I don't want to alarm anyone, but I feel it is my responsibility to report that the rumors are true:
People are running around our nation's airports face-naked.
I'm not talking about brief glimpses between bites of food either, I'm talking full-frontal. Noses, mouths, and cheeks with nothing left to the imagination. If you're traveling with young children, you might want to have some way to distract them from this jarring sight. Perhaps you could get a wholesome Disney activity book where they can practice their preferred pronouns or help your first-grader with her homework assignment on male reproductive organs.
Only a week before I was to board a plane, a U.S. District Judge struck down the CDC's mask mandate on public transportation.
According to media accounts, the most important thing to know about this decision was that it was made by a Trump appointee who once clerked for black Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas.
That's how you know she's probably a racist.
Oh, and dumb, of course. That's just assumed among the smart set (like those at the New Republic) who still triple mask and wish they could live in a place like Mexico City, where they spray your pants every time you enter a building to disinfect you:
Quote: "In Mexico City I couldn't enter any indoor space without putting on a mask, getting my hand squirted with hand sanitizer, and sometimes getting my pants sprayed with disinfectant."
SCIENCE!
There was also something about the mandate being "arbitrary and capricious," which we all know is false. Yes, while you could argue that with HEPA filters and quick air exchanges, the air on a modern jet is the most purified air outside of an Intel microchip clean room, you still have to scream really loudly: "BUT, VARIANTS!!"
In any case, I was ready for the move, having stopped wearing masks in every instance it was permitted, and increasingly even when it wasn't. In those latter circumstances I was never challenged by anyone, so as my traveling companions and I arrived at the airport and a discussion ensued about whether or not we needed a mask inside the airport (it does depend on jurisdiction), I said I wasn't wearing one unless someone said something.
My wife, who drove us there, shot me a "you're being a jerk" look, but you kind of get numb to that after a while.
I'll note here that we were flying out of Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport.
Yes, that's the actual full name – well, less a name really, and more a hodgepodge of special interests. The airport was once called Washington National Airport, but was renamed in 1998 at the behest of Republicans thirsting for revenge after years of having to fly in and out of "Kennedy."
In any case, my friends abandoned their concerns of wearing a mask when it was obvious that many people had decided to embrace their freedom to choose.
There was a moment of hesitation at security.
Look closely, and you can see that for whatever reason, the TSA left this sign up.
"Don't worry about it," I said.
I had the law on my side.
Probably.
(No one said anything, of course.)
This being the Washington metro region – where people with little-to-no-risk from the virus continue to mask up (the grocery stores are at over 50%) and where the majority of parents eagerly had their young children injected with a vaccine about which the long-term effects are completely unknown – you knew not everyone was going to go maskless.
And yet, even here, I would guess that over half the people were not wearing masks, including on the plane.
Others have noted this pattern as well.
There's no obvious demographic preference either, although I can tell you anecdotally that younger adults seem more likely to stick with the masks than older adults.
I had one such young man sit next to me, maybe half my age. Very pleasant. We both let each other do our own thing.
Kind of the way it used to be.
So there you have it, prepare accordingly!
Or not.
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