Science as Propaganda

Someone I consider a mentor recently said that “90% of science is marketing”. I thought that was well put and I’d like to extend the idea further. Much of science is propaganda and nothing more. That’s the topic we’re exploring today.

Science has an amazing reputation, justifiably so. Comedian and actor Ricky Gervais (amazing Golden Globes bit about Jeffrey Epstein here) speaks eloquently about this philosophy…

…except this is a very naïve understanding of science! While that may be true of science AS AN IDEAL it is far from those things in practice.

Why? Because human beings with all their biases and conflicts are the ones that conduct science. To counter everything Gervais said:

• Scientists discriminate.
• They’re far from all humble.
• They jump to conclusions…or even have them from the outset.
• They cover up evidence.
• They hack statistics to get to where they want to go.
• They get offended by new facts that don’t fit their paradigm.
• They definitely hold onto “sacred” scientific theories.

I’ve been thinking about narrative control and propaganda pretty much non-stop the past few weeks now. HOW is it done?

A big part is by utilizing the ALMIGHTY AUTHORITY of science. This is how science is used for good or ill.

But not all science is true!

In fact, “it is more likely for a research claim to be false than true” as was found by Ioannidas.

Think like the enemy…

If you are a propagandist, then there are few things more worthwhile than shrouding your propaganda in scientific clothing.

Can you get something published even if it is straight up lies, as long as it serves your agenda?

With that seed, then just tap into the media marketing machine. Few people are scientifically literate (especially if you use complex modeling) so you’ll be able to slip it by the vast majority of people.

Even those that are scientifically literate, everyone is busy, so who will have time to dig deep into every study?

Just look at how many layers you need to go through to understand the “truth”. As we move down the list we see less understanding, more propaganda.

1. Do you read and understand the whole paper?
2. Do you look at just the abstract?
3. Do you only read a news article or TV story about the science?
4. Do you only see a headline from such news about the science?
5. Do you only hear second-hand the above as the “science” spreads socially?

This science is then what government policies are based on, which in turn impact the public. (How many government officials fall into the same steps above? How many politicians are scientifically literate?)

So let’s look at a few examples of how this plays out:

• Remdesivir vs. Hydroxychloroquine
• Asymptomatic Transmission
• Face Masks

First up, two issues from my Medical Monopoly series.

Medical Monopoly Musings #44
Remdesivir – Poor Science and Conflicts of Interest

Remdesivir is an intravenous anti-viral drug being used for the novel coronavirus. It is produced by Gilead Sciences.

Pharmaceutical companies tend to have very high profit margins. When more than 10% profit is considered good…Gilead had over 50% profits in 2015 on $32.6 billion dollars!

With the novel coronavirus, the drugs companies have been rushing to cash in (*ahem* save lives).

The NIAID study showed that those patients with COVID19 taking remdesivir improved in recovery time and discharge from the hospital, down from 15 days to 11 days. However, the survival difference between remdesivir patients and placebo control was not statistically significant (8% vs. 11.6%).

(Meanwhile, a Chinese study published earlier at the end of April did not find any statistically significant clinical improvement. Here 14% of remdesivir patients died while 13% on placebo did, though again, not statistically significant.)

Christopher Roland of the Washington Post wrote, “Fauci said the results were modest. But, lacking any other treatments, he proclaimed the drug the “standard of care” for hospitalized coronavirus patients. Full results of the trial have not been released, and many questions about the drug’s effectiveness remain unanswered.”

The standard of care based on a press release and an interview. On May 1^st the FDA issued emergency use authorization for remdesivir for treating COVID-19.

Over three weeks later, on May 22^nd, the full study and data was finally released. Turns out the results for faster recovery time were only for a sub-group, those also receiving supplementary oxygen.  Furthermore, they also changed the primary outcome during the trial from number of deaths to recovery time while the trials were ongoing (though those who changed it said they didn’t have access to the data).

The study concludes, “These preliminary findings support the use of remdesivir for patients who are hospitalized with Covid-19 and require supplemental oxygen therapy. However, given high mortality despite the use of remdesivir, it is clear that treatment with an antiviral drug alone is not likely to be sufficient.”

At the time of writing there are numerous other clinical trials with remdesivir in progress.

Early on, Gilead pledged to donate 1.5 million doses of the drug. Beyond that, an independent organization estimated that Gilead could be charging up $4500 per patient for the drug…on something that is estimated to cost $1 per dose. What is $4500 more when that average coronavirus hospital bill is $30,000, especially since few patients are paying out of pocket?

So at best the drug has a modest effect. At worst, it has some negative side effects that was dropping people out of the trials. But wait, there’s more…

As I’ve established over the course of this series is that conflicts of interest are often at the root of controversies of the medical monopoly. Here is no different.

