People of Essex, be forewarned. The man who uses this as his social media image is Ethan Lawrence, candidate for Selectboard. In fact, Ethan Lawrence is the only name on the ballot for the office he seeks. But he’d be such a disaster that town Democratic Party chair Brian Shelden has stepped forward as a write-in candidate in hopes of derailing Lawrence’s bid for office.

Lawrence is an anti-vaxxer, anti-masker, and angry despiser of all things liberal. But he’s presenting himself as a thoughtful moderate in hopes of sneaking into office as Liz Cady did last year in her bid for Essex-Westford school board. Now, Lawrence has every right to be a candidate, but the voters deserve to be informed about his views and his character.

Until very recently, Lawrence maintained a lively, vulgar, conspiratorialist presence on social media. Now that he’s presenting as a moderate, he’s tried to hide his tracks. But hey, this is why God invented screenshots. Here’s a pretty typical example.

We’ve got more, and worse… after the jump.

Unimaginative reposting of lame hateful “jokes”? Check.

Ha ha ha ha no he’s not sorry. Well, he might be sorry now that he’s running for office as a stealth moderate.

Fluffing Joe Rogan with extra bonus implied transphobia? Check.

See, because weightlifting not only builds muscle, but medical expertise as well. I bet you didn’t know that.

Just plan good old hatefulness toward political opponents with extra bonus illiteracy? Check.

Such reasoning. If he doesn’t win the election, at least he can hope for a spot on the Oxford Union debate team.

Final category: Spitting rage fueled by a trivial development? Checkity check check.

Oh, what a side-splitter. Maybe Brad Broyles could give him a tryout?

Lawrence has also posted conspiratorial videos online. This one notes Australian enforcement of mask mandates and warns us that this kind of authoritarianism is in the works right here in the Good Ol’ U.S.A.

Aside from social media, Lawrence has occasionally appeared in conventional media. Too bad for him, he’s quoted as a fervent anti-masker. As in this story from August 2020.

“When [masks first came out, it was about, ‘Oh, you’re going to touch [COVID-19] off of something and then touch your face.’ And then they’re like, ‘Well, it must be aerosolized.’ I laugh because the CDC has posted many times, even the WHO has said the same thing, a healthy individual should not be wearing a mask. And they’ve gone back and forth on it, like three or four times,” said Lawrence.

That was true in the pandemic’s early days, but the experts quickly settled on masking as a sound preventative. But by then, Lawrence’s attention span had expired.

There’s more, but that’s a good representative sample. Voters of Essex, remember this when casting your Town Meeting ballot. Keep this guy out of public office.