A Spanish priest is facing up to three years in prison on “hate crime” charges for his heated words about Islam. Catholic News Agency has the story.
Last month, Father Custodio Ballester and two other individuals received a summons from a provincial court in Spain to answer charges of an alleged “hate crime” for criticising Islamic extremism.
If convicted, Ballester could be forced to pay a fine of more than $1,600 and serve up to three years in prison. The charges date back to 2020, when the Court Prosecutor’s Office in Catalonia accused Ballester of a “hate crime” based on what he wrote in a 2016 article titled ‘The Impossible Dialogue with Islam‘.
Four years later, Ballester is still awaiting trial on criminal charges for criticising the faith that he says aims to “destroy” all those who refuse to recognise Mohammed as “the last and ultimate prophet of God”.
“I know Muslims who were not offended and understood perfectly well that I was not referring to them but to those who live Islam in a violent, radical way,” he told CNA.
Ballester, 59, serves a parish in Barcelona within the archdiocese led by Bishop Juan José Omella. He has long been known for his pro-life activism.
“In Spain, ‘hate crime’ was invented and is directed at any speech that directly or indirectly refers to discrimination, encouragement of hostility, or inducement to violence,” Ballester told CNA. Previously, he pointed out, the criminal code was directed at whether someone had actually done something.
Asked whether he is prepared to spend three years in prison should he be convicted on the hate crime charges, Ballester said: “It doesn’t seem right to be convicted for something I’ve said, but in Spain anything is possible. But if I am convicted, this will no longer be Spain but Pakistan, where you can be killed for blaspheming the Koran or Mohammed.”
“There is no longer any true right to free speech in Spain,” Ballester said.
Worth reading in full.
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Twitter is becoming even more of a parody of itself.
It’s such a putrid hole of a place. You outlaw long form discussion, reducing interaction to short sharp snipes, add in followers (people who are either looking to catch you out or who hang on your every word, so polar opposites with an agenda), ban a few conservatives and light the touch paper on humanity.
Twitter has now become so woke it’s practically impossible to tell parody from nonsense.
Twitter is also riddled with bots and fake accounts established to push narratives in certain directions and overwhelm any push back against Covid fairytale. Add to that algorithm manipulation, shadow bans and T&Cs as nebulous as fog and it’s really just a tool of the burgeoning technocracy.
Amazing, that one slipped past me, not the communist nut bar but that someone finally called her out on it.
How is this bonkers person a ‘scientist?’ shes a behavioural psychologist when I last looked, lets have some real scientists on the MSM, it would make a refreshing change..
Psychology is not a Science. But if a group of psychologists set up a group called the British Psychological Society, this group bestows all these Dr and PhD’s and anything you want. Hence the BPS exists because Psychologists exist because BPS exists Psychologists exist and so on and so forth.
Communists get a lot of stick. I read once that in the 1960s in Indonesia, when the Army moved on Communists insurgents, one General proclaimed on the radio something like ‘Do not shoot the Communists, bullets are too good for them, use knives!‘. So please show some understanding.
They should get a lot of stick. Their ‘policies’ have killed 100,000,000 people and counting. Vile creatures.
Suspiciously round number but I take your point. It is instructive to look at the populations of the United States of America and Russia in 1900, and then compare them with today’s populations and see how they have diverged.
Rounded down and counting as annicx says.
It’s not a suspiciously round number, it’s an approximation, as the true number is unknown. When one person dies, it’s a tragedy, when it’s millions, it’s just statistics. You can’t make an omelette without breaking eggs, or in this case, millions of people.
The reason the population of the U.S. has increased so much has been down to immigration, i.e. 100 million in the past sixty years, and still going up thanks to the Democrats open-door immigration policy.
and by implication because people want to go there – rather than leave.
The Black Book of Communism: Crimes, Terror, Repression used the same method as Simon Wiesenthal Centre calculating Nazi deaths of 27 million.
Problem is like Nazis the Chinese and Soviets didn’t keep good records and will not share info.
Communism murdered 100 million people (and still counting) to enforce a system that never worked, and never will.
Well done Richard Madeley.
I bet Piers Morgan wouldn’t have asked that question. The fact that he hadn’t in any of the time he was on GMB proves that. The question should have been asked months ago. Good on RM.
We need to spell it out – Michie is evil and should be a global pariah. Under no circumstances should she or any of her fellow vile authoritarians be anywhere near any sort of ‘committee’. And she should never be described as a ‘scientist’ and always as a political activist.
Communism, an extremist, totalitarian ideology responsible for millions of deaths, including up to the present time, has indeed had a bad press.
Now let’s put it the other way round. Suppose instead of a communist woman, the government was taking advice from a far right man who claimed that for scientific reasons people from India should be restricted from coming into Britain, and a journalist mentioned his politics. Would these same people crying foul suggest an agenda against men? Or say it was unfair to mention politics?
I would tentatively suggest that some people are seeing what they want to in the Michie incident. In any case, politics and big business pollute scientific discourse far too much.
Oh dear! They have no answer except boycott, misogyny and witch hunt. How about answering the question truthfully?
George Cross fro Richard Madeley.
Well done Toby and I agree wholeheartedly with your conclusions.
At the start of the transcript “unconscious bias” came immediately to mind. However, let us not confuse some barmy socio / psychological theory with obvious facts. We have a millionaire, proselytising communist, promoting continuing restrictions and yet her communist principles have NO bearing whatsoever on this viewpoint. Clearly this oxygen thief has a very Pravda-esque view of unconscious bias – it doesn’t apply to her – as well as very Orwellian views on “the science” as well as logic and history.
I have never really been a fan of Madeley but he is putting the MSM to shame in his twilight years. His cover of the Mike Graham show some months ago was equally disruptive and made for fine viewing / listening.
Probably Madeley has made enough that he doesn’t worry if he doesn’t work again but he is all the better for it.
Good for Richard Madeley because Michie really needs burying. Evil cow.
F’ing hypocritical scumbags wouldn’t hesitate to hound out of government anyone with the most remote potential connection to politics of which they disapprove – “fascist” or “racist”.
The reality is that when you are in government or directly advising government your politics do matter. Of course they matter -only a moron or a liar would try to pretend they don’t.
The really revealing aspect of this, though, is that it has never been a problem for any member of our supposedly “Conservative” government that they have let an open actual communist influence policy, and in the most dangerous area possible (after arguably security and policing) to let a communist have influence – the manipulation and propagandising of the population.
