Counter-Currents
1,425 words
Does anyone believe that Covid-19 vaccination will not soon be compulsory for all citizens of Joe Biden’s “systemically racist” America? Going to work, sending your children to school, flying on a plane, going to a gym, being eligible for health insurance, voting, shopping — to do any of these things, and some I have not yet likely thought of — you will have to prove you’ve been officially jabbed. Since I don’t relish a future alone in a cave for the rest of my life, this sounds compulsory to me.
Don’t think it’s on the way? Okay, Gomer Pyle. There’s a Nigerian Prince who wants to put ten million dollars in your bank account as soon as you send him $5000 to qualify as a foreign recipient of the funds.
Let me offer some general thoughts about compulsion. Less of it is better. Sometimes, though, compulsion is the only smart option. Small children, crazy people, and criminals are the most obvious and appropriate targets for its application. You physically restrain your two-year-old from running out into that busy street. You lock up and sedate that guy who thinks he’s John Wilkes Booth and you are Abe Lincoln. You put Ted Bundy in “the chair” because his hobby happens to be murdering young women.
But for most grown-up, sane, law-abiding people, less is better. There is, no doubt, a subset of people out there whose members are thrilled to have their lives ordered by “superiors” to whom they consider themselves inferior. Think of the “good whites” who snap to when BLM launches its latest grievance. “What level of groveling will it take to convince you wonderful people that we are not racists?”
I’m not a member of that club. I believe most people are more productive, more creative, kinder, considerate, happier when they get to manage their own lives and worry about themselves. They resent being compelled to act against their will. They strenuously resist it. Resistance to authority imposes the social and financial costs of putting it down, which is why highly authoritarian societies typically end up with a small set of highly rich oligarchs who rule over a large mass of impoverished subjects. The resources that the oligarchs don’t allocate to themselves they spend on teaching the serfs not to complain and punishing them if they do.
Compulsion has been on a rampage over the last year. It’s all said to be for our own good. If you consider unemployment, social isolation, and fear to be good, then you can confidently proclaim that life has never been better. A tsunami of rules and regulations has washed over us. They intrude into regions of our lives, that until a short time ago, few people would have thought unimaginable. Schools, businesses, recreational facilities, and churches are choking on the restrictions. Governors and mayors make decrees so wildly inconsistent and puzzling that you have to suspect they are auguring their political futures by haruspicy — examining the entrails of sacrificed animals. One of the more ambitious autocrats, the ever-wise Michigan Governor Gretchen Witmer, sought to limit the explosive damage that might result from passenger over-capacity in the use of golf carts. From the imperial city of Lansing: “Only one golfer is permitted per cart. Two golfers can share a cart only if they are members of the same household.” From the dictatorship of the proletariat to the dictatorship of the golfers.
Perhaps they can be grateful to the Governor that they are still allowed the use of their two-woods and nine-irons.
Where is Covid-19 vaccination headed? I have very smart, well-educated friends who are urging me to get vaccinated. “The sooner everyone gets it, the sooner life will get back to normal.” “Back to normal?” When will the ten million from that Nigerian Prince hit your bank account, Amigo?
Here is how the dialogue unfolds:
Friend: “You should get vaccinated ASAP.”
Me: “I’m going to wait for a while.”
You can buy Stephen Paul Foster’s novel Toward the Bad I Kept on Turning here.
Friend: “Why? The sooner everyone does it, the sooner we achieve herd immunity and life returns to normal.”
Me: “My reaction is instinctive: the more pressure, the more duress I experience from people telling me to do what is good for me, the more I push back against it. I like to be presented options with the freedom to defer and, perhaps, decline. Since these vaccines have been rushed out in record time under tremendous political pressure, I remain skeptical. We know politicians never lie to us, right? Rhetorical question. My reluctance is based on a substantial history of being lied to by ‘the establishment’ in a very big, blockbuster sort of way. How about ‘weapons of mass destruction’ from the government? How about ‘hands up don’t shoot’ from the media covering the Michael Brown story in Ferguson? How about Big Pharma? Perdue: ‘Oxycontin isn’t addictive.’ Pfizer’s 2.3 million dollar fine for false advertising (lying) about the drugs they sell? That is just a small sample. As Dennis Miller once said: ‘Washington DC is to lying what Wisconsin is to cheese.’
