To be clear, I'm not a rebel and I wear a mask if there's a rule requiring me to do so. There is always a mask in my pocket. One chap in a bike shop said he would deal with the maskless me only if he and I stood outside the shop (I'd forgotten my mask on that occasion). He lost my business. The chap who runs a pet shop in Bude put up signs and asked me politely, so I masked up. No problem. Our village shop is tiny and compact and I haven't stopped masking up to go in there, even though they don't ask me to. They also only want two in the shop at a time. All good. It's their shop and they are polite about it all. Of course, that same mask, which is reasonably clean as I seldom use it, is a few weeks old. So I'm guilty of mask abuse. Along with almost everybody else. Either you use a new mask every time you take one off (and you never have one on that you raise and lower) or you're guilty, bang to rights. Hands up...?

"My position is that I firmly believe everyone should do the socially-responsible thing and wear a mask in public." [BWM]

Well it's socially-responsible in your opinion. My opinion is that the case is very far from having been made. I firmly believe that there isn't enough evidence for masks to justify going round judging people who choose to do without them.

Next time you go into Morrisons or Sainsbury's, stand at the entrance for a minute or two and watch how many people sail in there who sanitise neither their hands nor their trolley or basket. We don't know if masks do much but we do know that viruses live on hands and hard surfaces. Those people are potentially contaminating everything they touch in the shop. People like that, and people who refuse the vaccine, are the real culprits. Whataboutery not intended.