Fully Vaccinated. Zero Fear. Still Wearing A Mask

I fully trust the science and I know I don’t need a mask. But I’m long past wearing one just to keep me safe.

image: Adventist Healthcare

by Justin Rosario

At the very beginning of May, the waiting period after my second Moderna shot expired and I joined the rank of the fully inoculated. Debbie, my wife, had finished a few days earlier. Claudia, our best friend, got her second shot a couple of months ago (she’s a teacher), so we are all free to be free. Woohoo!

But the three of us had very different reactions to this newfound freedom. Debbie and Claudia are still uncomfortable being in crowds and near other people, especially if they’re unmasked. I, on the other hand, who generally dislikes crowds and being near other people, masked or otherwise, am completely at ease.

My carefree attitude comes from my deep and abiding faith (for lack of a better term) in science. I’m a huge nerd and I trust the science implicitly. If studies show I have 95%+ immunity from Covid and it’s all but impossible for me to spread it? That’s incredible. Combined with the dramatic and obvious drop in Covid cases as the vaccines came out and that’s pretty much all I need. The science and real world data prove I’m safe and not a danger to others, so I’m safe and not a danger to others. I know it in my bones. I’m not going to lick a toilet seat because I’m not a moron but I’m not at all worried about casual exposure at this point. 

Last week, the CDC even announced that fully vaccinated people no longer need to wear masks. Almost completely. Great! But...I’m still wearing a mask.

It’s Not Just About Me

The MAGA Moron Mob is ranting about vaccinated people wearing masks but let’s be 100% clear: They were ranting about unvaccinated people wearing masks so they can go lick a toilet seat. Tucker Carlson’s “child abuse” nonsense is about one thing and one thing only - the Republican effort to keep Covid going as long as possible so they can weaponize it against Biden and the Democrats in the midterms. 

That’s why Republican governors opened their states before their vaccination levels were high enough and removed Covid restrictions like mask mandates and social distancing guidelines. The very same people who said Covid was a “hoax” will turn around a year from now and demand to know why President Joe Biden hasn’t single-handedly eliminated Covid from the face of the Earth. Mark my words.

Accordingly, one of the reasons, although a very minor one, I still wear a mask in public is because I don’t want to be mistaken for a MAGA. I’m a 6’2” White guy who lives in a minority-dominant community. I love it here but I tend to stick out. The last thing I want is for my neighbors to think they live next to a rabidly racist piece of trash. That will become less of an issue over time as more people stop wearing masks, but for now, there’s a new viral video almost every day of some MAGA imbecile crying about their freedom and how victimized they are for being asked to wear a mask. Best not to be lumped in with that crowd of losers.

A more substantial reason to wear a maks is for other people’s peace of mind (aside from them not thinking I’m a possible Neo-Nazi/Neo-Confederate terrorist). Not everyone is vaccinated yet and, as with Debbie and Claudia, not everyone who is feels comfortable with that reality or fully trusts the science. That means me not being masked makes them extremely uncomfortable. 

This is the difference between manspreading on the train and being considerate. The difference between talking loudly in a restaurant and moderating your tone. Sure, you have to change your behavior to accommodate others, but it’s such a minor imposition that you would have to be a real asshole to take offense at it.

But those are the more altruistic reasons and, frankly, not the ones at the forefront of my mind. Most of the reasons I still wear masks are all about me. I like wearing a mask.

Why? Because I F**king Want To, That’s Why!

When Covid first landed, we scrambled to find masks. We got our hands on some of the disposable medical masks and then some homemade ones. They were all ugly as hell and I hated them with a passion. Later, we picked up some other masks in stores with different patterns and I hated those, too. Still ugly.

Then I started to get really annoyed with the lack of variety that appealed to me, personally. I’m about as far from a fashionista as it gets but I started to get picky about what I was putting on my face and went shopping online. Lo and behold, a plethora of geek masks appeared with designs from my favorite movies, comics, and TV shows. This, incidentally, is how I shop for the geek shirts I wear because the stuff in brick and mortar stores that can fit me is boring as hell.

