Coronavirus

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**queen_annes_revenge**

Government got to try and alleviate that same government induced fear now they want people back out again. Seems like something of a self inflicted wound though. Folks who don't want to wear masks just won't go out and won't go into the small shops they usually would.

**Ouze**

Well, those are all certainly words.

**Mad Doc Grotsnik**

Me? I’m turning my choice in mask into what passes for a fashion statement.

Got four new ones on order.

“Save Ferris”

“Spaceballs, The Facemask”

“What A Time To Be Alive”

and finally?

One with a Mandalorian helmet’s lower half and “This Is The Way”.

Take it, run with it. Be extra fabulous whilst being sensible

**queen_annes_revenge**

Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
Me? I’m turning my choice in mask into what passes for a fashion statement.

Got four new ones on order.

“Save Ferris”

“Spaceballs, The Facemask”

“What A Time To Be Alive”

and finally?

One with a Mandalorian helmet’s lower half and “This Is The Way”.

Take it, run with it. Be extra fabulous whilst being sensible

Oh I will. Despite it being a worthless, authoritarian diktat, I will take the opportunity to wear my new rhinophallic BDSM mask in a supermarket. Never let an opportunity for expression go to waste.

**Overread**

queen_annes_revenge wrote:
Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
Me? I’m turning my choice in mask into what passes for a fashion statement.

Got four new ones on order.

“Save Ferris”

“Spaceballs, The Facemask”

“What A Time To Be Alive”

and finally?

One with a Mandalorian helmet’s lower half and “This Is The Way”.

Take it, run with it. Be extra fabulous whilst being sensible

Oh I will. Despite it being a worthless, authoritarian diktat, I will take the opportunity to wear my new rhinophallic BDSM mask in a supermarket. Never let an opportunity for expression go to waste.

And now, as potentially mentally scaring as it could be, we need photos of you in this mask!

**BobtheInquisitor**

JamesY wrote:
BobtheInquisitor wrote:
I mean, if you haven’t received any death threats because an item was out of stock, have you even worked in retail?

But yeah, front line employees are going to get beaten or killed for asking “customers” to wear masks.

So, by your exaggeration, are you saying that the abuse, threats and intimidation that many would actually receive is acceptable?

Quite the opposite. Retail staff are treated terribly, and their employers (and police) almost never attempt to protect them. This pandemic is not only putting them in danger from the virus, but from an apparent deluge of abusive, even violent customers who’ve finally found their perfect excuse. It’s shameful that our society has decided to throw retail and service employees under the bus on such a scale.

PS: I was not exaggerating at all. People have attacked me or said they would get me in the parking lot because a book or Cd was out of stock. One guy chased me to the break room door and tried to batter his way through when he couldn’t get it open.

**GoatboyBeta**

queen_annes_revenge wrote:

Oh I will. Despite it being a worthless, authoritarian diktat, I will take the opportunity to wear my new rhinophallic BDSM mask in a supermarket. Never let an opportunity for expression go to waste.

*shrug* As long as it stays on your face without you having to hold it there, I wouldn't turn you away. It cant be any worse that dealing with people who think flipflops and socks are suitable footwear in the the north of England*shudder*

**JamesY**

BobtheInquisitor wrote:
JamesY wrote:
BobtheInquisitor wrote:
I mean, if you haven’t received any death threats because an item was out of stock, have you even worked in retail?

But yeah, front line employees are going to get beaten or killed for asking “customers” to wear masks.

So, by your exaggeration, are you saying that the abuse, threats and intimidation that many would actually receive is acceptable?

Quite the opposite. Retail staff are treated terribly, and their employers (and police) almost never attempt to protect them. This pandemic is not only putting them in danger from the virus, but from an apparent deluge of abusive, even violent customers who’ve finally found their perfect excuse. It’s shameful that our society has decided to throw retail and service employees under the bus on such a scale.

PS: I was not exaggerating at all. People have attacked me or said they would get me in the parking lot because a book or Cd was out of stock. One guy chased me to the break room door and tried to batter his way through when he couldn’t get it open.

Seems that I missed the tone of your previous post, I genuinely thought you were being sarcastic. Apologies. Luckily nothing as extreme as that ever happened to me, and I hope that they are no longer happening to you.

