Happy Christmas
For the past three days we’ve published a pared down version of Lockdown Sceptics so we can have a bit of time off over Christmas. Cartoonist Bob Moran has very kindly given us three original cartoons which we’re running on consecutive days.
Happy Christmas to all our readers. Thanks for all your links, stories and suggestions, as well as your comments below the line and in the forums. Lockdown Sceptics is a collaboration between our small team, the writers who contribute original material, and the readers who post comments or send emails to us at [email protected]. To date, we’ve had over 21,000 emails and we do our best to read them all.
Back in April, when I set up this blog, I imagined I’d be signing off about now. Turns out, that was naive. God knows when this madness will end, but at least there are some comforts in this digital camaraderie. Readers often get in touch to say Lockdown Sceptics has kept them sane. The feeling’s mutual.
Neil Ferguson: I was inspired by Communist China
Professor Lockdown gave an interview to yesterday’s Times in which he revealed that China’s lockdowns in January inspired him to push for more draconian measures in the UK than he had initially thought possible. Freddie Sayers in UnHerd has more.
Professor Neil Ferguson has given an extraordinary interview to Tom Whipple at The Times, in which he confirms the degree to which he believes that imitating China’s lockdown policies at the start of 2020 changed the parameters of what Western societies consider acceptable.
“I think people’s sense of what is possible in terms of control changed quite dramatically between January and March,” Professor Ferguson says. When SAGE observed the “innovative intervention” out of China, of locking entire communities down and not permitting them to leave their homes, they initially presumed it would not be an available option in a liberal Western democracy: “It’s a communist one party state, we said. We couldn’t get away with it in Europe, we thought… and then Italy did it. And we realised we could.”
He almost seems at pains to emphasise the Chinese derivation of the lockdown concept, returning to it later in the interview:
“These days, lockdown feels inevitable. It was, he reminds me, anything but. ‘If China had not done it,’ he says, ‘the year would have been very different.’”
To those people who, still now, object to lockdowns on civil liberties principles, this will be a chilling reminder of the centrality of the authoritarian Chinese model in influencing global policy in this historic year.
When lockdown critics like Dan Hannan claimed that the lockdown policies of Western governments were inspired by China’s illiberal response he was accused of political point-scoring. So it’s good to have it from the horse’s mouth.
Stop Press: A joint investigation by the New York Times and Politico has revealed the extent of China’s efforts to censor social media at the beginning of the pandemic, hoping to conceal its role in triggering the global crisis. Were the architects of the West’s lockdowns inspired by that policy too?
Stop Press 2: We’re publishing an original piece today entitled “When Did Scientists Turn Into Lobbyists?” about the ‘open letter’ that circulated in mid-March, supposedly by scientists (but mainly signed by mathematicians), urging the Government to go for a full lockdown. The author is an academic scientist who doesn’t want his name to be published.
Another Dodgy PCR Test Result
We get a lot of these stories at Lockdown Sceptics. As this reader says, whether you get a positive or a negative result from a PCR test is a bit of a coin toss.
Over Christmas, a family friend told me that he had recently been offered two tests – one for himself and one for his severely disabled son.
The son will not brush his own teeth without a fight, let alone accept a nasal swab, so our friend decided to take both tests himself. He took one test immediately after the other, and sent the tests off under the separate names.
Can you guess the results? One test was negative and the other test was positive! A 50:50 split from the same sample. Go figure.
Neither party had shown any symptoms of course. The son required a negative result to be allowed back into his special care facility after the holidays. Worryingly, it was ‘his’ test that was positive.
Our friend cannot work full time and/or look after his son 24/7 without specialist support, which has now been totally withdrawn for two weeks.
Not only is this PCR test completely arbitrary (it’s essentially a coin toss), it is actively putting vulnerable lives at risk.
We Fought the Law and the Law… Didn’t Win
A heart-warming Christmas story from a reader about how he and his family managed to celebrate in spite of all the restrictions.
Despite the insanity we managed to have a fairly normal Christmas with our family, who live 180 miles away, simply by ignoring all of it. We loaded up the car on Wednesday with dogs, presents and luggage and set out from our Welsh detention camp to my brother-in-law’s house in Suffolk. Once there we had dinner with them and their friends, spent Christmas Eve at our niece’s house and spent Christmas Day with the entire extended family. Meanwhile Suffolk was placed into Tier 4 but we returned home on Boxing Day with no sign of the police trying to enforce non-existent borders. I wonder if we are actually winning?
Stop Press: This reader’s behaviour was quite unusual. According to a Daily Mail poll, 85% of Britons complied with the rules.
