The Great Reopening – or Three Months Before We Can Go to the Pub
Yesterday, as expected, The Prime Minister held a press conference in Downing Street, flanked by Witless and Unbalanced, and unfolded his roadmap. As expected, it looks like it’s a map of pre-industrial Britain, with no motorways or even A roads to speak of. The journey is going to be slow, terribly long and the horse and cart may break down on the way. Isabel Hardman has written an explainer for the Spectator.
Step 1: From March 8th, people will still be instructed to stay at home, but schools and colleges will reopen, along with practical higher education courses. Face coverings should be worn in all indoor environments including schools unless two metre social distancing is possible… From March 29th there will still be no indoor mixing or holidays. People will be advised to minimise travel. The rule of six – or two different households – will return for outdoor mixing.
Step 2: No earlier than April 12th and at least five weeks after Step 1. Still no household mixing indoors. All retail, outdoor attractions such as zoos, libraries and community centres, personal care premises and outdoor hospitality will reopen. Indoor leisure such as gyms will open for individual or household group use. People will be able to stay away from home within the same household, and all children’s activities and indoor parent and child groups of up to 15 parents will reopen. Wakes and wedding receptions will widen up to 15 people.
Step 3: No earlier than May 17th and at least five weeks after Step 2. Indoor entertainment and indoor sports will reopen and a 30 person limit will apply outdoors. Outdoor entertainment such as performances can start along with some large events with capacity limits. The rule of six will now apply to indoor mixing. People will be able to travel overseas.
Step 4: No earlier than June 21st and at least five weeks after Step 3. Legal limits on social contact will lift and larger events allowed. Nightclubs will reopen
Hard not to be disappointed, given that Boris promised last year that it would all be over by Christmas. Does he now intend to under-promise, and over-deliver? One can but hope. At least Zero Covid appears to have been ditched, as Hardman points out.
The roadmap also covers what life with Covid as an endemic disease might look like. Ministers are opening four programmes of work to inform their policy on what ‘living with the virus’ will involve. These cover Covid status certification (the vaccine passport), large events, international travel and social distancing.
Worth reading in full.
Turning to the roadmap itself, it’s a long document, but here with a few ‘highlights’.
65. It is not currently known for how long people who receive a COVID-19 vaccine will be protected. This is because, as is the case with many vaccines, the protection they confer may weaken over time. It is also possible that new variants of the virus may emerge against which current vaccines are less effective. As well as working closely with manufacturers, Government scientists are seeking to better understand the impact of some Variants of Concern on the vaccines currently in deployment.
66. To ensure the country is prepared for these scenarios and while further evidence is gathered, the Government is planning for a revaccination campaign, which is likely to run later this year in autumn or winter. Any revaccination is likely to consist of a single ‘booster’ dose of a COVID-19 vaccine: the ideal booster may be a new vaccine specifically designed against a variant form of the virus. Over the longer term, revaccination is likely to become a regular part of managing COVID-19.
Moving on to the most politically sensitive bit:
Covid Status Certification
131: The Government will review whether COVID-status certification could play a role in reopening our economy, reducing restrictions on social contact and improving safety. This will include assessing to what extent certification would be effective in reducing risk, and the potential uses to enable access to settings or a relaxation of COVID-Secure mitigations. The Government will also consider the ethical, equalities, privacy, legal and operational aspects of this approach and what limits, if any, should be placed on organisations using certification. It will draw on external advice to develop recommendations that take into account any social and economic impacts, and implications for disproportionately impacted groups and individuals’ privacy and security. The Government will set out its conclusions in advance of Step 4 in order to inform the safe reopening of society and the economy.
What about football and travel?
Large Events
133) Over the spring the Government will run a scientific Events Research Programme. This will include a series of pilots using enhanced testing approaches and other measures to run events with larger crowd sizes and reduced social distancing to evaluate the outcomes. The pilots will start in April.
134) The Government will bring the findings from across different sectors and different settings to determine a consistent approach to lifting restrictions on these events. Depending on the outcome of this work, the Government hopes to be able to lift restrictions on these events and sectors as part of Step 4.
International Travel
135) The Government’s objective is to see a safe and sustainable return to international travel, for business and pleasure. When it is safe to do so the UK will again be the destination of choice for international visitors from around the world. In the short-term, the Government will continue to protect the vaccine rollout and mitigate against the risk posed by imported variants.
136) Vaccinations could offer a route to that safe and sustainable return. Once more is known about the evidence of vaccines on transmission and their efficacy against new variants, the Government can look to introduce a system to allow vaccinated individuals to travel more freely internationally.
137) The UK is working with other countries who have started similar programmes, to lead global efforts to adopt a clear international framework with standards that provide consistency for passengers and industry alike. The Government will make this a reality through ongoing work with the World Health Organisation and other multilateral organisations, the UK’s presidency of the G7 this year, and by working with other international partners.
138) However, any such system will take time to implement. It will be heavily dependent on improved scientific understanding about the role vaccination plays in reducing transmission. Introducing such a system also needs to be fair and not unduly disadvantage people who have yet to be offered – or gain access to – a vaccine. That being the case, the Government does not expect this solution to be available quickly, and restrictions like those in place across the world are likely to continue for the near future.
When can we ditch the masks and the stupid one-way systems in shops?
Social Distancing
145) Social distancing is difficult and damaging for businesses and, as a result, it is important to return to as near to normal as quickly as possible. Ahead of Step 4, as more is understood about the impact of vaccines on transmission and a far greater proportion of the population has been vaccinated, the Government will complete a review of social distancing measures and other long-term measures that have been put in place to limit transmission. The results of the review will help inform decisions on the timing and circumstances under which rules on 1m+, face masks and other measures may be lifted. The review will also inform guidance on working from home – people should continue to work from home where they can until this review is complete.
And finally, under the section marked long term:
Living with the virus
196) Like some strains of flu, COVID-19 is a relatively mild illness for much of the population, but it is more dangerous to vulnerable groups. The Government will ensure the country can live with the virus in the longer-term without imposing restrictions which bear heavy economic, social and health costs. The outcome of the four programmes of work set out in chapter 3 (large events, COVID-Certification, international travel and social distancing) will inform Government policy on living with the virus.
197) In addition to a comprehensive revaccination programme, set out in chapter 2, the Government will also use the Test, Trace and Isolate system to keep the virus in check. This includes regular asymptomatic testing in sectors with the highest risk of transmission, as well as testing in the workplace to help protect employees from infection and keep businesses open. The UK has already stepped up domestic production of lateral flow tests. As set out in chapter 2, the Government is also investing in bolstering domestic vaccine production capacity across the whole of the UK.
Worth reading in full – although, God knows, I cannot imagine more than about three people will.
Stop Press: The Telegraph reports that proposals for a major easing of lockdown before Easter were dropped after scientists warned the Government that it could lead to an extra 55,000 deaths. Thank you, SAGE.
Stop Press 2: Again in the Telegraph, Ross Clark notes the irony that we may be the first country to vaccinate its population but the last to reopen.
Stop Press 3: Watch Boris unveil his plan in the House of Commons yesterday.
The Ruination of Census 2021: An Unintended Consequence of Boris’s Glacial Reopening
A reader has flagged up an unintended consequence of the lengthy lockdown exit plan.
The Government has taken a blundering stride to repeating some of the planning mistakes of the current pandemic by telling public libraries they can’t reopen until April 12th.
By doing so, it will prevent library staff assisting in person anyone, notably those with poor English, completing their 2021 Census forms, even though they have been receiving training to do precisely that! This year, for the first time, the forms will be available online and the many people who still don’t have internet accesss at home will need to use a library PC to fill theirs in. Virtually all public libraries have PCs.
A high take-up rate for the once-a-decade census, whose accuracy is crucial for local and central government planning and prudent spending, is arguably even more important than the rate for vaccination, since everyone will benefit from the former while only the vulnerable truly need the latter.
It is disproportionately BAME people who will struggle to provide all the very detailed information that is required, and so go underreported, which will distort planning for a future pandemic. The failure to appreciate cramped living conditions, with more people living in homes than they were intended for, has accounted for very many Covid deaths as isolation was just about impossible and transmission hard to avoid. Hence the many instances of infections within the same family.
Putting your postcode in the search box here will produce many libraries as designated Support Centres, yet all are shown as closed. Very many are not even offering a telephone service. Some are offering email help – not much good if you don’t have digital access and an inefficient way to assist you if you do.
The ONS organises the Census on behalf of the Government and has been preparing the event for years. Will they be any more reliable with this than they are with the COVID-19 Infection Surveys they carry out every week, one wonders?
NB The online questionnaire goes live today (February 23rd) and completion is due by March 21st, the day for which all details should be valid.
P.S. It is still possible to request a printed copy, but some people are sure to not realise this. If a census helper knocks on their door (it’s not clear if they are even planning to visit people who haven’t returned their form), how likely are they to answer in the current climate of fear of strangers?
Another Reader Exchanges Emails With Neil Ferguson
Following Professor Neil Ferguson’s email exchange with one of our readers, which we published in yesterday’s Lockdown Sceptics, another reader decided to email him. He again replied. Here is their exchange in full.
Neil,
Someone sent you an article written by Derek Winton and you replied to that person by sending him/her a handbook about conspiracy theories.
So – anyone who disagrees with you must be a conspiracy theorist? Is that it?
But the Derek Winton article made no reference at all to any conspiracy or conspiracy theory.
It is possible you know to take a different view from you without thinking that you are part of some conspiracy.
Your reply referred to above doesn’t come across at all well. You might want to consider proffering an apology for it.
All the best,
XXXX
The Professor replied, with a couple of references that suggest he may have Googled “Lockdown Sceptics” and “no Second Wave” or “Casedemic” before replying.
Dear XXXX,
Reductionist rhetoric such as “anyone who disagrees with you must be a conspiracy theorist?” rather makes my point. It is not just anyone.
Science is about alternative perspectives, debate and being prepared to change ones view. My views are driven by the data and analysis of it – not just that from Imperial, but from researchers globally. Like most other people working on the virus, I learn new things every week, and that sometime involves rejecting previous beliefs.
However, the Winton piece was an ideologically motivated rhetorical rant, not a serious scientific discussion. Criticising 15 year-old C code is never going to be scientifically persuasive, because the science never depended on that (or any other) code. Never mind the bizarre but persistent minority belief that the world locked down because of the results from one modelling study.
That post came from a mindset that has predetermined what the truth is, feels that the “mainstream” world is not listening, and seeks to use polemic rather than actual scientific research to change others’ minds. That ticks quite a few of the conspiratorial thinking boxes. Admittedly not to the same degree as the emails I receive accusing me of being a minion of Bill Gates in wanting to implant microchips in people. But that is not saying much.
That is not to say I don’t think it’s legitimate to disagree about whether the social and economic costs of Covid measures are “worth it”. Or indeed about whether compulsory measures or recommendations should have been adopted. Neither of those issues are fundamentally scientific ones.
What is dangerous “alternate reality” nonsense is using rhetoric and cherry-picking of the science to try to deny the threat posed by the virus. To give a couple of not too historic examples:
https://dailysceptic.org/2020/09/01/latest-news-121/
This last year has been a tragedy for the world, and the consequences will be with us for decades. The response of the scientific community has been a silver lining though. We have learned more about this virus in a shorter time than I could have conceived would be possible. That we have multiple vaccines now available is a remarkable achievement – and one which will benefit the control of many other diseases. And, unlike much of the rest of the response to the pandemic, that research has been a truly global and co-operative effort.
Instead of futilely trying to undermine the work of thousands here and abroad, perhaps try celebrating human ingenuity in the face of adversity. The pandemic has been a random, terrible event. It is no-one’s fault – and while every country has made mistakes, most decision-makers (and the doctors and scientists behind them) have been trying to do the best they can, faced with very difficult decisions.
Best,
Neil
Our reader then replied to him.
Dear Neil,
Thanks for your email in reply to mine. I am grateful to you for taking the time. I know you are busy.
Some lockdown sceptics have made predictions that haven’t come to pass. But is that not also true of Imperial College modelling as Derek Winton has said?
You may say that the reason your team’s BSE projection on which he comments never came to pass is because the Government of the day took the projections of that team seriously and took drastic measures to mitigate the disease’s impact.
But what about your telling the Guardian in 2005 that up to 200 million people could be killed by bird flu? Few precautionary measures were taken to mitigate the impact of Avian Flu and yet the number of deaths is a tiny fraction of that figure.
And in 2009 an Imperial College modelling team of which you were a member significantly over-estimated the likely death toll from Swine Flu.
