Patrick Henry wouldn’t have worn a face mask

OPINION:

In March of 1775, history records one of America’s greatest patriots, Patrick Henry, delivering a fiery speech to his fellow Virginians urging them to take up arms against the tyrannical British, based in large part on his warning that the British had, in fact, already opened up a military campaign against the colonists. It is one of American history’s greatest moments, greatest speeches, greatest mental images of the spirit of this nation at work.

Now imagine Henry delivering that speech in a face mask.

It wouldn’t happen.

It never would have happened.

Fiery speeches of freedom and forced face masks do not mix.

And this is why the face masks that still dot the landscape in America must be obliterated — erased — disappeared, as the communists who love the forced face masking might say.

“Indeed, the imposition of masks [in China] was a deliberate political intervention by the Chinese Communist Party after 1949 as a symbolic break with tradition and sign of modernity,” The British Medical Journal blog wrote in a piece titled, “On the psychology and politics of wearing masks,” published in September 2021.

It’s about conformity.

It’s about doing for the collective.

And in a country where rights are supposed to come from God and where government is the humble servant-protector of those God-given rights, and where individualism is prized far, far and away above collectivism, political authority is never to be taken as the commanding presence. Certainly, politicians in this country are never to be allowed the right to dictate.

The coronavirus flipped that relationship to a dangerous point of almost no return — to a point where too many in America believe that a single bureaucrat can issue a decree and that all must obey as if it’s law.

Face masks came about in America because of fear. People like Dr. Anthony Fauci and President Biden and Bill Gates were able to convince citizens that a face mask would prevent the spread of the virus. Those who didn’t buy into the fear were shamed and bullied. Wear the face masks for others, because it makes others feel safe. 

Of course, there’s no ounce of truth to face mask claims.

But now, in America, there are many, far too many, young and old alike, who walk about with face masks, by themselves, on empty streets, in empty parks, while driving in cars that are empty of passengers — and they do so because it comforts them. It gives them a feeling of moral superiority. It soothes their irrational fears that are based on lies and deceptions and yes, even wicked anti-American intents.

There is something very un-American about Americans in face masks.

This is not the image of fighting founders, committed colonists, brave patriots of all ages, of both sexes rising up against the most powerful military in the world to say: Enough; we are a free and independent nation.

This is not the image of a country that lives by a creed of self-governance — of “we hold these truths to be self-evident” — that  we “are endowed by [the] Creator with certain unalienable rights” — that “whenever any form of government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the right of the people to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new government.”

This is not the image of a people who were swept to a call of arms by a passionate voice that cried, “I know not what course others may take, but as for me, give me liberty or give me death!”

No. Quite the opposite.

Face masks say subdued. They say sit down, shut up, quiet down, obey. They say live in lies for the good of others — to make others feel better, to make others feel safer — and to swallow the lie and to suffer the lie in silence.

Henry warned his fellow patriots of mistakenly believing the British had the best interests of the colonists at heart. He cautioned — loudly — against blindly pretending the British had not already assembled in war against them.

Similarly, America is at war right now.

Americans are facing a cultural shift that was ignited by coronavirus fears to move the country into collectivism and compliance. The face masks are the outward show of that collectivism and compliance. The face masks are the physical manifestations of how far Americans have gone down the communist path, and how many God-given rights citizens have ceded because of fear, guilt, shame, apathy and pressure.

Try delivering a fiery speech for the cause of freedom while wearing a face mask and see.

• Cheryl Chumley can be reached at cchumley@washingtontimes.com or on Twitter, @ckchumley. Listen to her podcast “Bold and Blunt” by clicking HERE. And never miss her column; subscribe to her newsletter and podcast by clicking HERE. Her latest book, “Lockdown: The Socialist Plan To Take Away Your Freedom,” is available by clicking HERE  or clicking HERE or CLICKING HERE.

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