear that wearing a mask does nothing to protect YOU from the virus. It offers some protection to others if you’re infectious.

Fair enough.

Here is the exact wording from the CDC:

...CDC recommends wearing cloth face coverings in public settings where other social distancing measures are difficult to maintain (e.g., grocery stores and pharmacies) especially in areas of significant community-based transmission.

It is critical to emphasize that maintaining 6-feet social distancing remains important to slowing the spread of the virus.  CDC is additionally advising the use of simple cloth face coverings to slow the spread of the virus and help people who may have the virus and do not know it from transmitting it to others.  Cloth face coverings fashioned from household items or made at home from common materials at low cost can be used as an additional, voluntary public health measure.”

Voluntary.

Yep, but by Sunday folks were posting snotty pictures of folks in public with - dare I say it - exposed faces.

Really, people?

Earlier, on Friday night, a debate raged on social media about whether the president was right or wrong to say he would not be wearing a mask.

The president gets tested regularly for the virus. He doesn’t have it. Why would he wear one? 

Just for show?

"With the masks, it's going to be really a voluntary thing. You can do it, you don't have to do it. I'm choosing not to do it, but some people may want to do it and that's OK," said President Trump at his Friday presser.

Predictably, the people who loathe the president lost their minds over that. 

Those who insisted that Trump should wear a mask - even though it would be pointless because he knows he doesn’t have the virus  - said he was setting a poor example for the rest of us.

Because these same people are always using the president as a role model, am I right?

Please.

Pressed by unmasked reporters about why he wouldn’t be covering his face, the president said:

 “I just don’t want to be doing – somehow sitting in the Oval Office behind that beautiful Resolute Desk, the great Resolute Desk, I think wearing a face mask as I greet presidents, prime ministers, dictators, kings, queens, I don’t know, somehow I don’t see it for myself.”

Bingo.

No one wants to see the leader of the Free World huddled behind his desk wearing a surgical mask any more than we wanted to see Jimmy Carter shivering in a cardigan because he’d lowered the White House thermostat to save energy.

It signals weakness. We don’t want weak leaders.

Calm down for a minute, I’ll explain.

Presidents are constantly trying to project strength. It’s their brand.

For instance, from Dwight Eisenhower’s second inauguration in 1957 through Bill Clinton’s in 1997, no American president wore an overcoat to deliver his inaugural address.

They didn’t absentmindedly leave them on the back seat of the limo that took them to the Capitol, either. They deliberately went out in winter without coats. To look invincible.

That included John Kennedy who gave his speech in 22-degree weather with a wind chill below zero. All around him stood bundled politicians, their breath forming clouds in the air, but Kennedy stood - coatless - at the lectern.

He looked confident and in charge. As if he couldn’t even feel January’s icy blasts. Perhaps he couldn’t.

If you notice images of presidents greeting world leaders at the White House, they always stand on the portico coatless as their guests arrive in overcoats and scarves.

Look, this doesn’t mean that ordinary Americans look weak when they don masks any more than they look weak if they bundle up when it’s cold.

We aren’t world leaders. We don’t have to worry about our brands.

So wear a mask. Don’t wear a mask. It’s your choice.

Just keep your distance. 

Oh, and to the newly-minted members of America’s mask patrol, mind your own business. 

Please.