That’s because they fundamentally don’t disagree with her much, on most broad social issues.
A communist liar? Surely not!
All she needs is the Gestapo uniform. Horrible wench.
Agree – but at least the Gestapo wore a uniform so you knew who they were and which side you were on – these fiends are much more cleverer than that – they dress as we do and will speak in the same terms as we do but underneath they are still the same cruel and repressive monsters as their tyrannical predecessors.
They are more like the old East Germany ‘mitarbeiter’ that happen to live next door, etc.
This has been known about for many months – so why the tough questions now?
I think the game is up – the covid house of cards is about to fall and we’re going to witness all those responsible for this colossal mess fight each other like rats in a sack.
It was the media that enabled the government and fake scientists to prolong our agony, and it should be the media that puts the scamdemic to the sword!
If only!
If she was invited on the program as a psychologist how comes she thinks that qualifies her to pronounce on medical matters?
They don’t like it up ’em!
But they do like panic! (we’re all doomed)
It would have been even better if he’d asked her why she thinks anyone should listen to a fucking psychologist let alone a communist cunt on medical matters.
I was going to say that but thought it was a bit rude
She’s not a medical expert. She’s a behaviourist.
And her calling herself a scientist is stretching it a bit. Same goes for all those alleged scientists coming up with their wildly inaccurate models. I think we need a better definition of “scientist” that precludes all these greedy frauds that we’ve been subjected to over the last 15 months.
Didn’t certain 20th century dictatorships try and persuade psychologists to declare that people who disagreed with their regime must be suffering from a psychological condition? A long (and continuing) history of “science” and lies.
Reminds me of the BT advert with Maureen Lipman “you’ve got an ‘ology, you’re a scientist”
I think we need to make distinctions between three types of scientists. 1: Those engaged in the hard science of testing hypotheses and making observations. 2: Social scientists who influence the behaviour of their research material. 3: Those engaged in the abstract sciences such as mathematical modelling and theoretical physics, whose ideas depend on assumptions rather than empirical evidence.
The second category should be subject to ethical scrutiny before we even think about letting them anywhere near public policy. The third category should be subject to scrutiny by the first category.
Great comment.
A bit too subtle for the masses perhaps, and would require journalists to get off their arses and start working for a living for the idea to gain traction.
Yep- and far too much of modern life is regulated by people from 2 & 3, with absolutely zero practical knowledge or experience outside a classroom or a lab. In so many areas you have spotty faced kids with fresh bits of paper upending years of practical and empirical knowledge because it says so in theory.
And wants us to behave in a way that is repellent to us all
Lefties live and breathe politics – its all they ever think about – its in their blood in their genes – they are fanatics – I read somewhere once that those who considered themselves to be conservatives were quite willing to have left-wing friends regardless of their opposite views whereas lefties/communists etc said that they could never have friends who were on the conservative right of the political spectrum – this is how single-minded they are where their politics is concerned. So for Michie not to be influenced by her communists beliefs would be about as likely as covid19 being transmitted by someone without symptoms … practically zero.
“I read somewhere once that those who considered themselves to be conservatives were quite willing to have left-wing friends regardless of their opposite views whereas lefties/communists etc said that they could never have friends who were on the conservative right of the political spectrum“
As a lifelong conservative (not “Conservative”), that certainly fit me – until this coronapanic.
I’ve had friends, associates and relatives who were unilateral disarmament naifs, hippies, pacifists, climate panickers, communists, feminists, globalists, anti-white racists, radical atheists, anti-British globalists, anti-English nationalsts, and the same on the other side – militarists, anti-black racists, anti-islam obsessives, antisemites,…. The politics never troubled me enough to not tolerate them even while disagreeing with them sometimes profoundly.
But I genuinely struggle to tolerate covid panickers. The harm they have done and the falsehoods they have based it on are just too profound, too intrusive, to overlook.
Indeed.
I agree with you — it has been shattering to see ones friends fold and be unable to look at anything but the BBC and read the MSM – but worse to actually want children to be jabbed with an experimental jab in order to make them ‘feel safe’. I too genuinely struggle to come to terms that they are so brainwashed
Me too. One of the practical difficulties is that there has been very little else to talk about.
Very well said Mark, same here……our household in now down to the bare minimum of “friends”, (and it suits us).
Well, it’s out there now, hopefully awakening many more as what she’s about, well done to RM. Doesn’t matter she didn’t answer, but got all butt hurt and offended as did the Twatter sycophants. Excellent. Shows her up for what she is, and as for the strawman-like arguement…?
That was one nice house that Communist had. I guess she is thinks she is one of the Communist elite who is more equal than everyone else.
Of course. Communism, like socialism, is all about lecturing others about how they should be losing more, not about actually sacrificing your own luxuries to help people (unless there’s a nice opportunity to get some cheap virtue signalling done).
Britain has a very strong, very old tradition of “champagne socialism”.
Absolutely. It’s very easy easy to be a Communist in a western democracy where you’ll never have to face the gulags, the death marches etc etc, especially when you’re one of the nomenklatura.
Hypocritical bitch
That is what I always throw at their faces – they’re disgustingly fake, hypocritical champagne sociaIists. As I was unfortunate to have been born behind the old iron curtain I know everything about communism.
As ugly on the outside as she is on the inside.
This was very clever questioning by Richard Madeley. He boxed her in from the start and she knew it. All he asked, in the politest of ways was “given your lifelong membership of the communist party can you tell us how this has influenced your work on SAGE?” In order to defend her position without declaring her hypocrisy she would have to at least undermine her communist principles and thus reveal her completely sham stance.
Michie of course swerved round the question and headed for the (im)moral high ground by claiming to be a scientist – which she clearly is not.
Quickly, surgically and neatly Richard Madeley blew this Gates whore out of the water.
A clinical demolition.
Well done Richard Madeley.
McCarthy like it was not. The problem with a lot of the loons who skulk on twitter is their total lack of general knowledge, aided by a consequent lack of historical context.
Very true- try telling them that Hitler was a socialist- they fairly explode in indignant rage! Quite funny really…
Isn’t the whole country infatuated with communism [the whole west, in fact] The EU, The BBC, all sorts of Leftists champing at the bit. Not just the usual suspects, but the Chinese government is heavily invested in the UK: nuclear power plants; wind farms; battery storage facilities and a massive chunk of the UK electricity networks. CCP could cause mayhem in this country, if it took their fancy. What are those huge Amazon warehouses, in principle, if not based on the Chinese system, something similar? Most billionaires and corporate hegemonies, are using some form of CCP type operations, or would like to be; they’re an absolute force to be reckoned with.And I’m pretty sure theirs is the blueprint for most ambitious world government types looking to be super competitive..
