What a difference a crime wave and tanking poll numbers make!

Masks?

To prevent robberies, “we are putting out a clear call to all of our shops, do not allow people to enter the store without taking off their face mask,” Mayor Eric Adams of New York City said. https://t.co/KbmBdyENjj

— The New York Times (@nytimes) March 7, 2023

WE DON’T NEED NO STINKING MASKS

In the annals of big city crime-fighting history, this will go down as one of the most memorable ideas in an administration pretty much bankrupt as a brain-trust goes.

Not long ago, New Yorkers were required to wear a face mask if they wanted to enter a store. But Mayor Eric Adams has now said the city’s shopkeepers should adopt the opposite approach: People who refuse to pull down their mask when they first come into a store should be barred, in case they plan to rob the place.

“We are putting out a clear call to all of our shops, do not allow people to enter the store without taking off their face mask,” the mayor said in a radio interview on 1010 WINS on Monday. “And then once they’re inside, they can continue to wear it if they so desire to do so.”

You could get whiplash in New York City, so rapidly do they swing from one dictate to 180° out from it just that fast. And implying that any New York/store patron who won’t demask after being asked is somehow inclined to a life of crime? After they’ve spent how many years browbeating and literally forcing their citizens into wearing masks because of the dreaded COVID SCIENCE™? How are city dwellers’ delicate liberal nervous systems supposed to cope with their face diapers being just as rudely ripped off? Your people are like Stockholm Syndrome sufferers – you have to bring them around slowly…ever so gently, Mr. Mayor.

Someone who wears a mask is the least likely to a commit crime. In case you still don't know, wearing a mask means we actually care what happens to people, even ones we don't know. Guys like Eric Adams want you to see it as a sign of moral deviance instead of moral integrity.

— Jessica Wildfire (@JessicaLexicus) March 7, 2023

…Mr. Adams’s suggestion is sure to draw the ire of those who remain committed to masking in public as Covid persists, as well as those with health conditions that put them at an elevated risk of severe illness if they were to be infected with the coronavirus.

Besides. Doesn’t the mayor know going without a mask is deadlier than a robbery?!?!?

*hyperventilates in paper bag*

Former cop Adams pooh-poohs the naysayers. Technology, he insists, will win the day and foil these masked banditos. You see, without their masks, you can take their picture! The mayor’s plan is so brilliantly simple, no low-life will ever figure it out. If one does, he won’t rob a store that asks him to unmask.

…Adams said the move would help cops “use the technology we have available to identify those shoplifters and those who are committing serious crimes.”

“When you see these mask-wearing people, oftentimes it’s not about being fearful of the pandemic,” he said. “It’s fearful of the police catching them for their deeds.”

When told his plan was “really putting the onus on the stores,” Adams said the NYPD was helping out by “beefing up our coverage in those BID [Business Improvement District] areas, those high-shopping areas, and we’re also beefing up our surveillance and practices.”

WIN-WIN.

If you need to wear your mask for health reasons, the mayor says put it back on after they’ve had a chance to get your portrait for posterity. One NYC gallery owner starting working on the wording for the sign in his gallery window. It sounds pret-tee ridiculous, no?

Some bodega owners, however – arguably some of the most victimized businesses in the city – aren’t even on board with that lenient, polite approach. They want a city-wide mask ban.

…But Francisco Mata of the rival Bodega and Small Business Group said Adams “should make it illegal to wear the masks now” and put the NYPD in charge of enforcement.

Store owners just have a really bad case of “Why can’t the cops and the city just do their frickin’ jobs?” And cops are offering the mayor a reality check.

…A Brooklyn store owner whose business was recently robbed said Adams’ plan was “easy for him to say.”

“What am I supposed to do? Ask every man, woman, kid who walks in to buy a juice to take their mask off?” the merchant said. “So, they take the mask off — then they rob me. How am I supposed to be safe? I have to make a living. What am I supposed to do, close up shop?”

…“If you tell one of these guys in the ‘hood who’s coming out to get a beer to take his mask off, he’s going to tell the bodega worker to shut up and beat the crap out of him,” a veteran Bronx cop said. “They should help these bodega owners with better cameras, plexiglass, panic buttons.”

Maybe telling the district DAs to stop charging bodega clerks with murder who’ve had to defend themselves against violent assailants would also be a good start? If robbers knew there could be consequences, masked or otherwise, robberies go down. It’s the weirdest equation, but foolproof.