It’s been a bad few months for democracy. Election results offensive to the European Union were annulled in Romania; an attempted coup occurred in Georgia over elections that didn’t go the way the west wanted; the French government, widely hated, teetered over the abyss as president Emmanual Macron tried to ignore the last election; on December 16, Washington’s pet German government fell; lots of funny-business happened in the Moldovan referendum and election, amid widespread disenfranchisement of Moldovan voters living in Russia; elections were long ago cancelled in dictatorial Ukraine; and South Korea hosted an attempted coup. In short, western democracies’ storied enchantment with elections is over. As western populations grow sick and tired of their political class and vote against it, what are elites to do? Annul, cancel, overturn and ignore the elections, that’s what. The problem, for the west, is the voters.
What will happen if far-right Alternative for Deutschland sweeps the early German elections in February, or if far-left France Insoumise does the same in France? Will the U.S. through its NATO and EU tentacles annul those votes? Don’t think it won’t try. And Washington doesn’t even have to give the order, because its European puppets know exactly what’s expected of them. Granted, the Romanian front-runner, so feared by NATO, Calin Georgescu, was far right. But so what? Besides, I doubt that’s what led to the constitutional court vacating the vote. More likely it was his opposition to the Ukraine War – hence the court citing “foreign influence” (translation: Russian) via TikTok as its flimsy basis for negating the election. Incidentally, reports are coming in that the heat and internet to Georgescu’s house have been cut off, and, surprise! he can’t get anyone on the phone to help with this.
But you can’t blame European honchos for ditching elections. They’re just following Washington’s lead. After all, the post-2016 phony Russiagate hysteria may not have succeeded in ousting Trump, as was intended, but it did provide the template for American vassals. The four years of lawfare against Trump (and then another four after he left office) blazed the trail for Europe, so that now, if a candidate not favored by political bigwigs wins, all they have to do is scream “Russian influence!” to dump the election. In other words, democracy is dying in the west. It’s kicking the bucket in Europe – and if Trump ends the Ukraine War (provided Biden doesn’t utterly sabotage his peace efforts before he takes office) or gets us out of the NATO sinkhole, you can bet your paycheck the 2028 establishment campaign will dust off the 2016 playbook and get right to work.
In western media, Georgescu has been portrayed as an unknown. This is false. He is well-known in Romania and had a diplomatic career. But he is also a religious nationalist, and that’s verboten in the EU; worse yet, the U.S., aka NATO, built its biggest military airbase in Europe – where? You got it, Romania. So Washington can’t have just anybody running that country. It must be someone who will keep everything copacetic with the U.S. A nationalist opposed to Washington’s pet proxy war in Ukraine is not that someone.
As for Georgia, there the electorate proved itself most unreliable to the Exceptional Empire. It voted in a government that actually dares to require foreign NGOs to register as such – you know, the way we do, here in the United States. But here, those NGOs don’t aim to overthrow the government, like they do in Georgia, in order for Tbilisi to open a second front against Moscow. Indeed, the vast majority of rioters against the Georgian government, who were arrested, were – I’m shocked! Shocked! – foreign, i.e. European. The icing on the cake is that the French president of Georgia refused to leave office when her term expired – a president with French and Georgian passports, who boasts Nazis in her family tree.
The EU finagled things more successfully in Moldova. That nation’s October 20 referendum on joining the EU won – kinda. In country, the Moldovan government only snagged 50 percent of the vote, but Moldovan expats in Europe gave it a boost, while the 400,000 Moldovans living in Russia found, to their dismay, only two polling stations open for them, by their government, in Moscow. That meant as few as 10,000 of them got to vote. And as East European expert and political scientist Ivan Katchanovski tweeted October 21, many pro-Russian citizens in Transdniestria could not vote. So all in all, the Moldovan referendum was a sorry excuse for a democratic exercise. Then there was also Moldova’s presidential election, equally compromised. But hey, Washington’s EU vassal got to lure a country out of Russia’s orbit, and that’s all that counts, not mere democracy, right? After all, Washington doesn’t stand for democracy. It stands for and has long stood for something quite different – power. Just look at it backing a terrorist takeover of Syria, among them a ruler on whose head Washington has a $10,000,000 bounty. Let that sink in. One American hand posts a huge reward for a terrorist, while the other hand paves his way to power. The obvious conclusion (also obvious to any student of American-backed coups and regime changes abroad going back at least 70 years) is that U.S. doesn’t stand for anything besides power (certainly not anything as antiquated and nettlesome as international law). That’s the definition of a gangster state.
