The COVID hysteria machine has been kicking into gear, but few people thought that mask and vaccine mandates would actually be coming back.

Personally, I expected that at least some places would hop on board the panic bandwagon, and as usual, I turned out to be right. (No, this was not prescience, just cynicism).

Widespread mandates are not back, although I fear that 2024 may see a return of the plandemic. So far the resistance to mandates is stronger than the desire of people in power to push the issue.

Academia is going to be a proving ground for the effort to push mandates. Rutgers is mandating COVID vaccines in order to enroll, and now a small private college in Georgia has announced a new mask mandate.

BREAKING: Black Atlanta liberal arts college Morris Brown implements mask mandate, social distancing measures amid new Covid scarehttps://t.co/Py3s8UJS1I

— The Post Millennial (@TPostMillennial) August 21, 2023

This is, of course, insane. A college mandating COVID vaccines for young healthy students is demonstrably harmful–anybody can do the math to show that even with the most optimistic assumptions COVID vaccines present a higher risk to college students than any conceivable benefit. The risk from COVID is nearly nil, while the risk of severe side effects from the vaccine is not. You don’t have to be a COVID vaccine skeptic to believe that assessment; it is simple math.

Mask mandates at least don’t present the risk of permanently damaging your health or killing you; instead, they are simply stupid and tyrannical.

The rationale given by the school itself is an embarrassment:

Morris Brown College has reintroduced a mask mandate for both students and staff while on campus, just a week after the commencement of classes.

The Atlanta-based private institution conveyed this new mask mandate through an official communication on Sunday, addressed to faculty, staff, and students. As part of a comprehensive set of COVID-19 safety measures, including the mask requirement, these protocols will remain in effect for a span of two weeks. The rationale for this decision is attributed to “reports of positive cases among students in the Atlanta University Center” as stated in the communication.

President Kevin James of Morris Brown College indicated to The Atlanta Journal-Constitution on Monday that the college has not yet received any reports of COVID-19 cases directly on its premises. He characterized these measures as “precautionary steps.”
The Atlanta University Center Consortium comprises several historically Black colleges and universities located on the western side of the city. Notably, Morehouse and Spelman colleges, as well as Clark Atlanta University, initiated their classes last Wednesday.

I have news for Kevin James: there will be cases of COVID popping up forever. Just as there are cases of the flu, the common cold, and mononucleosis. The idea that COVID will ever be eradicated is stupid, and just as stupid is the idea that its spread can somehow be prevented by masking.

Let’s assume for a moment that masks actually work to prevent the spread of COVID. Forget that 90%+ of the US population has gotten COVID despite all those vaccine and mask mandates, and that includes all the fanatics who lecture us incessantly about the precautions we should take. (If presidents, public health officials, and the most zealous mandate pushers get COVID then obviously it is hopeless for us mere mortals to assume we can avoid it).

Assume masks are 100% effective. Then what? Are students going to be confined to campus forever? Will they be required to wear masks everywhere off campus? Professors? Administrators?

If not then the mandate is worthless. People will simply get the virus off campus anyway.

It’s theater. Not only are masks essentially worthless; even the best masks are ineffective when not worn, and nobody is going to wear them every moment when they are out of bed.

Not. Gonna. Happen.

Academics advertise themselves as super smart, but their faith in their intelligence makes them more stupid in reality than most people. They give up common sense. Obviously.

They’re trying to do the Covid thing again. pic.twitter.com/QPJS2PuXIC

— The Post Millennial (@TPostMillennial) August 18, 2023

It’s obvious that there is a coordinated effort to ramp up the COVID fear, although I doubt that they can ever make widespread mandates acceptable to most people. Not only will resistance among skeptics be harder to overcome, but there has also been an uptick in fear fatigue. Like soldiers thrown into battle again and again a fatalism sets in. You can’t stay panicked forever.

Unless you are Taylor Lorenz or one of the few people whose happiness depends upon constant drama.

For most of us, COVID is a reality we have learned to live with. I expect that the powers that be will keep trying to ramp up the drama, and I expect the rest of us will simply shrug.

At least I hope so.