**AegisGrimm**

Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
Me? I’m turning my choice in mask into what passes for a fashion statement.

Got four new ones on order.

“Save Ferris”

“Spaceballs, The Facemask”

“What A Time To Be Alive”

and finally?

One with a Mandalorian helmet’s lower half and “This Is The Way”.

Take it, run with it. Be extra fabulous whilst being sensible

So far I have only stenciled "I'm Doing My Part" on my cloth mask. My new mission is to put slogans on my masks that piss off all the anti-mask old folks that keep calling me a "snowflake" despite being 38 years old. I think it's funny when they act all oppressed by my mocking. My next one was going to be "It's Really Quite Easy", but "This Is The Way" is better.

Contenders were also:

"Darth Responsible"
"Help, I'm Being Oppressed!"
"I Believe In Science"
"Because I'm An Adult"

**NinthMusketeer**

Ouze wrote:
For whatever it's worth, I do think that shifting the onus on mask enforcement to retail employees is a pathetic abdication of leadership from government... but about par for how all of this has unfolded, honestly. If I worked at a supermarket I would not feel particular comfortable asking the unmasked to mask up or leave - as we've noted, there have been violent confrontations. If you dont? You risk your employment, potentially headed into a depression - or risk getting sick from said unmasked person. It's not fair to ask someone making minimum wage bagging groceries to enforce social standards during a deadly pandemic.

The worst timeline continues apace.

The worst jobs should have the worst pay, just as the best jobs have the best pay. It makes sense if you don't think about it!

**Mad Doc Grotsnik**

They are all fantakka.

Get it done, my good N00B!

Only N00B because I’m now 40, allegedly.

**NinthMusketeer**

AegisGrimm wrote:
Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
Me? I’m turning my choice in mask into what passes for a fashion statement.

Got four new ones on order.

“Save Ferris”

“Spaceballs, The Facemask”

“What A Time To Be Alive”

and finally?

One with a Mandalorian helmet’s lower half and “This Is The Way”.

Take it, run with it. Be extra fabulous whilst being sensible

So far I have only stenciled "I'm Doing My Part" on my cloth mask. My new mission is to put slogans on my masks that piss off all the anti-mask old folks that keep calling me a "snowflake" despite being 38 years old. I think it's funny when they act all oppressed by my mocking. My next one was going to be "It's Really Quite Easy", but "This Is The Way" is better.

Contenders were also:

"Darth Responsible"
"Help, I'm Being Oppressed!"
"I Believe In Science"
"Because I'm An Adult"

Power to you sir, I hope you trigger many irresponsible citizens. Try not to enjoy it too much eh?

**stratigo**

Ouze wrote:
stratigo wrote:

Look, it's deeply worrying to me that a mod actively invested in a discussion is also the one moderating said discussion.

Can we get a mod not involved in the argument to moderate the thread?.

I think you're going to have a difficult if not impossible locating a single mod on this forum who won't agree agree that several parts of that last page were clearly off topic, because it unambiguously was - how many bankruptcies Trump has had, his history as a real estate developer, and so on. None of those tangents dovetail into this conversation in relation to Covid in any meaningful way. Any of those threads followed very far will wind up with the thread being locked.

Generally speaking they have been pretty good in this thread about allowing for limited political discourse because the topic is in some ways intertwined with government in inextricable ways: it's hard to talk about the covid response in the United States without also pointing out that it's been pretty incompetent at most levels of government, and there's been a pretty bad dearth of leadership. However those really were starting to stray pretty far afield I think.

The idea that mods can have a bias that somehow prevents them from being objective and thus required to recuse themselves is kind of a wrong-footed legalistic way of looking at things. For one, there is no requirement for the mods on a private forum to be fair or even handed. For another, the goal isn't to make binding and consistent rulings, it is to allow for productive conversation to continue while removing non-productive, off topic discussion. There is no punitive aspect to being asked politely in-thread to confirm to the rules of this forum.

You should start a thread in the Nuts & Bolts section if you'd like to discuss that idea further. I'm not trying to dismiss your concerns, but it has come up before, and the answer I gave you gave is typically along the lines what the responses have historically been. Manchu had a really good response about legalistic thinking that I tried finding for about 20 minutes but could not.

