Mask Issue

We speak with Frank Faranda, the author of "The Fear Paradox" about the psychology that goes into mask wearing in public.

>> welcome back to live at five tonight we are joined by frank and he is going to talk to us about fear, shame, all of the things he's in expert and present author and psychologist and he joins us now.

>> sighs to be here.

>> i know you recently wrote a book on fear.

You also have penned an article on fear.

It was much earlier on that we read your article during the pandemic.

What can you tells about the article and what has not been life you?

>> thank you, i guess originally when i wrote the article it was in the first days of us being directed to wear masks.

I think all of us were aware of just what an odd experience that is to walk out into the public sphere and to be covering half your face.

And to be monitoring as you are walking amongst other people, are they wearing a mask?

Should they wear a mask?

Should i wear a mask?

When the first things that struck me on the first act put a mascot and went out into my community, is i noticed the strange feeling that i later figured out was shame.

And i was so ashamed not for covered by face, o's not that i was disguising myself i felt the shame.

But i was feeling shame because in some ways i was aware that as a community, we no longer fully trust each other.

And because this virus is an invisible threats, you never quite know who has it or even if we have it.

A lot of people are asymptomatic and we do not even know that we might be passing this thing on.

And so i began to wonder what are the psychological dynamics of wearing a mask?

How does that play into our relationships?

>> how have you seen this evolve?

>> certainly in my work with my clients and just in my own experience with my friends and colleagues.

I have noticed that some people do associate masks with these kind of political dynamics.

Certainly not going to delve into the mask of politics.

But i will say it is a little bit on fortunate.

Because even though we all value our freedom, we need to take certain kinds of social responsibilities.

What i find is that some people believe that the mask is designed to protect them.

We should be afraid so we should cover ourselves.

The way someone works with chemicals might wear a respirator to filter out the toxins.

We are where these masks don't actually do that.

These light cloth maths unchecked masks.

They only catch the water drop is that leap our mouth and we keep those to ourselves.

So in some ways it's asking your 6-year-old in the car to put on her seatbelt.

Or it saying yes we have a right to own a gun.

But we need to keep that gun properly in our homes.

That is not a violation of our freedom, it's really just smart thinking.

>> we appreciate you are an expert and we like coming to you and talking with you.