Free speech being kicked into touch. Censorship in abundance; big tech kicking arse and taking names…Australia, Canada, New Bigotry, The democrats in the states, and shitloads of existing left wing and communist countries all around the Globe bolting punters in their houses and screaming for harder lockdowns [and plenty of them], and you got yourselves a hard core totalitarian, predominantly socialist/communist regime to look forward to. It’s been happening for years in this country alone. We allowed it. Subterfuge and gaslighting, for decades. Didn’t matter who you voted for: the Government always got in. Now we simply have to choose what, or which colour of uniform we’d all like to wear, for this Brave new world…. perhaps we should ask Susan !!
All sad but true. Years ago I had an argument with my son’s history teacher after he came home asking me why I was always telling him what a good PM Mrs T had been when, he had been taught, she had caused the winter of discontent and awful hardships that divided society? He really had been told this as fact, not opinion so I went to the school to complain- pointing out that I was actually there at the time and in fact it was the winter of discontent that brought about the election in 1979, but was told that they were teaching ‘established principles’ and that the belief was that it was the far right that undermined society and sowed the seeds of discontent…so objective facts mean absolutely nothing to these people.
Teachers are the most depressingly brainwashed people on the planet (I became one several years ago, later in life and immediately left in utter disgust). My son was kicked out of an A level Economics class a couple of years ago for making a comment in support of Brexit. Never mind that it was his right to hold that opinion; never mind that Sixth Formers are supposed to be exercising critical thinking and challenging what they read etc, he had committed sacrilege by opposing the pro-EU cult peddled by all schools and needed to be punished. He’s now in the army, refusing to have the covid jab which makes us enormously proud, but extremely sad as his career will suffer for his stance.
“Sixth Formers are supposed to be exercising critical thinking and challenging what they read etc“
Aah, it’s nice to hear these quaint, old fashioned recollections of what our society used to be like….
I would laugh, but it’s too serious….
“I laugh because I must not cry”
You’re right!
Nowadays its OK for men to cry Mark, just get in touch with your feminine side
Call me old fashioned….
Universities were once the centres for excellence, now they are brainwashing factories.
Absolutely! Only one of ours went to university; guess who is the vegetarian, animal rights defending, BLM supporting member of the family…..??
You should be proud of him- he has our gratitude for serving his country and protecting us.
Thank you. That’s why he signed up – shame they won’t let him do it properly because he won’t drink the Kool-Aid…..
“saying she’d been invited on to the programme in her capacity as a professor of psychology and wasn’t there to talk about politics.”
I thought everything was political from that world view?
How is she a scientist? How is what she does science?
She’s not.
Isn’t psychology notorious for quackery? Don’t certain things get reclassified as not a psychological disorder (or vice versa for all I know) for political reasons? (And then there’s computer modelling…)
Absolutely.
“In 1973, the American Psychiatric Association (APA) removed the diagnosis of “homosexuality” from the second edition of its Diagnostic and Statistical Manual (DSM). This resulted after comparing competing theories, those that pathologized homosexuality and those that viewed it as normal.”
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4695779/
Other mental conditions have been in and out of the DSM like bouncing balls.
“I really don’t get why it was “misogynistic” of Madeley to ask Susan Michie whether her hard left politics have affected her position on mask mandates” Of course it wasn’t but there’s nothing to get. Simple case of losing the argument or being put on the spot and playing the victim to deflect attention away from your weak arguments. Michie and her ilk will be livid about dropping mask mandates – they can see their power ebbing way – and will get plenty of support. BBC news website says a backlash has started about the masks = BBC wants to keep them.
It wasn’t misogynistic but this is how things go these days. Don’t dare question anything unless it has approval by the self appointed Commisariat.
The problem is that Michie is continually wheeled out as if she is some sort of expert on public health or viruses or something actually relevant to the control of a pandemic. She has no expertise in virology, epidemiology, virology, disease transmission or the effectiveness of RPE. Her opinion on the effectiveness of masks is worthless. She is there to advise the government on how to manipulate the population into doing what they are told. Her very presence on Sage is extremely worrying.
She describes herself as a ‘scientist’. How about the next protest being outside her house?
For a ‘Communist’, one devoted to sharing, she certainly seems to have a big, and probably expensive, house. Looks like she’s a Capitalist when it comes to her own money.
She is a millionaire – descended wealth.
Wrong, Toby, she didn’t mention that she was a psychologist – merely that she was a scientist. Madeley’s fault was that he failed to follow up on this fact and failed to reveal that she was on Sage as a predictor and manipulator of public opinion …. therefore his question was entirely relevant. Unfortunately, like you, he failed to prepare his ground sufficiently thoroughly. However, you can easily be forgiven. Madeley will perhaps remain a slightly tragic figure in this debacle.
Indeed, she and her SAGE colleagues, many without medical knowledge but are advisers of all sorts, who met in the meetings in April and May 2020 are dubbed “the nudge unit”.
About time that Professor Michie was called out. She is clearly a communist fifth columnist and, as such, ought to be interned until the current crisis is over. Conscious Bias runs through her public pronouncements like the writing in a dodgy stick of rock.
https://www.ucl.ac.uk/health-psychology/people/michie/contact.htm
“Scientist” has become an almost meaningless term. It seems to be a word that people use to give themselves status or to give their arguments more credibility but don’t for the life of me really know what it means any more.
see also “engineers”.
See, especially, “artists”.
Twitter is a cess pit used by Governments, politicians and other states to bombard their particular world view through mass tweets from centrally controlled operations. It should at
worst totally ignored and at best shut down. It has been allowed to have too great an influence on the life of this country’s people and not from a point of benefit. If all the politicos, businesses, and media outlets stopped using it, it would soon destroy itself through its bile and hate
Susan Michie is NOT a scientist/expert as far as viruses, transmission, immunity is concerned!! The mistakes are a) having her and fellow behavourial qucks on ANY committee and b) giving her airtime full stop
She’s a behavioural pyschologist and a lot of the ‘qualifications’ are ones you can buy
She’s not there to address illness. She’s there to manipulate opinion and behaviour.
