From the Guardian:
Anti-lockdown advocate appears on radio show that has featured Holocaust deniers
Dr Martin Kulldorff discussed ‘Great Barrington declaration’ letter on Richie Allen Show
…When asked by the Guardian about his appearance on the show, Kulldorff said: “As a public health professional, it is critically important to reach all segments of the population.
“I have appeared in both right (eg the Spectator) and left media (eg Jacobin) … Regarding the Richie Allen Show, I had never heard of it before they invited me.”
Kulldorff is professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School and a biostatistician and epidemiologist. The article notes that the show has previously featured the Holocaust deniers Nick Kollerstrom and Alison Chabloz, as well as “longstanding conspiracy theorists Dr Vernon Coleman and Piers Corbyn” – Allen, a protégé of David Icke, called Kollerstrom an “old friend”. The story has also been picked by the Jewish Chronicle.
The headline, it seems to me, unfairly gives the impression of some sort of affinity between Kulldorff and extremism, when I think we can take him at his word that he knew nothing about Richie Allen when he agreed to talk to him.
At the same time, though, it is a strategy of bad actors involved with alternative media and the conspiracy milieu to elicit content from more mainstream figures as a way to boost their own reach and credibility. When this happens, it is appropriate to ask the guest contributor to clarify their association and where exactly they stand. Appearing on the Richie Allen Show ought to be a reputational risk for anyone who wants to be taken seriously in public life.
Previous guests on the Richie Allen Show with reputations beyond the conspiracy milieu include Michael Mansfield, Ann Widdecombe and Maggie Oliver. Oliver in particular is much lauded as “the Rochdale whistleblower”, yet she frequently accepts interview requests from bad actors, whose sites she then amplifies on social media. Yet there seems to be less appetite for criticising “the angel of the North” than for going after a lockdown sceptic. (1)
Note
1. The “Great Barrington Declaration” is a creation of the American Institute for Economic Research, which is based in Great Barrington in Massachusetts. It claims to have the support of a large number of medical experts, although it has transpired that anyone can sign the document online without having their identity or credentials checked. When a journalist named Nafeez Ahmed demonstrated how easily a false name can be added, the AIER’s Editorial Director Jeffrey Tucker accused him of having “urged his followers to commit fraud and impersonate medical doctors and scientists”.
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Does anyone have an actual list of the actual signatories of the actual Great Barrington Declaration?
And their actual credentials?!
As opposed to a list of “bad actors” who lack credentials or credibility who signed in “support” of it!
Such as apparent “fraudster” Nafeez Ahmed!!!
I heard about the Declaration from Dr Sukharit Bhadi, retired professor of infectious diseases, etc, whom I first heard about from Peter Hitchens back in late March or early April. He, like me, is highly sceptical of this obvious health scare and, like former Supreme Court judge Jonathan Summption, of the extreme and irrational response of governmentst to it.
These health scares (well documented in Booker and North’s 2007 book Scared To Death) are a well-defined subset of collective fantasy (I have borrowed the term from Richard Webster). Moral panics, like the Savile amd Epstein stoties are another. The Holocaust looks like yet another and indeed, wehn you look into it, is another. The fake news churend out by the mainstream media across the world is another. Climate change is another, and history seems to be riddled with them. They all have so many things in common that you kick yourself for not realizing earlier. There is always a lot of deceit involved and often conspiracy, but I still believe that they are essentially irrational, although I am occasionally tempted to abandon this position.
Seeing through one collective fantasy does not provide immunity against others. Indeed I have yet to come across anyone who appreciates the scale of it.
I was dismayed to hear about Icke speaking at Trafalgar Square some weeks ago.
Webster died before the full scale of what he was minimising came out (institutional abuse). Can you really use his theory to ignore anything you don’t want to come to terms with?
You’re right!
It’s wrong to use the term “Moral Panic”!!
It should be IMmoral Panic!!!
We’re being panicked into panicking over hundreds of supposed COVID1984 deaths a DAY.
And thousands of Masquerade “cases” a day.
The last table for week 46 says 87 cases were notified.
And that’s suspected not necessarily confirmed:
https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/notifiable-diseases-weekly-reports-for-2020
Can someone explain THAT?!
I follow what is happening in Germany, the only country where any real challenge might come, particuarly after the fraudulent US election.
From what I can tell the virus has not been isolated (cf Italian scientist Stefano Scoglio and Fabio Franchi) and indeed Prof. Drostn’s swab test was rushed out in January some days before even the first clinical information arrived from China. It is no more than informed guesswork. (Samuel Eckert’s timeline was removed from YouTube but I found it on another channel. I try to memorize such information. eg test approved by WHO on 21 Jan and Chinese clinical report on 23rd).
It is true that some labs announced they had isolated the virus. This is where another independent researcher, Torsten Engelbrech comes in. He actually wrote to the labs in question to ask them whether the virus had indeed been isolated. Well, they replied, no or not quite. There are photos of the virus which, like a the story of Goldilocks, show tiny objects which are either too small or to big. And even if they have (sort of, allegedly, or just in their imagination) isolated it there is no evdience whatsoever that this putative ‘SARSCovid2’ virus causes the equally putative Covid19 disease, which has nothing to distinguish it clinically from any other respiratory ailment (despite the combined efforts of the media and the ‘viral coummnity’). Some mice were injected with such a mixture and the wild ones showed no symptoms while the specially bred lab mice had a weight loss of 8% and their fur was ruffled (but this is not thought to have been caused by the virus(es)).
What did give me a jolt (and I should be well past that stage by now) and made me (and everyone else) laugh out loud was the revelations blogger-historian Artur Achmoneit to the independent Corona Untersuchungsauschuss about Prof Drosten (the leading authority on the virus in Germany) and his elusive doctoral thesis. Nobody could find it and there was no record of it anywhere. But then, following the intervention of a ‘fact checker’ it mysteriously surfaced in a few locations but with strange irregularities and it could not be fully photocopied (in one case not within 60 years of the author’s demise) and was alrady out on long-term loan. it was reported that all the copies in one institution had been damaged in a flood. Then it turns out that the rules had changed (alhttough not until after Drosten had written his thesis) and that published articles could be incorporated into a thesis or even replace it. He had earlier written three articles together with his supervisor (who was the main author) and this was claimed to have fulfilled the requirement. So why did he even bother writing the thesis which could not be found and was then found? That is, if it really is his thesis and he did write it. And why did the university libraries get into such a muddle over it? Drosten looked sweaty and nervous at a recent address to pupils from his old school.
Look, we will just let the fact-checkers clear it all up. Probably just a simple misunderstanding. I for one have full confidence in them.
Above responses are appalling given the current US death toll of over 330,000 which is rising rapidly every day now a new deadly strain has been discovered. Such dreadful ignorance repeated ad infinitum by those who should know better like the ex-pop star Jonathan King who claims to have had Cobid and describes it like influenza yet my 40 year old NHS nurse that had it and isolated for 4 weeks described it as the worst “influenza” imaginable and when she went back to work in a NHS hospital she described the sheer despair and depression felt by both nurses and doctors overwhelmed by the pandemic and also having to fight mendacious ignorance of the “anti-lockdown” mob who make their job so much harder. Now my nurse friend has had a relapse and has basically left her job with some very odd & health threatening after affects including a very bad heart condition.
Yet again they trot out their “experts” and ignore reality which is before their eyes (such as the Denver mortuary having to bring in 2 huge refrigerated trucks to cope with bodies)- the fact they are given airtime is an utter disgrace given the death toll. It’s like giving flat earthers or those who claim gravity is non existent equal airtime to publish their claims which are backed by no evidence.