Round-up
- “Doctor allergic to shellfish suffers severe reaction to Moderna vaccine & gives himself EpiPen shot to lower heart rate” – The Sun has a report about the first doctor to have an allergic reaction to the Moderna vaccine
- “Irish Catholics protest Government shut-down of public Masses” – Irish Catholics were banned from worshipping in churches this Christmas so they held services outside them
- “Our year of bowing down to ‘The Science’” – Great piece by Bruce Pardy, a Law Professor at Queen’s University in Canada
- “South Africa says ‘no evidence’ its virus variant more dangerous than UK strain” – Matt Hancock may have to come up with a new excuse when he moves the entire country into Tier 5
- “Free us from this futile cycle of Covid control” – Dr John Lee in the Daily Mail reminds us how pointless lockdowns are
- “Keep schools open by getting Army medics to train teachers how to give pupils Covid tests” – Former Defence Secretary Tobias Elwood MP has come up with a novel way to keep schools open
- “One in five train services could be AXED next year” – 20% of train services could be cut, according to Treasury officials
- “French Government delays bill branded as ‘vaccine blackmail’” – The French Government has delayed plans to make it legal to discriminate against people who haven’t had the vaccine
- “Vaccines and our own antibodies hold fast against mutant Covid army” – According to the Sunday Times, if you’ve got the antibodies you should be immune to the new variants
- “Beds aren’t the problem. It’s the shortage of doctors and nurses” – Andrew Gregory, the Sunday Times‘s Health Editor, confirms the analysis of the senior doctor who writes regularly about the NHS for Lockdown Sceptic
- “Back to Normal, Save Lives” – If you want to get involved in a grass roots campaign, contact this group and ask them to send you some of their leaflets to deliver
- “Scientists Eye Potential Culprit Behind COVID-19 Vaccine Allergic Reactions” – According to the Wall St Journal, the allergic reaction to the vaccines could be caused by an ingredient they all have in common: polyethylene glycol, or PEG
- “‘Hypocrite’ Deborah Birx says she broke her own Thanksgiving travel warning after her parents ‘stopped eating’ and became depressed during the lockdown she helped create” – One of the architect’s of America’s shut downs broke the rules herself
- “With Covid mutating, it’s clearer than ever that we must eliminate this virus” – Social anthropologist Devi Sridhar doubles down on her ‘zero Covid’ strategy
- Blue Labour trade unionist Paul Embery pointed out in a tweet that to date only 377 people under 60 with no underlying health conditions had died of Covid. The responses by lockdown zealots weren’t pretty
Theme Tunes Suggested by Readers
Just two today: “War on Freedom” by Killing Joke and “I Think I’ll Just Stay Here and Drink” by Merle Haggard.
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, but that should just be a one-time thing. Any problems, email the Lockdown Sceptics webmaster Ian Rons 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 the ‘Wokies’ – the 10 most egregious examples of corporations pandering to identity politics. Not our idea, but RT‘s. Here are numbers 10, nine and eight.
10. Boeing
Perhaps attempting to distract from the revelation that management knew about the shortcomings in the 737 MAX’s onboard computer that killed hundreds of passengers in two crashes within six months, Boeing was quick to embark on an internal witch hunt as Black Lives Matter took over the sociopolitical discourse this summer, wielding the big stick of cancel culture against its own employees. Communications chief Niel Golightly resigned after just six months with the company over a 33 year-old article he’d written arguing against women serving in the military. While he claimed the piece no longer reflected his views, it was nevertheless “embarrassingly wrong and offensive”, Golightly said – to applause from the CEO, who boasted about the company’s “unrelenting commitment to diversity and inclusion in all its dimensions”.
Boeing’s planes may still be horrifically unsafe, but at least doomed passengers can die content that the airplane manufacturer has “zero tolerance for bigotry of any kind”.
9. SAS
Not to be outdone by the Americans, top Scandinavian airline SAS let its customers know in February that “nothing is truly Scandinavian”. Releasing a commercial claiming that cultural touchstones from Norway, Sweden and Denmark had actually come from elsewhere and declaring those countries’ residents were “no better than our Viking ancestors” in terms of (metaphorical) pillaging, the company seemed surprised when Scandinavians didn’t take kindly to being told they had no culture of their own. SAS ultimately removed the spot – though not before blaming the backlash on “right-wingers” and “hate groups”.
8. Penguin Random House
Publishing giant Penguin Random House in partnership with Barnes & Noble planned to celebrate Black History Month in February by changing the races of iconic literary characters for 12 re-released editions of young adult classics – confusing those they were trying to pander to (who asked why the publisher hadn’t just featured works written by actual black authors) and alienating others with the cheap stunt. At the eleventh hour, the “culturally diverse” book launch was shelved.
Worth reading in full.
Stop Press: Lewis Hamilton credits the “inspiration” provided by Black Lives Matter for his seventh Grand Prix win. I wonder how much of his £210 million fortune Hamilton will be allowed to keep if the “trained Marxists” who run BLM ever succeed in overthrowing the capitalist system?
Stop Press 2: Watch Tucker Carlson’s interview with Heather Mac Donald about how identity politics has destroyed the state of California.