Star Wars, Star Trek, Back to the Future, Batman, Teen Titans GO!, and more. These are the masks I wear now. I even got a Clerks cartoon mask. Obscure, yes, but I don’t wear it for you, I wear it for me, just like my shirts. If I’m feeling really saucy, I match my mask and my shirt because it makes me smile. Not that you can see it because I’m wearing a mask. 

For the first time in my life, I’m wearing an accessory. It’s a bit odd for someone like me who has never once bothered with that sort of thing but I like them and I really don’t care what anyone else thinks. 

This doesn’t mean I’ll be wearing them outside in the middle of the summer or on a warm spring day. I like my masks but not enough to smother myself when the temperature is up. Those things get sweaty!

On the other hand, when the cold weather comes back, you can bet I’ll be wearing my masks outside again, even if there’s no one within thirty feet of me. They may be sweaty and gross in warm weather but they are fantastic for protecting my face from the cold. They look cool and they’re functional?! Why wouldn’t I wear masks when it’s chilly?

On top of that, I just went an entire year without a cold. Sure, social distancing and washing my hands more definitely helped but masks played a huge role in warding off the filthy germs of you filthy humans. I get my flu shot every year but a lot of people don’t. Yet, despite that sad fact, this flu season was practically nonexistent. 

I will happily keep wearing a mask when I'm around people during cold and flu season. It was delightful not spending a single day of the last year with my head stuffed with cotton, my nose running like a waterfall, and wheezing like an old steam engine.

We May Be Done With Covid But Covid Is Certainly Not Done With Us

I’m vaccinated and I fully trust the science. But that means I trust all of the science. As I wrote about a few weeks ago, Covid is still rampaging through large swathes of the planet. India is of particular concern with its massive population, overcrowding, and its lack of resources. Thankfully, their second wave seems to be on the decline but with so many people still getting sick every day, and not just in India but also Brazil and Russia and so on, the science says there’s an increasing possibility of a variant that’s immune to our immunity. 

If and when that happens, we may not immediately be aware of its spread (although it won’t take long). When we do notice it, the variant will be all but impossible to stop. As long as Covid is still spreading (slowly) in this country, and around the world (much more rapidly), I’m not going to rush into a crowd without a mask just yet.

It’s not the most immediate thought in my mind when I go out but it’s still a thing, like looking both ways on an empty street; not really necessary but better safe than sorry. And if one of these hypothetical vaccine-immune variants should start spreading? Bonus! I won’t have to readjust my behaviour yet again. 

I can’t tell you to wear a mask or not. I have the privilege of being 6’2”, male, and White. While that means I occasionally bump my head on low hanging light fixtures, it also means very few people are going to start screaming obscenities at me whatever I choose to do. 

If you’re comfortable taking off your mask, that’s fine. It’s certainly safe to do so for the moment (and hopefully forever). Maybe try to maintain a little social distancing for those who are still twitchy about being around other people. It’s not going to hurt you and people are clearly traumatized from the last year and change. Have some compassion. Also, don’t throw away your masks. Just in case.

If you’re vaccinated and you still feel the need to wear a mask for any or all of the reasons I listed or above, do it. Or if you feel unsafe even with the vaccine, that’s fine, too. Trust is earned and, again, the last year has been extremely traumatizing. Being told the giant man-eating shark that ate 585,000 (as of this writing) of your neighbors is gone and believing it enough to jump in the water is not the same thing. You take your time and don’t let anyone pressure you to feel unsafe. You’ll get there sooner or later.

Mask on or off, be aware that while America is pretty safe, America is not the world. Canada, like many industrialized nations, is having serious problems getting its population vaccinated and they’re just coming off of a third wave. Europe is still a mess and Covid is surging in poorer nations. Pretending America is free and clear of Covid is like pretending the curtain between the smoking and non-smoking sections on airplanes back in the 1970s actually did something.

In the meantime, I’m going to enjoy occasionally taking my very cool masks off outside and wearing them all the time in style indoors. If that bothers you, I promise you, I couldn’t care less if I tried. Boo-yah.

Read an excerpt from the latest Banter Member’s essay:

Is It Time To Reassess The Neocons?

Once a mortal enemy of the Left, the Neocon establishment is emerging as a stalwart ally against Trumpism.

image: J. Scott Applewhite/AP

by Ben Cohen

“If Hitler invaded hell I would make at least a favorable reference to the devil in the House of Commons.”

