Face masks and shopping

[Emma123L]

For me shopping on the high street now is a quite a depressing and anxiety ridden experience. You queue to get into the each shop for 10 minutes, then anti had had to be slathered on hands and it be has made my skin peel on my fingers, I was told loudly by shop staff to follow the arrows on the floor and not to touch the clothes unless absolutely neccessary. Supermarkets are nearly as bad. Now with many people (all from 24th July) wearing masks people nervously dart out of the way of you with fear in their eyes ...mainly middle aged or older people .you can't see the rest of their face behind the mask..Is this how we are supposed to live for the next year or two before a vaccine is found...if one is found? I must say that cafes and pubs are populated by less nervous people and are bit more relaxing to go to. I'm doing most of my shopping online now for everything and just one trip to the supermarket. I'm sure many people's mental health will be affected by this if these measures are in place for a year or two.

I do not recognise this where I live. People still say hello and just step to one side without any look of fear. Major supermarkets have stopped the one way system now and I haven't had to queue for a couple weeks now, though I am not in a city. I've only been to a couple clothing stores and they didn't say anything about touching, though I was mindful about it.
You do have to accept it, but shop online if you must.

@Emma123L

The funniest thing I see when driving is the face mask fanatics driving in their cars with their face masks on🙄

🤣🤣🤣 Yep absolutely divs . I saw one lifting hers up to smoke as well

Totally agree with everything you've said by the way
I just won't go shopping anymore it will be online only for me absolutely nothing is getting me in a mask

Do you know much about masks and filtration rates OP? I do because I work in an operating theatre and wear them all the time. We wear them in theatre for a reason, they protect our patients. If they didn't work why on earth would we be wearing them?

Not remotely comparable to "people should cover their faces with something/anything while shopping". Surgical masks are properly fitted and their wearers have been trained in how to use them.

Most of the masks I see out and about are ill-fitting, and people do fiddle with them, adjust them, or take them on and off.

In a pharmacy the other day, one assistant wore hers as a chin-hammock for the entire time I was in there - about 20 mins, because of a screw-up by the prescription issuer - and another suddenly clawed hers down off her face, grabbed a fan (flamenco style, not one of the little hand-held helicopter jobs) and fanned her face vigorously, all the while talking very loudly. Probably an excellent way of spreading any virus she happened to have been exhaling.

It's all largely 'pandemic theatre' just as half the nonsense in airports is 'security theatre'.

@Emma123L

Sillysmiles Im not projecting! Sadly the media (to sell a story) and the government have scared the living daylights out of people so now to encourage the fearful back onto shops and the high street they have made face mask wearing mandatory to make people feel safer. People (mainly middle aged and older) do nervously dart out of your way and many do look fearful. Young people don't behave like this so much! Anyway I've made my decision to shop online from now on. I will still go to pubs and cafes where people are a bit more relaxed!

So and ageist and whinging about masks thread... okaaay.

I mean, it is entirely possible that the people the OP encounters are darting out of her way with fear in their eyes.

I mean, it must be pretty unsettling to have a stranger watching your every move and staring intently into your eyes trying to judge your emotion.

Nowt to do with their mask, though. More about the crazy stalker lady in the shop.

@JassyRadlett

I mean, it is entirely possible that the people the OP encounters are darting out of her way with fear in their eyes.

I mean, it must be pretty unsettling to have a stranger watching your every move and staring intently into your eyes trying to judge your emotion.

Nowt to do with their mask, though. More about the crazy stalker lady in the shop.

I started wearing a face mask today. By next Friday no one will bat an eyelid at it.

@Charleyhorses

I started wearing a face mask today. By next Friday no one will bat an eyelid at it.

Yes. By next week the non-mask wearers will be the odd ones out.

@slashlover @JingsMahBucket - it is unfortunate that you consider my reference to biologically known factors relating to sex to be anti-trans - this is quite the logical leap.

I am pointing out the blindness of a virus to subjective feelings. I am not commenting on the validity of those feelings or their societal acceptance and impact on individual wellbeing or experience of prejudice.

I am just saying that if you objectively belong to a higher risk group, you cannot identify your way out of it.

You can see the virus as anti trans if you like but it won't make any difference.

In health terms, sex hormones are significant. I would have thought that it is important that risk factors are not ignored in trans women that retain a male hormone profile or in trans men taking hormone blockers given the research on possible protection afforded by oestrogen but not HRT/HT. See the Zoe data on recent research.

it is unfortunate that you consider my reference to biologically known factors relating to sex to be anti-trans - this is quite the logical leap.

That's not what it is though. You brought trans people into a thread which had absolutely nothing to do with them. People were discussing whether they were going to wear a mask and suddenly you're talking about their feeling that they are really women or dress as women determinant in relation to severity? and subjective feelings over objective reality

It was a complete non suquitur purely to lever trans people into a discussion which had nothing to do with them.

