In August 2021, a video of Democratic congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez putting on a face mask on the steps of the US Capitol went viral. You might be surprised to hear that what was then such a common sight would draw much attention, but the problem was that Ocasio-Cortez had been filmed happily chatting to a large group of people without a mask on until it was time to pose for a picture. “Of course!” the conservative media outlet Breitbart tweeted, gleefully, along with the video.
By then, the face mask had become a powerful political symbol, and nowhere was this more the case than in America. For the left, wearing a mask meant you were a sensible, community-minded liberal; for the right, that you were a virtue-signalling, communist-adjacent member of the hypocritical coastal elite.
Some businesses, in places such as Kentucky, wouldn’t let you on to their premises if you were wearing a mask; others, in cities like New York, wouldn’t let you in if you weren’t. I recall being on the phone to a friend living in Brooklyn in the summer of 2021 who was mortified that, on a stiflingly hot day, she had accidentally taken a few steps outside her apartment without her mask on. It wasn’t that she believed she might be at risk of spreading Covid; it was that it was socially unacceptable not to be masked at all times in public.