Mastodawn

Christy S May 25, 2024

Canadian here so bear with me because I don’t fully understand US gun laws (nor do I understand their attachment TO guns).

What I do know is whenever there’s a mass shooting someone will bring up stricter gun control and the Right wing gun lovers shout “my freedom! You can’t take away my right to protect myself!”

Yet we are seeing a U.S. State attempt to criminalize the wearing of medical masks in all public spaces. Something that is quite literally “personal protective tool”. Why doesn’t our freedom to protect ourselves from infection as much as their freedom to carry a gun?

I can’t see any scenario where someone else would be harmed by an N95 - the same is NOT true for any gun. Yet one is being criminalized and the other isn’t.

I sincerely hope we start hearing more people speak out against criminalizing medical masks if for no other reason than the violation of freedom and bodily autonomy. You don’t have to care about Covid to understand that some people need to wear masks.

It is a very sad example of the state of the world when a person can walk into a pharmacy or grocery store with a gun - but not wearing a medical respirator DURING A PANDEMIC

#CovidIsAirborne #CovidIsNotOver #CovidCautious #sarscov2 #maskup #WearAMask #CleanAir #Pandemic #Disability #accessibility #DisabilityRights #N95s #Ableism #CommunityCare #Eugenics #MaskBans

Bruce Mirken May 24, 2024

@broadwaybabyto Do not try to understand the U.S. We're insane.

Broadwaybabyto May 24, 2024

@BruceMirken I just can not comprehend how anyone could be ok with guns in public places but not an N95. There is no logic at play here whatsoever and it’s devastating to watch it play out and have all these freedom loving gun folks scream that it’s deserved.

Bruce Mirken May 24, 2024

@broadwaybabyto
It is in fact incomprehensible.

aardvark May 24, 2024

@broadwaybabyto the logic has to do with “yes to what I want and no to what you want”

Aviva Gary May 26, 2024

@aardvark @broadwaybabyto And rights for them but no one else...

Graydon May 24, 2024

@broadwaybabyto @BruceMirken Guns enhance your status. Wearing a respirator says you're as subject to facts as anybody else, and thereby diminishes your status.

Lots of selection pressure for being really focused on status to the exclusion of all else, because like money, you can usually substitute it for whatever you don't have. Occasions like the present plague where you can't shift all the costs on to other, lower status people are rare.

Asbjornn May 26, 2024

@broadwaybabyto Most of my life I have been trying to apply logic to every situation, because it is the default setting of my brain. That strategy has in many situations not been the right choice.
If you are capable of ignoring logic and formulate feelings, which can lead to the situation you describe, then you might have a chance. If you are not able to ignore logic I can guarantee you will fail to comprehend the “freedom” these people talk about.
I, for my part, have given up on the topic

Asbjornn May 26, 2024

@broadwaybabyto I will spend my energy trying to figure out when not to apply logic. Because not all people work with logic as the default setting. Including people I care about.

y🍉mpsuit May 24, 2024

@broadwaybabyto images from September of 2020. This place is not a place of honor

Broadwaybabyto May 24, 2024

@yumpsuit this is just… wow. I don’t even know when to begin with everything that’s wrong in this photo.

It’s all deeply sad. Will people have to make their masks into gun holsters to be allowed the freedom to wear them? I certainly hope not!

Gordon J Holtslander May 24, 2024

@broadwaybabyto Perhaps you err in the concept that politics and logic are in any way related. Good political policy often uses logic, but politicians ...?

sabik May 24, 2024

@broadwaybabyto @3TomatoesShort
I wonder if military-style gas masks would fall under the US 2ⁿᵈ amendment...

Daniel Brotherston May 24, 2024

@broadwaybabyto

The answer is very simple...

It comes in two parts....

The people who make N95 masks have not played golf with and paid money to enough US politicians.

The people who make N95 masks have not spent decades funding a media campaign to brainwash the average American that masks = freedom.

US gun policy (actually US policy in general) has nothing to do with "freedom" as an objective concept in as much as such a thing can be object.

US "Freedom™️ " is an extremely narrowly defined concept.

y🍉mpsuit May 24, 2024

@danbrotherston @broadwaybabyto I’m a little shocked 3M and Honeywell aren’t donating play-golf sums given how intertwined with government they are, but you’re correct.

