No serious person denies that Covid was a deadly pandemic, but how it was handled by our so-called healthcare experts was a complete and utter failure. Frontline doctors and nurses did their absolute best as they selflessly cared for an endless queue of patients, however, the bureaucrats leading the CDC, WHO and NIH as well as the politicians, their media shills and corporate boardroom elites collectively did more harm than good in their hubris-infested approach to the crisis. One reason for the fiasco is that actual science was replaced with “the science,” a consensus of relatively few ultra powerful voices we were told to obey without question. Another reason is the complete abandonment of the American principles of individual liberty and personal responsibility.
The autocratic measures that comprised Covid strategy were a net negative to say the least. Lockdowns were massively destructive to businesses as well as personal lives, especially those of children. Masking and vaccine mandates caused terrible division among citizens. Censorship of dissenting opinions prevented debate and critical scientific method guidance. The vilifying of anyone who disagreed with the government-approved narrative destroyed careers and relationships.
With the benefit of hindsight, think of the lies that were told during this crisis, knowingly or unknowingly. The vaccine prevents transmission and is completely safe and effective. We just need two weeks of lockdowns to flatten the curve. This is a pandemic of the unvaccinated. This started because someone ate a bat. Now, think of the truths that were silenced because those in power refused to admit they were initially wrong. Mask mandates are ineffective (See the most recent analysis by Cochrane.) Natural immunity is superior to the vaccine. Putting healthy people in quarantine and paying them not to work is one of the dumbest ideas in history. The US funds the type of gain of function research that caused the pandemic and the same people entrusted to get us through this crisis helped cause it in the first place.
Instead of meeting a challenge of this magnitude with humility, something science demands, our public health stewards became authoritarians. Logical questions about nonsensical policies were labeled dangerous misinformation and censored. The priority quickly switched from protecting lives to protecting the power derived from the government’s monopoly on truth. It became apparent that Fauci and Walensky were given way too much power and they didn’t know how to handle it, so they did what incompetent people do in those situations. They barked arbitrary orders about masking, distancing and staying home so they could be seen as doing something. In many cases, their orders contradicted their own previous statements, as well as junior high science, but that did not stop them from labeling the disobedient as reckless heathens. As evidence emerged that ran contrary to their policies, they used the force of the federal government to double down on them and any dissenting experts who questioned their authority were silenced. As we’ve seen throughout history, when weak people are put in leadership positions, they will lie, feign expertise and shift blame in order to cling to power.
I recall it being somewhere around the time I was first told to wear a mask while walking twelve feet into a restaurant, take it off for an hour, then put it back on to leave, that I decided it might be in my best interest to be my own health advocate. I listened to various opinions, not just the ones pushed by Pfizer sponsored programs and quickly questioned what I had heard for months. It made sense to me that natural immunity was stronger than a spike protein-based experimental vaccine. It was illogical to think that a porous, bacteria-infested face napkin protected me from a micron-sized virus. As one virologist put it, masking is like trying to keep bees out of your yard with a chain link fence. It also seemed cruel to me to keep kids away from their friends and social activities when it was evident that healthy children were at less risk from the virus than the flu. And it struck me as downright demonic to threaten someone’s job if they didn’t take an experimental medicine they didn’t need even when we all knew it didn’t stop the spread of the virus. But these views went against the approved narrative, and I was surprised and saddened when some of my long-term friendships were threatened because I voiced them.
What was most shocking, however, was how many people willfully abdicated their God-given freedom and ability to reason in exchange for being relieved of taking responsibility for their own health. A great many people eagerly and mindlessly followed each directive, no matter how inane, confusing blind obedience with morality. The mask became the virtue signal of our age. The vaccine was a badge of honor. Good people did both. The wretches of society did neither. Lines were drawn and fighting erupted as the morally superior confronted the selfish and the ignorant. The entire pandemic became the fault of the unvaccinated as China and the NIH were blamed only by racist conspiracy theorists. It could not have been clearer what side the good people were on. Except, none of it was true. We know now that masking mandates had no effect. Getting the vaccine did nothing to protect others and while it probably helped the elderly, to many millions who took it, the jab only represented risk. In short, all the moral posturing and persecution that was committed against fellow citizens was based on actual misinformation provided by flawed people who valued their perceived omniscience and authority over their solemn responsibility.
Despite the awful performance of our healthcare bureaucracy and the net harm they caused, a good many people will, I am sad to say, do whatever they are ordered the next time something like this happens. And those who decide to trust their own reason and judgement will again be demonized by the self-righteous mob. I am hopeful, however, that many Americans may have learned some valuable lessons: Facts should outweigh narrative. One-size-fits-all medicine is not the best approach to a pandemic. Each individual’s right to make their own health decisions should be respected. In all areas of life, do your own research and be your own advocate, as no politician nor journo-activist cares about your life or that of your child like you do. Above all, remember that the voices that are being persecuted by authority instead of debated are often right.
