Earlier this week, I was sitting in my living room when my youngest daughter, 5-year-old Pfeiffer, walked up to me with a contemplative expression.
“Daddy, we’re not supposed to be happy that Trump has coronavirus, are we?” she asked.
I quickly answered, “No. We don’t want anyone to get sick, and we should never be happy when someone does.”
She looked down at her feet and back up at me.
“Then I just don’t know how I’m supposed to feel about it,” she replied.
Admittedly, we’ve made no qualms with anyone, especially our children, that we’re an anti-Trump household — a practice I’m certain is consistent with the anti-Obama and anti-Clinton households of their day, or the anti-Biden crowd of this election.
We occasionally watch the national news on TV as a family. We discuss current events and newspaper articles at the dinner table.
The children sometimes have questions, which we answer as best we can for their age level.
My wife and I have openly disagreed with Trump’s policies. We’ve made no bones in our thoughts, discussions or even our prayers to our Heavenly Father, that we want Joe Biden to win this election.
I certainly don’t want Trump to physically suffer or die. He is a fellow human, after all.
If I indeed hold to the belief, based on my faith, that I never want anyone to become ill or suffer, and certainly wouldn’t glory in it, then I have to practice that when it’s difficult. If I am going to teach my children not to wish things on others they wouldn’t wish on themselves, then I must show them that when it matters. If I will spout to someone the mantra, “Love your enemy,” — as I’m wont to do — then I have to be willing to practice it, even when my inner demons are yelling at me about how a particular person “got what he deserved.”
You might say, “There’s nothing noble in what you’re describing. It’s the obvious thing to do.” You’d be absolutely right. Unfortunately, where mask-wearing is concerned, pro-maskers are outright denied these same considerations from their counterparts.
All the credible scientific research on mask-wearing shows it is effective in slowing the spread of the virus and is primarily meant to prevent the wearer from spreading it.
So here’s another obvious example of how to regard our fellow man, right? Well …
What we get instead from anti-maskers are vile, sometimes violent arguments about how individuals should get to choose whether they want to infect other people, and that business owners should have the right to put their employees and customers at risk based on their personal beliefs on the subject.
Anti-maskers rail hard against any government mandates that defy their wishes, often using the “individual’s choice to be a biological weapon” defense.
Yet, we’ve seen instances where people who personally choose to wear masks are treated to insults, ridicule, protests and threats. We’ve seen mask bans in places around the country to retaliate for mask mandates that have expired. I’ve seen several videos and articles showing people demanding businesses allow them to enter without a mask despite that business owner “exercising the personal choice” to require them. MAGAs parade through Target stores maskless to demonstrate they won’t accept rules they don’t like. Some have pulled the masks off of other people and yelled in their faces.
Even a Starkville alderman, Ben Carver, used his public capacity on Tuesday to openly mock people who wear masks — snidely generalizing us all as folks who wear them outside or while driving our vehicles alone. He even implied he might be more willing to wear one if he had the choice, meaning, for Carver, doing the right thing only matters if it’s on his terms.
Mask wearing is seen as a symbol of political identity, rather than a social responsibility to protect against a pandemic, and many who oppose it believe not being offended takes precedence over public safety.
Those who disagree with mask mandates on individualism, often conservatives, are saying unequivocally that they have the right to infect other people simply because they don’t want to be inconvenienced. This is immoral, and it lays bare the hypocrisy of those who most often try to use the state to enforce certain other “moral values” when it suits them.
If they’re comfortable, that’s all that matters, right? And all their arguments, logical or not, must meet that end.
Nobody likes wearing a mask. It’s uncomfortable for everyone, but moral questions tend to be most important when the correct answer is most uncomfortable.
Moreover, whether you politically agree with something or someone should never be the basis for whether you care about their health.
Zack Plair is the managing editor for The Dispatch.
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