Again nothing approaching a lockdown was imposed. I accept these things don’t mean your subsequent work should be dismissed, but by the same token I don’t think you can dismiss the central arguments of the lockdown sceptics – that the lockdown policy will ultimately do more harm than it prevents – just because some of their predictions turned out to be inaccurate.
Correct me if I have this wrong but I don’t think that the adverse health/educational/social/political/other effects of lockdown have featured in modelling with which you have been involved. Could be your view is that that’s not your bailiwick – is that how you see it?
(In fairness to you, I do see on looking again at your email to me that – whatever your modelling work says – you accept that there is room for debate on the question of the social and economic harms that Lockdown might cause – though you don’t refer to the harm to health it might/does cause.)
If you have a moment I’d love to know how you respond to the evidence that the most severe policies – such as stay-at-home orders and business closures – are not more effective at reducing overall transmission than the more modest policies put in place in countries like Sweden and South Korea. I’m thinking of the work of John Ioannidis and his colleagues at Stanford in particular.
In addition, there is the evidence that laypersons like me can see with our own eyes.
Such as the fact that Florida which didn’t lockdown again in the autumn/winter has a lower Covid death toll than some states that did and overall the average number of Covid deaths in those US states that haven’t issued stay-at-home orders is lower than in those that did.
Isn’t it at least arguable that had we kept to our Pandemic Preparedness Strategy we wouldn’t have significantly more Covid deaths than we’ve had in England after three lockdowns? And that we’d have far lower levels of collateral damage?
Some of the criticism directed at you is deplorable, vitriolic stuff which I find utterly unacceptable. Reprehensible in fact. I am not with the people who put out that kind of material.
I would like to see reasoned debate instead.
I would like to see you talking to Sunetra Gupta, Carl Heneghan and John Ioannidis for example.
In fact, I would love to see a proper grown up debate between the leading scientists on both sides of this issue on the BBC or Channel 4.
I bet if you proposed it to the Beeb they’d have a good look at putting it on. (I can’t know whether any of the people I refer to above would want to show up – don’t know them.)
Take it easy.
Many thanks.
Cheers,
XXXX
Professor Ferguson, who must, by this stage, have had a fairly good idea where his response was going to end up, replied:
Dear XXXX,
Can I point out that I never “predicted” 200m would be killed by bird flu. The Guardian article you refer to was reporting this Nature paper – https://www.nature.com/articles/nature04017
What we looked at was what might unfold if bird flu (H5N1) gained the ability to spread from person to person. A threat which still exists, but not something we can predict the likelihood of happening (or ever tried). As I explained to journalists at the time.
That paper was a small part of a global research effort to improve preparations for a novel influenza pandemic which was stimulated by the emergence of H5N1. Pandemic planning has been a top priority for the UK Government since that time, with a novel pandemic being top of the UK Government risk register.
In relation to Swine flu, I think you are referring to the Dept. of Health reasonable worst case planning scenario which was agreed by SAGE in 2009. Multiple groups input into that, and it was never a prediction (rather it was closer to the upper bound of a confidence interval) – as the name implies – given the data available in April 2009, it quantified the worst case the UK Government might need to plan for. As more data became available, the uncertainty range narrowed and the upper bound on the confidence interval came down, leading the RWC to be revised down. That is how science works.
I would also note that SAGE has never revised the RWC for Covid agreed last March, largely because the severity we estimated for the virus turned out, unfortunately, to be basically spot on.
Best,
Neil
Stop Press: It is now 20 years since 2001’s Foot and Mouth epidemic and to mark the occasion John Lewis Stempel has written an interesting piece in UnHerd.
The Conspiracy Theory Handbook: a Short Review
Professor Ferguson’s first email to a Lockdown Sceptics reader included this link (pdf) to The Conspiracy Theory Handbook by Stephan Lewandowsky and John Cook. This ruffled a few feathers. After all, who would want to be a conspiracy theorist? Brian Davey, who has read the book, has written an explainer for us.
There’s a lot about the Conspiracy Theory Handbook in today’s LS. A few months ago I wrote a critique of that text – it bugged me that conspiracy theorist had become a phrase that is a “thought stopper” or “thought terminating cliché” to discourage further reflection about a topic. No doubt this is because it used to be the case that conspiracy theorists theorised plots against the elite – e.g. assassination plots. However, from about Kennedy’s assassination onwards “conspiracy theorists” were people who explained events by claiming plots that were organised BY the elite against ordinary people (or against other elite factions).
In this regard, one of the things that really bugged me about Lewandowsky and Cook’s description of what they analyse as a new kind of “thought disorder” is that people who are “conspiracy theorists” have what L and C decide to be an “unreasonable degree of scepticism of official narratives”. However Lewandowsky and Cook do not calibrate that idea. In other words, they do not tell us what a reasonable degree of scepticism of official narratives would be. It is almost as if, in the world of L and C, there is no public relations industry and spin does not exist… Clearly it does. Indeed what Gary Sidley, with justice, complains about – that psychologists now direct the Government’s PR lockdown strategy by deliberately inflating fear and the use of shaming – is not really new. PR has used sophisticated psychological insights ever since Edward Bernays who was the nephew of Sigmund Freud. What is happening then is that many otherwise comfortable people are waking up in horror to find themselves on the receiving end of manipulative techniques that have been used for a very long time…
Needless to say, Lewandowsky and Cook have ignored my criticisms which were published by the Irish think tank Feasta.
In conclusion, the so-called “Great Reset” and building back better is a strategy of the global super elite to concentrate economic power and push through a technological and social agenda in response to climate change, biodiversity collapse and resource depletion plus the damage done to the biosphere that is spilling out in new diseases. A considerable part of the people who previously thought of themselves as part of the elite are finding that they are not part of the club and are suddenly outsiders… while the Neil Fergusons’s, Patrick Vallance and Chris Whittys of this world were in the right places at the right times with the connections to hitch a ride on the imaginary strategy of the super elite fantasists like Bill Gates. This elite strategy is not really a conspiracy because it is open and there is no secrecy about their techno fantasies – but people who oppose this delusionary vision of the future for one reason or another have the “thought stopper” conspiracy-theorist label thrown at them. In my view, the super elite strategy is pure fantasy but that’s another story…
A Family Note
There follows a post by our regular contributor Guy de la Bédoyère with some sad family news.
This in normal times would be private but I think that under the circumstances it’s worth sharing because I doubt if my wife and I are alone and the point has far wider relevance.
On the night of February 21st/22nd my 100 year-old mother-in-law died in her care home. Although she had deteriorated physically she was mentally very alert and had no dementia. We had last seen her a few days earlier on one of the occasional ‘window visits’ we were permitted, and by today’s standards that was good fortune. She did not die of Covid and the doctor has confirmed that.
My mother-in-law’s long life included the deaths of two husbands and the even more tragic deaths of two of her three children, one as an infant in 1958 and about whom she still often talked. Thanks to the last year’s precautions her final 12 months of life meant that she never hugged or held her only surviving child again, she never saw her four great-grandchildren again and indeed never even met two of them thanks to Covid laws, and had only one or two fleeting visits from the three of her five grandsons who were able to travel from within the UK to see her back in the late summer and autumn. The two who live abroad of course were unable to come at any time in the last year.
She was acutely aware of what she had been denied for the sake of keeping her ‘safe’. I know there will be some who will respond by saying that the precautions over the last year have kept other people like her alive. And that is possibly true. However, the fact remains that people of very advanced ages are by definition not far from death, from whatever cause. For any one of them death can come without warning and they do not have time to spare. My mother-in-law was in her own way just as much a victim of Covid and its fall-out as those who died from the disease and I know she is far from alone.
So many elderly people, whatever the cause of death, Covid included, have spent their last months and weeks in brutal isolation in the name of keeping them safe.
That it has come to this, that we as a society and led by the Government and its scientific advisers with the willing acquiescence of organisations and individuals have done so much to commit the ultimate act of betrayal towards people at the end of their lives will surely go down in history as one of the most ignoble and demeaning aspects of this tragic year. There ought to have been a better way than that.
My mother-in-law’s last year of life was a hideous punishment. We can only console ourselves with the knowledge that her sadness, loneliness, and despair are over. We as a family, however, and especially my wife will be scarred forever by the experience. Boris’s lethargic lightening of the lockdown is of little use to us right now.
There will be a long time in which all of us will ruminate on the decisions made, but perhaps we can add my mother-in-law’s dismal last days to the ever longer list of things we should make sure never happen again.
Sunday in the Park With Rosie
The weather was good on Sunday and so Lockdown Sceptics reader Rosie Langridge went for a walk in a nearby park, and saw people out, about and relaxed. The trip led her to put some thoughts together on what lockdown sceptics can do to try and help the country readjust to the old normal. It involves getting out and about, talking to people and making social life as ordinary as possible again. Quite simple really.
Sunday being warm and sunny, we set off for the park. Not sure if that was a reasonable excuse or if we were indulging in a criminal activity.
There were crowds of people looking relaxed. Lulled – almost – into a parallel universe where life is as it should be. I wandered through a wide open door into a spacious café and looked around at the piled up tables and chairs, the barricaded display of artwork for sale, and the paintings on the wall. I just ignored the ‘people’ lined up in their masks. The ethical case for expecting me to overcome my aversion is slim. They choose to do it, not me.
I’d entirely forgotten about the one-way system business, and was unaware that I’d come in at the ‘wrong door’. I made my way backwards up the queue until a big burly man moved to block my way and towered over me saying, “There’s a one-way system for a reason,” and then blamed me for having “forced” him to speak to me. His muzzle was bizarrely emblazoned with “Lest we forget”. I nearly managed to remain polite.
But standing there I realised what we lockdown sceptics need to be doing now – our civic duty is to go into public places and behave in an ordinary manner, to show people that human interaction isn’t dangerous, and to re-accustom people to the sight of a human face. Go out and make our parks and streets crowded.
So, having recovered my aplomb, I fixed a cheery smile to my face and set off on our walk, exchanging nods and smiles with anyone who was ready to do so. And there were a lot of people out. It was lovely to see. I exchanged comments along the lines of, “Such a lovely day”, “So lovely to see the children having fun” (NB important!) – plus a few longer exchanges, taking opportunities where I could to talk about the issue of the day.
As an older woman was giving me advice, the man standing by replied that we are in unprecedented times with the pandemic. I said: “What pandemic? We’ve had flu and cold viruses all this time and there’s nothing different about a coronavirus.” The man walked off without even hearing me out. I’m still trying to think of a better reply to the “Unprecedented Times” meme but at least the woman heard my views.
Worth reading in full.
Postcard From the Philippines
We’ve been sent another Postcard! This one comes to us from Kyle Helke in Manilla, which has endured one of the longest and strictest lockdowns seen anywhere in the world. From the sound of it, they have done everything we have here, only more so and worse. Here is an extract:
Having lived in both New York and Italy during this time, I thought I had seen it all when it came to lockdown absurdity, but the Philippines are on a whole different level. Upon arrival, you are subjected to a PCR test and then sent to a hotel to quarantine (both at your expense). When we arrived, you were able to leave the hotel and go home to do your mandatory two-week quarantine after receiving your negative test result, but now they don’t even let you do that anymore; you have to remain at the hotel for the two-week duration. We were lucky to be able to move into our employer-provided housing during this time period, but getting food and taking care of other tasks was very difficult. I hate to think of how the less fortunate here manage in the same situation.
Regulations are stricter in Manila because it is the most populated region in the country. Face masks and face shields are mandatory when leaving your home, and you are subjected to temperature checks pretty much everywhere. There has been some push for people to use contact tracing apps, but because there are a plethora of them and the contact tracing system is not really standardised, it’s just really a formality. Most of the time when you enter a restaurant you can opt out of scanning the QR code or using the tracing app and just fill out your information on a sheet of paper. The culture here is one of compliance and rule-following, so no one really cares about the contact tracing stuff as long as they are seen to be following the rules. But, like many developing countries, the rules change frequently and without notice, so because of that everyday is a surprise. In November, we were allowed to bring our toddler to the grocery store; in December, that privilege was rescinded without public notice. One day there are one-way schemes on sidewalks with security admonishing violators by waving a compliance sign in their faces, the next week it could be like none of it ever happened.
The most grievous offence in this country, in my opinion, is the war the Philippine government has waged on children. Mask and face shield mandates are applicable for children two years and up. Children under 15 are technically not allowed to even leave the house, but this is such a young society that a blind eye is often turned on this regulation. For the longest time children under 18 were not allowed out, but I think in recent months the government is realising how unfeasible it is to keep working-age children at home, and they have reduced the age restriction to 15. However, children are still barred from restaurants, malls, and similar commercial establishments. Naturally, this also means children are not allowed in school, as it has been the case since March when the lockdown began. All learning is either done online, or, for public schools, through textbooks and workbook exercises that the schools drop off and pick up monthly at each family’s home. Every now and then there are a few articles in the news about getting kids back in schools, but I think this is just to placate the public; most people think this situation will go on until the end of the school year, and even into the next. All of this, of course, because the Government here – with the support of the Philippine Pediatric Society – is convinced that children are asymptomatic ‘superspreaders’ and therefore a grave threat to public health, which they base on numerous ‘scientific studies’. At this point, this country is one of the few in the world where children are not in some type of in-person school. How the Government here can know this and not be consumed by embarrassment and shame is beyond me.