Investigative journalist Sharyl Attkisson said, “When it comes to money, we checked financial ties among experts on the government panel devising coronavirus treatment guidelines— which had the effect of dialing back hydroxychloroquine use and giving an edge to remdesivir. We found that of 11 members reporting links to a drug company, nine of them named relationships to remdesivir’s maker Gilead. Seven more, including two of the committee’s leaders, have ties to Gilead beyond the 11 months they had to disclose. Two were on Gilead’s advisory board. Others were paid consultants or received research support and honoraria.”

There are other conflicts, but Gilead is by far the leader. Isn’t it interesting that the only approved drug happens to come from this company? Just a coincidence, right?

To give perspective on how conflicts of interest work on government panels we can look at the criminal case of Vioxx and similar drugs. The FDA’s 2005 advisory board had 32 advisors, ten of which had conflicts of interest with the drugs’ maker Merck. The board voted to keep these dangerous drugs on the market, but had these conflicted members not been involved, the vote would have gone the other way. Eight of these ten said that their ties did not alter their votes. (At least two were honest about it!)

Next time, we’ll turn to the even more controversial hydroxychloroquine, which is off patent and very cheap in comparison. Never has science become so politicized with a media barrage involved…

Medical Monopoly Musings #45
Hydroxychloroquine – Poor Science and Conflicts of Interest

Last time we covered the drug Remdesivir for COVID-19 and how this was bound to conflicts of interest with the drug’s maker Gilead in the approving committee, as well as some questionable science on whether it worked. Now we turn to hydroxychloroquine (HCQ), which was notably promoted by President Trump.

In this case, we’ll cover the drug in the same way as the previous one, looking at science and conflicts of interest.

The crazy thing is it is not possible to have this conversation in a balanced way anymore as politics is more polarized than ever. Personally, I am critical of lots of Trump’s actions and words, but unlike many, I am not blinded by 100% hatred for the man. There are some things he does and says that I do agree with.

Trump was not the first one to talk about HCQ. This was recommended by scientists across the world first and foremost by French Dr. Didier Raoult who said, “We know how to cure the disease.”

One study touted by the media in the USA was done at the VA showed that more people died when taking HCQ. But there were flaws in this study. As a retrospective study, it wasn’t randomized. More importantly sicker patients were put into the treatment group, which would then make sense as to why they died more.  

An influential study was published in the Lancet showing HCQ increased mortality which seemed to be the death-knell for this drug, so much so that the WHO paused its other ongoing trials of the drug (which were later resumed). This led many to claim that Trump’s disinformation was killing people!

Yet, this study was later retracted when the company behind the data, Surgisphere, wouldn’t share said data. They were behind another NJEM paper that got retracted for the same reason, though this one looked at ACE inhibitors, not HCQ.

Looking deeper, these are the only studies this company’s data has been used for. According to LinkedIn they only had five employees. Checking at the time of writing this, the number has gone down to two. Prior to February of this year the company only had one employee, the founder Dr. Desai, who has had malpractice suits against him.

The URL for the company has been excluded from the Internet Archive Wayback Machine. This is highly unusual, in fact, I have never seen any site disappear from it before!

There is much more controversy behind this company and its founder which you can find in the references. In other words, Surgisphere appears to be a shell company whose sole aims appeared to be to make HCQ look bad. So who was behind it?

One thing we find is that the Lancet paper’s lead author, Dr. Mandeep Mehra has a long list of drug and medical company conflicts. He has “personal fees from Abbott, Medtronic, Janssen, Mesoblast, Portola, Bayer, Baim Institute for Clinical Research, NupulseCV, FineHeart, Leviticus, Roivant, and Triple Gene.” This study was “supported” by Brigham and Women’s Hospital where they’re also doing Remdesivir studies with over 1,000 patients, for which they’re receiving funding from Gilead.

Yes, there are still more studies that show no benefit. Many of these don’t use zinc which is said to open the cellular pathway to allow HCQ into the cells to work. Dr. Anthony Cardillo said “[HCQ] really only works in conjunction with zinc. Every patient I have prescribed it to has been very, very ill and within eight to twelve hours they were basically symptom-free and so clinically I am seeing a resolution.”

Importantly, there are many studies that DO show benefit with little to no risk. A public Google document titled, “Sequential CQ / HCQ Research Papers and Reports January to April 20, 2020: Executive Summary Interpretation of the Data In This Report” shows more than 20 trials from across the world. They state, “The HCQ-AZ combination [an antibiotic also used in combination], when started immediately after diagnosis, appears to be a safe and efficient treatment for COVID-19, with a mortality rate of 0.5%, in elderly patients. It avoids worsening and clears virus persistence and contagious infectivity in most cases.” Doctors across the world are saying it does work.

