Now that the U.S. Department of Energy has joined FBI in concluding that the coronavirus likely leaked from a lab, it’s worth remembering that the media, en masse, condemned the lab leak theory as a “debunked conspiracy theory,” and Facebook censored people who dared suggest it
We still don’t know where the virus came from. WSJ says DOE “made its judgment with ‘low confidence.’” Four other agencies say it had natural origins and two are undecided
But that was the case in 2020 when journalists and Facebook pretended they knew
It’s clear that the scientists who claimed in Lancet, on Feb 19, 2020, “We stand together to strongly condemn conspiracy theories suggesting that COVID-19 does not have a natural origin,” were misrepresenting their unfounded opinion as a scientific fact.
It’s also clear that the low level of public trust in the media is well-founded. Journalists behaved like activists. They blindly trusted activist-scientists, went far beyond what the evidence showed, and morally condemned anyone who even suggested we consider the alternative… twitter.com/i/web/status/1…
Since 2016 there has been a pressure campaign by the US government and NGOs to “fight on-line misinformation.” The result was the widespread censorship of accurate information.
The lab leak theory was never outlandish. Scientists in 2015 openly worried one would create a pandemic
“An experiment that created a hybrid version of a bat coronavirus … has triggered debate over whether engineering viruses with pandemic potential is worth the risks”
“[V]irologists question whether the information gleaned… justifies the potential risk… the researchers have created a novel virus that “grows remarkably well” in human cells. “If the virus escaped, nobody could predict the trajectory”
“The virus left none of the traces that outbreaks usually create: no infected market animals or wildlife, no chains of early cases in travelers to the city, no smouldering epidemic in a rural area, no rapid adaptation of the virus to its new amazon.com/Viral-Search-C…… twitter.com/i/web/status/1…
Humility is a virtue. Until recently scientists thought volcanoes made dinosaurs extinct. Now the vast majority believe it was a massive asteroid.
Is billionaire high tech investor Michael Moritz @moritzKBE going to run for mayor of San Francisco? I hope so. Somebody needs to oust the city’s incompetent mayor @LondonBreed
“San Francisco has become a prize example of how we Democrats have become our own worst enemy.”
“San Francisco’s drug and homeless crises can be solved, but that would mean changes to the mechanics of government and co-ordinated political will. Several European cities, including ultra-progressive Amsterdam, have paved the way.”
After @Telegraph discovered that the publisher of late British children’s author Roald Dahl had censored & re-written his books, copies of Dahl’s original books have been flying off the shelf.
Funny that. People don’t like Woke totalitarian censorship.
“It has seen a 600 per cent surge in sales of Roald Dahl compared to the week before, while the author accounts for eight of the 10 top-selling children’s books since Saturday... “Sales in Roald Dahl books have risen exponentially over the last week and Wob is not expecting to… twitter.com/i/web/status/1…
Over time, rising narcissism and coddling culture reached a tipping point whereby elites began to view “being insensitive” as equivalent to “causing harm.” As such, insensitivity became viewed as worse than censorship and justification for it. The public.substack.com/p/the-narcissi…… twitter.com/i/web/status/1…
Biden is pushing for offshore industrial wind energy projects, but the largest lobbying group for Native American tribes, 30 New Jersey mayors, and a growing number of conservation groups have called for a moratorium because whale deaths are spiking
Since the passage of the 1973 Endangered Species Act, environmentalists have fought for strict protections for endangered species. They have demanded that the government apply what is known as the “precautionary principle,” which states that if there is public.substack.com/p/why-environm…… twitter.com/i/web/status/1…
There is a growing movement of conservationists who oppose offshore wind energy development
If you love whales and live on the East Coast, please contact the Coalition to add your name and get involved! This is the most important conservation battle saverightwhales.org… twitter.com/i/web/status/1…
Wokeness may have peaked but remains the ideology of the ruling class. Why? Because it doesn't actually change anything that matters. It's just a way for Woke elites to manipulate the superegos & emotions of other elites
This is the most important new insight in the article:
"How does wokenness, although a minority view, manage to neutralize the larger liberal and leftist space, instilling in it a profound fear about openly opposing the woke?
I similarly came to the conclusion that Wokeism is a religion after writing "Apocalypse Never" and "San Fransicko," and after reading John McWhorter's "Woke Racism," which also argues that Wokeism is a religion.
CNN says the "views" of @jk_rowling "cause harm," citing as evidence an activist who claims "very real hurt felt by young people who once saw Ms. Rowling’s fiction as a place of comfort, friendship and escape.”
This is also about a CNN lost to everything in the outside world other than its own envy at start-up news media companies like @TheFP doing the kind of real reporting that CNN used to do:
Should we be surprised that this whistleblower decided to take her story to @bariweiss@TheFP instead of CNN? Of course not. CNN, in a state of mindless Wokeism, could not be trusted by anybody who challenges the official ideology.
Many dismiss the Twitter Files evidence that FBI abused its powers but, notes progressive reporter Christian Parenti, "the FBI put its thumb on the scale... by refusing to release the contents of the laptop then by encouraging censorship compactmag.com/article/will-t…… twitter.com/i/web/status/1…
"The American security state is totally out of control. It makes war on anyone—left, right, center, apolitical, religious—whom it regards as threatening. Even parents who spoke out against Covid closures and “woke” curricula at school-board meetings have been investigated.… twitter.com/i/web/status/1…
"Leftists are badly deluded if they think an unaccountable secret-police state will attack only neo-Nazis. The stronger the security state, the more enemies it will find or manufacture, and the more pressure it will apply. Under such conditions, any left that can wage a… twitter.com/i/web/status/1…