If you're that scared, just stay home; your fears don't trump others' Freedom - Granite Grok

If you’re that scared, just stay home; your fears don’t trump others’ Freedom

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Every year, around 250,000 bikers ride into the Laconia / Lakes Region here in NH to blow off steam and have a good time (noted: as the years go by and the grey has set in, the amount and heat of steam have dissipated) around their common interest of bikes.

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This year, it will be a far tamer event as the Laconia City Council has, once again, placed restrictions on what and what cannot happen. In this Year of COVID, they’ve decreed that no vendor tents, not beer tents will be in use. No, they don’t have to do Emergency Orders like Gov. Sununu has done – all they have to do is not give out permits/variants for such activities in certain areas of the city (like down at Weirs Beach, the main congregating area of every Bike Week since I’ve been here – 36 years).

But again, in this Year of COVID, there are as many people mad that Bike Week is being delayed (normally it’s around Fathers’ Day) until August 22nd. Just like during the first Iraq war when “HALLIBURTON!” was a rallying cry (which meant as many things to the Libs as “Hope and Change” meant, well, to the Libs during Obama’s terms), now it’s “COVID!!  DEATH!!  DESTRUCTION!!”. From the local rag, Laconia Daily Sun (which is moving Lefter and Lefter):

With COVID-19 cases spiking in so many states, its time to cancel this year’s Motorcycle Week. We all know MC Week brings lots of business to the area, but this year it will also bring a huge influx of coronavirus, considering that thousands come from all over

I find it reprehensible and totally irresponsible that the powers that be find it perfectly okay to hold Motorcycle Week this year. If you think that the visitors are going to follow social distancing guidelines and also wear masks, then you are in need of a wake-up call. This is a totally ludicrous idea and needs to be reconsidered immediately. The local authorities are failing to protect the citizens of New Hampshire.

How many letters to the editor need to be written before someone smartens up. I am referring to the fact that there still are people who actually think that having Motorcycle Week during this pandemic is a good idea. To invite tens of thousands of people from all around the country to mingle among us for a whole week is the most irresponsible idea ever.

And these are just four of these kinds of LtE (Letters to the Editor) that are popping up. My response?

Who am I to restrict the Freedom of others just because I might be at risk? As the T-Shirt says “My Rights don’t end where Your Fears Begin”.  Look at Betty Isaac’s message again:

The local authorities are failing to protect the citizens of New Hampshire.

In this, the Live Free or Die State, what cockamamie ideas does she have that she would believe that the elected representatives could do? Be like NY and set up checkpoints at the State’s borders (“Yep, you’re on a Harley – turn around” or “you’re wearing biker leathers / black clothing – go home”)??

The local authorities can’t do a dam thing (Thank God and the Constitution!) about people coming into NH, especially the Lakes Region. Yes, they can withhold the permits as I said before. While Sununu COULD shut down hotels, he won’t – he knows better and even though he still has high poll numbers (although they started to plummet the last two months over reopening the State), he’s got an election going on.

I also agree with SD Governor Kristi Noem – it’s not their job to keep you safe. That’s YOUR job to keep you safe. It’s up to YOU to take the appropriate actions.

TMEW and I had this same argument last night over this, although more over sending the Grandson back to nursery school – we don’t know where those other kids / families have been nor who they have been in contact with? What if they have the WuFlu now, are asymptomatic, he catches it, and brings it home to us (in our sixties with comorbidities)? Do we NOT send him over her fears and my concerns (adding in the component of Bike Week intermingling? Do we impede his education over our Fears and concern? I pointed out that she had just returned from her and the Grandson spending almost a week with his Dad and others in Maine. All kinds of people in and out of the apartment, each one of them in contact with who knows who.

Same deal, just lesser numbers. With her concerns over the school year starting, what were her concerns for her visit?  Light bulb on.

As Americans, we do have the Right to travel unimpeded within the US (Commerce Clause even if some States are getting dangerously close to “show me your papers” status). My opinion?

Let them come. It’s up to me to protect me and mine, just like it will be for anyone in contact with the Biker visitors.

My response is that WE will go into our VOLUNTARY lockdown for the time of Bike Week and the incubation period. If necessary, we’ll keep the Grandson home to see if there is a dramatic rise in infections in the Lakes Region. If so, schools will be closed and we’ll have lost nothing. If not, he lost a week of school – no big deal at his age. But our actions will not impose on anyone else.

I do wonder if the people who wrote those Letters even considered putting other people before themselves? It doesn’t seem like it, does it? Instead, what they are demanding is that others change their behaviors to suit them, that their Fears must be allayed by others and that their current lifestyles not be affected. Such a burden that they feel is perfectly fine to impose upon others:

Thou shalt not make me afraid.

Whatever happened to the risk-taking, Principle standing, Rugged Individualism of our forefathers? Our Founders pledged everything in their quest to set up a new country based on the Rule of Law, the Right to Private Property, the Right to Free Speech and Beliefs – and Freedom. That phrase “shall not infringe” was not just about keeping and bearing arms.

In our decadence, we’ve transmogrifyed from fearless to fearful. From courageous to weak-kneed. From standing tall to taking knees.

From Freedom to Safetyism.

Crap.

IMHO, all of those Letter writers, even as they believe they are yelling for the right thing, don’t realize they are demanding to take a basic freedom away from others simply to give themselves the faux sense of “safety”. News flash – there isn’t any. Never has, never will. And the Chinese Flu will be around for a long time. It could mutate into a benign disease – but not likely. Instead, for the short term, y’all will have to adapt to it. Or not – your choice and not mine to make for you.

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