Extremely unexpected to find them among the companies not openly paying into America-flavored zaibatsu shenanigans. They make everything from radars to toothpaste!

https://www.opensecrets.org/orgs/3m-co/summary?id=D000021800

https://www.opensecrets.org/orgs/honeywell-international/summary?all=A&id=D000000334

3M Co Profile: Summary

3M Co organization profile. Contributions in the 2024 cycle: $244,778. Lobbying in 2024: $580,000. Outside Spending in the 2024 cycle: $0.

OpenSecrets

Broadwaybabyto May 25, 2024

@danbrotherston so sad and yet not at all surprising!

Paul H 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁷󠁬󠁳󠁿🇪🇺May 24, 2024

@broadwaybabyto

Perhaps they think if they spray enough rounds from an assault rifle they'll hit a few viruses and scare the rest away...

ForRealDough May 24, 2024

@broadwaybabyto

You’ll scratch your head less once you include that the decline/collapse will be managed in your concept of decline/collapse.

Try it, I did.

Still painful, but I no longer get so damn baffled.

It is consistent.

Just not to you.

It’s about the removal of public space.

Both achieve that aim.

cognitively accessible math May 26, 2024

@broadwaybabyto Take logic *out* of the picture and insert infantile "I WANT WHAT I WANT!" as well an unwillingness and/or inability to perceive any other perspective than their own as having value.
They want to feel the POWER of having a gun, and the POWER of not having to put on a mask and the POWER of making others not put on a mask.

Jeff Dutky May 27, 2024

@broadwaybabyto it’s quite simple, actually: there is a sacred piece of paper that guarantees “the right to bare arms” but no similar sacred piece of paper for masks or personal health. Also, recall that early colonists to what is now the U.S. were religious zealots for whom sacred pieces of paper meant more the logic, common sense, or individual health and safety.

Jonathan May 27, 2024

@broadwaybabyto

Because a mask means there's something to be scared of and I don't want to be be scared. So I will ban them and the cognitive dissonance goes away.

You can't think of them as both protective. I can't well articulate why just yet other than my first paragraph and to point out that for most people they want the gun but they don't want the mask.

The Old Fart 💙🐸🇨🇦🇺🇦May 27, 2024

@broadwaybabyto it may be different in Canada, but down here in the States we try very hard to not let logic or accountability get in the way of our freedom to senselessly kill ourselves in large numbers on a daily basis.

pacanukeha❌ (seasonally appropriate remix)May 27, 2024

@broadwaybabyto specifically it's because "the right to bear arms" is mentioned in the constitution.
that being said the anti-mask laws are clearly unconstitutional because it is well established that it is a form of speech.
the difference is because one is derived and the other is explicit

Richard W. Woodley ELBOWS UP 🇨🇦🌹🚴‍♂️📷 🗺️May 27, 2024

@broadwaybabyto
America has a gun culture, unfortunately it does not have a health culture, unless you count making profits off peoples health problems.

Violet Madder May 27, 2024

@broadwaybabyto

Meanwhile, the party that claims they are the sensible ones who DO care about gun control, are signing off on sending weapons to people bombing civilians.

Nothing makes sense.

Chuck May 27, 2024

@broadwaybabyto Trump drilled it into the cult’s heads that COVID was a hoax and when mask mandates were issued under Biden, the right wing turned that into somehow taking away free speech. Even though you are perfectly capable of demonstrating how stupid you are even with a mask on. I saw a woman with a mask with “Government Muzzle” printed on it and I should have asked her what it meant just so she would speak and I could ridicule her for obviously not being muzzled.

Alexander Dyas May 27, 2024

@broadwaybabyto

An other take -

Small state, personal freedom.

I'll have guns if I want, you can't take them away from me, it says so in the constitution.

You can't make me wear a mask if I don't want to.

I am so against you making me wear a mask that it has now escalated into - I don't want to see anyone wearing a mask.

-

As others have pointed out, I think fear is at the bottom of this. Fear of change. Fear of the unknown. Fear of different.

First off, guns have nothing to do with medical masks, and it's kind of skeevy to do so, just to get people upset over guns. Secondly, of course you should have freedom and bodily autonomy, and it's outrageous that anyone would criminalize wearing a mask, even to disguise themselves. The surveillance state is far, far more impactful than some wannabe bank robber doing something bad.

If the above seemed to have nothing to do with gun ownership, uh, yeah. I'll be happy to support disarmament, as soon as the police and military do it first. Until then, don't worry about it. Guns are fine, we probably should have more careful and selective gun sales, and it really doesn't have a huge impact compared to unregulated industry and trade. Please stop watching propaganda.