If you doubt that, just peek at South Korea, where the CIA’s man, president Yoon Suk Yeol, faced a grim electoral future. The voters were unlikely to support him in the next election, given that they mostly back the opposition. And that opposition, per Col. Douglas Macgregor, wants a Korean four-star general, not an American one, to head the roughly 500,000 Korean armed forces and also wants to boot the 30,000 U.S. troops off the peninsula. This, of course, goes over in Washington with all the joy of a root canal.
So what to do? Yoon took the bull by the horns December 3 with martial law. During the few hours when it looked like our man in Seoul had pulled off a coup, the Biden gang was coyly silent. But there is nothing enduring in this world, as Gogol noted, and even the most brazen attempts at subverting democracy occasionally fail. The opposition gathered and voted against Yoon. His defense minister was deposed, jailed and attempted suicide, and Yoon’s own tenure came now, ahem, under a cloud, to say the least, as insurrection charges loomed, and he was impeached and suspended from office.
And don’t forget France, where Macron, affronted by an EU parliament vote last summer that installed many anti-Ukraine War representatives, totally lost it and, quite idiotically and hubristically, called snap elections. He promptly lost those to the left, but then snubbed the voters by breaking with tradition and refusing to appoint a left-wing prime minister. Surprising no one, the center-rightist he chose received a vote of no confidence, and Macron’s government looked likely to fall. That was temporarily forestalled by the appointment, December 13, of a centrist prime minister. But if his government does ultimately crash, expect Macron to do something really stupid, like suspend the legislature, call a national emergency or, a la Yoon, declare martial law.
Lastly of course we have Ukraine, that shining example of democracy, where its president rules illegally, having cancelled elections, banned the opposition, throttled the press, exiled the church, jailed anyone he doesn’t like and press-ganged thousands of vehemently objecting Ukrainian men into the military. All this while ferociously lining his pockets with western, mainly American, funds. This is the tyranny upon which Biden bestows hundreds of billions of our hard-earned tax dollars. It’s not even supported by Ukrainians, most of whom, according to recent polls, want the war over. But Joe “War Is My Legacy” Biden, in his crazed enthusiasm for Ukrainian combat, just won’t stop. On December 11, Ukraine fired six ATACAMS into Russia. We can all thank God they did little damage, since the Russians shot two down and diverted four with electronic warfare. Had they inflicted real harm, we in the west might very well have had worse troubles than the death of democracy, namely death itself. Biden appears oblivious to this reality. For us, what’s at stake is life itself, and the whole, wondrous human and natural world. For him, it appears to be just another step on the path of endless war, another day, another dollar.
Eve Ottenberg is a novelist and journalist. Her latest novel is Booby Prize. She can be reached at her website.
December 21, 2024
Posted by aletho |
Civil Liberties | European Union, France, Georgia, Korea, Moldova, Romania, United States |
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Private entities were enlisted to flag content, even accurate information.
America First Legal (AFL) has revealed new information from a document it has been able to obtain through the lawsuit filed against the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA).
CISA is part of the US Department of Homeland Security (DHS), which has a “foreign disinformation” unit, the Countering Foreign Influence Task Force (CFITF).
However, as early as mid-February 2020, CISA (via CFITF) had already started to monitor domestic speech about Covid – nearly a month before the pandemic was officially declared by the UN’s WHO, and before orders started to be issued to shut down schools and businesses in the US.
Even though several layers deep, CFITF was still a government entity, and in order to circumvent constitutional issues related to censorship of online speech, the document indicates that the unit turned to what AFL brands “the censorship industrial complex” – specifically, its private sector component.
These were “fact checkers,” “bias raters” and similar that keep cropping up in revelations about the Covid-era censorship: Atlantic Council DFR Lab, Media Matters, Stanford Internet Observatory, Alliance for Securing Democracy, Center for Countering Digital Hate (CCDH) (a UK-based group, which now passes as “British-American”), Global Disinformation Index (GDI), and even an openly foreign government project, EU’s “EU vs. Disinfo.”
