08

The two most active threads yesterday were threads that I've already discussed so I'll skip them. As a topic, discussion of air quality easily overwhelmed everything yesterday with threads on various aspects of DC's smoke-filled air popping up in nearly every forum. One of those titled, "Red air quality, are you limiting activity?" and posted in the "Off-Topic" forum, was yesterday's third most active thread. The original poster said that she had moved a meeting that had been planned for outdoors to the inside and was debating about what to do about her kids' swim team in the evening. In many ways, yesterday's reaction to the poor air quality was reminiscent of the COVID pandemic, right down to debates about masks. Many posters went into full panic mode, avoiding nearly any outside exposure and making dire warnings. Others proudly bragged about having just returned from long, maskless runs outside. Posters snarked at those showing concern, implying that they were Chicken Littles. While some posters described a range of adverse reactions to the smoke including watering eyes and sore throats, others claimed to feel nothing as a result of the poor air quality. Discussion turned to related topics such as how to mitigate poor air quality by using air purifiers and who or what was responsible for the smoke. Throughout the thread posters reported about various events being cancelled, again bringing back memories of COVID shutdowns. The COVID analogy was even more explicit in several posts with their authors engaging in past arguments from COVID discussions.