On a Friday evening, in July, 1991, my wife, our fifteen-month-old boy, Kevin, and I were driving back to New Jersey in our light blue 1985 Ford Escort hatchback following a trip to Toronto.
What a great (so frustrating!) story! I imagine you both laugh about it now, but I can't imagine the moods you were in that night...what a d*ckhead that Ranger was. wow. Re: the mask maniacs- we visited son and daughter-in law and new grandson in the summer of 2021 in California. We checked into our cabin in Pacifica and were preparing some food when there was a knock at the door from son (my step son)- he was masked up and had tests for us "to keep grandson safe" when we were going over to meet him the next day. We snarkily swabbed our noses, asked if he wore the mask all the time and I pretended to put the swab up my nose and wait for the results while adding "we aren't sick" to the weird conversation. When we were given the "clear" to visit the next day we sat outside on their deck with neighbors who had a five and three year old- the three year (masked of couse...and she was supposedly a psychiatrist! ) The three year old kept taking his mask off as he ran around and threw it in the driveway where she would promptly put the dirt ridden thing back on his grubby little face!) When she found out I was a speech pathologist and had experience with young children she shared she had concerns about his language/speech development , to which I replied, "well if I am to listen to him the mask needs to come off"- she quite talking to me then. Just last year we had the conversation about masks and speech therapy in California- our son came to their defense saying they wore "plastic masks" so their mouths could be seen. A friend of his is concerned about their kid's speech development and the therpaist had a zoom meeting and met them in person in a MASK last April of 2024!!! California people are more broken than others.. Those are two trips we would not have taken if we had to do it over again....SMH
As a ‘Californian’ I can testify at the ‘brokenness’ of the people. These ‘broken people’ tend to cluster along the coastal metro areas of California. They are the supposedly ‘high functioning/higher earner’ members of society, but they were the worst in complying with the CONvid propaganda ‘messaging’. When you head East to the rural or agricultural parts of the state, people didn’t buy the mask crap and didn’t wear them. Businesses defied the ‘authorities’ and stayed open. And it still amazes me how many idiots still are wearing a mask…especially younger people who wear masks!
I belong to a Food Co-op, Ocean Beach People’s Food Co-Op in Ocean Beach in San Diego. Ocean Beach is a haven for alternative types…hippies, new agers, surfers, vegans, bikers, homeless street people, seniors. The other day, out of the three ‘cashiers’ available for check out, two of them (both young) had a mask on! As well as a few ‘senior’ shoppers, had masks on as well.
I try not to engage with any cashier or store personnel who is wearing a mask.
If there’s only a mask wearer, I ask them if they could please get a co worker who chooses to go mask free that I can speak with. So I can understand what they are saying. They freak out when I say this. I have walked out of stores when there is only a mask wearer as the visible representative of the business.
We avoid the cashiers with masks...and if someone tries to talk to me that is wearing a mask I tell them I can't hear them also...(I do have a hearing loss, so I need that visual to help me!)
I lived in Ocean Beach as a child in the 1960s, halfway up Newport Ave. in a marvelous two-story house. Every morning at Ocean Beach Elementary we all lined up outside our classrooms and said the Pledge of Allegiance and sang "America the Beautiful." Maybe it was once a week or only on special occasions, but I remember it as a daily ritual that was clarifying and positive. The quaint and innocent shops "downtown" were gradually converting to become"head shops" and grunge merchants. Eventually certain blocks became a mecca for filthy, stoned, unemployed grifters.
How ironic that prudish mask robots are manning the cash registers now at one of the area's original centers of grunge-rot.
OB People's Food Co-op has been in existence since 1971! It’s completely changed into this woke, progressive Vegetarian/Vegan store. Totally ‘inclusive’ and open to all sexual identities and persuasions…employees as well
customers. The turnover of staff in the past four years has been crazy. All the previously ‘familiar faces’ of the long term employees are no more. They are long gone.
They had a sign at the front entrance that said you needed to wear a mask even into 2022!
Ugh! Sad. I pity these people, but I don't want to hang out near them, either. You've probably heard the one about the guy who wears a mask while driving alone in his car-- In case the car has CARVID. ;)
Yes indeed…the ‘irony’ of it all does not escape me…but that same ‘community’ all up & down coastal California whole heartedly “embraced the CONvid fear porn messaging”…they dutifully masked up, isolated from each other, lined up to get the EUA mRNA jabs, and required their relatives to be Jabbed also, to even associate with them. There’s just no explaining their ‘Namaste’ stupidity.
Well, it's EXCITING to them, in their mundane, boring lives. How sad that we are beaten down into such a mindset that a Scary Viral Killer is on the loose, and we have to be AGITATED...
Maybe we need more COMMUNITY ACTIVITIES!!! Art and culture, where have ye gone?
Sad. We must remember they are Fear Bunnies and victims of the Most Evil Campaign of All Time... One day we will ALL be free of this fear, but it takes time.
Wow! That there was zero concern about mask hygiene is a clear indication that they were never about health. Didn't matter what you had slapped across your face ... as long as it was something. As far as I know in every other compulsory mask situation the hygiene factor is important. Sorry about your relatives being so indoctrinated.
I seldom wore a mask but always wore the same one. I still have it in my car collecting dust and germs. No one said boo-hoo about wearing the same mask for a few years as I guess the mask police didn't know crap anyway.
I still see some people in stores wearing masks. They are simply virtue signaling fools. They likely know the masks are ineffective. They look foolish and pathetic to me. Why did so many people fall prey to the covid scam??? I believe, as other people have written, that our government, at all levels, used the same psychological warfare on us during covid as they use to create unrest and overthrow foreign governments. Our government perfected the technique. The covid psyop was 24/7, on all the major broadcast stations and in all social media. They created fear and overwhelmed people's senses. It was unrelenting and it was too disturbing for most people to believe that the government, the media, the medical community and the universities all lied ... They all lied to them.
I saw a few people wearing masks outside at a farmers market this past Sunday. It was about 90 degrees. Noticing the obvious contradiction to care about healthy local food and to also wear a slave mask that harms health I couldn’t help but give a sarcastic smile and utter a few pleasantries as I passed. My wife, ever the non confrontationist, gets irritated with me AGAIN and says, “Why bother? What’s the point?” And I say, “No, I will never stop making fun of these idiots.”
