this is an interesting question you pose. the reflexive answer is that censorship "allowed" the mandates to happen but that's a bit too simplistic. i was able to find alternative information; it's out there even if it takes a bit of digging.
i'm reminded of something my friend said recently. she and her husband were subjects in the moderna trials but she called me for help getting her mother IVM when she had covid. she was telling me that she intended to get the bivalent booster as soon as it was approved and my dismay was obvious. "you read different things than i read," she answered.
i wanted to say "but you don't read at all." of course i see all the stuff about how great the vaccines are; you'd have to be blind and deaf to miss it. but i also see what's going on around me even if i didn't have access to malone, berenson (they disagree), mcCollough, RFK jr and Del Bigtree. in fact i never listened to or even heard of most of those people UNTIL i became suspicious of the vaccine. then i sought them out.
sure you give a child a cartoon bandage when they're afraid of needles, but donuts and lottery tickets for adults? and when the carrots failed to work- the sticks. i lost my job, my passion of 40 years over my refusal to take a shot. but in the previous 39 years, no one had ever checked my medical records. they might have guessed what i would do based on my prior insistence that the tetanus shot requirement boilerplate language be stricken from my contract.
my Moderna friend had a bad bout of Delta followed by a bout of Omicron and she called me to ask for advice and, like i said before, for help getting IVM to her unvaccinated best friend and later her mother. surely she saw how the wonders attributed to the vaccines kept being downgraded. the back pedaling, the shifting goal posts.
for her to say that i read different stuff (i.e., fringe, alternate, conspiracy theory) while she reads mainstream based on "Science" and "Truth" is kind of a lazy man's excuse.
but the reality is this: EVEN IF COVID HAD BEEN AS DEADLY AS THEY SAID IT WAS AND THE VACCINES AS EFFECTIVE AND SAFE AS ADVERTISED, the mandates still would not have been justified. they are unconstitutional, they violate bodily autonomy. what rights do we have if we can't decide what to do with our own bodies?
then to see the My Body My Choice crowd advocate forced vaccination, the people you might expect to be most sympathetic to a refuseniks cause!!! "you have no right to spread your germs to me!" i might answer "Well, you have no right to deprive me of the future worker, cannon fodder and tax payer who is going to support me in my old age."
formerly intelligent people lost the ability to think, to reason, to see what was obvious to anyone with eyes and a few brain cells.
so i guess, yes. censorship violates the first amendment but the mandates violated something even more sacred
Lockdowns and mandates were assaults on the body. Censorship is an assault on both the truth and your mind. I think maybe there isn’t a “correct” answer. Each individual has to decide for themselves which was worse.
I don't use Twitter but Alex also posted to his substack and this is what I said in response to a post that listed failure to attempt early intervention and treatment: "I actually think this is a close second to the mandates. As sadistic as denying treatment was/is it primarily affected the elderly, and I do believe that was barbaric, but in many ways the mandates have focused on the young. They targeted school children, college students, athletes, military, and first responders. Even pregnant women were coerced into compliance. Healthy humans at no significant risk, with very little to gain but much to lose. "
I would never deny how evil censorship is but it was fear that stopped people from talking about their vaccine hesitancy. Even in the darkest days of mandate coercion there was a handful of people I looked forward to crossing paths with because I knew we would talk about how crazy this shit is. Even if you were not inclined to seek out reliable sources or to investigate for yourself, the lies were glaringly obvious. From the beginning the vaccinators weren't trying to be convincing so much as intimidating.
Somewhat related to censorship, but also worth considering, is the propaganda assault. You could see the vax/mandate train a comin' from a mile away, but we still couldn't stop it.
Excellent post. I was a bit annoyed by the Berenson poll (and didn't respond), since all three sins were egregious. What's the point of trying to rank them? Seemed to me like a useless and largely irrelevant question. And BTW, as a case in point about your active vs. just-have-one comment regarding Twitter accounts, I never, ever use mine -- and only set it up (years ago) to research Twitter as part of an article on social media I was writing.
