But if wearing a mask becomes a political statement there's bound to be a political statement to the contrary from the other side. I don't think that's a game we should play. Let's just follow the science where possible.

Risk probabilities also need to be taken into account. The science on mask wearing did change and it's possible it may change again if the virus evolves in the near future.

What won't change is the risk profile of wearing vs not wearing a mask. Wearing a mask despite necessity is an inconvenience, but unlikely to result in harm. Not wearing mask, even if current science says is safe to do so, is still exposure to potential harm that may have been unforeseen. For instance a transmission vector that is not yet a well characterized one. This is why I personally take a dim view to these sorts "following the science" arguments.

I'm not opposed to erring on the side of caution where things are evolving fast and we may not have enough good science. What I'm opposed to is making political statements like this because it can easily backfire, especially when society is already very polarised.

Agreed. Although sometimes its easier not to fiddle with the mask taking it off and on again, especially if one doesn't have easy access to hand hygiene

This is the epitome of cargo-cult thinking. Why on earth should mask-wearing when not necessary be normalized?

You're right that it's political - except that it has actual detrimental consequences to society to normalize doing unnecessary things, especially when your goal is expressly to divide people (as that's literally the main thrust of what what "political statements" in the form of virtue signalling accomplish).

Rational, well-informed people should wear masks indoors and in busy outdoor areas, and enjoy some fresh air when they can get away from that. Wearing a mask when you don't need to to "reinforce" unnecessary behaviour is irrational, and will continue to make anyone who is anti-mask think that you're not approaching the situation reasonably.

It isn't a big deal to wear a mask all the time. I wear one in my workshop when alone all day. I semi-regret donating all my N95 masks last spring - I still cannot get good replacements and I'm allergic to sawdust. There is no harm in wearing a mask when you don't need to. there is harm in messing up some borderline cases. So just get used to it on your face and forget about it.

Yeah, no, every time I see specious reasoning like this it just makes me resent having to wear a muzzle more. I'll still do it when it makes sense, but I can't understand why anyone wouldn't hate doing it.

I hear this from a lot of people, so it must be real, but I honestly do not get it. If the masks fits well you forget it is even on.

Do you, like, not exercise or something? Do you walk really slowly, so you don't need a lot of air? Are your lungs just dryer than most people's? Do you never wear glasses, sun or optical?

Industrial supply shops tend to have valved disposable respirators, and cartridge respirators in stock, especially in NIOSH ratings other than N95. The Honeywell cartridge respirators are awesome for dealing with sawdust.

Beware the risks of doing things just for appearances and encouraging others to do so, it gives weight to the people who deny mask wearing does anything.

It really bothers me when the CEO of that health company was being harrassed for not wearing a mask after he has recovered from an infection, the mask would do nothing for him or anybody else, but he wasn’t using it as a political statement so he was doing wrong?

But in a time of extreme public anxiety, and especially one where the topic of taking some action to try to avoid unknowingly infecting your community has become controversial on its own, is doing a simple thing which signals to the people around you that you're likely taking some level of precaution and are understanding of public health guidelines not worth its benefits to the community?

Some kinds of signaling are useless at best, problematic at worst. But wearing a mask even if you believe you technically don't require one to avoid being contagious seems like a common sense way to promote community during a stressful time to be around strangers - they don't know you, they don't know your medical history, they have no way of knowing when you wait near eachother in the grocery checkout line whether you're carrying antibodies and presumably not capable of being contagious or whether you're just flagrantly ignoring public health advice.

(Ignoring, of course, the subset of people who would inevitably falsely assume they were not capable of being contagious for whatever reasons even if they really could be... we probably all know that friend who swears they had COVID earlier in the year, but did not get tested at the time and have not had an antibody test since to verify. Do we really want those people getting the idea that their anecdotal illness is an opt-out from face coverings in public?)

The many interpretations of public health messaging around the world have shown us pretty well over the last 8 months that many people do really poorly with developing science and/or nuance. "Wear your mask in public, always" removes a lot of room for error, either malicious or just misinformed.

If you’re doing it for virtue signaling and the people who think it’s nothing but virtue signaling can tell because you’re open about your motivation, doing something for appearances harms the good you’re actually trying to accomplish.

Thanks for being the hero our society needs.

What's occurred to me in the last few weeks is that a good number of people who, no doubt, watch films or read books where the theme is conformity have no idea the works are about them.

Wearing a mask indoor: yes

Wearing a mask outdoor: no