To Wear or Not To Wear A Mask?
The painting above: Sanity, Her Son, and Credulous by Jordan Henderson
To wear or not to wear a mask?
Eins, zwei, drei… are you obediently marching to the rhythm of mandatory coronavirus masks? Mask on! Mask off! Besides possible lack of oxygen or, on the other hand, possible state repression if you refuse to wear it, how do you feel? Good and protected by a caring government, or humiliated and stripped of your basic human rights by technocrats? Eins, zwei, drei…
There is no public consensus about this prolonged and increasingly absurd Coronavirus policy that went from ‘a couple of weeks’ of measures to forming a ‘new normality’. And there is hardly such a thing as unmanipulated Covid-19 data either. The implementation and impact of the technology bring everything to a totally new level, which—among other questions about the legality of the measures and a possible change of the paradigm of the ‘pandemic’—the mainstream media have turned a blind eye to. The fundamental question is: are the measures constitutional, or it would take a paradigm shift in the conceptualisation of epidemic/pandemic to somehow fit the measures into the constitutional background?
A new normal or the legality of the ‘new normal’?
Different countries have different constitutions and legal systems, and they have implemented different coronavirus policies, yet there is a common thread that transcends borders. Besides the possible unconstitutionality of Covid-19 measures, we could also mention mandatory masks.
The Slovenian legal theoretician, philosopher and modern constitutionalist Andraž Teršek stated there is no legal provision in the (Slovenian) judicial system to fine those who refuse to wear a mask. The decree that mandated masks in Slovenia is not legally binding since it was constructed in an incomplete legal form (lex imperfecta). In other words, there was a procedural error in passing the specific decree that mandated masks. According to Slovenian law, it is possible only to issue a fine for actions that are defined explicitly in a particular part of the Law of Contagious Diseases (Zakon o nalezljivih boleznih). However, the decree that mandates masks was not signed in accordance with this detail. Therefore, the decree is only binding on the level of the spoken word, but not binding in the legal sense. Teršek concludes that an individual who refuses to wear a mask can be fined neither by the police nor by inspection authorities.
It’s likely the same in other countries, and lawyers everywhere probably should roll up their sleeves and do some investigation. I’m willing to bet that this coronavirus drama is a modern Gordian knot of law, beyond absurd and, as it also appears, beyond reason. Great Britain passed a law that would enable the demolition of buildings under the premise of ‘stopping a second wave of coronavirus’. A Wisconsin (USA) government agency ordered employees to wear a mask for Zoom meetings even from their home. Dr. Fauci, one of the leading members of Trump’s Coronavirus Task Force, also suggested wearing an eye shield in addition to a mask. Some countries, Belgium and some parts of France and Italy for example, for mandated masks particular hours of the day, even when outdoors. And that is not even close to all, American Dr. Deborah Birx suggested that people should also wear a mask at home, or American presidential candidate Joe Biden called for nation mandate to wear a mask, as a patriotic duty, or while another American, Dr. Siegel, promoted the idea of a yellow badge for unvaccinated people (!)
Anythig to get attention off the collapsing economy?
Anthropological perspective
Strangely though, and I say this from an anthropological perspective, the majority of people don’t really follow the rules; instead, they are more or less pretending that they do. At least from what I have seen in the small part of the world where I live, in rural and central Slovenia. Masks here are currently mandatory in enclosed public spaces, but people often ignore that, entering buildings without a mask or with one sitting just under their nose or even under their mouths, on their chin. Outdoors, it is noticeable that people often forget about social distancing and disinfecting their hands. A transparent, more in-depth and scientific-anthropological analysis would probably confirm my superficial assessment. That being the case, we could also speculate that it would be possible to statistically prove that this kind of—let’s say—public passive resistance didn’t ‘flatten the curve’, as officially stated. Since money has obviously become the alma mater of the systems’ science, that kind of research isn’t exactly material for financialisation.
Most likely, my voice would be discredited along with the voices of all those who might observe a similar paradox of dividing the public sphere into two worlds. The virus doesn’t spread outside, but when people go indoors, they face different and dangerous scenarios. There is Covid-19, just waiting and preying on people none of whom are behaving in any way that would warrant wearing a hazmat suit. In reality, most of them have at best one and only one, clean but not exactly sterile, ordinary mask that is unlikely to give protection from the smallest particles, so it isn’t really protecting anybody.
Still, cameras can record everybody. And in the spirit of this new wave of technocratic puritanism, it would come as no surprise if the appropriate fragment of technocratic reality were held up as the gold standard. Different governments do or could easily manipulate data and present their country and citizens as humble Covid-19 rule followers. Therefore, my observation doesn’t count, even though it’s evident that people tend to gravitate together because social relationships are a basic human need and right, even more so because we are facing an unprecedented, prolonged overreaction to a flu-like virus. But the propaganda machine goes on and on, without acknowledging an apparent discrepancy: BLM protests are ‘legitimate’, while protests against lockdown, corona policy and possible enforcement of a Covid-19 vaccine are ‘a public health threat’. Or Catholic religious services are allowed, while concerts and other mass gatherings are forbidden. Eat, pray, wear a mask and don’t overthink?
To wear or not to wear a mask? The Hamletian question of our time. Who would have believed that some real or imaginary virus could stop the world like this? On the other hand, the modern population probably started to doubt general Western policy and its construction of ‘foreign enemies’, so this virus has presented itself as a convenient new form of ‘foreign enemy’. In general, people aren’t afraid of different cultures, colours, nations and religions anymore. Many men and women have realised that they can easily cooperate and have moved on from the patriarchal patterns of the past. Immunology appears to be the new theme in the headlines of the mainstream media, and the media and politics wouldn’t take advantage and hype the fear and panic around coronavirus to an unimaginable level of nonsense, would they?
This is it, and it’s going to get even worse. Prepare yourself for technocratic slavery and wear a mask? Just look at New Zealand or Australia. Covid-1984 is our new religion, and the most important daily information should be how many are infected. We no longer hear how many people who have tested positive for Covid-19 are in hospital. What is trending is the number of infected people and, based on unreliable tests, that daily number should probably scare people to their bones. Frightened people will accept the ‘new normal’, but the ‘new normal’ is also frightening.
To quote journalist Patrick Henningsen: “As I’ve said many times before, COVID has enhanced the authoritarian proclivities of tyrants already in government. Tony Blair disciple and head of New Zealand parliament, Jacinta Ardern, just delayed NZ elections because a hand full of alleged ‘cases’ of Coronavirus. So if you live in the ‘free’ west, be forewarned. Those who fail to heed the ‘public health’ coup we’re seeing around the world, you are effectively enablers for whatever agenda, rule set or law, the Establishment decides to drop down on top of society going forward…”
Lucid ending
It’s not the fact that this notorious flu-like disease couldn’t be analysed without acknowledging the significant fear whipped up by the mainstream media’s, the real phenomenon here is in the probably ritualistic stopping of the World and the instrumentalised propaganda of the so-called new normality. Of course, hardly any critical doctors, scientists, lawyers or independent commentators are invited by those who control the narrative to object to this germaphobic reality in public discourse. Therefore, we have a global mess, and medical tyranny is hardly an answer. Instead, the newly registered Russian’s Sputnik 5 could, if we take the name literally, offer a nice ride through space, from where we could get some objectivity concerning corona measures and also a proper reflection about the genuine normality of planet Earth.
I’m not sure that Covid-19 is real, but Covid-1984 definitely is.
And again: Sanity, Her Son, and Credulous by Jordan Henderson
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