“Mask Exempt” Lanyards
We’ve created a one-stop shop down here for people who want to buy (or make) a “Mask Exempt” lanyard/card. You can print out and laminate a fairly standard one for free here and it has the advantage of not explicitly claiming you have a disability. But if you have no qualms about that (or you are disabled), you can buy a lanyard from Amazon saying you do have a disability/medical exemption here (takes a while to arrive). The Government has instructions on how to download an official “Mask Exempt” notice to put on your phone here. You can get a “Hidden Disability” tag from ebay here and an “exempt” card with lanyard for just £1.99 from Etsy here. And, finally, 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.
Don’t forget to sign the petition on the UK Government’s petitions website calling for an end to mandatory face masks in shops 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, and he’s even said he’ll donate half the money to Lockdown Sceptics, so everyone wins.
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.
Stop Press: Austria’s constitutional court has ruled that compulsory mask wearing in schools is illegal, according to Agence France-Presse.
Stop Press 2: Baroness Nicholson tweeted a great video in which portraits of various famous Britons have been adapted so they’re all wearing masks. Not pretty.
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. 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.
Judicial Reviews Against the Government
There are now so many JRs being brought against the Government and its ministers, we thought we’d include them all in one place down here.
First, there’s the Simon Dolan case. You can see all the latest updates and contribute to that cause here. Alas, he’s now reached the end of the road, with the Supreme Court’s refusal to hear his appeal. Dolan has no regrets. “We forced SAGE to produce its minutes, got the Government to concede it had not lawfully shut schools, and lit the fire on scrutinizing data and information,” he says. “We also believe our findings and evidence, while not considered properly by the judges, will be of use in the inevitable public inquires which will follow and will help history judge the PM, Matt Hancock and their advisers in the light that they deserve.”
Then there’s the Robin Tilbrook case. You can read about that and contribute here.
Then there’s John’s Campaign which is focused specifically on care homes. Find out more about that here.
There’s the GoodLawProject’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.
The Night Time Industries Association has instructed lawyers to JR any further restrictions on restaurants, pubs and bars.
And last but not least there’s the Free Speech Union‘s challenge to Ofcom over its ‘coronavirus guidance’. A High Court judge refused permission for the FSU’s judicial review in December 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 [email protected] 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.
Quotation Corner
We know they are lying. They know they are lying, They know that we know they are lying. We know that they know that we know they are lying. And still they continue to lie.
Alexander Solzhenitsyn
It’s easier to fool people than to convince them that they have been fooled.
Mark Twain
Men, it has been well said, think in herds; it will be seen that they go mad in herds, while they only recover their senses slowly, one by one.
Charles Mackay
They who would give up essential liberty to purchase a little temporary safety, deserve neither liberty nor safety.
Benjamin Franklin
To do evil a human being must first of all believe that what he’s doing is good, or else that it’s a well-considered act in conformity with natural law. Fortunately, it is in the nature of the human being to seek a justification for his actions…
Ideology – that is what gives the evildoing its long-sought justification and gives the evildoer the necessary steadfastness and determination.
Alexander Solzhenitsyn
No lesson seems to be so deeply inculcated by the experience of life as that you never should trust experts. If you believe the doctors, nothing is wholesome: if you believe the theologians, nothing is innocent: if you believe the soldiers, nothing is safe. They all require to have their strong wine diluted by a very large admixture of insipid common sense.
Robert Gascoyne-Cecil, 3rd Marquess of Salisbury
Nothing would be more fatal than for the Government of States to get into the hands of experts. Expert knowledge is limited knowledge and the unlimited ignorance of the plain man, who knows where it hurts, is a safer guide than any rigorous direction of a specialist.
Sir Winston Churchill
If it disagrees with experiment, it’s wrong. In that simple statement is the key to science.
Richard Feynman
Of all tyrannies, a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It would be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron’s cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated; but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end for they do so with the approval of their own conscience.
C.S. Lewis
The welfare of humanity is always the alibi of tyrants.
Albert Camus
We’ve arranged a global civilization in which most crucial elements profoundly depend on science and technology. We have also arranged things so that almost no one understands science and technology. This is a prescription for disaster. We might get away with it for a while, but sooner or later this combustible mixture of ignorance and power is going to blow up in our faces.
Carl Sagan
Political language – and with variations this is true of all political parties, from Conservatives to Anarchists – is designed to make lies sound truthful and murder respectable, and to give an appearance of solidity to pure wind.
George Orwell
The object of life is not to be on the side of the majority, but to escape finding oneself in the ranks of the insane.
Marcus Aurelius
Necessity is the plea for every restriction of human freedom. It is the argument of tyrants; it is the creed of slaves.
