Tag: authoritarianism

bookmark_borderExcellent article explaining why lockdowns are unconstitutional

Posted on by Marissa

I recently read an excellent opinion piece by David R. Geiger in Commonwealth Magazine entitled, “Governor’s COVID-19 orders are unconstitutional.” In this piece, Geiger explains in an eloquent, straightforward way why lockdown orders and stay-at-home orders – focusing on those implemented by Massachusetts Governor Charlie Baker – are wrong.

“The animating principle of our nation is the maximal safeguarding of human liberty,” Geiger reminds us.

Under Massachusetts laws dealing with public health and infectious diseases, he points out, “the only restraints on liberty the government may impose are temporary isolation of any ‘sick or infected person’ and quarantining of others in his household, in each case with compensation for resulting wage loss.”

To essentially quarantine the entire population of the state obviously exceeds these limits. Baker likely realized this and therefore decided instead to use the Civil Defense Act of 1950 to justify his totalitarian measures. But as Geiger points out, this law was intended to be used during wars, nuclear power plant radiation releases, fires, floods, earthquakes, and other natural disasters that physically alter the Earth in defined areas. Diseases don’t seem to fit this category.

Geiger lists all the ways that lockdown orders violate people’s rights:

Forced closures of businesses, schools, and places of worship; prohibitions on gatherings or of humans approaching or touching one another; and mandates that people cover their faces in public are radical and unprecedented, and unquestionably infringe both expressly enumerated and historically enjoyed rights. These include individuals’ rights to move about freely, associate with others as they choose, express themselves through their appearance, make decisions about their own health, educate their children, exercise their religion, and support themselves through their chosen occupation, and businesses’ rights to operate within the bounds of the law.

Government infringement on individual liberty cannot be justified by the mere existence of some degree of risk; rather, the individual’s conduct must pose a serious risk of significant harm. We do not limit freedom of movement by banning driving because it poses risk; instead, we prohibit only reckless or drunk driving. For this reason, Massachusetts’ public health statute does not authorize shutting down normal life due to the risk of infection, but instead restricts the liberty only of a person who is actually infectious, or his close household contacts who have a significant likelihood of being so.

Exactly! It’s one thing for the government to infringe upon the liberties of a person who actually has the coronavirus, but for the government to infringe upon the liberties of everyone merely because any given person might possibly have the virus is ridiculous.

Another favorite quote from the article (emphasis mine): “If some individuals are concerned about such risks they are free to protect themselves by keeping a distance or wearing a mask… But those who are willing to accept such risks in order to live life have a fundamental right to do so, and the fact that exercising this right may cause some increase in disease cases provides no ground to quash it.”

Geiger reminds readers of the “inherent harm in depriving Massachusetts residents of their fundamental freedoms,” something that proponents of lockdown orders tend to discount. “The people of the Commonwealth should rise up against them, insist that they cease immediately, and ensure that they never recur,” he writes.

I could not agree more. Everyone who calls lockdown opponents “selfish” or “irresponsible” needs to read this article.

bookmark_borderRebels open playgrounds in New York

Posted on by Marissa

New York City Mayor Bill DeBlasio is under fire for banning kids from playing in parks at the same time as he encourages mass protests about racial issues.

On Monday, city employees welded the gates to a playground shut in the Williamstown neighborhood of New York. They later replaced the welding job with a lock to prevent children from using the playground.

“How long can we keep our kids in prison?” asked one local mom. “I don’t feel like I live in a free country.”

David Niederman, president of the United Jewish Organizations of Williamsburg and North Brooklyn, said: “We are dealing with families who have been imprisoned in their homes for three months, and they can’t go and breathe fresh air? Kids cannot have what they need, which is fresh air.”

And State Assemblyman Joseph Lentol made a good point about children’s ability and right to make their own decisions: “These kids have parents that can instruct them on safe distancing and making sure they are not only safe distancing and make sure the playground isn’t full. There’s an honor system… We’ve given them enough information to do what’s right and let’s trust them to have at least a little bit of fun.”

