Right-wing rag more upset by crying toddler than 1 million dead

More than 1.1 million people in the U.S. have died from COVID-19, and there have been well over 6 million hospitalizations. But according to The Federalist, “One of the most disturbing images of the Covid-19 pandemic was when a teacher tried repeatedly to force a mask on a crying toddler, despite his visible distress.”

Unfortunately, they are not f-cking kidding.

First off, I invite you to watch that video. That kid was annoyed and he was not having it, but he was not hysterical or unduly distressed. If you spend time around toddlers, you will find that things they get at least that visibly distressed about include having their food cut up before it is served to them, not having their food cut up before it is served to them, and not being allowed to run into traffic. “Ridiculous things that upset toddlers” is an entire genre of viral humor content.

As the parent of a young child early in the pandemic, I, too, sometimes had to press him to wear a mask. There were definitely tears once or twice. You know what? He adjusted. He was fine. Because it's not actually that big of a deal! There were also, by the way, tears when we took out the recycling bin, because there might be something interesting in it.

Here are some of the actual most disturbing images and facts about the COVID-19 pandemic. You want to talk about distressed children? More than 200,000 children lost parents or caregivers to the virus. I’m guessing their distress was a little greater than that of a child adjusting to wearing a mask for the first time.