William Pitt the Younger
If you tell a lie big enough and keep repeating it, people will eventually come to believe it. The lie can be maintained only for such time as the State can shield the people from the political, economic and/or military consequences of the lie. It thus becomes vitally important for the State to use all of its powers to repress dissent, for the truth is the mortal enemy of the lie, and thus by extension, the truth is the greatest enemy of the State.
Joseph Goebbels (attributed)
The whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed (and hence clamorous to be led to safety) by menacing it with an endless series of hobgoblins, most of them imaginary.
H.L. Mencken
I have always strenuously supported the right of every man to his own opinion, however different that opinion might be to mine. He who denies to another this right, makes a slave of himself to his present opinion, because he precludes himself the right of changing it.
Thomas Paine
In every age the men who want us under their thumb, if they have any sense, will put forward the particular pretension which the hopes and fears of that age render most potent… It has been magic, it has been Christianity. Now it will certainly be science… Let us not be deceived by phrases about “Man taking charge of his own destiny.” All that can really happen is that some men will take charge of the destiny of others.
C.S. Lewis
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…
Discussion
Comments
This week across the site:
To join in with the discussion please make a donation to the Daily Sceptic.
Profanity and abuse will be removed and may lead to a permanent ban.
QUESTION for MODS!
I am getting multiple confirm subscription to lockdown sceptics emails.
Are these EACH specific to a post where I have rememeberd to uncheck the don’t receive notification of replies?
Or is it teething problems?
Degrading the communication facility is part of the Great Brain Robbery.
I understand why you might want more protections against 77 ways to set people into doubt, division and diversions of delay and distraction so as to deny a consciousness from growing as a movement of recognition and integrative response.
So, who are ‘the police’.
Are they simply Robocops? Do they have no views on the ‘duties’ they are asked to perform ?
A while back some Spanish police were pictured ‘coming out’ against lockdowns.
I’d wager the police are a weak link. As individuals, they must see what is unfolding….
I think we will see some snapping.
Views ?
I wish, but I don’t think so.
PCs are very PC these days. The enthusiasm with which they lay into lockdown sceptics is not entirely down to orders received.
Bill, I remember seeing a very interesting protest some years ago where the protestors all just carried mirrors, which faced the police. How would our police feel if faced with themselves in an otherwise silent protest?
First time a UK scientist Andrew Hill Livepool University coming out for Ivermectin
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yOAh7GtvcOs&feature=youtu.betreatment&ab_channel=TratamientoTemprano
“Meta-analysis of ivermectin studies done by the University of Liverpool for WHO and the logic behind waiting for 3 additional trials due in January to confirm that “this is going to be a transformational drug”
Great find, but I know this cure doesn’t fit into the narrative. £1/£2 per treatment. SAGE will have a heart attack.
Virtual silence in the MSM about a Ivermectin . Information control to support the narrative. I bet you these trials were in the worst possible conditions for Ivermectin – nothing in the normal range and still it shines through as an effective treatment. It seen known about for at least six months! And sill are applying all these delaying tactics.
Dear Lockdown Sceptics. I think there is a way to end lockdowns with immediate effect. Since we are ‘all in it together’ surely it is right that MPs should all take 20% pay cut and a randomly selected 10% of them should lose their pay entirely should they continue to vote for any restrictions. Same with SAGE. Accept the same terms if you want to be in it. Same with the BBC if that’s possible. You’ll see immediately no talk of the virus in the media, SAGE will effectively disband by itself. Literally overnight the lockdowns will end.
Can you campaign for this?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F7-MyvrT_5M&feature=emb_logo
Resistance!
I know how she feels!
Just saw that on another site. When Americans stand their ground sure do .
People in the UK probably don’t realise but soon into the new year Trump supporters are going to be heading for DC, not in the thousands or tens of thousands but likely in their hundreds of thousands and maybe millions. This is going to be a full blown crisis. Either Pence himself might refuse to accept the electoral votes when it comes to their counting or, more likely, there might be sufficient Republican Senators and Reprentatives to talk out the counting process (each elected member of Congress gets 2 hours to make their cases).
There’s a new serous claim out tonight that forensic examination has shown the Georgia machines (or rather tabulator, at the end of the process ) were (covertly) linked to China. An interesting development.
A message to Ivor Cummins (satire)
Ivor, my imaginary friend, a man of many children, many graphs, many explanatory videos that a child could understand (but not politicians), much logic and data (spock would love it), a great beard, a calm manner and many working hours a day (27 the last time I checked) – you’re still twittering as I write this – what the hell are you doing? Get a life! I’ve read your great fat book but what fuel are you burning to keep going like this? It’s no food stuff that I’ve encountered. We’ve had enough of your positivity! Give it up. We can’t take it any longer. Give us some COVID death cult reality – stop saying it isn’t real. Your logic, reasoning and sanity is becoming too much. Get on board with the agenda before it kills you. Have a great evening.
Well, is there any point any more?
I wake up in the morning wishing I hadn’t.
I go to bed at night half hoping I won’t wake up the next day.
