According to the UN, lockdowns are responsible for the deaths of hundreds of thousands of children in the developing world. The disruption from school closures is leading to devastating outcomes for children. And as studies already show, lockdowns hardly had any effect on deaths from COVID-19, while they are surely to a large extent responsible for the spike in excess deaths from other causes.
Now that the virus has become endemic, it is time to move on. But it is not time to forget. For if we forget we are in danger of repeating this horrifying experiment.
In short, the situation is this. Information about the failure of lockdowns is slowly emerging. More and more information on the catastrophes caused by them is becoming known, increasingly being covered by the mainstream media. People are starting to feel on their own skin the economic consequences and attempts to pin all that on the war in Ukraine are doomed to fail. Even if the majority of the vaccinated may still hang on to their belief that vaccination did something for them, the spiking excess mortality and the obvious failure of the vaccines to prevent transmission are too clear to be denied. And now it even appears the original claims of efficacy were based on a twisting of data.
At the same time, most people have become complicit in the lockdown and vaccination narrative. They have repeated the mantras so often they have become stakeholders; it is now their narrative also, which means changing opinion is difficult. It is hard to admit having been fooled, especially when you‘ve taken an active part in fooling others also. And if you‘ve been active in ostracising your unvaccinated friends and relatives, there may be no way back for you.
Most people still believe in the narrative and consider those sceptical of the vaccines as crazy ‘anti-vaxxers’; the belief in the efficacy of lockdown is also based on a very strong fallacy of intuition, which is hard to escape. Admitting that what you‘ve wholeheartedly supported is not only causing misery and death all around the world, but even scarring your own children for life, is probably too difficult for most people. So they close their eyes.
Before I continue, a word of caution. Almost from the very outset, I realised there was something fishy about the whole story; there was such a huge discrepancy between the facts and the narrative. In fact, I had been focusing hard on the application of critical, logical thinking in the months before, publishing a book on the subject just before the pandemic struck. So I was in a questioning mood already. Mostly, my predictions have been proven correct, whether it is the consequences of the lockdowns, the ineffectiveness of the vaccines, or the uselessness of masking or the lockdowns for curbing transmission. But being right on one count doesn‘t mean you have to be right on the next, and belonging to a small minority with strong views may well taint my analysis and predictions.
Anyhow, here‘s what I think: I believe we‘re approaching a tipping point. The facts speak for themselves, and facts have the annoying habit of becoming known; in the end they always do. We are still in the phase of denial, we still cling to our false beliefs, we still cannot comprehend the consequences of what was done to us, what we did to ourselves, perhaps by succumbing to mass hypnosis as claimed by psychologist Mattias Desmet. But this stage cannot last long; this is the quiet before the storm hits.
Most people don‘t know the storm is about to hit. But those who have a questioning mind and can think clearly and critically have seen the indications, and based on those they are able to look ahead and predict where we‘re heading. They see how inflation, supply disruptions and shortages have been caused by lockdowns and unprecedented money printing to support them; they understand basic psychology and the devastating effects of school-closures and masking on children; they have read the reports on rising hunger and collateral deaths caused by healthcare disruption and isolation; they have read the studies and understand the data on vaccine effectiveness and the VAERS reports.
Many of the longer-term consequences will emerge slowly. The deterioration in children‘s education, the psychological scarring – those will emerge gradually and the cause-effect relationship may not be clear to most people. Hunger and deaths in developing countries will be ignored in the affluent West as usual, though not in the countries affected. The damage from the vaccination campaigns will become more visible as time passes, especially if the most pessimistic predictions regarding people‘s health hold true. But it is the economic reality we are facing that will be the loudest wake-up call. Surging inflation is leaving people considerably worse off. Many will lose their homes, living standards will fall, the poorest will go hungry.
In Iceland, after the financial crash of 2008, when the local currency was devalued by half and all the country‘s banks went bust, thousands lost their homes and unemployment surged. In early 2009, massive protests drove a democratically elected government out of power and the blame was pinned on reckless bankers – admired by all a few months before based on a fairytale of unfailing ingeniousness – and of course on politicians for not having seen what was on the cards.
Who will be blamed this time? Will it only be Putin? That‘s unlikely, or rather, that explanation will not hold for long; people will seek the culprits closer to home. The Americans, Chinese, Africans, Indians, many of whom have barely heard of Ukraine and to whom Europe is an unimportant and decaying part of the world, how likely are they to blame a far-away warlord, when at home their politicians have not only failed to keep their promises but have lied to them also on a massive scale?
