Here’s The Deal With Vaccines and Masks You Pesky Libertarians

Coming from me. An ornithological libertarian with a reckless approach to the sanctity of life.

I’m not a fan of Government interference. I don’t think the Government should be allowed to mandate what people can and can’t do. I like my Government departments the way I like my Harvey Weinstein, hands-off, watched for malevolence all the time and as far away as fricking possible.

But my view comes with a few caveats that are germane to living in a shared world.

You can walk around with your mask off

I think you can walk around without a mask if you want to. I’m all for your rights to do this, I think it’s a terrible thing for the State to get involved and police what you can and can’t wear over your face. I think it’s then very problematic to try and enforce it with their own lightly armed militia. That’s what I think the police are.

I hate wearing a mask. It makes my beak sweaty and my face shape is not conducive to comfort if I put a mask on.

I still wear one. Why? Despite being a libertarian I looked at the science. I interpreted the work of epidemiologists when they put it out. Does that make me a Sheeple? Possibly. Am I willing to bet my life on it? Not a chance.

Masks seem like a good choice to make. And at its core libertarianism is all about choice.

That brings me neatly onto point number two. If you argue your position that you’re allowed to do what you want and the Government shouldn’t get involved, everyone else can too. That includes people who have chosen to wear masks and get vaccines.

If businesses start deciding that you can’t come in unless you’ve had your jabs and/or are covering your face — that’s entirely their choice. Ba-dah-bing-bah-dah-boom you’ve got no real recourse I can employ on your behalf. If your private company employers start deciding a condition of your employment is vaccination or mask-wearing, turns out I’m totally fine with that too.

“That’s being forced!”

Not really because you still have a choice, albeit a shit one. You can give up your job and your capacity to go out to places you like or show up and be escorted out. Majority rules in a libertarian state. And don’t worry, market forces will win out. If there are enough people who collectively band together to decide against masks, then services will spring up to serve their needs.

“So this would be a two state solution?”

Sure. If that’s what you want to call it. If you choose not to follow the advice of scientists and medical professionals, I’m 100% with you and your right to dissent. I’m less keen on you mandating your choice for everyone else simply by showing up unannounced like a child’s turd in a bathtub.

If you want to create a United States of Maskless Free-Thinkers then go ahead. I dare you. I double dare you.

And I’m really bloody-minded

I have never taken the hippocratic oath. Lucky for me, because I think I’d be struck off pretty quickly. If you’ve managed to contract a virus and you present yourself at a hospital having turned down a vaccine, you’d go to the back of the Penguin queue.

I’m not going to throw the name Darwin around too much in particular circles… but this is Darwinism.

Doctors in my country are wholesome people who will treat everyone at the point of need — but I don’t know how they do it. I really don’t. If you don’t trust medical science to advise you on the best way to prevent an illness, why on earth are you showing up and demanding that medical science resolve your medical issues once they arrive.

You don’t believe the virus exists so that whole failure to breathe thing is probably unrelated. If you’re so confident that the whole thing is a hoax, stay at home, ride it out.

And here’s the kicker. There’s a limited number of beds in hospitals. There’s a limited number of doctors and nurses and care staff. Every single time you show up to be treated, there’s a direct consequence to someone else.

There’s a cancelled scan, there’s a missed biopsy, there’s a kid who doesn’t get tucked into bed at night because his parent is doing double shifts.

I’m a libertarian because I don’t believe the Government should be involved in the day to day minutiae of my life. I think the state has an overreach. That doesn’t give me carte-blanche to not read things and make ill-informed choices.

Y’all be idiots high on your own libertarianism. All rights, zero responsibility

And if you tell me to ‘do my own research’ I will simply point you to this very accurate psychological deconstruction of why conspiracy theories exist by the APA. The fact that I know at least two teachers who are anti-vaxxers is a damning indictment of the state of the British education system. The fact that an anti-vaccination march aimed at the BBC went to the wrong address is very informative.

I can’t trust you to do your own research if your depth of planning and research doesn’t lead you to the right place to protest. It wasn’t as though the BBC relocated to Manchester and other cities in absolute secrecy the day before. The information was readily available, you just didn’t find it, understand it and let it inform your action plan.

The ill-fated People’s March to the BBC is a great metaphor.

And that’s it in a nutshell. You have the right to choose to be uninformed or under-informed. I will argue for your rights to remain un-oppressed by the State in so much as I can — but you have to understand by consistently demonstrating your right to be reckless, you must accept the right to social rejection.

So, by all means, go out without your mask on, just don’t expect to be able to get in anywhere. When that happens (and it will) don’t complain about being shut out of public life by businesses and individuals exercising their right to free choice.

You have the right to stupidity and you have the responsibility to deal with the consequences of your actions. Whether that’s death or social exclusion.

See I told you… Penguins be mean.