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Behind the mask: Why the new US campus protestors cover their faces
Semafor ^ | Apr 23, 2024 | David Weigel

Posted on 04/27/2024 11:50:18 AM PDT by MinorityRepublican

The first thing you see are the masks — the N-95s, the surgical masks, the patterned cloth masks, the bandanas — which largely vanished from American life over the last two years but are a defining feature of America’s swelling left-wing protest culture.

Faculty members at New York University link arms to protect a “Gaza solidarity encampment,” most of them wearing face masks. Activists block travel across the Golden Gate Bridge, all of them in masks. Members of the March on DNC 2024 coalition show up to their Chicago press conference in face masks, removing them only when it’s their turn to speak.

Nearly one year after the official end of the federal COVID-19 emergency declaration, the regular use of face masks for non-immunocompromised people has faded from American life. Outdoor masking, mandated in many states during the peak of the pandemic, became even rarer after a 2022 CDC advisory scaled it back.

But that gradual return to barefaced life never reached left-leaning protests, where face masks are widely used and encouraged.

Part of the reason, say organizers, remains an attempt to make a point about exposure to COVID-19 and other health risks, which some in the left-wing protest movements believe remain dire. And part is the threat of a different kind of exposure — from being captured by facial recognition technology or becoming doxxed (their personal information being shared online) by counter-protesters.

(Excerpt) Read more at semafor.com ...


TOPICS:
KEYWORDS: domesticenemies; education; israel; masks
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1 posted on 04/27/2024 11:50:18 AM PDT by MinorityRepublican
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To: MinorityRepublican

Because they are ugly.


2 posted on 04/27/2024 11:51:09 AM PDT by GSWarrior
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To: MinorityRepublican

“ But that gradual return to barefaced life never reached left-leaning protests…”
*************************************************

Nor has it reached the criminal elements. Masking to hide identity has become NORMALIZED.


3 posted on 04/27/2024 11:55:58 AM PDT by House Atreides (I’m now ULTRA-MAGA-PRO-MAX)
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To: MinorityRepublican

They mask up just as the BLMers did, as Antifa did and Occupy Wall Street did.

Terrorism is as terrorism does.


4 posted on 04/27/2024 11:57:37 AM PDT by Responsibility2nd (A truth that’s told with bad intent, Beats all the lies you can invent ~ Wm. Blake)
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To: House Atreides

I think trying to hide identity is the main reason.


5 posted on 04/27/2024 11:58:12 AM PDT by Jamestown1630 ("A Republic, if you can keep it.")
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To: MinorityRepublican

Note also that the supposed right wing group “Patriot Front” also wears masks. Just another deep state front group.


6 posted on 04/27/2024 11:59:44 AM PDT by glorgau
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To: MinorityRepublican

Because these protesters are basically a bunch of spineless cowards.
Crack them over their heads and they will stop protesting the same day.
But the Nazi league schools won’t do it because they are just as cowardly as the protesters and are Hamas supporters.


7 posted on 04/27/2024 12:00:44 PM PDT by 353FMG
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To: MinorityRepublican

They want to show solidarity of this and that but want to remain anonymous but are real brave little cowards?


8 posted on 04/27/2024 12:00:55 PM PDT by Karliner (Heb 4:12 Rom 8:28 Rev 3, "...This is the end of the beginning." Churchill)
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To: MinorityRepublican

The eyes are almost as good as fingerprints or face photos. During Covid I went to several funerals in which everyone was masked. I recognized people there I had not seen in years just by their eyes.


9 posted on 04/27/2024 12:01:23 PM PDT by Ruy Dias de Bivar ( )
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To: MinorityRepublican

It’s purely to hide their faces. The Covid stuff is just their excuse.


10 posted on 04/27/2024 12:01:29 PM PDT by monkeyshine (live and let live is dead)
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To: Jamestown1630

11 posted on 04/27/2024 12:01:57 PM PDT by Dick Bachert
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To: Dick Bachert

The ‘Useful Idiots’


12 posted on 04/27/2024 12:04:23 PM PDT by Jamestown1630 ("A Republic, if you can keep it.")
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To: House Atreides
Nor has it reached the criminal elements. Masking to hide identity has become NORMALIZED.

One practical reason - the rise of the surveillance state and its technology is certainly a reason. everyone can be identified now, and 20 years from now.

But combined with that and multiplying that fear of detection, people are far more amoral. They lack any moral grounding and thus have no courage of their convictions. Many people are brave only within a mob. People who believe they know "truth" do not hide themselves. Christian martyrs are the ultimate example

13 posted on 04/27/2024 12:04:37 PM PDT by PGR88
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To: All

About 100 people showed up for the Students for Justice in Palestine teach-in on the steps of the UVA Rotunda. Photo by Eze Amos.

14 posted on 04/27/2024 12:05:22 PM PDT by MinorityRepublican
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To: MinorityRepublican

I do not agree with their cause.

Israel is our ally, they actually were attacked, we have formal defense specific agreements with them... Israel is a Western and liberal soceity with a rule of law that is surrounded by backward heathens and savages.

That said, in a Orwellian society where police show up with camera’s and record, after J6 where facial recognition was used to go after folks, do you really blame them in wanting to safegaurd their privacy in what has become a literal police state?

I also encourage all protestors (right, left, religous, athiest, white, black, Latino, gay or straight, for or against abortion) to leave their phones behind. You may as well be wearing a court ordered ankle monitor. Law enforcement and the IC will collect that data and put you at that location and time...

After J6 even those that never entered the Capital building were interviewed by the FBI (a perminent record is created) because of facial recognition and cell phone data. They dind’t even break the law!


15 posted on 04/27/2024 12:05:45 PM PDT by Red6
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To: MinorityRepublican

Lawyer: So with his mask on you actually cannot state that my client is the one who relieved himself on the sidewalk and then threw a trash barrel onto the patrol car windshield.
👨‍⚖️🧑‍⚖️


16 posted on 04/27/2024 12:05:45 PM PDT by frank ballenger (There's a battle outside and it's raging. It'll soon shake your windows and rattle your walls.)
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To: PGR88
One practical reason - the rise of the surveillance state and its technology is certainly a reason. everyone can be identified now, and 20 years from now.

That's a good point.

17 posted on 04/27/2024 12:06:19 PM PDT by MinorityRepublican
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To: MinorityRepublican
Why are these COWARDS hiding their faces?

There is NO NEED for them to hide their faces. Their schools are on-board with their ideology AS WELL AS the FIB, DOJ, DHS, CIA, and the Joe Burden regime..

18 posted on 04/27/2024 12:06:56 PM PDT by CivilWarBrewing (Get off my back for my usage of CAPS, especially you snowflake males! MAN UP!)
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To: MinorityRepublican
Part of the reason, say organizers, remains an attempt to make a point about exposure to COVID-19 and other health risks, which some in the left-wing protest movements believe remain dire.

Liars.

I'm calling BS on that excuse.

19 posted on 04/27/2024 12:07:15 PM PDT by metmom (He who testifies to these things says, “Surely I am coming soon.” Amen. Come, Lord Jesus…)
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To: Red6
Law enforcement and the IC will collect that data and put you at that location and time...

Leave your phone at home, you can use that as evidence that you were home at the time.

20 posted on 04/27/2024 12:07:40 PM PDT by MinorityRepublican
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