Thread by @EmpireinWinter

The Left's Covid failure: King's College Prof. of History

'the Left’s blatant disregard & mockery of people’s legitimate concerns (over lockdowns, vaccines or Covid passports) is shameful....'
unherd.com/2021/11/the-le…

'Not only are these concerns rooted in actual hardship but they also stem from an understandable distrust of governments and institutions that have been undeniably captured by corporate interests.'

'As writers who have always positioned ourselves on the Left, we are disturbed at this turn of events. Is there really no progressive criticism to be made about the quarantining of healthy individuals, when the latest research suggests...'

'there is a vanishingly small difference in terms of transmission between the vaccinated and the unvaccinated? '

'But why has the mainstream Left ended up supporting practically all Covid measures? How did such a simplistic view of the relationship between health and the economy emerge, one which makes a mockery of decades of (Left-leaning) social science research'

'How...did the Left end up ridiculing the very notion that, given the money at stake, and when BioNTech, Moderna & Pfizer currently make between them over US$1,000 per second from the Covid vaccines, there might be motivations...other than “the public good” at play?'

'And how is it possible that the Left, often on the receiving end of state repression, today seems oblivious to the worrying ethical and political implications of Covid passports?'

'the idea that governments tend to exploit crises to further entrench the neoliberal agenda has been a staple of much recent Left-wing literature'

'famously, in her 2007 book The Shock Doctrine, Naomi Klein explored the idea of “disaster capitalism”. Her central thesis is that in moments of public fear and disorientation it is easier to re-engineer societies'

'If recent history is anything to go by, governments will surely find a way to make many of the emergency rules permanent – just as they did with much post-9/11 anti-terrorist legislation.'

'We support government intervention if it serves to further the rights of workers & minorities...full employment...crucial public services, to rein in corporate power, to correct the dysfunctionalities of markets, to take control of crucial industries in the public interest.'

'But in the past 18 months we have witnessed the exact opposite: an unparalleled strengthening of transnational corporate behemoths and their oligarchs at the expense of workers and local businesses.'

'Another Left-wing fantasy that has been shuttered by reality is the notion that the pandemic would usher in a new sense of collective spirit....On the contrary, the pandemic has fractured societies even more – between the vaccinated and the unvaccinated'

'...explaining the Left’s embrace of “Covid measures” is its blind faith in “science”. This has its roots in the Left’s traditional faith in rationalism. However, one thing is believing in the undeniable virtues of the scientific method...'

'– another is being completely oblivious to the way those in power exploit “science” to further their agenda.....Being able to appeal to “hard scientific data” to justify one’s policy choices is an incredibly powerful tool in the hands of governments...'

'– it is, in fact, the essence of technocracy. However, this means carefully selecting the “science” that is supportive of your agenda – and aggressively marginalising any alternative views, regardless of their scientific value.'

'This has been happening for years in the realm of economics. Is it really that hard to believe that such a corporate capture is happening today with regard to medical science? '

'“Consultants who made millions of dollars from corporate and government consultation were given prestigious positions, power, & public praise, while unconflicted scientists who worked pro bono but dared to question dominant narratives were smeared as being conflicted.'

'Organized skepticism was seen as a threat to public health. There was a clash between two schools of thought, authoritarian public health versus science – and science lost”.'

'a historic failure from the Left, which will have disastrous consequences. Any form of popular dissent is likely to be hegemonized once again by the (extreme) Right, poleaxing any chance the Left has of winning round the voters it needs to overturn Right-wing hegemony.'

'Meanwhile, the Left holds on to a technocracy of experts severely undermined by what is proving to be a catastrophic handling of the pandemic in terms of social progressivism.'

'As any kind of viable electable Left fades into the past, the discussion & dissent at the heart of any true democratic process is likely to fade with it.'

If you've thought of yourself as someone 'on the Left,' or 'left-leaning,' & yet find all this repugnant or incoherent, we might humbly submit that you ask if you were ever really of the Left, or have just been a Liberal, on the Liberal drift to, then thru, the Centre-Right.

@threadreaderapp unroll

Wondering, @NaomiAKlein, if you've already mounted a Left critique of vaccine policy--from IT to corporate capture to mandates--as an expression of disaster capitalism.