An egregore is an image I keep coming back to as well. How to tackle an egregore this big? Perhaps only by hiding (which I have failed to do) - or by openly attacking it so that others who see it too can be strengthened.
This is the most divisive topic of the age. You are free to express any opinion you like about it (this isn’t Facebook) but you must do so with respect for others and their views.
If you disagree with my own views enough to unsubscribe, I wish you well, but please don't post here or email me to tell me so.
Please be open and kind, even as you disagree. Anyone who offers up abuse, insults or unkindness will be bundled into a truck by Australian soldiers - or just see their comment deleted.
Having been with the hundreds of thousands who rallied in Melbourne last Saturday and felt the strength of their resistance, I feel at this darkest hour there may still be light - perhaps that is the way things work. For me and I think many who were there - many young women and children - the threat to force children to be "treated" - injected - is the absolute red line. But the fight is now against the rest - the majority of our community - who have become the vigilante police, and who want the vaccine passports so that THEY can go out safely. They have been lobotomised by 18 months of lies and fear and corrupted science, and cannot believe the truth. It is also worth noting that from conversations I find that many in the marginalised parts of society, - Islamic community, Indigenous community - who hear their news through friends and social media are being forced to comply against their better instincts.
I hope I can help you keep up the fight Paul, also contributing similar thoughts on my blog 1489.is - which represents a sort of medieval corruption of 1984.
I'm one of the compliant, and it's been bugging me. Haven't had my 'Vaccine Moment' till now. I'm wondering why. Your words made me wonder even more. I feel invited to spend more time in prayer for wisdom and direction.
I think, unfortunately, the church is often not really the church. In WW2 the vast majority of churches couldn't get in line fast enough to support the government propaganda. Not much has changed.
I've been pondering on this some more, and you know: the Narrative was at first one of solidarity. This is the story I endorsed when I got vaccinated. Still mourning how ugly it got last months.
Mathias Desmet is so cogent on this. I'm so glad to have found him and this explanation. From very early on it felt to me like a kind of mass psychosis. There's a good infographic on this, which talks about menticide, produced by After Skool.
Having a bit of trouble with the frame of mass psychosis when it comes to a choice I made myself out of the will to do good. Is the idea of people making an atonomous for them moral choice (whether it's good one or not) still an option in this story of mass formation?
In my opinion, mass psychosis is easier to understand and come to terms with when you awaken to the fact that power systems—whether they be government, corporate, etc.—naturally employ strategies to limit independent thought. These systems understand the psychology of everyone’s desire to what they believe is right—a moral choice. They can then use this natural drive/motive to control/nudge/predict people’s behavior at large. To begin to understand this more deeply, as you awaken, ask yourself from where did you get the idea that doing what you did was “good”? It is likely that you—like most others—got that idea from within the social system which you are currently a part of.
Deeper down, you’ll find that your very notion of who you are has been described externally, and for most of your life it has been somewhat comfortable and easy to accept. Only once the chains begin to tighten, as discomfort grows, are we given the insight to see the truth. This time, as uncomfortable and scary as it is, is a gift to us. It is an opportunity to begin to accept who we really are, to step into a life of courage, to feel true and honest love. Once you awaken to the truth, you can have compassion on those still in chains.
We’re so glad you are here, we’ve been waiting for you!
Alan Watts on the same subject - "We seldom realize, for example that our most private thoughts and emotions are not actually our own. For we think in terms of languages and images which we did not invent, but which were given to us by our society."
I find that a lot of propaganda and manipulation are based on flattery and divisiveness. You're a good moral person against those bad immoral granny killers who don't believe in science.
I find this talk of 'awakening' disturbingly gnostic. I'm not sure who the 'we' are who are so glad, and I also don't understand what the 'here' in this same sentence means.
“Reflecting on the tragic generation of poets, his contemporaries in London in the eighteen-nineties, Yeats asks:
‘What portion in the world can the artist have who has awakened from the common dream but dissipation and despair’
To awaken from the common dream comes neither naturally nor easily to us.
Sir Gawain baulked as did Nietzsche:
‘I suddenly woke up in the midst of a dream, but only to the consciousness that I am dreaming and that I must go on dreaming lest I perish- as a somnambulist must go on dreaming lest he fall.’...” John Moriarty
We are conditioned to the common dream from our infancy, at four we are uni-formed and before we reach puberty we have a smartphone to hypnotise us. We are conscripted to the common dream and it is harder than Yeats or Nietzsche could ever have imagined now to awaken. Maybe it’s the poets and the artists who can sound the bell now but being kept in a constant state of frenzied fright, how could anybody possibly hear I wonder?
Science is God and saviour of our era and has supreme authority, We have complete faith in it and don’t question the Prescribed commandments. Scientific fundamentalism has replaced religious fundamentalism and extremism and this is the real threat to humanity. It dictates our world view and we have become totally dependent on pharma and tech to survive.
So, who can wake up to that reality about our species and face head on the reality that we have plundered our planet and now we may be sleepwalking ourselves to ultimate disaster. What a virus humanity has become having sucked the lifeblood from the planet and it’s inhabitants we now turn on ourselves.
Psychosis or hypnosis? Who knows and who can sound the bell in our time?
Hey Elsa, for me freedom of choice is the primary aspect of all of this; you had the right to make an informed choice and you did whatever your motive/s - I celebrate this. The most frightening thing is the loss of this freedom to choose and the fervour of ordinary people (neighbours friends, famiily) who are in support of this loss. It's so hard to see them in the same light.
Wonderful, my comment got deleted, I'll try again. You say "the Narrative was at first one of solidarity", this is mass formation as it's not meeting with real human beings, flesh and blood but acting upon propaganda. The phrase itself is an oxymoron, how can solidarity be a narrative?
Beware that people can do truly evil things in the name of good. The "common good" narrative is used by totalitarian regimes to justify loss of liberties and mass killings. It's been the case for the past 1.5 years. "Do good" to eradicate covid, no matter what cost, even if more lives are lost to the lockdowns and vaccines.
Yes, I'm aware of this possibility, as you can read in my previous comments. As to your question 'how can solidarity be a narrative': I think for us as humans 'narrative' is all we have. Reality belongs to God.
I don't agree with this, and I think we have to be careful with these ideas. Mass hypnosis is very real (it's what advertising is for, and what social media does) but we can all too easily fall into believeing we are the 'awakened' ones. This is what both sides are currently doing: assuming the other are 'sheeple' or 'covidiots.' It's an enemy narrative. I think the solidarity was real, as it was in, say World War Two in Britain.
The balance between liberty and security is the conundrum at the heart of the modern liberal state. In reality we have never been as 'liberal' as we pretended, I think, and this is becoming clear.
A very good point and I have been pondering it too. And what really broke that solidarity? It was the vaccines. As soon as a Machine-manufactured, profitable tech solution entered the mix, we were always going to start dividing. It almost looks like a moral lesson.
Personally, I experienced the loss of solidarity in the Netherlands when the QR passes arrived. At that point being vaccinated became a story of privilege. Vaccines in itself have done great jobs, I think, for instance in battling some ugly diseases like polio, thyphoid, measles. In that light vaccines might also be an example of science's solidarity with humankind. What do you think?
That's probably right. It's not the vaccines as such which injetc the divisions, but the regime around them, and the way they are used to divide. Presented to us as one possible part of a wider response to covid, they could indeed bhave been beneficial - and arguably they have been in a medical sense, which matters. But the associated QR codes, as you say, immediately made them a tool of social division and control.
I doubt Biden was the originator or even a pusher of the QR codes. I imagine he feels like many of us the wrongness of our culture and like us is trapped in his position, even though president, by a dilemma: If COVID turns out to be the horror that it could have been, he has to act decisively and humanely to prevent a crumbling of his party's (and maybe country's) future, and the re-ascendence of the Orange Clown. This whether he is a sheeple or not.
And remember, most of these vaccine decisions were made before it came so easily seen that the American psyche was no longer comfortable with top-down government .
Yes, but the vaccines against covid19 are not traditional vaccines but they based on a new biotechnology, never previously tested on humans, involving mRNA instructing the cells’ machinery to produce the spike protein, which tends to accumulate in ovaries. According to the inventor of the mRNA vaccine technology, Dr. Robert Malone, the spike protein may even affect the health of future generations.
The name Edward Bernays keeps popping into my mind when I think about this coercion. He was a nephew of Sigmund Freud who founded the field of public relations. I also think about Cambridge Analytica and the various odd narrative popping up in recent years. Unelected people are driving the bus, but they are getting sloppy.
Yes Elsa, prayer, wisdom and direction is what we all need right now. I think right now we are all like coming out of different cocoons, entwinned in different fabrics of various totalitarian misinformation, whether political or spiritual and I think at this time authentic prayer with God will help us to synergise the information clouding our busy minds. An anonymous writer called this the cloud of unknowing which becomes a knowing, an intuition which is God given, described as our intuitive sixth sense. Authentic foreboding truth is the knowing that butterflies seek during the exodus from the religious and poli-technical machine.
Not all religious machines are identical, the components of mine were encased with ‘for your own good literature’ but Jesus didn’t say it was wrong to have wealth he just said that it was wrong to love wealth because much evil can come from the love of money.
I remember when I was in the cocoon reading the scriptures in Timothy about the love of money being at the root of all evil. At those times I pondered on how evil would be manifest in the end times of which were to come. I used to read the scriptures in revelation which I now understand in modernity alludes to inflation and am writing this journal to tell the world not to worry because God has written the script from beginning to end and holds the crown.
God owns everything, if we have his joy and we trust him we will be ok.
Not as yet no. There is a very evil undercurrent undermining his findings.
The corruption won't change for now. This is a spiritual battle. Non violent action and practical support and exposure are our artillery. Our spiritual armour is what will preserve our souls.
I don't think I have ever agreed (though with a very heavy heart) more with an article in my whole life. What has been astonishing is the way the 'left', which up until 18 months ago I considered myself a part of, has endorsed these steady erosions of freedom, have almost welcomed them in fact. If you aren't already familiar with it I would take a look at the website of Simon Elmer's Architects for Social Housing where there a vast body of writing on these developments. Thanks again for this light in the dark.
My feelings about the 'left', with which I fellow-travelled for many years, are much the same. I have an essay planned on just that subject. I will take a look at that website; thanks. What the left is becoming is part of the strange bigger picture of the age, I think.
I guess Left/Right is collapsing and Freedom/Coercion is replacing it. Paul, I can't thank you enough for your writing and for the solace I have found on these comment pages.
The centre left is done; being absorbed into a moral black hole of its own making. Horrific.
I avoid Twitter (mainly for the reasons contained in the following tweet with all of its unbridled anger and loathing) but someone passed this on to me and I thought it's (sadly) quite a good example of so much of the rhetoric from those on the liberal left these days. This guy (Jerry Saltz) is a senior art critic for New York Magazine, previously he held the same position at The Village Voice, and is also a Pulitizer prize winner. Yesterday he said, on Twitter:
'My latest Covid thought is “Let her rip:” Meaning, we who are lucky enough to be triple & double vaxed are pretty protected. Let the rest die. I know they pose a danger to us all. But we are more than 97% protected from them. If they want to die, I say let them die. Freedom.'
Let the rest die. No room for nuance, no empathy for those who are afraid or unable to be vaccinated for various reasons. Just this othering, the holy 'we' and the unclean 'them'. The fact that he thought this was a perfectly fine thing to say to his half a million followers tells us a lot about the state of the world we are currently living in.
With an IFR of 0.2% I will happily give people of this ilk the middle finger as they will not get their wish. In less than a year the unvaccinated will be the healthiest people on the planet and 5 billion people will have "buyer's remorse".
I feel that the future is a crisis in human immunity.
Even if every single person gets vaccinated it will not eradicate covid 19. We are creating a dependency on pharma.
Is this really a vaccine? It’s an RNA injection that reduces severity of symptoms for a period of time. Do you really think that this stops with a booster? Not at all this is continuous periodic injections.
As I see it we have polluted our macrocosm and upset the balance of nature we are now ,30 years too late, talking about biodiversity. And now we will do likewise at a microcosmic level and there will be consequences at some point.
People just totally trust the science and cannot even conceive that it could be wrong.
You can farm your land organically but cannot manage your body organically it seems.
It's scary and pathetic of Jerry S. I used to follow him on Instagram, but his feed was actually the first clue I had that this vaccine thing was going to get really ugly. I unfollowed him a few months ago when he started telling people to "shun their unvaccinated friends and family." I don't need that in my IG feed or my life. Just say no.
Waking bleary-eyed from the Post-Modernist dream, a foul taste in the mouth and the hangover from hell is truly unpleasant; but its the waking that is important now, not the need to vomit.
As an old leftist myself, I have been observing with complete bewilderment my old peers devolve into an authoritarian mob supporting an official narrative that from the start had the feel and taste of a giant corporate operation. For anyone wondering how this transformation, or this revelation of a hidden personality, came about, I highly recommend this recent piece by Toby Green and Thomas Fazi: https://unherd.com/2021/11/the-lefts-covid-failure/?=frlh
Thank you, oac. I read the article, and though it started well, by the end the author's left leaning had surfaced again and I felt there was little insight as to how to navigate the fetid morass the left wing finds itself wading through these days. In turn, I would thoroughly recommend 'The Master and His Emissary' by Ian McGilchrist - his (physiological/neurological) take on the inherent duality of humans (Left Brain & Right Brain), and our shift toward authoritarianism being correlated to increasing Left Brain dominance is really quite...exciting; an apolitical, intuition generated, science backed, tight beam focus into the shadowed cortical folds of our matter-emergent minds. It really is excellent, and has enabled an already open mind a far wider view point from which to gather thoughts..and gird loins.
It's so bewildering and distressing isn't it? I have always considered myself to be politically left too, in fact I was a member of the Labour party for many years, but in the past two years pretty much all my beliefs that were attached to constructs have fallen away.
that's because you have realised that your beliefs were only constructs themselves. now you can truly see that everything you thought was true is inverted
Another ex-lefty here. It’s deeply troubling how far the left has diverged from the concept of freedom, both in thought and in deed. Perhaps it was always like that and I just didn’t notice quickly enough.
There was a point some 15 years or so ago where I thought I was on the left yet kept finding myself attacked for straying from orthodoxy. At the same time I began to notice how most liberals were not actually driven by principles at all, but rather most closely resembled fanatics of a sports team. Team Donkey in the USA. Donkeys good, Elephants bad, we don't need to discuss how and why (and in particular we must never discuss why Donkeys and Elephants seem to quietly collaborate on so many harmful policies).
So I wandered far off the map, to where today I see a culture filled with crazy people; a wetiko-riddled global slave camp ruled by a thin strata of sociopaths. I have no particular solutions as of yet, but I instinctively feel this: Do Not Want.
I maybe wrong but I think in this country at least Labour (and the left) saw the NHS as their core issue, their opposition to the dismantling and privatization they feared was gradually happening under Tory rule was a key message and one that the majority of the population would probably agree with them on. So to back up that position all they could do was to call for ever more draconian lockdown rules to be implemented to protect that institution and its workers. Whenever the government announced a new set of measures Labour’s response was to demand that they be introduced sooner and for longer. The space for a different narrative, one that questioned the efficacy of lockdowns and the closing of schools, was left empty. All of the political parties (with the exception of a few dissidents on the right of the Conservative party) endorsed the measures; it was just a question of how ‘soft’ or ‘hard’ they were in terms of the nature of those measures: lockdown sooner/later, lockdown for longer/shorter. For Labour to even countenance not taking these measures would have amounted to a betrayal of the institution and staff of the NHS, their support of which formed the majority of their electoral appeal. And especially as the media, to a degree of consensus I’ve never seen before, all took the line that these restrictions were absolutely necessary to stop the spread of the virus.
This same position was maintained by Labour during the vaccine rollout, especially during the early phases when we were told that the vaccines might actually stop the transmission of Covid rather than simply mitigate the severity of the symptoms. To do anything other than endorse these vaccines, and their widespread use, would have been seen as not wanting the pandemic to end and looking to add yet more patients to our endlessly overstretched health service. Any caveats as to the safety of the vaccine or the necessity of vaccinating those who weren’t vulnerable to Covid would have been seen as endorsing the dreadful phenomenon of ‘vaccine hesitancy’. These shots were the silver bullets that would end a year of misery, so Labour had to get behind them and the whole ghastly apparatus that was starting to form around them in the form of QR codes and vaccine passports. Public health was firmly Labour territory, but this crisis was playing out under Conservative rule so what to do but double down on any and all measures and demand even more of them, tougher and longer. Anything to stop the spread.
This would only account for what happened to the political left in this country where the NHS occupies a hugely important position in the national consciousness and Labour are its white knight of defence against the forces that continually conspire against it. But I imagine it’s a similar case elsewhere where the public good (the sacred ground of the left) must always trump the rights of the individual, now extending, in a way that would have been unimaginable 2 years ago, to our individual bodily autonomy. After all the countries that have slid most quickly into authoritarian rule and draconian Covid measures and mandates have tended to have centrist or nominally left of centre governments: New Zealand, Australia, USA, France. It’s also interesting note that when the emergency covid bill was up for renewal in March the only MPs who voted against it were right wing Tory backbenchers and the rump of Jeremy Corbyn’s old shadow cabinet (the extreme left in the eyes of the media) along with ten Liberal Democrats. A group of individuals who’d either had their shot at power or knew they were never going to get near it and therefore had nothing to lose by going against the grain. The rest of the Labour party blithely waved it through, as they have everything else, without seeming to bat an eyelid. Emergency powers, vaccines and boosters for all, lockdowns, bar and restaurant closures, masks for children in schools, social media censorship, vilification and harassment of the unvaccinated. Anything to stop the spread.
It's so disconcerting that nobody with a high media profile seems to be pointing out that (as Paul notes) the vaccines don't actually work in the way we were told they would. They don't stop anyone catching Covid. They don't stop transmission. At best, they could reduce the severity of an infection -- but that effect is impossible to measure. It might not even be the case. How incredible that no major commentator is saying "Hang on... the emperor is starkers".
As with most ideologies, any failure /cannot/ be the fault of the ideology, and can only be addressed by the administration of yet more of the failing ideology. Booster shots forever.
As our author reminds us this is new technology (unproved or used)-- its not the vaccines of the past. Big clue there as to the motivation and whats coming.
I will say that Labour in my lifetime has always been an authoritarian force. Blair brought in restrictions on protests and gatherings, 'hate speech' laws and all the panoply of early restrictions on speech and conduct which have been gathering pace ever since. I think its socialist roots simply mean that even neoliberals like Blair will tend towards a desire for centralised state control.
Which is not to suggest that the Tories are not authoritarians too. They very much have been over the years. But there's a libertarian rump on the right which seems absent on the left. More anarchists needed in parliament maybe.
Yes, perhaps, for a long time now, these distinctions have actually been illusory and unhelpful, but we hang and hold on to them anyway in the absence of anything else. I have found myself in the strange position recently of supporting the views of people on the libertarian right, which has provoked a kind of vertigo, or discombobulation, due to past allegiances that were very firmly on the other side, and had been for a long time. The enemy has now become my friend. There seems to be a far greater tolerance for dissent on what I would have firmly thought of (not in a good way) as the 'other' side 18 months ago. Perhaps, more broadly, we all need to shed these tribal vestiges to move forward. What, at first, was upsetting, for me, is now slowly turning into something else; a recognition that these century-plus (and beyond) old groupings that still dominate the media and political landscape are no longer of any use, at all, in the situation we find ourselves in now. Perhaps something new is being born from all of this. It certainly feels that way.
Except the libertarian rump, while rejecting face masks and COVID controls, had no problem voting through one of the most repressive policing bills recently.
There is a reason that I refer to them as "Team D" and "Team R".
That said, I hear more reasoned and fact-based (as opposed to slogan-based) arguments from sports fans as to why they cheer for a given team than I hear from most political partisans.
Also from the same camp. After a discussion with a NDP candidate on my doorstep in Sept (Justin Trudeau Liberal was re-elected in Canada)where human rights for all was NOT part of their platform as it had been since I voted at age 18 (now 62) I realized it was all a veneer. Being inclusive is what good people are supposed to do - be welcoming and supportive of everyones human rights.
I agree it was always like this with cracks showing (ie people not helping people in distress in the street-- don't want to get involved), dead migrants on the shores of Europe (remember the small child)-- what has changed there-- still more. So many examples of a society that pushed enough will find the villain to be whoever the Machine tells them it is.
Me too. It's when the "good" of the collective subsumes that of the individual maybe where problems start? Remember the many examples of "socialist" movements morphing into authoritarianism/fascism/totalitarianism though: Hitler, Mussolini, Stalin, Pol Pot...
Yes, I too was a social-democrat most of my life. But what has happened this last year has turned me fully to anarchism. There simply does not appear to be any way to have a society in which we allow authority (as in a special class with privileges to dominate others not possessed by the rest of society) to exist.
This is probably the best essay I have read about it, especially as it deals with the fact that you can still have 'authority' but not 'authority to dominate people against their will':
The right would do much the same, given the chance.
For political power attracts sociopaths the way catnip attracts cats. The history of the medieval and Renaissance Catholic Church is most instructive here, and this an institution that traces its founding to Jesus Christ Himself.
The church helped organize society and provide some semblance of structure after the void left by the fall of the Roman empire (this transfer of power occurred over a couple hundred years, not overnight). But eventually the Church got too powerful, and as you rightly point out, power corrupts. This is when they started selling indulgences, remember? The reason we had separation of Church and State was thanks to the printing press, and the Church no longer had a monopoly on the word of God or knowledge in general (prior the Church had a monopoly on writing books, by hand).
We are now at an inflection point where we desperately need the separation of Money and State. The insanity of the sociopaths in power is unchecked because they have access to un-sound money, they print money at will to fund whatever, not limited by resources. They don't even need taxpayer money to go to war, which is why we can "afford" to go to war for 20+ years. We need sound money yesterday.
But where, how? I encourage all of you to learn about bitcoin please. Which is a currency, a monetary system, and an independent system of property rights. Un-confiscatable by governments. Bitcoin is freedom money. I don't see how we will be able to fight the machine, if they can freeze our bank accounts the moment they decide we are persona non-grata. Need separation of Money and State.
With regard to bitcoin and crypto, i highly recommend the work of bantam joe (has a website and on facebook) and Alison Mcdowell (wrbsite is 'wrench in the gears' and also on telegram and twitter) as well as the website 'silicon icarus' by Raul Diego, for a deeper dive into what crypto and blockchain is all about.
Bitcoin is not "crypto", and "crypto" is not Bitcoin. So called "crypto" will be a tool the current fascist establishment will use to push for CBDCs (central bank digital currencies) and enforce complete financial surveillance. Bitcoin on the other hand, because of its Proof-of-Work consensus mechanism, cannot be controlled by anyone, hence why it is freedom money. The environmentalists are attacking it because (gasp) it uses energy to secure and protect this independent monetary system.
To learn about bitcoin I would specifically avoid Twitter & Telegram. Books like "The Bitcoin Standard" by Saifedean Ammous are a wonderful place to start which will lead to other works. You can also search for the free online course "PRDV151: Bitcoin for Everybody" which contains a myriad of articles and curated content to bring you up to speed on the monetary revolution currently underway.
Thank you for the recommendations Claudia, i will look it up. Just to clarify (since it seems you didn't bother to look up the sources I suggested but assumed you already know what "this is all about"), the sources I gave are NOT environmentalists (in fact, are strongly critical of rhe billionaire's fake-environmentalism and grenwashing which seems to be a thin viel for bringing in the 4th insustrial revolution) but are very deep researchers in the field (one of them, bantam joe, is actually a programmer and developer on blockchain, the other two are some of the deepest researchers in the world today), so I would still highly recommend reading through before jumping to premature conclusions and dismissing things off-hand so arrogantly.
Amd if I may add a more general note, it seems increasingly difficult to talk with anyone about anything in these divisive times, society seem to have eegressed into the infantile egoic war mentality phase, most seem so incredibly attached abd identified with our mental position, and seem so hostile to anything that isn't 100% in agreement with our mental position.
My wish is that we could rise above the arrogance and hostility and "digging of heels" involved in this egoic war mentality (which seem to be the default approach of almost everyone today) and could actually comminocate and listen.
Couldn't agree more, the left has really shown it's Stalinist tendencies, any erring from the line and you are shot on shot on social media by these people, many I considered friends. Even the anarchists are as bad - that really disturbs me
I'm not completely sure who you are referring to when saying 'the Left', but if you are talking about the Wall St corporate Democrats and their hypnotized CNN/WashPost zombies then this is most definitely NOT the left, these are right wing capitalist liberals who, except for identity politics, are practically indistiguishable from the capitalist republicans in their servitude to the billionaire class.. the only tool that these two billionaire-owmed partirs have to supposedly distinguish themselves from each other (to create the appearance of choice between two distinct options) is identity politics, amd that is exactly.why identity politics has such gigantic role kn american politics, without it the scamcwould be seen right through, that there is only one big corporate war party in america working for the billionaire class. Identity politics is the only tool the have to create the appearance of two distinct options.
In my observation, the left is non-existant in the anglo world today, has been erased from view a long time ago already, the only choice we have today in the anglo world is between right wing capitalist conservatives and right wing capitalist liberals, which are deceptively called 'the left' even though they have nothing to do with the left, and in fact are doing everything in their power to destroy the left, to destroy what was traditionally called the left, not the Democratic party corporation (or its hypnotized MSNBC zombies), which is a right wing party through and through - pro war, pro capitalist, pro empire, pro Wall St, pro the ultra wealthy class..
I actually just wrote about it in a recent post, of interested see the last 3 paragraphs of this post
No I don't mean them, I am in the UK and don't engage a lot with American politics, more that in Europe and specifically the UK. Having said that, I don't see massive difference some ways, The centrist mainstream Labour Party are much stricter on Covid measures than the government and for anyone who asks questions they are politely told to get in line. The Momentum, Corbynite left and anarchists who I would often have been on the streets with have become the Covid storm troops fulfilling governments and oppositions role for them. If you waiver one iota from Covid fear you are excommunicated, destroyed on line and shunned on the street. It has been incredibly disillusioning to experience this, I am not a Covid denier and had my first two vaccines but to raise any questions - well you are a threat to life and should be treated as such
Thank you Chris, I thought I was replying to the original commentor, John P, but nonetheless I do appreciate learning what's happening in the UK, which indeed sounds horrible and devastating.
I do know, though, of a couple of resources from the UK left who are profoundly critical of the official narrative, I assume you already know about them but will mention just in case - Off-Guardian and Winter Oak Press. And in the European left (in Italy) i am aware of Giorgio Agamben...
Thanks for doing this. It is extremely hard to have sensible discussions around tricky subjects these days. It's very rare to change our minds at all really, we tend to look for viewpoints that support our existing perspective, don't we? So it's very interesting and important when a respected writer takes a dissenting or contrary position.
That said, it makes me consider that perhaps the vehicle for the message is as important as the message itself sometimes (I'm thinking about what you wrote because you wrote it, but had it come from another source I probably wouldn't be so much) and perhaps this is also part of the problem we face today.
I think that's absolutely right. It's part of the tribalism, and it also relates to our tendency towards confirmation bias. The thing that is being said, correct or incorrect, is first filtered through who said it, and whether or not they are One Of Us. I think this is another thing that has always been true, but which has been brought very clearly into the light now.
Another fantastic article! I will never take this vaccine. I first had Covid in March 2020, and listened to the news intensely. With many dying on those ventilators, I was full of fear, but my intuition spoke to me about avoiding hospital as there was no cure, I was so afraid, for I could hardly breathe. I sought to steam my lungs and seek cures on the internet. During that time, I bumped into Doctors who are now censored, which then elicited within me a sense of deep mistrust of authority and that all was not well, that this was a genesis of dissenters speaking out against a strange new normal narrative.
I have read your comments here Paul and they resonate with mine. Thank you for your hard work, encouragement, courage and faith. I so look forward to your writings and am thankful for you providing this space so we can all share respectfully. My hope is that your words will touch those asleep to wake up and see what is really going on.
That's one of the things that has collapsed in the last 5 years: institutional trust. In America at least (according to Gallup), the only national institution above 40% trust is the military. Only 20% of Americans trust big corporations or the media, so it's not surprising that huge national media companies aren't believed.
However, I have a group of writers and journalists that I do trust: Bari Weiss, Rod Dreher, Paul, to a lesser extent Glenn Greenwald, Andy Ngo, Chris Rufo. I don't agree with all of these people, but if one of them says it happened, I have confidence that it did, or that they will come clean and correct their mistakes. Notice that none of those names work for a major media company. This is what happens in untrusting societies: the messenger becomes as important at the message itself.
I disagree. The military has the highest percentage of trust because it is us. Our mothers, fathers, sons, daughters, brothers and sisters. Now if that 40% figure would refer to military leadership you might be right to be afraid.
Work out the logic of this statement if you can: "The ECHR ruled last week that compulsory vaccination can be considered "necessary in a democratic society"."
It specifies that member states should not discriminate on the basis of vaccination status in any way so that there is no pressure to be vaccinated without free informed consent. The relevant parts:
7.3.1 ensure that citizens are informed that the vaccination is not mandatory and that no one is under political, social or other pressure to be vaccinated if they do not wish to do so;
7.3.2 ensure that no one is discriminated against for not having been vaccinated, due to possible health risks or not wanting to be vaccinated;
The ruling also notes that political interests that may favour Pharma or other interests should be guarded against. According to the French source I heard this from, the ruling has some power over European states for compliance with resolutions, perhaps unlike the ECHR - which has dubious authority, like other "human rights" bodies - or the ICC for that matter.
The NHS also has similar resolutions in the Equality act of 2010, which were specified in a page on exemptions. I was about to paste the link, but found "this page cannot be found".. any more.
Yes - but informed consent was not obviously a universal good in that period, if its 1966 adoption in the UN's International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights is anything to go by.
It isn't. That Covenant specifically bans only "In particular, no one shall be subjected without his free consent to medical or scientific experimentation." I think that arguably prohibits mandatory vaccination under 'emergency approval' but not all.
But in general it states regarding the right that it lists: "The above-mentioned rights shall not be subject to any restrictions except those which are provided by law, are necessary to protect national security, public order (ordre public), public health or morals or the rights and freedoms of others, and are consistent with the other rights recognized in the present Covenant."
I would submit that informed consent in an absolute sense over a disease with a 34% case fatality rate is insane. Furthermore, smallpox was eradicated with forcible vaccination in 1977, so we had 11 years of multiple nations interpreting the Convenant in a way opposite to what you advocate.
an ex GP living about 2 miles from me. The GMC tried to discredit her and her credible evidence. The reading on her website is about the lengths she went to to clear the abuse and labelling heaped upon her. Judy Mikovitz jailed for speaking out about what Fauci was doing with the science of Aids therapy in 1983/4.
