Why is wearing a face-mask so political?

Yesterday, a good friend of mine posted a passionate video of a woman on Facebook defending her choice not to wear a mask in public places. And I couldn't help but feel disappointed. Still, I decided not to post a personal response. Instead, I posted this video created by the University of Michigan School of Public Health explaining how all of the public health measures recommended by experts makes an impact on stopping the spread of COVID-19. Other individuals who responded were not entirely objective and were shockingly more political, which made me wonder how wearing face masks become a political debate in America? And, is it just as simple as Democrats support wearing masks but Republicans do not?

In early June, the Pew Research Center conducted a poll on American's face mask-wearing behavior. The survey discovered that mask-wearing is indeed becoming a partisan issue. Democrats are more likely to say they wore a mask all or most of the time in the past month (76% vs. 53%) (Igielnik, 2020). While only 49% of conservative Republicans have reported wearing a mask all or most of the time in the past month – 49% compared with 60% of moderate Republicans (Igielnik, 2020).