We are screwed day by day with more lies and bullshit.
We are tortured on every bloody radio station with “infomercials” from the effing government which, whilst I know they are crap, do my head in!
Everywhere I look I see the bizarre and weird sight of my fellow Britons muzzled and wandering around like zombies from a horror movie.
I hear people I once thought quite bright telling me it’s because of the fucking “danger” and even people I love looking at me with pity, as though I might have a “problem”!
Well I do have a problem, and I am not sure how much more of it I can take.
Have had a few of the Aussies finest “Merlot” red sleeping drafts (getting a bit expensive now), so probably making a pillock of myself (nothing new there though) and will unfortunately probably wake up again tomorrow and see this post and be mortally embarrassed!
Whatever!
Sounds pretty lucid to me! Don’t be embarrassed. Tomorrow is another day which can be better if you make it so.
Thanks!
I do try, it’s just getting harder and harder.
I have had a bit of a crap last 3 or 4 years for various reasons, and I had decided 2020 would be a good year and was feeling positive about all sorts in January.
Then came February and I thought “Oh well that’s a bit of a bummer!” and then… and then…. and so on…
I will try to stay positive….I think!
Keep with it fella, been there, just keep venting, no one is judging
Thanks – what would we do without this place?!
I know, I honestly think I’d have lost it without knowing I’m not insane and others see what we do.
The lies might have become too big to fail, but we will go to our deaths knowing we were right. We may be a minority, but we are large enough to push back and to remind each other we’re not the crazy ones.
Don’t watch TV news, don’t listen to radio news. If you must watch TV there is an excellent channel called ‘Talking Pictures’ (on Freeview) that shows old black and white films and series like Professionals and Persuaders. All from a pre-covid and pre-woke age when all was hunky-dory in middle England. Go for a long walk while it’s still legal.
Haven’t done any TV news for quite a while. I only listen to Talk Radio and a local music station which is quite a good distraction and if in the car I just hit “mute” when the crap comes on!
Have watched some of the older (fun) stuff like you mentioned online, along with some delightfully “non-PC” comedy which helps I must say.
Trouble is you have to come back to reality at some point! But thanks for responding.
Yes, important not to expose yourself to the lie machine too much. Personally I tend to stick to Talk Radio and music stations, though even Talk Radio went all vaccine jubilato and came a cropper recently once they realised it wasn’t the end of the madness. On the other hand I do like to sample the enemy propaganda, so will dip into the BBC News site, Guardian, Sunday papers and Newsnight as the mood takes me. Important to know how the enemy – those seekingnto deprivemus kf our liberty – are thinking. But must admit these diversions have become less frequent as the propaganda has become more and more predictable.
Yeah you could probably do a “Mystic Meg” these days and say what you will find on the Bullshit Broadcasting Corporation et al, and not be far off.
Ironically just hearing a new “safety” message on local music radio about New Year’s Eve,
I would love to know the identity of the voice-over scumbags making these for cash – they know what they are doing and should pay a price for it!
Ah well, Aussie sleeping draft coming to the end, so might hit the sack.
I feel quite depressed tonight. I had a nightmare last night that the police were going round schools, and arresting teachers who were passing on “dangerous” ideas to children. Politicians were considering extending the rules to all adults, including parents.
Today I was thinking that most people now seem to think in binary. If you have questions about the vaccine – you’re an “anti-vaxer” (described by the PM as “nuts”). If you are sceptical about lockdowns, you are a “covid-denier” or a “conspiracy theorist”. This binary thinking extends into many areas of debate, the US election, BLM, the NHS.
I worry that people are loosing the ability to think properly and independently. They fail to see that rarely is an issue binary – there are always nuances and questions. And rarely is an idea dangerous. It is never dangerous to question, debate and reason.
Grown adults, with careers and influence can’t actually think. It is terrifying.
Hope for a better night’s sleep tonight.
Tbh, I gave up on about half of the people in know and their ability to think critically at least 20 years ago.
Your “nightmare” was a sound piece of rational analysis. Many inventions, songs and other useful information have come to people during sleep. You can enjoy a good rest tonight knowing you are a sane and insightful person. 🙂
Can’t disagree with any of that –
As I ranted a bit elsewhere here just a while ago, I find everything you said to be true and I start to think it’s me that’s going bonkers, because of the constant narrative that seems to have made people I once thought intelligent, apparently incapable of questioning what they are fed daily.
Binary does seem to be the only result now.
With older people I think it’s a burying of heads, and a belief that it will “all be ok in a bit”!
With younger people it’s a lack of attention span and the, once common desire to question everything, has gone.
In a way it’s a sign we are winning. When your opponent resorts to name calling — anti-vaxxer, covid denier — instead of arguing the facts, they have lost. I know it doesn’t feel like we’re winning and every day is frustrating, but the zombies can’t come up with anything better than name calling as an argument. Very juvenile and the sign of a simple mind.
