As far as I can tell, this started about a week ago in Washougal, Washington when a group of students led by a kid named Cade Costales organized a walkout in protest of mask mandates. You may have to open up Instagram to view the post because for some reason Instagram does not allow you to embed posts on external sites:
This kid is a total alpha, and clearly wise beyond his years. Basically, the plan was to walk into school without masks on, and when teachers tell them to put their masks on, they respectfully decline until they’re sent home. The video of Cade’s speech went viral, so Jesse Watters had him on the show the other night:
Watters also highlighted a group of students in Herculaneum, Missouri who organized their own mask protest.
In Oakdale, California, high school students walked out in large numbers:
There was also a walkout at a suburban Chicago high school, although it’s not clear which one–some in the comments are saying Vernon Hills but there’s no confirmation:
Now, the obvious and easy take here is that these are just young kids who are looking for an excuse to get out of going to school. And there’s some validity to that; I’m sure a good portion of these kids just want a free day off. And if your parents are #Based and support you walking out, then who cares if you get suspended?
But it also takes a lot of courage to stand up to your teachers and the school administration. These are the primary authority figures in these kids’ lives, and while it may seem obvious to us adults that it really isn’t such a huge deal to get in trouble at school, for most high schoolers, it’s not as apparent to them. They really are showing a lot of bravery here and I think this is awesome.
If it’s such a no-brainer decision to walk out of school in protest, then why don’t kids do it all the time, over anything they want? Well because it’s not such a no-brainer decision. In addition to Getting In Trouble, these kids are also risking their social status with their peers–we don’t know what percentage of high school students actually like wearing masks. What if these kids become social pariahs at their schools?
So I don’t think it’s fair to these kids to say they’re just looking for a way out of going to class. I think they’re really showing a lot of courage here and setting an example for everyone else: civil disobedience is the only way we get out of this.
It’s also impossible to deny that Wearing A Mask Fucking Sucks Balls and that if you’re forced to wear a mask all day due to a virus that you intuitively understand poses virtually no threat to your wellbeing, you are eventually going to get fed up with it.
These high schoolers understand Covid-19 isn’t a threat to them. They know the masks aren’t protecting them.
They probably look around and think to themselves, “Nobody I know has died from Covid. What is so bad about Covid? We should not have to wear these masks. This is stupid.”
And they’re 100% correct.
This all ends when we say it ends. Mass refusal to comply works.
These high schoolers are braver than 99% of adults out there, to be honest. Most adults will just sit there and take it on the chin.
But hey, it took a child to point out the emperor had no clothes, right?