The economic consequences will force people‘s minds to question the rest. Once they‘ve realised what drives the inflation and devaluation of their pensions, they may start questioning the vaccines, if only due to the rise in excess deaths and the adverse effects experienced by many. Once you‘ve found someone to blame for one thing, you‘ll quickly pin the next one on them also, especially when they haven‘t been entirely honest. You decided to believe them, even if you had a hunch what they said wasn‘t true; you chose to overlook it, but now; now they‘ve done this to me, I‘m losing my home, I cannot put food on the table, I still have those lingering side-effects ever since my vaccination, my daughter‘s been depressed since the school closures and it‘s only getting worse – what a fool I was to believe those scoundrels! This is the way it will play out. The tipping point will be the economic shock. The rest will follow.
But what then? Many of the key players behind the catastrophe have already started to distance themselves from their earlier propaganda. A few, like U.K. SAGE member Mark Woolhouse even seem to regret their actions. But many more will not. Recently, the Icelandic Chief Epidemiologist said in an interview the lockdowns hadn‘t been stringent enough. And he blamed those few politicians who voiced their doubts and worried about the wellbeing of society as a whole for undermining the solidarity behind the measures – as if he were the emperor, the politicians only his servants. And he is not alone. Many of those people will continue pushing the narrative even as it crumbles around them. They will be the first targets of people‘s anger. Then it will be the politicians, pharmaceuticals, media and Big Tech.
There will of course be strong pushback. There will be a scramble for alternative truths once the narrative starts crumbling, for something to keep the veil on the lies and atrocities. The push for continued masking, lockdowns, vaccine mandates and so on will continue for a while. And we shouldn‘t forget there are huge vested interests at stake here, not only reputations, but to many big business sectors, lockdowns were a godsend. The censorship will be ramped up even further. But despite all the power, money and technology, the facts will emerge, the truth will prevail in the end. It always does.
Some might say I‘m too optimistic, that we are already under the control of conspiring media, Big Tech and corrupt officials, with no way out. But is it really so? Recently a U.S. attempt at handing unprecedented powers over to the WHO was averted, thanks mostly to African leaders and strong public opposition. The vaccine mandates are disappearing and what will eventually come of the still existing plans for health passes is unclear. But of course the danger is still there.
What really matters is how we react as the narrative crumbles. Will we just shrug and move on with our daily lives, not caring about the threat to our freedom and humanity? Or will we face the consequences of our failure to think critically, of our gullibility, our lack of moral integrity, as the German people were forced to do after World War II, and as the Icelanders had to do after 2008? Will we bring those responsible to court? Will we learn, once again the hard way, how the only thing that can prevent such catastrophes in the future is taking responsibility as thinking, doubting individuals? And will we finally understand the true meaning of Hannah Arendt‘s conclusion in The Origins of Totalitarianism, that flawed as it may be, it is only a sovereign nation state of free people, governed by elected representatives who take their responsibility seriously – and not unelected officials, supranational organisations or huge corporations – that is really able to protect universal human rights? As it did in the tiny Faroe Islands during the pandemic.
We have to move on. We have to rebuild our societies, re-establish our moral values and our rights, rebuild trust in science and trust within our communities. But to truly move on, we must face, understand and act on the roots of the catastrophe, and take full responsibility for the part each person played. This is why we must not forget. We must never forget.
Thorsteinn Siglaugsson is an economist who lives in Iceland. Find him on his Substack page.
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I don’t share Mr Siglaugsson’s certainty that the truth will out. The forces of Globalist authoritarianism ranged against us are too powerful.
I expect that our Governments/Scientists will admit to some minor “mistakes” but continue to insist that most of their policies were right or at the very least well-intended “bearing in mind the information available to them at the time.” And the sheeple will gratefully grab that excuse to explain away their own gullibility and compliance with destructive policies.
History is written by the victors and I’m not at all confident that the scientists who refused to follow the narrative and those ordinary people who resisted the propaganda will win.
I will never forget. Or forgive.
Neither will I, but I’ve a horrible feeling that those who pushed the narrative the hardest will in time to come, be rewarded with things like the Order of the Garter – as happened just last week to one of the most reviled war criminals still unhung.
The profound wrong-ness of lockdown policies will never be formally acknowledged, even though it will be tacitly. Like after a car prang: never admit liability.
I do hope the horror will die away, but the hushing-up and denials are already happening – perhaps that’s how it works: ‘least said, soonest mended’.