In addition to the obvious individual liberty concerns, DeBlasio is facing allegations of anti-Semitism because the playgrounds that he has ordered closed are in predominantly Jewish areas.

The Reagan Battalion pointed out DeBlasio’s hypocrisy:

Fortunately, community leaders fought back against DeBlasio’s authoritarian, discriminatory policies. Assemblyman Joe Lentol organized a rally demanding the opening of the park, and several people cut open the lock with bolt cutters.

 

bookmark_borderRe-opening the country is about freedom, not just the economy

Posted on by Marissa

A few weeks ago, when the U.S. first began to emerge from coronavirus-related restrictions, President Trump acknowledged that opening the country might result in more deaths than would have occurred it the country had remained locked down.

ABC’s David Muir asked Trump, “Do you believe that’s the reality that we’re facing, that lives will be lost to reopen the country?”

Trump replied: “It’s possible that there will be some because you won’t be locked into an apartment or a house… Will some people be affected? Yes. Will some people be affected badly? Yes. But we have to get our country open and we have to get it open soon.”

The ABC News article described Trump’s stance as “directly acknowledging there will be a real, negative human cost in prioritizing an economic revival over a more cautious approach in favor of public health.”

This is typical of the way the debate over reopening the country has been framed: as a trade-off between the economy on one hand and health and safety on the other hand. But it’s not just the economy that’s at issue: it’s people’s fundamental rights and freedoms. The paternalistic, authoritarian restrictions that governments put in place to slow the spread of the virus did not only completely destroy the economy, ruin businesses small and large, and take away the livelihoods of millions of people. They also violated the rights of every single person: the right to move about freely, the right to assemble, the right to protest, the right to privacy, the right to religious freedom, and the right to bear arms, just to name a few. Governments had no right to enact these restrictions in the first place; therefore they could not possibly end the restrictions too soon. If something violates people’s rights, then the sooner it stops, the better.

But far too many people have described even the first cautious steps towards reopening the country as reckless, immoral, irresponsible, and even (according to one acquaintance on social media) “sickening.”

Epidemiologists Dr. Abby Greenberg and Dr. Harvey Finkel expressed such sentiments in a Boston Globe letter to the editor. “Opening up society and businesses now, or soon, will lead to many deaths,” they wrote. “Death is permanent. Economic loss can eventually be recouped. Trading deaths for dollars is unconscionable. Inconvenience and boredom must be borne with equanimity.”  

But it is not a matter of trading deaths for dollars. Nor is it even a matter of trading deaths for freedom. Freedom is a right. If something is a right, it cannot be taken away, full stop. It makes no sense to even debate whether or not freedom should be traded for health, or safety, or even lives. It is never OK to violate rights, to any degree, no matter how many lives could be saved by doing so. Restoring freedoms that should never have been taken away in the first place is neither reckless, nor irresponsible, nor sickening, nor immoral, nor unconscionable. It is a fundamental moral obligation. Contrary to what Greenberg and Finkel argue, extending the lockdown would be unconscionable.

Furthermore, it’s not about “inconvenience and boredom.” It’s about the moral principle that people have the right to make their own decisions about their lives. It’s not about the specific things that are sacrificed in an effort to reduce the risk of transmitting the virus; it’s about the principle that people should be free to weigh risks and decide for themselves what sacrifices (if any) to make to reduce their risk. How dare Greenberg and Finkel (and the many other people who think similarly) reduce this moral argument against the lockdown to a complaint about inconvenience and boredom? How dare they demand that people “bear with equanimity” the trampling of our fundamental rights?

It is common to hear the argument that a particular policy position is correct because it “saves lives,” as so many people have argued with respect to lockdown orders. It is difficult for opponents to argue against any policy position framed this way without sounding like callous jerks. But the fact that something saves lives does not automatically make it morally right. This point is explained wonderfully in an article by Anthony Davies and James Harrigan entitled “No Policy Can Save Lives; It Can Only Trade Lives.” Here is an excerpt:

Regardless of whether we acknowledge them, tradeoffs exist. And acknowledging tradeoffs is an important part of constructing sound policy. Unfortunately, even mentioning tradeoffs in a time of crisis brings the accusation that only heartless beasts would balance human lives against dollars. But each one of us balances human lives against dollars, and any number of other things, every day.