What about Trump’s conflict of interest for HCQ? A big hubbub was made of this. New York Times reported, “Mr. Trump himself has a small personal financial interest in Sanofi, the French drugmaker that makes Plaquenil, the brand-name version of hydroxychloroquine…As of last year, Mr. Trump reported that his three family trusts each had investments in a Dodge & Cox mutual fund, whose largest holding was in Sanofi.”

Mutual funds own lots of stocks. For this reason mutual funds are exempt from conflict of interest laws (not that that makes it impossible for them to be a problem). Yet his stake in Sanofi is no more than $1,500. More importantly, HCQ is off-patent. While Sanofi makes it, so do many other companies. And its dirt cheap, especially compared to the new patented Remdesivir.

Meanwhile all of the New York Times articles I’ve seen have been silent regarding the conflicts of interest behind the approval of Remdesivir.

This is how “science” is done in our modern world. While most of the time bad science hides in the shadows, this is one of the most blatant examples I’ve seen! Too bad our news cycle has moved on, so the people aren’t thinking about this anymore. Few and far between will hear this story. Remdesivir is still the standard of care being promoted.

Yet, some are fighting back. The Association of American Physicians & Surgeons has sued the FDA, Health & Human Services and BARDA over this to “to end the irrational interference.”

One more personal thought…it’s all misdirection!

What is the drug that will save us? Notice how the entire scientific, political, and medical conversation is on this drug, that drug, or the vaccines. Notice how nothing is mentioned about ANY of the important aspects of health. I’m not saying we shouldn’t be doing drug trials and find those that can help. That’s all well and good, but if it really were about health and saving people we’d be talking about much else.

There are plenty of trials showing common nutrients are working for this disease; zinc, vitamin C, vitamin D, phytonutrients, etc. Even Google is censoring those topics as the CEO of YouTube said they will “remove information that is problematic, including anything that is medically unsubstantiated, such as take vitamin C, take turmeric. Anything that would go against WHO guidelines, we will be taking those down.”

Notice the Agendas Going On Here…

The agenda is clear from the beginning. Make drug companies money! That is a constant agenda.

A secondary agenda is that we need a therapy now, but it can’t be too good, because the only true savior is the upcoming vaccine, which goes back to the first agenda.

Notice what is missing from the agenda. Saving lives! Understand that to some sociopaths money absolutely comes over lives…

So when scientists first, and President Trump later, start talking about a cheap and effective drug, that must be clamped down on.

How do we do so? By publishing science showing what is effective and what is not. By showing what is safe and what is dangerous. It doesn’t matter if we have to go so far as to completely make up data to do so, if we get a paper out, the propaganda machine can crank it into high-gear.

The damage is done! No matter the paper gets retracted later or studies are critically flawed. We don’t need to mention it. We’ll just tuck that away into the small corners of the internet. After all, riots are going on so there’s no time to cover it on our news program.

Notice that the big authority paper the New York Times trumps up (pun intended) a very tenuous conflict of interest for Trump and HCQ. But they fail to mention the significantly large conflicts of interest with Gilead and remdesivir.

This is one more example of how journalism is broken.

I only found out about such conflicts because of following investigator Sharyl Attkisson. (She used to work for CBS News but went independent because of the censorship and conflicts of interest that were occurring there. This award winning journalist is now labeled a right-wing conspiracy theorist by her detractors.)

This is Scientism

I first encountered these problems reading Rupert Sheldrake’s book, Science Set Free. He writes, “I have spent all my adult life as a scientist, and I strongly believe in the importance of the scientific approach. Yet I have become increasingly convinced that the sciences have lost much of their vigor, vitality and curiosity. Dogmatic ideology, fear-based conformity and institutional inertia are inhibiting creativity.”

I like science too. It’s great…when it’s done properly. But it has massive flaws, nor is it the only way of seeing the world.

What is called the Science Worshiper’s Method here is not just used by lay people. Unfortunately, scientists themselves fall into this category, especially those with conflicts of interest.

I dug more deeply into this topic as I wrote Powered By Nature as they idea underpins our moving away from nature.

“Science has in many ways become a new religion. “Scientism” is described as the excessive belief in the power of scientific knowledge and techniques. Like many religions, there’s even the promise of an ideal future, a kingdom of science, when our technology makes us immortal and god-like. Also apparent is an arrogance that comes with the belief that it’s just a matter of time until science proves that its own viewpoint is correct. Just as in the corrupt Catholic Church of years past, the scientific community embraces a self-preserving quality for the way things are done. The establishment reaps benefits in keeping things the way they are. And thus, things that threaten it will be put down in a number of ways.”