This is an excellent postcard. Worth reading in full.
Round-up
- “There is no logical reason why UK holidays cannot restart immediately” – Self-catering holidays are zero risk, and would lift the gloom, writes Oliver Smith in the Telegraph
- “‘The vaccine is supposed to let us live’: Travel leaders call for an end to draconian restrictions” – The Telegraph has assembled the views of a group of tour operators and hoteliers, all calling for the Government to be bolder
- “Why isn’t Matt Hancock in jail?” – Will Havelock, writing in CAPX, provides more detail on the recent court judgement that found Matt Hancock has acted unlawfully
- “Should spreading anti-vaccine misinformation be criminalised?” – The BMJ debates whether the deliberate spreading of vaccine misinformation should be criminalised. 61% of BMJ readers say ‘yes’
- “Open letters from the UK Medical Freedom Alliance” – The UK Medical Freedom Alliance has published a number of interesting letters, most recently to the PM and senior ministers about mask mandates, and to Piers Morgan about his recent tweeting on the subject of vaccine passports
- “Britain Is Entering a Parallel Universe” – In a column for Bloomberg Opinion, Niall Ferguson says that Philip Pullman’s novels are an intimation of the post-pandemic world.
- “We’ve sacrificed a lot of our freedoms and a lot aren’t coming back” – More plain speaking from Peter Hitchens in his latest discussion with Mike Graham on talkRADIO
- “Dr Mark Changizi on Escape from Lockdown” – In the latest edition of the Escape from Lockdown podcast, Alex talks with theoretical cognitive scientist Dr Mark Changizi about why governments have been so determined to lockdown their citizens
- “Germans are turning down Oxford-AstraZeneca Covid vaccine” – Germany’s vaccination programme is in trouble, with people failing to keep their appointments for the Oxford Astrazeneca vaccine, according to the Times
- “Costs are rising exponentially for Europe’s disinformation war on vaccine science” – Europe’s coolness on vaccines makes the restructuring of some eurozone debt inescapable, writes Ambrose-Evans Pritchard in the Telegraph
- “Quebec actress dies while waiting for surgery delayed by COVID-19” – A tragic story reported in the Montreal Gazette
- “‘There’s no other option’: Toronto restaurant owner vows court action over extended lockdown” – CTV News reports the case of Adam Skelly, who is challenging the lockdown rules in the Ontario superior court
- “Dutch restaurant group suing state over Covid closures” – RT reports that the largest restaurant association in the Netherlands is set to embark on legal action to get the Government to drop its Covid restrictions due to their devastating impact on hospitality
- “Medical Censorship and Harms of Lockdowns” – Watch three Canadian doctors speak out about COVID-19 and the harms of lockdown
- “Declining a COVID-19 Vaccine Risks Penalties in Some Countries” – The Wall Street Journal details the price paid for refusing the vaccine in some countries around the world
- “The ‘Vaccine Passport’ Agenda” – The Swiss Doctor takes on vaccine passports
- “The Florida Versus California Showdown” – The two states provide a clear example of the dubious efficacy of COVID-19 lockdowns, writes Amelia Janaskie on the AIER blog
- Listen to publican Adam Brooks pleading for pubs to reopen sooner than May 17th
Theme Tunes Suggested by Readers
Sixteen today: “Mixed Signals” by Robbie Williams, “Roadmap to Revolution” by Oceans on Mars, “From Safety to Where” by Joy Division, “Fear Loves This Place” by Julian Cope, “I Won’t Back Down” by Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers, “Big A, Little A” by Crass, “Mighty and Superior” by Conflict, “What’s Another Year” by Shane MacGowan, “A History of Bad Men” by the Melvins, “We Gotta Get Out Of This Place” by the Animals, “Detention Home” by the Dead Boys, “Ain’t Nothing To Do” by Dead Boys, “Road to Ruin” by the Libertines, “Storm the Reality Asylum” by Rip Rig and Panic, “People Have The Power” by Patti Smith and “Running Scared” by Roy Orbison
Love in the Time of Covid
We have created some Lockdown Sceptics Forums, including a dating forum called “Love in a Covid Climate” that has attracted a bit of attention. We have a team of moderators in place to remove spam and deal with the trolls, but sometimes it takes a little while so please bear with us. You have to register to use the Forums as well as post comments below the line, but that should just be a one-time thing. Any problems, email Lockdown Sceptics here.
Sharing Stories
Some of you have asked how to link to particular stories on Lockdown Sceptics so you can share it. To do that, click on the headline of a particular story and a link symbol will appear on the right-hand side of the headline. Click on the link and the URL of your page will switch to the URL of that particular story. You can then copy that URL and either email it to your friends or post it on social media. Please do share the stories.
Social Media Accounts
You can follow Lockdown Sceptics on our social media accounts which are updated throughout the day. To follow us on Facebook, click here; to follow us on Twitter, click here; to follow us on Instagram, click here; to follow us on Parler, click here; and to follow us on MeWe, click here.
Woke Gobbledegook
We’ve decided to create a permanent slot down here for woke gobbledegook. Today, we bring you a hitherto under-considered method of reducing the COVID-19 infection rate in the US: Reparations for Slavery. Happily a peer-reviewed study by researchers from the Harvard Medical School has now hit upon this solution as Cockburn notes in Spectator US.
To defeat coronavirus, America didn’t need a vaccine. It just had to pay every black person in the country $250,000.
This remarkable finding comes from the intrepid minds of Harvard Medical School. In their paper, 11 elite health professionals claim that reparations for slavery would have radically reduced US infections and death rates from coronavirus.
To reach its conclusion, the study compares coronavirus infection rates in Louisiana with the country of South Korea, where coronavirus was largely quashed. Now, Cockburn can think of many differences between South Korea and Louisiana – he has never thrown up into a garbage can in Seoul, for starters – but for all their PhDs Harvard’s experts are remarkably simpleminded on the topic. The paper says nothing about South Korea’s conformist culture, its intense xenophobia, its high education levels, or its low obesity rate. No, it’s the equity, stupid: South Korea is more equal than Louisiana. It didn’t have slavery. So a few hundred thousand in reparations and Louisiana would be just like South Korea.
The paper’s scientific pretensions fray towards the end, when its authors collectively turn toward the reader and tell them that, if they want to reopen the country without erecting socialism, they might as well bring back Jim Crow:
“Since reparations have not been enacted, however, ‘reopening’ American society early (after coronavirus-forced shutdowns) had a disproportionate adverse mortality effect on Black people, an effect that was predictable. Therefore, de facto, it resembles a modern Tuskegee experiment, since massive wealth redistribution could have averted these deaths, just as penicillin to treat syphilis would have averted deaths in the nearby state of Alabama.“
That’s some real science right there. Would one-off reparations payments really change American inequality long-term? How can anyone possibly predict the sociopolitical ramifications of the most dramatic wealth transfer in the history of the United States? Isn’t it irresponsible and an abuse of the scientific method to create a ‘model’ where virtually every variable is simply made up?
Stop Press: Merseyside Police has apologised after driving through Wirral with a poster on a van proclaiming that “being offensive is an offence”. from the BBC.
Merseyside Police has apologised for claiming “being offensive is an offence” as part of a campaign to encourage people to report hate crime.
The force came under fire over the weekend after the message appeared on a billboard in Wirral.
It has since clarified that while hate crime is an offence, “being offensive is not in itself an offence”.
A spokesman added the poster was “well intentioned” by the local policing team in Wirral but it was “incorrect”.
The message on the billboard sparked criticism over whether being offensive constituted a crime.
The Telegraph also has a report of the episode in which Toby is quoted:
It’s deeply alarming that Merseyside Police have such a poor grasp of the law. As Lord Justice Sedley said in a landmark case in 1999, “Free speech includes not only the inoffensive but the irritating, the contentious, the eccentric, the heretical, the unwelcome and the provocative provided it does not tend to provoke violence. Freedom only to speak inoffensively is not worth having.”
The Free Speech Union has written to Merseyside Police asking for assurance that they have not interviewed or arrested anyone for this imaginary crime.
Needless to say, Titania McGrath was thrilled to discover that being offensive is now a criminal offence.
Stop Press 2: The Salisbury Review has a good think piece on the Nigerian actress who was was dropped from her role as Celie in the musical version of The Colour Purple after another actor dug up a five year-old Facebook post in which, as a Christian, she had expressed her view that homosexuality is a sin.
Stop Press 3: We do, occasionally, like to post links to arguments being made by people on the other side of the aisle. Responding to Gavin Williamson’s recent proposals for strengthening free speech protections in universities, Arianne Shahvisi argues that the Goverment has conjured up an imaginary problem to distract its supporters from its abject failures of the past 12 months.
“Mask Exempt” Lanyards
We’ve created a one-stop shop down here for people who want to obtain a “Mask Exempt” lanyard/card – because wearing a mask causes them “severe distress”, for instance. You can print out and laminate a fairly standard one for free here and the Government has instructions on how to download an official “Mask Exempt” notice to put on your phone here. And if you feel obliged to wear a mask but want to signal your disapproval of having to do so, you can get a “sexy world” mask with the Swedish flag on it here.
A reader has started a website that contains some useful guidance about how you can claim legal exemption. Another reader has created an Android app which displays “I am exempt from wearing a face mask” on your phone. Only 99p.
If you’re a shop owner and you want to let your customers know you will not be insisting on face masks or asking them what their reasons for exemption are, you can download a friendly sign to stick in your window here.
And here’s an excellent piece about the ineffectiveness of masks by a Roger W. Koops, who has a doctorate in organic chemistry. See also the Swiss Doctor’s thorough review of the scientific evidence here and Prof Carl Heneghan and Dr Tom Jefferson’s Spectator article about the Danish mask study here.
Stop Press: Boris’s roadmap involves secondary school pupils wearing masks in classroom. A senior teacher at school in London has sent us some thoughts.
It was already clear in the autumn term that the wearing of masks in the corridors and communal spaces had the effect of maintaining the idea that there was a crisis. Seeing hordes of kids with masks over their faces was a genuinely dystopian sight. But at least we didn’t have to put up with that nonsense in the classroom. Now, it seems, we do. Put aside for a moment the peculiarity of insisting on a further restrictive measure as part of your ‘roadmap’ out of lockdown, and at a time when you are trumpeting the success of the vaccines. The real nightmare is the de-humanising effect that masks have. To obscure the bulk of your face in an environment that is meant to encourage social participation is the worst possible measure. If you want to reduce your children to suppressed, voiceless drones, then masking them up is the best way to do it. Ignore for a moment the health hazards of an increasingly damp, germ filled bit of material across your respiratory systems all day long. Ignore, if you can, the environmental knock-back of millions of disused, disposable masks. What the mask really does is symbolise your liability as a human being. Only by somehow becoming less human are you allowed to exist in the Covid-mad world, and masking in classrooms will bring that message home to school pupils better than anything else.
Boris Johnson and his inadequate crew of wilting ministers may have added the mask mandate for classrooms as a further sop to the anti-education teaching unions. For them, it is just another minor measure in the destruction of society that they are so determined to achieve. For children in school, they may start to wonder whether the return was really worth it, as they exchange a screen for a mask and get no nearer to proper human interaction.
The Great Barrington Declaration
The Great Barrington Declaration, a petition started by Professor Martin Kulldorff, Professor Sunetra Gupta and Professor Jay Bhattacharya calling for a strategy of “Focused Protection” (protect the elderly and the vulnerable and let everyone else get on with life), was launched in October and the lockdown zealots have been doing their best to discredit it ever since. If you googled it a week after launch, the top hits were three smear pieces from the Guardian, including: “Herd immunity letter signed by fake experts including ‘Dr Johnny Bananas’.” (Freddie Sayers at UnHerd warned us about this the day before it appeared.) On the bright side, Google UK has stopped shadow banning it, so the actual Declaration now tops the search results – and Toby’s Spectator piece about the attempt to suppress it is among the top hits – although discussion of it has been censored by Reddit. In February, Facebook deleted the GBD’s page because it “goes against our community standards”. The reason the zealots hate it, of course, is that it gives the lie to their claim that “the science” only supports their strategy. These three scientists are every bit as eminent – more eminent – than the pro-lockdown fanatics so expect no let up in the attacks. (Wikipedia has also done a smear job.)
You can find it here. Please sign it. Now over three quarters of a million signatures.
Update: The authors of the GBD have expanded the FAQs to deal with some of the arguments and smears that have been made against their proposal. Worth reading in full.
Update 2: Many of the signatories of the Great Barrington Declaration are involved with new UK anti-lockdown campaign Recovery. Find out more and join here.
Update 3: You can watch Sunetra Gupta set out the case for “Focused Protection” here and Jay Bhattacharya make it here.
Update 4: The three GBD authors plus Prof Carl Heneghan of CEBM have launched a new website collateralglobal.org, “a global repository for research into the collateral effects of the COVID-19 lockdown measures”. Follow Collateral Global on Twitter here. Sign up to the newsletter here.
Judicial Reviews Against the Government
There are now so many legal cases being brought against the Government and its ministers we thought we’d include them all in one place down here.
The Simon Dolan case has now reached the end of the road. The current lead case is the Robin Tilbrook case which challenges whether the Lockdown Regulations are constitutional, although that case, too, has been refused permission to proceed. There’s still one more thing that can be tried. You can read about that and contribute here.
The GoodLawProject and three MPs – Debbie Abrahams, Caroline Lucas and Layla Moran – brought a Judicial Review against Matt Hancock for failing to publish details of lucrative contracts awarded by his department and it was upheld. The Court ruled Hancock had acted unlawfully.
Then there’s John’s Campaign which is focused specifically on care homes. Find out more about that here.
There’s the GoodLawProject and Runnymede Trust’s Judicial Review of the Government’s award of lucrative PPE contracts to various private companies. You can find out more about that here and contribute to the crowdfunder here.
Scottish Church leaders from a range of Christian denominations have launched legal action, supported by the Christian Legal Centre against the Scottish Government’s attempt to close churches in Scotland for the first time since the the Stuart kings in the 17th century. The church leaders emphasised it is a disproportionate step, and one which has serious implications for freedom of religion.” Further information available here.
There’s the class action lawsuit being brought by Dr Reiner Fuellmich and his team in various countries against “the manufacturers and sellers of the defective product, PCR tests”. Dr Fuellmich explains the lawsuit in this video. Dr Fuellmich has also served cease and desist papers on Professor Christian Drosten, co-author of the Corman-Drosten paper which was the first and WHO-recommended PCR protocol for detection of SARS-CoV-2. That paper, which was pivotal to the roll out of mass PCR testing, was submitted to the journal Eurosurveillance on January 21st and accepted following peer review on January 22nd. The paper has been critically reviewed here by Pieter Borger and colleagues, who also submitted a retraction request, which was rejected in February.
And last but not least there was the Free Speech Union‘s challenge to Ofcom over its ‘coronavirus guidance’. A High Court judge refused permission for the FSU’s judicial review on December 9th and the FSU has decided not to appeal the decision because Ofcom has conceded most of the points it was making. Check here for details.
Samaritans
If you are struggling to cope, please call Samaritans for free on 116 123 (UK and ROI), email jo@samaritans.org or visit the Samaritans website to find details of your nearest branch. Samaritans is available round the clock, every single day of the year, providing a safe place for anyone struggling to cope, whoever they are, however they feel, whatever life has done to them.
Shameless Begging Bit
Thanks as always to those of you who made a donation in the past 24 hours to pay for the upkeep of this site. Doing these daily updates is hard work (although we have help from lots of people, mainly in the form of readers sending us stories and links). If you feel like donating, please click here. And if you want to flag up any stories or links we should include in future updates, email us here. (Don’t assume we’ll pick them up in the comments.)
And Finally…
London Calling is back! After a one-week hiatus due to technical difficulties (one of them forgot to press the record button), Toby and James Delingpole are back to have a good old moan about the roadmap, Harry and Meghan’s ungracious exit from the Royal Family and the horrors of children having to wear masks in schools.
You can listen to the podcast here and subscribe on iTunes here.
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Morning all. Keep fighting the good fight!
Good morning. Here is a brilliant article. It brings together (with corroborated references) the different strands of what is behind this plandemic.
https://architectsforsocialhousing.co.uk/2021/02/19/cui-bono-the-covid-19-conspiracy/
“Faced with evidence of the power of these organisations to ‘create our own reality’, our first resort, it seems, is to denounce their existence, like children who hope that, by closing their eyes, the monster at the bottom of their bed will disappear.”.
Excellent, this was recommended to me this morning by Miriam of this parish (“Miriam and Alan”) during a doubtless still illegal (and very pleasant) recreational stroll along the Bugsworth Canal Basin. (Highly recommended, if you like investigating our industrial heritage in an open air setting.)
Saved me the trouble of finding it, thanks. His piece analysing the death numbers was excellent.
We must be ‘narrative sceptics’ not just lockdown. The so-called vaccine is evil and killing people already.
Yes I was wondering if we need to start a new group called ‘vaccine sceptics’
Could start a new forum.
They have created a pandemic by cooking the books and changing the definition of the narrative. They have then produced an experimental solution. We are now expected not just to take their solution, and quite possibly be turned into second class citizens if we refuse it. The media are not speaking up about the vaccine related deaths in care homes instead they are pushing the success of their vaccine at every opportunity. People like Mike Yeadon who have spoken up about the concerns around the vaccine, especially regarding fertility, have been silenced. There is no allowance for scepticism for vaccines in the media narrative. This has ALL been about the vaccine and the subsequent passports. If we are sceptical about lockdowns surely we should inevitably be sceptical about other experimental solutions to this created situation? Scepticism is wisdom in this situation. Anything else is following the pseudo science and giving up. I for one will not give up. My sister was permanently and severely brain damaged following her whooping cough vaccine in the 70s. She had a minor seizure following the first and second dose, but the doctor convinced my mum that the third dose was necessary and would be… Read more »
Horrific. Your story is heart breaking yet more common that people care to contemplate.
Fourteen years ago my great-niece had the MMR at 13 months old. One day she was a happy, bubbly tot staggering across the room falling into her mother’s outstretched arms, the next, that sweet little body was completely collapsed. She couldn’t even raise her head. Three or four years later the hospital had special, rigid leather, full length boots made to help her to stand up, which she eventually did, and learned to walk again.
She has spent all her schooldays in a remedial class and is a sweet, kind young girl lucky enough to be surrounded by loving family. But she will never have a normal life.
Poor little mite. Not to mention the effect on her family – who have been/will continue to be turned into carers for her even after she reaches adult age and should be independent.
If anyone had done that to my family member and I had a face to put it to. That person would be shanked in the street.
I guess people don’t get as angry as I do.
“We need to understand why it’s necessary, we need to understand why children are being used as guinea pigs, we need to understand why they are pushing it so hard. We need to understand why the passports are even being considered. Scepticism is the only intelligent and thoughtful response to this vaccine.”
Right. And this is where the resetting of the financial system and moving most people to Universal Basic Income and a Social Credit System comes in. Certainly, this is a shakedown racket by Big Pharma, but I think of that more as the engine to power what is taking place.
I am sorry to say that I do not think we can dismiss some of the more horrific possibilities that once people are genetically modifed enough they will be owned by various corporations and therefore have zero rights as humans.
People simply need to get real and understand that this is a coup by the technocrats around Big Pharma in league with the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and the bankers around the Federal Reserve.
The British establishment is taking its orders from corporations by way of global bodies like the Trilateral Commission.
Im not sure where i read this but the rules on moving genetically modified “things” across borders used to be very strict, apparently these rules were relaxed shortly before gene therapy roll out, I am having difficulty verifying this.
someone mentioned this in the last couple of days here and provided the links. What struck me was the change was done so recent I was surprised something to do with the EU would still affect us.
Totally agree with you here.
Yes something very nasty is taking shape and it centres around the Covid vaccines, that aren’t vaccines. The only thing I would add to your telling exposition is that many people will not survive these “vaccines” and of course they are not meant to. Most of us are regarded as being surplus to their requirements.
If it’s indeed the case that most of us are regarded as surplus to requirements – then it would be a logical explanation for the decision made that the jab will be rolled out going down the agegroups. After all – the elderly cost more in health care on average/usually are no longer working/usually are no longer bringing up children. So overall conclusion – if treating people as economic units, rather than as human beings, would be that they cost a lot more/contribute a lot less. I guess it was decided to do it that way – rather than asking people if they are the 3rd/4th/5th etc child in a family (ie came along after the 2 replacement people in that family had been born). Hastens to add that I don’t believe those should be regarded as “surplus to be disposed of” either – even though I would argue as to why were they conceived in the first place (ie when the parents had already had the replacement two people and must know we live in overcrowded country/overcrowded world).
The ten year census will arrive soon, I wonder what will be gleaned from that.
I believe Branch Covidian will be a popular option in the religion question.
Yes, even if you believe the Covid nonsense, it would make no sense to vaccinate the under sixties. Now they are planning criminal trials on children, incredibly sick and likely satanic.
Yet it could be a long death over years.
Also, the sterlization angle I suspect is important.
True
I agree that this is the plan from all I have read and listened to.
Very powerful post. Thanks for sharing.
I really don’t know what to say, other than what a powerful post that was.
It must be very hard when people call you, an anti-vaccer in a mocking or nasty way, as I’m sure some do, having had the experience first hand of a sibling having their life ruined by one, as you have.
I was a young lad through to a teenager in the 70s and I do have a recollection of a lad in another class at school who’s little brother “became ill” after the whooping cough jab.
I’m afraid I don’t know the details, as these things tended not to be spoken about to kids at that time and also the family apparently moved from the area shortly afterwards. But just recently, with all the present problems, hearing stories like yours, it makes me very angry that you are dismissed by many “in authority”.
I’m not a complete antivaxxer, my children have received most of their vaccines, although we have proceeded slowly and with caution. My youngest child had her Men B as a baby and had an Adsense seizure following it. She didn’t receive the follow up vax. We have now being called up for her one year imms. I feel really conflicted, but largely persuaded that for her, with her previous history, we will defer her vaccines. This new vaccine is so different though. It is an experiment and one in which I do not choose to partake. My only concern is coercion or mandatory vaccines. We live on a small holding and we are busy preparing the property for those who need to escape and join us in our life outside the system.
Any person that suffers an adverse reaction after a vaccination has an increased chance of suffering worse adverse reactions or even death with future vaccinations Always do your research. The NVIC website is highly recommended Biography, Barbara Loe FisherCo-Founder & President National Vaccine Information Center (NVIC) Barbara Loe Fisher is co-founder and president of the National Vaccine Information Center (NVIC), a non-profit charity she founded with parents of vaccine injured children in 1982 to prevent vaccine injuries and deaths through public education. For the past four decades, she has led a national, grassroots movement and public information campaign to institute vaccine safety and informed consent protections in public health policies and laws. She has researched, analyzed and publicly articulated the science, policy, law, ethics and politics of vaccination to become one of the world’s leading non-medical, consumer advocacy experts on vaccination and human rights. She has three grown children and a grandson. Her oldest son suffered a convulsion, collapse and brain inflammation within hours of his fourth DPT shot in 1980 when he was two and a half years old. He was left with multiple learning disabilities and attention deficit disorder and was confined to a special education classroom throughout his… Read more »
Thanks again Victoria – you seem really on the ball. What’s interesting is that you, who have given us some really useful information, have got 9 upticks while Liberty, with a harrowing story, has got many many more.
These upticks are another reminder that emotion is what makes humans tick. Facts are important, but people are driven by emotion. It is what has made the Covid narrative so persuasive. The media have played on the emotions of the nation. They have manipulated us with guilt and sob stories. My story is real though, and that is what we on here are all seeking. We are seeking truth, but truth accompanied with real emotions will always tell a more compelling tale. Thank you Victoria for your very helpful information. Thank you Bungle for inspiring me to share my story. It’s cathartic to write the painful memories and to give a voice to my sister, whose voice was stolen by a vaccine.
Same as for the covid bollox – emotion trumps facts. 🙂
What’s with all the overvaxxing anyway? FOUR DTP shots before the age of 3??? I did not get that many and I was 16 in 1980. I hear it’s getting worse too.
I’m not on a small holding but I am seeking out people to work with outside of their system. https://freedomcells.org/ & https://thegreatbeartrail.com/ (not working at the moment though). Prepping as much as I can and growing fruit and veg as best I can along with some chickens! I hope you meet others you can work and grow with.
Great initiatives, GuyRich – you should contact The Light truthpaper and offer to write an article on what you have planned for this. You can reach them here – news@thelightpaper.co.uk, and this is the link to the website – https://thelightpaper.co.uk/. Word of this needs to be spread.
I’ll have a look at this. Thanks.
The Great Bear Trail – that rings a Canadian bell!
Owen Benjamin (comedian) runs it. It’s basically the same as the freedom cells idea.
Is Freedom Cells on board with the coming Totalitarian Health State or a bunch of half a fag Chomsky loving fuckboys lining up for the jab while touting ‘sustainable living’?
Only United States it seems.
As far as I can tell it’s setup by Derrek Broze of the Conscious Resistance. Agorist/voluntaryism in nature but definitely opposed to the oncoming technocratic state. Promoting permaculture and small community living. It’s worth a shot in my view. Don’t know if there are any views on Chomsky.
No, I’m not a complete antivaxxer either, but I also am concerned that we must be free to choose and not be “forced” into taking something lest our freedoms be stolen from us if we don’t. I agree that the new vaccines are experimental and it concerns me that the pharmas have been given legal immunity by the government in the UK. That just makes me more suspicious. I am (just) in my 60s and had a medical problem in my mid 40s which was dealt with, but that, according to doctors, makes me fall into an “at risk” category. I was always disgustingly healthy before my 40s. I had not been to the doctors at all since I was 18 and caught “German” measles and went to find out what it was! – I believe there was no MMR vax. when I was a kid so I caught chicken pox, measles, mumps and even scarlet fever, which may be why my immune system now still seems to work quite well. I have now been in pretty good physical health ever since the problem which was fixed my mid 40s, so I don’t consider myself “at risk”. Every year I… Read more »
Well, I’m a COMPLETE anti-vaxxer now.
Do you think I will trust ANYTHING to do with the medical profession, period?
If by some horror I have to ask for advice from a medical doctor, I will check to see if they signed the Great Barrington Declaration. If not, their advice will be immediately discounted.
Thank you Liberty for posting your tragic story. My two children had individual jabs (paid for privately) rather than the MMR but you cannot now get individual mumps vaccine even privately (if I were a suspicious person I would ruminate on the reasons why – it was still around in daughter’s day). The GP was trying to persuade me to let my son have the MMR and was not happy when I replied that I was old enough to remember cases like your sister’s and all the assurances that a vaccine was safe and then compensation being paid out.
It does not make you anti-vaxx, it just means you want to wait and see how THIS one pans out.
I wish you and your sister well and hope you are able to see and hug her soon.
I had the same problem with single vaccines with mine. I seem to remember that Tony Blair had a holiday in France about the time his son’s mmr was due,, and declined to comment when asked about it citing privacy/ confidentiality.
THIS is exactly what people should be doing. Buying smallholdings and houses in the country with large gardens to grow vegetables. As well as getting to know people in the area who can swap things with you. Have to think about water being taken away from tap and electricity not being available.
We have a borehole and plan on getting solar panels and then some sort of generator and battery. My husband is the brains behind that. I am the creative part of the team! We moved here 18 months ago, just in time!
We have a solar panel on our RV in Canada (sigh) and it’s enough to keep the water pump and lights running and the computer/phone charged – so we can go out into the bondu in comfort!
That reminds me of the saying ”He will always be a slave who cannot live upon a little”.
People won’t be allowed to grow their own vegetables for much longer. That’s also on the ‘verboten’ list.
Share your website – please! Would love to escape as soon as possible – but I daresay there’ll be fierce competition!
I remember the whooping cough vaccine scandal. It was not an isolated incident. Not surprising, you will find little mention of this in the current climate.
A friend’s sister died following the whooping cough vaccine. My Dad was offered £5000 by Tony Blair in the 90s, in relation to my sister’s vaccine damage, during the MMR vaccine crisis. He never told me why. Hush money?
Bliar again. 😒 He’s always there at the bottom of every pile 💩
He certainly never seems to be far away from a shit-heap that’s for sure. I didn’t know he was guilty of that as well. I knew he’s guilty for the Iraq War and for the Welsh Referendum and for just those two charges I do wish I could time travel back and ensure his parents never met in the first place (ie so he couldnt be conceived).
Unfortunately he’s rising to the top of the slurry again at the moment!
Urrghh!
Pertussis (Whooping Cough) Disease & Vaccine InformationGet the Information You Need to Make an Informed Vaccine Decision
https://www.nvic.org/Vaccines-and-Diseases/Whooping-Cough.aspx
—
Dr. Humphries | Pertussis or “Whooping Cough” VaccineDr. Suzanne Humphries testifies at the West Virginia Education Committee the morning of Saturday, March 18, 2017. She discusses history and problems with the pertussis or “whooping cough” vaccines (DPT, DTaP, & TDaP).
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-gS8BSBYYMk
—
Sodium ascorbate treatment of whooping cough.
[formerly titled the vitamin C treatment of whooping cough]
https://drsuzanne.net/wp-content/uploads/2017/10/Vitamin-C-Whooping-Cough-PDF.pdf
My friends daughter had a baby boy and was offered the MMR
vaccine. She refused on the advice of her mother because Tony Blair would not say whether or not little Leo had had it. I’m pleased to say that the baby eventually had chickenpox, measles,mumps and recovered like we all did after the war and is now a strapping young man with his first published book behind him. This vaccine is sounding like genocide.
Liberty – how sad that is. After what you said a couple of days ago about many in your family NOT being sceptical, that must make it even harder for you.
Indeed, I don’t know how they can just buy into this. My mum also died when I was 14, in part because she was underdosed on radiotherapy, due to a mistake by the radiographer. We were yet again compensated, in the scheme of things the money was irrelevant, I just wanted my mum, I say all this because I want to explain that even though my family has been personally involved in two awful, life changing incidents which have been caused by medical professional malpractice, the current fear narrative overshadows that for them. We have lost so much to medical negligence, and now I have lost family to fear.
Indeed – I can sympathise that you are being put through all the current vax nonsense after what has happened to your family personally – and yet still they don’t believe us. Hug en route through the ether to you.
What a burden your family has to carry from other people’s incompetence.
I hope that there’s a road back for all of us in this situation. I am desperate to steer a careful way through all the obstacles – I know I can’t convince them to see things my way, or even a different way – but I think perhaps we can learn to live with the elephant in the room.
So, so shocking Liberty, my heart goes out to you with the hope that you find a way through this. To lose your mother at 14 and then suffer so much afterwards.What a terrible world we live in. Sending love and all good wishes to you,good always overcomes evil.
Tillysmum, love does indeed triumph over evil. After Mum died I came to faith in Jesus Christ, who gave everything to pay the ultimate price for the evil in this world. He has carried me every day since. His love has helped me to forgive and has taught me to love and trust again. I have a blessed life, not despite my past, but because of it. Every pain I have gone through could have broken me, and sometimes almost seemed to, but God used it to grow in me a love and compassion for others who suffer, so that I may be there for them in their hour of need. I am strong, not because of me, but because God has grown me through each trial.
Banjones, thank you for your comment, it made me feel like a person, not just a commenter. It reminded me that people do notice and they do care. It reminded me that we can still create communities which look out for one another.
Yes, Liberty – I agree. This site has been a nerve-saver! Comments such as yours make us see things in perspective – you’ve had such a tough time. Glad to know you’re out in the good fresh country air (as we are, I thank God), and making plans to bring like-minded others to you. We shall look out for your website!
I’m really sorry Banjones, but for the sake of privacy, we’ll be keeping it underground advertising-wise, as we want to live in peace without government interference. We have lots of friends keen to escape and a Christian community ready to worship and work together. We do not plan on being exclusive, all will be welcome, but I am expecting word of mouth to carry the message of our place of freedom, rather than the much watched internet. We had our first Spring bookings yesterday. They will exchange their self contained accommodation for farm work. I really believe that these sort of places will spring up all over the country. I pray you find one near you.
How wonderful. What an inspiraton too. God be with you and health and happiness too.
I sympathise with you and your sister. I have epilepsy which was triggered years ago by the polio vaccine but it is very mild compared to your unfortunate sister; it is the reason why I have refused all other vaccines especially the C19 one.
Instances of vaccine damage are common, but are swept under the carpet and hardly ever make the mainstream news. In my family a first cousin was brain damaged as a toddler following smallpox vaccination and was permanently institutionalised until he died at age twenty. A very young second cousin died three weeks after smallpox vaccination, this in the late 1940’s. Another 1 year old first cousin (once removed) died in the early nineties, just a week after the MMR injection and the death was classed as an idiopathic SIDS, was it hell!
There ahas been a dramatic reduction in SIDS since the pandemic began. ‘Children’s Health Defence’ put it down to the startling reduction in the take up of the newborn vaccine programme. Incidentally I have a friend whose baby died the night of their 8 week imms. Could be a coincidence?
Before we pullup our sleeves for the vaccine we should all know how vaccination came into being. As is well known Dr Edward Jenner discovered vaccination by observing milk maids had perfect skin. This was due to them catching cowpox which made them immune to smallpox. He then got a child and the pus of cowpox which he then inoculated the child with. Later on he came across a patient suffering from smallpox collected the pus which he infected the inoculated child with. The child didn’t develop smallpox and vaccination was born.This is the story we all hear but there’s down side to the story. Later on Dr Edward Jenner decided to vaccinate his son but unfortunately he had a fit and suffered brain damage dying at the age of 21. Today’s vaccine is light years more safer than Jenners pus/vaccine but we should never forget there’s always some sort of danger when you have a vaccine.
So terribly heartbreaking to hear this. My daughter is 56 now and I would not allow her to have all the vaccines recommended at the time.I was sceptical even as a 22 year old. And then there was thalidomide and countless other chemicals peddled by the doctors who had to get their quotas and who years ago were directed by the representatives of the pharmaceutical companies. Everything you take into your body has a reaction and imbalances the immune system, even an antibiotic will take 6 months before it leaves. For God’s sake let us get back to common sense and ditch all this Big Pharma. It’s quite simple, good quality unprocessed food, exercise and sleep. And no interference from
chemicals, from what I understand, the vaccine injury to children in America is shocking.
Feel for you friend.
Yes I was wondering if we need to start a new group called ‘vaccine sceptics’
That may be necessary, the LS team seems a very long way from being remotely sceptical about the dangerous, hardly tested, liability free and highly experimental vaccines, that many, for no good reason, believe are going to spring us out of the government own manufactured Covid mess.
Your quote talks about people who cannot gain access to or have not yet been offered the vaccine. This suggests that once we all have been offered the vaccine then discriminating against those of us who refuse their offer would a different matter. In other words our choice will be between taking the experimental jab and fully partaking in society, or refusing it and becoming a second class citizen denied many of the basic freedoms we once took for granted.
Then we need to begin the development of a parallel society/community. Find businesses that will support the sane un-gene edited people out there.
Interesting..I’m a 2nd year Filmmaking student and I’m currently working on a screenplay about this scenario. The other students think its fiction, I keep saying it will be a documentary by the time I come to film it this time next year (if they allow me into the third year without a vaccine…)
Agreed. Unfortunately this is proving quite difficult, even within my own family where there is a modicum of scepticism people just can’t go further than ‘its all just a big mistake’.
my thoughts exactly
Most of those freedoms are NOT coming back. As for second class citizen, I think long term injuries from this unknown quantity and without redress from either Big Pharma or government would render one thus. Not to mention the totalitarian grid that they are ushering through with passports and so on. Days of flying cheaply are over with.
Vernon Coleman gives a fairly good assessment of the short term effects here. But the long term effects are even more worrying here.
We must now stop repeating ourselves and take action. I have proposed 6th March as Resistance Day. Please join.
If I could join you I would but being 8000 miles away I can only be there is spirit. Good luck with it
My son’s in Fiji. Can you join him?
There is already a push for 8th March as REOPENING day. And 13th March “I do not comply” protest. And 8th March also “Global Group Hug”
We should focus on those dates and keep up with the resistance as we go about our everyday lives.
Let’s do them all. Mine stems from this site, that is why it is special to us, I hope.
A number of days of action have been suggested, If we designate too many then we risk being spread too thinly and numbers suffer. Short days and inclement weather will also keep numbers low. The first attempt at the Great Reopening was probably impacted this way. It has now scheduled for 20th March (Spring Equinox) and gives time for preparations to be made.
However, I am in favour of re-asserting our rights and freedoms starting last year. In common with most sceptics, every day is Resistance Day for me.
Gathering in one mass protest in a well known location just hands victory to the police.
Not if people fight back in defense when that happens well who knows.
You’ve obviously missed my point. This is absolutely not one mass protest. If people reading this go to their local supermarket at 9 am without a mask and tell anyone hampering them that twice is a criminal offence, the only police presence in any of these thousands of shops, should be to arrest the employee who commits a crime by breaking the 1997 Act. I know the police would shuffle out of this but just video the staff and send it to Head Office threatening the store.