Five-thousand Americans die each year from choking on solid food. We could save every one of those lives by mandating that all meals be pureed. Pureed food isn’t appetizing, but if it saves just one life, it must be worth doing. Your chance of dying while driving a car is almost double your chance of dying while driving an SUV. We could save lives by mandating that everyone drive bigger cars. SUVs are more expensive and worse for the environment, but if it saves just one life, it must be worth doing. Heart disease kills almost 650,000 Americans each year. We could reduce the incidence of heart disease by 14 percent by mandating that everyone exercise daily. Many won’t want to exercise every day, but if it saves just one life, it must be worth doing.

Legislating any of these things would be ridiculous, and most sane people know as much. How do we know? Because each of us makes choices like these every day that increase the chances of our dying. We do so because there are limits on what we’re willing to give up to improve our chances of staying alive. Our daily actions prove that none of us believes that “if it saves just one life” is a reasonable basis for making decisions.

In another thoughtful article, Conor Friedersdorf at the Atlantic argues that in addition to negatively impacting people’s quality of life, lockdown measures could negatively impact people’s life expectancy as much as, or more than, the virus itself. He cites the dangers posed by food shortages, the likelihood of suicide and/or drug use among those whose livelihoods are destroyed, and the impact of a crashing economy on the medical system:

The general point is that minimizing the number of COVID-19 deaths today or a month from now or six months from now may or may not minimize the human costs of the pandemic when the full spectrum of human consequences is considered. The last global depression created conditions for a catastrophic world war that killed roughly 75 to 80 million people. Is that a possibility? The downside risks and costs of every approach are real, frightening, and depressing, no matter how little one thinks of reopening now.

Anyone who thinks that the economic devastation caused by the government’s response to the coronavirus will simply be reversed in time might want to think again.

It is interesting that just three months ago, the idea of the government banning restaurants from offering dine-in service, sports teams from playing, and stores from opening would have been unthinkable. But now that most state governments has done just that, it is considered the default. Those who want to relax the restrictions bear the burden of proving that doing so is safe, and if they do not do that to the satisfaction of the medical and political establishment, they are attacked as irresponsible, greedy, and selfish. Yet it is those who want to extend the shutdown of our country who should bear the burden of proof; it is those who want to keep people imprisoned in their homes who are truly immoral.

bookmark_borderThere’s nothing ugly about individual rights

Posted on by Marissa

A few weeks ago I read a letter to the editor in the Boston Globe which I strongly disagree with. Numerous people in our society seem to share this viewpoint, particularly with respect to the coronavirus pandemic, and I find it deeply wrong. In a letter published on May 16, 2020, Jeffrey Halprin of Natick wrote:

I read selfishness disguised as patriotism in the comments of a gun shop owner who sued to reopen, when he said that “the second Amendment should not be suspended during a health pandemic.” I realized how close the connection is between the quarantine protesters and the gun lobby. Both are all about “me” instead of “us.”

Guns make it easy to sit in a high window and randomly pick off dozens of people listening to county music in Las Vegas. Not my problem. Uncontrollable virus racing through nursing homes, hospitals, and neighborhoods? Ditto.

The Second Amendment, written, ironically enough, to protect the community, with a “well-regulated militia,” is now the cover that people use to turn their back on the community so that they can sell a few more guns.

As for the people who turn their backs on the request to pitch in and sacrifice until we find a way to keep the virus from randomly picking off their neighbors? What an ugly way to live.

In this letter, Halprin is harshly criticizing gun shop owners who fought for their right to open, as well as protesters who have been bravely standing up to authoritarian government policies in general. His criticisms are baseless.

As inconvenient as it may be to those who value the community above all else, people have rights. Specifically, people have the right to live their lives as they please, so long as they do not violate the rights of anyone else.

