Free To Drive Drunk? Are Mask Refuseniks Any Different From Drunk Drivers

Laws punishing drunk, or impaired driving are based upon principles of public health and public safety. That is to say, laws forbidding and punishing drunk driving are based historically upon the damages, injuries, and deaths caused by those who have driven while intoxicated.

At some point, The People refused to be abused and victimized any longer, stood up, and resoundingly said ‘NO MORE!‘, and passed legislation making such behavior and associated acts a serious crime. In some states, it’s not uncommon to read of individuals charged with DUI, who are also charged with the felonies of either murder, or criminally negligent homicide in cases where their actions resulted in the death of another.

Have laws against DUI stopped the offense or eliminated the injuries, damages, and deaths associated with the same?

No, but they have so significantly reduced them to the extent that such offenses and their associated damages are now the exception, rather than the rule.

The same principle applies to tobacco use, and smoking. It is a known carcinogen, and its consumption and use is a well-documented cause of numerous types of cancers, associated diseases, suffering, and early death – most notably recently, renown guitarist Eddie Van Halen, who died of metastatic oral cancer contracted from smoking aged 65.

Consequently, taxes upon tobacco have been increased in many areas, and places where its consumption is permitted is severely limited.

And so, now, we have COVID to deal with. Fundamentally, as far as the net effect – death, damage, and destruction – how is that any different? Seriously. Well over 250,000 lives unnecessarily lost in LESS THAN THE SPACE OF A YEAR, and with well over 13,000,000 cases, the good ol’ USA is the world’s NUMBER 1 repository of COVID-19… by far!

Yaay!
Thanks (for nothing) Trump!

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COVID-19, Masks and the Freedom to Drive Drunk

By Andrew Koppelman, Opinion Contributor
11/29/20 03:00 PM EST

Does freedom mean the right to refuse to wear a mask during the COVID-19 pandemic?  Many Americans think so. It is President Trump’s most important legacy. Here’s one implication that is too little noticed: If that is what freedom means, then we owe drunk drivers an apology.

The idea is shaping our world. Ignoring urgent expert advice, an Idaho health board recently rescinded its mask mandate, while 100 new cases were reported in one day and the local hospital was running out of beds. (A couple of weeks later, it reversed itself and imposed the mandate.) The board member who led the change explained, “I agree we have a problem with this virus, but at the same time I object to the mandate the board passed because it restricts people’s right of choice and ability to comply or not comply under penalty of law.” Another member said, “I personally do not care whether anybody wears a mask or not. If they want to be dumb enough to walk out there and expose themselves or others to it, they can.” The story was reported in the Daily Beast under the headline, “This really happened.”

This is a new and unfamiliar conception of freedom. Some people, notably New York Times columnist Paul Krugman, have blamed libertarianism for this stuff, but the standard libertarian story is that people have the right to do what they want as long as they don’t hurt anyone else. Now we are told that they have a right of choice even if they do hurt other people.

Drunk drivers were once casually tolerated. After Mothers Against Drunk Driving was founded in 1980 by a woman whose 13-year-old daughter was killed by one, attitudes and laws both became harsher. The proportion of fatal crashes involving drunk drivers plunged, from 53 percent in 1982 to 34 percent in 1997. There were over 26,000 drunk driving deaths in 1982, and fewer than 11,000 in 2018. I believe universal mask-wearing would have had a comparable effect. An estimated 100,000 or more lives would have been saved.

But, if you’re concerned about masks’ infringement on individual liberty, then why endure DWI (driving while intoxicated) laws? Masks are a lot cheaper than the cabfare home from the tavern, and then there’s the hassle of coming back for your car the next morning. And DWI laws affect you much more intimately, dictating what you can put into your body. Just because your car was repeatedly drifting into oncoming traffic, the cops get to make you take a breathalyzer test. With a machine that covers your face. Just like a mask!

State governors who have refused to require masks all make arguments that logically would shield drunk drivers as well. (States where masks are least worn are among those with the highest rates of COVID symptoms.)

Oklahoma Gov. Kevin Stitt says, “This is a personal responsibility.” Then why not rely on personal responsibility to let people decide for themselves how snockered they can be before they get behind the wheel?

Gov. Kristi Noem of South Dakota, where the disease is spreading with record-breaking speed, writes:  “If folks want to wear a mask, they should be free to do so. Similarly, those who don’t want to wear a mask shouldn’t be shamed into wearing one. And government should not mandate it. We need to respect each other’s decisions.” At a Trump rally last month, Noem said that the absence of restrictions made South Dakotans “happy because they are free.” Try that with DWI. If folks want to drive sober, they should be free to do so. We need to respect drunk drivers’ decisions. And so forth.

And, of course, there’s President Trump:  “It’s voluntary. You don’t have to do it. They suggested for a period of time, but this is voluntary. I don’t think I’m going to be doing it.”  It was, of course, Trump who decided to make resistance to masks a political cause. It has cost him. Had he encouraged masking, perhaps the disease would be under control, the economy recovered and Trump himself would have been easily reelected.

But maybe that’s the price of freedom. If he’s going to take this principled stance, though, he should also be standing up for the drunk drivers.

I hate to have to say it, but I’d better: This is satire. I do not really want to legalize drunk driving. There are always two ways to resolve an inconsistency. If drunk driving should be prohibited – and, yes, of course it should – then walking around indoors mask-less in a pandemic is just as bad. But if you really think that you should be free to infect other people with a disease that has already killed more than 250,000 Americans, then you should stop being so mean to drunk drivers.

Andrew Koppelman, is the John Paul Stevens Professor of Law at Northwestern University, and author of “Gay Rights vs. Religious Liberty? The Unnecessary Conflict.” Follow him on Twitter @AndrewKoppelman.

https://thehill.com/opinion/civil-rights/527725-covid-19-masks-and-the-freedom-to-drive-drunk