I normally avoid photos that might be under copyright, but this one tells a tale that ought not to be avoided, and thus falls under ‘fair use’ standards. From The Philadelphia Inquirer:
SEPTA bus riders are frustrated by persistent delays. Officials say a shortage of drivers is to blame.
The regional transit agency was not able to hire at the rate of attrition and has to play catch up.
by Thomas Fitzgerald | Saturday, September 18, 2021
SEPTA has a deficit of 105 bus operators, a lingering effect of the COVID-19 pandemic, leading to delays on many of the agency’s bus routes. Alejandro A Alvarez, Philadelphia Inquirer Staff Photographer. Click to enlarge. Photographer
The transit agency is down 105 bus operators, officials said. Austerity measures during last year’s coronavirus shutdowns, including a four-month hiring freeze, have hampered SEPTA’s ability to keep up with attrition.
As a result, thousands of frustrated riders wait longer at bus stops.
And when operators scheduled for duty call in sick or have family emergencies, regular occurrences in a workforce of more than 2,600 people, managers in SEPTA’s nine bus garages have to scramble.
There’s more at the original, but the telling part of the photo is the sign on the front of the bus: “A mask or face covering is required on SEPTA”. You can click on the photo to enlarge it, and see the bus marquee more easily.
We have previously reported on mask mandates for certain jobs, including bus drivers, pushing people away from those jobs. People just don’t want to wear a diaper over their faces. But the only reference to that in the Inquirer article was this:
- The transit agency is down 105 bus operators, officials said. Austerity measures during last year’s coronavirus shutdowns, including a four-month hiring free(Nat Lownes, of the Philly Transit Riders Union) said some of his friends who are bus operators tell him they’re worn out with the demands of the job, which include enforcing federal mask regulations and often dealing with irate riders. “It can be brutal,” he said.
The Inquirer article didn’t have a single word about bus drivers themselves not wanting to wear masks, and while some passengers don’t want to wear the silly things for a thirty-minute ride, the drivers are required to have them on for an eight hour, or longer, shift.
This is why I frequently refer to journolists. The spelling ‘journolist’ comes from JournoList, an email list of 400 influential and politically liberal journalists, the exposure of which called into question their objectivity. I use the term ‘journolism’ frequently when writing about media bias. There’s really no way that Thomas Fitzgerald, the article author, didn’t know about the frustration of bus drivers and others having to wear face masks for hours on end, and the stories of the patricians going maskless while their ‘servants’ had to wear face diapers aren’t going to encourage people to take jobs requiring the wearing of masks.
An actual journalist would have reported on that, but the editorial position of the Inquirer is to support mask and vaccine mandates, and the credentialed media just don’t like reporting on things with which they disagree.
If wearing a mask while you drive a bus is your biggest complaint, you have a cushy job. Stop complaining. Grow up. Get vaccinated and wear the mask.
Well, some have, but the shortage of bus drivers has been well documented, and multiple sources have stated that part of the reason for the shortage is because potential drivers would rather do something else than take a job where they have to wear a mask all day.
I know, I know, people actually exercising their freedom annoys you.
And you missed the point of the article, that being that The Philadelphia Inquirer writer, who almost certainly knows that the mask mandate is contributing to the shortage of drivers, omitted that from his story.
Do you believe that the credentialed media ought to censor important parts of the story?