I hope you don’t mind but I stalked your cafe on trip advisor yesterday, am I right in thinking that you have an uplifting slogan “bat signal” on the wall in one of the photos to alert your fellow travellers? If so, your cafe looks wonderful and if ever we are unleashed I will be paying a visit.
Cheers!
Ferguson says we’re learning more all the time and that this virus is as bad as he thought it was.
Er… what?
Nothing of any substance has changed since last year. We knew last year that the IFR was lower than they predicted. We knew it only really affected older people with co-morbitities.
The only thing that’s changed is that people now believe we can control a virus.
No, the only thing that we have (re)learned is that you can control people very easily if someone in authority commands you.
Exactly, maybe by the end of the “decade of health” They’ll get to the 510k mortality number – with SARS-cov2, Ferguson, will turn round ‘gotcha!, My model got us there in the end’.
Pickle tickler
They have got to higher numbers by adding two flu seasons together, something which is never done – the figures we should be looking at are October 2020 to now as the current flu season vs Oct 2019 to March 2020 as the last flu season. What happened in April 2020 was nothing to do with deaths from flu or covid19 and everything to do with the massive spike in environmental pollution which happened in tandem with the peak in deaths due to us being in lockdown but with windows open coinciding with very poor air (very similar to what happened during the worst period of pollution in the 1950s).
Inspector Jericho, police drama set in 1950s London. Episode ‘The Hollow Men’ in a great London smog where the man in the white lab coat Govt Advisory Fim in the cinema says
‘Breath Through your nose, far more effective than a mask’.
In that episode about the Great Smog in The Crown, there was a doctor in that scene where Churchill visits the hospital who said pretty much the same thing.
What evidence is there the virus exists?
What proof is there PCR diagnoses the virus?
What objectively determines the cause of death?
As far as I’m aware, coronavirus’s have always existed but their threat have never been deemed great enough to be concerned about. Also pretty sure previous attempts to create a vaccine for coronavirus failed every time because it’s not something that can normally be vaccinated against. I’m not an armchair expert by any stretch so could be completely wrong with the above comments, but very sure I’ve read about this somewhere with authority.
There is no hard evidence that the Sars-cov-2 coronavirus exists, as it has never been isolated. There is no proof that PCR can confirm the existence of any virus, including Sars-cov-2, nor can any of the other tests that they now pretend are able to do this job. Cause of death is now based on supposition or on outright lies, as objectivity could get a doctor sacked.
Not sure “We knew last year that the IFR was lower than they predicted.” is right. I think the Imperial model used an IFR of 0.9%. Most estimates of IFR in high income countries (UK, for example) are now around the 1.0% mark. The global average is usually estimated around 0.23%
The 1% is an over estimate that takes no account of the asymptomatic, or the very mild symptomatic that don’t know they have had it. Its just a number used to justify political actions. The 0.23% figure has at least some basis as it uses a very large population statistic, although I suspect its about 100% overstated.
Political whores are two a penny when you are as wealthy as Gates.
He seems to have an awful lot of time on his hands, writing petty responses to emails while he’s supposedly very busy heroically fighting a war to save the NHS from having to deal with sick people.
Somebody published the PANDA data last week.There is nowhere on the planet where the IFR is above 0.15.
I’ve forgotten. What’s a pub?
There’s one near me that is like this:
Empty, boarded up building with strange name over the door.
It’s a place where, as described by a government spokesperson at least three times on the Today Programme,
“people drink so much they are falling all over each other totally ignoring Social Distancing.”
Our pubs were deliberately targeted because that is where the working classes congregate
The main reason Cannabis isn’t legal in the UK is because it’s just a thing we British do not do culturally. This comes from the top and pretty much drives cannabis prohibition.
Who decides it’s just not a thing the British do culturally? The people on top or those further down? I suspect plenty of Brits use it, legal or not, and I would be surprised if someone like Johnson has never used it.
And he’s got plenty of people to ”shield” him. Those whose so-called careers depend on him being flexible enough to dance at the end of their strings.
What a deliberately ignorant bunch of arrogant tossers saying this.
It’s an old building which is either going to be demolished or converted to flats.
A very sad-looking building.
If the government concedes that this virus is of mild effect on the vast majority of people, as it does, and if the vaccination programme is such an astounding success, as it is logistically (leaving aside questions of safety et al) then why no feature, so far as I can see, in any of it’s pronouncements of how many in the general population have had it and surely should be presumed to have natural immunity. If I am mistaaken then please correct me. I would have thought this virus, running for over a year now, even allowing for it not to be as transmissable as many fear, should have infected millions. I seem to recall a major university (Imperial or UC?) positing that it could be 12 million and that was a few months ago. If that figure were to be added to the number vaccinated ( a type of gold standard,I suppose,for the government) and the vaccinated focused on the most at risk groups then are we not at or close to herd immunity and,if so, why are the government still dithering? Should they not be thinking, “Job done”? Am I wrong in thinking maybe natural immunity must be… Read more »
Switch your thinking to the goal being full vaccination, regardless of immunity. Then what? Why would they be doing that?
And remember, they want to vaccinate the entire globe, with money they printed from nothing, on you as the collateral. Why?
Well we know why don’t we….? World population is too large apparently. Has to be reduced apparently. We westerners are consuming too many resources apparently. We need our wealth and consumption reduced apparently.
It’s OUR wealth they want to reduce not theirs!
I’m ware of that. That’s why I say ”we need our wealth reducing apparently”. ‘They’ have no intention of reducing theirs. They want to increase their wealth. At our expense.
Because they can. There was some idea at the start of an actual health threat but once they opened the pandempanic box and let out the remaining unspent capital, well then we had to go with a ‘Plan B’
Another day, another dollar?
Another elephant I spotted in the Snake Oil Room.
The snake oil doesn’t prevent transmission or infection.
But it is supposed to reduce Covvideaths.
BUT THE COVID CORPSE COUNT IS A LIE.
If most of the alleged Covvicorpses didn’t sadlidie of Covid, how can the snake oil reduce the corpse count?
The random quoting of ‘scary’ death figures with no attempt at comparison or context has been a feature of this hoo-haa. There is currently hand wringing over half a million deaths in the USA but little attempt to put this into context with the size of the population, how this equates to the age adjusted ‘normal’ death rate and over what time period? Similarly the very inappropriately named ‘SAGE’ group predict 91,000 deaths if we ease UK lock-down too early, again no idea if this is in addition to or part of normal deaths, no time period, no comparison with population size.
As it is, with better weather heading our way, respiratory virus deaths will probably decline and all of this will be attributed to their magic potions.
There isn’t a lockdown right now. 2/3rds of my daughter’s class are back at school. A friend has 50% attendance at her inner London school. You can’t cross the road from my house to the post office because of the traffic. Toyota chucking out time is as bonkers as always, everyone is back at Royces in Derby. The parks and beaches are rammed. The idea lockdown is suppressing anything other than business is ludicrous. Look at the fuel price, FFS.
I believe the number of people whos death certificate states died of covid as opposed to with, is give or take a few around 4000
Why is it a lie that 5000 people per week, 700 per day, more people are dying than have done in the past five years? A bad influenza year generates about 20k excess deaths. That’s four weeks. We’ve seen multiples of that this winter. Note I did not say what they died of, but the respiratory count this winter is far in excess of past winters.
Nice of Boris to allow us back into pubs in 3 months. Nice to allow the kids back to school, albeit wearing ridiculous facemasks.
After all, he must have plenty of evidence that these lockdowns have been a great success, aided employment, kept people healthy and improved mental health,
I’ve got to admit I’m having trouble finding it.
After all, we had excess deaths of 54,600 (per Institute and Faculty of Actuaries) last year from 14th March to 1st Jan (44,000 if you include the whole year). That includes all those who died because of the lockdown as well. By way of comparison, there were 51,000 excess deaths in the winter (December to March) of 2017/18 (source: ONS)
That international pariah Sweden has lost 408 people under 60 to the virus in the whole period up to February 17th 2021. If you look at graphs of deaths, it’s virtually indistinguishable from the UK.
Florida and California showed very similar death patterns, despite ridiculous lockdowns in California and none in Florida.
Come on Boris, open the country now. Stop this nonsense. Read the numbers and see the garbage being fed to you for what it is!
He can’t. Not enough people have taken up the jab yet…People aren’t desperate enough yet, either because of fear or eagerness to be allowed out to play.
Ye they need to get the jab into arms and there may be more vaccine “hesitancy” among younger people. It is an exceptionally high take up amongst over 70s if true.
There is NOTHING ‘ridiculous’ about facemasks. They are DANGEROUS.
Why do you people stop on saying this? Have you even read about the coup by Big Pharma and the plan to reset the financial system by way of a social credit system?
Do you REALLY think that ‘Boris’ doesn’t realise what is going on.
WAKE UP!
READ!
I totally agree with this. 🙂
I think that facemasks make the risk of infection greater. If I was a “conspiracy theorist™️” I would think they were mandated to make sure the cases and illness were increased to prolong lockdown.
That’s what I think, the face naps are mandatory for a lot of reasons and probably most importantly they are known to DRIVE respiratory infections making them worse, making us suffer from a wider range of respiratory ailments and boosting community transmission.
The occultic evil of them is evident and so is the psychological effect and how utterly corrosive they are to human interaction.
The imposition of face masks is deliberate evil. Nothing more.
“The imposition of face masks is deliberate evil.“
Considering all the other pernicious actions of western “governments'” e.g. denial of HCQ, sick patients sent to care homes without medical support, DNRs, false counting of Covid deaths, denial of on-line free speech, de-platforming of highly qualified scientists, reprehensible attacks on the GBD signatories and so on, I can find nothing that they have done that has been any benefit to the people.
Repeal the Coronavirus Act. Recall all MPs.
Repeal the Coronavirus Act. Recall all MPs
Otherwise, defund the useless spongers!
It IS. Same with the social distancing harming kids immunities and our own. It’s biological terrorism.
This is the absolute truth about the matter. Bill Gates is controlling Big Pharma and us. I am so tired of those people who do no critical or contructive thinking, it is staring us in the face. Why are the nurses and doctors going along with it? Nothing we are told by MSM makes sense,We are like hamsters in cages, continually circling round with no real answers. Yes, WAKE UP NOW before they decide that vaccines will be delivered yearly whether we like it or not. Or is it too late now?
From the ATL postcard from the Philippines.
At this point, this country is one of the few in the world where children are not in some type of in-person school. How the Government here can know this and not be consumed by embarrassment and shame is beyond me.
Hey, Gulag UK, you’re in really good company.
I think North Korea is probably a better place to live than the UK right now. They can probably go to the pub once a week and sing patriotic songs at least.
Yes. A glass of Korean sake, while belting out “Marshal Kim Il-sung Is Our Supreme Commander”.
Social Distancing: In lockdown 1 cars stayed parked in the place for months on end as people really did stay home.
But prior to bozos roadmap plenty of people are visiting friends and family in their homes or outdoors.
Vaccination queues outside surgeries hugger mugger because it’s more important to stay out of the rain.
Covid Safe Traffic Layouts: some being challenged in Court, a local one was abandoned because it inconvenienced members of the Labour Social Club.
Pedestrian One Way schemes: nobody ever took the slightest notice of those.
Work From Home if you can: more and more people designating themselves as Key Workers and finding reasons why they need to be in the office.
Schools closed except for vulnerable children and those of key workers: some schools have 50% attendance as parents fight to have themselves identified as Key Workers.
Hand Sanitizer: widely ignored by one and all, even in hospitals.
Yet masks seem to command almost universal compliance (present company excepted). Why do people ignore or evade other measures yet obey the face nappy rule when it us so easy to be exempt ?
ABSOLUTELY, TOTALLY, COMPLETELY AGREE.
I asked a similar question yesterday.
Because it’s a visible totem of the new religion?
Sorry Ed, missed that but it bares (?) repeating.
Don’t worry, I missed it too, in that I posted it in reply to a comment in the middle of the day and forgot to look back for any answers.
Because psychologically, for the human herd, it isn’t easy. It marks you out as Different and Therefore Wrong.
It doesn’t worry me because I’m used to being Different and Therefore Wrong. It was ground into me in school until I stopped caring. I bet a lot of us sceptics had similar early experiences.
But for most people, even without the very real fear of a fine, it’s agony to be Different andTherefore Wrong. They’d rather suffocate.
I think you’ve hit the nail on the head
That is an interesting hypothesis “I’m used to being Different and Therefore Wrong. It was ground into me in school until I stopped caring. I bet a lot of us sceptics had similar early experiences.”