Granted, a supposedly democratic government should not be doing that at all,but given that’s what this “Conservative” government intended to do, a communist psychologist is probably the perfect adviser for the task.
Once you realise this is not about a virus it becomes clear. This is an NGO takeover of elected governments, see how it doesnt affect non democratic countries. The money is coming from Mega rich Pharma
Spot on.
Richard Madeley was correct to ask, imply, infer that she wants us to be controlled in her totalitarian state. She didn’t like the truth
Since when has Psychology been a Science? I thought that Science has to be repeatable and verifiable, neither of which apply to Psychology.
Anyone can call themselves a ‘scientist’ these days or an ‘expert’ !
Good on Richard Madeley even though he’s been a bit of a wet wank over quite a lot of this.
There’s a reason why the Communists and the National Socialists were bestest friends until they weren’t
Rather than questioning her political belief, RM should have questioned the beliefs she holds that are dressed up as science.
Few, if any, on these advisory boards have an understanding of the transmission, infection, and disease process, and base their prognostications on ‘because’ without any ‘why’.
There is already a huge volume of published research, but as Churchill might have paraphrased “SAGE will often trip over relevant and important research that should cause them to consider the errors they are making, but they just pick themselves up, dust themselves off, and carry on as if nothing had happened”
Nothing wrong with questioning the political beliefs of someone who is in government or advising government. Madeley did the right thing here in addressing the issue pointedly ignored by almost every media and political commentator.
Michie’s daft adherence to an irrelevant party is actually a distraction. This isn’t about traditional politics, which is, at best, a symptom – not a cause of certain mental frameworks.
It’s more interesting to consider what links the Johnsons, the Starmers and the Michies in brain-death.
“What links the Johnsons, the Starmers and the Michies in brain-death.”
The worship of collective healthcare, and the idea that the state is responsible for our health and therefore entitled to lock us down for our own supposed good or the greater good of society. The belief in the nanny state.
Current events have nothing to do with a “virus.”
Lest we forget: Covid (Covert ID)
“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. They may be more likely to go to Heaven yet at the same time likelier to make a Hell of earth. This very kindness stings with intolerable insult. To be “cured” against one’s will and cured of states which we may not regard as disease is to be put on a level of those who have not yet reached the age of reason or those who never will; to be classed with infants, imbeciles, and domestic animals” – C. S. Lewis
There are communists and there are communists. There are still some well-meaning but delusional Marxists who want to struggle for a future Utopia, despite the leasons of the twentieth century. Michie isn’t one of them. She has expressed admiration for CCP totalitarianism. The communist party of which she is a member received Soviet funding. It backed the Soviets sending in the tanks to crush the 1956 Hungarian uprising and the 1968 Prague Spring. Both a long time ago now, but she ought to be asked how she feels about those events now, and about the similarities between the psyops of totalitarian states and those of SPI-B.
to ask Susan Michie whether her hard left politics have affected her position on mask mandates. Of course they have! After all, forcing people to wear masks as a condition of participating in certain activities is a flagrant breach of their liberty and the reason Michie doesn’t care about that and thinks public health concerns should take priority (even though there’s precious little evidence that masks reduce transmission of the virus) must in part be because she’s a communist, who famously don’t put much value on individual freedom.
Forcing people to wear masks in certain situations is a marginal breach of liberty – forcing people to take a test before they can drive a car by themselves is a much bigger constraint and we don’t complain much about that. Nor do we associate it with communism!
We don’t know if Michie cares about the breach of liberty or not (unless there is evidence elsewhere). Just because she thinks on balance mandatory masks are good idea it does not follow that she didn’t care about the downsides. It is just an assumption.
It doesn’t follow that Michie decided in favour of masks in part because she is a communist. That again is simply an assumption without evidence.
Jones and to some extent Madeley are committing the ad hominem fallacy. “X must be wrong because X is that kind of person”
“Forcing people to wear masks in certain situations is a marginal breach of liberty – forcing people to take a test before they can drive a car by themselves is a much bigger constraint and we don’t complain much about that. Nor do we associate it with communism!”
You have this completely wrong. Mask wearing is a far more significant breach of liberty precisely because it is relatively trivial in terms of its practical effects – it represents a badge of submission and conformity. The clear knowledge of its irrelevance and the openness of the authorities’ lying about it (consider their complete reversal in the summer of 2020 when the only shortages were of covid cases and of fear), makes it all the more effective as such.
https://twitter.com/ClarkeMicah/status/1340738177817055235
Given SPI-B was on record as noting that lack of fear was a problem and it needed to be boosted, it’s unsustainable to pretend that mask mandates were not about maintaining fear and thereby compliance with the idea that “emergency measures” were justified.
“We don’t know if Michie cares about the breach of liberty or not (unless there is evidence elsewhere). Just because she thinks on balance mandatory masks are good idea it does not follow that she didn’t care about the downsides. It is just an assumption.”
Questions about motivation are always assumptions. That doesn’t mean they can’t ever be asked, and the only reason someone would pretend, as you do here, that they are somehow illegitimate in relation to someone involved in government, is because you don;t like the particular implications in this case.
Unless you are a very unusual human being, you’d be perfectly happy to make assumptions about motivation if it suited your politics, perhaps if the person in office were a “racist” or “fascist”, or some other out group.
“It doesn’t follow that Michie decided in favour of masks in part because she is a communist. That again is simply an assumption without evidence.
Jones and to some extent Madeley are committing the ad hominem fallacy. “X must be wrong because X is that kind of person””
No, they are making, or implying, a reasonable inference that someone whose politics are based upon core assumptions that individual liberty is of no value and that manipulation of people and lying to them for the greater good are legitimate political activities might have had her policy recommendations influenced by those beliefs.
The effectiveness of mask wearing is a matter of dispute. Carefully selected quotes without dates or context in a twitter post are not evidence! I know I won’t persuade anyone here that they are effective but given papers like this surely you can concede it is a matter of dispute.
I guess you are referring to this SPI-B document from March last year. It is a document laying out several options for increasing adherence to social distancing of which increasing level of perceived threat is just one. It clearly identifies increasing perceived threat with having a good understanding of the risk. There is no record I am aware of that the SPI-B decided to go for this option.
In any case it is a massive assumption that the mask mandate was introduced to increase the perceived threat when many experts think it has a substantial effect.
