Why are people so weird about masks? Wearing a mask isn't that hard, definitely not inconvenient enough to justify active outrage.
Because they're effectively a form of collective "punishment" at best. For the vaccinated, we've been told for years that once we get our vaccine, we can return to normal. We got our vaccines, got boosted, and were told we can live our lives like it's 2019. We tried to help the anti-vaxxers. They said it wasn't worth the risk. They made the choice to roll the dice. We shouldn't have to bear the punishment for other people not wanting to take the vax.
Moreover, it all just comes off as anti-science security theater. As BRTD said, mask mandates had a negligible (if any) effect in preventing cases as the virus evolved. Omicron and BA2 are much less severe than Delta. In NH, we made it through the Delta era without a statewide mandate. Portsmouth, the most liberal town in my county, repealed their mandate in July of 2021. Exeter repealed theirs in May of that year. We went through the height of the pandemic without a mandate, and
now, after the rise of a less dangerous variant, they brought masks back?
'This wasn't even localized to a bunch of upper-crust brunchlib college towns either. The state Democratic Party was openly calling for a statewide mask mandate! The mask cultists zeroed in on "muh case numbers" and made us jump through hoops to make it look like they were doing something against a virus that we knew was inevitably endemic.
