4 ms·

Masking was never inherently a political issue, even if some people tried to make it one. From a purely scientific perspective, and regardless of one's politic

Masking was never inherently a political issue, even if some people tried to make it one. From a purely scientific perspective, and regardless of one's political leanings or preferences, it was obvious from the start that widespread everyday masking simply isn't effective, nor is it practical. If such masking was even just somewhat effective, the entire situation would have been over by mid-2020 at the latest. That clearly wasn't the case. Even in large regions with strictly-enforced masking (even outdoors, in some cases!), combined with numerous other onerous restrictions, we still saw massive case number spikes. Those would not have happened if masking worked. Of course, there are also the numerous harmful effects of masking that must be considered. It causes many accessibility problems, it causes childhood development problems, it causes social strife (including discrimination), it enables abusive policing, and so forth. Hopefully, society as a whole has been reminded how masking just doesn't work, and that's exactly why we didn't bother with it until this recent debacle.

joshuamorton 4y ago
I'm curious, when you say "masking works" what do you mean? Because you seem to mean it as "prevents 100% of transmission", and therefore anything less than that means masking isn't effective. And that's simply untrue. Masking does, really, truly, assist with covid spread. It doesn't prevent 100% of transmission, because nothing does, especially something that requires active participation, but yeah it helps a lot if people actually do it. It's likely a large part of the reason that I've never caught covid, despite a fairly active social life and continued in-person office work for almost a year now. And why the social events I attend, where you can have a hundred people in close quarters breathing on each other haven't had recorded transmissions, despite recorded isolated cases. > It causes many accessibility problems, it causes childhood development problems, it causes social strife (including discrimination), it enables abusive policing, and so forth. There's no evidence for any of these claims, and in fact you'll find the accessibility community strongly favors masks as immunocompromised people exist. Widespread seasonal masking has been common in other countries for decades (since SARS-1, two decades ago), and there's no evidence that it causes childhood development issues. There's, like, one academic paper whose conclusion is that mask wearing makes it difficult for preschoolers to detect the emotion of a person wearing a mask. But any extension of that to impacts on childhood psychological development isn't academic, it's you making things up.
- VancouverMan 4y ago
  As with other actions, it's the relationship between the benefits that something brings versus the costs associated with doing it that determine whether or not it's "working". The costs associated with widespread everyday masking are severe. You even quoted the ones that I'd mentioned earlier. Just to overcome those severe costs, masking would have had to consistently bring astounding benefits. At a bare minimum, that should have been a nearly-complete end to the transmission of not just this virus, but others, as well. Unfortunately, we didn't see that happen, because masking isn't effective. We experienced the severe costs of masking, but without receiving any benefits from enduring those costs. This was demonstrated by what's among the largest set of scientific experiments ever performed, involving many millions of people, in many nations, and over two years of masking in some cases.
  - joshuamorton 4y ago
    > The costs associated with widespread everyday masking are severe. You even quoted the ones that I'd mentioned earlier. Yes, and stated that they are, for the most part, not actually costs. Masks don't cause accessibility problems, they don't cause child development issues, they don't cause social strife when consistently warn and enforced, and they don't cause abusive policing (police don't enforce mask mandates anywhere in the US, and consistently were one of the least compliant groups!). You can't keep lying about these supposedly "severe" costs when anyone with eyes can see that they're made up. I mean you can, but it's your credibility lost.
    - VancouverMan 4y ago
      Josh, I recommend that you do even just some basic research into this topic. It's quite complex, and I can't do it justice here. Masking certainly does cause accessibility problems for many people. For example, people with mobility and other issues involving their fingers, hands, arms, shoulders, neck, and ears can find it quite difficult, or even impossible, to put on, to wear, or to remove a mask. Masking can also aggravate respiratory and cardiovascular-related medical issues. Masking can aggravate PTSD and other psychological issues. Masking can cause problems for those with hearing-related issues, as it can make it difficult to hear the muffled voices of others, as well as making lip-reading impossible. In jurisdictions where accessibility is considered important, the forced masking bylaws or legislation typically had accessibility-related exemptions, because masking does cause severe accessibility problems for many people. The harmful social impacts of masking take many forms. Among the most egregious were when exempt individuals were denied service, reasonable accommodation, and in some cases employment. Such people also faced significant harassment when in public, even in so-called "tolerant" societies. Sometimes this would involve verbal abuse. Sometimes it would involve having creeps take and share photos of them, in attempts to socially shame them. Sometimes it would unfortunately involve physical abuse, even with the police being the perpetrators at times. A less-visible aspect to this very real threat of harassment was how some people just stopped participating in society as much as possible, even at the cost of financial, psychological, and social harm to themselves. Forced masking, especially in schools, has definitely had a negative impact on the education and development of children. This manifests in various ways, including communication-related delays and difficulties, trust/fear-related issues, immune system deficiencies, and so on. Perhaps you were spared the worst of this based on where you happen to live, and luckily didn't have to experience the costs of masking yourself. Others, however, suffered significantly because of masking, even if you may not realize it.

