Verbally attacked for not wearing a mask

[8catsaremycoven]

Wow, had a great experience in Lidl today - I was verbally abused and intimidated by a bloke in his 40s for not wearing a mask.

I'm minding my own business, choosing some fruit for DHS when random angry bloke walks past and hisses "You should be wearing a mask ". He doesn't stop and ask me directly why I'm not wearing a mask, just walks past me and says it in an undertone.

I catch up with him because he's browsing and tell him I'm exempt because I'm asthmatic. Apparently anyone can claim to be exempt and it's my personal fault that people are dying?! I told him that I wished that I was able to wear a mask to protect myself if nothing else, he just carried on ranting at me. No security guards in the store, other shoppers just stood and watched. I ended up crying in frustration and walking away.

I can't wear a mask because of my asthma but I also suffer from PTSD because an XH put a pillow over my face and raped me.

Am I expected to explain everything to anyone?

YABU - get over everything, risk a major asthma attack and wear a mask

YANBU - asthma is enough to excuse me from wearing a mask let alone my other reasons, which I don't feel I should have to explain to anyone

Bring it on, I'm sure someone is going to roast me but I truly hope that you're going to be behind me.

I left the shop shaking and in tears

Visors and scarves don't work. I see people with the stupid scarf thing and see it as a way to pretend to comply but not. They are never actually on someone's face. And the evidence is in on visors. They don't work.

I think that even if it's legal to do something that doesn't mean that you should. I'm getting rather sick of all the shouty people saying ITS THE LAW when there are a lot of morally questionable things that are legal.

For example going up to someone and berating them for not wearing a mask. Perfectly legal. But not really very nice at all.

Click and collect is a good compromise. Not 'ablist' or 'unfair'. No wandering around the aisles (hardly fun anyway), much more convenient and a wider range of goods. In fact this thread has reminded me it exists - I'm sick of getting whatever shit my 'local' Tesco has when my local (smaller) Sainsbury's can do me a proper shop I can whizz in and pick up in seconds.

And to be honest I fucking hate supermarkets because they are full of people not wearing masks. Maybe I'd be one of the lucky ones and not catch it or be asymptomatic but I don't want to roll that dice. And I don't want it on my conscience to unwittingly give it to a colleague who then gives it to someone who then dies. Or becomes unable to work. Just because someone else wanted to be a fuckwit.

It's one thing to have a condition that means you can't wear a mask - it's quite another to visit the consequences of that (death, long term ill health) on other people. Because if you never wear one your chances are higher of getting it AND passing it on unless you are ultra ultra careful.

I think that even if it's legal to do something that doesn't mean that you should. I'm getting rather sick of all the shouty people saying ITS THE LAW when there are a lot of morally questionable things that are legal

'morally questionable' is a matter of personal taste and opinion. That's why the law is there. So that when people question other people's definition of right and wrong, we have something to refer to.

AKA, with all due respect, your opinion (and mine) counts for nothing.

@PurpleDaisies

Me!

I have tubes coming out of my nose. That you behind my ear. I literally physically can't get a mask over the tube.

However (and this is a big however). My reason is VERY visual. People can see it a bloody mile off. People leave me alone. I've never even been asked.

@lemonsandlimes123

The thing is there are actually very few medical exemptions, as many people have pointed out, vanishingly few asthmatics CAN'T wear a mask. It's more that for many people it's unpleasant or uncomfortable so understandably some of them interpret that as meaning they don't have to. I wonder if there are any conditions that mean you are considered exempt from wearing a seatbelt, certain sensory issues etc? I would guess not but I can guarantee that if people were able to self diagnose as exempt from wearing seatbelts there would suddenly be a whole lot of people with sensory issues and PTSD that meant the couldn't be restricted in any way and were therefore exempt. My guess is that were there to be a gas attacks and everyone was issued with gas masks an awful lot of exempt people would suddenly manage to wear a mask.

Actually. I think you've made a good point

If there was radioactivity around. Who wouldn't wear a gas mask

I'd be screwed. I'd be dead. If I can't physically fit a mask over my tube. I couldn't get a gas mask on it

But that's a good point

@BamboozledandBefuddled it's really really simple.

WHY doesn't matter. The emotions or 'ablism' or your anger at retail workers doesn't matter. Whether someones refusing or can't use one is completely irrelevant. It makes zero difference.

The only thing that matters is the OUTCOME. And if you believe that the wearing of masks makes no difference therefore we shouldn't have to that's one thing. But so far the scientific evidence supports the wearing of masks to protect others as well as social distancing and not being indoors with groups.

So WHY someone isn't wearing one isn't the point. It's what will happen if they don't. We can deal with a small number who don't - but getting more than a handful and especially in one place is a game changer. Because when people start walking around with no masks or lanyards other people think they don't have to wear one.

China is well on the way to economic recovery and will soon have more power and money than you can imagine. Because they are a lot less human rights focused and the Chinese a lot less individualistic.

Our government has run out of money and can't magic more up. The nhs is, apparently, fucked.

Benefits will be cut, taxes will go up and everything we go from driving a car to buying a house will cost a fortune. Retail rates will skyrocket once this is over. Parking costs, parking fines etc. Councils and the government will frantically be trying to claw money back.

EVERYONE has a duty to do everything they can because the consequences are serious for everyone including g and especially the vulnerable.

I'm shocked at your callousness toward retails workers too. They don't get paid a lot and shouldn't be exposed to unnecessary danger.

