By Michael V. Cusenza
Asked on Thursday about a possible new NYC mask ban, the mayor of our city didn’t mince words.
First of all, that’s what cowards do. Cowards hide their face. Dr. King did not hide his face when he marched and for the things he thought were wrong in the country. Those civil rights leaders did not hide their faces. They stood up. In contrast to that, the Klan hid their faces. Cowards hide their faces when they want to do something disgraceful,” Mayor Eric Adams said on WABC-77’s “Cats and Cosby.”
“We removed the ban before because of COVID. I think that I agree with those who are calling for removal of the ban, not only for the protesters who are using vile language, but also criminal behavior. Remember late last year, I called for storekeepers to tell people before entering the store remove your mask. In our transit system, people have hid under the guise of wearing a mask for COVID to commit criminal acts and vile acts. I think now is the time to go back to the way it was pre-COVID, where you should not be able to wear a mask at protests and our subway systems and other places.”
Photo Courtesy of Wikimedia
“Criminals anarchists, political agitators and professional protesters have been taking advantage of” such suspensions, the Council Common Sense Caucus wrote.
Adams said the most pressing issue in NYC is hate.
“A city as diverse as New York and where we respect the right to peaceful protest has really eroded to the disrespect of private property. We saw what happened to the president of the museum, to some of the vile language. There’s one person who’s talking about he wish Hitler was still around,” Adams added.
“You don’t call for peace and you do vile actions. That is just really just disrespectful, it’s ugly. When people try to say that we don’t have a balanced approach, no one wants to see innocent children die as we see playing out now. New York City is a place where you protest peacefully. You don’t protest in the manner that we’re seeing on playing out by some who are participating now.”
The City Council Common Sense Caucus issued a statement on reinstating anti-masking laws in New York.
“Taking a page out of the Ku Klux Klan playbook, criminals, anarchists, political agitators and professional protesters have been taking advantage of the pandemic-era suspension of our laws by using masks to conceal their identities while committing crimes, terrorizing our communities and creating chaos in our streets and subways. This is exactly why New York first enacted anti-masking laws hundreds of years ago, and why they need to be reinstated immediately.”
