Festival of Hypocrisy
Lollapalooza weekend in Chicago highlights continued duplicity and mixed messaging of politicians
(Photo Credit: Chicago Tribune)
Lollapalooza, one of the world’s largest music festivals, took place this weekend in Chicago. Four days of music from classic rock acts (Journey) to pop rap (Post Malone).
I attended Saturday with plans to see as many acts as I could. I ended up missing Journey, but seeing two performances—from 90’s rap rock group Limp Bizkit and Post Malone—I won’t soon forget.
What else I won’t soon forget is the environment around Grant Park.
Loose, open and leaning heavily on the side of living a joyful life.
It got me thinking…if Chicago is concerned about the rise in Covid cases, so much so that leaders are threatening mandates and lockdowns, why hold a music festival attended by hundreds of thousands of maskless people, maskless and using bogus vaccine cards to gain entry?
Because those in charge aren’t that concerned. It’s all posturing.
Just like the education leaders who listen more to union demands than science.
If Lollapalooza can be maskfree (I didn’t see a single spectator wearing one), certainly schools can be.
Per organizers instructions, I did bring my vaccine card to the festival Saturday (the day I attended the festival.)
It’s the second time I’ve brought my card to an event this summer.
The previous time was on July 22 while attending the Big Ten Media Days in Indianapolis. There, I was told organizers could check for proof of vaccine upon request. It didn’t happen and my card remained in my backpack.
Saturday at Lollapalooza, spectators had to get through a line labeled “vaccine check” before entering the grounds. I pulled mine out and the security worker eyed up my vax card and ID for a few seconds and approved my entrance.
(I have no problem providing my vax card for a privately-controlled event. I’m not going to deny myself the pleasure of a music concert by objecting to the disclosure of such information. I got the vaccine just for these types of summer events.)
A friend of mine, who has not been vaccinated, also attended on Saturday. His work around was to photoshop his name onto a vaccine card template and download onto his phone. He showed that to the security guard and they let him right through.
I heard a few others at Lolla refer to this forgery, a simple process that could have been completed while waiting in line at the first entry point gate.
Here’s a video that shows how simple it was to sidestep the vax check:
You don’t think any of those people holding up cards were in possession of forgeries?
Someone could have written “Mickey Mouse” as their name and no one would have batted in eye.
I’m sure a similar form of falsification could be done by parents for their own children to bypass vaccine mandates at schools this fall.
Because requiring vaccines for any eligible school-aged child is absent of supportive data of its efficacy. The one thing we know for sure is the vaccine does reduce the possibility of getting seriously ill or dying of Covid. It’s the one clear piece of information we’ve gotten in the past year. But that’s for adults. With kids, all the vaccine research done over the past year points to how the best immunity from Covid comes from…their age group. Forcing masking on the unvaccinated is punitive and more dangerous than a mask-optional environment.
A recent study in the U.K. showed the damage done by masking school-aged children and re-enforced how being a kid is the best defense against the virus.
All day Saturday, I was surrounded by school-aged kids. All were maskless, and either lied about their vaccine status (no one cared) or I’m sure there were plenty that were truthful. But they didn’t need to be.
Despite organizers and political leaders not requiring masks or any certifiable vaccination proof, that didn’t stop judgmental corporate media from shaming them.
How ridiculous is that tweet? It’s straight from the corporate media/public health/teacher’s union playbook.
Hate on kids at every opportunity.
Sunday, Chicago mayor Lori Lightfoot along with the city’s top health official, Dr. Allison Arwady, spoke to the press. They continued the tough rhetoric on masking and vaccination, believing it will rid the general population of this nagging virus, as if ‘No Covid’ is attainable.
Via the Chicago Tribune:
Lightfoot said everyone in the city “has the tools right now to fight this virus and the variant.”
“The vaccine. The vaccine. The vaccine,” Lightfoot said. “That’s the tool we have to help ourselves, to help our family, to help our community and our city. ... We need people to mask up and vax up.”
According to Lightfoot, 90 percent of Lolla attendees this weekend were vaccinated.
How can she possibly say that?
If she bothered to stand by the “vaccine check” lines for five minutes she’d know how much of a sham the whole thing was.
Also Monday, the city released statistics from the weekend festival:
—Total attendance: 385,000
—Number of arrests: 19 (way down from the previous festival, in 2019, where 31 people were arrested)
—number of fake vaccine cards seized: 0 (again, no one cared)
No wonder Lightfoot was all smiles this weekend:
We know Lightfoot had a grin on her face because we can see it. It’s not covered up by a piece of cloth.
Because compliance to the mayor’s "mask up” and “vax up” directive applies to all other than her.
Just another politician with a “do as I say, not as I do” mission statement.
By now, we’re all familiar with Governor Ron DeSantis of Florida. Want to know the real reason DeSantis is as popular as he is in Florida?
Because from the beginning of Covid, he said keeping the state open was his number one priority. And he hasn’t deviated from it. His opponents are attempting to muzzle him with a Twitter smear campaign.
But DeSantis has no plans to back down. He’s sticking to his “open” doctrine, doubling down when challenged.
There is no mixed messaging. What you see and hear from the Florida governor is what you get.
We can’t say the same for Illinois, for Chicago, where mixed messaging is a daily occurrence.
Mayor Lightfoot made sure the city got its four-day concert. Millions of dollars are expected to funnel into Chicago’s bank account. I was happy to contribute, plunking down $8 for bottle of “Liquid Death” water and $10 for a skinny Stella beer.
As for the five-year-old kindergarteners going to school for the first time later this month and in September?
They’ll be wearing a face covering.
If only school could be held in a mosh pit at Grant Park.
Then they’d be free to do whatever they want.
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