Forgive me. It’s just this thing I have about trusting powerful people and forces who have a long track record of deceit. I think suspicion is a healthy reaction, especially when suddenly it’s an ’emergency’ and it’s ‘hurry up, do what we tell you.’ I am even more distrustful when we are lectured non-stop about the ‘public good’ and about how much the overlords care about our well-being. The ‘war on terror’ initiated by George W Bush: when will the ‘war’ be over, and just what have we, the American people, gotten out of it so far other than miserable air travel and more surveillance?
Back to normal post-Covid-19 is in the same ‘Valhalla’ category as ‘victory’ in the war on terror. Normal is going to look much like it does right now: compulsory masking, social distancing, and rolling waves of lockdowns with CNN talking heads in their chorus of ‘The sky is falling.’ ‘Normal’ will continue with the further destruction of small businesses, massive unemployment, and the enrichment of Big Pharma, hedge fund managers, and Wall Street stock manipulators. Lots of people will get poorer and more restricted; a few will be much richer with many options.”
Friend: “So, these suspicions have made you into an anti-vaxxer?”
Me: “No, I’m a wait-and-see sort of guy. Not that I was a big fan of his, but how did Ronald Reagan put it? ‘Trust, but verify.’”
Friend: “But the consequences of your refusal don’t just affect you. Your refusal threatens those around you with a greater risk of infection. The state has a right to enforce compliance with procedures that protect public health.”
Me: “Really? Your argument rests on two unfounded conjectures: (a) that the vaccine will not damage my health, which would certainly have a deleterious effect on those around me and my family, (b) that unvaccinated, I would be a serious risk to others. Since I currently live a near hermit’s life and will continue to do so for the foreseeable future — in part, forced to — the infection risk I pose to others would be minimal.
For your argument I offer a counter-argument: when the state forces me to inject a substance, it has taken away from me the most fundamental right I have: control over my body. The state now owns me. I have become its property. It will do to me and with me whatever it claims will serve the goal of ‘public health,’ a concept virtually unlimited in its scope. ‘You are a threat to public health’ is the twenty-first-century equivalent of ‘enemy of the state.’”
End of dialogue.
The public health dictatorship continues to unfold with all the features that apply to dictatorial regimes: rule by decree and the bypassing of legislative process and authority justified by an emergency; vilification of skeptics and resisters; wild promises of better times ahead (someday); and elites who exempt themselves from the rules they enforce on their subjects.
The public health dictators will have no compunctions about compulsory vaccination. Expect it soon.
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53 comments
The people yearned for a Dictator, but when the Crisis came Trump acted like a classical liberal who worshipped blacks. So the Democrats gave us Biden and his 6,000,000 executive orders and a military capital.
I’ve been hearing reports of lots of nasty side effects, including Bell’s palsy, among other things. My doctor got the shot already, he says that for a while, he was sick as a dog. One speculation (based on failed efforts to develop a coronavirus vaccine for cats, which get another type of coronavirus) is that it may cause sterility in females – if that happens in humans too, I bet the globalists pushing the depopulation agenda will love it!
It seems to me that there might be something else in play which will motivate the public to get vaxxed. Back in December, some “authorities” predicted that there’d be new and worse strains coming by February. Well, looky here, we got that now! I’d love to know the transmission belt where they got that information. You can’t predict when a new strain of something will appear and what it’ll do any more than you can predict when and where lightning will strike. So did they, like, have a crystal ball or something, or… hmmmm…
Technically these vaccines were ready to be administered on a voluntary basis in June. f the authorities wished to allow people to step forward for a jab millions of willing or enthusiastic people could have been vaccinated in autumn.
