Courtesy of Roy Edroso’s newsletter (one of my favorites and you should subscribe if you do that sort of thing) here’s one example of what the right wing is spreading around among themselves in order to keep the outrage machine at fever pitch and the money flowing in:
STATE AGENTS RAID PRESCHOOLS, GRILL TODDLERS WITHOUT PARENTAL CONSENT (Steadfast Clash)
There was a lot of doubt surrounding many of the mandates that originated from the COVID pandemic. As the pandemic that killed hundreds of thousands of Americans wanes, the truth is becoming clear. Most of the mandates were bureaucratic power grabs by fearful politicians.
Over two years and a million dead — mostly in red states where masks and vaccines are for liberal sissies — and the one thing we’ve learned is that vaccines and masks are for liberal sissies.
… From early in the pandemic, masks were little more than political theater. It’s sad, because these masks have damaged our children. The full extent of this damage created by hiding human emotions and curtailing emotional development may not be fully realized for decades.
We have no proof of this, but we bet years from now, when we get some real scientists up in here like Stella Immanuel, it’ll turn out wearing a mask was worse than catching COVID, and we will curse Sleepy Joe’s name even more than we do now!
…In California, another state full of tyrannical liberal leaders, officials took it a step further. California is attacking preschoolers like an inquisition.
That’s a little harsh. State agency people went to Aspen Leaf preschool and talked to the kids about masking without a “familiar adult” present. Even the unfriendly Voices of San Diego reports that “child care licensing investigators do have the authority to interview children in isolated settings” though “many Aspen Leaf parents said they believed such tactics were meant to be used in extreme cases, like alleged child abuse.”
My own memory of early school years is full of “unfamiliar” adults such as substitute teachers and nurses and other kids’ parents talking to me. My Mom couldn’t give a shit. You know why? Because that’s what school is. Or was, anyway — maybe now they send teachers out to kids’ neighborhoods weeks in advance to insinuate them into their lives so the kids don’t have a Stranger Danger freakout when they get to school, I don’t know.
But news of this “raid” has spread through the rightwing disinfo journals like tales of swarthy Cubans strip-searching women before the Spanish-American War, and the Steadfast Clash correspondent is particularly inflamed:
…When will Americans draw the line? What will the next reason be for encroaching on freedom?
This is more dangerous than one might think. The next step is a Marxist-style society where the government can do what they want to whomever they like. If Americans continue to allow these types of things to happen, we will soon regret it.
Stirring words, but for some reason this just made me think of all the videos I’ve seen of black kids getting thrown around by cops, so I couldn’t get with it.
I thought of that too. And it’s also quite interesting in terms of what Trump 2.0 has been doing down in Florida — banning schools from implementing mandates, telling them what they are and aren’t allowed to teach, even in colleges, banning businesses from doing any diversity training that might make someone feel bad about themselves, refusing to allow businesses to require masks and vaccines. They’ve even deployed the Texas-style vigilante legal method to keep teachers from discussing LGBT issues in school, with plenty of wriggle room to carry it all the way into high school. I don’t know about you, but that sure sounds like the government encroaching on freedom to me.
I also remembered the people marching in Charlottesville chanting “Jews will not replace us” and cheering the GOP president Donald Trump at meetings and I also recalled the storming of the US Capitol with people chanting (these folks do a lot of chanting) “Hang Mike Pence” and rioters screaming “tell that cunt Nancy Pelosi we’re coming for her!” So talking to little kids about mask wearing doesn’t strike me as a comparable authoritarian threat. I guess your mileage may vary but I honestly don’t know why.
There are more examples of this kind of right wing lunacy in Edroso’s newsletter’s regular feature, This is Hard Core. Nobody does it better.