I’ll wait with interest to see what trouble the inevitable economic meltdown will cause.
Fascinating time to be alive (and unvaxxed).
People wanting to be kind and conciliatory and ‘not sink to their level’ is part of the problem.
I’m more of a fight fire with fire sort of person.
Don’t get me wrong – I let the occasional acid observation fall, like yesterday when I was asked to deputise for someone jabbed-up and down with the coof.
Usually get met with blank incomprehension.
The cognitive dissonance is too engrained.
or the cognitive dissonance has been too much and just shorted out the brain, no thinking involved anymore, just blind obedience
I am an optimistic guy, but in this, I agree.
Yep. You nailed it:
I expect that our Governments/Scientists will admit to some minor “mistakes” but continue to insist that most of their policies were right or at the very least well-intended “bearing in mind the information available to them at the time.” And the sheeple will gratefully grab that excuse to explain away their own gullibility and compliance with destructive policies.”
Of course, they could have and should have known from the “information available to them at the time” that the fear-mongering narratives were bogus. For example, by March 2020, everyone looking KNEW this disease was only perhaps deadly to the very old. Still, schools were cancelled and healthy young people were told they couldn’t participate in sports.
It’s nigh on impossible to fight “well-intended” as you come across as really unforgiving. There has been a clear shift in my friends in that even the most staunch supporters of the interventions are not as defensive. It won’t help the friendships by pointing out that I said way back that if they thought the interventions were restrictive, just wait until the economic fallout hits everyone. “Told you so” wins no friends but one so wants to say it.
However, support of the vaccine is still strong despite clear evidence that it didn’t do what they were sold on – prevents you catching it and therefore infecting others so take it for the greater good.
Pretty sure I read that once brainwashed it’s nigh on impossible to reverse.
What an excellent article. The majority of the population has been complicit in this and many will be defensive. This article has been carefully written. (One facility I would love on this site is to be able to give articles star ratings (see Off-Guardian)).
An extreme example of this is the U.S. Congressman who just lost his vaccinated daughter, who died “unexpectedly in her sleep.”
There’s no way even this man will blame the vaccines for taking the most precious thing in his world from him.
The Guardian yesterday had an article on facial paralysis in younger people, brought to our notice by Justin Beiber. Not once did the article talk about vaccination, not once…
Of course, it’s the elephant in the room….
I really like elephants. If there is/was one in the room I’d like to talk about it and to it…
We cannot properly move on until the mass vaccination stops, and the chances of that happening seem very slim indeed because vaccination has become an article of faith of a religious cult as well of course as a global industrial complex on a par with the military one.
Agreed but it really does need to stop. Few things fill me with fear but the FDA approving the vaccine in very children was one of them.
The data is very clear now and even accepted – the vaccine does nothing to stop transmission. So like the flu vaccine, it should only be considered for the vulnerable. Which means that it stops for everyone outside that category under 60.
And people over 60 who are sentient and capable of doing their own risk assessment. The vaccination (huh!) should be like putting on a hat or scarf – something you choose to do for your own comfort or well-being not to conform to the opinion of others.
Interested in what the down marker has a problem with?
I always thought it was interesting how after the fall of communism in Russia the people were robbed of their wealth by a handful of people.
The sanctioning of Russian Oligarchs over Ukraine has been justified by claiming their wealth has been ill gotten.
The solution? To rob the Oligarchs and thus indirectly the Russian people again of the money that should have been theirs in the first place.
Over the last two years we have seen a similar
thefttransfer of wealth from regular people all over the world, on the grounds of public health. Now the people are suffering for it whilst the criminals are laughing all the way to the bank.I agree with everything you say except the part about laughing all the way to the bank. From what I can see they’re not laughing because they’re terrified, and they know there won’t a bank to run to for much longer.
Unless you know about BSV…
It’s lost on me – I’d love someone to explain it to me!
There have been many huge cons pulled in the past, and yet if you try to talk about them, you’re branded as a conspiracy theorist. I mean quite far back in the past, and some relatively a lot more recent.
Take Jesus of Nazareth. A real clever guy, an outcast, son of an “unfaithful” Mary. He tried to stick it to the powers at the time. They hated him, felt threatened by him, and in a rather unenlightened move, killed him very publicly and unwittingly made a martyr of him. But the man died, and that was that.
If he were alive today, he would be dismayed at how the powers managed to adopt his image as a way to further enslave and empoverish the masses, and that the masses believe him to be a god. Just what he told them not to do.
