THREAD: A (white) teenager and his father in Georgia were being interviewed about the need for masks as school starts. Both spoke about how they felt wearing masks is unnecessary and amounts to "taking their rights away." I'm so interested in the psychology behind this....(1/15)

...Do they not realize that smoking is banned from restaurants and bars for the very same reasons (public health)? Do they not see that traffic lights are in place to keep us from driving into and injuring or killing each other (public health)?...(2/15)

...These laws and regulations are part and parcel of living in an orderly society where a modicum of protection exists in the form of minor restrictions on individuals for the good of the common whole. Because no, not voluntary efforts and, no, not prayer...(3/15)

...but only government mandates and directives can solve this and many other of our collective problems.

We're on the road to fascism & restricted freedom, NOT from logical health-saving mask mandates but because of actions taken by current gov't officials to restrict...(4/15)

CERTAIN people's voting rights & abilities to make a living commensurate with even the "average" person. People don't see this. They don't see the invisible but sinister & hateful ways that those they've elected, and in whose actions their fellow citizens are complicit,...(5/15)

....commandeer existing societal infrastructure to ACTUALLY take away American citizens' freedoms.

They’re not looking at the uniformed, but unidentifiable agents in the streets of big cities, sent by the feds, who randomly take down peaceful protesters…(6/15)

...based on the administration’s need to look tough. Why? Because these protesters aren’t the gun-toting, mask-less ones in Michigan who were left to their own devices when they stormed the Statehouse and screamed in the face of law enforcement...(7/15)

...Those folks got a pass. THEIR rights appear secure. Those white, apparently disaffected white men.

The fact is, people like that man & his pliable kid may or may not understand, but, because of their race and gender, their "freedoms" are relatively secure already...(8/15)

...It's those who are unlike them - those who weren't born into privilege - those who had a society that worked against their success from day 1 - that are the ones whose rights are in most need of protection. Those rights need protecting via laws that can be enforced...(9/15)

...as well as education about those rights and other realities of our existence (how ironic that the push to recklessly open schools in the name of "freedom" comes from those most afraid of the science and logic that those schools teach!)...(10/15)

...The anti-mask mandate stance has been created by those same "government officials" who need a rallying point to consolidate their base on an issue that can easily be used to distract from the administration's failure to adequately respond to the pandemic and to...(11/15)

...protect the collective society. It is this very principle - that of the need for collective action to protect the individual citizen that is being obscured by political facades that appeal to tradition and the idea that you have to hold on to what you have and...(12/15)

...what you believe to be true. "I've got mine. Don't take it away." It's that concept of Americans "clinging to guns and religion" that Obama once (accurately) spoke about.

If the father and son were to wear masks & actually attend school for the purpose of learning...(13/15)

...and becoming educated, instead of wallowing in ignorance - to understand how to critically analyze & use logic, and to understand history as it really happened, not how they wish it had happened - AND if they adopted some of the principles from the Christian religion...(14/15)

...they no doubt tout as their own - they might actually understand that they are being hoodwinked and used by the very government that they despise yet cling to when the one in power is manipulative of them yet as ignorant as they are. (15/15)