Three-time Olympic volleyball gold medalist Kerri Walsh Jennings wrote on Instagram that she went shopping without a mask in "an exercise in bravery."
After followers lambasted the move, Jennings posted a second Instagram in which she apologized for causing offense yet defended her choice as an act of "freedom."
Research has shown over and over that face masks can prevent coronavirus transmission.
You can count three-time Olympic volleyball gold medalist Kerri Walsh Jennings among the naysayers.
In an Instagram post on Sunday, Jennings wrote that she recently chose not to wear a mask when shopping, a move she said came from a desire to "stand up for my rights & for the freedoms our constitution has granted us all WITHOUT being reckless or putting anyone else in danger." Jennings described the decision as "an exercise in bravery."
Masks are required statewide in California, where Jennings lives (she also wrote on Instagram over the weekend that her family would be moving out of the state); however, she did not say in the post where she was shopping. California has recorded the highest COVID-19 case total in the US: more than 745,000 cases.
"We are all endlessly complaining about the restrictive & arbitrarily selective rules that we are being strongly 'suggested' to follow & yet we are all consenting; not much of a fight, just a lot of complaining & strongly disagreeing with this manipulation, but we keep consenting," she wrote. "It's maddening. It has crushed our society, people's livelihoods, our children's spirits, & the fabric of our world. We have become a country & a world estranged from each other & it is more deeply unhealthy than any virus could ever be."
A post shared by Kerri Walsh Jennings (@kerrileewalsh) on Sep 6, 2020 at 11:35am PDT
Responses to the post lambasted Jennings as "selfish," "entitled," and "poorly informed," leading her to craft a follow-up Instagram post, this time with a white flag and the word "TRUCE."
Jennings apologized "to those I've upset so deeply" but didn't seem to budge on her stance about masks. Instead, she said she's "alarmed for my country."
"I was not looking to do anything but express my belief that FREEDOM IS RIGHT WORTH FIGHTING FOR, and amidst the chaos, divisiveness, fear, and undeniable emotion of these times, I believe we have to stay mindful of the FACT that our freedoms have slowly been taken from us with our consent," Jennings wrote in the second post.
Jennings went on to characterize the mask issue as "an emotional, layered, nuanced, and polarizing topic" — even though public-health and infectious-disease experts nearly universally agree that the benefit of mask wearing during the pandemic is not up for debate. A study out of the UK found that requiring all people to wear face masks in public could be enough to contain an outbreak without a lockdown. Similarly, an analysis of of COVID-19 outbreaks across various countries suggested that nations where the people are accustomed to wearing masks experienced less severe outbreaks than those where mask wearing was new.
Jennings wrote in her post that she does not "believe in [masks'] efficacy unless it's of a certain caliber." Research has shown, however, that almost any form of face covering is better than none.