Humans are screwed from the beginning. Some realise it, usually by some random event, and find a way out to freedom. But that freedom ain’t easy…
It’s mind boggling how much is going on at the same time. We’ve got the technological singularity, the internet and AI, we’ve got culture wars, we’ve got the continuation of 20th century geopolitics and The Great Game, we’ve got religious wars. We’re at war on every possible front. Peak Human right now, and I think it’s coming to a head. I also know that every generation has felt a bit like this and we do have that End of the World circuit in our make-up. What a time to be alive.
Astronomers talk about a Great Barrier being the reason why we don’t observe a galaxy full of technologically advanced civilisations. I think we’ve reached our Great Barrier.
Yeah. Peak Human, and not in a good way…
No – more the sum of all our worst instincts.
But doesn’t a new Golden Age follow Kali Yuga? If so the main objective would seem to be not getting caught in the between-times. Which however unfortunately seem to have arrived!
You will pay a heavy price for taking his name in vain.
Largely agree with this article and it’s good to see a sober assessment like this on DS, which manages to avoid adopting the language of the enemy.
I maintain the belief that the underlying cause of everything we’ve witnessed over the past several years is the collapse of the Western economic system and a desperate attempt to retain power in a system that the world’s political and economic elites know is about to fail. It shouldn’t be surprising that totalitarianism is the chosen method for dealing with this unprecedented event – totalitarianism is the default system of governance for most of human history, we are really just reverting to type.
Frank Zappa predicted this brilliantly:
Economies have collapsed before of course. But nothing like our modern interconnected astronomically complex global economic system has ever existed, and I don’t believe that the world’s economic overlords (who, let’s not forget, got us into this mess to begin with) have any idea how to deal with this. Power blocs are forming around the world right now and consolidating and strengthening their power in preparation for this. The Great Reset is just one Western component of this, and it’s a fairly pathetic one that is doomed to fail.
I think in 100 year’s time, historians, if there are any, will describe this period as a crash and a prelude to World War 3. History repeating itself. I predicted in early 2020 that by the time this was all over, no one would remember that it involved a virus; I stand by that.
I’d tend to agree with your assessment that this has been orchestrated (or at least taken advantage of) by a small group of rich, tunnel-vision folks who stand to lose in the power shifts, but are still so drunk on and corrupted by their power that they think they can engineer the ‘solution’ for their benefit. In fact, they’re just utterly clueless about human nature.
They are – once you view The Great Reset as a desperate panic measure, taken by completely out of touch idiots, it all starts to make sense.
I agree that the great re-set is coming (already started) and we should have always “followed the money.” The money happens to come from some magic “printing press” … that has to be protected.
When even this magic printing press can’t produce enough money, they will start confiscating people’s money via their now-mandatory digital-currency accounts. There will be no cash to hide under your bed.
This all really started when they started disparaging “gold bugs.” The “gold standard” or “as good as gold” is now the thinking of kooks. The real money is pieces of paper with the pictures of dead presidents on them (or digital money now). The “real” money – or “History’s money” – has been cancelled.
Massive crimes have been committed and the major players at least deserve to be in jail. In March 2020 the British government knew that Covid was not a a disease of high consequence but they followed the WHO globalist trail anyway and lied to everyone about the risks. Even now this issue is being fudged. It wasn’t a mistake.
https://www.ageofautism.com/2022/06/the-british-government-the-world-health-organization-and-global-coup-of-2020.html
One of the extraordinary things about this whole saga is the egregiousness and absolute impunity shown by those in power. That’s why I believe this is a panic measure – it is as though the perpetrators don’t expect there to be a functioning legal and political system to prosecute them when this is over.
I was on a group call last night with a distinguished chronicler of globalist malfeasance: one of his clearest messages was that we do not move on. Apparently, articles like this one are appearing – though this is the first I have seen – and it does suggest the perpetrators are getting worried, and that is the good news. But let’s be clear that what these people did and are doing still are crimes against humanity. From the beginning this site played the traditional establishment line that everything that goes wrong is a cock-up, and it is partly psychologically understandable that you do not want to believe the worst of your friends. But the evidence is massive that there was no cock up. On U.K. Column on Friday they had footage of a UN official talking about Covid as a softening up operation. There will be millions of deaths, tens of millions of injuries, hundreds of millions of wrecked lives, and there was no cock up – and they want more.