Among the kinds of speech CFITF would monitor and/or flag was that of President Trump, his comments about Hydroxychloroquine going back to 2020. The document reveals that CFITF (via Atlantic Council, DFR Lab) knowingly chose to give itself the right to flag even accurate information, justifying a thing as serious as censorship by presenting hypothetical scenarios:
“Once-accurate information can become misinformation as it ages, leading to erroneous conclusions and misinterpretation of the current situation,” the document reads. This was put in the context of the rapidly changing “nature” of the pandemic.
However, it took years for the same awareness – that information related to Covid was constantly changing – to start reversing some censorship decisions (e.g., the Covid origin theory).
As for CISA/CFITF early pandemic activities affecting online speech, AFL believes that they may represent “a violation of what’s known as the Supreme Court’s ‘major questions’ doctrine, which holds that government agencies must not stray from the specific legal authorities given to them by Congress.”
December 20, 2024
Posted by aletho |
Civil Liberties, Full Spectrum Dominance, Science and Pseudo-Science | Covid-19, COVID-19 Vaccine, Human rights, United States |
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UK’s Online Safety Act has come into force and the Office of Communications (Ofcom) regulator has quickly set out to start enforcing it, with noncompliance resulting in high fines.
What those opposed to the legislation consider to be a censorship law and a sweeping one at that, is, according to Ofcom, a way to “protect” online users in the UK from illegal harms by legally requiring tech companies to “start taking action to tackle criminal activity on their platforms” as well as “make them safer by design.”
But what the law’s provisions in reality do, say critics, is bring in even more censorship, while at the same time providing for possibilities to undermine encryption via backdoors.
Then there are those who don’t think the Online Safety Act goes far enough, and are in particular upset by the gradual way it has been designed to boil this particular “frog.”
Right now, the deadline of March 15, 2025, has been given to tech companies to come up with risk assessments regarding the consequences that illegal content has on their users, and then starting two days later, they will have to begin putting measures in place to reduce those risks.
But going forward, Ofcom, which says the current requirements are “just the beginning,” plans to introduce more measures, including “crisis response protocols for emergency events (such as last summer’s riots).”
Here, the fear is that newsworthy content about various forms of protests could get censored as well.
Citing crimes like child abuse and terrorism as the reason, Ofcom also reserves the right to force tech firms to build and implement what are effectively encryption backdoors.
Ofcom says the Online Safety Act allows it to, “where we decide it is necessary and proportionate, make a provider use (or in some cases develop) a specific technology to tackle child sexual abuse or terrorism content on their sites and apps.”
Coupled with this, another provision – hash-matching – starts to gain sinister overtones, contrary to what the stated reason for it is, namely, preventing the sharing of “non-consensual intimate imagery and terrorist content.”
Ofcom is for now short on details regarding this, but the two requirements combined could easily be used for encryption backdoors.
Privacy is one victim of weakened encryption that immediately comes to mind, however, harm to online security, and the economy is often overlooked.
“Creating an encryption ‘backdoor’ for law enforcement would effectively be a blackmailer’s charter, allowing criminals and hostile foreign actors to exploit security flaws,” notes the Adam Smith Institute, and adds:
“Such measures would undermine the growth and competitiveness of the UK technology sector, potentially resulting in large companies withdrawing from the market entirely.”
December 20, 2024
Posted by aletho |
Civil Liberties, Full Spectrum Dominance | Human rights, UK |
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The European Parliament has taken another step in its ongoing efforts to control the flow of information online, approving the creation of a new committee tasked with combating what it describes as foreign interference and disinformation.
Dubbed the European Democracy Shield, the initiative is framed as a safeguard for democratic processes but raises significant concerns about censorship and overreach. The committee’s establishment aligns with the European Commission’s policy agenda for 2024-2029 and is expected to begin operations next year.
At a plenary session in Strasbourg, the decision received strong support, with 441 members voting in favor, 178 opposing, and 34 abstaining.
While presented as a measure to protect democracy, critics have long questioned whether such sweeping powers risk stifling dissenting views under the guise of fighting disinformation.
The committee’s mandate extends to scrutinizing online platforms, AI-generated content, and so-called “hybrid” threats—broad categories that could potentially encompass legitimate political speech or alternative narratives.
Comprising 33 members, the Ad Hoc Committee on the European Democracy Shield will serve a 12-month term. Its composition, to be determined by political groups, will be announced in late January. The scope of its responsibilities includes reviewing existing laws for potential weaknesses that could be exploited and recommending reforms. However, skeptics may argue that this approach could lead to increased regulatory burdens on digital platforms, raising questions about freedom of expression and transparency in decision-making.
December 20, 2024
Posted by aletho |
Civil Liberties, Full Spectrum Dominance | European Union, Human rights |
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A motion to ban the Alternative for Germany (AfD) is unlikely to move forward, as there is less than a week left to vote on such a ban in this legislative period, and sources involved with the effort say there is no majority in place for such a move.
The motion, originally put forward by CDU MP Marco Wanderwitz, who previously said he would retire after this term, will definitely not be put forward this term, co-signer Carmen Wegge (SPD) told the Rheinische Post.
As Remix News previously reported, it appeared as if a ban procedure would almost certianly move forward just a month ago, with 105 MPs voicing cross-party support, including from MPs like Claudia Roth and Katrin Göring Eckardt from the Greens, and Ralf Stegner and Helge Lindh from the SPD, just to name a few.
The motion will only move forward if there is a majority, but so far, the CDU and the SPD have spoken out against it. There are grave worries that such a ban procedure could take years, and in any case, with elections expected to take place in February, it could lead to a substantial boost for the AfD. Currently, the SPD and CDU also see no success with the Constitutional Court, which has the final say in such a ban procedure.
So far, Chancellor Olaf Scholz (SPD) and CDU leader Friedrich Merz do not back the ban, although both have hinted that they may support such a procedure in the future.
Notably, politicians involved in the ban procedure are once again resorting to claims of protecting democracy by banning what is currently the second-largest party in the country.
“Due to the early elections, it is not yet clear whether we can put our motion to a vote in this legislative period,” said Wegge. “The AfD represents the greatest threat to our democracy.”
She claims the party’s goal is to abolish democracy, despite the AfD actually putting forward motions for direct democracy in the country, which would allow the country to make decisions via nationwide referendums — undoubtedly a purer form of democracy than what currently serves as democracy in Germany.
Meanwhile, as Remix News previously reported, the Greens are working on an alternative ban procedure which would be more gradual but which MPs of the party, and other parties, believe would have a better chance of succeeding.
Efforts to ban the AfD are certainly not helped by the fact that it is the second most popular party in the country at the moment, routinely polling between 18 and 20 percent. A move to outright ban the party would be seen as a catastrophic blow to democracy.
December 20, 2024
Posted by aletho |
Civil Liberties, Progressive Hypocrite | Germany |
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For a while now, emerging AI has been treated by the Biden-Harris administration, but also the EU, the UK, Canada, the UN, etc., as a scourge that powers dangerous forms of “disinformation” – and should be dealt with accordingly.
According to those governments/entities, the only “positive use” for AI as far as social media and online discourse go, would be to power more effective censorship (“moderation”).
A new report from the US House Judiciary Committee and its Select Subcommittee on the Weaponization of the Federal Government puts the emphasis on the push to use this technology for censorship as the explanation for the often disproportionate alarm over its role in “disinformation.”
We obtained a copy of the report for you here.
The interim report’s name spells out its authors’ views on this quite clearly: the document is called, “Censorship’s Next Frontier: The Federal Government’s Attempt to Control Artificial Intelligence to Suppress Free Speech.”
The report’s main premise is well-known – that AI is now being funded, developed, and used by the government and third parties to add speed and scale to their censorship, and that the outgoing administration has been putting pressure on AI developers to build censorship into their models.
What’s new are the proposed steps to remedy this situation and make sure that future federal governments are not using AI for censorship. To this end, the Committee wants to see new legislation passed in Congress, AI development that respects the First Amendment and is open, decentralized, and “pro-freedom.”
The report recommends legislation along four principles, focused on preserving American’s right to free speech. The first is that the government cannot be involved when decisions are made in private algorithms or datasets regarding “misinformation” or “bias.”
The government should also be prohibited from funding censorship-related research or collaboration with foreign entities on AI regulation that leads to censorship.
Lastly, “Avoid needless AI regulation that gives the government coercive leverage,” the document recommends.