- Winston Churchill

After 9/11, Neoconservatives in America became perhaps the most dangerous political organization on the planet. Figures like Dick Cheney, Paul Wolfowitz, John Bolton and Donald Rumsfeld rapidly gained power in the wake of the Al Qaeda attack, and used their influence over the George W. Bush administration to assert American military might anywhere they saw fit.

Bolstered by ideologues in the commentariat like William Kristol, David Frum, Charles Krauthammer and Max Boot, the Neocons set their sight on remake the world in America’s corporate capitalist image. Afghanistan, Iraq, Iran, North Korea — anywhere that dared challenge American supremacy would be confronted with unparalleled violence and destruction. Once tamed, these countries would pay the Empire back with their natural resources and open their markets up to Walmart and McDonald’s.

America against the world

Claiming that America was under continued attack in the months and years after 9/11 by unseen forces, the Neocons amassed political power quickly, and learned to wield it with devastating consequences. They sensed a historic moment where their ideas would resonate with the public and belittled anyone who challenged this agenda.

Led by Vice President Dick Cheney, the US government fabricated evidence in front of the UN, lied to its citizens about who was threatening them, and bullied allies into setting the preconditions for war in Iraq. And they got their way. In 2003, The US invaded Iraq — a country that posed no threat to America and had nothing to do with 9/11 — in what turned out to be the worst military disaster in modern history.

For years, anyone who dared point this out was labeled by the powerful cabal of warmongers as a cowardly traitor. Iraq was destroyed and thousands of Iraqis and Americans lost their lives, but Neocon ideology became orthodoxy in the GOP — a set of ideas and principles that could never be challenged. America was the most powerful country in the world. America could attack any country it pleased for any reason it gave, and never have to apologize. American free market capitalism was holy, its belief in freedom unshakeable, and the rest of the world had to accept this.

No candidate could run for office as a Republican without proclaiming these ideas loudly at every given opportunity.

No apologies

In preparation for his presidential run in 2012, Mitt Romney wrote a book titled “No Apology: The Case For American Greatness”. The title was created as a rebuttal to President Obama’s supposed weakness on foreign policy and belief in Republican circles that he had apologized for America’s past actions abroad (he hadn’t). Romney, who has always been a moderate conservative rather than an ideologue, knew he had to satiate Republican voters’ thirst for violent, imperialistic fantasy. The book was published in early 2010 after over one hundred thousands civilians had died in Iraq, and American objectives in the region destroyed by years of the Bush administration’s severe mismanagement.

Republican candidates knew the script though: deny reality, project bravado, and accuse the other side of cowardice. It did not matter whether you had served in the military yourself, or even been in a fist fight. As long as you claimed the Iraq war was a great success, you could get elected.

A myth dismantled by a fascist

So powerful was the Neocon myth that it took a reality TV star turned fascist to dismantle it. For all of Trump’s sins, he called the movement out and helped take apart the key ideologues. During the 2015/16 GOP primaries, Trump assailed George W. Bush for failing to defend the nation on 9/11 and denounced the Iraq war in the most withering terms. “We have done a tremendous disservice not only to the Middle East — we've done a tremendous disservice to humanity,” he said during a GOP primary debate in late 2015. “The people that have been killed, the people that have been wiped away — and for what? It's not like we had victory. It's a mess. The Middle East is totally destabilized, a total and complete mess.”

Trump manhandled the Republicans vying for the presidency by calling them what the Left had for so many years. Jeb Bush, Marco Rubio, Rick Santorum, Lindsey Graham, and Rick Perry weren’t tough guys, they were chickenhawks. The Iraq war and the endless conflicts sought by the Neocons weren’t cool, they were stupid and cost too much money. The pornstar dating, fake billionaire presidential candidate ripped the veil off of the GOP and exposed them for the cowards they really were.

Or did he?

Time to reassess the Neocons?

Five years and almost 600,000 dead Americans later, Trump will now go down as the worst president in US history…

This is an excerpt of today’s Members Only piece. Continue reading here and get a 2 month free trial on a Banter Membership!: