Maybe it's different in different regions but, in my opinion, wearing masks, social distancing, avoiding unnecessary outings, etc. is not intended to keep no one from ever getting sick. I still see it as flattening the curve to keep the number of hospitalizations below the number of available beds. I suspect your strategy of just opening everything up wide and going back to normal would result in a yo-yo between wide open and fully locked down. With things in a phased opening and people wearing masks and such, we can keep our lives more "steady" but without the rampant outbreaks we saw in March and couldn't manage.
Admittedly, there are some people who will never get it. Every time my wife freaks out about "100 new cases in our province today", I ask how many in hospital and remind her that our health minister hasn't told us (and probably won't) how many beds are available but presumably she's watching those numbers and advising the premier accordingly. Whether he follows that advice is obviously another matter.