Don't Misread the Ending of CA's Statewide Masking Order
The Governor is Literally Doing the Least He Can Do
The news is out that Governor Newsom will end the statewide mask mandate in a week on February 15th.
While this is good news I would urge everyone not to misread this as a major victory.
Newsom’s announcement is not a policy change, but simply the act of not renewing an order which was already set to expire on the 15th. I guess even Newsom couldn't stand the optics of renewing a mask mandate after French Laundry 2.0...
Ironically, given current Covid case trends in California we will still have far more reported cases in the week when the mandate expires then when it was put in place on December 15th, proving once again that these mandates are arbitrary and don't affect the epidemic curve.
The order was put in place so it would look like Newsom was "doing something" before the surge, and so that he could end it after the surge and take credit since it "would have been worse", but unfortunately it still hasn't actually ended.
The main reason to be skeptical of the announcement is that it doesn't truly end the mask mandate. The statewide mandate remains in affect for two groups, neither for justified reasons.
First, the unvaccinated has never regained the right to enter public spaces mask-less since California first adopted statewide Masking orders way back in the spring is 2020! This unethical medical apartheid will remain in place even as the Omicron wave has shattered any remaining hopes that the vaccines prevent infection or spread…
And as even the CDC has admitted to the superiority of Natural Immunity.
Second, California will still require masks in schools, meaning the lowest risk group, school aged children, still must endure the barbaric practice of covering their faces daily. Children must impede their learning as a ritualistic sacrifice to public safety, which has no logic or reason to it. Who are they protecting? At what cost? Why are masks needed if schools without masks have the same or better outcomes?
And if these major objections weren't enough, with the governor's state or emergency order still in place, local counties retain the ability to issue stricter orders. Los Angeles County (containing 1/4 of the entire state's population) has already announced that their universal indoor mask mandate will remain in place and other deep blue counties are sure to follow.
So please, save your celebrations. This is literally the least the Governor could do. We must demand more.
While states like Florida have been fully open since mid 2020, we here in California have been subjected to yet another year of "The Science" with nothing to show for, our Covid outcomes are nearly identical!
The tide is turning, and blue states across the country are slowly making the "pivot" back to normalcy. But California seems poised to be one of the last to make this move, especially when it comes to our kids. Keep the pressure on and demand nothing less than fully normal life now!
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