I’m not sure bout ‘winning’ – but it’s proof positive that we are right, since the covmaniac arguments can’t stand up to scrutiny.
Developers of Oxford-AstraZeneca Vaccine Tied to UK Eugenics Movement – unlimitedhangout.com
Just reading this from the article “To fully finance Hill and Gilbert’s Vaccitech, and specifically its quest to develop a universal flu vaccine, Oxford Science Innovations sought £600 million from “outside investors,” chief among them the Wellcome Trust and the venture-capital arm of Google, Google Ventures. This means that Google is poised to make a profit from the Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine at a time when its video platform YouTube has moved to ban COVID-19 vaccine–related content that shines a negative light on COVID-19 vaccines, including the Oxford-AstraZeneca candidate. “
A very strange anecdote this, a policy of using hospitals as overspill when care home outbreaks reach a certain level.
“I also know of cases where struggling nursing home has bussed in whole cohort of community diagnosed positives not because of clinical need but for infection control”
https://twitter.com/brendanm0ran/status/1342186297633472512
With all the panic on the MSM news this evening about London 999 calls, it seems its over 50% down on March peak (blue line), also case numbers show exactly what you’d expect with PCR. Many people hotstepped into getting tested for peace of mind ahead of Christmas dinner. I wonder how many isolated when they found out they were PCR + within ten days of the big day. Look at the ramp up, totally irregular and not demonstrative of natural spread. Just an artefact of more people getting tested
Progression dashboard – NHS Digital
I’m in London and haven’t heard sirens for months and months; what a load of old bull.
Anyone know why the want us to be locked down at New Year? Law Abiding citizens under house arrest !
Gotta get Biden over line and CCP like us damaging our economies.
Joel Smalley on Twitter: “Since 2nd Nov, there is no statisitcally meaningful correlation between deaths within 28 days of a positive COVID test and all-cause excess death. There is no signal at normal scale, log scale or diff-log, suggesting the two are independent of each other. https://t.co/Yn1BWFYuub” / Twitter
That’s a good piece of basic statistical work, highlighting the massive question marks around the nature and scale of PCR testing as a diagnostic procedure.
And, of course, he’s quite right – any decent responsible authority would be right into these questions … which suggests ….
Ivor Cummins looks like he’s producing a monthly bulletin on Irish Covid situation. Good for anybody looking to provide a short alternative summary of matters there.
Ivor Cummins on Twitter: “IRELAND RISES. They need to download and print out this – and deliver it EVERYWHERE: https://t.co/YlsxVWwa0m Post: https://t.co/AT8NyabqNG” / Twitter
nothing in Cork?-the rebel county
Sunderland Covid-19 outbreak: Fourth game is postponed amid “volume” of cases – BBC Sport
Any Black Cat fans? Get some lateral flow into ya and end the pain
The DM is very hyper this evening
Well you would be, sitting on a fence spike! Can’t be comfortable especially when you try to face in both directions.
Asymptomatic transmission of COVID-19 didn’t occur at all, study of 10 million finds
https://www.lifesitenews.com/news/asymptomatic-transmission-of-covid-19-didnt-occur-at-all-study-of-10-million-finds
The evidence keeps on coming but seems to evade all of the governments advisers.
As Ferguson said, they know they can get away with it.
Spent quite a lot of time during the Christmas period talking to an Italian activist sceptic
Situation there seems pretty similar to here – there are people fighting it in various ways but not much mainstream opposition
Vaccine hesitancy across Europe:
https://twitter.com/SandraWeeden/status/1343303821775265792
Source: Reuters
https://www.reuters.com/article/health-coronavirus-europe-vaccines-resis-idUKKBN2910J4
“Myself, I am vaccinated against everything I can be,” Bishop Tihon told reporters after getting his shot, standing alongside the health minister in Sofia.
A common tactic, hire the local religious leaders to affirm their support.
Call it desperation by the authorities myself ;o))
Sadly, there isn’t a vaccine against stupidity
Roll up your sleeve Bish, here comes the saline…
Let’s take these numbers at face value. If a government feels it is right to force/coerce such people into having a vaccine then that government does not represent the people.
It should lose all legitimacy on that basis alone.
If there are that many of us (half of NHS staff, maybe?) then the government has a real problem. All governments have a real problem. lol
But governments are supposed to represent the science now, not us. Get with the program!
Maybe but 2020 has also been a big lesson for Europeans about how their governments lie to them over matters of life and death. Also – one prediction I got right – the silver lining of the Covid cloud has been that the public have learnt a lot more about vaccine safety. Prior to Covid, the MSM – conniving with Big Pharma and Government – had kept up this facade that all vaccines are “safe” and that to even mention “adverse resctions” in public showed you were some kind dangerous nutjob extremist.
