The Lesbian Bar That Tried to Make Masks Optional

In August of 2026—five years after the peak of COVID hysteria—a lesbian bar in Greenfield, Massachusetts, posted an Instagram update that would tear its community apart. Last Ditch bar and arts venue announced that it would open Saturday nights as "mask optional," relaxing a policy that had previously required patrons to wear "a well-fitted KN95 mask or better at all times." The response was immediate and vicious. "People like you kill disabled people in the name of your own leisure and convenience," wrote one commenter. Another hoped the venue would "get firebombed for robbing my fellow immunocompromised people of their Saturday plans." The thread grew to 442 comments.

This is the story the Boston Globe published in full, and Matt Walsh reads it aloud on his show not because he has a clever take to offer, but because the event itself is so bizarre that it leaves almost no room for analysis. "All I can do," he says, "is simply relay it to you in stupefied amazement." The bar had only relaxed the policy for one night of the week. Masks were optional, not prohibited. And Greenfield had not reported any COVID cases in more than two months. None of that mattered.

The Logic of the Firestorm