I also knew covid was a con from day 1 because EVERYTHING they told us to do was the exact opposite of how one would strengthen their immune systems. It was laughably pathetic and still is and I will never stop mocking them.
I have become IMMUNE to their fear trippy thing. ha ha But I DO think it's FEAR. They're still afraid, and the govt keeps bringing in NEW reasons to be afraid... It's sad, really. But I just kind of roll my eyes now... Unless it's a CHILD in a mask, that really pisses me off!!
I try not to say anything too sarcastic. I usually give a sideways glance and a sly smile, like I know they are an idiot. However, sometimes I get up close to them just to see how they react and see if they get uncomfortable. I think they are pathetic idiots, but I still feel sorry for them. I don't think they can help doing that stupid stuff. It is truly pathetic.
Yes if you give them the eye to eye direct contact look, they can’t handle it…it’s because they are hiding behind the false narrative that the mask provides for them.
I just thought of a good remark…”Are you under the care of a psychiatric professional and did they recommend you wear the mask for improved mental health outcomes?”
I'm not sure if it's vanity that caused most of the gullible to fall for the scam. I think it was likely fear that motivated most of them. The government/media/medical/universities really pushed the fear. But I don't know what motivates the last of the mask wearers now that the government has ratcheted down the fear. I think it is more of a political statement.
Excessive pride...in appearance or accomplishments -- vanity. "See..? I care about others...I wear this snot pouch to protect not myself, but others..."
Then there's cowardice -- indulgence in that which frightens to the point of ignobility. Tossing away your own freedom is one thing. Expecting or demanding others do so to accommodate your fear to the point of destruction of everything?
I admit I am vain and proud of my accomplishments- but I don’t talk about them to anyone and I am not and never will be gullible and stupid! (ie conned!!)
But I have to say this: It's EASY to scorn and even degrade these people, who are simply frightened out of their sense-making brains... It's LIZARD BRAIN thinking, NOT normal, NOT rational. They are VICTIMS, no matter how obnoxious they are, they are victims. I am angry at the smirking, horrible psychopaths who are BEHIND all this... THEY should be punished.
The scamdemic was fueled almost entirely on unjustified fear propagated by the government through the media. That was the most effective control they had. Facts and logic were either made-up or totally absent in their justifications. Although, I do agree that the fearful people couldn't resist the 24/7 fear psyop (that's why the government used fear), I do resent that the fearful wanted to stop non-fearful people from working, getting medical treatment, school and food. The fearful people were too gullible and they believed anything the fear mongers told them. That was dangerous for us. And they will do it again in the future when the next fear psyop comes. We need to convince those fearful people that what they did was horrible so that they will not do the same thing again when the government ramps up the fear about something else.
Well, they are a minority, and I think spending time creating yet MORE hostility between We the Peeps is a waste of time and effort. I think we should IGNORE them and get busy figuring out how we are going to deal with this oncoming TYRANNY. It's going to be a financial slam to the head like a lead pipe, I'm thinking, and the drive to FORCE us to do things or lose access to our own money will be their game. That's what I'm reading in the cards...
I asked today at the USPS about having a box... You HAVE to get your box ONLINE, and you HAVE to pay at least three months up front, but if you move or don't need it, you get no refund or transfer, they just keep whatever. There's more vile crap but basically you're forced to be digital at least part of the time, so they can TRACK you.
I’m not sure the best thing is going to be a continuing drive to convince the Fear Bunnies… They’re STILL masking and getting jabs. I think maybe it makes more sense to concentrate on connecting those of us who understand things, growing the numbers of those willing to ACT, and then doing ACTION, such as getting feet in the street and building community… When Fear Bunnies see big crowds of people who are NOT AFRAID, they have something concrete to go on… Being in a CROWD of people makes most people feel safer… Just my thoughts.
Perhaps they do believe the masks are effective. I truly don't know. Some of them are elderly and frail. However, many of them are young and healthy. Those seem to enjoy wearing it like a badge of honor that sets them apart.
The thing particularly about masks, was the whole changing agenda.
"The Science."
In the early days, the Health Authorities were earnestly telling us that masks were neither necessary nor helpful. Then there was the sudden 180° turn: all of a sudden, masks were mandated, and now were supposed to be both necessary and helpful.
In the beginning, you were allowed to wear a cloth covering... even a scarf was ok. Then it changed, it had to be a specific type of mask...
Here in Australia, it was the same. Sometime around our third lockdown in Brisbane, Queensland, when the mask shortage was over and you could actually buy them again, masks were mandated. And specifically, even if you were driving alone in your own car.
At that point, it had to be obvious that this was a scam, and about subservient & unquestioning compliance, not public health.
I'm 71 years old. (In 2020, make that 68.) I no longer have the energy or stamina to actively defy police, or even the security guards at Bunnings (our equivalent of Home Depot). I never wore a mask, or got a PCR test, or a jab in the arm. But I wore a badge saying "Face Covering Exempt" - my way of saying a polite and legal "Fuck you!"
Maybe that puts me on the cowardly edge of the Resistance - but at least it does send a signal to others that not everyone is compliant and brainwashed.
I did get covid (after going to the big rally here in Canberra, in Feb 2022).
It was a bit nasty for a day or 2, but I had my little bag of frowned-on remedies, and I survived and recovered completely.
I have no regrets.
And if Big Pharma want to try it on again, learning from their experience, well, I have learned from my experience too.
I will never trust official health advice ever again (not that I did anyway, but this has taken my trust to a new low).
I wore a mask only one time in order for be permitted to go into a Target store in Erie, PA. A young man passed me and I could smell cigarette smoke from him as he passed by. That’s when I knew. After that, I shopped only in stores where the Amish shopped, because the Amish never wore masks and no one forced them to. If there’s a next time, and if I have to, I’ll buy an Amish dress in order to avoid wearing a mask.
