Thread by @originalspin

To those fueling the current media trend of attacking masks as “unnecessary virtue signaling” now that the “pandemic is over” is that:

A. the pandemic isn’t over and
B. you’re going to get people harassed and hurt, and a disproportionate number of them will be Asian

Mask wearing has always been a prosocial behavior, not a selfish one. But it’s generally hard to convince Americans to do anything that doesn’t lean into self interest, so getting them to wear masks was messaged as about protecting YOURSELF. It isn’t.
qz.com/299003/a-quick…

When you wear a mask, you protect OTHERS if you happen to be infectious. And it works best when mask wearing is normalized—or at least not actively condemned—because like vaccination, it’s a herd wellness phenomenon. And yes, people mask up in Asia regularly during flu season.

That carries over to Asian Americans. So we were the first to adopt masks during Covid, we ignored it when people said it was unnecessary, we will be the last to not wear them and the first to start again if there’s an outbreak.

Which is going to make us targets. It already has.

But again: THE PANDEMIC ISN’T OVER. It’s ravaging India and S.America. New strains are emerging as a result. Only 1/3 of Americans are vaxxed. We’re already seeing high-profile “breakthrough” cases (Bill Maher) and we’ll see more as Covid explodes abroad.
nytimes.com/2021/05/15/ups…

Vaccination is a herd phenomenon. We need 80% of Americans to have antibodies before we can feel truly safe. We’re not even close. And yet high-profile people are not just attacking masks but mocking those who want to maintain mask wearing.

https://twitter.com/Yascha_Mounk/status/1393307296583802881?s=20

What’s going to come next (we’ve seen it already) is widespread contempt for mask wearers. Masks will be burned in public, people will try to yank masks off strangers, or harass and abuse people seen wearing masks. As noted above: Many will be Asian.

We lose nothing by encouraging people to wear masks simply to normalize it in the culture. Sadly the people who refuse to mask are also most likely to refuse to vaxx—and the most likely to attack and harass those who do. Is this what you want to normalize instead?

You may choose to not wear a mask—that’s fine. But by deriding mask wearers and pushing for demasking even among those who prefer to keep them on, you make it harder to get people to wear them again in the future—because this isn’t the last pandemic—and put masked people at risk.

And that means me, double Pfizer, my family and most of my Asian friends. You’re aiming people’s slurs and fists at us.

Two bonus charts for anyone who thinks the pandemic is over and we should return to “normal” immediately:

82% of Democrats have gotten the vaccine and 11% intend to.

Only 43% of Republicans have gotten the vaccine.

44% say they never will.

Half the country is not normal.