People are not obligated to take on the problems of others and make them their own. Mass shootings such as the one in Las Vegas, as horrific as they may be, are not the fault of innocent gun owners. They are the fault of the mass shooters. Innocent gun owners are not required to “pitch in” to solve this problem by sacrificing their freedoms.

Similarly, people are not obligated to sacrifice their freedom of movement, assembly, speech, or religion, their privacy, or their livelihoods in order to lower the risk of virus transmission for the community as a whole.

A world in which people are required to put the needs of others above their own would be a truly ugly place to live. Halprin is demanding that each person “pitch in and sacrifice” by giving up a certain amount of freedom for the sake of the community. But how much does he think people should be required to sacrifice? Where is the line drawn between being sufficiently community-minded versus unacceptably selfish? And more importantly, what is the purpose of demanding that everyone pitch in and sacrifice for the sake of the community, when by doing this you are depriving every member of the community of the right to live according to his or her own preferences and values, the very thing that makes life worth living? This might create a safer society, with fewer shootings and fewer cases of the coronavirus. But it would also create a society in which people are not free to live their lives in the way that makes them happy, in which people are not entitled to use their time and energy on what they believe is important, and in which no person’s life truly belongs to him or her. The fact that other people are sacrificing for your benefit, just as you are sacrificing for theirs, does not even begin to make up for the loss of freedom and self-determination. All that is accomplished by requiring people to put others first, is to create a world where everyone is worse off.

Freedom is not something that should be pitched in and sacrificed. It is something that rightly belongs to each individual. The honorable thing to do is to defend one’s rights, as gun store owners and anti-lockdown protesters are doing, not to meekly give these rights up.

A world in which each person is free to make his or her own decisions and live in the way that best suits him or her is best for all people. There is nothing wrong with valuing the “me” instead of “us.” Nor is there anything wrong with focusing on one’s own self, as long as one does not harm other people in the process. The idea of individual liberty is simple, logical, fair, egalitarian, and beautiful. To insult people who are bravely standing up for their rights, because they have not demonstrated what you consider to be an adequate amount of concern for the community? Now that is ugly.

bookmark_borderThe most offensive tweet I have ever seen

Posted on by Marissa

Over the years, I have seen numerous ridiculous and offensive things on Twitter. But I may have found the most offensive tweet yet. In the below exchange, Bethany Mandel very reasonably explains her opposition to Covid-19 lockdown orders. Joe Lockhart responds by… calling her a killer. Yes, you are reading that right.

Continue reading “The most offensive tweet I have ever seen”

bookmark_borderSocial distancing snitches

Posted on by Marissa

A recent New York Times article about “social distancing informants” describes behavior that is truly disturbing to anyone who values liberty or individual rights. This phenomenon is exactly what it sounds like – people who rat out and publicly shame others for violating authoritarian measures designed to stop the coronavirus.

The article describes these excuses for people as “Americans frustrated by fellow citizens violating government orders to wear masks, close nonessential businesses, and refrain from gathering in groups.” Some of them “said they thought that calling out violators was a civic duty and a matter of public health.”

Nothing could be further from the truth. To criticize fellow citizens who are doing nothing wrong is the opposite of a civic duty – it is morally wrong. It is incomprehensible to me why someone would be frustrated by people minding their own business.

In one example, a Wisconsin cardiologist attended an anti-lockdown protest and posted a picture on Facebook. A man named Kevin Rusch saw the photo on Facebook and was “furious.” He decided to contact the hospital at which the cardiologist worked, and shared the photo with his network of friends, warning people to visit the hospital “at your own risk.” As a result of Rusch’s actions, the hospital suspended the doctor, and congratulatory messages poured in on Facebook. How could someone be happy about an innocent person, who did nothing wrong, losing his job? How could someone be “furious” at a person who did absolutely nothing wrong?