You just reminded me of this: long after mask-wearing rules were eliminated, a guy who ran register at a local grocery store was still wearing one. I was in his line and noticed his mask was down on his chin while he was coughing and sneezing and blowing his nose. I asked him why he was still wearing one. He replied, "I like it. And besides I think it's preventing me from catching colds." I said, "It looks like you have a cold right now." Then I said that within 20 minutes of wearing one, you are growing colonies of bacteria, yeast, fungus, and mold because you have created the perfect conditions: dark, warm, and moist. He never wore his mask again. I have found that telling people about masks in that way is often more convincing than explaining how viruses can get through all the little openings in the fabric. It's gross enough to get them thinking.
I had a mask that read “placebo” on it for those times I was forced to wear one. I realized there were few who got it-didn’t know the definition of the word. Kind of took some of the fun out of it ;)
Masks were “required” to enter my gym for a while, didn’t have to leave it on, mind you, but wear it when you walked in and checked in. Absolutely stupid 🙄 But I always wrote a message on mine, “Rona-con maskerade,” or “scamdemic of the sheep.” Anything to protest.
If the masks were such a slam dunk great idea, how come no ever thought of it during prior flu seasons? Do the virus particles get trapped in the mask or do they bounce off? What if you have covid but don't know it (asymptomatic!) - are you constantly rebreathing the virus your body is trying to expel? The covid narrative had way more holes in than that old tent of yours! ;-)
Well written Mark, again. My skepticism of mask effectiveness was reinforced by a carrer of military training w a gas mask in a simulated chemical environment and I'm accutely aware of the misery one incurs just from tear gas if the mask lets in the slightest ammount of contaminated air. I remember gov't healt agencies in the 80s shrieking relentlessly about using latex condoms over sheep skin to stop the spread of AIDS because the AIDS virus was small enough to penetrate the pores of the sheep skin. Modern gov't data would suggest N95 condoms would be at least as effective as latex in stopping viral spread. I still smoked when American Coronamania kicked off in earnest in middle of spring 2020, and blew cigarette smoke through and around the N95 paper mask. Smoke particals are larger than the Covid virus. I have a high school diploma and some college, and a successful "professional blue collar" carreer and it stupifies me/ enrages me to this day the number of "super smart" people I personally knew who fell for this and perpertuated the mask lie and see absolutely no difference between their anti-viral mask advocacy and advocating the use of an ugly Christmas sweater to also be an effective bullet proof vest. I have a tough time discerning what's worse- their advocacy of a useless protocol, or the majority who lapped it up and fell for it.
One of your best, Mark. When I heard even the size difference of the mask fiber being like a chain link fence to a mosquito, that was all I needed to know, and was incredulous the entire time that so many ignorant/scared/propagandized people bought into all of it.
there are two main points to this story, both equally important. although it's ostensibly about the ineffectiveness of masks- if the spaces in the weave are large enough to let air in, large enough to allow you to breathe, then they're large enough to allow viruses and microbes in as well which pretty much defeats their purpose, the 2nd point should not be missed.
there was a lot of faulty logic arguments used in their defense during the pandemic- "you wouldn't want your surgeon to be unmasked, would you?"
a surgical patient isn't breathing the same air as the surgeon, isn't breathing room air, so that argument falls flat. the surgeon is wearing a mask to keep spittle from coughs, sneezes or just talking- not microbes- from falling into your open incision.
the 2nd point might be even more important, the rigid thinking of the Ranger. when people wonder how the Holocaust happened, how all holocausts happen, how the authoritarianism of the pandemic happened, this is why. when i was in grade school, we saw a documentary about the Holocaust and the Nuremberg trials. "i was just following orders, i was just doing what i was told" was repeated again and again during the film (in subtitles as the film was in the original german) and it was not taken then as an excuse for heinous behavior.
and yet, Ranger Rick was just following orders. he had no pity on weary travelers; a 15 month old baby did not figure into his calculus. this is a guy who would have just as easily tossed that 15 month old into a gas chamber. just as easily have arrested a surfer. just as easily administered midazolam to a person with a flu- "must follow the protocol"- or denied you the ability to be with your dying relative. these are the pharmacists who refused to fill your legal prescription for ivermectin and reported your doctor to "the authorities" or the hospital that appealed the court's direct order to give IVM to an end stage covid patient, playing down the clock on that person's life.
one is tempted to say that these are terrible people with no integrity or backbone, and i do say that: they ARE terrible people BUT they are also everywhere. they are your neighbors, they were your friends, they run the bakeshop that refused to serve you because you didn't have the right papers, they ride the trains with you, they sit in the church pew behind you, they are your co-workers who pretended not to notice when you suddenly vanished after working with you for 10 or 20 or 40 years.
they are why this has happened in the past and why it will happen in the future.
That was exactly my thought - Ranger Rick was a perfect nazi-to-be. I am totally sure he would have been a covid zealot - if he was still around. People with such a dark heart seem to last forever - God giving them plenty of time to repent, I guess. My son was in his last year of college during the scamdemic. He wore a full blown respirator to mock the mask crap. Instead of people getting the joke, many complimented him on his seriousness.
When the MA moron, Charlie Baker, issued his snot pouch mandate, it infuriated me to the point where I scared myself. :) Grateful we had a place to which we could escape (family house in northern NH), I told hubs, "We're outta here." (Condo near Boston.) We stuffed both vehicles and took off for "the north country." (The NH moron did not issue his "order" until Nov...Wait. What?)
On a trip back to the Boston area over the summer (for some reason I've forgotten), I got together with a wonderful friend/neighbor from our building. She masked; I, of course, did not. Went to Lexington Center for coffee. Every. Single. Person. Wore. His/Her Snot. Pouch. What a freakin' weird sight it was. I told friend I would absolutely go inside with her to order coffee...
Nervous, but smiling at me, she said she'd go in. She did not want to risk a scene. I could wait outside at the small sidewalk cafe table. Honest to God, like being transported to a parallel universe..Bright, beautiful breezy New England summer day in one of the most chi-chi towns in MA. Populated by masked freaks...Anyway, out she comes with our coffees. We start to talk about the masks...
Her: See...it's like this. We wear masks to protect others.
Me: But I'm not sick.
Her: You might be.
Me: No...I'm not sick. Do you mean I might be "infected?" (She nods.) OK...I might be, but...I'm still not sick...
