World Health Organization (WHO) head Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus appears to be expanding the scope of his global effort from the pandemic to what he calls the “infodemic.” Tedros weighed into the conflict between musician Neil Young and podcaster Joe Rogan and streaming giant Spotify. Tedros supported Young’s demand that Rogan be censored by the company for his views on the virus and treatments. It was a particularly glaring position for Tedros after he and WHO have been repeatedly accused of supporting China in early efforts to scuttle investigations into the lab theory on the origin of this virus.
Joe Rogan — who hosts “The Joe Rogan Experience” podcast — and has been criticized for questioning whether young healthy people should get the vaccine due to its low fatality rate for younger people. He was also criticized for praising ivermectin, a medicine used to kill parasites in animals and humans despite objections that it is ineffective against the virus.
As will come as no surprise to people on this blog, I have long opposed efforts to cancel Rogan or others for their dissenting views on the virus or its treatment. In the last few years, we have seen an increasing call for private censorship from Democratic politicians and liberal commentators. Faculty and editors are now actively supporting modern versions of book-burning with blacklists and bans for those with opposing political views. Columbia Journalism School Dean Steve Coll has denounced the “weaponization” of free speech, which appears to be the use of free speech by those on the right. So the dean of one of the premier journalism schools now supports censorship. Free speech advocates are facing a generational shift that is now being reflected in our law schools, where free speech principles were once a touchstone of the rule of law. As millions of students are taught that free speech is a threat and that “China is right” about censorship, these figures are shaping a new society in their own intolerant images.
What is most distressing is to see health officials calling for censorship. The National Institute of Health (NIH) has been sued by animal rights groups over actual government censorship.
In this case, Tedros backed Young and thanked him for “standing up against misinformation and inaccuracies” around Covid vaccinations before stressing “we all have a role to play to end this pandemic and infodemic.”
He added “@NeilYoungNYA, thanks for standing up against misinformation and inaccuracies around #COVID19 vaccination… Public and private sector, in particular #socialmedia platforms, media, individuals — we all have a role to play to end this pandemic and infodemic.”
The “role” being described by Tedros is corporate censorship.
We have seen various journalistic and scientific figures banned for expressing skepticism over pandemic claims from the origins of the virus to the efficacy of certain treatments. For example, when many people raised the possibility that the virus may have been released from the nearby Chinese virology lab (rather than the “wet market” theory), they were denounced as virtually a lunatic fringe. Even objections to the bias of authors of a report dismissing the lab theory were ridiculed. The New York Times reporter covering the area called it “racist” and implausible. Now, even W.H.O. admits that the lab theory is possible and Biden officials are admitting that it is indeed plausible.
The same is true with the debate over the efficacy of masks. For over a year, some argued that the commonly used masks are ineffective to protect against the virus. Now, the CDC is warning that the masks do not appear to block these variants and even CNN’s experts are calling the cloth masks “little more than facial decorations.”
https://www.nationalreview.com/bench-memos/ruth-bader-ginsburg-can-learn-from-justice-kavanaugh
I’ve seen that written as “who watches the watchers”
We are supposed to have people tasked with “monitoring” others.
The US govt has Inspector Generals, that are assumed to be apolitical, and neutral.
John Durham has just discovered that the Dept of Justice Inspector General has been sitting on cell phones .“Durham filing reveals his team learned for first time, this month, the Office of the Inspector General had TWO cellphones for former FBI General Counsel who is central witness in Sussmann case,
https://theconservativetreehouse.com/blog/2022/01/25/latest-durham-filing-indicates-doj-office-of-inspector-general-is-part-of-dc-coverup-operation/
It is impossible to express how corrupt the DoJ and FBI have become
Not sure how that top link got there. It is from a previous comment.
Ghebreyesus’ call for censorship, New York State’s allocation of COVID treatments according to race, and Brigham and Women’s Hospital’s refusal to to provide a heart transplant to an unvaccinated patient are Exhibits A, B, and C for why the government has no business running the health care system
Many Americans didn’t know much about Joe Rogan until the left tried to censor him. More and more of us are starting to listen in. It turns out that Rogan has a lot of interesting things to say.
I have to echo EDKH. I was ignoring Rogan. Until he was taking so much flak I knew he was over the target. So I found him and listen to his interview while I work in the shop.
He has a much larger audience than CNN and MSNBC combined. We haven’t seen this since Limbaugh.
Like Limbaugh, the media cant cancel Rogan, because the media did not create him.
This turned out to be a great advertising campaign. I never heard of him until this little spat. Many cable programs, especially CNN have less than a million viewers. Apparently he has 11 million and perhaps more, especially now.
And we may or may not agree with Joe Rogan or his guests. But we can learn something from them. I think many “average” Americans are smarter than the “smart, well-educated with all f the initials after their names.
“The Commonwealth Court of Pennsylvania on Friday found the state’s mail-in voting law unconstitutional.”
Is it a lie, or is it an opinion? It was an opinion that is now becoming fact, based on better information that keeps coming in. The lie is that no courts. have ruled … which was a lie then, and now we have a judicial decision finding that many of the votes cast were unconstitutional. Whether it be Trump or Covid, the left is continuously lying and trying to prevent others from having their say.
—–
Court finds Pennsylvania mail-in voting law unconstitutional
Law was challenged by Doug McLinko, vice chair of the Bradford County Board of Commissioners, who argued he was unable to perform his duties as commissioner and certify the 2020 election because the 2019 law is unconstitutional.
https://justthenews.com/politics-policy/elections/pennsylvania-mail-voting-law-found-unconstitutional?utm_source=breaking&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=newsletter
S. Meyer. Wisconsin has ruled the use of drop boxes violated the law.
The number of votes that were illegal are growing in those swing states. If Judges would have listened to the evidence, those votes would have had to been tossed. Changes the out come of the election.