The cardiologist wrote a thoughtful post on Facebook calling the events an “orchestrated slander of my name and reputation.” He added:

“Most disturbing was the vulgarity involved and a clear sense of an orchestrated political hit job… They vandalized my home by scattering feces on the front steps prompting me to file a police report. They also mocked Christianity. Nobody should have to put up with this evil. No human has the right to inflict this pain on others. America’s Constitution enshrines the right to assemble peacefully and voice opinions. Blood from our forefathers has paid for this right countless times… We shouldn’t be so willing to give up these rights when we feel the government is on the wrong course… To those who showed an unsubstantiated vile toward me and my religion, I feel sad for you, and I pray that you find peace.”

In another instance of social distancing snitching, when a Colorado restaurant, C & C Coffee & Kitchen, bravely opened in defiance of the governor’s orders, dozens of people flooded its Yelp page with complaints, and one customer named Nick Whitehill filed a complaint with the county health department in addition to posting photos on Twitter to “shame” the restaurant. A lovely person on Twitter wrote, “You’ve given up your right to treatment at a hospital. Worms for brains.”

Another individual, Delaney Kalea of Alabama, witnessed a group of teenagers committing the horrific crime of hanging outside a bowling alley while dancing and playing football. She “made the responsible decision as we were driving off to call the cops.” She added: “My blood boils almost every day when I think about this. Where is the human decency?”

Excuse me? How could someone’s blood boil at the thought of people doing absolutely nothing wrong whatsoever? How is it “responsible” to call the cops on people minding their own business? You, Delaney Kalea, are the one who lacks human decency for so harshly criticizing innocent people. You are a bully.

Nadine Campbell of New York publicly shamed people on Facebook for existing on a beach. “People were milling around. It was really upsetting,” she complained. How can it be upsetting to witness people minding their own business and doing nothing wrong?

On Twitter, people use the hashtag “#FloridaMorons” to describe those who have committed the evil deed of visiting beaches.

On Facebook, I personally have witnessed people use the word “idiots” to describe those who are bravely protesting against authoritarianism in Boston and the term “selfish disease spreading morons” for those who go to the beach. 

How dare these individuals personally attack their fellow citizens by calling them idiots and morons? This behavior is cruel, mean-spirited, and nasty. It is bullying.

Other snitches persecute their fellow citizens on local websites such as Patch. “Four teenage girls with lacrosse sticks and white hoodies just walked past our place. Parents, you need to do better,” posted one individual.

Do better? The teenage girls did nothing wrong. How would it be “better” for parents to prevent their children from doing something that the children have every right to do?

My hometown newspaper, the Melrose Weekly News, has provided additional examples of social distancing snitching. Every week in the local police log, there are entries describing citizens calling the police on such innocent activities as a father and daughter shooting hoops, people exercising in parks, children building a bridge in the woods, small groups of people gathering in backyards, and DPW workers performing maintenance work on a field. Also according to this newspaper, a couple from Melrose who visited Ogunquit, Maine, were accosted while eating lunch near their car and told to go home so they would not spread the virus in Maine.

In Manhattan, one excuse for a human being put up posters reading: “Dear jogger, bicycle douchebag, yuppie/millennial, narcissist swine: Put on a f***ing mask. Please respect your community and the lives of others. You do not live alone.”

Narcissist swine? Seriously? How dare you so crudely and nastily insult your fellow citizens? What is the purpose of stereotyping people based on their age and socioeconomic status? How does jogging or biking without a mask disrespect your community or the lives of others? And what is meant by “You do not live alone?” Lots of people do live alone. If this sentence is supposed to mean that everyone who lives in a community is connected somehow, I suppose this is true to some extent, but that does not give people the right to control the lives and decisions of others. People have a right to decide for themselves whether or not to wear a mask. It is possible that not wearing a mask might indirectly affect others, but this indirect effect does not outweigh each person’s right to make decisions about his/her own body. The person who made these posters, by presuming that he or she has the right to dictate what others wear, demonstrates a lack of respect for the lives of others. The person who made these posters is truly a narcissist swine.