The Committee notes the current state of affairs where the Biden-Harris administration made a number of direct moves to regulate the space to its political satisfaction via executive orders, but also by pushing its policy through by giving out grants via the National Science Foundation, once again, aimed at building AI tools that “combat misinformation.”
But – “If allowed to develop in a free and open manner, AI could dramatically expand Americans’ capacity to create knowledge and express themselves,” the report states.
December 19, 2024
Posted by aletho |
Civil Liberties, Full Spectrum Dominance | Canada, European Union, Human rights, UK, United Nations, United States |
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The UK’s sweeping online censorship law – the Online Safety Act – that will be enforced from March of next year is already claiming its first victims.
The new legislative landscape in the country is now not providing any kind of safety for hundreds of small websites, including non-profit forums, that will have to shut down, unable to comply with the act – specifically, faced with what reports refer to as “disproportionate personal liability.”
The fines go up to the equivalent of USD 25 million, while the law also introduces new criminal offenses.
Earlier in the week, the act’s enforcer, Ofcom, published dozens of measures that online services are supposed to implement by March 16, including naming a person responsible – and accountable – for making sure a site or platform complies.
The law is presented as a new way to efficiently tackle illegal content, and in particular, provide new ways to ensure the safety of children online, including by age verification (“age checking”).
Opponents, however, reject it as “a censor’s charter” designed to force companies to step up monitoring and censorship on their platforms, including by scanning private communications and undermining encryption.
But another way that concrete harm can be done to the online ecosystem, while declaratively seeking to prevent harm, is now emerging with the example of small and community sites, where those running them are unwilling to take on the massive risk related both to the fines, and criminal responsibility in case they fail to “moderate” according to the act’s provisions.
UK press reports about one of the first examples of this, as the non-profit free hosting service Microcosm and its 300 sites – among them community hubs and forums dedicated to topics like cycling and tech – will go down in March, unable to live up to the “disproportionately high personal liability.”
“It’s too vague and too broad and I don’t want to take that personal risk,” Microcosm’s Dee Kitchen is quoted.
Although the general impression has been that only large corporate services will be affected by the law, in reality requirements and penalties for them are higher, but Ofcom made it clear that “very small micro businesses” are also subject to the legislation.
Microcosm’s decision illustrates what that will look like in practice, as sites – big and small – consider finding hosting overseas, or even leaving the UK market.
December 19, 2024
Posted by aletho |
Civil Liberties, Full Spectrum Dominance | Human rights, UK |
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The Ukrainian Security Service (SBU) said on Wednesday it had conducted a routine “counter-sabotage” raid in the government quarter of Kiev.
The operation was carried out by the SBU in cooperation with other law enforcement agencies, namely the civilian National Police and military police.
The SBU outlined the goal of the raid as “checking the counter-sabotage protection” of the area, as well as the safety of “persons eligible to state-level security.”
Law enforcement officers inspected the grounds and buildings in the quarter, including of public institutions and residential areas, searching for unspecified “prohibited items.” People who happened to be present were subjected to random checks.
“The SBU asks citizens to be understanding about possible inconveniences and to respond appropriately to lawful actions and demands of law enforcement officers, to have identification documents with them, as well as to observe the curfew,” the agency announced.
It was not immediately clear whether the raid had yielded practical results or whether any “prohibited items” had been discovered or suspicious individuals apprehended.
The maneuver was meant to reinforce the security of Ukraine’s top leadership, and comes a day after the assassination of the commander of the Russian Radiological, Chemical, and Biological Defense Forces, General Igor Kirillov. The general was killed in an explosion along with his aide in Moscow. Multiple media outlets reported the SBU being behind the attack.
The SBU reportedly regarded the general as “a war criminal and an absolutely legitimate target.” Moscow has condemned the killing as a terrorist attack and vowed to bring those behind it to justice.
December 19, 2024
Posted by aletho |
Civil Liberties | Ukraine |
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The spokesman for Ukraine’s military intelligence service (HUR), Andrey Yusov, has called on “radicals” to go after opposition MP Yury Boyko for criticizing Kiev’s crackdown on the Russian language and attempts to “de-communize” the country.