Actually I try not to make assumptions about people’s motivation. I might conjecture but I have been wrong too many times to be sure – unlike Toby who seems dead certain he knows what Michie’s motivation is.
In any case I try not to let any theories I might have about someone’s motivation influence my judgement as to whether their views are right or wrong (no doubt I fail from time to time and that is a fault). What matters is the evidence.
“There is no record I am aware of that the SPI-B decided to go for this option.” I think it’s pretty clear the govt have been actively promoting a disproportionately negative view of the situation.
You think it is clear. I don’t. I guess we aren’t much further forward.
How would you characterise the way the govt and their agencies and advisors have presented covid related information?
Interesting. Better than I might have expected under very difficult circumstances.
I’ve seen some surveys in this regard but cannot link to them, but anecdotally people tend to vastly overestimate the dangers of covid, and think it was an unprecedented public health emergency. I doubt that would be the case had they received unbiased information with a context.
I hope you will understand that I remain sceptical until I see some actual evidence as opposed to anecdotes.
Presenting raw number of cases, hospitalisations and deaths without making clear the accuracy of the test, the number of tests done, the basis on which the tests were done, the fact that people testing positive are not necessarily infectious, misrepresenting asymptomatic spread likelihood, more or less every model/prediction from SAGE and the rest of them, ignoring seasonality, ignoring counterfactuals like Sweden, various US States, confusing law with guidance, confusing deaths “with” with deaths “from”, presenting data with no historical context, speculating about variants when they had no real data about them, not mentioning some key facts about the vaccines (emergency basis, still in trials), not looking into alternative treatments, having no idea of the numbers of people being “hospitalised” counted as covid who actually had any covid symptoms.
I thought we were talking about evidence that people vastly overestimate the dangers of Covid? You have given me a list of things you think the government has done wrong (with no evidence or examples) which is quite different.
My original point was that the govt have deliberately chosen to present a very negative view of the situation, possibly triggered by the suggestions from SAGE. I have cited some choices they made in this regard.
Retracted due to political pressure – like the recent study in “Vaccines” which concluded that the risk benefit calculation for vaxxs meant the risks were not worth the benefits. None of this is about science – they told you from the start what it’s all about “THE NEW NORMAL”.
Facemasks in the COVID-19 era: A health hypothesis
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7680614/
Conclusion
The existing scientific evidences challenge the safety and efficacy of wearing facemask as preventive intervention for COVID-19. The data suggest that both medical and non-medical facemasks are ineffective to block human-to-human transmission of viral and infectious disease such SARS-CoV-2 and COVID-19, supporting against the usage of facemasks. Wearing facemasks has been demonstrated to have substantial adverse physiological and psychological effects. These include hypoxia, hypercapnia, shortness of breath, increased acidity and toxicity, activation of fear and stress response, rise in stress hormones, immunosuppression, fatigue, headaches, decline in cognitive performance, predisposition for viral and infectious illnesses, chronic stress, anxiety and depression. Long-term consequences of wearing facemask can cause health deterioration, developing and progression of chronic diseases and premature death. Governments, policy makers and health organizations should utilize prosper and scientific evidence-based approach with respect to wearing facemasks, when the latter is considered as preventive intervention for public health.
___________________________________
There are about 30 masks studies for you to go through at the bottom of the main article which prove that yet again MTF, you are on the wrong side of the argument and the wrong side of truth and the wrong side of history:
Most Recent Mask Studies
https://www.thelastamericanvagabond.com/masks-coming-back-despite-science-you-already-have-immunity-mrna-found-most-organs/
Your first link is to a paper that has been retracted. The retraction notice is here. One of the points is “The manuscript misquotes and selectively cites published papers”. In view of that I am not going to spend a lot of time looking at the links.
The other link is just to a blog item.
Please – can’t one you simply give me a link to a single credible study that you believe proves masks don’t work?
You need to scroll down the page on LAV and you will find links to about 30 papers which answer your question. It couldn’t be any clearer. I know the paper was retracted – I wrote as such, and I have read their retraction notice, but if you think politics didn’t play a role you are naive. Equally, if you think the whole paper is invalid, you are naive. GO TO THE BOTTOM OF THE PAGE TO FIND DOZENS OF LINKS TO MASK STUDIES
Most Recent Mask Studies
https://www.thelastamericanvagabond.com/masks-coming-back-despite-science-you-already-have-immunity-mrna-found-most-organs/
By LAV I assume you mean the first of the two links. As I thought I had explained, this paper has been retracted and one of the grounds is misquoting and selectively citing sources. However, nothing daunted, I had a look at some of the 67 references. Only 9 of them even mention masks in the title. The first two were WHO guidance on the use of masks, the third was a comparison of different types of masks for healthcare workers. At that point I thought this is silly. Maybe some of the titles that don’t mention masks are actually about masks. So I looked at 9 and 10, at least they mentioned Covid! However, on inspection, neither article referred to masks. At this point I thought, why I am doing all the work to find a reference to support your case?Just give me a link to a paper you think is good evidence. Is this so hard?
PS Blog items are not evidence.
I know you are being disingenuous but just to set the record straigh and to prove yet again you are wrong, here are all the studies you managed to miss despite being given very clear instructions on how to find them:
Most Recent Mask Studies
https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2021.05.18.21257385v1.full-text
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0306987720333028
https://swprs.org/face-masks-evidence/
5 NIH/National Library of Medicine studies from 2004-2020 all finding verifiable health effects from wearing a face mask, including scientifically verified reduction in blood oxygen level:
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/29395560/
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/32590322/
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/15340662/
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/26579222/
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/31159777/
Cloth Mask Study
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4420971/
SOME of the mask studies on efficacy:
https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2020.04.01.20049528v1
https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2020.03.30.20047217v2
https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMp2006372
https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jama/fullarticle/2749214
https://www.cmaj.ca/content/188/8/567
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5779801/
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/19216002/
https://aaqr.org/articles/aaqr-13-06-oa-0201.pdf
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4420971/
https://academic.oup.com/cid/article/65/11/1934/4068747
https://www.jstage.jst.go.jp/article/bio/23/2/23_61/_pdf/-char/en
https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/BF01658736
https://www.journalofhospitalinfection.com/article/0195-6701(91)90148-2/pdf
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2493952/pdf/annrcse01509-0009.pdf
https://web.archive.org/web/20200717141836/https://www.cidrap.umn.edu/news-perspective/2020/04/commentary-masks-all-covid-19-not-based-sound-data
https://www.nap.edu/catalog/25776/rapid-expert-consultation-on-the-effectiveness-of-fabric-masks-for-the-covid-19-pandemic-april-8-2020
https://www.nap.edu/read/25776/chapter/1#6
https://wwwnc.cdc.gov/eid/article/26/5/19-0994_article
https://academic.oup.com/annweh/article/54/7/789/202744
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6599448/
https://www.acpjournals.org/doi/10.7326/M20-1342
https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s00392-020-01704-y
https://clinmedjournals.org/articles/jide/journal-of-infectious-diseases-and-epidemiology-jide-6-130.php?jid=jide
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S1130147308702355
Well I am not sure how I was supposed to find them. As far as I can see, they aren’t references in the paper you linked to.