Wisconsin talk radio host Vicki McKenna described the mentality of the social distancing snitches as “a creepy Orwellian sensibility.” She’s got that right. To criticize, shame, or attempt to punish innocent people who are doing nothing wrong is an act of aggression. The attitudes, words, and actions of these social distancing informants are morally wrong and despicable.

bookmark_borderThis weekend in overzealous social distancing enforcement…

Posted on by Marissa

In one of the latest examples of overzealous attempts to fight the spread of COVID-19, New Mexico Governor Michelle Lujan Grisham banned a drive-in movie theater from reopening.

According to the Washington Times, city officials in Las Vegas, New Mexico believed that the state government had given the drive-in the OK, and a showing of “Trolls World Tour” and “Doolittle” was planned. But then the governor called the county’s emergency management department and told them the drive-in wasn’t allowed to open after all. “The governor’s office said they would treat the drive-in just like any other movie theater,” said Mayor Louie Trujillo.

This makes no sense. A drive-in, where people sit in their cars in an outdoor field watching a movie on a huge screen, is completely different than a movie theater, where everyone is sitting in an indoor auditorium. If there is any form of entertainment well-suited to social distancing requirements, it would be a drive-in. I can think of no reason why a governor would ban a drive-in from operating, unless she is attempting to be as much of a jerk as possible and to ensure that none of her citizens are able to do anything remotely fun, ever.

In separate but similar news, Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot dispatched three squad cars and two unmarked cars filled with armed officers… to shut down a church service.

Pastor Courtney Lewis was in the middle of his sermon at the Cornerstone Baptist Church when the police began to bang loudly on the front doors.

“All we are seeking is the same consideration and trust that is being tendered toward the liquor stores, abortion clinics, and Walmart,” the pastor said, according to the Geller Report. He described the arrival of the armed cops as “like the Soviet-style KGB… the only thing she hasn’t done yet is beat the doors down and arrest our members.”

Pastor Lewis wrote a letter to U.S. Attorney John Lausch which can be read here.

bookmark_borderCoronavirus vaccine should not be mandatory

Posted on by Marissa

When a vaccine for the coronavirus is eventually developed, it will be a huge benefit to those who want the protection and peace of mind that it brings. There will also almost certainly be a minority of people who – for one reason or another – would prefer not to receive the vaccine.

And there is absolutely nothing wrong with that.

That’s why it’s disturbing that Harvard Law School Professor Emeritus Alan Dershowitz said in an interview:

If a safe vaccine is to be developed for Covid-19, I hope it’s mandated, and I will defend it… Let me put it very clearly, you have no constitutional right to endanger the public and spread the disease, even if you disagree. You have no right not to be vaccinated, you have no right not to wear a mask, you have no right to open up your business… And if you refuse to be vaccinated, the state has the power to literally take you to a doctor’s office and plunge a needle into your arm.

Like most proponents of forcing people to undergo medial procedures against their will, Dershowitz points to the Supreme Court’s decision in Jacobson v. Massachusetts (1905), in which the court ruled that states may require people to be vaccinated if their boards of health deem it necessary for public health or safety. As World Net Daily puts it: “If any individual is allowed to act without regard to the welfare of others, true liberty does not exist, the court argued.”

I strongly disagree with this school of thought. Each person has a right to do anything he or she wishes, as long as those actions do not violate the rights of anyone else. What determines whether an action violates someone’s rights? One must compare the effect of the action on other people against the effect of banning the action on the person or people who wish to do the action.

In the case of vaccines, the question is: Which has a more direct impact on a person, having other people existing in the world who have not been vaccinated, or being forced to be vaccinated against one’s will?

As Dershowitz and the Jacobson court note, people are affected somewhat by the existence of other people who do not get vaccines. The percentage of people in a community who have or have not been vaccinated does affect each individual’s risk of catching a disease. People who are not able to get vaccines for medical reasons can catch illnesses from those who have chosen not to get the vaccine.

However, this impact is indirect. Actually getting sick has a large and direct impact on someone’s life, but a person who hasn’t gotten a vaccine does not cause anyone to become sick. The disease does. The presence of unvaccinated people merely affects a person’s risk of catching a disease; it does not cause a person to catch a disease.