Snopes is a shell of its former self, but their report on Judy Mikovitz seems to imply that her jailing on a charge of stealing came from an employer that may have been making retribution for her mistakes (to put the best spin on it, it is a fascinating story). The controversy over her science work had nothing to do with AIDS. See: snopes.com/fact-check/scientist-vaccine-jailed/
PS, by fascinating I especially mean the part on mouse DNA contamination. Judy Mikovitz may simply have been unaware of the large potential for it. I don't know if that exonerates her or not (it probably doesn't, but I don't know for sure).
Vera Sharov says that the only code that matters in this situation is the Nuremberg Code. Public Health bureaucrats hate it! They tamper with all the other codes, eg Helsinki, the one you mention, etc. But they cannot tamper with Nuremberg. That might be because those that wrote it knew it would happen again ……. So, stick to Nuremberg and ignore everything else.
Terrific piece - thank you for articulating the issues so thoughtfully and so thoroughly and for being a genuinely independent voice. Have followed your work for some years (alerted by a Roger Scruton footnote) and have several of your books. Not by any means in lockstep with all opinions (which would in any case show a sad lack of critical thinking on my own part) but have always found the ideas expressed well worth engaging. You might be glad to hear I’ve just upgraded to a paid sub.
All of this resonates so powerfully with me. Thank you for your honesty, Paul, especially the revelations about yourself. I have experienced exactly the same things - I have to really watch myself for confirmation bias and judging people. I had to delete my Twitter account because I found myself at one point going on there repeatedly to doom-scroll through the drama and division. It shocked me that I was so addictively drawn to all the conflict and vitriol.
Your words about deleting your Twitter account are inspiring. Although I have gathered a large number of resources through my months of scrolling my Tweeter feed, I think I have become addicted to it and although I try to avoid the antagonistic, insensitive, censuring, and downright aggressive comments, they are getting to me and affecting my mental health. Mostly though, under the illusion of catching up on the latest news and interpretations of "reality", I find myself narrowing my interpretative universe to a level that personal interactions with real people would not allow.
That's so true about narrowing one's interpretative universe, so beautifully put. It was affecting my mental health too. I dithered for a while due to fear of missing out. But I have a history of addiction and can't afford to go down that road again - I think the toxic Twitter habit could have led to picking up a drink or a drug. Since deleting my account I've hardly given Twitter a thought and don't miss it at all.
Phew … so glad to hear this, I have been a lockdown sceptic all along and although 71 my Vaccine Moment came with the delivery of an NHS leaflet. It said that for over 75 year olds, there was a one in 10 change of dying if I caught Covid. I immediately went online to assess my risk and realised it was an outright lie. I felt immediately that this was a bridge too far for me. I am studying around personal agency, the use of behavioural ‘nudges’ and the ways in which a herd mentality develops. I have lost friends and had conflicts with family but I will not be moved. Have you read the philosopher Giorgio Agambens latest pieces about the creation of a medical technocratic future? If a person like this can be so villified for his views what kind of society are we now?
Thanks for this recommendation Mary. Have you read 'State of Fear' by Laura Dodsworth? She has interviewed several people involved in behavourial 'nudging'.
no but I heard her speak at the Battle of Ideas on the topic of the ethics of nudging and she was brilliant. Frank Furedi was on the panel as well and has written extensively on the politics of fear.
Actually Mary that statistic is probably correct if you look at a fairly recent set of tables of mortality from birth to 85+ by year from of all places the US public heath establishment. It is almost zero up to about age 12 or so and tops out just above 2% at 85+. My 64 yr old wife is .3%. I can provide the table but keep in mind these numbers are in the range of flu mortality except the young and the very old get hit much harder with the influenza virus depending of course on what year you are looking at. Paul is dead nuts on. RESIST!
“Where are we now? The Epidemic as politics” by Agamben was originally published in 2020. It is a collection of short essays and commentary in translation from the Italian. The above link is to a free, really superb podcast by David Jack in which he reads his October article “ Bare Life and health terror’ it explains how a new political space or ‘‘no touch future’ is being brought in by social distancing and mask wearing which signals the end of community as we have know it.
Thankyou Mary. There are so many interesting and thoughtful essays examining what is happening to our society - or has already happened - but they remain compartmentalised, along with discussion groups around them, like this one. Another good writer and thinker on what he calls "menticide" is Edinburgh psychotherapist Bruce Scott. He is particularly concerned about the effects of this CULTure on child development - masks and lack of normal contact. He tried to have his work published in journals but ran into so much resistance he was forced to publish on his blog:
Thanks for that link. Have you come across Mark Crispin Miller? His foreword to the classic book ‘Propaganda’ by Bernays is fantastic. He’s a professor who’s been teaching in US for decades on the topic of propaganda and is very eloquent. Needless to say his current views are now considered heretical in academia.
Thank you, Paul. A brilliant essay, which I will forward to friends (not all of whom will thank me or it) . By chance (?) only yesterday. I was reading 'The Barcode Moment' for the first time in 'Confessions' (a real hard copy which is such a pleasure to endlessly staring at a screen) and wondering what my moment will be. I have been jagged (as the Scots say) three times now and, given my age, 68, think on balance it's the right thing for me to but I utterly respect all those who think otherwise. I did print out my vaccine passport because I went to Ireland last month for a week. I only had to use it once to go into a restaurant (most of the time we were seeing family). We went back to the restaurant a second time and I was pleased to see they didn't want to see it again as they remembered us. Back here in Edinburgh my token resistance is not to use my phone to scan QR codes for track and trace, although if I'm asked I will fill in a paper form. Partly this is because I distrust what the Scottish govt would use the data for but is also because of my technical incomptence. Yesterday evening we went to a restaurant with friends after seeing the new Bond film, 'No time to die' (all about an evil plot to spread diseases....) and one used his phone to check in. It took a good 10 minutes and two attempts, which confirmed me in my resolution to resist using it.
Good luck in your continued resistance, I look forward part 2.
After reading the book have you got a better idea what your moment will be? Here in Toronto I too saw the Bond Film in October (I am a huge Bond fan) at a drive in and ordered a lovely restaurant meal (take out) to eat (long film!) while enjoying the film. Perfect.
Perhaps it is because I am in the medical field that I see the "much ado about nothing"in comparing COVID vis a vis other horrid flu years and why I resist the fear porn around COVID, but I would like to think it is more due to my curiosity and questioning of anything "authorities" demand. Asking questions and as our author beautifully states about the giant hole in vaccine passports-- the jab does not stop the transmission of COVID. Period.
I think that is all we have to tweet, facebook, instagram, tell our family, friends. Thats it over and over. Forget the masks, how this new jab tech affects (especially footballers!) etc. Just say the jab does not stop the transmission of COVID. Not debatable even by the letter agencies or Dr. Mengele- sorry Fauci.
Tremendous gratitude to you, Paul, for your courage and brilliance. One thing I have noticed here in Vermont, where vaccine rates are very high along with surging cases, is the tremendous strain this has put on friendships. At least among the people I know, those who are not on social media are the ones that are not complying. Those on social media have taken up the Narrative. And they have so easily adopted the vitriol toward the unvaxxed. I don't think this is a coincidence. I hope you will discuss this next.
The social media connection is a very interesting point. I might well look more at that next time. It has become an incredibly useful tool of social control.
This really hit home today. I appreciate your measured reasoning, it is lacking in all of the discussion. Typically I'm one of those, "and on the other hand" type of men. But these days, when I'm speaking with friends, that just seems to be offering the limb up for an amputation.
You should (he says about someone else's livelihood) take this one out from behind the payroll. It deserves much exposure and a wide audience..
Thanks Brian. I've found the same. Being 'reasonable' at present is like laying your head on the block. But becoming a naked partisan is soul-destroying. What a line to walk.
This essay is actually not paywalled for precisely that reason, and I've just been asked to write a version of it elsewhere, so we'll see how much shit hits the fan then!
Thank you so much Paul for so well articulating what many of us comprehend, yet more widely seems either invisible or still 'alarmist' - to find clear, cogent insight into the increasingly blanket dissemination of these 'great lies designed to make us unfree' is a true support for your fellow travellers' hearts and spirits. Despair is the great challenge when we are so often atomised and isolated in our respective bids to walk in the opposite direction of this devastating line of travel. Your notes from what is daily becoming an outright, naked bid to dismantle and reassemble human consciousness as a component within the Machine sing clear and loud to the souls of all of us who are longing to hear the truth that we seek to live by and defend. To convey hope through being fully present to what is is a remarkable gift, it is received with heartfelt gratitude, for it makes all the difference to facing this to know we are anchored in a shared fellow feeling for what it means to be human.
An egregore is an image I keep coming back to as well. How to tackle an egregore this big? Perhaps only by hiding (which I have failed to do) - or by openly attacking it so that others who see it too can be strengthened.
Great comment - many thanks for the perspective. I am somewhat envious ...
I gave mine up about 3 years ago. Hold strong. It's difficult but seems more wise the more time passes
Thank you, I'm encouraged by your words.
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Having been with the hundreds of thousands who rallied in Melbourne last Saturday and felt the strength of their resistance, I feel at this darkest hour there may still be light - perhaps that is the way things work. For me and I think many who were there - many young women and children - the threat to force children to be "treated" - injected - is the absolute red line. But the fight is now against the rest - the majority of our community - who have become the vigilante police, and who want the vaccine passports so that THEY can go out safely. They have been lobotomised by 18 months of lies and fear and corrupted science, and cannot believe the truth. It is also worth noting that from conversations I find that many in the marginalised parts of society, - Islamic community, Indigenous community - who hear their news through friends and social media are being forced to comply against their better instincts.
I hope I can help you keep up the fight Paul, also contributing similar thoughts on my blog 1489.is - which represents a sort of medieval corruption of 1984.
Love your 'lobotomised' sentence above. You nailed it.
CJ Hopkins is fantastic. He is fighting the good fight and he is a very solid writer a real pleasure.
I'm one of the compliant, and it's been bugging me. Haven't had my 'Vaccine Moment' till now. I'm wondering why. Your words made me wonder even more. I feel invited to spend more time in prayer for wisdom and direction.
I think, unfortunately, the church is often not really the church. In WW2 the vast majority of churches couldn't get in line fast enough to support the government propaganda. Not much has changed.
Try this one, arch bishop to boot.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bDwHpMbdho0&t=3s
I've been pondering on this some more, and you know: the Narrative was at first one of solidarity. This is the story I endorsed when I got vaccinated. Still mourning how ugly it got last months.
The solidarity aspect of mass formation is what enables the Narrative to continue to exist. Mathias Desmet talks about this at length.
Mathias Desmet is so cogent on this. I'm so glad to have found him and this explanation. From very early on it felt to me like a kind of mass psychosis. There's a good infographic on this, which talks about menticide, produced by After Skool.