The funnest think I see when driving is the face mask fanatics driving in their cars with their face masks on

Yes we know that Emma123L because you started a whole thread yesterday about how hilarious you find it, along with all the other threads you've started about masks?

Can't imagine where you shop that there are so many old folk darting out of your way with fear in their eyes. Never seen anything like that personally; or maybe I'm just not a particularly scary person.

@applesandpears33

It is already a legal requirement in Scotland to wear a mask when shopping and it is amazing how quickly everyone has adapted to it.

Agree with this. I've been surprised how quickly it's become the norm

@slashlover - this is absolutely an issue relating to subjective feelings in relation to objective reality.

Sometimes subjective feelings take precedence over objective reality and vice versa. Because we are subjective social beings existing in an objective world. Sometimes it's not black and white and we have social and cultural leeway. Other times, not so much. Eg gravity - operates completely independently of my beliefs and feelings. It is resistant and whether you like it or not, biology is resistant. It has an objective reality that is independent of cultural and historical thought or belief even though surgery and pharmacological interventions have to some extent made this a grey area.

So, the point of the thread

Do you wear a mask because subjectively it makes you feel safer

OR

Do you wear a mask because objectively it reduces transmission and viral load

Is this a situation where the subjective is key or vice versa? Is subjective resistance lowered with objective understanding or is the objective reality lost in a purely cultural narrative of 'freedom'?

I have started to wear one when shopping recently. I don't experience the emotion of fear/nervousness when I think about it, I feel "safe" on an emotional level either way, but I'm aware that not only might I be helping to stop the actual spread of the virus but also helping other people to feel safer, people who perhaps have more reason to worry if they're older/smokers/carers/have various health problems.

YABVU. Not only are you projecting your anxiety onto everyone else around you, but you’re also spreading lies about face masks because you don’t want to wear one.

Shame on you.

Barely anyone was mask wearing in Home Bargains but almost everyone in Boots and Home Sense was.

That's a really interesting observation from a previous poster. I think dempgraphics will end up playing a massive role in infection rates within communities. Lack of education about health issues, such as how to wear a mask and why (not with your nose sticking out, or constantly re-using the same one, or wearing those with a one-way valve that blows potentially infected breath directly out of the hole!).

For anti-maskers, there are many reasons why masks are a good idea in shops.
A) Retail workers have a higher infection rate - so you should protect them and also protect yourself from them.
B) People who are saying masks aren't effective - there's a shedload of research and publications saying they make a difference.
C) Schools are different, the bubbles are smaller and identifiable. My large retail shop can have several thousand people pass through each day, plus the 50 staff.

It really isn't a big deal after the first few times. I feel very vulnerable without one now!

I posted on another thread very similar to this. About going to a pub for Sunday lunch with social distancing tables. They can only have max 50 % capacity and so have had to have less staff. Every other table was cut off.. was sad to see especially as this would be usually a very busy country pub.
Agreed, shopping is not a pleasant experience, queuing to get in then keeping 2 metres apart. Now wearing a face mask.
Having said that, I noticed Sainsburys doesn’t have a queue system anymore at my nearest one and there wasn’t any one way arrows. Almost seemed normal, except people wearing masks.

I do understand the need for the masks and obviously I will follow the rules like a good citizen. But let’s not pretend this is normal.
I know some countries in Asia wear masks normally, but isn’t that because of pollution? Just because other countries where them as the norm, doesn’t mean we want to be like them. China isn’t a county I want the UK to follow..
As I said, I’ll wear one where I have to.

Anyone else get a sore throat after wearing a mask for a long time or is it just me?

I don’t think this will last forever ( I hope!)
People will take the piss and where a really think one or have it dangling down.
People remove them to talk to shop staff anyway! Defeats the object!
Didn’t Boris say something about hopefully being back to nearly normal by Xmas??

I meant wear a really thin one!

I went to IKEA today and it was just bloody depressing. I won't be going back to the shops with a mask on. I will online shop or do without. People aren't social distancing at all, just blatantly standing in the middle of isles so you can't get passes, coming right up bend you, crossing your path. Everyone's standing 2 meters apart outside but then just about holding my hand in the shop.

I wore my mask to go to the hairdresser's this morning and then kept it on for the supermarket. I've got the knack now of how to position it so that my glasses don't stream up. It really wasn't a big deal.

I have every sympathy for those who have real difficulty wearing one, whether that's due to physical illness/disability, hidden disability, pstd relating to previous trauma or any other genuine reason. There needs to be some kind of way for them to have an exemption from their gp and maybe get a lanyard so that they aren't mask shamed when they're out and about.

But those people who are just complaining because they don't like being told what to do or they think the virus has gone away need to grow up, stop moaning and just get on with it like most of the rest of the world.

People will take the piss and where a really think one or have it dangling down.
People remove them to talk to shop staff anyway!

Most people don't do either of these things.

A few people not wearing them correctly and literally 4 people not wearing them at all was today's experience of shopping in Scottish city centre.