With assault rifles in tow, they've descended on the Democratically controlled capitals of Michigan, Minnesota and Virginia demanding their "Freedom" and "Rights", but what they're really demanding is death.
According to a Politico/Morning Consult poll released earlier this week, 81% of Americans believe that the United States “should continue to social distance for as long as is needed to curb the spread of coronavirus.” In other words, most Americans are smart enough to realize that while social distancing is inconvenient and difficult, it is certainly preferable to dying from COVID-19. But a minority of far-right extremists have been holding rallies and protests against social distancing. And journalist Jason Wilson, in an article The Guardian, takes a look at some of the groups behind those protests.
“While protesters in Michigan, Ohio, Kentucky and other states claim to speak for ordinary citizens, many are also supported by street-fighting right-wing groups like the Proud Boys, conservative armed militia groups, religious fundamentalists, anti-vaccination groups and other elements of the radical right,” Wilson explains.
One of the protests occurred in Michigan on Wednesday, April 15. According to Wilson, that demonstration was organized by the Michigan Conservative Coalition, a.k.a. Michigan Trump Republicans, and was “also heavily promoted by the Michigan Freedom Fund, a group linked to Trump cabinet member Betsy DeVos.” Placards, Wilson adds, “identified the Michigan Proud Boys as participants in the vehicle convoy.”
“The pattern of right-wing not-for-profits promoting public protests while still more radical groups use lockdown resistance as a platform for extreme right-wing causes looks set to continue in events advertised in other states over coming days,” Wilson explains.
Lockdown resistance provided by the Proud Boys. That fact alone should make it clear exactly what this anti-lockdown effort is really about.
This is on top of the fact that minorities groups are disproportionately affected by Covid-19.
WASHINGTON — Last week the racial disparities that have accompanied the coronavirus outbreak in the U.S. became a major story. Officials in St. Louis, Detroit and a large swath of states reported that African American populations had been hit especially hard by the virus.
A look at the data helps explain why. Behind the well-known daily numbers of the pandemic — the cases, hospitalizations and deaths — a mix of geography, socioeconomics and health factors make COVID-19, the disease associated with the virus, particularly dangerous for some minority groups.
At this point, the racial disparities around the virus are impossible to ignore, with African Americans seeing higher rates of hospitalization and of deaths.
A Centers for Disease Control and Prevention study of the virus found that 33 percent of those who have been hospitalized are African American — even though that racial group makes up only 13 percent of the general population. Meanwhile, 45 percent of those in hospitals for the virus are white and non-Hispanic, even though that group makes up more than 60 percent of the overall population.
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