Having a bit of trouble with the frame of mass psychosis when it comes to a choice I made myself out of the will to do good. Is the idea of people making an atonomous for them moral choice (whether it's good one or not) still an option in this story of mass formation?
In my opinion, mass psychosis is easier to understand and come to terms with when you awaken to the fact that power systems—whether they be government, corporate, etc.—naturally employ strategies to limit independent thought. These systems understand the psychology of everyone’s desire to what they believe is right—a moral choice. They can then use this natural drive/motive to control/nudge/predict people’s behavior at large. To begin to understand this more deeply, as you awaken, ask yourself from where did you get the idea that doing what you did was “good”? It is likely that you—like most others—got that idea from within the social system which you are currently a part of.
Deeper down, you’ll find that your very notion of who you are has been described externally, and for most of your life it has been somewhat comfortable and easy to accept. Only once the chains begin to tighten, as discomfort grows, are we given the insight to see the truth. This time, as uncomfortable and scary as it is, is a gift to us. It is an opportunity to begin to accept who we really are, to step into a life of courage, to feel true and honest love. Once you awaken to the truth, you can have compassion on those still in chains.
We’re so glad you are here, we’ve been waiting for you!
Joel, your second paragraph really resonated with me in more ways than one. Thank you for the insightful words.
Wonderfully written Joel.
Alan Watts on the same subject - "We seldom realize, for example that our most private thoughts and emotions are not actually our own. For we think in terms of languages and images which we did not invent, but which were given to us by our society."
I find that a lot of propaganda and manipulation are based on flattery and divisiveness. You're a good moral person against those bad immoral granny killers who don't believe in science.
I find this talk of 'awakening' disturbingly gnostic. I'm not sure who the 'we' are who are so glad, and I also don't understand what the 'here' in this same sentence means.
I wonder if mass hypnosis is more fitting.
“Reflecting on the tragic generation of poets, his contemporaries in London in the eighteen-nineties, Yeats asks:
‘What portion in the world can the artist have who has awakened from the common dream but dissipation and despair’
To awaken from the common dream comes neither naturally nor easily to us.
Sir Gawain baulked as did Nietzsche:
‘I suddenly woke up in the midst of a dream, but only to the consciousness that I am dreaming and that I must go on dreaming lest I perish- as a somnambulist must go on dreaming lest he fall.’...” John Moriarty
We are conditioned to the common dream from our infancy, at four we are uni-formed and before we reach puberty we have a smartphone to hypnotise us. We are conscripted to the common dream and it is harder than Yeats or Nietzsche could ever have imagined now to awaken. Maybe it’s the poets and the artists who can sound the bell now but being kept in a constant state of frenzied fright, how could anybody possibly hear I wonder?
Science is God and saviour of our era and has supreme authority, We have complete faith in it and don’t question the Prescribed commandments. Scientific fundamentalism has replaced religious fundamentalism and extremism and this is the real threat to humanity. It dictates our world view and we have become totally dependent on pharma and tech to survive.
So, who can wake up to that reality about our species and face head on the reality that we have plundered our planet and now we may be sleepwalking ourselves to ultimate disaster. What a virus humanity has become having sucked the lifeblood from the planet and it’s inhabitants we now turn on ourselves.
Psychosis or hypnosis? Who knows and who can sound the bell in our time?
Hey Elsa, for me freedom of choice is the primary aspect of all of this; you had the right to make an informed choice and you did whatever your motive/s - I celebrate this. The most frightening thing is the loss of this freedom to choose and the fervour of ordinary people (neighbours friends, famiily) who are in support of this loss. It's so hard to see them in the same light.
Wonderful, my comment got deleted, I'll try again. You say "the Narrative was at first one of solidarity", this is mass formation as it's not meeting with real human beings, flesh and blood but acting upon propaganda. The phrase itself is an oxymoron, how can solidarity be a narrative?
Beware that people can do truly evil things in the name of good. The "common good" narrative is used by totalitarian regimes to justify loss of liberties and mass killings. It's been the case for the past 1.5 years. "Do good" to eradicate covid, no matter what cost, even if more lives are lost to the lockdowns and vaccines.
Yes, I'm aware of this possibility, as you can read in my previous comments. As to your question 'how can solidarity be a narrative': I think for us as humans 'narrative' is all we have. Reality belongs to God.
I don't agree with this, and I think we have to be careful with these ideas. Mass hypnosis is very real (it's what advertising is for, and what social media does) but we can all too easily fall into believeing we are the 'awakened' ones. This is what both sides are currently doing: assuming the other are 'sheeple' or 'covidiots.' It's an enemy narrative. I think the solidarity was real, as it was in, say World War Two in Britain.
The balance between liberty and security is the conundrum at the heart of the modern liberal state. In reality we have never been as 'liberal' as we pretended, I think, and this is becoming clear.
A very good point and I have been pondering it too. And what really broke that solidarity? It was the vaccines. As soon as a Machine-manufactured, profitable tech solution entered the mix, we were always going to start dividing. It almost looks like a moral lesson.
Personally, I experienced the loss of solidarity in the Netherlands when the QR passes arrived. At that point being vaccinated became a story of privilege. Vaccines in itself have done great jobs, I think, for instance in battling some ugly diseases like polio, thyphoid, measles. In that light vaccines might also be an example of science's solidarity with humankind. What do you think?
That's probably right. It's not the vaccines as such which injetc the divisions, but the regime around them, and the way they are used to divide. Presented to us as one possible part of a wider response to covid, they could indeed bhave been beneficial - and arguably they have been in a medical sense, which matters. But the associated QR codes, as you say, immediately made them a tool of social division and control.
I doubt Biden was the originator or even a pusher of the QR codes. I imagine he feels like many of us the wrongness of our culture and like us is trapped in his position, even though president, by a dilemma: If COVID turns out to be the horror that it could have been, he has to act decisively and humanely to prevent a crumbling of his party's (and maybe country's) future, and the re-ascendence of the Orange Clown. This whether he is a sheeple or not.
And remember, most of these vaccine decisions were made before it came so easily seen that the American psyche was no longer comfortable with top-down government .
Yes, but the vaccines against covid19 are not traditional vaccines but they based on a new biotechnology, never previously tested on humans, involving mRNA instructing the cells’ machinery to produce the spike protein, which tends to accumulate in ovaries. According to the inventor of the mRNA vaccine technology, Dr. Robert Malone, the spike protein may even affect the health of future generations.
Ik hope not, since I've been injected with the stuff :)
The name Edward Bernays keeps popping into my mind when I think about this coercion. He was a nephew of Sigmund Freud who founded the field of public relations. I also think about Cambridge Analytica and the various odd narrative popping up in recent years. Unelected people are driving the bus, but they are getting sloppy.
Yes Elsa, prayer, wisdom and direction is what we all need right now. I think right now we are all like coming out of different cocoons, entwinned in different fabrics of various totalitarian misinformation, whether political or spiritual and I think at this time authentic prayer with God will help us to synergise the information clouding our busy minds. An anonymous writer called this the cloud of unknowing which becomes a knowing, an intuition which is God given, described as our intuitive sixth sense. Authentic foreboding truth is the knowing that butterflies seek during the exodus from the religious and poli-technical machine.
Not all religious machines are identical, the components of mine were encased with ‘for your own good literature’ but Jesus didn’t say it was wrong to have wealth he just said that it was wrong to love wealth because much evil can come from the love of money.
I remember when I was in the cocoon reading the scriptures in Timothy about the love of money being at the root of all evil. At those times I pondered on how evil would be manifest in the end times of which were to come. I used to read the scriptures in revelation which I now understand in modernity alludes to inflation and am writing this journal to tell the world not to worry because God has written the script from beginning to end and holds the crown.
God owns everything, if we have his joy and we trust him we will be ok.
To help fill in the blanks... https://subsplash.com/churchofgladtidings/media/mi/+759kw83.
History of how we got here. Yes, sadly it was developed from here. On other videos he goes into those responsible and the laws broken.
Start with Judy Mikovits, This is the Summit
https://subsplash.com/churchofgladtidings/media/ms/+gxszyrd.
I will watch this one later but she is a hero
Dr Martin really does know what he is talking about is all I can say
Have you seen his most recent ones?
Not as yet no. There is a very evil undercurrent undermining his findings.
The corruption won't change for now. This is a spiritual battle. Non violent action and practical support and exposure are our artillery. Our spiritual armour is what will preserve our souls.
would you like links and a place to follow him?
Yes please send.
I don't think I have ever agreed (though with a very heavy heart) more with an article in my whole life. What has been astonishing is the way the 'left', which up until 18 months ago I considered myself a part of, has endorsed these steady erosions of freedom, have almost welcomed them in fact. If you aren't already familiar with it I would take a look at the website of Simon Elmer's Architects for Social Housing where there a vast body of writing on these developments. Thanks again for this light in the dark.
My feelings about the 'left', with which I fellow-travelled for many years, are much the same. I have an essay planned on just that subject. I will take a look at that website; thanks. What the left is becoming is part of the strange bigger picture of the age, I think.
I guess Left/Right is collapsing and Freedom/Coercion is replacing it. Paul, I can't thank you enough for your writing and for the solace I have found on these comment pages.
The centre left is done; being absorbed into a moral black hole of its own making. Horrific.
I avoid Twitter (mainly for the reasons contained in the following tweet with all of its unbridled anger and loathing) but someone passed this on to me and I thought it's (sadly) quite a good example of so much of the rhetoric from those on the liberal left these days. This guy (Jerry Saltz) is a senior art critic for New York Magazine, previously he held the same position at The Village Voice, and is also a Pulitizer prize winner. Yesterday he said, on Twitter:
'My latest Covid thought is “Let her rip:” Meaning, we who are lucky enough to be triple & double vaxed are pretty protected. Let the rest die. I know they pose a danger to us all. But we are more than 97% protected from them. If they want to die, I say let them die. Freedom.'
Let the rest die. No room for nuance, no empathy for those who are afraid or unable to be vaccinated for various reasons. Just this othering, the holy 'we' and the unclean 'them'. The fact that he thought this was a perfectly fine thing to say to his half a million followers tells us a lot about the state of the world we are currently living in.
With an IFR of 0.2% I will happily give people of this ilk the middle finger as they will not get their wish. In less than a year the unvaccinated will be the healthiest people on the planet and 5 billion people will have "buyer's remorse".
