By Jo Nash
As a lockdown sceptic, over the last few months I have experienced the kind of treatment at the hands of my lockdown lefty ‘friends’ they previously reserved for online rants at the alt-right Twitterati. As I shared these upsetting experiences it became clear that others had suffered the same kind of abuse from people they had previously considered ‘comrades’. This led to my interest in the psychology driving the left lockdowners’ bullying of socialist lockdown sceptics and widespread denial of debate.
My opposition to lockdown has been explained in a series of three articles for this site and is based on my direct experience of the disproportionately destructive consequences lockdown has for the working class, vulnerable people, and children [1]. In the UK, being kept under house arrest for 23 hours a day, separation from friends and family, the widespread loss of livelihoods, and travel bans have all been imposed by the government to contain the spread of a virus with a median infection fatality rate (IFR) of 0.05% in otherwise healthy people under 70 years of age [2]. In contrast, like other sceptics, I support the previous pandemic management strategy agreed upon by the British government which involved quarantining the sick, shielding the vulnerable, extended hygiene measures and supporting as much normality in the remainder of society as possible [3].
My former friends appeared to be influenced by the claims of various public figures who profess to be socialists and yet persist in pressuring the UK’s Tory government to impose more draconian restrictions upon basic human freedoms, despite the disastrous effects of lockdowns on the most vulnerable people in our society.
Owen Jones made a particularly repugnant piece on ‘deniers’ for his YouTube channel recently [4]. With the moribund expression of a tortured soul doomed to wander forever among the undead, Jones addresses the camera with a grim yet hollow earnestness. Parroting dodgy government mortality statistics based on ‘suspected COVID’ during the ‘first wave’ in the absence of either testing or post-mortems, followed by ‘death for any reason within 28 days (now 60 days) of a positive PCR test’, all the while ignoring the recent WHO warning about governments’ misuse of the PCR tests at cycle thresholds that may have rendered their results totally useless prior to the middle of January 2021 [5], he proceeds to launch a series of attacks on heretical lockdown sceptics who are ‘just wrong’… all to ominous background music that conveys the sense of a looming threat.
To prove this, he presents several dubious graphs based on the above metrics that would make any decent health statistician despair, while berating the media for giving airtime to the dangerously ignorant critics of lockdown, including Oxford University epidemiologist Professor Sunetra Gupta, ‘wrong’; former Pfizer ‘employee’ (actually former Vice President) Dr Mike Yeadon, ‘wrong’; Carl Heneghan, Professor of Evidence Based Medicine at Oxford University, ‘wrong’. Jones bases his critique of these unscientific simpletons on his superior command of numbers, well known as he is for his expertise in statistical interpretation and health informatics.
His entire case rests on his naive acceptance of unscrupulous statistical methods which alone makes him right. Puffed up and proud of his henceforth justified and virtuous support for lockdown, Jones labels his lockdown sceptic targets ‘dangerous and shameless’ before assuring his fans that he, Owen Jones, will not let them get away with it. I suspect they are all now quivering in fear of his pro-lockdown crusade, imminent exposé, and demolition of their scientific careers; the equivalent in terror to being mauled to death by a baby seal.
Meanwhile, vaccinations have been rolled out rapidly in care homes where deaths have increased in direct proportion to the numbers jabbed [6], unemployment is about to skyrocket as furlough ends [7], suicide has become the biggest cause of death in the young [8], 225,000 people are still waiting for NHS treatment for a year or more [9], while non-COVID excess deaths in the home have risen by 40% [10]. The scale of deaths caused by the pandemic has recently been estimated as 220,000 with half of these lost to non-COVID causes such as cancelled operations [11]. The same article states:
“Officials calculated that over the next few years another 40,000 people may die due to the economic impact of lockdown, including rising unemployment and mental health issues.”
Yet the left lockdown zealots continue to champion the conditions responsible for this unfolding catastrophe.
In my dystopian vision of our endlessly locked down future ,‘never mind about the suffering masses comrades’, cries a now greying Jones, ‘act like you’ve got it! Lockdown to eliminate the virus, longer, harder, faster!’ as he crusades through the streets of London stuffed with homeless beggars still waiting for their first NHS appointment, now postponed until 2030. By that time, the UK population who have managed to survive will be a multiply-masked bunch of pasty-faced genetically modified pin cushions, socially distancing to outwit the constant stream of new variants, who own nothing but are happy [12]. No matter, because with lefty lockdown zealot Jones on their side, at least they will be ‘safe’!
Jo Nash is a freelance research editor and writer, and former Lecturer in Mental Health at the Faculty of Medicine, University of Sheffield (1998-2011).
References:
[1] Left Lockdown Sceptics (2021) ‘Our Analysis of Lockdown and Covid-Fascism’ https://llsceptics.com/f/our-analysis-of-lockdown-and-covid-fascism
[2] Ioannidis, J.P.A. (2020) ‘Infection Fatality Rate of COVID-19 Inferred from Seroprevalence Data’ https://www.who.int/bulletin/online_first/BLT.20.265892.pdf
[3] Dept. of Health (2011) ‘UK Influenza Pandemic Preparedness Strategy 2011’ https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/213717/dh_131040.pdf
[4] Jones, O. (2021) ‘Dangerous, Shameless and Wrong – and Why They Can’t Get Away With It’ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ffpiV1NNUEA&t=530s
[5] WHO. (2021) ‘WHO Information Notice for IVD Users 2020/05’ https://www.who.int/news/item/20-01-2021-who-information-notice-for-ivd-users-2020-05
[6] Davis, I. (2021) ‘Why Is There A Correlation Between the Vaccine Rollout and Increased COVID–19 Mortality?’ https://www.ukcolumn.org/article/why-there-correlation-between-vaccine-rollout-and-increased-covid%E2%80%9319-mortality
[7] Honeycombe- Foster, M. (2020) ‘Bank of England Predicts UK Unemployment Will Soar After Furlough Scheme Ends.’ https://www.politicshome.com/news/article/bank-of-england-predicts-uk-unemployment-will-soar-after-furlough-scheme-ends
[8] Weinmann Al-Nawab, L (2021) ‘Covid: Suicide Prevention Help Calls During Lockdown’ https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-wales-55751615
[9] Andrews, L (2021) ‘NHS Waiting List for Routine Operations Hits 12-Year High With Almost 225,000 Patients Untreated for at Least a Year, Figures Show’ https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9249123/NHS-waiting-list-routine-operations-hits-12-year-high-225-000-patients.html
[10] Jackson, M (2021) ‘Many More People are Dying at Home Without the Right Support – If We Don’t Take Action to Address This Hidden Crisis Now, Even More families Will Suffer.’ https://www.mariecurie.org.uk/blog/more-people-are-dying-at-home-without-the-right-support/287134
[11] Hayward, E (2021) ‘Government Estimates 220,000 Will be the True Death Toll of the Pandemic – With Nearly Half Lost to Non-Covid Causes Such as Cancelled Operations.’ https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9203279/Government-estimates-220-000-true-death-toll-pandemic.html
[12] WEF (2020) ‘WEF by 2030 You’ll Own Nothing and You’ll Be Happy.’ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lBBxWtKKQiA