By Mike Renzella
Assistant Editor, The Haldimand Press
This week, Ontario lifted its mask mandate following a series of public health relaxations as the severity of cases and infections of COVID-19 continue to subside. We’ve made it here after two years, and the prospect of a summer filled with normal activities is a very exciting prospect indeed.
Personally, I am excited to see concerts postponed from 2020 starting to reschedule. Live music is something I’ve missed a great deal, and I can’t wait to experience it again (Pearl Jam this fall is going to be epic). In big and small ways things are changing at a rapid pace, and that is exciting and scary all at once.
It’s easy at this time to get caught up in the ongoing debate raging over this issue. Look in either direction, it won’t take long to find someone either espousing the virtues of continuing to wear masks in public settings, while another person jumps for joy at the prospect of having their “face muzzles” removed.
Over the past two years we have struggled to see eye to eye with members of our own communities, we’ve seen deep division both at home and across the country. Members of our community have rallied together under the banner of freedom. Flags have been waved, social media arguments have been relentlessly had, and the mask has become a symbol of far more than a pandemic. It’s become a line in the sand between two opposing ideological viewpoints.
Now that the choice to wear a mask or not is in our own hands, please remember above all else to respect the choices others make. They may not align with your own, and that may cause you to feel upset, or angered, but at the end of the day they have the right to make their choice, just like you have the right to make yours.
The next few months are bound to be an interesting, if awkward, time of change as we collectively move forward and try to find the right balance between remaining cognizant of the lingering threat of COVID while learning how to live with it in a way that doesn’t completely disrupt our sense of normalcy.
There are bound to be hiccups along the way. Just like over the past two years, those in charge won’t always get it right. They are, largely, working off of the best information they have available to them, but as we’ve learned since March 2020, things can change in a heartbeat, and mistakes can be made in the name of trying to do the right thing.
We have lived through a tragic, frightening, and divisive period of our collective lives. More uncertainty lies on the horizon, without a doubt.
We should try to understand that frustrations on both sides of the issue are worth consideration. The teacher with health concerns over the removal of masks in their classroom is just as entitled to their frustration as the parent who was unable to attend their kid’s hockey practice due to vaccine mandates. Finding a way to accept that difference of opinion is crucial to moving forward. Failing to do so will leave us stuck where we are, and I think it’s safe to say nobody wants that.
This has been uncharted territory for all of us, and it’s perfectly understandable that the presence of a pandemic and the drastic measures employed to contain it could spark so many wild and varied emotional reactions in our community and beyond. What’s important is remembering that behind every extreme opinion, on either side, is a human being.
If we can remember that, perhaps it won’t just be a virus that we eventually learn to move beyond.
