“Face” Masks

[ItsALovelyDayToday]

I just want to know why the word “face” has to be added in front of mask. The definition of mask is FACE covering. So why face mask? We’re all wasting time and energy saying face when it isn’t needed.

If anything they should be called nose, mouth and chin masks as that’s all they cover, not the whole face!

Let’s all start saying head hats, leg trousers and hand gloves.

I'd never noticed this! You are of course right. My only thought is whether is an 'Americanism', as they do use neck tie,

In Dutch it's called a mouth mask. That's annoying as well as it might encourage those who don't cover their nose with it.
Lower face mask?

Ooh I like “lower face mask”. I also find to annoying cause when someone says face mask I think of a mud-pack type mask first. Though those should be called skin masks or something!

Less wanky than the PC gawn mad "face coverings" which always made me think of people walking about with a huge flannel type bit of cloth over their whole fizzog.
Michael McIntyre has a funny video where he talks about "eye glasses" etc.

@StepOutOfLine I’ll need to try and find that Michael McIntyre thing, sounds right up my street.

I have a bit more sympathy with eyeglasses, as I imagine the word originally had to distinguish spectacles from “spyglasses” or telescopes. When you read of an admiral or pirate “putting the glass to his eye”, it meant a telescope. So “eyeglasses” is rather sweetly archaic!

@Babdoc, whether a pair of spectacles, a telescope or a microscope, they are all used by the eye, no other part of the body.

Foot pedal is another one.

@Babdoc

I have a bit more sympathy with eyeglasses, as I imagine the word originally had to distinguish spectacles from “spyglasses” or telescopes. When you read of an admiral or pirate “putting the glass to his eye”, it meant a telescope. So “eyeglasses” is rather sweetly archaic!

My grandfather said glasses for binoculars.

Isn't eyeglasses to distinguish them from drinking glasses?

Drinking glasses

Cross Post with Zarinea

Ifailed, I’m not disputing that they are both used by the eyes. But the telescope was invented first, and therefore some way was needed to distinguish spectacles from telescopes - which were already called glasses or spyglasses. Hence spyglasses and eyeglasses!

Saw an elderly lady on a mobility scooter in tescos with her mask under her chin. No idea what that would be called🤣

But the telescope was invented first

Spectacles were first used in the 13th century , telescopes came 300 years later.

Is face mask not the term for a medical/surgical type mask though? As opposed to a dressing up mask? Or a masquerade ball type mask? Or oxygen mask?

Your facial bones only go up to your eyes, so maybe that's calling it face?

Lots of places have said to wear a 'face covering'

@FuckingFabulous

Lots of places have said to wear a 'face covering'

Ha! I'm not in the Uk and where I live we must wear proper masks, not scarves, etc. and covering the entire face is illegal so face covering would not work.

Lots of places have said to wear a 'face covering'

That's because when this thing all kicked off there were not nearly enough medical masks to go around. And so we were told that they didn't work because there weren't enough to go around. And when the evidence finally backed up the common-sense assumption that yes, covering your face would help to block escaping droplets, and people finally grasped the notion that the face covering was intended to protect others rather than the wearer, the word "covering" was used to stop the public from buying up stocks of PPE that were needed for medical staff. It was the physical blocking that mattered more than how it was achieved.

@DIshedUp

Is face mask not the term for a medical/surgical type mask though? As opposed to a dressing up mask? Or a masquerade ball type mask? Or oxygen mask?

Your facial bones only go up to your eyes, so maybe that's calling it face?

I'm a nurse - we just call them masks.

A mask doesn't only mean something worn over the face, I suppose: what about "her devil-may-care attitude was a mask for her true feelings" or "he covered his fury with a mask of laughter"? It can just mean a concealment in general.

@AskingQuestionsAllTheTime

A mask doesn't only mean something worn over the face, I suppose: what about "her devil-may-care attitude was a mask for her true feelings" or "he covered his fury with a mask of laughter"? It can just mean a concealment in general.

To add to the pedantry, the word in both of those examples still means a face covering. They're metaphors.

Masking your true feelings does not necessarily involve covering your face, though, does it? Metaphor or no, I don't see that one as being about only your face, because body-language isn't facial.

'FFP2' stands for 'Filtering Face Piece2'.

I think it's come about because there's also the phrase "face covering." A face covering doesn't have to be a mask, it could be something like a neck tube pulled up over your nose and mouth, but when it is an actual mask, people call it a face mask because it's somehow associated in their mind with a face covering.

Which means paradoxically they'd call something like a child's animal mask just a mask, when it covers more of your face than a so-called "face mask."

I tend to use "face covering" for whatever I'm using for Covid purposes, because it's not always the same kind of thing in my case.