Open (More or Less) Post on Covid 115

[ecosophia]

We are now in the third year of these open posts. As the phrase "died suddenly" repeats in the mass media like a mantra, statistics for work days lost to illness and all-cause mortality mount up in heavily vaccinated nations, and more and more ugly facts about the official response to Covid spill out into public, we are entering what may well turn out to be the most difficult period of the Covid disaster -- the phase in which denial rises in lockstep with the death rate, and a great many people try not to admit what has been done to them by the people and institutions they trusted. It could get ugly, folks.

So it's time for another open post. The rules are the same as before: 

1. If you plan on parroting the party line of the medical industry and its paid shills, please go away. This is a place for people to talk openly, honestly, and freely about their concerns that the party line in question is dangerously flawed and that actions being pushed by the medical industry et al. are causing injury and death. It is not a place for you to dismiss those concerns. Anyone who wants to hear the official story and the arguments in favor of it can find those on hundreds of thousands of websites.

2. If you plan on insisting that the current situation is the result of a deliberate plot by some villainous group of people or other, please go away. There are tens of thousands of websites currently rehashing various conspiracy theories about the Covid-19 outbreak and the vaccines. This is not one of them. What we're exploring is the likelihood that what's going on is the product of the same arrogance, incompetence, and corruption that the medical industry and its tame politicians have displayed so abundantly in recent decades. That possibility deserves a space of its own for discussion, and that's what we're doing here. 
 
3. If you plan on using rent-a-troll derailing or disruption tactics, please go away. I'm quite familiar with the standard tactics used by troll farms to disrupt online forums, and am ready, willing, and able -- and in fact quite eager -- to ban people permanently for engaging in them here. Oh, and I also lurk on other Covid-19 vaccine skeptic blogs, so I'm likely to notice when the same posts are showing up on more than one venue. 

4. If you don't believe in treating people with common courtesy, please go away. I have, and enforce, a strict courtesy policy on my blogs and online forums, and this is no exception. The sort of schoolyard bullying that takes place on so many other internet forums will get you deleted and banned here. Also, please don't drag in current quarrels about sex, race, religions, etc. No, I don't care if you disagree with that: my journal, my rules. 

With that said, the floor is open for discussion.

Comments

Re: What do you do?

[(Anonymous)]

I want to push back on a response I keep hearing that I now think is a mindless cliche - namely, avoid or delete the Internet and have more face-to-face interactions.

That's just wrong.

The only sane conversations I am having these days are on the Internet, on forums like this or on other alternate social media that I frequent. Without that I would be completely isolated.

The face to face communities I used to belong to are all totally in the Covid mania. My old singing group held its convention outside, and required a negative covid test the day of the sing to get in.

My local occult/New Age community is pretty much all hard left politically, and caught up in the mainstream hysterias - not a good place to go if you have the wrong thoughts about covid or gender or race or politics.

My daughter is a nurse, a big vaxx/drug advocate, and was one of the first to get shots for herself and her daughters, and one of the last to keep wearing a mask.

I have no face-to-face support to talk sanely on subjects like covid.

---
Okay I'm done ranting now... having said all that, I think there is a half-truth to the No Internet idea.

There is some media I avoid completely, including ALL TV and ALL mainstream news sites.

I avoid watching videos of any fear-porn topics, especially on current news events - or, any video I do watch is with the soundtrack turned off. I also limit watching graphic pictures.

I try to get my news and data from largely text sites, from sources I trust, where I have a bit of time to read and reflect on what I see.

---
And - for me - I need a place to stand OUTSIDE OF day-to-day reality, and in a larger context than the short-term myopia of current news - and even of just this one life.

Reading Marcus Aurelius, Seneca, Epictetus and the other Stoics helps. So does Plato and the late Platonists.

Sometimes I need the Bhagavad-Gita or the Upanishads, a much, much broader frame of reference to consider this one lifetime.

Praying the Psalms helps sometimes, and sometimes it just makes me angry.

Wordless Prayer helps sometimes, as does chanting and meditation, sometimes.

It also helps a lot to think calmly about death, including my own - I'm 71 and the clock is ticking loudly.

Do I still sometimes wake up at 3 am filled with fear and panic? Yes - and when I do, sometimes the best I can do is to just be there in my fear and panic, let myself feel it.

Re: What do you do?

[(Anonymous)]

I'll second this. I know literally no one around where I live who I can talk to about Covid issues, aside from one person who is decidedly woke on gender issues; and have had very little luck with meeting other sane people. I think walking away from the internet is possible, only if, and this is a big if, there are people around you are mostly sane. If there aren't, then using the internet is a necessary evil.