Posted on 08/01/2022 11:02:01 AM PDT by Zhang Fei
ORINDA, Calif. — They waved signs that read “Defeat the mandates” and “No vaccines.” They chanted “Protect our kids” and “Our kids, our choice.”
Almost everyone in the crowd of more than three dozen was a parent. And as they protested on a recent Friday in the Bay Area suburb of Orinda, Calif., they had the same refrain: They were there for their children.
Most had never been to a political rally before. But after seeing their children isolated and despondent early in the coronavirus pandemic, they despaired, they said. On Facebook, they found other worried parents who sympathized with them. They shared notes and online articles — many of them misleading — about the reopening of schools and the efficacy of vaccines and masks. Soon, those issues crowded out other concerns.
“I wish I’d woken up to this cause sooner,” said one protester, Lisa Longnecker, 54, who has a 17-year-old son. “But I can’t think of a single more important issue. It’s going to decide how I vote.”
Ms. Longnecker and her fellow objectors are part of a potentially destabilizing new movement: parents who joined the anti-vaccine and anti-mask cause during the pandemic, narrowing their political beliefs to a single-minded obsession over those issues. Their thinking hardened even as Covid-19 restrictions and mandates were eased and lifted, cementing in some cases into a skepticism of all vaccines.
Nearly half of Americans oppose masking and a similar share is against vaccine mandates for schoolchildren, polls show. But what is obscured in those numbers is the intensity with which some parents have embraced these views. While they once described themselves as Republicans or Democrats, they now identify as independents who plan to vote based solely on vaccine policies.
Their transformation injects an unpredictable element into November’s midterm elections.
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
The real issue is they now despise heavy handed attempts at control by “experts”.
The real issue is they now despise heavy handed attempts at control by “experts”. However, the NYT does not dare put it into those terms. So it just paints them as rabid anti-Vaxxers.
> anti-vaccine
It’s not a vaccine by the original, rational definition but it makes it easy to classify people as anti-vaxxers.
“The real issue is they now despise heavy handed attempts at control by “experts”.
That’s the good news from the article. It finally hit them in the heat when the control came to ‘their” kids. Hopefully the awakening will bleed over to other controls.
Hit then in the HEART. (sorry)
This article just drips with curled-lip, sneering condescension towards ordinary people with legitimate questions and concerns. No qualms at all about seeing the author of this screed dangling from a rope.
Share this with them:
Covid Pitch Meeting with Harrison Smith
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9BepDADNtJA
This was already happening.
It’s one reason why Deep State had to steal the last election.
It took you 54 years to figure it out? Go back to sleep Lisa, you will never wake up at this point.
Repubs would be wise to exploit this newfound thirst for liberty re: vaccines and masks via campaign ads, but you know they won’t.
Covid had one silver lining. We know who the hysterical ninnies are, from friends and family all the way up to our elected representatives.
Big diff. We anti-vaxxers don't try to deny YOU the CHOICE to take it if you wish. You Vacci-Nazis insist on forcing it upon everyone.
LOL! EXCELLENT!
It may have taken her 54 years to wake up, but at least she got there. Now if only the rest of the sleeping citizens would wake up!
Remarkable how a boot on your neck makes you evaluate your life choices up until that time.
Just for the record, I am not for vaccine or mask mandates
It’s settled down for now. Avoid getting sick this fall, and tell the politicians to require voting in person for all who can do so. I’ll vote in person again, if the craziness from the fringes is pushed out of sight enough.
I ran into to plenty of Democrats while doing rallies up and down the state.
There are plenty who are supremely pissed about the response to Covid.
I don’t think they actually changed their vote
I agree with your point about not changing vote...
Cities of Beverly Hills, Pasadena, and Long Beach announced that they will not enforce the mask mandate if ordered by LA County Health Dept...There are a plenty of Democrats in those cities...Not many Trump supporters...In November, most people in those cities will vote for Gavin Newsom...Not the GOP candidate...
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