joshuamorton 4y ago

I'm curious, when you say "masking works" what do you mean? Because you seem to mean it as "prevents 100% of transmission", and therefore anything less than that means masking isn't effective. And that's simply untrue. Masking does, really, truly, assist with covid spread. It doesn't prevent 100% of transmission, because nothing does, especially something that requires active participation, but yeah it helps a lot if people actually do it. It's likely a large part of the reason that I've never caught covid, despite a fairly active social life and continued in-person office work for almost a year now. And why the social events I attend, where you can have a hundred people in close quarters breathing on each other haven't had recorded transmissions, despite recorded isolated cases. > It causes many accessibility problems, it causes childhood development problems, it causes social strife (including discrimination), it enables abusive policing, and so forth. There's no evidence for any of these claims, and in fact you'll find the accessibility community strongly favors masks as immunocompromised people exist. Widespread seasonal masking has been common in other countries for decades (since SARS-1, two decades ago), and there's no evidence that it causes childhood development issues. There's, like, one academic paper whose conclusion is that mask wearing makes it difficult for preschoolers to detect the emotion of a person wearing a mask. But any extension of that to impacts on childhood psychological development isn't academic, it's you making things up.

VancouverMan 4y ago
As with other actions, it's the relationship between the benefits that something brings versus the costs associated with doing it that determine whether or not it's "working". The costs associated with widespread everyday masking are severe. You even quoted the ones that I'd mentioned earlier. Just to overcome those severe costs, masking would have had to consistently bring astounding benefits. At a bare minimum, that should have been a nearly-complete end to the transmission of not just this virus, but others, as well. Unfortunately, we didn't see that happen, because masking isn't effective. We experienced the severe costs of masking, but without receiving any benefits from enduring those costs. This was demonstrated by what's among the largest set of scientific experiments ever performed, involving many millions of people, in many nations, and over two years of masking in some cases.
- joshuamorton 4y ago
  > The costs associated with widespread everyday masking are severe. You even quoted the ones that I'd mentioned earlier. Yes, and stated that they are, for the most part, not actually costs. Masks don't cause accessibility problems, they don't cause child development issues, they don't cause social strife when consistently warn and enforced, and they don't cause abusive policing (police don't enforce mask mandates anywhere in the US, and consistently were one of the least compliant groups!). You can't keep lying about these supposedly "severe" costs when anyone with eyes can see that they're made up. I mean you can, but it's your credibility lost.
  - VancouverMan 4y ago
    Josh, I recommend that you do even just some basic research into this topic. It's quite complex, and I can't do it justice here. Masking certainly does cause accessibility problems for many people. For example, people with mobility and other issues involving their fingers, hands, arms, shoulders, neck, and ears can find it quite difficult, or even impossible, to put on, to wear, or to remove a mask. Masking can also aggravate respiratory and cardiovascular-related medical issues. Masking can aggravate PTSD and other psychological issues. Masking can cause problems for those with hearing-related issues, as it can make it difficult to hear the muffled voices of others, as well as making lip-reading impossible. In jurisdictions where accessibility is considered important, the forced masking bylaws or legislation typically had accessibility-related exemptions, because masking does cause severe accessibility problems for many people. The harmful social impacts of masking take many forms. Among the most egregious were when exempt individuals were denied service, reasonable accommodation, and in some cases employment. Such people also faced significant harassment when in public, even in so-called "tolerant" societies. Sometimes this would involve verbal abuse. Sometimes it would involve having creeps take and share photos of them, in attempts to socially shame them. Sometimes it would unfortunately involve physical abuse, even with the police being the perpetrators at times. A less-visible aspect to this very real threat of harassment was how some people just stopped participating in society as much as possible, even at the cost of financial, psychological, and social harm to themselves. Forced masking, especially in schools, has definitely had a negative impact on the education and development of children. This manifests in various ways, including communication-related delays and difficulties, trust/fear-related issues, immune system deficiencies, and so on. Perhaps you were spared the worst of this based on where you happen to live, and luckily didn't have to experience the costs of masking yourself. Others, however, suffered significantly because of masking, even if you may not realize it.