On the importance of words.
But we are not having a rational discussion about the tools and the investments that we need to reopen the economy. Instead, the people protesting to reopen the economy are also protesting against the use of a key tool to reopen the economy, masks! Welcome to crazy town.
So writes Alex Tabarrok in “Save Grandma, Save the Economy,” Marginal Revolution, May 7.
I think Alex doesn’t get the importance of the word “the” when he writes about “the people protesting to reopen the economy.” If he had said “some of the,” he might have had a point.
I can speak only about the demonstration in Monterey against California Governor Newsom’s lockdown. My local libertarian activist friend Lawrence Samuels and I organized it. I was disappointed that only about half of the protestors wore masks, although about half of this half did seem to be doing reasonable social distancing. But the protest was all about the lockdown. There were, by my count, about 130 people there at the peak. There were probably about 60 or 70 homemade signs protesting the lockdown. I was there from 12:45 p.m., 15 minutes before it began, to 2:10 p.m., 10 minutes after it ended. I walked back and forth checking the signs.
A large number of people, and many of the ones I talked to, wanted desperately to be allowed to go back to work. One hairdresser I talked to by phone afterwards is quite willing to do the masks and all the rest if she can just open her business again.
How many signs did I see protesting masks? Zero.
See here for pics from a local newspaper and here for a video by a local news channel.
READER COMMENTS
Jon Murphy
May 7 2020 at 12:04pm
My experience at an “Open Maryland” protest was slightly different but in your favor. Just about everyone wore masks. I overheard someone talking with the local press and they made a point of emphasizing that no one objected to reasonable measures, like masks or plexiglass barriers between work stations, but the overreaction of lockdowns.
Daniel Hill
May 7 2020 at 12:59pm
I suspect there’s a bit of availability bias affecting Alex’s comment. The protests getting national TV coverage are not ones like yours in CA, but the men with guns storming the Michigan statehouse.
Mark Brady
May 7 2020 at 8:32pm
I suggest that the PR case for wearing masks at rallies is more persuasive (to avoid people getting distracted from arguments for lifting the lockdown) than the epidemiological case for the public wearing masks when they’re out and about.
From what I can make out, “expert” opinion on the usefulness of masks varies from the view that it is probably better than nothing (with the caveat that its effectiveness largely, if not entirely, depends on the nature of the mask and the way it is worn) to the view that wearing masks is counterproductive if we wish to defeat the coronavirus.
Thomas Hutcheson
May 8 2020 at 12:17pm
Sample of one but the FB friend most opposed to people who supposedly want to keep the economy closed opposes masks as unsafe for the wearer.
I think this is indicative of the general misunderstanding of social distancing regulations and recommendations, including using masks. The are less for protecting the implementer than to reduce the risk the implementer will infect others. I don’t begrudge non-mask wearers wanting to ever so slightly increase their risk of infection but their display of indifference to the health of others.
Mark Brady
May 8 2020 at 11:14pm
“Are there downsides to wearing a mask?” And other questions are addressed here by a GP in the UK.
https://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/features/doctor-note-masks-protect-coronavirus-200419070105671.html
MG
May 8 2020 at 4:41pm
It is frustrating to see how critics — tenured professors on full pay working from home — would need to “introduce into evidence” demands that those who are suffering the most from broad based restrictions are not yet frustrated enough to be making. And they have real life skin in the game, real one, not rhetorical skin in the game,
David Seltzer
May 8 2020 at 5:08pm
David, good onya for protesting Governor Newsom’s lockdown. My gym reopened April 24th. There are Lysol wipes and disinfectant spray at every workout station. People acting in their own self interest and concern for others are rigorous about following established protocols. None of us needed Governor Kemp baby siting us.
Comments are closed.