To all the people who “can’t” wear masks, what would happen if you were on a plane and the oxygen system failed and the masks dropped to keep you alive? 😂

@Powerchewings

To all the people who “can’t” wear masks, what would happen if you were on a plane and the oxygen system failed and the masks dropped to keep you alive? 😂

It says an awful lot about you if you find this idea funny

@bamboozledandBefuddled if you want to protect retail workers, can you spread the word that people still need to socially distance even with masks and not to spend ages over their shopping so that other customers, rightly or wrongly, get impatient and start taking unnecessarily risks. While you're at it, perhaps you could write to your local supermarket and enquire about limiting numbers otherwise Christmas will be carnage with either customers punching one another or spreading COVID

Click and collect is a good compromise. Not 'ablist' or 'unfair'.

You mean apart from the massive assumption that everyone has access to car?

@MarriedtoDaveGrohl you say
China is well on the way to economic recovery and will soon have more power and money than you can imagine. Because they are a lot less human rights focused and the Chinese a lot less individualistic.

This is true but should a totalitarian state be held as an example of how to deal with this and can we rely on them to accurately report their figures. Even our own country is tweaking them with the odd loophole

Btw, I’m a supporter of the Sunflower Lanyard scheme, but not of the people blatently taking the piss out of it as they “can’t” wear a mask.

'Special' is quite an offensive word in the context, though @powerchewings

I’m asthmatic and wear a mask, doesn’t mean you can though, it affects people differently.

People like that are horrible, out for blood, the only way for people like him is killing them with kindness’

It doesn’t bother me to be nice to someone who is horrible to me, if I manage to get them to change their tune I take that as a personal win, even if it appears I haven’t ‘won’. As I prefer no confrontation out in public, so if it doesn’t end that way I am happy, and that’s what matters.

Next person like that I would say “yes, I’m exempt, thank you so much for wearing yours though, it really means a lot to me that people like you are making a sacrifice to help vulnerable people like me” end of conversation, I wouldn’t speak again after that to really get the point across and await their response as no matter what they say next (something nice or nasty) they will look like a dick- job done.

You don't need a car to do click and collect? It's no different than walking out of the supermarket with your bags. Difference is, they're all in one spot outside. You can lift them and leave the supermarket how you normally do. Bus, taxi, walking, etc. Asda let you do it for free from £20.

So no, you don't need a car. Next excuse, please?

Also, totally agree regarding gas masks and air masks in planes.

@Powerchewings

To all the people who “can’t” wear masks, what would happen if you were on a plane and the oxygen system failed and the masks dropped to keep you alive? 😂

Well. Now for me. Those are round. I think if I could get a good suction over my tube. It might be alright

Otherwise that would be me gone!

Absolutely @Powerchewings.

It's the same thing as people ordering radar keys from eBay when they aren't entitled to one. It totally fucks over the people who rely on them. We need to keep them for people who genuinely need them. Needed them before the pandemic, might I add.

If everyone starts buying one then the sad fact is, people will stop respecting them. Therefore, those who need them most will have lost an essential piece of equipment to their life.

That’s just stupid, wearing a mask that makes breathing difficult compared to a airplane mask that pushes out oxygen are completely worlds apart....obviously!

(I can’t believe you was stupid enough to post that)

Apart from the fact that the op lives in a country where vlick and collect doesn't exist

@stretchedmarks

You don't need a car to do click and collect? It's no different than walking out of the supermarket with your bags. Difference is, they're all in one spot outside. You can lift them and leave the supermarket how you normally do. Bus, taxi, walking, etc. Asda let you do it for free from £20.

So no, you don't need a car. Next excuse, please?

Also, totally agree regarding gas masks and air masks in planes.

I don’t know about you but the shops round here are limiting it to one slot a week. Could you carry a weeks shopping home in one go? Could you do it in a wheelchair? Could you do it with toddlers to herd? Could you do it manage it if the local buses don’t go that way? Could you do it if you can’t afford the taxi? Could you do it if the nearest shop is miles away?

For example, our local ASDA doesn’t do click and collect anymore. The other main supermarket doesn’t offer it. The nearest store after that is eight miles away. I can’t walk eight miles. I can’t afford the £20 taxi back with all the shopping. I can’t carry a weeks load of shopping to and from the bus stops and that’s if the (notoriously constantly cancelled) buses even turn up... OH WAIT BUT IM NOT ALLOWED ON THE BUS WITH MY DIRTY MASKLESS FACE even if they do turn up. Maybe I should teleport home?

People are so fucking ignorant.

@9ofpentangles Not sure why you tagged me about protecting retail workers - I haven't mentioned them. I think you want the pp I was responding to whose name I can't be bothered to look up.

Gas masks - there would have been people who could not have worn them if they had been needed. They were often the same people who would not go into shelters during air raids. The majority were men who had fought in WW1 who were suffering with what we now know to be PTSD.

Maria, perhaps a delivery would best be suitable, then. If you're vulnerable I can't see why you'd want to go out shopping every day?

One of the problems is that some people are taking the Mick. On the dreaded Facebook, I saw a video someone posted about a little old lady (her words not mine) making her cry in costa for asking her to wear a mask. When she had the sunflower lanyard on her wrist and she doesn't want to wear a big sign saying I don't need to wear a mask.

She was saying how hard it is on people who are exempt, and how people look at themAnd make them uncomfortable. I felt quite sorry for her.

Imagine my shock when I saw her posting on a friends page with a photo of people queueing outside of supermarket, arrows pointing Two people wearing a mask and calling them Cowards. She then did a big rant about how wearing face masks is something that only stupid people do.

So essentially, I still feel sorry for people who genuinely Are exempt. It's unfortunate that the scheme has been taken over by those people who just don't want to wear a face covering