Yes, the left has tried to prevent forensic audits because they know that cheating accounted for many of Biden’s votes. I can’t claim that Trump or Biden won, but with time we are seeing that only very specific areas that were Democrat strongholds seem to be where the most illegal voting took place. That should tell us something.
Then there is this . . . .
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9052247/WHO-chief-Tedros-Ghebreyseus-accused-aiding-genocide-Ethiopia-nobel-peace-prize-nominee.html
His Ph.D. is in community health, from Nottingham University, so he has a degree in ‘public health’; he is not a physician, nor is he a research scientist in the medical field. Even so, perhaps he is better qualified than Neil Ferguson, whose Ph.D. is in theoretical physics.
Like many in the elite, why he has held such high positions is something of a mystery. His reelection was via a ‘procedural’ vote.
Ah, democracy!
https://www.france24.com/en/live-news/20220125-sole-candidate-tedros-set-to-remain-world-health-chief
In his latest Substack post (The Folly of Pandemic Censorship), Matt Taibbi makes the point that the most dangerous “misinformation” comes from official/formal sources (government/legacy media) not from independent sources like Rogan. His piece is really worth reading. https://taibbi.substack.com/p/the-folly-of-pandemic-censorship
Brian Anonymous,
That was a good read.
Support more alt-media like Matt Taibbi.
To pay heed to a prevaricator (dirty rotten liar) is unbelievable. Only another perjurer would.
We are surrendering our society to ninnies who continue braying at absurdities.
The media powers have at their disposal all the means necessary to counter Rogan’s (and others) message. We have examples from history of public service announcements educating the people about the dangers of drugs and smoking. The US government could have flooded the airwaves and social media with educational messages about vaccines and the virus, and they coould have made an effort to send a consistent message from the WH and the CDC. Instead they opted to contract out censorship to their Big Tech hitmen. This is just a trial run. Don’t expect anything the “in-power” group says to be censored, but we can expect whoever is in power to use this censorship tool against their opponents. Just another step towards a totalitarian society .. the preferred choice of the leftist collectivist mob.
Delayed, denied, and mistreatment, not limited to planned parent/hood. Masks that break even when following strict protocol, and increase infection and transmission in general use. Non-sterilizing “vaccines”, adverse events, and silent spread. And social contagion that increases the diversity of collateral damage. Follow the cargo cult.
TEDROS is a card carrying member of the Globalist/Elite = as well as a Globalist Fool/Stooge/Puppet-Globalist fear the truth and they are now seeing their dreams go up in smoke by the World resistance to Biden, BOJO, and etc. Come Nov. they will be in shear PANIC when the DEM’s get voted out and they lose more Supreme Court Cases.
I don’t believe he is even a medical doctor. To that we have Fauci at age 80 who never treated patients and certainly hasn’t cured HIV/AIDS or MRSA or anything else that is considered contagious. Whatever are they going to do in a few weeks when the UK opens up?
We are all paying through the nose for this routine and it’s time to let our so called representatives know it’s next to Inflation on our top of the list of demands for change – NOW. Parties do not matter. Results do.
Precisely, the era of voting for party is over, though here in the states, voting against the modern Democratic party should certainly be considered seriously. I never in my wildest dreams imagined that Western countries would be leading the fore in censorship and fascism, but here we are with our modern ‘Progressives’. Stop voting for them. they have lost any semblance of creditability.
“Whatever are they going to do in a few weeks when the UK opens up?”
Concoct a new panic — which the Biden administration, and its media lackeys, are doing now over Ukraine.
“Tedros supported Young’s demand that Rogan be censored by the company . . .”
More ominously, Biden’s Surgeon General demanded that Spotify censor Rogan.
And in the category of be careful what you wish for: Spotify just removed Young’s music from its platform.
Put another chunk in the wall.
Cook us up some bacon and some beans.
Tell all Americans that they are dumb itSahys too.
Wash my socks and darn my old blue jeans.!
Love it. A Chinese puppet pushing for censorship in the U.S. You cant make this stuff up.
We keep debating censorship as if proponents of censorship misunderstand the issues; as if with just a little logic, the censors will see the error of their ways.
Recognize that censors are authoritarians trying to dominate us.
They do not respond to logic, only power.
Does a wolf stop hunting because the deer is cute?
Same thing; the authoritarians will stop censoring us when the price of censorship becomes too high.
November is coming.
Do what you can to raise the price of censorship.
When does the counter-revolution begin?
The inmates have the keys.
Remember that this bozo Tedros bend over to China at every turn.
Note the Democrats fall right in light with the communists calling for censorship.
“. . . health officials calling for censorship.”
Welcome to the French Revolution.
Will no one ever ask (and keep asking), “Who guards the guards”?
Unusually smart people, doing unusually stupid things seems to be today’s norm. This cannot end well.
I think “smart” is questionable these days.
Seems to be a number of people in academia are behaving like 5 year olds.
To be fair, I’ve had similar thoughts: how did people that I formerly considered to be so thoughtful and intelligent come to this? Ideology, greed, even simple low information – these are more powerful for many than the opposite, and those that have taken control of our institutions know it, and they exploit it. They will be sure that freedom of speech remains in tact long enough for them to secure what they believe is permanent control before abolishing it to ensure that permanence is impenetrable. Again as above, I never imagined we’d end up here, but we have. We are the only ones that can prevent it from going any further. Stop voting blue. Period. Vote independent if you can’t stomach voting red, but – Stop. Voting. Blue. For anything and everything.