Now? Well of course it’s Pfizer, Moderna and Astra-Zeneca who are referring to adverse reactions caused by their products (!) and although there is still the drumbeat propaganda of “vaccinatom will save us” the public are much better informed and are beginning to understand there is a balance of risks when it comes to vaccination v non-vaccination, not safety over risk.
I’m not all hesitant. Tell me how the full trials went in 3 years time. And it’s not a vaccine; it’s an immunotherapeutic. 🤓
Happy to get vaccinated but as I haven’t seen a doctor in over 25 years I guess I will need to register. Hopefully they will fast track me….
You are joking?
I reckon so …
All Governments know many won’t take the vaccine, that’s what they want, to string this out until the reset is complete. If you study the great depression of 1929 the ffull force of unemployment wasn’t felt immediately, then suddenly whoosh, everything collapsed. I don’t know when that day is here, but it’s not ready yet, hence the need to keep this going.
Notice how the fear factor is being ramped up now that Christmas is over.
No, but I don’t watch mainstream media. No fear here.
Same,not for about 8 months
Just caught the ITV news, it certainly is. However, its been this way since the Pfzier vaccine was approved I think. Cases – Fear – Ambulance Scenes – Hospitals At Capacity – Vaccine – Hope – All In This Together – IGNORE
yep, given I live in London I should be kept awake by the sirens
It was reliably reported thag during the first lockdown ambulance crews were asked to flash their blue lights when on the move even when there was no need eg returning to their normal waiting area after a call out. I think it’s true. The streets were pretty deserted but I noticed ambulances always had the blue lights on. It was all about raising the perception of peril.
The Daily Mail Headline of the moment is nonsensical and is being paid for by those with financial interests who even use different names and claim to be in two jobs at the same time. Call me out if I’m wrong. This cuts to the heart of the issue. The paid for media are driving this lunacy.
Look at the name of the journalist here. Ameila Wynne. Google it.
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9090939/Millions-Britons-face-plunged-Tier-4-lockdown-week.html
https://muckrack.com/amelia-wynne
https://www.linkedin.com/in/emma-wynne-4787273a/
Who is paying for Emma (or is it Amelia?) Daily Mail, Australia Broadcasting Corporation, or a Bill Gates financial giveaway? I think the latter.
We need more shout outs against mass media. Utter bollo*ks paid for article.
Just my humble opinion.
The mutant strain bit us nonsensical, but surely the risk of more going into tier 4 (or just lockdown 3) is factual.
“Lockdown 3”
We’re still in Lockdown 1, have been since March
Lockdown continues until pre-March normality is restored
Argh! Sorry incomplete comment and couldn’t edit. Yes, it’s all different shades of the same bollx, but it will do its job with the masses. Keeps people cowed if they think there is a prospect of additional punishment
I, similarly, have been unable to discern the hiatus between each lockdown. Life has been royally fucked up since it began.
So true. A surprising prison break on my conformist street over Christmas. Feels much more sceptical. I’m telling everyone to turn the BBC off. Are we turning a corner? Thoughts please.
Correct. It is – I was referring to sentences like “The next tier review is on December 30 and infections continue to climb”
I don’t think they climbed on 25th December. I don’t think they climbed Boxing Day or today either. No-one of sound mind thinks this.
The threat is there but the numbers in the Midlands and North, even with fake stats don’t warrant CCP shutdown.
DM commenter sums it up:
So Christmas day mixing has caused this?? Thought the virus takes a week to show symptoms. Then you need a test. Results then take a day or two. It’s only been 2 days since Christmas day so how are the current figures down to mixing bubbles. This manipulation of the data would be funny if most of the country didn’t believe what’s being reported.
They don’t even try to hide their lies anymore.Why should they,no one is holding them to account.
They are getting more fantastical from 4000 deaths a day to a mutant strain that is 70% more infectious.
the Nigerian strain may jump the shark
The Nigerian strain won’t infect you. It will just phish your bank details.
I mentioned earlier the Council of Europe report on H1N1.
[ https://assembly.coe.int/CommitteeDocs/2010/20100604_H1N1pandemic_e.pdf ]
I could pick out the whole of the conclusions as being relevant – but this one struck me forcibly :
“64. The rapporteur considers that some of the outcomes of the pandemic, as illustrated in this report, have been dramatic: distortion of priorities of public health services all over Europe, waste of huge sums of public money, provocation of unjustified fear amongst Europeans, creation of health risks through vaccines and medications which might not have been sufficiently tested before being authorised in fast-track procedures, are all examples of these outcomes. From the rapporteur’s perspective, these results need to be critically examined by public health authorities at all levels with a view to rebuilding public confidence in their decisions. Public health authorities need to be better prepared for the next infectious disease of pandemic scope, which might be of greater severity.”
I think we can safely say that, far from ‘lessons being learned’, the lessons of that other fake pandemic were thoroughly trashed by the same interest groups.
Once might be a mistake. But ….