I don't understand what this means. What is the "buyer's remorse" for the vaccinated in a year. Or are you just making stuff up in a negative way
Start with Judy Mikovits, then David Martin...
https://subsplash.com/churchofgladtidings/media/ms/+gxszyrd
Just my opinion, friend.
Too late. Now a year and half later and no hellish deluge of vaccine death.
Although, after six vaccine/booster, I find myself with an inoperable brain tumor. Hmm. No, don't go there...
I feel that the future is a crisis in human immunity.
Even if every single person gets vaccinated it will not eradicate covid 19. We are creating a dependency on pharma.
Is this really a vaccine? It’s an RNA injection that reduces severity of symptoms for a period of time. Do you really think that this stops with a booster? Not at all this is continuous periodic injections.
As I see it we have polluted our macrocosm and upset the balance of nature we are now ,30 years too late, talking about biodiversity. And now we will do likewise at a microcosmic level and there will be consequences at some point.
People just totally trust the science and cannot even conceive that it could be wrong.
You can farm your land organically but cannot manage your body organically it seems.
It's scary and pathetic of Jerry S. I used to follow him on Instagram, but his feed was actually the first clue I had that this vaccine thing was going to get really ugly. I unfollowed him a few months ago when he started telling people to "shun their unvaccinated friends and family." I don't need that in my IG feed or my life. Just say no.
Yes, surely once only 99.5% of us left alive we will have learned our lesson. I only hope civilization can survive such a devastating loss.
Waking bleary-eyed from the Post-Modernist dream, a foul taste in the mouth and the hangover from hell is truly unpleasant; but its the waking that is important now, not the need to vomit.
As an old leftist myself, I have been observing with complete bewilderment my old peers devolve into an authoritarian mob supporting an official narrative that from the start had the feel and taste of a giant corporate operation. For anyone wondering how this transformation, or this revelation of a hidden personality, came about, I highly recommend this recent piece by Toby Green and Thomas Fazi: https://unherd.com/2021/11/the-lefts-covid-failure/?=frlh
Thank you, oac. I read the article, and though it started well, by the end the author's left leaning had surfaced again and I felt there was little insight as to how to navigate the fetid morass the left wing finds itself wading through these days. In turn, I would thoroughly recommend 'The Master and His Emissary' by Ian McGilchrist - his (physiological/neurological) take on the inherent duality of humans (Left Brain & Right Brain), and our shift toward authoritarianism being correlated to increasing Left Brain dominance is really quite...exciting; an apolitical, intuition generated, science backed, tight beam focus into the shadowed cortical folds of our matter-emergent minds. It really is excellent, and has enabled an already open mind a far wider view point from which to gather thoughts..and gird loins.
It's so bewildering and distressing isn't it? I have always considered myself to be politically left too, in fact I was a member of the Labour party for many years, but in the past two years pretty much all my beliefs that were attached to constructs have fallen away.
that's because you have realised that your beliefs were only constructs themselves. now you can truly see that everything you thought was true is inverted
You're right, this understanding is emerging from the fog.
Exactly
I'm still politically "left". I haven't changed, it's everyone else on the left that has changed. They have all lost the plot.
Another ex-lefty here. It’s deeply troubling how far the left has diverged from the concept of freedom, both in thought and in deed. Perhaps it was always like that and I just didn’t notice quickly enough.
It's so disorientating. But also maybe liberating.
There was a point some 15 years or so ago where I thought I was on the left yet kept finding myself attacked for straying from orthodoxy. At the same time I began to notice how most liberals were not actually driven by principles at all, but rather most closely resembled fanatics of a sports team. Team Donkey in the USA. Donkeys good, Elephants bad, we don't need to discuss how and why (and in particular we must never discuss why Donkeys and Elephants seem to quietly collaborate on so many harmful policies).
So I wandered far off the map, to where today I see a culture filled with crazy people; a wetiko-riddled global slave camp ruled by a thin strata of sociopaths. I have no particular solutions as of yet, but I instinctively feel this: Do Not Want.
I maybe wrong but I think in this country at least Labour (and the left) saw the NHS as their core issue, their opposition to the dismantling and privatization they feared was gradually happening under Tory rule was a key message and one that the majority of the population would probably agree with them on. So to back up that position all they could do was to call for ever more draconian lockdown rules to be implemented to protect that institution and its workers. Whenever the government announced a new set of measures Labour’s response was to demand that they be introduced sooner and for longer. The space for a different narrative, one that questioned the efficacy of lockdowns and the closing of schools, was left empty. All of the political parties (with the exception of a few dissidents on the right of the Conservative party) endorsed the measures; it was just a question of how ‘soft’ or ‘hard’ they were in terms of the nature of those measures: lockdown sooner/later, lockdown for longer/shorter. For Labour to even countenance not taking these measures would have amounted to a betrayal of the institution and staff of the NHS, their support of which formed the majority of their electoral appeal. And especially as the media, to a degree of consensus I’ve never seen before, all took the line that these restrictions were absolutely necessary to stop the spread of the virus.
This same position was maintained by Labour during the vaccine rollout, especially during the early phases when we were told that the vaccines might actually stop the transmission of Covid rather than simply mitigate the severity of the symptoms. To do anything other than endorse these vaccines, and their widespread use, would have been seen as not wanting the pandemic to end and looking to add yet more patients to our endlessly overstretched health service. Any caveats as to the safety of the vaccine or the necessity of vaccinating those who weren’t vulnerable to Covid would have been seen as endorsing the dreadful phenomenon of ‘vaccine hesitancy’. These shots were the silver bullets that would end a year of misery, so Labour had to get behind them and the whole ghastly apparatus that was starting to form around them in the form of QR codes and vaccine passports. Public health was firmly Labour territory, but this crisis was playing out under Conservative rule so what to do but double down on any and all measures and demand even more of them, tougher and longer. Anything to stop the spread.
This would only account for what happened to the political left in this country where the NHS occupies a hugely important position in the national consciousness and Labour are its white knight of defence against the forces that continually conspire against it. But I imagine it’s a similar case elsewhere where the public good (the sacred ground of the left) must always trump the rights of the individual, now extending, in a way that would have been unimaginable 2 years ago, to our individual bodily autonomy. After all the countries that have slid most quickly into authoritarian rule and draconian Covid measures and mandates have tended to have centrist or nominally left of centre governments: New Zealand, Australia, USA, France. It’s also interesting note that when the emergency covid bill was up for renewal in March the only MPs who voted against it were right wing Tory backbenchers and the rump of Jeremy Corbyn’s old shadow cabinet (the extreme left in the eyes of the media) along with ten Liberal Democrats. A group of individuals who’d either had their shot at power or knew they were never going to get near it and therefore had nothing to lose by going against the grain. The rest of the Labour party blithely waved it through, as they have everything else, without seeming to bat an eyelid. Emergency powers, vaccines and boosters for all, lockdowns, bar and restaurant closures, masks for children in schools, social media censorship, vilification and harassment of the unvaccinated. Anything to stop the spread.
That's a good analysis of the UK left, John P.
It's so disconcerting that nobody with a high media profile seems to be pointing out that (as Paul notes) the vaccines don't actually work in the way we were told they would. They don't stop anyone catching Covid. They don't stop transmission. At best, they could reduce the severity of an infection -- but that effect is impossible to measure. It might not even be the case. How incredible that no major commentator is saying "Hang on... the emperor is starkers".
As with most ideologies, any failure /cannot/ be the fault of the ideology, and can only be addressed by the administration of yet more of the failing ideology. Booster shots forever.
As our author reminds us this is new technology (unproved or used)-- its not the vaccines of the past. Big clue there as to the motivation and whats coming.
Yes, very interesting, thanks.
I will say that Labour in my lifetime has always been an authoritarian force. Blair brought in restrictions on protests and gatherings, 'hate speech' laws and all the panoply of early restrictions on speech and conduct which have been gathering pace ever since. I think its socialist roots simply mean that even neoliberals like Blair will tend towards a desire for centralised state control.
Which is not to suggest that the Tories are not authoritarians too. They very much have been over the years. But there's a libertarian rump on the right which seems absent on the left. More anarchists needed in parliament maybe.
Yes, perhaps, for a long time now, these distinctions have actually been illusory and unhelpful, but we hang and hold on to them anyway in the absence of anything else. I have found myself in the strange position recently of supporting the views of people on the libertarian right, which has provoked a kind of vertigo, or discombobulation, due to past allegiances that were very firmly on the other side, and had been for a long time. The enemy has now become my friend. There seems to be a far greater tolerance for dissent on what I would have firmly thought of (not in a good way) as the 'other' side 18 months ago. Perhaps, more broadly, we all need to shed these tribal vestiges to move forward. What, at first, was upsetting, for me, is now slowly turning into something else; a recognition that these century-plus (and beyond) old groupings that still dominate the media and political landscape are no longer of any use, at all, in the situation we find ourselves in now. Perhaps something new is being born from all of this. It certainly feels that way.
Except the libertarian rump, while rejecting face masks and COVID controls, had no problem voting through one of the most repressive policing bills recently.
There is a reason that I refer to them as "Team D" and "Team R".
That said, I hear more reasoned and fact-based (as opposed to slogan-based) arguments from sports fans as to why they cheer for a given team than I hear from most political partisans.
Great comment
Also from the same camp. After a discussion with a NDP candidate on my doorstep in Sept (Justin Trudeau Liberal was re-elected in Canada)where human rights for all was NOT part of their platform as it had been since I voted at age 18 (now 62) I realized it was all a veneer. Being inclusive is what good people are supposed to do - be welcoming and supportive of everyones human rights.
I agree it was always like this with cracks showing (ie people not helping people in distress in the street-- don't want to get involved), dead migrants on the shores of Europe (remember the small child)-- what has changed there-- still more. So many examples of a society that pushed enough will find the villain to be whoever the Machine tells them it is.
Me too. It's when the "good" of the collective subsumes that of the individual maybe where problems start? Remember the many examples of "socialist" movements morphing into authoritarianism/fascism/totalitarianism though: Hitler, Mussolini, Stalin, Pol Pot...
And yet the "collective" is another aspect of community, which is the heart and home of love and worship.
Yes, I too was a social-democrat most of my life. But what has happened this last year has turned me fully to anarchism. There simply does not appear to be any way to have a society in which we allow authority (as in a special class with privileges to dominate others not possessed by the rest of society) to exist.
This is probably the best essay I have read about it, especially as it deals with the fact that you can still have 'authority' but not 'authority to dominate people against their will':
https://expressiveegg.org/2018/12/10/anarchism-at-the-end-of-the-world/
Simple. Now the left has the whip hand.
