Nothing new under the sun: 1918 flu mask "slackers"

[Anti Federalist]

Photos show how San Francisco had to convince its 'mask slackers' to wear masks after many defied the law while the 1918 Spanish flu pandemic seized the city

https://www.businessinsider.com/san-...ic-2020-5?op=1

Katie Canales
Jun 3, 2020, 3:56 PM

San Francisco has been praised for adhering to the advice of public health officials and responding to the COVID-19 pandemic quickly.
But a century earlier during the Spanish flu pandemic, the city was met with anti-mask advocacy, a movement that also exists during the present-day health crisis.
Hundreds of "mask slackers" failed to comply with the law during the pandemic, leading to their arrests, and an "Anti-Mask League of 1919" formed.
Then and now, masks aren't a silver bullet in containing respiratory diseases, but they can help.

San Francisco and the surrounding region has been lauded across the US for its stringent compliance with public health orders during the 2020 coronavirus pandemic.

It was one of the first to enter a shelter-in-place order on March 17. But it also happens to be the birthplace of anti-mask sentiment during the 1918 Spanish flu pandemic.

The city enforced the wearing of masks during the 1918 pandemic, but some residents were dismissive, wearing them improperly out of apathy or to smoke, leading to hundreds of arrests and even a shooting. And some heartily fought back against the enforcement, believing that the masks were unsanitary, useless, and a threat to their constitutional rights.
newspaper clipping anti mask league

An "Anti-Mask League" was formed in January 1919 in San Francisco, with its members — dubbed "Sanitary Spartacans" — fighting for the mask-wearing mandate to be repealed. They eventually got their way, but only after San Francisco became one of the worst-hit cities in the US. Eventually, 45,000 residents were infected.

(So the face diapers didn't work then and they don't work now. - AF)

[r3volution 3.0]

Oh, the "slacker" concept didn't originate with the Spanish Flu.

America experienced an essentially psychotic reaction to (late) entry in the Great War.

People who weren't on board (like Germans and Irish) were treated very poorly.

The Germans weren't too keen on fighting Germany, for obvious reasons; the Irish would rather jump in the sea than help England.

Gangs roamed the streets to round up and punish "slackers," i.e. anyone who didn't think that going to die for Perfidious Albion was a good idea.

The wrong side won.



...fairly OT, but who's ever heard the old pre-war 1913 German national anthem?

You're welcome.