If I look at Northern Ireland’s bed count, it’s been in terminal decline over the last 10 years.
• Available hospital beds Northern Ireland 2009-2020 | Statista
From 7,200 to 5,200 and that is with a growing population both in number and age.
That 5,200 number is a reflection of general estimated bed numbers. Not really real time. What is real time is the Department of Health’s daily dashboard and guess what the number of beds is stated as?
2,895 beds of which 2,888 are currently occupied
Microsoft Power BI
This is shocking to me. The dashboard sets off alarm bells showing 100% occupancy in hospitals in Northern Ireland. There were reports of 7 ambulances in the Antrim Area Hospital last week treating patients as they waited in a queue outside the ER and this bounced the local gov into another 6 week lockdown. My town has been in full lockdown now since October 3rd save for a week before Christmas.
So why the huge drop? Is is social distancing of beds? Of staff being relocated and isolated on top? Who the hell knows. This kind of context is just side-lined. Nobody here is asking these questions in any public… Read more »
The who NHS has halved available beds in the last 30 years. Down from just under 300k. All the time, the population has been increasing. It’s a manufactured overwhelming of the system that we see every winter.
It’s another aspect of the appalling standard of reporting that we suffer.
There was a time when decent investigative reporters would have been all over these different aspects like a rash.
Not now.
The BBC and Channel 4 get a lot of justifiable stick for pathetic complicity. But – even in the case of the BBC – ’twas not always thus, despite its establishment bent. There was a time when Panorama, for instance, genuinely did do uncomfortable stuff. Similarly, Channel 4’s ‘Despatches’ (10 years ago, for instance,Peter Oborne did an incisive examination of the Israel Lobby’s dire influence on the politics of the nation).
Not now – despite some picking around the edges.
V. true. Panorama were completely shown up by a certain MrTR. Sweeney who was caught on camera coming out with many unGuardian like comments about gays, gypsies, Irish, women etc while quaffing copious amounts of alcohol during working hours had to leave the BBC service. The BBC claimed the documentary would still appear. It never was. Liars. Is Dispatches still going? It used to be good but haven’t seen or heard anything from them in the last couple of years. Journalism in the MSM in both the UK and USA is pretty much dead.
My 76 year old mum is now driving back to Tier 2 Cumbria this evening after 5 nights in now Tier 4 Hampshire. She would have gone back tomorrow morning but for the risk of snow and dangerous roads.
We’ve had a great Xmas and she has been spending quality time with us, her grand daughter, and her 2 y/o great grand daughter. Everyone hugged. No social distancing. Some of us have antibodies (we paid for a test in May when epidemic was over) Mum was a career nurse. She knows its all bull.
I’m proud of my 76 year old mum and hope there is no hold up on the M6 tonight.
Be very proud of your mother.
Let’s hope that this sort of example of saying ‘f.it’ to the impositions has been widespread.
It may not produce immediate results, but it is a start.
We also had as normal a time as was feasible, without anti-social distancing,given some constraints re. genuinely vulnerable individuals, and some sheer practicalities of travel.
It sounds like The Times have used the interview with NF as a stalking horse (to very good effect) but the other papers simply haven’t picked it up. Undermining lockdown simply doesn’t shift copy.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-london-55461390 apparently the number of 999 calls are now worse than at the height of the pandemic. However, they don’t say how they compare with this time last year.
It’s worth considering that people may be reluctant to call on friends/family and the default course of action will now be to call emergency services in most situations.
No idea how much this would increase the figures but it’s likely to have a considerable effect.
If you can’t see your GP and 111 is useless or unavailable, 999 is your only recourse.
As happened to us this week. We’ve been trying to get an urgent referral and treatment for my son for a month. They gave him an outpatients appointment for mid January, I thought it unlikely he’d make it to Christmas. We called the ambulance on Tuesday as he was nearing collapse. All the box tickers have gone home for Christmas so his earliest chance for the treatment he needs will be next Tuesday. PALS told us to contact our GP ( useless), phone 111 ( useless) or in an emergency 999. Well they created the emergency.
Hope it works out ok for your son. Thinking of him.
Thank you, much appreciated.
Indeed they did. Heart aches for you – hope all goes well; kick up one helluva stink if it doesn’t. X
This is unconscionable. My thoughts are with you and your son and I hope he gets the treatment he needs immediately. Like Jane said, I’d scream bloody murder in order to get him treated.
Suicides are high around new Year in normal times. I dread to think what this year will be like.
A bit of light entertainment from Canada:
https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=opera+revue
Alex Belfield: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eBfrHVqPo44
Julia Hartley Brewer & Nick Ferrari should be sacked immediately say snowflake lefties!
Vaccination, that’s my by-word
Vaccination’s what you need
If you’ve already had the test
And you’re more virtuous than the rest
Vaccination’s what you need…
If you wanna be a covid breakeeeerrr…
Fuck ’em. Now, what was the question?