I don't particularly care about what mods will think of a discussion being on and off topic verse the incentive for a mod to use their power to win an argument they are having. A mod not involved in the argument has less incentive. There will always be biases, but it is bad form to moderate a contentious discussion that you are a part of and have a clear perspective. It's just adding more pressure to act in your own interest that isn't needed for good moderation. The point is to have less incentive to act badly, and winning an argument is strong incentive.

Mario wrote:
JamesY wrote:I'm not in disagreement with you at all. What I do disagree with is the notion that it should be the duty of shop staff to enforce the law in this regard. A 17yr old kid or middle aged woman (and these groups form a significant proportion of supermarket staff) shouldn't have to worry about approaching someone who clearly isn't interested in the well-being of themselves or anyone else. No one in that role should. If they are acting like that in the first place, I doubt they'd be all to civil if approached about it.
I don't know. Generally, when something minor happens, store staff tends to deal with it all the time. It's kinda part of the job. In this case it simply means telling people that they are not allowed to enter the store unless they are wearing a mask. That's just like informing customers about any other store rules they didn't know about.

You don't need the police for that. That's been the most normal thing over here. Who else should say it if customers "forgets" to wear a mask (or whatever their excuse is)? They don't need to hug the anti-maskers, just tell them from a distance that they need a mask. If somebody's really overreacting to this then I'd not want them in a store anyways and you can call the police (or whatever store policy is at that point).

Azreal13 wrote:Yes, because all shops have enough staff on duty at all times to essentially act as personal shoppers for a dozen people with good reasons not to use a mask.
Yes because you usually don't have a dozen people who have "good reasons" to not wear a mask. Most people with asthma and even other respiratory issues can wear masks. There are very few who really can't do it and those shouldn't be a problem to handle and they would be safer at home/in the hospital with somebody else doing the shopping for them. Why are they exposing themselves to this risk anyways? Are they suicidal? Staff helps people all the time with all kinds of issues. Occasionally helping somebody as a personal shopper shouldn't be a problem if you filter out all the fake ones.

If your store has a dozen people who can't wear a mask at the same time then you most probably have close to a dozen liars. Or you are living in extremely peculiar circumstances.

In our block we have an old lady who has to cart around an oxygen tank and take long breaks on her walks and she manages to wear a mask. I don't know how bad it has to be for somebody to be unable to wear a mask but I'm relatively confident that it's not a problem that affects many people. There may be a lot of donkey-caves who want to fake a medical condition as an excuse but that's a different issue.

Most people not wearing a mask are also not hyper militant about it and will, with a bit of public shaming, comply or leave, which is in the best interest of everyone.

It's the handful of non maskers whose response to being asked to wear a mask is to get violent and abusive, up to even shooting store staff, that is a huge issue though. And it's not exactly easy to tell. Though I'd be more wary if they were in, say, trump paraphernalia.

queen_annes_revenge wrote:
Well, I've got my mask on order from S&M orginals, so its not going anywhere, although I may die from auto erotic asphyxiation in the middle of the super market.

If you are wearing a mask that's at risk of choking you randomly as you go about your day, you are doing BDSM wrong and should probably stop and spend some time educating yourself on safe ways to practice masochism.

**Kilkrazy**

I've done two missions in a mask. One to Aldi, and a shorter mission to Waitrose to get the stuff Aldi was out of.

I'm using disposable sterile surgical masks manufactured in the UK by a company set up by dentists, FWIW.

The bad news is that even fitted correctly, the mask fogs my glasses, and because I've got a big head it's quite stretched to cover my face properly. Also it's a bit humid to wear.

The good news is that there is nearly 100% compliance with face covering in the shops, and mask wearing in the open has increased as well.

**GoatboyBeta**

I've found that having the top of the mask just below the eyeline, and wearing the glasses over the mask helps. Although it doesn't stop it entirely.

**queen_annes_revenge**

stratigo wrote:

If you are wearing a mask that's at risk of choking you randomly as you go about your day, you are doing BDSM wrong and should probably stop and spend some time educating yourself on safe ways to practice masochism.