Her: Well, anyway. The reason we all need to wear them is that I wear my mask to protect you...and you wear your mask (the one I didn't have) to protect me...
Me: So. Let me get this straight. I wear a mask -- even though I'm healthy -- to protect you, not myself?
Her: Yes.
Me: So, your mask doesn't protect you? It protects me?
Her: Yes...(But she's starting to waver a bit here...)
Me: OK, so even though you can still breathe -- inhale and exhale through the mask -- when it comes to protecting against a virus, it protects me from you, but not you from me? So...they only work one way?
Her: She's looking at me...and gives the silent, but telltale...blink...and no answer.
This woman was one of the loveliest people I knew in MA. It saddened me to see this. She knew me, though, 😉 and though probably unworthy of it, she told me often how much she respected me. She lived on the floor below us.
So, in approaching this, I tread gently, trying to get her to the point of seeing the complete illogic of her stance. She copped no attitude at all toward my refusal, but I think she was 1) partly afraid of the "thing" itself and 2) caved to the pressure of virtually every single other person behind a snot pouch.
We were at the Peet's Coffee on Mass Avenue in Lexington Center. The irony of this -- living, working, shopping where "the shot heard 'round the world" took place -- was (is!) utterly lost of the vast majority of Bay Staters.
Indeed! Our local “reverend” (not reverend in the true meaning at all - job opening rather, grrr) wrote an article in our small community weekly paper re a fundraiser for Ukraine- where you would have to be masked (can’t remember if jabbed was a pre req then too), but her lines were identical to your friend’s (the I wear, you wear mantra) above and I wanted to vomit at the smug superiority and idiocy. It was obviously a well repeated piece of banal crap cleverly inserted into the mania.
Trump was a reality actor following orders, every bit as much as Biden is, and probably has the same cartel pulling his strings. You can read more about this at momanddadmatters.substack.com
Why is the question, in the wake of the debate, "will Biden drop out of the race" as opposed to "will Biden now relinquish the nuclear button", given his now acknowledged dementia? Trump is blase about the nuclear button because he knows and has known, *all along*, that such decisions about things as the nuclear button, the national emergency and indeed all of the trains running on time, has been handled by "the staff" of the deep state, not to worry his pretty little head about. Just follow the script.
Another version of the twilight zone was having a lot of contacts in the yoga world where the breath is king. Certainly, they would never ever restrict their ability to breathe. What a shocker. When I was the only person in a class who didn’t wear a mask, I found I couldn’t relax because I imagined them all resenting me - not a crazy supposition considering that people hiking in the mountains went out of their way to avoid me not only physically but with their eyes. My very act of breathing threatened people. That’s when I had to face the dark forces head on. They recruited an army just like in the matrix movie where the agents can use any body of an unsuspecting normie.
Yesterday, Bellingham, Washington, walked into a vintage thrift store in the downtown area. Two young tattooed women staffing the place were wearing big black N-95 masks. "What's with the masks?" I said. "Why are you wearing them? Don't you know it's been proven that they aren't really effective? And, you're just breathing your own foul air all day long." "We're wearing them to protect our clientele," one of them answered sharply. "These masks were designed for heart surgeons, who wear them up to 22 hours during heart surgery." And then a patron (28-ish guy) piped in, "I wore those all throughout my medical training." I shrugged my shoulders and said (as I walked out of the store, a 73-year-old woman): "No shots, no vaccines, no illness. I never get sick." Oh, the stupidity of the young 'woke.'
I knew from the beginning that it was a scam. Call it gut instinct or common sense. Cloth masks were ridiculous especially ones made from t-shirts. The ranger was a stereotypical government employee using his power over the little people. What a jerk. Good essay.
I've known for years from some ancient reading that the size of any virus is to the size of a basketball, which is to the size of the earth. IE, very small. And no one has actually seen a virus: they infer its existence from various other factors. Your ranger is exactly like those who imposed the lockdowns, etc. Give some people a little power and there's almost no limit to what they'll do with it. All totalitarian ideologies are dependent on these type people.
Agree with you on tents. I never had one that kept the rain out .
Mark, another great article. Hope the park ranger suffered from incurable anal itching the rest of his life, lol. Maybe he was suffering from it at the time you were there!
Anyhow, I enjoy reading all the comments here. To all of you with kids/grandkids and other relatives of an impressionable age (from 1 to 100!) do what you can to encourage them to be renegades. Sometimes it's hard to veer from what the "compliant" are trying to talk us into, and walk outside of what they consider the "safe" zone. If we did it, they can too.
It's encouraging to see just how many of us were able to tap into our own inner renegade during the past 4 years. Keep it up.
What a great (so frustrating!) story! I imagine you both laugh about it now, but I can't imagine the moods you were in that night...what a d*ckhead that Ranger was. wow. Re: the mask maniacs- we visited son and daughter-in law and new grandson in the summer of 2021 in California. We checked into our cabin in Pacifica and were preparing some food when there was a knock at the door from son (my step son)- he was masked up and had tests for us "to keep grandson safe" when we were going over to meet him the next day. We snarkily swabbed our noses, asked if he wore the mask all the time and I pretended to put the swab up my nose and wait for the results while adding "we aren't sick" to the weird conversation. When we were given the "clear" to visit the next day we sat outside on their deck with neighbors who had a five and three year old- the three year (masked of couse...and she was supposedly a psychiatrist! ) The three year old kept taking his mask off as he ran around and threw it in the driveway where she would promptly put the dirt ridden thing back on his grubby little face!) When she found out I was a speech pathologist and had experience with young children she shared she had concerns about his language/speech development , to which I replied, "well if I am to listen to him the mask needs to come off"- she quite talking to me then. Just last year we had the conversation about masks and speech therapy in California- our son came to their defense saying they wore "plastic masks" so their mouths could be seen. A friend of his is concerned about their kid's speech development and the therpaist had a zoom meeting and met them in person in a MASK last April of 2024!!! California people are more broken than others.. Those are two trips we would not have taken if we had to do it over again....SMH
Awww, we're not all like this, Cheryl. Many of us in California resisted. You just met loonies.
That is so great to know! Sorry if I offended! Plenty of loonies here in Az too!!!