On the other hand, being required to undergo a medical procedure such as vaccination affects a person directly. It involves a person’s skin being pierced by a needle and a substance being injected into his or her body.

A person’s right to make decisions about his/her own body outweighs any supposed right to make decisions about the bodies of other people in order to manage one’s own disease risk. In other words, the importance of being able to decide for oneself whether or not to get vaccines outweighs the importance of being able to decide whether or not the people around you get vaccines.

A country in which the government has the power to take someone to a doctor’s office and plunge a needle into their arm is a country without liberty in any meaningful sense of the word. To claim, as the Jacobson court did, that there is no true liberty without being able to control other people’s actions that might have an indirect impact on you, is ridiculous.

I would likely choose to get the coronavirus vaccine when it comes out. But it should be my choice.

bookmark_borderGym owner defies restrictions in MA

Posted on by Marissa

In my home state of Massachusetts, a gym owner is defying government restrictions and encouraging others to do the same.

Dave Blondin, owner of Prime Fitness & Nutrition in Oxford, MA, opened his business on Monday, even though Massachusetts will not allow gyms to open until “phase 3” of its reopening plan. Monday was the beginning of phase 1.

“Enough is enough,” Blondin said, according to the Boston Herald. “We need our sanity back. Gyms should join me. Every gym owner is essential… We need to stand our ground. We have to open our gyms.”

“They’re so happy and smiling being able to work out again,” he said of gym members. “It’s so important for their mental health, anxiety, stress, depression.” He added that members are unanimously supporting him and have offered to pay any fines that the gym incurs.

One gym member, a nurse, said: “I think it’s a great idea. It definitely helps with the mental health… I don’t think there’s any issue going on whatsoever.”

Blondin said in a Facebook video: “I would like to call upon all other gyms in Massachusetts to do the same. Whether you’re big, whether you’re small, whether you’re a studio, whatever you are, start opening your doors. We’re all in this together. If Walmart that’s right down the street can sit there and have 356 cars there, then we can work out.”

So far Blondin has received a verbal warning and a written warning from the Oxford Board of Health. The law authorizes a $300 fine for each day the gym is open, as well as eventually a cease and desist order. Yesterday, 7 News captured an exchange between Blondin and board of health agent Tom Purcell during which Purcell asked Blondin if there was anything he could to convince him to comply. “Nope, let me open my business and get back to my livelihood,” he replied.

Speaking to 7 News, Blondin said, “It’s not fair. We’ve been out of business for too long now. The eight weeks have gone by, and I’ve used my PPP (paycheck protection program) funds, and that’s it. Unless they want to fund me again, this is over.”

“It takes a lot to stand up to everybody who’s staying closed,” said gym member Samantha Chamberlain.

Blondin said to Channel 5/WCVB:”If the worst thing that they’re gonna do is give me a citation… I’m trying to choose my freedom. Yeah, I’ll take the citation.”

Town Manager Jennifer Callahan said she has received “many angry calls and emails from residents calling on the town to shutter this business immediately.” Why someone would make an angry call or send an angry email about people minding their own business is beyond me. Blondin and his members are doing nothing wrong, and I admire their courage in standing up to government overreach.

bookmark_borderRebellious gym owner arrested in California

Posted on by Marissa

In Oceanside, California, gym owner Lou Uridel was arrested for opening his business in defiance of the state’s stay-at-home order. Upon being released, he has continued to defy the order by re-opening the gym. The police department stated that it plans to cite Uridel for each day the gym remains in operation. The maximum penalty for each citation is $1,000 and/or 90 days in jail.

Reportedly, police told Uridel that they would arrest every customer if he reopened his gym. However, after consulting with his lawyer, he was advised that police did not have the power to do that, and so he decided to re-open this past Wednesday.

“There’s some members who kind of shy away from that and there’s some members who say, you know what, if they’re going to take me away in handcuffs for working out, then they can go ahead and do it,” Uridel said.

Salute to everyone who falls into the second category and is willing to take a stand against government overreach.