However, thanks, you have come up with something we can discuss. The middle one is retracted but I will have a look at the other two. I see a stream of other links below but there is no way I would have time to look at them all.
TheFascistCoronaFraud
First thanks for all the links. I suspect you won’t believe me but the truth is I just didn’t realise they were in the blog item you linked to. You have to scroll through a lot of stuff to get to the links.
Obviously I don’t have time to look at them all. But I did look at the first thirteen. I was left wondering whether you or indeed the author of the blog had read them. Most were simply irrelevant. Two provided some (but not conclusive) evidence that masks are not effective, and two concluded they were to some extent effective. As my position is just that the use of masks is disputed I feel vindicated.
Of particular interest is the Cochrane review. As I expect you know, Cochrane do high quality metastudies. They concluded there was a general lack of quality trials and therefore a lack of evidence either way but recommended the use of masks based on experience with the SARS epidemic.
In case it is of interest, here are the 13 links with my brief comments. I do not intend to pursue this further as it has taken up far too much time already.
Most Recent Mask Studies
https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2021.05.18.21257385v1.full-text
Interesting but significance is limited (see comments below the article)
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0306987720333028
retracted see https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0306987721001201
https://swprs.org/face-masks-evidence/
List of further references – give me a break!
5 NIH/National Library of Medicine studies from 2004-2020 all finding verifiable health effects from wearing a face mask, including scientifically verified reduction in blood oxygen level:
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/29395560/
Surgical (N95) mask on specific exercise
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/32590322/
Not a study just some comments about facemasks and exercise
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/15340662/
Surgical (N95) masks in a very specific context
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/26579222/
Surgical (N95) masks in a very specific context
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/31159777/
Showed that viruses may collect on medical masks in healthcare settings – therefore do not wear for too long
Cloth Mask Study
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4420971/
Very old study – 2011 – and therefore not about Covid.
SOME of the mask studies on efficacy:
https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2020.04.01.20049528v1
Conclusion of the paper:
“Based on the RCTs we would conclude that wearing facemasks can be very slightly protective against primary infection from casual community contact, and modestly protective against household infections when both infected and uninfected members wear facemasks. However, the RCTs often suffered from poor compliance and controls using facemasks. Across observational studies the evidence in favour of wearing facemasks was stronger. We expect RCTs to under-estimate the protective effect and observational studies to exaggerate it. The evidence is not sufficiently strong to support widespread use of facemasks as a protective measure against COVID-19. However, there is enough evidence to support the use of facemasks for short periods of time by particularly vulnerable individuals when in transient higher risk situations. Further high quality trials are needed to assess when wearing a facemask in the community is most likely to be protective.” my emphasis
https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2020.03.30.20047217v2
Conclusion of the paper:
“Most included trials had poor design, reporting and sparse events. There was insufficient evidence to provide a recommendation on the use of facial barriers without other measures. We found insufficient evidence for a difference between surgical masks and N95 respirators and limited evidence to support effectiveness of quarantine. Based on observational evidence from the previous SARS epidemic included in the previous version of our Cochrane review we recommend the use of masks combined with other measures.” my emphasis
https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMp2006372
Not a study about efficacy – just an article about considerations of universal masking in hospitals.
https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jama/fullarticle/2749214
Just compares medical masks to N95 – influenza not Covid (2019)
“The effectiveness of mask wearing is a matter of dispute.”
Not really. The dispute is over whether it might have some trivial impact at the margins. It’s clear that mask mandates overall have no impact on the development of real world epidemics.
As for the nice juxtaposition of your positions on mask effectiveness and government motivation, it’s a classic example of applying inappropriately high evidential standards to things you want to claim to be false and absurdly low to those you want to be true.
“Actually I try not to make assumptions about people’s motivation. I might conjecture but I have been wrong too many times to be sure – unlike Toby who seems dead certain he knows what Michie’s motivation is.“
You might believe this of yourself, but it’s almost certainly not true, at least in relation to politics.
Consider how you would respond for instance to a lifelong BNP member and genuine racist (as opposed to the far more common “racists”) in a governmental position. You would, I have very little doubt, have no problem making assumptions about that person’s motivations in addressing, say, border control policy.
That’s a pretty good analogy for drawing attention to Michie’s position here.
You say it is clear that masks make little difference and your evidence is a twitter posting containing some quotes. I have provided a paper which links to 11 studies (of varying quality but all quantified studies with actual evidence) that have shown substantial effects.
I suggest the 11 studies are substantially more evidence than conjecture on government motivation based on an option that we don’t know they adopted.
I take your point about assuming motivation. I was wrong. There are circumstances where it is clear why someone is doing or saying something. I just think we are too inclined to jump to conclusions. However, even in the case of the BNP member I hope I would assess the truth of anything he said based on the evidence and not on the fact that he was a BNP member. (It is hard to do that, but it is logical).
I have to say the BNP example is a poor analogy to Michie. She was asked to give an opinion as a scientist on something which has both scientific and political aspects. Suppose that same BNP member was an acknowledged expert engineer. Then someone asked him about the viability of a project to build a bridge to France (or some other project which allowed more immigrants). If he said he was against it I would not assume it was because of his politics.
(Listening to the clip again I thought Madeley and Michie both did well. It was a reasonable question to ask her and she was canny enough not to be drawn into an irrelevant debate which would distract from the main message. He accepted that graciously.)
If you consider psychology a science, then she is a scientist, though as with most of SAGE they do not act in a scientific manner nor are they speaking in their capacity as scientists but as people with a political agenda.
Leaving that aside, which you may dispute, she’s not a scientist in the field of face coverings as they influence the spread of viruses, so my opinion on the matter is as valid as hers.
