Australians for Science and Freedom

People of a certain age will remember only too well Pastor Martin Niemöller's poignant lament that as the Nazis hunted down groups one by one, those outside the target groups kept their head down and voice quiet in order to stay out of trouble. "Then they came for me and there was no one left to speak for me."

In the Covid equivalent, since 2020 first they went after the lockdown critics, organizing "devastating takedowns" of "fringe epidemiologists" just as with the three authors of the Great Barrington Declaration, forging semi-fascist alliances between state and corporate power involving Big Government, Big Tech, Big Pharma, Big Media and Big Philanthropy.

Then they went after the mask mandate resisters, othering them as selfish far right-wingers with no thought for the welfare of the collective community. Next they moved seamlessly to the vaccine-hesitant, tarring and treating them as germ-carrying walking biohazards too diseased and unclean to be fit for society.

Justin Trudeau talked the banks and financial service providers into freezing the funds and accounts of anyone supporting the truckers' Freedom Convoy and PayPal UK most recently demonetized Toby Young and the Free Speech Union. Stung by the immediate, powerful and growing backlash, they've canceled their own cancellation but that doesn't detract from the new chilling low of attacking an organization that took no position of its own but merely defended the right of everyone to speak freely.

Australia was not immune to the galloping authoritarianism of Western democracies. Melbourne was Ground Zero for some of the most draconian restrictions on individual freedoms and civil liberties, as most routine daily activities were criminalized for people and small businesses.

Victoria became the world leader among democracies in police excesses, as peaceful protestors (yes, you read that right) were bashed with batons, fired upon with rubber bullets, a pregnant young woman was arrested and handcuffed in the presence of her toddlers while still in pajamas for posting on Facebook about a planned peaceful protest with people asked to be masked and respect social distancing, and so on. Sydney streets were patrolled by the military.

A handy compilation of these scenes can be seen in this sober yet partly fun interview with Jay Bhattacharya when he was recently in Melbourne.

Yesterday, September 28, I received a press release from the Australian Medical Network (AMN). A bill before the Queensland Parliament is to be debated and voted into law on October 11.

It will compel doctors to refrain from saying anything that reduces "public confidence in safety." According to the AMN, the new law means (1) "government health bureaucrats will determine how doctors should approach treatment recommendations for their patients" and (2) would give to the health regulators "the power to sanction doctors for expressing their professional opinion based on their assessment of the best available science."

Furthermore, by legal provisions I don't fully understand but a couple of lawyers examining this have assured me is a correct understanding, once enacted the state law will become more or less the national law.

The Collapsing Official Narrative

The debate is over, the verdict is in: Lockdowns did not work in reducing Covid infection and mortality burdens but did cause enormous and lasting damage on health (especially through canceled operations and deferred screenings for treatable-if-detected-early killer diseases like cancers and heart conditions), mental health, children's development, youth well-being, and employment, poverty, food security, and economic outcomes.

Dr. Scott Atlas from Stanford University's Medical Center and later the coronavirus adviser to President Donald Trump, explained how policies of total isolation prevent the development of population immunity which prolongs the problem. The harm/benefit balance of lockdowns, school closures, masks and universal instead of age-segregated vaccines is tilting increasingly toward net harms.