The entire right-wing propaganda machine came after Zohran Mamdani. The president and his allies came after him. Democratic leaders, by and large, did not have his back until the last minute. He still won, turning out historic numbers and inspiring young voters. His politics can win anywhere.

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People continue to call COVID advocates’ pleas for masking “unreasonable”. Yet people who’ve already been disabled by COVID have no choice but to live with the “unreasonable” burdens of constant COVID safety. My latest: substack.com/home/post/p-...

"The government hates masks so much these days because they are a visual challenge to its propagandist narrative: it is perfectly fine and healthy to repeatedly contract COVID-19. This is a lie." Great piece from the always brilliant @juliadoubleday.bsky.social: www.thegauntlet.news/p/beyond-all...

@juliadoubleday.bsky.social is the author

Maybe I’ll make it my tradition to re up my personal essay about my brutal long covid migraines every time I’m in the midst of another multi day one. Day 4 or 5 over here🤕 Reporting always free at the Gauntlet, but essays paywalled to fund the newsletter www.thegauntlet.news/p/this-may-h...

"You could call the situation unreasonable. You could call the situation our government has put us in unreasonable. You could direct your frustration over said unreasonable, untenable situation upward, where it belongs:

This is well worth your time (seriously). If you don't want to read something on substack (understandable, I avoid the place too), you can find this same piece on Patreon here: www.patreon.com/posts/beyond...

“In January 2024, a study published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences found that chronic absenteeism… nearly doubled following the Covid pandemic.” “In total, nearly 30% — some 13 million children — regularly missed school.”

'I was disabled by this virus nearly two years ago. It is not “crazy” to avoid a virus that already disabled me. It would be extremely odd to accept the public propaganda that this virus is harmless over my body’s own truth'

We all share the air. If we would care about the quality of the air we share, everyone benefits. One great way to do that is masking up in public spaces. You’ll be sick less. You’ll be making spaces more accessible. You’re showing solidarity with disabled people.

Honestly, I don’t need you to mask everywhere. I just would appreciate it in grocery stores, medical facilities, airports, and airplanes. That would make my life so much safer. Just orders of magnitude safer.

@juliadoubleday.bsky.social's writings on COVID are powerful. Their power is rooted in three equally indispensable realities: 1️⃣ the natural science of the disease itself; 2️⃣ the public policies needed to mitigate its harms; and 3️⃣ the interpersonal & institutional dynamics of engaging denial.

I'm trying to do better with meeting people where they are. What frustrates me is when folks who purport to have a left wing politic refuse to try and meet me where I'm at, too. My life is more expensive taking on the burden of everyone's refusal to make things safer. I am not being unreasonable.

“… we will never get clean air without public pressure, and there will never be public pressure without public awareness that COVID is dangerous. As long as the public continues to treat COVID like a cold the government has no incentive to move on clean air.” — @juliadoubleday.bsky.social

This is an incredibly important read, and yeah, I very much feel the same way. Pretty much anyone still masking does. And we're right.

It's meee! I'm disabled by COVID and being unreasonable by asking people to not keep doing this to each other!

A must-read. I can’t even keep track of how many friends & acquaintances with Long Covid (myself included) have poured our life’s savings into trying to recover, making painstakingly slow strides here & there, only to have it all wiped out & worse by a reinfection. Please give us a fucking break!

A balm of a text re. what’s reasonable & unreasonable and on the absurd burden (& criticism) upon those of us harmed/devastated & following the science of COVID and #LongCovid. Gracias, Julia @ryankenacts.bsky.social @johngreensbluesky.bsky.social @hankgreen.bsky.social @markruffalo.bsky.social

"You could direct your frustration over said unreasonable, untenable situation upward, where it belongs: at the government, not downward, at struggling sick people, who have no choice but to engage with COVID safety practices including masking." - @juliadoubleday.bsky.social

Wear a fucking mask. Please. I still mask anyplace I go. Have been for years, and other than making my drip slay, it's not hurt anybody. It can only help, literally

Excellent piece. Every time this discourse rolls around they treat those of us that mask like we’re hypochondriacs. No we’re the ghosts of infections past. We plead with you so that you can avoid our fate. In return you mock us. #MECFS #LongCovid

"It is not reasonable to place any expectations on the broad back of the majority of society, but it is reasonable to pile everything the majority won’t do on the thin slice of disabled people who are carrying their own weight and attempting to carry everyone else’s as they drown."

"We are not being unreasonable to expect freedom from infection with a pathogen that will certainly further disable us when we step into a public space. We are not being unreasonable when we expect solidarity from nominally progressive people."

