You have to assume 2 basic ideas for the masks to be useful. First is asymptotic spread, which, although might be true, is more political and less settled scien

You have to assume 2 basic ideas for the masks to be useful. First is asymptotic spread, which, although might be true, is more political and less settled science[0]. Second, the ideas that masks work to protect people from you for respiratory viruses. There's a 2013 study (way before the current political pressure) that challenges this[1], and UIC Health also made a claim masks weren't necessary, although now they have a big disclaimer over the opinion[2]. So why not just wear one. Even if those two are correct ideas? What about people who can't wear masks? There are people who have suffered trauma. If you say, "I can't for medical reasons" people just assume you're some right-wing republican. There is judgement back and fourth when you make the masks a requirement, and further you're asking people to disclose something that might be very personal. A man in Ontario was pepper sprayed and arrested by police for not wearing a mask[3]. Police shot another Canadian man for not wearing one[4]. And we're not even talking about the psychological effects. Why is no one making the connection between the normalization of the mask and massive civil unrest?! It should be a very obvious hypothesis, and yet no one seems to be discussing it (I talk about it here[5]). Challenging mask ideology doesn't mean you want everyone's grandma to die. There are legit reasons why this should be optional and not mandated. When you mandate something like this, it breaks the social contract. [0]: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23957495 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23957495 [1]: https://www.cambridge.org/core/services/aop-cambridge-core/content/view/0921A05A69A9419C862FA2F35F819D55/S1935789313000438a.pdf/testing_the_efficacy_of_homemade_masks_would_they_protect_in_an_influenza_pandemic.pdf https://www.cambridge.org/core/services/aop-cambridge-core/c... [2]: https://publichealth.uic.edu/news-stories/commentary-masks-for-all-for-covid-19-not-based-on-sound-data/ https://publichealth.uic.edu/news-stories/commentary-masks-f... [3]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EmaKvW1H2Tg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EmaKvW1H2Tg [4]: https://www.timeslive.co.za/news/world/2020-07-17-canadian-police-shoot-man-in-mask-incident/ https://www.timeslive.co.za/news/world/2020-07-17-canadian-p... [5]: https://battlepenguin.com/politics/secondary-effects/#masks-hurt-our-perceptions-of-one-another https://battlepenguin.com/politics/secondary-effects/#masks-...