The National Review magazine, once a staunch conservate publication and now more to the center published an article Monday that delves into the motivations of those enamored with not only the donning of their own face masks but ensuring that everyone on planet earth does as well. For me there were two takeaways from this article, first and foremost, it just ASSUMES as an established fact that masks don’t “work,” and second, it’s now acceptable in polite society to rip into mask wearers. Both of those positions would have not only gotten you fired and de-platformed about ten minutes ago but made to attend “flat earther reprogramming” class.

The article is headlined, “Why Progressives Can’t Quit Their Masks.” The web headline is “Progressives See Masks as Cultural Identity, Not Science.” For those of you not as familiar with the term “progressives,” basically it would be folks who are left of center, some a bit and some quite a lot. Based on that headline it seems to me that the pivot & shift is to now make progressives the new “persona non grata!”

Given that National Review is a U.S. based publication they look at things with an American perspective, however, I believe the premise of what they’re saying could be applied worldwide. National Review first puts forth how much trouble the Biden Administration is having getting progressives to agree to give up the masks, why you ask, well for progressives, it feels like a POLITICAL defeat to them.

It’s this mindset ultimately that’s making unmasking specifically and a “return to normal” generally far more difficult for the vast majority of our progressive friends. To them this is no longer a “science and health” issue, It has become a cultural and social issue, and a quasi-religious one at that for the Covidians. At a core level for the ardent kind of progressive, giving up masking feels like giving in. It doesn’t feel to them like the epidemic has been beaten, to these folks, it feels like it’s them that have been beaten, and their cultural enemies (Dr. Robert Malone, Joe Rogan, Tucker Carlson, President Trump and their right-wing crazy neighbor) have won.

Now if all of this wasn’t enough to make these folks run screaming out of the room looking for a “safe space”, National Review decided to double down and invoked the “R word”, that’s right, the one most progressive’s despise, religion, National Review had the audacity to infer that progressives view “masks as religion.” Ruh, oh!

“What they are running up against — and what Joe Biden is running up against among his own base — is a species of religious fanaticism. Like the declarations of progressives who once swore off ‘Trump vaccines,’ it is a matter of identity, not a matter of policy, much less one of science.“

It’s noteworthy also National Reviews assumption that JOE BIDEN wants to stop the masks. That’s odd given the fact that dementia Joe has never said that, not publicly. Publicly, he’s still touting the CDC’s official mask guidance (which changes depending on the direction of the wind). But the folks at National Review just took it for granted that Biden is behind the push to unmask, I’m guessing because that’s what those of us who’re sane are doing because at the end of the day we’re following the evidence, which is overwhelming in favour of unmasking.
You want proof of this insanity, look no further than the University of Nevada Reno, where progressive students went on a march to protest the ending of masking mandates, yes you heard me correctly, they want mask mandates to stay at the university, and at the time I posted it they had 1500 fellow Covidians who had signed the petition. It’s strange that the most fervent Covidians are on average well educated, scholastically.
The article’s final line was priceless. In fact, for those of us who’ve spent the past two years trying to push back against a relentless barrage of bad news, it’s been what we ponder daily:

“The news on Covid is generally good these days. And I cannot remember another time in which generally good news has caused so much angst and misery.”

I guess it’s part of their religion!