Sure, science corrects itself sometimes. But it can take a hundred years or more for a “holy” theory to be overthrown. We do not have the kind of time available…

Science is Real Fake!

Our appeal to scientific authority is really, really broken because science can and has been gamed.

You only have to go back to “Tobacco Science” to understand how the scientific game is used.

Yes, science tends to work pretty much perfectly in physics, engineering and chemistry. Once you move outside of these hard science fields where things either work or don’t work, things begin to get more slippery.

If you don’t think that huge corporations have gotten even BETTER at gaming the scientific system you’re falling prey to some of the best propaganda around.

I’ve spent a lot of time on PubMed, a database of science and medicine. I’ve read countless breakdowns of all the ways that science can be flawed both intentionally and not. (At some point I’d like to compile a list of all the ways.)

You can literally find science to back up just about anything you want to believe these days. That makes saying “Science is Real” meaningless.

Once again, this is information warfare. Think of the upregulation and downregulation I covered recently being used in fields of science.

More often than not, it’s not about hiding away information but instead using such an overabundance of it to confuse and muddy the waters. This is “censorship through noise”…and then let us authority figures filter the noise for you.

The science can be completely hollow…and the desired effect still achieved.

How did opioids become so widespread? Didn’t “science” know about the addictive qualities? Turns out science was pretty much made up there too.

A NEJM article reviewing how it happened said this, “In conclusion, we found that a five-sentence letter published in the Journal in 1980 was heavily and uncritically cited as evidence that addiction was rare with long-term opioid therapy. We believe that this citation pattern contributed to the North American opioid crisis by helping to shape a narrative that allayed prescribers’ concerns about the risk of addiction associated with long-term opioid therapy. In 2007, the manufacturer of OxyContin and three senior executives pleaded guilty to federal criminal charges that they misled regulators, doctors, and patients about the risk of addiction associated with the drug.” (emphasis added)

In this case the “hollow science” was cited 608 times over the following years, the majority of which using it as evidence of their low addiction rate.

That’s right. Scientists and doctors were part of the propaganda machine.

I’ve come to the conclusion that it is best to assume some level of conspiracy is going on with anything big because of historical evidence that there often is. Not to say that’s 100%, because it’s not, but to use that as a starting point for hypothesizing.

With what I know, at least when it has to do with health and medicine, we should similarly start with the assumption that any scientific study is false!

…Especially if it is propagated in the mainstream news!

Again, don’t make assumptions that lock you into 100% belief. But use that as a starting point for investigating further.

“Very Rare” Asymptomatic Transmission

A stir was cause recently when a top WHO official said that asymptomatic transmission is “very rare”. Understand that this is the key point of everything we’re doing! Shutting down businesses. Social distancing. Mask mandates (to be covered shortly).

Instead of asking sick people to stay home so they don’t infect others, we need healthy people to stay home because they might have the virus, not know it, and spread it to other people.

“From the data we have, it still seems to be rare that an asymptomatic person actually transmits onward to a secondary individual,” said Dr. Maria Van Kerkhove, Technical Lead COVID-19 WHO Health Emergencies Programme. “We are constantly looking at this data, and we’re trying to get more information from countries to truly answer this question…It still appears to be rare that an asymptomatic individual actually transmits onward.”

“We have a number of reports from countries who are doing very detailed contact tracing. They’re following asymptomatic cases, they’re following contacts, and they’re not finding secondary transmission onward. It’s very rare. Much of that is not published in the literature.”

Here’s one such study that is published. “A Study on Infectivity of Asymptomatic SARS-CoV-2 Carriers” which found that of 455 contacts of an asymptomatic carrier, none of them contracted SARS-CoV-2.  

This caused an outcry and Dr. Kerkhove walked backed her statements. “I was responding to a question at the press conference. I wasn’t stating a policy of WHO or anything like that. I was just trying to articulate what we know. And in that, I used the phrase ‘very rare,’ and I think that that’s misunderstanding to state that asymptomatic transmission globally is very rare. I was referring to a small subset of studies.”

Here’s the kicker…“Some estimates of around 40% of transmission may be due to asymptomatic, but those are from models, so I didn’t include that in my answer yesterday, but wanted to make sure that I covered that here,” Kerkhove said. (emphasis added)

To sum this up:

1. From the DATA available both published and unpublished asymptomatic transmission is very rare.
2. But models and estimates say asymptomatic transmission may be big.
3. So our policy and recommendations are to go with the models and estimates and not the scientific data.