As a ‘Californian’ I can testify at the ‘brokenness’ of the people. These ‘broken people’ tend to cluster along the coastal metro areas of California. They are the supposedly ‘high functioning/higher earner’ members of society, but they were the worst in complying with the CONvid propaganda ‘messaging’. When you head East to the rural or agricultural parts of the state, people didn’t buy the mask crap and didn’t wear them. Businesses defied the ‘authorities’ and stayed open. And it still amazes me how many idiots still are wearing a mask…especially younger people who wear masks!
I belong to a Food Co-op, Ocean Beach People’s Food Co-Op in Ocean Beach in San Diego. Ocean Beach is a haven for alternative types…hippies, new agers, surfers, vegans, bikers, homeless street people, seniors. The other day, out of the three ‘cashiers’ available for check out, two of them (both young) had a mask on! As well as a few ‘senior’ shoppers, had masks on as well.
Ugh! I won’t go to someone still wearing a useless mask! These relatives are both in the health field. Go figure!!
I try not to engage with any cashier or store personnel who is wearing a mask.
If there’s only a mask wearer, I ask them if they could please get a co worker who chooses to go mask free that I can speak with. So I can understand what they are saying. They freak out when I say this. I have walked out of stores when there is only a mask wearer as the visible representative of the business.
We avoid the cashiers with masks...and if someone tries to talk to me that is wearing a mask I tell them I can't hear them also...(I do have a hearing loss, so I need that visual to help me!)
me too. Hearing loss so it is necessary but it gives me a chance to free them from their foolishness
Same
Kudos to you. I wonder if it causes any of the Maskers to question it...
I lived in Ocean Beach as a child in the 1960s, halfway up Newport Ave. in a marvelous two-story house. Every morning at Ocean Beach Elementary we all lined up outside our classrooms and said the Pledge of Allegiance and sang "America the Beautiful." Maybe it was once a week or only on special occasions, but I remember it as a daily ritual that was clarifying and positive. The quaint and innocent shops "downtown" were gradually converting to become"head shops" and grunge merchants. Eventually certain blocks became a mecca for filthy, stoned, unemployed grifters.
How ironic that prudish mask robots are manning the cash registers now at one of the area's original centers of grunge-rot.
OB People's Food Co-op has been in existence since 1971! It’s completely changed into this woke, progressive Vegetarian/Vegan store. Totally ‘inclusive’ and open to all sexual identities and persuasions…employees as well
customers. The turnover of staff in the past four years has been crazy. All the previously ‘familiar faces’ of the long term employees are no more. They are long gone.
They had a sign at the front entrance that said you needed to wear a mask even into 2022!
Ugh! Sad. I pity these people, but I don't want to hang out near them, either. You've probably heard the one about the guy who wears a mask while driving alone in his car-- In case the car has CARVID. ;)
Yes indeed…the ‘irony’ of it all does not escape me…but that same ‘community’ all up & down coastal California whole heartedly “embraced the CONvid fear porn messaging”…they dutifully masked up, isolated from each other, lined up to get the EUA mRNA jabs, and required their relatives to be Jabbed also, to even associate with them. There’s just no explaining their ‘Namaste’ stupidity.
Well, it's EXCITING to them, in their mundane, boring lives. How sad that we are beaten down into such a mindset that a Scary Viral Killer is on the loose, and we have to be AGITATED...
Maybe we need more COMMUNITY ACTIVITIES!!! Art and culture, where have ye gone?
Sad. We must remember they are Fear Bunnies and victims of the Most Evil Campaign of All Time... One day we will ALL be free of this fear, but it takes time.
I don’t see masks much in North County
Lizard Brain Thinking... it's why FEAR is the #1 Tool of the Oppressor.
Wow! That there was zero concern about mask hygiene is a clear indication that they were never about health. Didn't matter what you had slapped across your face ... as long as it was something. As far as I know in every other compulsory mask situation the hygiene factor is important. Sorry about your relatives being so indoctrinated.
I seldom wore a mask but always wore the same one. I still have it in my car collecting dust and germs. No one said boo-hoo about wearing the same mask for a few years as I guess the mask police didn't know crap anyway.
Masking is utterly ludicrous, and actually HARMFUL.
The stupidity of that is just mind-boggling. POOR CHILD!!!!
I know! I guess both kids are having problems in school now. Beware the PhD letters! Doesn’t mean you have common sense!!
I still see some people in stores wearing masks. They are simply virtue signaling fools. They likely know the masks are ineffective. They look foolish and pathetic to me. Why did so many people fall prey to the covid scam??? I believe, as other people have written, that our government, at all levels, used the same psychological warfare on us during covid as they use to create unrest and overthrow foreign governments. Our government perfected the technique. The covid psyop was 24/7, on all the major broadcast stations and in all social media. They created fear and overwhelmed people's senses. It was unrelenting and it was too disturbing for most people to believe that the government, the media, the medical community and the universities all lied ... They all lied to them.
I saw a few people wearing masks outside at a farmers market this past Sunday. It was about 90 degrees. Noticing the obvious contradiction to care about healthy local food and to also wear a slave mask that harms health I couldn’t help but give a sarcastic smile and utter a few pleasantries as I passed. My wife, ever the non confrontationist, gets irritated with me AGAIN and says, “Why bother? What’s the point?” And I say, “No, I will never stop making fun of these idiots.”
I also knew covid was a con from day 1 because EVERYTHING they told us to do was the exact opposite of how one would strengthen their immune systems. It was laughably pathetic and still is and I will never stop mocking them.
I know some days I cannot resist commenting to the ‘mask wearers’…WTF why do you have a mask on and for what purpose?
I have become IMMUNE to their fear trippy thing. ha ha But I DO think it's FEAR. They're still afraid, and the govt keeps bringing in NEW reasons to be afraid... It's sad, really. But I just kind of roll my eyes now... Unless it's a CHILD in a mask, that really pisses me off!!
Me too Frontera
I try not to say anything too sarcastic. I usually give a sideways glance and a sly smile, like I know they are an idiot. However, sometimes I get up close to them just to see how they react and see if they get uncomfortable. I think they are pathetic idiots, but I still feel sorry for them. I don't think they can help doing that stupid stuff. It is truly pathetic.
