Mask mandates in America didn’t start with the coronavirus pandemic. During the Spanish flu of 1918, government officials ordered similar edicts, their media and nonprofit lackeys shamed the resistant, and health agents in some cases went to fatal extremes to punish the noncompliant, Fox News’s Tucker Carlson reported Monday during his monologue. At the height of the worst pandemic in American history – the Spanish flu of 1918 – cities across the country did something, modern America would find familiar. They issued mandatory mask mandates and punished anyone who didn't comply. "The man or woman or child who will not wear a mask now is a dangerous slacker," read a typical announcement from the Red Cross. The city of San Francisco, took the rules so seriously that a city health agent shot a man who refused to wear a mask – he hit the two bystanders who happened to be standing behind the man. That seemed a bit much to some people, but many others went along with it. They were afraid of the virus. They wanted to do their part to stop it. Most of all, they trusted their leaders. If their leaders put a mandate in place, they assumed it was for a good reason and they wanted to help. (Fox News) But then something happened that shook the American public from their blind obedience. A photograph surfaced from a boxing match in San Francisco. Among those attending were several high-ranking public officials—all unmasked. “The photograph went national. Americans were shocked to discover that the people making and enforcing the rules had no intention of following those rules,” Carlson said. “Mask mandates across the country ended shortly after. The public was willing to endure inconvenience, but not hypocrisy.”