I said it, I’m not taking it back.
Alabama is set to drop the mask mandate today at 5:00.
So what.
Every single grocery store chain still has masking as a policy. So does every big box retailer.
I can’t buy groceries or go to a hardware store or anything else without a mask.
Companies will never get rid of the mask policies because woe be unto the first one that does and get sued by a customer or employee claiming they got COVID there after they dropped the policy.
It would be an ambulance chaser’s dream.
Then there would be that online harassment by Branch Covidians calling these companies “grandma killers.”
Worries over liability will keep mask policies in place indefinitely.
What are you going to do? Not buy groceries? Pay more on Instacart?
States need to say “unless we mandate masks you can’t require them.”
If we leave this up to the same corporate management that goes woke to appease the internet mob, masking will live on forever in every retail and service chain in America.
Don’t a lot of states already have mask bans, as part of their anti-Klan laws?
Yes, including Alabama.
I’ve always felt that the “Klan Laws,” whilst obviously well intentioned, were an unacceptable violation of First Amendment protections on free speech.
What I think should be done (esp. here in my city of Portland, OR) is to make the wearing of a mask or any other attempt to conceal one’s identity during the commission of a felony to be an aggravating element of the crime. Similar to the way that use of a weapon during a crime will bump it up from “Assault” to “Aggravated Assault.”
If you want to wear a mask for whatever peaceable reason you want, go for it. Halloween, theatre, medical concerns, kinky sex… I don’t care. But if you’re wearing a mask while committing a crime, the only logical conclusion is you planned the crime in advance and wanted to ensure you wouldn’t be caught.
But Ish….
States that have anti-klan mask laws don’t have the antifa problem that you guys do.
And its really hard to make wearing a mask and additional, aggravating element stick if you can’t identify the suspect in the first place due to them wearing a mask and “didn’t see shit” coming from the other people there.
Antifa is in every state, and growing. I can’t emphasize enough that a must read for all of us blog followers is to read Andy Ngo’s book “Unmasked” Buy it before it is memory holed.
You would not believe the shit they are stirring.
I’m in Houston. I’ve stopped wearing masks in markets and no one cares. The employees are just as nice to me as they have always been. No one has so much as frowned at me, neither employee nor customer.
Same here in central Missouri. I just don’t wear a mask, including to my son’s school functions. Nothing is said. When I visit family and friends in St. Louis, Columbia and KC I explain they just need to move to the free part of the state. I know several that drive quite a bit to shop where they don’t need masks.
Two minds on this one.
I do not want government at any level micromanaging anyone’s lives, and that includes their businesses. If a business wants to mandate masks, I won’t stop them. I may choose to shop elsewhere, or I may just put up with it for a few minutes. All depends on what I get out of it.
On the other hand, I would very much prefer the State or Local government to be the focus of the cancel culture mob, not a business. As soon as my city drops the mask mandate, is the last time I will carry one in my pocket.
If you are open to the public, you are not allowed to discriminate based upon beliefs. The left has made that the law. Since I believe the face diapers are a load of horseshit, they(public companies) need to deal with it and bake the damn cake.
Only one making you wear the mask is you. I have yet to wear one at all, if a place doesn’t want my money then I go else where
100% Agree. I work on a federal installation so I’ve got to deal with some of this shut if I want to keep putting food on the table. I’ve gotten three emails from different levels of management reminding me that we’re required to wear our virtue signal at all times even though Alabama ditched the state mandate.
It’s one of those things that if you have to constantly remind people of how super serious we all need to take this then . . . yeah.
The cohorts I go to the gym with have all said that they’re burning they’re masks as soon as the the Feds stop with their stupid bullshit.
North Middle Tennessee here: haven’t worn a mask at all. Early on I was “reminded” politely, and I responded politely that I had a medical exemption, and that was the end of that. I wasn’t lying, but I wouldn’t have worn a mask anyway. My stepdad got a bronchial staph infection many years ago from wearing dust masks for work. It reduced him from a muscular 260lbs to a unsteady 150lbs and caused issues that eventually killed him.