The real world evidence regarding masks shows no correlation between mask mandates and anything else, so for me it is case not proved. I’m against mask compulsion on principle, but would be willing to consider it a reasonable imposition if real world evidence of substantial benefits was compelling.
Will you be wearing a mask forever?
It is quite radical to dismiss psychology as a science. But that is one too many rabbit holes to explore.
I have only seen that snippet of the interview so I have no idea which aspects of mask wearing Michie was commenting on. In any case she was presumably part of scientific discussion about mask wearing and as a pyschologist would have been well equipped to assess the arguments of people with greater expertise in the area e.g. she would know what a good scientific trial looked like.
Did you see the list of 11 trials I linked to? Quite a lot of real world data there.
No I won’t wear a mask forever and I don’t think she really meant that.
I need to get on with my life – so I will stop there.
If you think they work in protecting others or yourself, why won’t you wear a mask? Do you think they work in protecting you, or others, or both?
OK. Back now. I do wear a mask I just don’t anticipate wearing one forever as the risk will eventually be negligible.
And do you do this to protect yourself, others, or both?
“You say it is clear that masks make little difference and your evidence is a twitter posting containing some quotes.”
No, my link to the twitter post was in support of the point that the authorities changed their position.
As for the evidence on mask wearing, the preponderance is very clearly against the hypothesis that they make any significant difference. I’m not interested in bothering to link to any of the several collections of studies and analyses of relative evidential weight that I’ve seen, nor the numerous graphs of epidemic progress showing no deflection whatsoever from mask mandates, because I don’t believe you are interested in the truth on these topics anyway. That’s clearly not what you are here for. Further, I’m pretty confident you are already well aware of them, and if not you could have found them very easily if yo were interested.
“However, even in the case of the BNP member I hope I would assess the truth of anything he said based on the evidence and not on the fact that he was a BNP member. ”
I doubt it, based on repeated experience. As I noted. you would be a very unusual human being and a very unorthodox member of our presumably shared modern US sphere culture to do that, and such evidence as there is here as to your nature strongly suggests the contrary – rather desperate conformism.
“I have to say the BNP example is a poor analogy to Michie. “
On the contrary, it’s an excellent analogy on most counts.
“she was canny enough not to be drawn into an irrelevant debate which would distract from the main message”
It’s clearly relevant, for the reasons I have pointed out here, and the fact that she evaded an awkward question, as politicians (which is what she is operating as here) tend to do, rather confirms its significance than refutes it.
I will just pick up on the one point.
I’m not interested in bothering to link to any of the several collections of studies and analyses of relative evidential weight that I’ve seen, nor the numerous graphs of epidemic progress showing no deflection whatsoever from mask mandates, because I don’t believe you are interested in the truth on these topics anyway. That’s clearly not what you are here for.
You have even extended your assumptions about motivations to me! What do you think I am here for? I suspect you are not going to believe me but I am here primarily to learn about different viewpoints and evidence that shakes my preconceptions is always interesting. Indeed I have changed my views on the efficacy of lockdowns as a result of this site.
“You have even extended your assumptions about motivations to me! What do you think I am here for? “
Yes, as we both agreed doing so is sometimes appropriate.
I do not know why you are here but I do not believe it is honest discussion. Anyone who had gone to the trouble of finding the studies supporting mask wearing (such as they are) who was genuinely interested would have easily been able to find the numerous studies refuting the hypothesis that mask mandates assist in dealing with respiratory virus epidemics.
Indeed, would have noticed the real world reality that mask mandates have made no systematic and significant observable impact on covid epidemics.
Yes, as we both agreed doing so is sometimes appropriate.
Yes – but I am bit surprised that you think it is appropriate in my case when the only thing you know about me is my comments on this forum. I am certainly not going to make any assumptions about your motivation.
Anyone who had gone to the trouble of finding the studies supporting mask wearing (such as they are) who was genuinely interested would have easily been able to find the numerous studies refuting the hypothesis that mask mandates assist in dealing with respiratory virus epidemics
It is not so easy as you think. I did a Google search on “are masks effective”. There were ten items on the first screen – all of them were to the effect that mask are effective. How long do I keep searching? When I do find something that is anti-mask how I am to know that it is one that you accept? One of the reasons for subscribing to this forum is to understand what sceptics believe is the best evidence for their case.
“Yes – but I am bit surprised that you think it is appropriate in my case when the only thing you know about me is my comments on this forum. “
Bear in mind that I specifically did not make any detailed positive assumptions about your motivation. All I did was eliminate one possible motivation. (All such assumptions are always, of course, rebuttable presumptions, though once honesty is in question – as with the government and medical authorities over covid – it becomes very difficult to present further plausible evidence at all.)
“When I do find something that is anti-mask how I am to know that it is one that you accept?“
From memory the AIER and possibly Ivor Cummins had large collections of mask studies, and weighed up the evidential qualities involved. Search for AIER mask evidence and you should find plenty.
Well assuming I am dishonest is a bit more than eliminating one possible motivation – there are many honest motivations!
I tried Googling “AIER mask evidence” and sure enough a lot of AIER articles were listed. But what a nightmare sorting through them. They are long, confusing, keep on referring to each other so you don’t know whether you are repeating yourself, and at least some of the links are grossly misrepresented (I gave up rather quickly as you can imagine). For example, a 2003 news item in the Sydney Morning Herald was described as “a recent publication”. If you are so sure that masks don’t work why don’t you just save a lot of time and confusion by giving me a link to a piece of evidence that you find convincing?
I just posted a tonne of evidence that masks produce no real benefits above. Any miniscule benefits they are shown to have are negated by the very real harms they cause to the wearer. They causd more harm than they prevent. Read my post above for evidence. Please go through the links on the page I linked to. Also interesting that you should say this :
“OK. Back now. I do wear a mask I just don’t anticipate wearing one forever as the risk will eventually be negligible.”
The risk of Covid19 IS NEGLIGIBLE. C19 has survival rate of 99.97% from NATURAL IMMUNITY in the under 70s!!! That’s the whole point. This whole charade is built on the bullshit notion that Covid19 is some dire threat. IT ISN’T which is why NOBODY SHOULD BE FORCED TO GO THROUGH ANY OF THIS CRAP
Please see my response to your tonne (sic) of evidence.