"Is it “reasonable” to...mask all the time?...Of course, it is not reasonable, nor fair. That is why COVID-aware people continue to advocate for change...none of what we’re being asked to do is reasonable nor fair." Must-read from @juliadoubleday.bsky.social—"living proof. COVID can&will harm you."

"You could call *the situation* unreasonable. You could call the situation our government *has put us in* unreasonable. You could direct your frustration over said unreasonable, untenable situation upward, where it belongs:

“According to the masses: It is not reasonable to place any expectations on the broad back of the majority of society, but it *is* … to pile everything the majority won’t do on the thin slice of disabled people who are carrying their own weight and attempting to carry everyone else’s as they drown.”

Not sure if anybody is doing it better than @juliadoubleday.bsky.social —Please read: “when you shrug off the difficulty.. of practicing COVID safety.. you are casting that burden onto the shoulders of those who are already carrying more than you are. ” Link: www.thegauntlet.news/p/beyond-all...?

People continue to call COVID advocates’ pleas for masking “unreasonable”. Yet people who’ve already been disabled by COVID have no choice but to live with the “unreasonable” burdens of constant COVID safety. My latest: substack.com/home/post/p-...

Too many people say "doing what you can to avoid spreading covid" and mean "staying home when I don't feel well enough to leave the house anyway." They don't usually even mean masking the whole time they're covid positive. It's exhausting.

Long COVID patients are constantly harangued about our requests for COVID safety. Yet what we're asking for is far less than what we're called on to do to survive. @juliadoubleday.bsky.social open.substack.com/pub/thegaunt...

Excellent thread

“If thousands of studies are telling you to look for a certain kind of harm and then millions of people start wondering why they are experiencing exactly that type of harm, is it so hard to connect those two dots?”

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Nobody has Long COVID, but everybody has brain fog, cognitive decline and memory loss. I talk about the overwhelming scientific evidence that COVID damages the brain, and the overwhelming social unwillingness to acknowledge it in my latest: www.thegauntlet.news/p/when-will-...

"If thousands of studies are telling you to look for a certain kind of harm and then millions of people start wondering why they are experiencing exactly that type of harm, is it so hard to connect those two dots?" Or has #COVID has destroyed people's ability to reason...? #disability #pandemic

“I’d argue that you can’t see what you refuse to see.” 😭😭😭

Personne n'a de #COVIDLong mais par contre, tout le monde a un "brouillard mental", des problèmes de mémoire et oublie ses mots... Pourquoi avec toutes les preuves scientifiques qu'on a sur le #SARS-CoV2 on continue de collectivement fermer les yeux ? (article en anglais)

“Research shows that even mild COVID-19 can lead to the equivalent of seven years of brain aging”. I feel this. I’ve remarked that I felt like COVID aged me a decade

"This is the narrative the left uses because it allows them to be 'sympathetic' to Long COVID patients while refusing to mask or take any sort of preventive action. This is the idea that Long COVID is real, it exists, but only a certain kind of person gets it, and it’s a small minority of people."

“Reactions online seem to be simple disbelief that COVID damages brains- but this is anti-science…However we still have a hegemonic refusal to acknowledge COVID as a threat from the far-right to the far-left, it is a largely united front to treat COVID as the cold it is so clearly not.”

"The evidence has been building for years and has been consistent; COVID causes brain damage. Despite the clear evidence, we’ve continued to infect the population, not once, but repeatedly, with no plan to end the onslaught of reinfections." #LongCovid

Insightful. “Disabled people, and people with Long COVID, have been calling ourselves canaries in the coal mine for a reason. We may have been harmed first and worst, but we are warning you that COVID is dangerous because our bodies are made of flesh and blood - hearts and brains- just like yours.”

"We’ve been serially infecting children with a virus that damages their brains. We know it does this. And we just…. keep doing it?"

The hypocrisy of the left when it comes to the idea of “following the science” is truly staggering.

You know, you see these articles about the cumulating effects of COVID and it's really bad but locally you have to discuss with people that say "if it's an epidemic, there is no need for protection anymore".

…. 🤷‍♀️

“nobody can get a virus that is objectively bad for you, objectively harmful, that we know invades the brain, degrades the immune system, and attacks the blood vessels, dozens and dozens of times, and just “be fine” That is not how human bodies work.”

"The fact that COVID infections damage our brains is not debatable. There are hundreds of studies to support that COVID affects the brain, leading to memory, attention, executive function, and mental health issues." again: COVID infections damage our brains #LongCOVID