Yes if you give them the eye to eye direct contact look, they can’t handle it…it’s because they are hiding behind the false narrative that the mask provides for them.
I just thought of a good remark…”Are you under the care of a psychiatric professional and did they recommend you wear the mask for improved mental health outcomes?”
LMAO!
As I keep writing, every important "truth-seeking" organization in the world is now captured. Every one of them.
So the Great Purge that must happen to save the world is going to have to exile a shit-load of captured dumb asses in "leadership" positions.
(Excuse my French).
Bill, Here becuz of your recommendation.. read this & subscribed. The others you mentioned in "Plan B" I knew already (good 'uns all) .. thanks much
You'll love Mark's writing, Maskull. He just published a book that you'd love too.
Why do so many people fall prey to the COVID scam? And so many others?
Vanity. It's the Devil's favorite sin.
I'm not sure if it's vanity that caused most of the gullible to fall for the scam. I think it was likely fear that motivated most of them. The government/media/medical/universities really pushed the fear. But I don't know what motivates the last of the mask wearers now that the government has ratcheted down the fear. I think it is more of a political statement.
Excessive pride...in appearance or accomplishments -- vanity. "See..? I care about others...I wear this snot pouch to protect not myself, but others..."
Then there's cowardice -- indulgence in that which frightens to the point of ignobility. Tossing away your own freedom is one thing. Expecting or demanding others do so to accommodate your fear to the point of destruction of everything?
I admit I am vain and proud of my accomplishments- but I don’t talk about them to anyone and I am not and never will be gullible and stupid! (ie conned!!)
FEAR. It's not just for breakfast anymore.
But I have to say this: It's EASY to scorn and even degrade these people, who are simply frightened out of their sense-making brains... It's LIZARD BRAIN thinking, NOT normal, NOT rational. They are VICTIMS, no matter how obnoxious they are, they are victims. I am angry at the smirking, horrible psychopaths who are BEHIND all this... THEY should be punished.
The scamdemic was fueled almost entirely on unjustified fear propagated by the government through the media. That was the most effective control they had. Facts and logic were either made-up or totally absent in their justifications. Although, I do agree that the fearful people couldn't resist the 24/7 fear psyop (that's why the government used fear), I do resent that the fearful wanted to stop non-fearful people from working, getting medical treatment, school and food. The fearful people were too gullible and they believed anything the fear mongers told them. That was dangerous for us. And they will do it again in the future when the next fear psyop comes. We need to convince those fearful people that what they did was horrible so that they will not do the same thing again when the government ramps up the fear about something else.
Well, they are a minority, and I think spending time creating yet MORE hostility between We the Peeps is a waste of time and effort. I think we should IGNORE them and get busy figuring out how we are going to deal with this oncoming TYRANNY. It's going to be a financial slam to the head like a lead pipe, I'm thinking, and the drive to FORCE us to do things or lose access to our own money will be their game. That's what I'm reading in the cards...
I asked today at the USPS about having a box... You HAVE to get your box ONLINE, and you HAVE to pay at least three months up front, but if you move or don't need it, you get no refund or transfer, they just keep whatever. There's more vile crap but basically you're forced to be digital at least part of the time, so they can TRACK you.
I’m not sure the best thing is going to be a continuing drive to convince the Fear Bunnies… They’re STILL masking and getting jabs. I think maybe it makes more sense to concentrate on connecting those of us who understand things, growing the numbers of those willing to ACT, and then doing ACTION, such as getting feet in the street and building community… When Fear Bunnies see big crowds of people who are NOT AFRAID, they have something concrete to go on… Being in a CROWD of people makes most people feel safer… Just my thoughts.
I'd say they're actually Fear Bunnies, and thus they are in Lizard Brain thinking.
Perhaps they do believe the masks are effective. I truly don't know. Some of them are elderly and frail. However, many of them are young and healthy. Those seem to enjoy wearing it like a badge of honor that sets them apart.
It's kind of like a Merit Badge for Stupidity.
The thing particularly about masks, was the whole changing agenda.
"The Science."
In the early days, the Health Authorities were earnestly telling us that masks were neither necessary nor helpful. Then there was the sudden 180° turn: all of a sudden, masks were mandated, and now were supposed to be both necessary and helpful.
In the beginning, you were allowed to wear a cloth covering... even a scarf was ok. Then it changed, it had to be a specific type of mask...
Here in Australia, it was the same. Sometime around our third lockdown in Brisbane, Queensland, when the mask shortage was over and you could actually buy them again, masks were mandated. And specifically, even if you were driving alone in your own car.
At that point, it had to be obvious that this was a scam, and about subservient & unquestioning compliance, not public health.
I'm 71 years old. (In 2020, make that 68.) I no longer have the energy or stamina to actively defy police, or even the security guards at Bunnings (our equivalent of Home Depot). I never wore a mask, or got a PCR test, or a jab in the arm. But I wore a badge saying "Face Covering Exempt" - my way of saying a polite and legal "Fuck you!"
Maybe that puts me on the cowardly edge of the Resistance - but at least it does send a signal to others that not everyone is compliant and brainwashed.
I did get covid (after going to the big rally here in Canberra, in Feb 2022).
It was a bit nasty for a day or 2, but I had my little bag of frowned-on remedies, and I survived and recovered completely.
I have no regrets.
And if Big Pharma want to try it on again, learning from their experience, well, I have learned from my experience too.
I will never trust official health advice ever again (not that I did anyway, but this has taken my trust to a new low).
The key take-away from the entire Scamdemic: "Don't trust the experts."
I like the “Face Covering Exempt” badge idea! 😉👏🏼
I wore a mask only one time in order for be permitted to go into a Target store in Erie, PA. A young man passed me and I could smell cigarette smoke from him as he passed by. That’s when I knew. After that, I shopped only in stores where the Amish shopped, because the Amish never wore masks and no one forced them to. If there’s a next time, and if I have to, I’ll buy an Amish dress in order to avoid wearing a mask.
I didn't think of this until most people had stopped masking but it would have been cool to write "This is all a Scam!" on a mask and then wear it.
