Thread by @ne0liberal

As pointed out by @ATabarrok - "The people protesting to reopen the economy are also protesting against the use of a key tool to reopen the economy, masks! Welcome to crazy town."

I can think of two hypotheses why this is happening.

marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolu…

First, the 'Death of Libertarianism' hypothesis. The American Right, now dominated by a sort of naive libertarianism, is so intellectually bankrupt that they can do nothing but scream against orders of any kind. "Government tell me what to do = BAD" whether masks or lockdowns.

This is a popular POV, and likely influences things, but I don't think it's correct. Actual libertarian voters are rare. The mostly rural conservative protesters aren't libertarians on most issues: LGBT issues, govt spending, military, criminal justice, immigration, trade, etc.

A second hypothesis: a Revolt of the Public-esque wave of anti-elite anger that manifests particularly among rural conservatives, but doesn't have firm ideological roots. It's just against whatever the current expert/elite advice is.

A quick @mgurri style analysis

* Things got very bad, very fast
* People got very angry
* Can't protest a virus, so you protest the response to the virus. No matter what it is.

The protests are against stuff, but not for specific actions (other than naive do-nothing-ism)

The Venn diagram of protesters for the following list has a LOT of overlap

* Centralized quarantine
* Vaccinations
* Businesses asking customers to wear masks
* Temperature checks (private or public)
* Lockdowns

The interesting twist is that over the the last decade+ 'elites giving expert opinions' has become blue tribe-coded in US discourse, so the anti-elite anger has only manifested in the red tribe.

I think tribal polarization+Gurri is the clearest framework to view these protests.