I’ve always been a bit of a germophobe and many “people” are filthy.
I HATE touching the carts at grocery stores. I’ve been opening doors with my feet for decades.
If someone is concerned about staying healthy, fine. Virtual signaling? GFY.
My two unsolicited cents.
It’s common to wear a mask in some crowded Oriental cities. And has been since before Covid. The risk of a viral infection is high in many crowded urban environments.
I had a friend with an auto immune deficiency disease. He has since passed, but he most certainly wore a mask in public.
Point is, the average person does not need to mask up. But there are always some rare exceptions.
If I knew someone (physically) near me was auto-immune or similar, I would wear a mask and keep socially distanced.
I wore a mask because I lived with someone who probably would have died had they caught covid. If some people here had seen me, maybe you would have thought I was a Karen or virtue-signaling, or whatever.
I am not sure masks were a hill to die on. I was always ambivalent about that since lots of people had very good reason to wear them, and some of them you couldn’t tell by looking.