You just reminded me of this: long after mask-wearing rules were eliminated, a guy who ran register at a local grocery store was still wearing one. I was in his line and noticed his mask was down on his chin while he was coughing and sneezing and blowing his nose. I asked him why he was still wearing one. He replied, "I like it. And besides I think it's preventing me from catching colds." I said, "It looks like you have a cold right now." Then I said that within 20 minutes of wearing one, you are growing colonies of bacteria, yeast, fungus, and mold because you have created the perfect conditions: dark, warm, and moist. He never wore his mask again. I have found that telling people about masks in that way is often more convincing than explaining how viruses can get through all the little openings in the fabric. It's gross enough to get them thinking.
Masks - aka "bacteria farms"
😂
I saw one that said “this mask is as effective as Justin Trudeau “….! We naturally had a great chat!
I had a mask that read “placebo” on it for those times I was forced to wear one. I realized there were few who got it-didn’t know the definition of the word. Kind of took some of the fun out of it ;)
Maybe they went home and looked it up.
Masks were “required” to enter my gym for a while, didn’t have to leave it on, mind you, but wear it when you walked in and checked in. Absolutely stupid 🙄 But I always wrote a message on mine, “Rona-con maskerade,” or “scamdemic of the sheep.” Anything to protest.
One time I stopped for gas at a convenience store in Okmulgee, OK and saw a guy with a mask that read "This mask is bullshit."
Brilliant.
Haha I did into the Grocery store , actually it was fun .
If the masks were such a slam dunk great idea, how come no ever thought of it during prior flu seasons? Do the virus particles get trapped in the mask or do they bounce off? What if you have covid but don't know it (asymptomatic!) - are you constantly rebreathing the virus your body is trying to expel? The covid narrative had way more holes in than that old tent of yours! ;-)
Well written Mark, again. My skepticism of mask effectiveness was reinforced by a carrer of military training w a gas mask in a simulated chemical environment and I'm accutely aware of the misery one incurs just from tear gas if the mask lets in the slightest ammount of contaminated air. I remember gov't healt agencies in the 80s shrieking relentlessly about using latex condoms over sheep skin to stop the spread of AIDS because the AIDS virus was small enough to penetrate the pores of the sheep skin. Modern gov't data would suggest N95 condoms would be at least as effective as latex in stopping viral spread. I still smoked when American Coronamania kicked off in earnest in middle of spring 2020, and blew cigarette smoke through and around the N95 paper mask. Smoke particals are larger than the Covid virus. I have a high school diploma and some college, and a successful "professional blue collar" carreer and it stupifies me/ enrages me to this day the number of "super smart" people I personally knew who fell for this and perpertuated the mask lie and see absolutely no difference between their anti-viral mask advocacy and advocating the use of an ugly Christmas sweater to also be an effective bullet proof vest. I have a tough time discerning what's worse- their advocacy of a useless protocol, or the majority who lapped it up and fell for it.
There are studies that show Nicotine stopping covid infection. Cigarettes working better than a mask--I didn't think I'd ever see that.
One of your best, Mark. When I heard even the size difference of the mask fiber being like a chain link fence to a mosquito, that was all I needed to know, and was incredulous the entire time that so many ignorant/scared/propagandized people bought into all of it.
Exactly, how did they not know? However, I have yet had a single soul ask me how I knew. Doubt I ever will.
there are two main points to this story, both equally important. although it's ostensibly about the ineffectiveness of masks- if the spaces in the weave are large enough to let air in, large enough to allow you to breathe, then they're large enough to allow viruses and microbes in as well which pretty much defeats their purpose, the 2nd point should not be missed.
there was a lot of faulty logic arguments used in their defense during the pandemic- "you wouldn't want your surgeon to be unmasked, would you?"
a surgical patient isn't breathing the same air as the surgeon, isn't breathing room air, so that argument falls flat. the surgeon is wearing a mask to keep spittle from coughs, sneezes or just talking- not microbes- from falling into your open incision.
the 2nd point might be even more important, the rigid thinking of the Ranger. when people wonder how the Holocaust happened, how all holocausts happen, how the authoritarianism of the pandemic happened, this is why. when i was in grade school, we saw a documentary about the Holocaust and the Nuremberg trials. "i was just following orders, i was just doing what i was told" was repeated again and again during the film (in subtitles as the film was in the original german) and it was not taken then as an excuse for heinous behavior.
and yet, Ranger Rick was just following orders. he had no pity on weary travelers; a 15 month old baby did not figure into his calculus. this is a guy who would have just as easily tossed that 15 month old into a gas chamber. just as easily have arrested a surfer. just as easily administered midazolam to a person with a flu- "must follow the protocol"- or denied you the ability to be with your dying relative. these are the pharmacists who refused to fill your legal prescription for ivermectin and reported your doctor to "the authorities" or the hospital that appealed the court's direct order to give IVM to an end stage covid patient, playing down the clock on that person's life.
one is tempted to say that these are terrible people with no integrity or backbone, and i do say that: they ARE terrible people BUT they are also everywhere. they are your neighbors, they were your friends, they run the bakeshop that refused to serve you because you didn't have the right papers, they ride the trains with you, they sit in the church pew behind you, they are your co-workers who pretended not to notice when you suddenly vanished after working with you for 10 or 20 or 40 years.
they are why this has happened in the past and why it will happen in the future.
Yes, numerous people I thought could think and say "No," bought the whole thing.
That was exactly my thought - Ranger Rick was a perfect nazi-to-be. I am totally sure he would have been a covid zealot - if he was still around. People with such a dark heart seem to last forever - God giving them plenty of time to repent, I guess. My son was in his last year of college during the scamdemic. He wore a full blown respirator to mock the mask crap. Instead of people getting the joke, many complimented him on his seriousness.
Good Lord.
oh my god! people lost their minds!! some permanently, i'm afraid.
Re being protected if one dons a snot pouch...
When the MA moron, Charlie Baker, issued his snot pouch mandate, it infuriated me to the point where I scared myself. :) Grateful we had a place to which we could escape (family house in northern NH), I told hubs, "We're outta here." (Condo near Boston.) We stuffed both vehicles and took off for "the north country." (The NH moron did not issue his "order" until Nov...Wait. What?)
