The left needs to unite against pandemic ableism, not out of goodwill or charity towards disabled leftists, but for our movement’s survival. Organizations limit their potential membership when they romanticize pre-pandemic organizing practices, where everything happened in person and those who couldn’t attend due to disability or illness, lack of transportation, a work conflict, or family caregiving duties simply couldn’t participate. 

I wish more organizations would accommodate the disabled and at-risk by doing the bare minimum, masking. It is easy. It’s not inconvenient. You sacrifice nothing by wearing a mask. It’s more than solidarity, it is beneficial to everyone. It is something tangible that you can do. Remember that we, us human beings, eradicated two strains of the influenza by masking. But community health and prosperity is antithetical to capital forces. It is such an easy trap for people to continue existing as if untold millions don’t suffer and die from preventable illness each year.

Many leftists on Lemmygrad and Hexbear lament how hard it is to find an org. Sorry, but if you’re a leftist you don’t get to whinge and complain about organizing in the imperial core if you’re unwilling to take a simple, tangible action. Wearing a fucking mask. It’s one of the few individual actions that makes an enormous difference. Anti-masking — by way of disinformation or simply ignoring disease — is a reactionary tool capital uses to keep you in a state of inaction. There is no “return to normal” when normal means more disease, suffering, and death. 

I’ll never forget what u/wopazoo@hexbear.net said on this. 

You cannot get people to return to pre-pandemic behaviors without eradicating the thought of the pandemic in their mind. Eliminating masks, the symbol of the pandemic, is necessary to achieve the ends of a reversion to pre-pandemic behavior.