Over the weekend, Boyko, who had previously served as the co-chairman of the now-banned Opposition Platform – For Life party, published a video in which he spoke in defense of the Russian language and condemned Kiev’s demolition of monuments, renaming of cities, and the ban on the canonical Ukrainian Orthodox Church. The politician currently heads the parliamentary group Platform for Life and Peace in the Ukrainian Rada.
Boyko’s video sparked a backlash from a number of top Ukrainian officials, including the head of the presidential office, Andrey Ermak, who called the criticisms “Russian narratives.”
Meanwhile, writing on Facebook, Yusov claimed that the fact that Boyko was still free was a call for action for radical groups in Ukraine and suggested that the “Derussification, decolonization and decommunization of Ukraine should move so fast that no bastard could even have the time to record a Тiktok.”
Evgeny Karas, a notorious far-right activist and leader of the neo-Nazi S14 group, whose members have a record of harassing minorities and have been accused of high-profile political murders, also called for violence against Boyko.
”Commissioned officers, civilians and demobilized for family reasons, join the squadron of the Holy Inquisition,” Karas wrote on Telegram, calling on them to “roll up their sleeves” and punish Boyko.
On Tuesday, Boyko was summoned for questioning by the Ukrainian Security Service (SBU), after which he posted another video in which he apologized for his previous comments.
“If any Ukrainians <…> were offended by my words, I want to apologize and say that we must all be united,” the politician said in a video published by the news outlet Strana.
Boyko’s Opposition Platform – For Life party, which was the second largest party in terms of seats in parliament, was banned along with other opposition parties following the escalation of the Ukraine conflict in 2022. The authorities in Kiev claimed that the opposition had been involved in subversive activities and have prosecuted several MPs linked to the party.
December 18, 2024
Posted by aletho |
Civil Liberties, Full Spectrum Dominance | Human rights, Ukraine |
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A new chapter in the fight against censorship unfolded as the US House of Representatives approved the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) for fiscal year 2025. While 124 Democrats opposed the bill, its passage marked a significant step in addressing concerns over biased media practices and government spending.
Among its provisions, the legislation includes a prohibition on contracts with firms like NewsGuard Technologies, an organization criticized and accused of targeting certain media outlets.
Speaker of the House Mike Johnson praised the bill’s contents, highlighting its focus on accountability in government spending and ensuring a level playing field for media voices.
Founded in 2018, NewsGuard claims to serve as a nonpartisan fact-checking organization, rating the reliability of news websites. However, critics argue that its actions reveal a far different agenda. The group has been accused of systematically targeting certain outlets while shielding some publishers from scrutiny.
Its self-proclaimed mission to “promote truth” often directs readers to government-endorsed sources like the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), a practice that raises questions about impartiality – especially since it has received funding from government sources.
Breitbart, The Drudge Report, and The Daily Mail are among the prominent outlets that have been ranked poorly by NewsGuard.
Reports indicate that the organization allegedly advises advertisers to avoid these sites, effectively stripping them of revenue. Critics see this as financial censorship—a strategy to silence dissenting voices while funneling resources toward establishment-backed media.
In recent years, these concerns have deepened, particularly following revelations that the US Department of Defense (DOD) awarded NewsGuard $749,387 in taxpayer funds in September 2021.
December 16, 2024
Posted by aletho |
Civil Liberties, Full Spectrum Dominance | Human rights, United States |
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A Canadian doctor who was censored for discussing Covid topics during the pandemic is taking her legal battle to the country’s Supreme Court, in a bid to have free speech restrictions imposed on her finally removed.
Dr. Kulvinder Kaur Gill made the decision after the Ontario Court of Appeal ruled to uphold three “cautions” she received for tweets opposing what she considered to be harmful Covid lockdowns, published in August 2020.
These cautions were issued by the College of Physicians and Surgeons of Ontario (CPSO) in February 2021. The state’s medical regulator in 2020 warned medical professionals that the opinions they express should be in line with whatever the government or public health institutions decide is the correct information.
That included lockdowns, which Gill openly criticized early on, and continues to believe were ineffective in dealing with the pandemic. Besides her opinion, Gill also offered what her legal counsel says is “ample evidence” to CPSO to support her stance on the ineffectiveness of lockdowns.
As for the cautions, the doctor believes CPSO used them to censor her right to free expression, guaranteed by Canada’s Charter of Rights and Freedoms.