On a trip back to the Boston area over the summer (for some reason I've forgotten), I got together with a wonderful friend/neighbor from our building. She masked; I, of course, did not. Went to Lexington Center for coffee. Every. Single. Person. Wore. His/Her Snot. Pouch. What a freakin' weird sight it was. I told friend I would absolutely go inside with her to order coffee...
Nervous, but smiling at me, she said she'd go in. She did not want to risk a scene. I could wait outside at the small sidewalk cafe table. Honest to God, like being transported to a parallel universe..Bright, beautiful breezy New England summer day in one of the most chi-chi towns in MA. Populated by masked freaks...Anyway, out she comes with our coffees. We start to talk about the masks...
Her: See...it's like this. We wear masks to protect others.
Me: But I'm not sick.
Her: You might be.
Me: No...I'm not sick. Do you mean I might be "infected?" (She nods.) OK...I might be, but...I'm still not sick...
Her: Well, anyway. The reason we all need to wear them is that I wear my mask to protect you...and you wear your mask (the one I didn't have) to protect me...
Me: So. Let me get this straight. I wear a mask -- even though I'm healthy -- to protect you, not myself?
Her: Yes.
Me: So, your mask doesn't protect you? It protects me?
Her: Yes...(But she's starting to waver a bit here...)
Me: OK, so even though you can still breathe -- inhale and exhale through the mask -- when it comes to protecting against a virus, it protects me from you, but not you from me? So...they only work one way?
Her: She's looking at me...and gives the silent, but telltale...blink...and no answer.
Me: Head tilt toward her, eyebrows raised.
End of.
Honest to God.
Very few people would even have that discussion with me.
This woman was one of the loveliest people I knew in MA. It saddened me to see this. She knew me, though, 😉 and though probably unworthy of it, she told me often how much she respected me. She lived on the floor below us.
So, in approaching this, I tread gently, trying to get her to the point of seeing the complete illogic of her stance. She copped no attitude at all toward my refusal, but I think she was 1) partly afraid of the "thing" itself and 2) caved to the pressure of virtually every single other person behind a snot pouch.
We were at the Peet's Coffee on Mass Avenue in Lexington Center. The irony of this -- living, working, shopping where "the shot heard 'round the world" took place -- was (is!) utterly lost of the vast majority of Bay Staters.
Sigh...
Indeed! Our local “reverend” (not reverend in the true meaning at all - job opening rather, grrr) wrote an article in our small community weekly paper re a fundraiser for Ukraine- where you would have to be masked (can’t remember if jabbed was a pre req then too), but her lines were identical to your friend’s (the I wear, you wear mantra) above and I wanted to vomit at the smug superiority and idiocy. It was obviously a well repeated piece of banal crap cleverly inserted into the mania.
If conservatives had known that president quack speed was actually a Democrat plant, they never would have locked down
They BLEW it. Instead of listening to Tucker Carlson, Trump shoulda called me.
I know more science than does Tucker.
Trump was a reality actor following orders, every bit as much as Biden is, and probably has the same cartel pulling his strings. You can read more about this at momanddadmatters.substack.com
Why is the question, in the wake of the debate, "will Biden drop out of the race" as opposed to "will Biden now relinquish the nuclear button", given his now acknowledged dementia? Trump is blase about the nuclear button because he knows and has known, *all along*, that such decisions about things as the nuclear button, the national emergency and indeed all of the trains running on time, has been handled by "the staff" of the deep state, not to worry his pretty little head about. Just follow the script.
Another version of the twilight zone was having a lot of contacts in the yoga world where the breath is king. Certainly, they would never ever restrict their ability to breathe. What a shocker. When I was the only person in a class who didn’t wear a mask, I found I couldn’t relax because I imagined them all resenting me - not a crazy supposition considering that people hiking in the mountains went out of their way to avoid me not only physically but with their eyes. My very act of breathing threatened people. That’s when I had to face the dark forces head on. They recruited an army just like in the matrix movie where the agents can use any body of an unsuspecting normie.
Bird's,
May the breath in me honor the breath in you. I wish you peace amongst the craziness.
Ah, how lovely. Right back atcha. Many good wishes to you and your loved ones.
Yesterday, Bellingham, Washington, walked into a vintage thrift store in the downtown area. Two young tattooed women staffing the place were wearing big black N-95 masks. "What's with the masks?" I said. "Why are you wearing them? Don't you know it's been proven that they aren't really effective? And, you're just breathing your own foul air all day long." "We're wearing them to protect our clientele," one of them answered sharply. "These masks were designed for heart surgeons, who wear them up to 22 hours during heart surgery." And then a patron (28-ish guy) piped in, "I wore those all throughout my medical training." I shrugged my shoulders and said (as I walked out of the store, a 73-year-old woman): "No shots, no vaccines, no illness. I never get sick." Oh, the stupidity of the young 'woke.'
Thanks, Vegan, for speaking truth to stupidity.
I knew from the beginning that it was a scam. Call it gut instinct or common sense. Cloth masks were ridiculous especially ones made from t-shirts. The ranger was a stereotypical government employee using his power over the little people. What a jerk. Good essay.
I've known for years from some ancient reading that the size of any virus is to the size of a basketball, which is to the size of the earth. IE, very small. And no one has actually seen a virus: they infer its existence from various other factors. Your ranger is exactly like those who imposed the lockdowns, etc. Give some people a little power and there's almost no limit to what they'll do with it. All totalitarian ideologies are dependent on these type people.
Agree with you on tents. I never had one that kept the rain out .
Danny Huckabee
Mark, another great article. Hope the park ranger suffered from incurable anal itching the rest of his life, lol. Maybe he was suffering from it at the time you were there!
Anyhow, I enjoy reading all the comments here. To all of you with kids/grandkids and other relatives of an impressionable age (from 1 to 100!) do what you can to encourage them to be renegades. Sometimes it's hard to veer from what the "compliant" are trying to talk us into, and walk outside of what they consider the "safe" zone. If we did it, they can too.
It's encouraging to see just how many of us were able to tap into our own inner renegade during the past 4 years. Keep it up.