Please read the links I provided before writing them off. The Last American Vagabond links to dozens of studies, but you choose to ignore them and say it’s just a blog. IT LINKS TO DOZENS OF STUDIES WHICH PROVE THAT YET AGAIN YOU ARE WRONG AND MORE THAN LIKELY BEING DISINGENUOUS
You are looking for these headings at the bottom of this link https://www.thelastamericanvagabond.com/masks-coming-back-despite-science-you-already-have-immunity-mrna-found-most-organs/:
Most Recent Mask Studies
5 NIH/National Library of Medicine studies from 2004-2020 all finding verifiable health effects from wearing a face mask, including scientifically verified reduction in blood oxygen level:
Cloth Mask Study
SOME of the mask studies on efficacy:
I am sorry, I only just read this comment which is a shame because it would have saved a lot of confusion and crossness. Just to be clear, when you referred to LAV I thought you were referring to the retracted paper with its 60 odd references. So I never looked at the bottom of the LAV blog entry. This morning I understood what was going on (and you posted the links in multiple comments). You can see my response here.
Well this provides good support for my suspicions about your honesty. This kind of willful noncooperation and nit-picking strongly suggests you are not open-minded in the topic.
To save wasting time and energy I’m just going to repeat the prima facie refutation of the position you seek to argue for: look at all the graphs of epidemic progression and plot the dates of mask mandates. Note how often you can see an impact on the progress of the epidemic.
QED.
Says everything that Michie and her mates are not thrown out of Sage already. Behavioural Psychology features 99% in Sage.
It is SAGE itself that is rotten to the core.
Lets put Susan Michie into context with other great Communists:
“It is acceptable to suffocate democracy for the sake of socioeconomic equality” – Lenin
“A lie told often enough becomes the truth” – Lenin
“To speak the truth is a petit-bourgeois habit, a luxury of worry-free and aimless people. To lie, on the contrary, is often justified by the lie’s aim” – Lenin
“Show me the man and I’ll find you the crime.” – Lavrentiy Beria
“Given a short time with a psycho-politician you can alter forever the loyalty of a soldier in our hands or a statesman or a leader in his own country, or you can destroy his mind.” – Lavrentiy Beria
“To produce a maximum of chaos in the culture of the enemy is our first most important step. Our fruits are grown in chaos, distrust, economic depression and scientific turmoil. At least a weary populace can seek peace only in our offered Communist State, at last only Communism can resolve the problems of the masses.” – Lavrentiy Beria
“Better to kill an innocent by mistake than spare an enemy by mistake.” – Pol Pot
“He who protests is an enemy; he who opposes is a corpse.” – Pol Pot
“Darwin himself, in his day, was unable to fight free of the theoretical errors of which he was guilty. It was the classics of Marxism that revealed those errors and pointed them out. “ – Trofim Lysenko
“All political power comes from the barrel of a gun.” – Mao Zedong
“Youth should learn to think and act as a mass. It is criminal to think as individuals!” – Che Guevara
“Xi Jinping is one of the strongest and most capable revolutionary leaders I have met in my life.” – Fidel Castro
“We should wear masks forever” – Susan Michie
I don’t care if we never hear from Michie again, I would expect that her views are influenced by her politics which are based on a system that we have fought against, and I hope we continue to fight against. There is no place for communism in a free country, which I hope we are returning to being.
When Michie was reminded about her view that masks should be worn “forever”, she objected with the words “I said forever to some extent – but only ‘forever’ is quoted”. So, what does on earth does “forever to some extent” mean? Are these terms not opposites, or near opposites? How can a situation last “forever” and also “to some extent”? The woman is absolutely barking.
As you know George Orwell called it double think.
“doublethink is the act of holding, simultaneously, two opposite, individually exclusive ideas or opinions and believing in both simultaneously and absolutely. Doublethink requires using logic against logic or suspending disbelief in the contradiction.”
This Self Elected Independent SAGE is conning people. They sound “important” but are a bunch of Lefties who just appointed themselves as SAGE, and stuck Independent in front, which normally is not used so they are SAGE!!!
What a Psychologist is doing answering questions on masks I do not know. But what tickles me is that the lefties are going around claiming White People are Racial Biased, but if you ask them if their politics makes them biased, they get shirty. Great innit?
Extremists should never be allowed anywhere near the slightest whiff of power and influence. The extreme right isn’t, so neither should the extreme left be. Anyone who has lived in luxury and safety in the west throughout many years of communism elsewhere, and seen the effect on those peoples – the suffering, deaths, the unimaginable terror and cruelty of all of these regimes yet would wish it to be instituted YET AGAIN…..should never, ever, hold any position in public life at all. Because they are not only delusional, but dangerously delusional. I consider this woman a public menace, a very real danger to my children and I wish she was ‘disappeared’, just like under her favoured authoritarian hand.
Amusing that a psychologist claims to be a scientist. Heavens, next thing will be Ferguson claiming to be a scientist: oh, just a mo.
“… who famously don’t put much value on individual freedom…” for other people…
The YouTube video doesn’t go to 14:29. Has it been edited to remove this section?
what exactly is the purpose f having a COMMUNIST as a GOV advisor?? GET the Commy OUT I Say. She even had teh audacity to argue that she is a scientist fist!! She is a COMMUNIST FIRST.
Thing is if Michie gets the heave ho, she could do a Ferguson and never actually leave. Do people ever leave now, Blair got the boot years ago but still lurks in the shadows, organising his Blairites
No,wrong wrong wrong wrong wrong. You don’t ask other “scientists” whether their political choices affect their understanding of “the science”( a note here,no such thing as “the science”,science evolves and understanding changes with new research). Having said that, mask wearing is a symbol of compliance not a health measure,one of few peer reviewed studies (the Danish study) shows little or no benefit,in any event written on the box of the ubiquitous blue mask it clearly states NOT SUITABLE FOR PREVENTING VIRAL TRANSMISSION.
I just made a comment and got “waiting for approval”. It is the first time I have seen that message. I guess it might be because the comment was very long so this an experiment to test it.
This comment was posted with no problem – so I guess it was the length.
Moderator here, I’ve seen your very long post, we have no problem with it except its length. I approved it for publication 15 minutes ago, but if it isnt appearing, I suspect it is too long for the Comments format. On the Forum, for example, the limit is 2500 characters
Just for people’s information: Deepti Gurdasani’s zero Covid fanaticism is rooted in a personal tragedy — she admitted in a tweet on the 12th of July that she’s on double immunosuppression.