Thanks for another very thoughtful and thought-provoking essay. I had trouble deciding between mandates and censorship when I voted, but finally decided on censorship. You have helped me to think more deeply about this, and I'm still torn between the two.
One thing I would say in support of choosing censorship on the poll is that in my opinion, censorship --and certainly as it has been practiced during this psyop--encompasses more than just suppressing voices on social media platforms such as twitter. It has involved all manner of communication and all venues. Teachers on all levels of education, and certainly in universities and colleges, have been muzzled and forced to indoctrinate their students with the "correct" covid narrative (Mark Crispin Miller's experience is just one example). Almost all forms media have focused on amplifying the frightening narrative 24/7, saturating consciousness and dulling the consciences with messages encouraging division and hatred (as you point out), while drowning out and demonizing the voices of those with alternative opinions and information. The propaganda was everywhere, posters in the subways and on buses, signs in stores, masks on faces.
You discussed these things in the essay, but treated them as separate from censorship, but I believe they are integral to it. The overwhelming and never-ending force of these messages, as well as the suppression and demonization of alternative sources of information, is the major reason why most of us have found it almost impossible to get information through to friends and family members who to this day will not consider looking at the information we offer them and continue to put their lives in danger playing spikeshot roulette.
Yes, it is very much a character issue as well, and I am hard put to have patience with those who refuse to see the obvious, who maintain a willful blindness I find incomprehensible, but then I remind myself of the myriad ways they have been denied (or tricked into denying themselves) access to the truth.
this is an interesting question you pose. the reflexive answer is that censorship "allowed" the mandates to happen but that's a bit too simplistic. i was able to find alternative information; it's out there even if it takes a bit of digging.
i'm reminded of something my friend said recently. she and her husband were subjects in the moderna trials but she called me for help getting her mother IVM when she had covid. she was telling me that she intended to get the bivalent booster as soon as it was approved and my dismay was obvious. "you read different things than i read," she answered.
i wanted to say "but you don't read at all." of course i see all the stuff about how great the vaccines are; you'd have to be blind and deaf to miss it. but i also see what's going on around me even if i didn't have access to malone, berenson (they disagree), mcCollough, RFK jr and Del Bigtree. in fact i never listened to or even heard of most of those people UNTIL i became suspicious of the vaccine. then i sought them out.
sure you give a child a cartoon bandage when they're afraid of needles, but donuts and lottery tickets for adults? and when the carrots failed to work- the sticks. i lost my job, my passion of 40 years over my refusal to take a shot. but in the previous 39 years, no one had ever checked my medical records. they might have guessed what i would do based on my prior insistence that the tetanus shot requirement boilerplate language be stricken from my contract.
my Moderna friend had a bad bout of Delta followed by a bout of Omicron and she called me to ask for advice and, like i said before, for help getting IVM to her unvaccinated best friend and later her mother. surely she saw how the wonders attributed to the vaccines kept being downgraded. the back pedaling, the shifting goal posts.
for her to say that i read different stuff (i.e., fringe, alternate, conspiracy theory) while she reads mainstream based on "Science" and "Truth" is kind of a lazy man's excuse.
but the reality is this: EVEN IF COVID HAD BEEN AS DEADLY AS THEY SAID IT WAS AND THE VACCINES AS EFFECTIVE AND SAFE AS ADVERTISED, the mandates still would not have been justified. they are unconstitutional, they violate bodily autonomy. what rights do we have if we can't decide what to do with our own bodies?
then to see the My Body My Choice crowd advocate forced vaccination, the people you might expect to be most sympathetic to a refuseniks cause!!! "you have no right to spread your germs to me!" i might answer "Well, you have no right to deprive me of the future worker, cannon fodder and tax payer who is going to support me in my old age."
formerly intelligent people lost the ability to think, to reason, to see what was obvious to anyone with eyes and a few brain cells.
so i guess, yes. censorship violates the first amendment but the mandates violated something even more sacred
Lockdowns and mandates were assaults on the body. Censorship is an assault on both the truth and your mind. I think maybe there isn’t a “correct” answer. Each individual has to decide for themselves which was worse.
I don't use Twitter but Alex also posted to his substack and this is what I said in response to a post that listed failure to attempt early intervention and treatment: "I actually think this is a close second to the mandates. As sadistic as denying treatment was/is it primarily affected the elderly, and I do believe that was barbaric, but in many ways the mandates have focused on the young. They targeted school children, college students, athletes, military, and first responders. Even pregnant women were coerced into compliance. Healthy humans at no significant risk, with very little to gain but much to lose. "
I would never deny how evil censorship is but it was fear that stopped people from talking about their vaccine hesitancy. Even in the darkest days of mandate coercion there was a handful of people I looked forward to crossing paths with because I knew we would talk about how crazy this shit is. Even if you were not inclined to seek out reliable sources or to investigate for yourself, the lies were glaringly obvious. From the beginning the vaccinators weren't trying to be convincing so much as intimidating.
Somewhat related to censorship, but also worth considering, is the propaganda assault. You could see the vax/mandate train a comin' from a mile away, but we still couldn't stop it.
Excellent post. I was a bit annoyed by the Berenson poll (and didn't respond), since all three sins were egregious. What's the point of trying to rank them? Seemed to me like a useless and largely irrelevant question. And BTW, as a case in point about your active vs. just-have-one comment regarding Twitter accounts, I never, ever use mine -- and only set it up (years ago) to research Twitter as part of an article on social media I was writing.
Mandates for sure!! They made our lives contingent on injecting poison into us. Nothing could be worse
Bodily autonomy was violated against the Nuremberg code.
Our legal system is designed to benefit the establishment and only started to act much later only because of a change in popular opinion!
Even Ted Kaczinkski wrote that the final battle is over ones own body.
Thankfully, people are learning to draw boundaries, with the boosters and child jabs having dismal uptake, lol!
Stopping censorship won't change the fact that people like Berenson get sway by their reputation (his New York times past etc).
People like Berenson would still muddy the waters with their own soft propaganda, their own confidence in being right.
He still demonizes ivermectin and cannabis and people believe him.
Based on what? He's smart or something.
I pick something, but many think he's smart just because he was against the jabs.
Another big fool in that space is Dr Malone, who is great at making truth sandwiches with a tiny bit of directed lying in the special sauce.
Censorship sucks but my body, my choice is the ultimate right.
Wholeheartedly agree mandates were the worst. Especially with the added hypocrisy of mandates coming from the “my body, my choice” libs.
Thanks for another very thoughtful and thought-provoking essay. I had trouble deciding between mandates and censorship when I voted, but finally decided on censorship. You have helped me to think more deeply about this, and I'm still torn between the two.
One thing I would say in support of choosing censorship on the poll is that in my opinion, censorship --and certainly as it has been practiced during this psyop--encompasses more than just suppressing voices on social media platforms such as twitter. It has involved all manner of communication and all venues. Teachers on all levels of education, and certainly in universities and colleges, have been muzzled and forced to indoctrinate their students with the "correct" covid narrative (Mark Crispin Miller's experience is just one example). Almost all forms media have focused on amplifying the frightening narrative 24/7, saturating consciousness and dulling the consciences with messages encouraging division and hatred (as you point out), while drowning out and demonizing the voices of those with alternative opinions and information. The propaganda was everywhere, posters in the subways and on buses, signs in stores, masks on faces.
You discussed these things in the essay, but treated them as separate from censorship, but I believe they are integral to it. The overwhelming and never-ending force of these messages, as well as the suppression and demonization of alternative sources of information, is the major reason why most of us have found it almost impossible to get information through to friends and family members who to this day will not consider looking at the information we offer them and continue to put their lives in danger playing spikeshot roulette.
Yes, it is very much a character issue as well, and I am hard put to have patience with those who refuse to see the obvious, who maintain a willful blindness I find incomprehensible, but then I remind myself of the myriad ways they have been denied (or tricked into denying themselves) access to the truth.