The entire problem with victim blaming is that "do it to yourself" is a sliding scale and it's hard to know where to properly draw the line.
I think most of us would probably agree that getting covid while doing nothing to protect yourself makes one less sympathetic than many other victims, but I firmly disagree with this sweeping statement about victim blaming in general.
There are people literally claiming masks and vaccines are against their religion. That's not victim blaming, it's stating a fact. It's the same as saying Joe got hurt in a car crash and wasn't wearing a seatbelt.
Like I said, I'm not saying that this was victim blaming, I'm only protesting against this explanation for why it's not:
> It's not really victim blaming if you do it to yourself.
"They did it to themselves" is always the structure of a victim blaming exercise. That doesn't mean that every time someone says "they did it to themselves" it's victim blaming, but you have to actually demonstrate why it's true in this case that the victim did it to themselves.
For example, to add some nuance to your car crash example: if Joe died in a car crash and wasn't wearing his seatbelt, it would obviously not be victim blaming if he were drunk and spun out of control. It probably would be victim blaming if he were hit by a drunk and happened to also not be wearing his seatbelt. Yes, he should have been wearing a seatbelt, but the context makes him a victim regardless, and it would be inappropriate to say "he did it to himself", even if it might have been appropriate in the case where he was also the drunk.
Lots of people are careful while crossing the street, yet some of those careful people still get hit by cars. That doesn't mean that you stop being careful while crossing the street.
As for the whole mask debate. I'm not sure how effective they were ate preventing people from catching COVID. After all, most people wore masks that were poorly fitting. I am fairly confident that it cut down on the amount of airborne COVID, or at least reduced exposure in face-to-face interactions. Unfortunately, most people only seemed to be concerned about the selfish angle and few people seemed to be concerned about the selfless angle.
If you're hit by a car, there is another party to the incident whose responsibility to avoid hitting people is at play. It is generally understood that a driver has a greater duty to avoid hitting people than people do to avoid getting hit. To wit, people have a right to not be hit by cars. It is a crime or wrongful act.
Victim Blaming is a logical fallacy in which the responsibility for an incident is misattributed, sloughing blame from the more-responsible party to the less-responsible party.
Catching a disease is not like being hit by a car, even by accident, because there is not a legal obligation to avoid infecting other people if you have a disease. If you catch covid, no crime has been committed.
In fact, the presumption of duty is often reversed, except in exceptionally malicious circumstances. The responsibility for being accidentally infected usually lies with the one who failed to avoid it. Although, it is not unthinkable to expect people to have a legal duty to avoid infecting others, say, by wearing a mask...
But if a person denies that idea, they can't at the same time claim it's not their responsibility that they got sick.