Twitter, where she posted her thoughts on the situation developing in 2020, has in the meantime become X, and this social platform is now supporting her by covering the legal costs, as she continues her effort to appeal against CPSO-imposed speech restrictions.
Those costs amounted to $6,000 as the lower court ruled to uphold the regulator’s decisions that targeted Gill in 2021.
Gill expressed her gratitude to X and Elon Musk for the support, and provided links about the details of the case in a post, saying that to “first do no harm” as a physician meant opposing lockdowns – and that this triggered a 5-year “unjust journey” for her.
“The growing overreach of regulators into monitoring the speech of professionals on social media has become a matter of national concern to the public, which loses the benefit of hearing a variety of opinions when professionals’ speech is chilled out of fear of punishment,” Gill’s lawyer Lisa Bildy said in a statement.
According to Bildy, her client spoke against lockdowns and other harmful Covid-era mandates aligning evidence-based concerns and her conscience – rather than obeying CPSO’s “edict” to align with whatever the authorities decided were the right measures.
December 14, 2024
Posted by aletho |
Civil Liberties, Full Spectrum Dominance, Science and Pseudo-Science | Canada, Covid-19, Human rights |
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A new study by Chaufan et al, titled COVID-19 Vaccination Decisions and Impacts of Vaccine Mandates: A Cross-Sectional Survey of Healthcare Workers in British Columbia, Canada, has just been uploaded to the MedRxiv preprint server. They found that COVID-19 injection mandates took a massive toll on the well-being of healthcare workers:
Goal: To document the experience and views on mandated vaccination of healthcare workers in British Columbia.
Methods: Between May and July of 2024, we conducted a cross-sectional survey of healthcare workers in British Columbia. We recruited participants through a snowball sampling approach, including professional contacts, social media, and word-of-mouth.
Results: Close to half of respondents, with 16 or more years of professional experience, were unvaccinated, and most had been terminated due to non-compliance with mandates. As well, and regardless of vaccination status, most respondents reported safety concerns with vaccination and felt unfree to make their own vaccination choices, yet did not request exemptions due to high rejection rates by employers. Most of them also reported experiencing anxiety or depression, with about one fourth considering suicide, as a result of mandates. Nevertheless, most unvaccinated workers reported satisfaction with their choices, although they also reported significant, negative impacts of the policy on their finances, their mental health, their social and personal relationships, and to a lesser degree, their physical health. In contrast, within the minority of vaccinated respondents, most reported being dissatisfied with their vaccination decisions, as well as having experienced mild to serious post vaccine adverse events, with over half within this group reporting having been coerced into taking further doses, under threat of termination, despite these events. Further, a large minority of all respondents reported having witnessed underreporting or dismissal by hospital management of adverse events post vaccination among patients, worse treatment of unvaccinated patients, and concerning changes in practice protocols. Nearly half also reported their intention to leave the healthcare industry.
Discussion: Our findings indicate that in British Columbia, mandated vaccination in the healthcare sector had an overall negative impact on the well-being of the labour force, on the sustainability of the health system, on patient care, and on ethical healthcare practice. Findings resemble those of a similar study in the province of Ontario, with perhaps the most salient difference being that in British Columbia the policy was implemented at the provincial, rather than the healthcare establishment, level, leaving no room for individual establishments to opt out.
One of the most shocking findings from this study is that employer vaccination mandates led to suicidal thoughts in 23.5% of healthcare workers and depression/anxiety in 81.4%. This is likely because 80.1% of the respondents were terminated from their job for refusing experimental injections and subsequently suffered negative impacts on their finances, mental health, social and personal relationships, and physical health. These results suggest that vaccine mandates are likely a major contributing factor to the record-high depression rates observed since 2021:
The findings of this study confirm that vaccine mandates should never be implemented again, anywhere in the world, under any circumstances. As the authors concluded, the policy of mandated vaccination “failed on several fronts – scientific, pragmatic, and ethical.” Compensation is highly warranted for all individuals who refused to comply with mandates and were unethically terminated.
Nicolas Hulscher, MPH
Epidemiologist and Foundation Administrator, McCullough Foundation
December 14, 2024
Posted by aletho |
Civil Liberties, Science and Pseudo-Science | Canada, COVID-19 Vaccine, Human rights |
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