April 3, 2025
A coalition of Black and Jewish advocacy teams is looking for laws to extend penalties for crimes dedicated whereas sporting a masks.
UnMaskHateNY, a coalition of Black and Jewish advocacy teams, has launched an advert marketing campaign advocating for New York State laws that will impose extra penalties on crimes dedicated by masked offenders.
The advert marketing campaign seeks to counter “misinformation” concerning the laws, which some have mistaken for a “masks ban,” Occasions of Israel experiences. The invoice wouldn’t prohibit masks however would enhance penalties for crimes dedicated whereas sporting one.
“With all of the confusion within the debate about regulating the conduct of individuals sporting masks, we thought it might be useful to set the file straight,” the advert says. “Folks can put on masks to their coronary heart’s content material, however they’ll’t put on masks and interact in intimidating, harassing or threatening exercise.”
Titled “Tremendous, Not Tremendous,” the 30-second advert options photographs distinguishing acceptable masks use—similar to for sports activities, medical causes, or non secular functions—from unacceptable use, like concealing one’s identification throughout violent protests or vandalism. The industrial will air this week on cable TV and digital platforms.
“The textual content solely prohibits the sporting of a masks in conditions through which they’re used to cover the identification of an individual partaking in intimidating, threatening, or harassing exercise. Nothing much less, nothing extra,” the advert says.
The marketing campaign aligns with New York Governor Kathy Hochul’s efforts to move the laws as a part of the state funds. The invoice seeks to create the offense of “masked harassment,” growing penalties for crimes dedicated whereas sporting a masks “with the first function of menacing or threatening violence” or “inflicting an individual or group to moderately concern for his or her bodily security.”
The New York department of the American Civil Liberties Union known as the laws a “masks ban” and warned that it might “open the floodgates to disproportionate enforcement.” If handed, the masked harassment regulation would function equally to hate crime laws, which reinforces penalties for offenses motivated by discrimination.
Sporting a masks with out partaking in felony exercise wouldn’t be impacted. New York had anti-masking legal guidelines for over a century till they had been repealed in 2020 as a result of COVID-19 pandemic.
RELATED CONTENT: Microplastics And Pollution Linked to Kidney Harm: New Research Highlights Hidden Risks