Even commercial airlines are getting in on this farce.
” Qantas chief executive Alan Joyce cited Qantas customer research in which 89% of respondents support a vaccination requirement for flying, and that such a requirement would encourage them to travel internationally again. ” https://www.flightglobal.com/strategy/flyers-support-mandatory-vaccinations-for-international-flights-alan-joyce/141976.article
Well, firstly I call BS on their own dodgy research. They probably stopped passengers from disembarking until they filled out a small questionnaire in pencil, and secondly I think this could be legally challenged. When will these people just leave others alone and mind their own business !?
I, too am a hermit, A-social but pro-social. I decided that, at age seventy-six, I had nothing to lose. So I took the Moderna jab. So far, so good. No adverse side-effects.
I have no intention of getting any form of the regime’s vaccine. I essentially stopped flying years ago because of the pat down/scan requirements. Add in the mask (which I don’t wear) and now the vaccine, and I’m relieved of the responsibility to attend a particular relative’s funeral, when it comes. Since I’ve been leaning that direction (not to go) anyhow, this additional flying compulsion eliminates the residual guilt I’ve been battling for my decision. Win-win.
There is a fine line between distrust of authority and Right Wing kookiness, and this piece has jumped over it. Not to mention the “don’t tread on me” attitude doesn’t go anywhere in today’s world.
Calling names such as “kook” isnt an argument.
The article itself makes no argument against vaccination beyond the juvenile “b-b-but I don’t WANNA be forced!” I’m perfectly fine with you having a right not to shower, so long as all the rest of us have the right to refuse association with you.
Positions that can be argued without an argument can be dismissed without an argument.
I’m with your friend. You sound like a naughty little boy who stomps his foot when his mommy tells him to please turn out the light when he leaves his room. Because of you, I am the one pushed into the dark cave for life, because so many like you refuse the vaccine. I’m past 75 and am at the top of the list for the coroner’s clutches. I’ll be getting my first ‘jab’ — what my English friends call it — this coming Sunday, and the second in two weeks. When my computer-savvy roommates found an ‘open site’ in L.A., we both registered at once — and I ran howling with joy, and singing “I’m So Glad, I’m Glad, I’m Glad, I’m Glad” from the old Cream album.
Please reconsider. Thank you.
Turning off the light actually makes sense. Taking a vaccine that you cant actually prove works doesnt make sense. Vaccines are closer to a religion than a science. You really should examine the actual facts instead of blindly assuming they stop disease.
Somehow flu shots are at an all time low, and somehow flu cases have been eliminated. Explain that, were all waiting.
No, YOU should examine the facts. Vaccination is one of the supreme triumphs of WESTERN civilization. It was also a huge advantage to us in the race for global power, until we idiotically (liberally) shared our superior knowledge with the rest of the world, so as to increase their reproduction at the expense of our own.
The scientific method (developed by the white man, of course) is sound, though not always perfectly applied. Science, esp medicine, is one of the last redoubts of Western objectivity. These vaccines may pose risks for some. But they are lifesavers for others. This article was stupid (although I share the author’s libertarian bent). We should attack the enemy where he is weakest (BLM supremacism; mass immigration; “gender fluidity”; etc), NOT in the public health area where he is strongest. I believe that the Right’s sorry approach to this real (if overblown) pandemic is what cost Trump and the GOP the Presidency and Senate.
I enjoyed this article, even if I basically disagree with it. Hope to see more from the writer.
I don’t believe the vaccine is weaponized, since we already have required vaccinations for children, and a voluntary, but popular, flu vax which is administered every year. Both combined already prick enough people to do a lot of damage. It’s too much trouble to create a new one to kill or sterilize people, when we already have several that will do.
The other reason I don’t believe it’s weaponized is because if there are mass side effects or deaths, the gov’s fingerprints will be all over it. They may want to kill us, but they definitely don’t want to be blamed for it. They’d rather die themselves than be exposed as anything other than our saviours.