Me too. Not long ago my mother said my stand on masks, lockdown, et al was me being difficult as I ‘was always like that’ and if they’d said ‘you can’t were a mask’ I’d be wearing one out of obstinance. Sad how little they know me after 55 years. The rest of my family think I wear a tinfoil hat. And I sit in frustrated bemusement as to how not one of them have ever done any research or fact-checked.
Far too many people would prefer to suffer in silence and avoid all confrontation I am not one of them. I have been called a troublemaker for speaking out but I would prefer to be called one than perceived as being a walkover. I hate injustice more than anything else.
Your mother sounds just like mine! I saw her in person for the first time since October and she thinks I’m “not handling the whole situation very well.” FFS, anyone who is handling it “well” is not human! I just turned 56 so we’re of the same sceptical vintage and yes, I was always a kid who didn’t like to be told what to do and always broke rules that made no sense to me. I read this somewhere but it bears repeating: The ones telling us to wear tin foil hats for looking into conspiracies are now the ones wearing masks. So ironic.”
Good point. The Japanese have a saying: “the nail that sticks out gets hammered” and people are afraid of standing out. In the case of the muzzles they would rather develop breathing problems or skin issues rather than stand out.
My school reports constantly labelled me as a “malcontent” and a former line manager used it too to describe me. I stopped caring then and I don’t care now.
During conversations about this bollox I’ve been called a ‘rebel’ and an ‘old hippy’. I’m happy to admit to being both, and more.
Interesting to hear you say that, about “being Different and Therefore Wrong”. I’d concluded that about myself with WuFlu – in social terms, I’m used to being off to the side or the bottom of the heap, and so being the only person present not wearing a face mask isn’t enough to make me feel like I should go against my own interests and join the crowd. I’ve just returned from another trip to Melbourne, Victoria. I wore a face mask on the plane, in the public areas of the hospital I was visiting, at a club a family member took us to for dinner, and in one shop. And that was all. I didn’t wear a mask in the airport, in taxis, in the hotel, in restaurants or in any other shop. I’m very much a rarity in that, but the thing is, hardly anyone says a word about it. If they do, all you have to say is “I have an exemption”, and that’s been the end of the conversation every time. The fact that I can prove a genuine medical reason for not wearing masks is beside the point. I’m a timid kind of person who hates… Read more »
I, too, have been Different and Therefore Wrong since I was a child. Never know it was going to be my actual survival strategy as an adult!
You do realise that this information is being used by the people controlling all of this to ensure that they will spot this early enough with children now masked in schools to stamp it out and to ensure that no one who behaves like we did will ever be allowed to pursue such blatant disregard for the herd mentality in the dystopian future they are setting up.
Or… children of the brainwashed will sadly not survive, and children of the sane will evolve stronger – in body, mind and soul. Could be actual Darwinism at play…???
I too have always been Different-Therefore-Wrong, never quite fitting into any particular “clan”. I was probably in my 50s before I really stopped caring, and adopted the attitude “I’m Different Therefore Right” (Though with becoming modesty I freely admit that being always right is one of my less endearing characteristics 🙂 )
Being different never got me anywhere in the corporate world, but eventually there came acknowledgment that my differences added a value because my opinions (even unsought) were not subject to the groupthink of the clans/factions.
I just have to be true to myself. If that means I question the narrative, refuse to wear a mask and remain uncowed, then I can always hold my head up, wherever this all ends.
“Being different never got me anywhere in the corporate world, but eventually there came acknowledgment that my differences added a value because my opinions (even unsought) were not subject to the groupthink of the clans/factions.”
Sounds just like me!
Yes, I think I’ve been different, but probably only since my mid twenties. I’ve always been very analytical and done things based on logic, but it never occurred to me many intelligent people didn’t do the same. I used to assume those more experienced than me, must be right, even though they couldn’t explain their logic on an issue. But time and time again it transpired later that the reason that they had no clear logic was that they were wrong or if they were right they were right by chance not for the reasons they had given. So I kept a careful mental note of all these occasions and learned from those occasions when I was right all along, and the occasions when I was wrong. I remember at work calling out a mis-selling scandal that was costing the company I worked for hundreds of millions of pounds. Unbelievably, while they had been found out and were being forced to pay for the mis-selling, they were carrying on mis-selling at the same rate as the past. Having noticed this, I took the matter up with a senior person at the company. The only action taken was that the executive… Read more »
I too have a great respect for whistleblowers they are very brave people. They risk their careers to highlight injustices within companies or government departments. Let’s face it if those companies or government departments are on the level and not up to dirty tricks there wouldn’t be any need for whistle-blowers.
I liked your piece as I can relate to it in my own experience.
“To make your way to a senior position in a company, you need to be willing to play all sorts of nasty games, and act in what I would consider to be an immoral way.”
Too true, and obviously the same goes for politics – yet we vote them in!
Since they started ramming PC politics down my privileged white male throat i’ve been different and therefore wrong. Society placed me in the social pariah status and forced me to challenge everything I thought I believed in.
As a result I sit on the right of the spectrum and therefore I am used to not following the herd nowadays. It’s usually my go to position as they are often entirely wrong and misdirected by the media.
I’ve always enjoyed being different. Someone once told me I wasn’t like other people as an insult. I took it as a compliment.
Good point.
This is a very 21st century, selfish version of a “pandemic”.
“I believe the world is ending, yet I also want to carry on as normal whilst criticising others. I know. Stick a mask on my face.”
Ridiculous.
I I felt the way they do about the danger of this virus I would be locked at home with the windows sealed shut, a stack of canned goods and an array of weapons by the door.
Very true! There are an awful lot of hypocrites around. I bet most of my immediate neighbours would say they agree with Lockdown – but absolutely none of them are abiding by the rules (judging by the number of visitors they are having). Ironic really given that I am, almost certainly, the only one around here that is anti-Lockdown and yet not having loads of visitors (because I’m not a “local”). Still – quite a few people I know have now seen me in the supermarket and various other shops and so do know I’m not in Lockdown (as a mask was conspicuous by its absence).
I think few people are really following the rules in total, other than businesses who risk consequences.
For other people, there are just not enough cops and informers to go around, and while BS can be maintained for a few weeks it starts to become unenforceable after a few months. Rebellion would be good but an erosion of compliance is more likely and in my view has already been happening and is likely to gather pace.
Johnson has rejected “Zero-Covid”, which already has some on the Labour benches etc. moaning.
Most people do not understand even the basics about infection control, they have been conned into thinking that facemasks actually achieve something. At Tesco, where I work, 98% of staff wear them. They wear ill fitting cloth rags, mostly unwashed for weeks at a time, constantly fiddled with and removed while in the canteen. Even the Trolley staff are required to wear them.
Everytime I point out the absurdity of those pathetic pieces of cloth, I get blank looks. The fact of the matter is they will wear them until they are told they don’t have to anymore.
Some people genuinely don’t know about the exemption. They believe you have to have a medical condition to be exempt. Don’t forget, pretty much every shop has large posters telling you masks MUST be worn. To date, I’ve only seen one sign with *unless medically exempt in tiny lettering at the bottom.
Two of my friends wear their masks because they ‘feel safer’ doing it. I’ve tried explaining that, not only do they not protect you but can be bad for you but they still carry on wearing them.
Many places show quite clearly ‘unless you are exempt’ on their signs saying that a mask must be worn. Sainsbury’s is an example where I am in Chesterfield.
This lack of info on exemptions info is very annoying, even dentists insist on this face covering must be worn crap.
I think some people don’t know about them and even if they have conditions that render them exempt they would rather have more say ashtma attacks because they don’t want the confrontation.
One of my colleagues admitted that its for psychological reasons that she wears it and this despite the fact that I’ve pointed out that mask wearing was harmful both from a physical and psychological standpoint.
They haven’t a clue what they are doing is what. They get their signals from those around them and some small snippets of news.
As soon as a critical mass of thinking individuals ditch the masks, only the truly psychologically damaged will remain masked
Not as easy to get away with as the others.
Camouflage. Same reason that if you were a spy in occupied France during WW2 you walked about wearing a beret and a carrying string of onions, not wearing a bowler hat carrying a rolled umbrella.
Verisimilitude perhaps ?
A cry for freedom from Edinburgh. Scottish Liberty Party have been good throughout.
https://soundcloud.com/scottishliberty/tams-speech-in-front-of-the-scottish-parliament
Doctor doctor I think I feel fine. Well, sit down in that wheelchair, just in case you fall over and break your legs. The strain on the hospitals with you there would be awful. But…. Don’t be selfish. It’s just for 3 weeks. Doctor doctor. It’s been a year now, and I’m still in the wheelchair. I really do feel fine so I was wondering if maybe…. Look, I told you before. Think of others. (Long sigh). Fine. Come back tomorrow and i’ll think about it. Next day. Ok. Over the course of the next 4 months, we will cautiously get you moving. We will start in two weeks time, where I’ll let you move your big toe up and down. Then in 5 week gaps we will move on to different toes, flexing your ankle…. Walking? God no. Don’t rush me. Then, at the end of that 4 months you might be allowed to walk again, with a Zimmer frame of course. A Zimmer frame? But… How long for? Possibly forever. Impossible to say, but we cannot and will not risk you falling over or we’ll be right back to square one won’t we? I suppose so. Sorry. Now.… Read more »
Very good.
Thanks Danny, needed a smile this morning!
Depressing day yesterday – I think I preferred life without the “roadmap”. (And I see even Annie has been driven to capital letters – things must be bad😊)
That made me laugh; thankyou
Brilliant, most creative Danny boy!
Man after me own ….
The Bozzer announces that we must learn to live with Covid.
FOR CRYING OUT LOUD!!!!!!
You’ve missed the point – learning to live with covid lockdowns, covid yearly vaxx and covid passports.
Warm, sunny day yesterday.
Strolling on the sand where a river meets the sea. Sparkles and gurgles as the river and sea water pleat themselves into endlessly varying patterns. Beach strewn with drifts of white cockleshells. Patterns of red and grey rocks. A quickening of green things growing, and the first primroses. People strolling, children laughing, dogs playing together. Smiles, greetings, the little joking remarks that people make to strangers to show their goodwill.
All strictly forbidden in Gulag Wales.
But we were all there anyway.
I was chatting to a friend in Pembroke Dock yesterday, as I was planning on a visit later this week. Sadly it isn’t going to happen as she cautioned me that the cops west of Carmarthen are bored shitless, so are routinely pulling all and sundry over.
Any suggestions for a destination within range of Newport Annie. I desperately want to get the camera out.
Do you mean Newport, Mon., or Newport, Pembs?
I was west of Carmarthen the whole afternoon yesterday, never a sniff of a rozzer.
Not seen one in Pembs for ages, either. And I get about.
I’m Newport, former Mon Annie. Good to know though thanks.
I might find a house that needs viewing near the seaside somewhere.
Annie I love reading all your comments. We were often down to Pembs to visit my parents who are all locked up and constantly glued to the BBC and mass media. It is so good to hear there a voice of sanity coming from down there.
Have a piece of paper in your car that says “sorry I cannot speak. I have a valid reason for travel to do with mental health. Sorry,I cannot tell you any more.”
After hearing our ‘Dear Leader’ yesterday I did feel he ought to get out more, he announced that very soon people would be allowed to do what they are already doing anyway and more besides. Locally, it seems to me, that the fear factor is slipping away and as the weather picks up the lock-down road map could be overwhelmed by a tsunami of freedom seeking traffic.
My general impression of London.
Good for you! They can’t take any of that away and I hate them for trying to do so.
Still no one has asked Ferguslime about pre existing immunity, cross immunity and why “infections” have been falling before every single lockdown. I notice he had nothing to say about his ridiculous BSE/ vCJD predictions which precipitated the ruination and suicide of hundreds of British farmers. An apology would be nice. Anyway, I still think the lady doth protest too much.
Why is anyone asking Ferguson anything with his track record? Why does he still exist?
He’s totally discredited
Yeah, both readers were nowhere near the mark, which is probably why he replied.
I also note how his swine flu predictions could still become true.
He’s mad in the head.
It’s like the alleged prophecies of Nostradamus – predict disaster, don’t be too specific about the details, and eventually something bad will happen and they can say “Look, my prediction came true”.
‘I would also note that SAGE has never revised the RWC for Covid agreed last March, largely because the severity we estimated for the virus turned out, unfortunately, to be basically spot on.’
Well, Prof Ferguson, if you got it spot on, take a look at the attached and then tell us exactly how that corresponds with ‘severe’ at all?
Oh, and if your glib response is that your dotty predictions would have come about without government intervention; lockdowns, that would be complete nonsense:
‘California and Florida provide a clear example for the dubious efficacy of Covid-19 restrictions. Their disparities elucidate the enduring costs of lockdowns with regard to the economy and livelihoods of residents. The states also pave the way for us to better understand whether authoritarian measures truly work in controlling a virus and, on a greater scale, the trajectory of human behavior.’