The right would do much the same, given the chance.
For political power attracts sociopaths the way catnip attracts cats. The history of the medieval and Renaissance Catholic Church is most instructive here, and this an institution that traces its founding to Jesus Christ Himself.
This is right on the money.
The church helped organize society and provide some semblance of structure after the void left by the fall of the Roman empire (this transfer of power occurred over a couple hundred years, not overnight). But eventually the Church got too powerful, and as you rightly point out, power corrupts. This is when they started selling indulgences, remember? The reason we had separation of Church and State was thanks to the printing press, and the Church no longer had a monopoly on the word of God or knowledge in general (prior the Church had a monopoly on writing books, by hand).
We are now at an inflection point where we desperately need the separation of Money and State. The insanity of the sociopaths in power is unchecked because they have access to un-sound money, they print money at will to fund whatever, not limited by resources. They don't even need taxpayer money to go to war, which is why we can "afford" to go to war for 20+ years. We need sound money yesterday.
But where, how? I encourage all of you to learn about bitcoin please. Which is a currency, a monetary system, and an independent system of property rights. Un-confiscatable by governments. Bitcoin is freedom money. I don't see how we will be able to fight the machine, if they can freeze our bank accounts the moment they decide we are persona non-grata. Need separation of Money and State.
With regard to bitcoin and crypto, i highly recommend the work of bantam joe (has a website and on facebook) and Alison Mcdowell (wrbsite is 'wrench in the gears' and also on telegram and twitter) as well as the website 'silicon icarus' by Raul Diego, for a deeper dive into what crypto and blockchain is all about.
Bitcoin is not "crypto", and "crypto" is not Bitcoin. So called "crypto" will be a tool the current fascist establishment will use to push for CBDCs (central bank digital currencies) and enforce complete financial surveillance. Bitcoin on the other hand, because of its Proof-of-Work consensus mechanism, cannot be controlled by anyone, hence why it is freedom money. The environmentalists are attacking it because (gasp) it uses energy to secure and protect this independent monetary system.
To learn about bitcoin I would specifically avoid Twitter & Telegram. Books like "The Bitcoin Standard" by Saifedean Ammous are a wonderful place to start which will lead to other works. You can also search for the free online course "PRDV151: Bitcoin for Everybody" which contains a myriad of articles and curated content to bring you up to speed on the monetary revolution currently underway.
Thank you for the recommendations Claudia, i will look it up. Just to clarify (since it seems you didn't bother to look up the sources I suggested but assumed you already know what "this is all about"), the sources I gave are NOT environmentalists (in fact, are strongly critical of rhe billionaire's fake-environmentalism and grenwashing which seems to be a thin viel for bringing in the 4th insustrial revolution) but are very deep researchers in the field (one of them, bantam joe, is actually a programmer and developer on blockchain, the other two are some of the deepest researchers in the world today), so I would still highly recommend reading through before jumping to premature conclusions and dismissing things off-hand so arrogantly.
Amd if I may add a more general note, it seems increasingly difficult to talk with anyone about anything in these divisive times, society seem to have eegressed into the infantile egoic war mentality phase, most seem so incredibly attached abd identified with our mental position, and seem so hostile to anything that isn't 100% in agreement with our mental position.
My wish is that we could rise above the arrogance and hostility and "digging of heels" involved in this egoic war mentality (which seem to be the default approach of almost everyone today) and could actually comminocate and listen.
Couldn't agree more, the left has really shown it's Stalinist tendencies, any erring from the line and you are shot on shot on social media by these people, many I considered friends. Even the anarchists are as bad - that really disturbs me
I'm not completely sure who you are referring to when saying 'the Left', but if you are talking about the Wall St corporate Democrats and their hypnotized CNN/WashPost zombies then this is most definitely NOT the left, these are right wing capitalist liberals who, except for identity politics, are practically indistiguishable from the capitalist republicans in their servitude to the billionaire class.. the only tool that these two billionaire-owmed partirs have to supposedly distinguish themselves from each other (to create the appearance of choice between two distinct options) is identity politics, amd that is exactly.why identity politics has such gigantic role kn american politics, without it the scamcwould be seen right through, that there is only one big corporate war party in america working for the billionaire class. Identity politics is the only tool the have to create the appearance of two distinct options.
In my observation, the left is non-existant in the anglo world today, has been erased from view a long time ago already, the only choice we have today in the anglo world is between right wing capitalist conservatives and right wing capitalist liberals, which are deceptively called 'the left' even though they have nothing to do with the left, and in fact are doing everything in their power to destroy the left, to destroy what was traditionally called the left, not the Democratic party corporation (or its hypnotized MSNBC zombies), which is a right wing party through and through - pro war, pro capitalist, pro empire, pro Wall St, pro the ultra wealthy class..
I actually just wrote about it in a recent post, of interested see the last 3 paragraphs of this post
https://m.facebook.com/story.php?story_fbid=10158201701746455&id=630471454)
No I don't mean them, I am in the UK and don't engage a lot with American politics, more that in Europe and specifically the UK. Having said that, I don't see massive difference some ways, The centrist mainstream Labour Party are much stricter on Covid measures than the government and for anyone who asks questions they are politely told to get in line. The Momentum, Corbynite left and anarchists who I would often have been on the streets with have become the Covid storm troops fulfilling governments and oppositions role for them. If you waiver one iota from Covid fear you are excommunicated, destroyed on line and shunned on the street. It has been incredibly disillusioning to experience this, I am not a Covid denier and had my first two vaccines but to raise any questions - well you are a threat to life and should be treated as such
Thank you Chris, I thought I was replying to the original commentor, John P, but nonetheless I do appreciate learning what's happening in the UK, which indeed sounds horrible and devastating.
I do know, though, of a couple of resources from the UK left who are profoundly critical of the official narrative, I assume you already know about them but will mention just in case - Off-Guardian and Winter Oak Press. And in the European left (in Italy) i am aware of Giorgio Agamben...
Thanks Dan. Not used substack before and thought it was a direct reply
Thanks for doing this. It is extremely hard to have sensible discussions around tricky subjects these days. It's very rare to change our minds at all really, we tend to look for viewpoints that support our existing perspective, don't we? So it's very interesting and important when a respected writer takes a dissenting or contrary position.
That said, it makes me consider that perhaps the vehicle for the message is as important as the message itself sometimes (I'm thinking about what you wrote because you wrote it, but had it come from another source I probably wouldn't be so much) and perhaps this is also part of the problem we face today.
I think that's absolutely right. It's part of the tribalism, and it also relates to our tendency towards confirmation bias. The thing that is being said, correct or incorrect, is first filtered through who said it, and whether or not they are One Of Us. I think this is another thing that has always been true, but which has been brought very clearly into the light now.
Another fantastic article! I will never take this vaccine. I first had Covid in March 2020, and listened to the news intensely. With many dying on those ventilators, I was full of fear, but my intuition spoke to me about avoiding hospital as there was no cure, I was so afraid, for I could hardly breathe. I sought to steam my lungs and seek cures on the internet. During that time, I bumped into Doctors who are now censored, which then elicited within me a sense of deep mistrust of authority and that all was not well, that this was a genesis of dissenters speaking out against a strange new normal narrative.
I have read your comments here Paul and they resonate with mine. Thank you for your hard work, encouragement, courage and faith. I so look forward to your writings and am thankful for you providing this space so we can all share respectfully. My hope is that your words will touch those asleep to wake up and see what is really going on.
That's one of the things that has collapsed in the last 5 years: institutional trust. In America at least (according to Gallup), the only national institution above 40% trust is the military. Only 20% of Americans trust big corporations or the media, so it's not surprising that huge national media companies aren't believed.
However, I have a group of writers and journalists that I do trust: Bari Weiss, Rod Dreher, Paul, to a lesser extent Glenn Greenwald, Andy Ngo, Chris Rufo. I don't agree with all of these people, but if one of them says it happened, I have confidence that it did, or that they will come clean and correct their mistakes. Notice that none of those names work for a major media company. This is what happens in untrusting societies: the messenger becomes as important at the message itself.
That the military would have the highest percentage of trust is very telling. We are very, very afraid.
I disagree. The military has the highest percentage of trust because it is us. Our mothers, fathers, sons, daughters, brothers and sisters. Now if that 40% figure would refer to military leadership you might be right to be afraid.
Very good point!
Informed consent has gone by the way, too.
While the concept is promoted by the WHO (https://www.who.int/groups/research-ethics-review-committee/guidelines-on-submitting-research-proposals-for-ethics-review/templates-for-informed-consent-forms ), a ruling in April of the European Court of Human Rights critically undermined it (https://www.euronews.com/2021/04/13/how-a-court-ruling-lays-the-ground-for-mandatory-covid-19-vaccination ).
Work out the logic of this statement if you can: "The ECHR ruled last week that compulsory vaccination can be considered "necessary in a democratic society"."
I hadn't seen that. The ground is really being prepared, isn't it?
A few months back I wrote to my local MP about mandvax and cited a Resolution from the European Parliament issued in January:
https://pace.coe.int/en/files/29004/html
It specifies that member states should not discriminate on the basis of vaccination status in any way so that there is no pressure to be vaccinated without free informed consent. The relevant parts:
7.3.1 ensure that citizens are informed that the vaccination is not mandatory and that no one is under political, social or other pressure to be vaccinated if they do not wish to do so;
7.3.2 ensure that no one is discriminated against for not having been vaccinated, due to possible health risks or not wanting to be vaccinated;
The ruling also notes that political interests that may favour Pharma or other interests should be guarded against. According to the French source I heard this from, the ruling has some power over European states for compliance with resolutions, perhaps unlike the ECHR - which has dubious authority, like other "human rights" bodies - or the ICC for that matter.
The NHS also has similar resolutions in the Equality act of 2010, which were specified in a page on exemptions. I was about to paste the link, but found "this page cannot be found".. any more.
The U.S. Supreme Court ruled the same way on smallpox vaccination - in 1904.
Yes - but informed consent was not obviously a universal good in that period, if its 1966 adoption in the UN's International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights is anything to go by.
It isn't. That Covenant specifically bans only "In particular, no one shall be subjected without his free consent to medical or scientific experimentation." I think that arguably prohibits mandatory vaccination under 'emergency approval' but not all.
But in general it states regarding the right that it lists: "The above-mentioned rights shall not be subject to any restrictions except those which are provided by law, are necessary to protect national security, public order (ordre public), public health or morals or the rights and freedoms of others, and are consistent with the other rights recognized in the present Covenant."