Having said that, I won’t be getting it either lol. Not immediately anyway. The technology is too new, the gov is too incompetent, and I’ve been American too long to be required to do anything.
‘I don’t believe the vaccine is weaponized, since we already have required vaccinations for children…’
This is what we call a nonsequitur.
Read on dawg:
“Both combined already prick enough people to do a lot of damage. It’s too much trouble to create a new one to kill or sterilize people, when we already have several that will do.”
I never thought I would say this, but I’ll sooner move to Sweden than take an experimental vaccine to prevent a largely imaginary disease.
You forgot the real argument: “If the vaccines work, why do you care if I take it? You’ll have taken yours and be immune.”
“Oh, they DON’T work! Then why should I take it?!
The argument is not so egocentric. I take vaccines, and I want other people to take vaccines, so that there is enough immunity in the general population that diseases cannot spread to the level of becoming pandemics.
Weird argument. If I really cared, I’d take the vaccine to protect all the people who aren’t vaccinated? I’ve never seen this argument issued when it comes to measles or mumps, diseases that are deadlier than Corona by several orders of magnitude.
And Corona is not even a “pandemic” now, it’s only a “pandemic” because the WHO changed the definition back during SARS, in order to push Tamiflu, the bullshit remedy produced by Gilead Sciences, a company run by Bush II-administration insiders like Dick Cheney and Donald Rumsfeld.
You are scared of muh Corona, you take the experimental vaccine.
It is the rationale for all vaccination campaigns. Vaccination, like naturally-acquired immunity, once widespread enough short circuits disease outbreaks because when the infection jumps from person to person, it encounters people who are immune, so they don’t pass it along. The illness can’t propagate widely and fails to become a serious outbreak.
A disease that infects millions and kills hundreds of thousands is something to take seriously, but go ahead and quibble over the defintion of pandemic.
Ofcourse, you’re welcome to trust govt and CDC statistics on covid deaths, because they seem pretty trustworthy don’t they?
You also forget to mention the many deaths and other illnesses associated with this vaccine already, and vaccines in general for that matter. Maybe u should do a bit of research into why autism, food allergies, and CFS don’t exist in the third world, and why they all popped up in the west after vaccines.
Felix’s logic is sound. If vaccines protect you, why should u care if others don’t partake?
You sound pretty ignorant of this topic.
Felix’s logic is only sound if you assume that all people are and should be purely self-interested. That’s a false assumption.
You sound like a standard disinformed Right-wing crank on this topic.
So we’re ignorant right-wing cranks now?
The “vaccine” does not imbue immunity; even if I take that EXPERIMENTAL vaccine, I’d still be contagious. The only thing it does, apparently, is ameliorate the symptoms, so how does it impact you if I don’t take it? It doesn’t even impact yourself: you still have to double-mask, you still have to self-isolate, you still have to social distance.
The various vaccines on the market have all gone through double-blind testing, which is a highly sound technique that is standard for testing the effectiveness of pharmaceuticals. Calling them “experimental” to imply that they are somehow untested and dodgy is a deeply dishonest bit of rhetoric.
A double-blind test is not all it takes to get an FDA approval, it’s a process that normally takes a decade; obviously, since the vaccine has been know for less than a year, knowledge about side effects are all but theoretical. That’s why the federal government waived standard FDA procedure for Corona vaccines.
But you have not responded to my initial paradox: If the vaccine works, why do you care if I take it or not? And if it doesn’t work, why should I take it?
The FDA and other regulatory agencies around the world cut a lot of red tape to get the vaccines out.
I responded by pointing out that your paradox is based on a false egocentric premise.
They should have been rolled out much more rapidly.
I think they are extremely concerned that this could mutate into a more dangerous thing.
If the vaccines had been more rapidly deployed, technically possible, then the virus could havw been zeroed out in the UK for example. The Astrazeneca could have been mass produced in Summer for UK residents. Boris dropped the ball again.