‘More and more people flee California to places like Tennessee, Texas, and Florida as they continue to be restricted in their freedom to work and go to school.’
https://www.aier.org/article/the-florida-versus-california-showdown/
Perhaps he is Humpty Dumpty, ‘A word means what I take it to mean; no more, no less’.
In all this time. And with their multiple media appearances, not just Ferguson but all of SAGE, they’ve never really been asked to debate. Some pro lockdown heads have encouragingly done so, see the Cambridge Union debate, but for SAGE they bat safe balls only.
And they wonder why everyone’s a conspiracy theorist now.
It’s all a BIG FAT LIE to usher in authoritarian “health passports” that will deny you your fundamental human rights. Resist it all NOW. No tests, no forced isolation. No vaccines. Don’t pick up phone to doctors or unknown numbers. Don’t answer the door. Put junk mail IN THE BIN!
Great advice!
Resist testing of school children and masks in the classrooms
I have told my doctor’s surgery that I didn’t want the vaccine twice. Since then I have had 15 phone calls (unaswered naturally) and three letters, one from the hospital and two from the surgery. I’m doing as you suggested but sometimes it feels like harrassment.
They may yet live to regret flushing out the antivaxxers…. seems the general public DO want to know what toxic substances do to their bodies.
Here’s hoping. Some bed wetters don’t seem to care though. Just reach for the magic snake oil.
Been groomed into being drug addicts. Having seen active addicts close up, it’s disturbing to watch.
wish I shared your optimism on that – seems to me majority of uk general public are still swallowing the govt/media proposition that there is a deadly disease out there that they MUST be vaccinated against in order to be allowed to live normally again/go on holiday and are not looking too deeply into any side effects of what they are consenting to or its efficacy etc.
I don’t blame Fergi for anything much; the people in government who give this doofus any credence whatsoever are the ones to blame.
I blame him for existing: a serious error on the part of Evolution.
I spent the early part of this morning catching up on Peter Hitchens latest interview on Talk Radio (from yesterday). The discussion began with talk of our liberties, whether we would ever get them back, and so on. Hitchens observed: ‘I think that an awful lot of people have grown used to this. I think that a surprising number of people quite like it…that they readily swap actual liberty for notional safety…and I think that’s been established’. As we await the spoonfuls of ‘normality’ that the government will dole out to us over the coming weeks, mindful that at any moment the rug could quite easily be tugged from under our feet, it could be seen that, to borrow from the metaphorical story Hitchens mentions, we are reduced to ‘bargaining for a parody of the freedom (we) used to have’. Some might argue that Hitchens is too pessimistic, regarding his viewpoint of the perceived supplicant nature of the population at large; others that he is bang on the money. Some have noted here that they have perceived a change in the tenor of comments in papers like The Daily Mail, and I often follow the links that are posted here, and… Read more »
PETER HITCHENS could have become a LEADER but instead he sat on the sidelines as a contrarian COWARD.
I think his commentary belongs somewhere at the beginning of all this, before people realised this was a PlanScamdemic.
He has his niche and has done well out of it. Hitchens is a total coward.
I have to give Peter his due he has been resolute from day one even in the face of severe vitriol. I cannot call Peter a coward if the whole population had been as well learned as him we wouldn’t be in this mess.
Maybe he just isn’t cut out to lead anything or anyone. He’s a journalist.
I for one was grateful that he was around at the very start. It was very comforting to hear someone say publicly what I was seeing and thinking for myself.
It was a very helpful sanity check.
Once the side effects start materialising, I have no doubt that there will be vaccine envy – those who have received the “vaccine” will envy those of us who have not.
This is not the Great Reopening, it is another step towards The Gulag Britain – lockdowns, yearly vaxx and vaxx passports are still on the table.
It is planned that WE will active the Great Opening.
THE GREAT REOPENING 20TH MARCH (bitchute.com)
A few juicy bits from the Government roadmap, as cited in today’s post: To ensure the country is prepared for these scenarios and while further evidence is gathered, the Government is planning for a revaccination campaign, which is likely to run later this year in autumn or winter … Over the longer term, revaccination is likely to become a regular part of managing COVID-19. The Government will review whether COVID-status certification could play a role in reopening our economy … This will include assessing to what extent [vaccine] certification would be effective in reducing risk, and the potential uses to enable access to settings or a relaxation of COVID-Secure mitigations. … the Government can look to introduce a system to allow vaccinated individuals to travel more freely internationally. The UK is working with other countries who have started similar programmes, to lead global efforts to adopt a clear international framework with standards that provide consistency for passengers and industry alike. [i.e. vaccines] The Government will make this a reality through ongoing work with the World Health Organisation and other multilateral organisations … … any such system will take time to implement. … Introducing such a system also needs to be fair and not unduly… Read more »
The idea of certification – just a different name for the “vaccine” passport, or immunity passport. Ironically anyone who has ever tested positive (falsely or otherwise) should be able to claim immunity. But that’s not what this is about – this has nothing to do with immunity, nothing to do with risk, it’s to do with compliance through fear and coercion. Those who won’t do as required could easily become second class citizens.
He’s on his side, which is the opposite of our side, note the constant attacks on “conspiracy theorists” a.k.a anything opposing the establishment narrative. I’ve never really bought into the “controlled opposition/gatekeeper” trope, but I think we are witnessing a mi5 covert operation. Now tell mi5 is a conspiracy theory!
He’s on his side
Do you mean Toby, or JB? I’m hoping i’m wrong, but there’s an unpleasant whiff starting to emerge from the daily posts. (Although others will argue it’s been there for a while.)
The stink has been lingering for sometime, I’m even starting to question the reason it was ever started. It’s a classic strategy to herd your enemy in one place to monitor them 😉
LS is controlled opposition?
I’m beginning to wonder.
Please stop the conspiracy theorist social stigmatization. There is an elite cabal that have an agenda to control us as Toby Young knows all too well, it is a political neo-liberal elite, a.k.a middle class establishment & he is one of them! People of various descriptions have delusions of grandeur to rule the world. They usually fail, but there is no denying the ruling class of liberal left encouraged facilitated & funded by nihilistic globalists. The purpose of their conduct is simple, to destroy traditional conservative & religious cultural values that are a road block to the new world order a.k.a one world governance & anyone denying that ambition must have been living on the moon for the last 75yrs. As if to prove this our lives & economies are dominated by NGOs eg. IMF, WHO, UN etc. Their aim is to deconstruct cultural traditions, beliefs, nature & natural process. Fundamentals that underpin society such as principles of biology, the function of sexual dimorphism, biological reproduction, nuclear family corrupt by the normalization of sexual deviation, destruction of community by corporate interest, the demolition of Nation by unelected unaccountable neo-liberal coalitions i.e. the EU. Another threat has surfaced with technology, that… Read more »
Let’s get one thing straight abotu Neil Ferguson. He believes he’s right because he is a theorist. I’ve come across theoretical physicists in my career and the ones bedded in with the government teat mostly believe their own farts. The telling response was: What is dangerous “alternate reality” nonsense is using rhetoric and cherry-picking of the science to try to deny the threat posed by the virus. To give a couple of not too historic examples:https://dailysceptic.org/2020/09/01/latest-news-121/https://dailysceptic.org/dr-clare-craig-false-positive-pseudo-epidemic-coronavirus-testing-pcr-lateral-flow/ Ferguson does not discuss measurement. His whole theory is predicted on it, as is all scientific study, but he chooses not to believe a pathologist who deals in this everyday is wrong. Do I trust or accept everything Claire Craig says? No. But she makes a lot of points that are valid about the difficulties and dangers of overdiagnosis. Ferguson DOES NOT CARE about that. He is a theorist. He believes his models and that’s it. The trouble is that he is saying that he ethically believes his models should be applied. He does not caveat anything in those letters. I would have fired him and his ilk ages ago and possibly looked into protecting myself legally. These people are the same as the… Read more »
Great post. I have had some terrible experiences of theoretical mathematical modellers.
In IT I see nothing but bad models. I have never encountered an accurate one. On any topic, ever. Bad data, no data validation, corrupted source files, no documentation, no in line code comments, bad coding, logical errors aplenty, no testing…etc etc. Would take myself with 2 friends about 4 hours to completely demolish Fergutard’s models. They are shyte.
I almost totally agree with your post. Same experience with me. But I’ve written a good model – to calculate tides, sun/moon/rise/set, etc. Bodged in excel. Works fine. The thing is, I’ve tested it against actual observations …
and no one paid me for it.
Same thing in my career and that’s even including experimental physics. Ferguson making the claim that arguing about code is meaningless is another tell. He uses those very same models to drive his understanding of viruses. They all do that.
They get new data and plug it into the same shite without considering the wider picture and the quality of the data. And after having their circle-jerk with all their mates you are the one who is wrong.
Personally I say leave them to it. Just don’t give them any opportunity to apply it to the real world
I find Ferguson’s emails deeply tedious. He’s a charlatan, and as such has nothing to say.
I’m not scientist and neither is Ferguson. Both of us ponder life and make guesses.
It started becoming quite common in the ’70s and ’80s for scientists starting off in physics to find they weren’t quite up to it and had no real prospects in the field, so they would transfer to biology or some other less intense field. I’d guess that Fergi is one of those.
THANK YOU!!! This post has made my day. I think you are originally NN in Thailand and you’ve been awake to the BS from day one. And one day I hope I get to hug you. Thank you!!! Every WORD of this!
mRNA vaccines for farm animals? Erm no thank you!
“The precision of the technology was summed up for me when one of the virus experts was recently asked on the BBC if the vaccine would work on the new variant of the virus.
He said: “The genetic code is like an email; we just go in and precisely adjust a few letters in it to reflect the change in the virus.”
These genetically engineered vaccines will literally save millions of lives, allow economies and businesses to thrive again and save jobs.
Yet these precision genetic techniques, which have the potential to revolutionise crop breeding and vaccine development for animals, are being denied to the farming industry by the SNP Government.
Surely it is time our politicians used their common sense, ended the hypocrisy and recognised these tools are part of the solution in the move to a more sustainable agriculture.”
https://www.pressandjournal.co.uk/fp/business/farming/2780068/george-lyon-covid-vaccine-highlights-need-to-accept-genetic-engineering/
Would you be happy eating meat which had come from animals “vaccinated” with mRNA vaccines? I wouldn’t touch anything GMO if I knew about it.
Thoughts?
I believe that mRNAvaccines were used innths poultry industry against Avian Flu. Now, any sign of the virys in a bird and tghe entire flock is destroyed.
Neat way of getting a reliance on synthetic meat, as a certain indivudual is suggesting we should all be eating instead of the real stuff.
Why is the msm barking on about ‘back to normal’ by June 21st? (Don’t worry its a retorical question!) It’s just another carrot on a 4 month long stick. They really are taking the piss now. Apart from a few nuts on social media I think the mood is changing out there. I took my kids to the play park over the weekend and again yesterday. Very busy, not a mask in sight. I spoke to a few parents I know and they’re all fed up with it now. Apart from a few nuts on social media I think the collective mood is changing. A nice, sunny weekend in March should bring the masses out to play and put this shit show to bed.
Johnson had to appease back benchers to protect his position, the road map is bollocks, numerous roadworks will mean an infinity of diversions, this map isn’t worth the paper it’s printed on, Johnson is set to piss away trillions more on vaccines, testing, tracing, furlough & PPE enriching his cronies & corporate interests at the expense of guess who! Whilst we slowly rot in enslavement.
Doris and SAGE idiots will start messaging LD4 in the spring (or threaten it), hence the variants and ‘doubts’ about vaxx efficacy (flu vaxxes never stop transmission, no proof exists they do). His roadmap is a short jaunt and then a return to base.
Roadworks all over the place and of course variant road blocks ahead.
You credit Johnson with too much say in what he does, nut nut is controlling the fat.
Johnson’s road map has been set out with, we assume, the approval of the Behavioural Insights Team. These people are the supposed experts – so they must surely know the effect these restrictions are having, as well as the psychological harm of the way they are being lifted. The messaging from the government has been orchestrated by a group of technocrats and experts who are deliberately harming people’s well being – they cannot be assumed not to know what is happening to so many.
If there is an industry of fraud and nonsense it is Psychology and related ‘expertise’. Imagine a country of 70 mns submitting itself to fake models, made up by quackademics ‘fact checked’ by behavioural philosophy lunatics. Beggards f***ing belief really.
When this shit show is over, these “behavioural psychologists” should be jailed, sacked from their jobs and struck off from their professional body (if there is one).
Then the worst offenders like that Mitchie woman should be executed.