I would submit that informed consent in an absolute sense over a disease with a 34% case fatality rate is insane. Furthermore, smallpox was eradicated with forcible vaccination in 1977, so we had 11 years of multiple nations interpreting the Convenant in a way opposite to what you advocate.
Can we trust the science..the state knows best? https://www.jayne-donegan.co.uk/homeopathy/. This lady is
an ex GP living about 2 miles from me. The GMC tried to discredit her and her credible evidence. The reading on her website is about the lengths she went to to clear the abuse and labelling heaped upon her. Judy Mikovitz jailed for speaking out about what Fauci was doing with the science of Aids therapy in 1983/4.
Snopes is a shell of its former self, but their report on Judy Mikovitz seems to imply that her jailing on a charge of stealing came from an employer that may have been making retribution for her mistakes (to put the best spin on it, it is a fascinating story). The controversy over her science work had nothing to do with AIDS. See: snopes.com/fact-check/scientist-vaccine-jailed/
PS, by fascinating I especially mean the part on mouse DNA contamination. Judy Mikovitz may simply have been unaware of the large potential for it. I don't know if that exonerates her or not (it probably doesn't, but I don't know for sure).
I think her career was ruined after that but thankfully she is able to warn the world about the corruption.
Vera Sharov says that the only code that matters in this situation is the Nuremberg Code. Public Health bureaucrats hate it! They tamper with all the other codes, eg Helsinki, the one you mention, etc. But they cannot tamper with Nuremberg. That might be because those that wrote it knew it would happen again ……. So, stick to Nuremberg and ignore everything else.
Exactly
Terrific piece - thank you for articulating the issues so thoughtfully and so thoroughly and for being a genuinely independent voice. Have followed your work for some years (alerted by a Roger Scruton footnote) and have several of your books. Not by any means in lockstep with all opinions (which would in any case show a sad lack of critical thinking on my own part) but have always found the ideas expressed well worth engaging. You might be glad to hear I’ve just upgraded to a paid sub.
All of this resonates so powerfully with me. Thank you for your honesty, Paul, especially the revelations about yourself. I have experienced exactly the same things - I have to really watch myself for confirmation bias and judging people. I had to delete my Twitter account because I found myself at one point going on there repeatedly to doom-scroll through the drama and division. It shocked me that I was so addictively drawn to all the conflict and vitriol.
Your words about deleting your Twitter account are inspiring. Although I have gathered a large number of resources through my months of scrolling my Tweeter feed, I think I have become addicted to it and although I try to avoid the antagonistic, insensitive, censuring, and downright aggressive comments, they are getting to me and affecting my mental health. Mostly though, under the illusion of catching up on the latest news and interpretations of "reality", I find myself narrowing my interpretative universe to a level that personal interactions with real people would not allow.
That's so true about narrowing one's interpretative universe, so beautifully put. It was affecting my mental health too. I dithered for a while due to fear of missing out. But I have a history of addiction and can't afford to go down that road again - I think the toxic Twitter habit could have led to picking up a drink or a drug. Since deleting my account I've hardly given Twitter a thought and don't miss it at all.
Phew … so glad to hear this, I have been a lockdown sceptic all along and although 71 my Vaccine Moment came with the delivery of an NHS leaflet. It said that for over 75 year olds, there was a one in 10 change of dying if I caught Covid. I immediately went online to assess my risk and realised it was an outright lie. I felt immediately that this was a bridge too far for me. I am studying around personal agency, the use of behavioural ‘nudges’ and the ways in which a herd mentality develops. I have lost friends and had conflicts with family but I will not be moved. Have you read the philosopher Giorgio Agambens latest pieces about the creation of a medical technocratic future? If a person like this can be so villified for his views what kind of society are we now?
I haven't read that Mary, but thanks for the pointer. Keep at it!
Thanks for this recommendation Mary. Have you read 'State of Fear' by Laura Dodsworth? She has interviewed several people involved in behavourial 'nudging'.
no but I heard her speak at the Battle of Ideas on the topic of the ethics of nudging and she was brilliant. Frank Furedi was on the panel as well and has written extensively on the politics of fear.
Actually Mary that statistic is probably correct if you look at a fairly recent set of tables of mortality from birth to 85+ by year from of all places the US public heath establishment. It is almost zero up to about age 12 or so and tops out just above 2% at 85+. My 64 yr old wife is .3%. I can provide the table but keep in mind these numbers are in the range of flu mortality except the young and the very old get hit much harder with the influenza virus depending of course on what year you are looking at. Paul is dead nuts on. RESIST!
Hi Mary, Might you have a link to the Agamben essay?
https://www.australianbookreview.com.au/podcast/760-the-abr-podcast/8436-david-jack-on-giorgio-agamben-and-the-politics-of-the-pandemic-the-abr-podcast-77
“Where are we now? The Epidemic as politics” by Agamben was originally published in 2020. It is a collection of short essays and commentary in translation from the Italian. The above link is to a free, really superb podcast by David Jack in which he reads his October article “ Bare Life and health terror’ it explains how a new political space or ‘‘no touch future’ is being brought in by social distancing and mask wearing which signals the end of community as we have know it.
Thankyou Mary. There are so many interesting and thoughtful essays examining what is happening to our society - or has already happened - but they remain compartmentalised, along with discussion groups around them, like this one. Another good writer and thinker on what he calls "menticide" is Edinburgh psychotherapist Bruce Scott. He is particularly concerned about the effects of this CULTure on child development - masks and lack of normal contact. He tried to have his work published in journals but ran into so much resistance he was forced to publish on his blog:
https://dr-bruce-scott.com/2021/10/13/beyond-a-state-of-fear-menticide-and-schizogenesis/
He also says a lot about Giorgio Agamben...
Thanks for that link. Have you come across Mark Crispin Miller? His foreword to the classic book ‘Propaganda’ by Bernays is fantastic. He’s a professor who’s been teaching in US for decades on the topic of propaganda and is very eloquent. Needless to say his current views are now considered heretical in academia.
Thank you!
Mary, do you have a link to this piece by Giorgio Agamben?
See above reply to Elizabeth
Do you have a link to Giorgio Agamben's latest work?
See above reply to Elizabeth
Do you still have the leaflet?
Yes I’ve kept it carefully :-)
Thank you, Paul. A brilliant essay, which I will forward to friends (not all of whom will thank me or it) . By chance (?) only yesterday. I was reading 'The Barcode Moment' for the first time in 'Confessions' (a real hard copy which is such a pleasure to endlessly staring at a screen) and wondering what my moment will be. I have been jagged (as the Scots say) three times now and, given my age, 68, think on balance it's the right thing for me to but I utterly respect all those who think otherwise. I did print out my vaccine passport because I went to Ireland last month for a week. I only had to use it once to go into a restaurant (most of the time we were seeing family). We went back to the restaurant a second time and I was pleased to see they didn't want to see it again as they remembered us. Back here in Edinburgh my token resistance is not to use my phone to scan QR codes for track and trace, although if I'm asked I will fill in a paper form. Partly this is because I distrust what the Scottish govt would use the data for but is also because of my technical incomptence. Yesterday evening we went to a restaurant with friends after seeing the new Bond film, 'No time to die' (all about an evil plot to spread diseases....) and one used his phone to check in. It took a good 10 minutes and two attempts, which confirmed me in my resolution to resist using it.
Good luck in your continued resistance, I look forward part 2.
After reading the book have you got a better idea what your moment will be? Here in Toronto I too saw the Bond Film in October (I am a huge Bond fan) at a drive in and ordered a lovely restaurant meal (take out) to eat (long film!) while enjoying the film. Perfect.
Perhaps it is because I am in the medical field that I see the "much ado about nothing"in comparing COVID vis a vis other horrid flu years and why I resist the fear porn around COVID, but I would like to think it is more due to my curiosity and questioning of anything "authorities" demand. Asking questions and as our author beautifully states about the giant hole in vaccine passports-- the jab does not stop the transmission of COVID. Period.
I think that is all we have to tweet, facebook, instagram, tell our family, friends. Thats it over and over. Forget the masks, how this new jab tech affects (especially footballers!) etc. Just say the jab does not stop the transmission of COVID. Not debatable even by the letter agencies or Dr. Mengele- sorry Fauci.
Carol, thanks for the phrase, "fear porn". I'd not seen it before.
Tremendous gratitude to you, Paul, for your courage and brilliance. One thing I have noticed here in Vermont, where vaccine rates are very high along with surging cases, is the tremendous strain this has put on friendships. At least among the people I know, those who are not on social media are the ones that are not complying. Those on social media have taken up the Narrative. And they have so easily adopted the vitriol toward the unvaxxed. I don't think this is a coincidence. I hope you will discuss this next.
Deepest thanks.
The social media connection is a very interesting point. I might well look more at that next time. It has become an incredibly useful tool of social control.
Please don't discount the paid troll factor. Don't assume social media represents society.
Hello Suzanna. We have a network of people here in east/central VT if you are nearby.
This really hit home today. I appreciate your measured reasoning, it is lacking in all of the discussion. Typically I'm one of those, "and on the other hand" type of men. But these days, when I'm speaking with friends, that just seems to be offering the limb up for an amputation.
You should (he says about someone else's livelihood) take this one out from behind the payroll. It deserves much exposure and a wide audience..
Thanks Brian. I've found the same. Being 'reasonable' at present is like laying your head on the block. But becoming a naked partisan is soul-destroying. What a line to walk.
This essay is actually not paywalled for precisely that reason, and I've just been asked to write a version of it elsewhere, so we'll see how much shit hits the fan then!
with the offering up the limb thing, don't worry .... "'Tis but a Scratch!"
If I can just recall the airspeed of an unladen swallow, I'll be golden.
beware those migrating coconuts don't drop on your head though, could be fatal.
Thank you so much Paul for so well articulating what many of us comprehend, yet more widely seems either invisible or still 'alarmist' - to find clear, cogent insight into the increasingly blanket dissemination of these 'great lies designed to make us unfree' is a true support for your fellow travellers' hearts and spirits. Despair is the great challenge when we are so often atomised and isolated in our respective bids to walk in the opposite direction of this devastating line of travel. Your notes from what is daily becoming an outright, naked bid to dismantle and reassemble human consciousness as a component within the Machine sing clear and loud to the souls of all of us who are longing to hear the truth that we seek to live by and defend. To convey hope through being fully present to what is is a remarkable gift, it is received with heartfelt gratitude, for it makes all the difference to facing this to know we are anchored in a shared fellow feeling for what it means to be human.