While you still see people wearing the face diapers, it’s dwindling from approximately 95% a year ago, to maybe 30 or 40% now. I have had one store, an AT&T outlet, refuse service, but all we did was go to the one a few miles away and all was good.
States need to say “unless we mandate masks you cannot require them.”
Fixed it for you.
But I respectfully disagree.
As has been said, as much as I dislike private businesses requiring masks, they are private businesses — if they want to allow my patronage only on the condition I wear a pink bunny suit, that’s their decision; my decision would be to find another business to accept my dollars. I don’t think leveraging the State is the right tool to get that job done.
It’s exactly that sort of government micromanagement that saddled us with mask requirements in the first place. The problem isn’t that States mandated a practice we don’t agree with, and the solution won’t be States reversing and mandating the opposite; the problem is that the States have the power to mandate those requirements at all.
“my decision would be to find another business to accept my dollars.”
And when all your local grocery stores require one….what do you do then?
I’ve been getting the bulk of my household groceries by delivery for years. Long before the SARS-COVID-2 outbreak… It costs a couple bucks more, to be sure, but as my husband and I both work very unusual hours, the convenience of just having everything left on our porch was worth the extra.
Alabama may have the mask “mandate” but I have yet to wear one in any store I have been in.
I think the issue isn’t so much the customers being told “please wear a mask” but the fact that so many companies are continuing to mandate that all of their employees wear masks at nearly all times while on shift. Despite the fact that all of the real evidence and science has born out that masks are not only ineffective but actually harmful to your health.
I live in TN and not a single person has asked me to wear a mask when I shop at their store. But our HR Dept specifically issued a notice to all employees that the mask mandates within the company will continue despite the rescinding of TN’s mandate. And they’ll even continue punishing employees for non-compliance up to termination. Even though they didn’t have anyone sign a revised employment contract. And they haven’t stipulated any responsibility on the part of the company in the event anyone develops a respiratory infection. Or any evidence based structure for easing or repealing any of the requirements.
I’m in Huntsville. I’ve been going commando (maskless) at Publix, Kroger, Walmart, Star, and more including Belk and almost everywhere, for a couple of months. Some places are assholes (REI and Best Buy – you don’t want my money, I can arrange that). It is still fairly uncommon, however I see more and more people not wearing them.
I agree that too many places (e.g., banks) require masks, making life difficult for people who don’t wear masks.
Virginia still has a mask mandate, although the Governor said explicitly that the police wouldn’t be enforcing it, so I’d say there’s “technically” a mask mandate.
The below only applies to retail stores, not medical services…medical services absolutely will deny you service if you don’t join in their kabuki performance, so I’ve had to play the game to get medical treatment, but as far as the stores…
They all have big signs at the door that say “mask required for entry”.
I’ve been ignoring those signs from the beginning, so for about a year now.
I’ve only had something said about it, maybe 4 or 5 times. On those occasions, usually someone will ask me “do you have a mask?”, to which I reply “nope”. They then say “do you need one?” and I reply “no thank you” and keep on walking.
I’ve only actually been told I couldn’t come in without one once and I just said “no problem, you don’t want my money, I’ll take it elsewhere.*
So, if you really don’t want to wear a mask…don’t. Make them tell you to leave*, most won’t…they rely on peer pressure, not confrontation. There are lots of people I talk to that understand the masks are just useless props and serve no real purpose but still wear them just because they’ve been told they have to. Stop It. Grow a pair and just say no. I stopped giving in to peer pressure and started making my own decisions a long time ago and I have no desire to be, or be treated like, a child again.
*If an employee DOES ask you to leave and you refuse, you’re trespassing, so on the rare occasion that someone does confront you, if they tell you flat out that you have to mask up or leave, unless you want to be arrested for trespassing, do so..