I’ll admit that “experimental” was a poor choice of word, but that “red tape” (i.e. comprehensive testing protocols) is there for a reason. I had a girlfriend who worked for Big Pharma, she ran test suites for seven years on a single blood-clotting agent, a drug that had been approved for other uses already.
And no, you did not point out WHY I’m being egotistical: There’s no scenario where I’ll hurt anyone but myself if I’m wrong about the vaccine. And since I allowed you to pick the premise you preferred (1 the vaccine works or 2 the vaccine doesn’t work) I fail to see what “false” premise you refer to.
Academic, but just out of curiosity: do you believe the vaccine will make you immune to Corona Chan?
The reason why people who get vaccinated should also want others to be vaccinated is because the more people in the population who are immunue (either through vaccination or through having fought off the disease), the less chance the disease will spread widely and sicken or kill unvaccinated and otherwise vulnerable people.
The astrazenica jab could have been given to millions of old Brits in summer and autumn. The delays were largely down to pants shitting cowardice and knobbling Trump. Vaccine was ready and safe and just needed approval by the Albino Turk In Chief.
You could say exactly the same thing about the flu. Do you also shame people if they don’t take their flu shots?
And where does it all stop? By driving your car, you’re a threat to my life. How about we set the speed limit to 15 mph nationwide, that way we’d save a shitton of lives, and not just geezers who’d have croaked in six months anyway.
So who’s the egocentric one here?
Covid is much more dangerous than the seasonal flu. If the seasonal flu were as dangerous as covid or the Spanish flu, yes, I would do more than shame people for not getting their flu shots.
Well well well, not so very different from any of our other overlords after all.
“I would do more than shame people for not getting their flu shots.” What would you do? I cannot believe the editor of this site gets to type that and walk away without explaining WHAT YOU WOULD DO. I mean, besides all the name calling, of course. It occurs to me that I’ll have to have proof for you, so do I get denied going to restaurants so you can feel safe? And I’m the one who is egocentric??
The covid vaccines can properly be called “experimental” because they have been released onto the market before the completion of clinical trials. This means little is known both about side effects and the duration of the protection offered by the vaccines.
Mass deportations of third world trash is the main way to fix infections.
The right is continuing to drop the ball on the pandemic by not using it as the prime example of what harm open borders, globalism and unrestricted travel can bring.
Exactly ! …
I also make comments in the peanut gallery of online newspapers linking covid with globalism, and how it translates into things like higher real-estate prices for young families due to immigration, foreign Chinese and Indian students who come to ‘study’ and never return to their home nations, property speculation, lower wages due to competition for labor etc. This is really a great time to get people who don’t really consider these things to start connecting the dots.
It’s also a great time to start to dismantle the left’s hold on ‘environmentalism’. Surely less traffic on the roads, less carbon emissions from international travel is a good thing ? Lower infrastructure costs etc etc. Make them eat their words and challenge their assumptions.
Healthy adults who do not have medical insurance would be fools to take the vaccine. The risks far outweigh the benefits.
Provide universal health care, and then we can talk about this experimental vaccine. Otherwise, please leave my healthy body alone.
Some thoughts from my crack addled brain:
Can I still get the kungflu if I’m vaccinated?
Yes.
Can I be still contagious?
Yes.
Will I still have to wear a mask, social distance and be subject to arbitrary and capricious restrictions?
Yes.
If I suffer harm from the vaccine, can I seek redress?
No.
Even a drug and alcohol soaked loser like myself can see this is a losing proposition.
Look no further than the outcry over Tom Brady unmasked. He’s outside. Open air. Nearly zero risk. And in Florida. He was celebrating his victory. These people don’t stop until everyone bows down to the state or mob. I preferred his example of personal freedom. The outcry was inevitable.
If the seasonal flu were as dangerous as covid or the Spanish flu, yes, I would do more than shame people for not getting their flu shots
A few years ago, an occasional article writer and commenter for counter-currents said:
… In a Sallis, regime, it’ll be either a “shot in the arm, or a bullet in the head. Have a nice day.
