Personal freedom to refuse masks? What about everyone else’s right to live?
A favorite childhood thing for me was riding in the back of a pickup. The wind, the sun, the combination of speed, motion and sense of freedom — that was living.
Bicycle and motorcycle helmets were for sissies.
Seatbelts? Most cars didn’t have them in those days.
And the only chore I actually looked forward to was lighting our household trash in the burn barrel out back.
My children experienced none of the above, thanks to government. Intrusive, meddling, fun-killing and freedom-destroying government.
Now 58, I can’t recall most particulars of the political fights that ushered in these losses of liberty, except that some were fierce. It’s no small thing to tell freedom-loving people raised on a spirit of independence that they must give up a personal freedom, especially one they cherish.
I didn’t have a motorcycle, but I remember doubting that the push for a helmet law could succeed. Wearing one, I figured, was a personal choice, as personal as the decision to take up smoking, or to use contraceptives. I wrongly predicted that legislation to require that all riders don helmets would never pass.
I do remember hearing advocates say that motorbike accidents cost taxpayers a ton of money covering hospital bills for riders with scrambled brains, or worse. That one made some sense, as I had recently joined the ranks of taxpaying adults in the late 1980s.
When California’s universal helmet law finally went into effect in 1992, motorcycle fatalities dropped 37%. We never looked back. Time and experience have convinced all but the most hardcore anti-helmeteers that it’s a common-sense law after all.
The same goes for children’s helmets when riding bikes. It took us a while to get used to seatbelts, which were mandated in 1986, but they’ve since become — quite literally — part of the auto furniture. You never hear people demanding a return to riding in open pickup beds.
Most new homes these days don’t even have fireplaces, one of the worst stationary sources for the winter air pollution that really and truly hurts friends and neighbors with breathing problems. No one disputes that backyard trash burning is a terrible idea, on several levels.
A mask isn’t an attack on personal freedom
Times change. Peoples’ needs change.
Our most critical need these days is more mask wearing in public. Unfortunately, this simple effort has been politicized as an insidious threat to personal freedom of choice.
The coronavirus pandemic is wreaking havoc on Modesto and Stanislaus County, now among the worst-hit places in California, which recently surpassed New York for the most COVID cases in the United States. More than 1% of Stanislaus residents are infected, according to reported counts, and experts say the real number is much higher. Our ICU beds are filled, and we had lost 79 souls as of Thursday.
Anti-maskers need to drop their resistance for the good of all.
I get the personal-freedom argument. No one wants to be told what to do.
But when your personal choice affects my health — and hers, and his, and everyone’s — it’s no longer only about you. It’s about all of us.
Collective health trumps selfishness
You may feel that you’re strong, but you don’t know whether you’re infected with COVID-19. One of the most agonizing aspects of this disease is how easily it’s passed around by asymptomatic and presymptomatic carriers infecting people through their carelessness. Face coverings dramatically slow the spread.
Refusing to wear a mask is selfish and pathetic. It’s the main reason, in addition to unprotected gatherings, that Stanislaus County went from having pride at relatively few COVID cases in March and April to the shame of being among the nation’s worst hotspots today.
Even President Donald Trump now says face coverings in public are essential to fight the virus. Our elected Stanislaus supervisors — Republicans, all — have been saying it for weeks.
Compared to giving up helmetless motorcycle rides, and driving around with seatbelts, a little piece of cloth over your nose and mouth is nothing.