*Shrug* I'm not into any of that fetish stuff. I bought it to mock the new law.

**xKillGorex**

Worth people checking out anti fog spray. Had trouble with my eye pro fogging up while wearing a goggles and mask for air soft. Gets pretty warm running around all day but later switched to a better pair a glasses that don’t fog.

One tip is to rub a bit of washing up liquid on both sides of your lens. Let it dry then polish of with a soft tissue, may take a while to buff it off but it’s worked for me in the past.

**RiTides**

Stratigo - I just wanted to say, for what it's worth I mostly share your view regarding moderating topics I am (personally) involved in. That's why I stated the note as I did, because I was involved in the discussion but it was just getting really far off topic.

As Ouze noted, if you want to discuss site moderation you can always start up a thread in N&B to discuss further.

**queen_annes_revenge**

Bunch of new cases in Spain, where masks are mandatory... everywhere.

**Future War Cultist**

Not enough people in my area are wearing masks but I haven’t encountered many people being outright dicks about it. There was one, I can only describe him as a stereotypical boomer, but he was shamed into silence with little effort.

**queen_annes_revenge**

What a great country we live in..

**Future War Cultist**

Hey, he started it...opening his fat mouth.

**Not Online!!!**

Gentlemen please.

**queen_annes_revenge**

See this is the worst part about this mask nonsense. The busybodying. Everyone has to be up in everyone elses grill about what they are or aren't doing... If you're so scared of the Corona I definitely have, why are you coming up to me asking why I'm not wearing a mask? Just f off and leave me alone. It began with the lockdown curtain twitchers, but the mask stasi are up a new level.

I remember when we as a nation used to just leave folks to their business. I fear we'll never return to that.

This isn't about public safety, it's about signalling their compliance, and forcing those who don't want any part of it to bend to their will.

**Future War Cultist**

I think there was a misunderstanding there. I was referring to the aforementioned boomer out in my area, not QAR. That’s...actually quite funny now that I think of it.

Automatically Appended Next Post:

queen_annes_revenge wrote:
See this is the worst part about this mask nonsense. The busybodying. Everyone has to be up in everyone elses grill about what they are or aren't doing... If you're so scared of the Corona I definitely have, why are you coming up to me asking why I'm not wearing a mask? Just f off and leave me alone.

I remember when we as a nation used to just leave folks to their business. I fear we'll never return to that.

This isn't about public safety, it's about signalling your compliance, and forcing those who don't want any part of it to bend to your will.

But little goatee fat mouth was the one who was annoying other people about their wearing of masks. That was until he bothered the wrong person and was not so subtly warned to be quiet.

All mouth (and money) but no trousers. It was actually funny imo.

**queen_annes_revenge**

Fair enough. I don't care if people want to wear masks. All I expect is the same in return for the fact I don't.

**ScarletRose**

queen_annes_revenge wrote:
Fair enough. I don't care if people want to wear masks. All I expect is the same in return for the fact I don't.

I don't care if people want to drive drunk, they should just leave me alone while I drive drunk.

**RiTides**

Regarding the exchange further up this page:

Despite my post above, basic site rules still apply in this thread, as they do everywhere on the site. If you can't discuss a topic politely without name calling, then you simply can't discuss it on Dakka.

Again, this is all in the interest of being able to keep this thread open so we can continue discussing this important topic. Further posts using insults or that are extremely off topic will simply be deleted.

Thanks for your help everyone

**Future War Cultist**

Was that at me? I did clarify who I was talking about.

**NinthMusketeer**

ScarletRose wrote:
queen_annes_revenge wrote:
Fair enough. I don't care if people want to wear masks. All I expect is the same in return for the fact I don't.

I don't care if people want to drive drunk, they should just leave me alone while I drive drunk.

That is a good analogy, seriously. It gets straight to the 'not a guarantee but a risk' element. If masks were about protecting oneself from getting it I imagine many people would be happy to let others go without them. But it is not. It is about the safety of people around you, and a person has no right to put others in danger just because they can't be arsed to wear a mask.

Sidenote; supporters of stand your ground laws should point out how approaching someone without a mask on very much is a threat to their life. Yet somehow I don't think they will be.