'A very toxic environment': Virginia students navigate ugly mask battle

[Nevilledog]

Link to tweet

Tweet text:

Julia Raifman
@JuliaRaifman
Caleb, 12, with lung challenges, on asking not to sit next to maskless students

“I don’t want to end up in the hospital again. I don’t want to be hooked up to machines & have to hear people talking about how long they think I have left & stuff like that”

washingtonpost.com
‘A very toxic environment’: Virginia students navigate ugly mask battle
Virginia students discuss how Virginia Gov. Glenn Youngkin's mask-optional order for schools has impacted their experiences in the classroom and with their friends during the coronavirus pandemic.
6:36 AM · Feb 20, 2022

https://www.washingtonpost.com/education/2022/02/18/virginia-masking-student-voices/

No paywall
https://archive.fo/9h9Fm

Alexandra Swan, 17, believes it is wrong to make snap judgments about other people.

But these days, when the senior walks through the doors of her high school in Louisa County, Va., she finds it hard to follow her own rules. Whenever she sees another student — friend, foe or stranger — her eyes jump to the same place: their mouth and nose, which might or might not be covered by a mask, now that Louisa County Public Schools has complied with Virginia Gov. Glenn Youngkin’s (R) controversial order that made masking optional.

“I see these people just not wearing a mask, or wearing one pulled down, like, under their chin,” said Swan, “and my brain just immediately goes, ‘That person does not share the same ideals as me. We won’t get along.’ ” She added: “They may not be a bad person. They may just be thinking the same things as their parents.”

Youngkin issued his mask-optional order, which aims to give Virginia parents choice over masking in both public and private schools, on his first day in office. A fierce fight ensued: Seventy of 131 Virginia school districts refused to comply and kept their mask requirements, according to a Washington Post analysis, and parents and school officials filed a flurry of lawsuits for and against the order. This week, the Virginia General Assembly narrowly passed — along largely partisan lines — a law that requires all schools to go mask-optional on March 1, ensuring every one of Virginia’s more than 1.8 million public and private schoolchildren will face masking decisions and tensions at school in days to come.

As the adults battle over the merits of masking, Virginia students have been forced to navigate the real-life fallout.

*snip*