I wrote this article last week documenting that that the March 20 lockdown was no cock-up, it was a deliberate and cynical power-grab in which people were lied to by those who knew otherwise
https://www.ageofautism.com/2022/06/the-british-government-the-world-health-organization-and-global-coup-of-2020.html
Have you got a link to the story about the UN official?
https://www.ukcolumn.org/video/uk-column-news-17th-june-2022
From 37mins
Thanks
I tried to click through to that article and got `’nginx”.
Can you use a different browser?
Thanks – it worked. Fascinating and scary stuff.
Moving on implies forgetting. They are injecting under fives in America.
“Covid Cases” aka fake PCR Tests are “on the rise”.
Neil Oliver: Whatever Covid is, or was, it has been used to green light the revolution those in power had in mind.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gkt78vsNMtM
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“This is why we must not forget. We must never forget.”
And of course we must add –
Never Forgive.
I’m as sceptical of the sentiments in this piece as I am of claims of lockdown, mask & vaccine zealots. I very much doubt significant future vaccine harms but I do think the vaccinated will be more susceptible to both covid & other illnesses. This will be blamed on pesky new variants & rather than undermine faith in vaccines people will clamour for new ones. I think most people think the vaccines reduced the severity of their symptoms & they don’t think they’ve been conned.
I think people in the West mainly blame Russia for economic woes, this is why the narrative is switching to a war lasting years. But I do think there will be widespread social unrest & this will be used to declare Marshall law in various places & civil restrictions, green passes etc to fight ‘domestic terrorism’.
Big upheavals in North Africa caused by food shortages, more migrants, more clampdown.
It won’t be pretty.
My friend’s son-in-law has been diagnosed with micro clots and Long Covid. He was double vaccinated after having had Covid first. He’s been told that he got Covid from the children he teaches – 5-12 year olds. The family believe this which is interesting as they have 2 children under 5 and allow the grandparents to look after them. No amount of discussion will cause them to change their mind and I imagine they’ll get their own children vaccinated as soon as possible. They believe the vaccines mean you don’t get Covid so bad.
My own son, also a primary teacher and double vaccinated, has had Covid three times but doesn’t blame the children which is at least something.
While I think this is an excellent, well constructed article and much to admire in the author’s optimism I cannot at this stage of our misery share the positivity. I believe a more realistic view of the way the story will unfold is presented by Dr Vernon Coleman. Unfortunately, as Dr Coleman reminds us, he has been right about the Scamdemic since Day One. Anyway here’s the counterbalance:
https://vernoncoleman.org/videos/nightmare-your-street
This is a great summary explaining why we almost certainly will not get the full truth:
“At the same time, most people have become complicit in the lockdown and vaccination narrative. They have repeated the mantras so often they have become stakeholders; it is now their narrative also, which means changing opinion is difficult. It is hard to admit having been fooled, especially when you‘ve taken an active part in fooling others also. And if you‘ve been active in ostracising your unvaccinated friends and relatives, there may be no way back for you.”
My comment: Way too many “stakeholders” by now.
This caught my eye, I think it must have been precognition or prejudice alerting me to the item and telling me that the smaller communities are still in petri dish mode for social conditioning (‘LOL!’)
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-isle-of-man-61873373
“Mandatory face masks reintroduced at Manx Care sites after Covid spike… The number of people with the virus quadrupled last week in the wake of an influx of visitors during the TT period….”
In this particular case one assumes there is a big payload of retirees there ex-UK and more pronouncedly limited healthcare provisioning, nevertheless pushing the discredited face-rag comfort blanket is so… yesterday.
Please, please. Give this guy a lectern and put him before the MSM, BBC, Sky; et al (not Whitty) – His analogy is truly breathtaking.
A great article. The only problem I see is that the elites will blame Putin and also Climate Change and also here in the UK, BREXIT.
I also live in hope though that the Ukraine war and huge increases in energy and fuel costs will open people’s eyes to the huge con that is Net Zero.
I enjoy reading articles that give people some hope. The author might be accused of being over optimistic but I’m with him on this. We all need to believe that it is possible to win this war no matter how small the chances appear right now. It’s still early days and the fight is the most worthy of all – to protect our most basic human rights. These are rights that even those in power know will affect their husbands, wives, children, their nearest and dearest. So there must come a time when some of the most powerful people on the planet from the legal and medical and other professions, together with the help of very wealthy philanthropists, break through. In the meantime we can all play our small part by spreading the truth, tactfully demonstrating to our fellows how wrong those in power have been, peacefully protesting and, to keep us in that fight, writing and reading articles such as this.