I did not see our esteemed editor-in-chief respond to that comment. Is this the more-than-shaming treatment I and my family (and some of my acquaintances) can look forward to?
If antivaxers had their way, the world would still be stalked by smallpox. Perhaps antivaxers can wear special badges, so random members of the public know who they are dealing with.
I would certainly bar the children of parents who refuse to vaccinate them for childhood diseases like measles from enrolling in public schools.
Pointless if you don’t have strict border controls I’m afraid to say.
A lot of migration and travel will need to be zeroed out first. Most Anti vaxxers tat the authorities will focus on will be rural cranks who’ve largely dropped out of society and live in isolated circumstances for several reasons. My sister is an anti Vaxxer and she literally lives on a windswept Moor with sheep and a collie. The real problem is disgusting urban populations teeming with foul races.
Greg, to call me an anti-vaxxer for not wanting to rush right out and get this vaccine is pretty disingenuous to say the very least. For example, my kids have all their vaccines, except the HPV vaccine that they keep trying to shove down my throat with all their might. This was suggested – and by that I mean they badgered me – for my 10 year old daughter so that she wouldn’t get cancer from having sex. Do you mind if she still goes to school, Greg?
You can call me all the names that make you happy, but anti-vaxxer doesn’t stick. So what is your real argument?
I don’t blame you for being skeptical about the new vaccines for Covid. If you aren’t in a risk category, then I can’t blame you for hanging back and seeing what happens.
But the Covid crisis has provided an opportunity for an influx of sweeping anti-vaccination cranks into more mainsteam discussion.
I am seeing otherwise sensible people rejecting vaccination altogether, apparently ignorant that vaccination has erased smallpox and significantly reduced the occurrence of other diseases.
Giving an HPV vaccine to a 10-year-old seems like madness, probably dictated by the sexual precocity of non-whites. It certainly would not be a prerequisite for school attendance, and any school that suggested it should be justly suspected of harboring pedophiles.
How about you trouble yourself to read some good books by properly qualified persons to get the real history of smallpox and the smallpox vaccine? Mind you, with the removal of antivaccination comments on twitter, facebook, etc., it is just a matter of time before these books become unavailable as well. It’s hard to find any reference to them on google.
You can change your mind, you know. It is not a crime to do so, anymore than it is a crime to get sick. Used to be that entire populations believed that infectious-type illness was caused by an angry god, astrological motions, evil spirits, etc. Today, we blame invisble enemies lurking about in people’s lungs. This is not progress.
Tucker sums up my issue with this particular vaccine.
https://www.breitbart.com/clips/2021/02/10/carlson-media-rollout-for-vaccine-came-off-like-a-diet-pepsi-commercial-at-the-super-bowl-tons-of-celebrity-endorsements-not-a-lot-of-science/
When powerful people I hate are telling me to take it and shut up, I get a little edgy.
The RNA technique is new but actually quite brilliant. It tricks the body into producing antibodies to the virus without injecting a denatured version of the virus. It should be safer than conventional vaccines. The fact that it was developed so quickly gives everyone pause, although people have been working on vaccines for types of SARS for some time. The rapid emergence of new strains might render the vaccines pointless, however.
It’s as if SV-40, Dr Mary’s Monkey etc etc had all been forgotten.
Just in the interests of balance: as far as childhood vaccinations are concerned:
https://nationalvanguard.org/2020/12/ten-year-study-unvaccinated-children-far-healthier-than-their-vaccinated-peers/
https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/17/22/8674
Relative Incidence of Office Visits and Cumulative Rates of Billed Diagnoses Along the Axis of Vaccination
James Lyons-Weiler 1,* and Paul Thomas 2
Int. J. Environ. Res. Public Health 2020, 17, 8674
In the UK the death rates aren’t above 2008’s and the ‘flu fatalities have almost disappeared ^h^h^h^h^h^h^h^h^h^h been redesignated COVID-19. It’s all pretext.
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