The question to ask is the WHO a science based organization…or a political one?

(If you read my work on the WHO you know the answer to that one.)

Remember that despite the 100,000+ deaths in the US and 463,000+ worldwide (big numbers that instill fear), the death rate is nothing compared to what the models predicted. We know games have been played with the numbers, not to mention inaccurate testing, and yet the CDC says the total death rate is between 1% at worst and 0.2%, with their best estimate being 0.4%.

Of these, almost all of them are 70 to 80+ years old, the people that are similarly taken out by the flu (despite there being a vaccine for that one).

So now let us turn to the great face mask debate…

Are Face Masks Effective?

If we collectively can’t even figure out something as simple as face masks, what chance do we have with bigger issues like racism, global warming, poverty, economic policy?

Seeing the polarization of this play out on social media has been entertaining.

I’m in California and as of a couple days ago, Governor Newsom signed an executive order that face masks are required when in public, including outdoors if social distancing isn’t possible.

We’ll put this clear and total contradiction aside for a second…

What boggles me the most is that people trust our health officials and organizations despite how inconsistent they are.

Fauci, the CDC and the WHO have now all flip-flopped on this issue. Is it because new science has come to light?

Because make no mistake, the previous science did NOT show that wearing masking for asymptomatic people did anything.

I refer back to the 2019 report from the WHO where they said this:

OVERALL RESULT OF EVIDENCE ON FACE MASKS

Ten RCTs were included in the meta-analysis, and there was no evidence that face masks are effective in reducing transmission of laboratory-confirmed influenza.

Quality of evidence

There is a moderate overall quality of evidence that face masks do not have a substantial effect on transmission of influenza.

Resource implications

Reusable cloth face masks are not recommended. Medical face masks are generally not reusable, and an adequate supply would be essential if the use of face masks was recommended. If worn by a symptomatic case, that person might require multiple masks per day for multiple days of illness.

RECOMMENDATION:

Face masks worn by asymptomatic people are conditionally recommended in severe epidemics or pandemics, to reduce transmission in the community. Disposable, surgical masks are recommended to be worn at all times by symptomatic individuals when in contact with other individuals. Although there is no evidence that this is effective in reducing transmission, there is mechanistic plausibility for the potential effectiveness of this measure.

In summation, they say there is a moderate level of scientific evidence that they do NOT work, but there is a plausible mechanism by which they could so they might be recommended in certain circumstances. Once again, the recommendation actually goes against the science!

The WHO’s April 6^th, 2020 coronavirus guidelines said this: “there is currently no evidence that wearing a mask (whether medical or other types) by healthy persons in the wider community setting, including universal community masking, can prevent them from infection with respiratory viruses, including COVID-19.”

But flip-flopping in their June 5^th advice: “The use of masks is part of a comprehensive package of the prevention and control measures that can limit the spread of certain respiratory viral diseases, including COVID-19. Masks can be used either for protection of healthy persons (worn to protect oneself when in contact with an infected individual) or for source control (worn by an infected individual to prevent onward transmission).”

On March 8^th, 2020. Dr. Fauci told 60 Minutes, “Right now in the United States, people should not be walking around with masks…There’s no reason to be walking around with a mask. When you’re in the middle of an outbreak, wearing a mask might make people feel a little bit better, and it might even block a droplet. But it’s not providing the perfect protection that people think that it is. And often there are unintended consequences; people keep fiddling with the mask, and they keep touching their face…But when you think masks you should think of healthcare providers needing them and people who are ill.”

Later he’s saying, “I do it [wear a mask] when I’m in the public for the reasons that, a) I want to protect myself and protect others. And also because I want to make it be a symbol for people to see. That that’s the kind of thing you should be doing.”

The US Surgeon General tweeted this:

On April 3^rd, the CDC flip-flopped as well.

But that’s flip-flopped because of new evidence right?

Here’s the CDC’s page on “Recommendation Regarding the Use of Cloth Face Coverings, Especially in Areas of Significant Community-Based Transmission”

Do you see that? On their recommendation page, not a single one of the studies is actually about masks or face coverings. Its all about asymptomatic carriers.

Isn’t that the wrong thing to be covering on this page with scientific backing?

Notice the pattern. News article has headline about the new mask recommendation. They link to the CDC but don’t mention science at all. Neither does the CDC, at least not for whats relevant.

Digging deeper on the CDC website I did find this.

A May review of the data posted on the CDC’s website states, “Although mechanistic studies support the potential effect of hand hygiene or face masks, evidence from 14 randomized controlled trials of these measures did not support a substantial effect on transmission of laboratory-confirmed influenza.” (emphaiss added)

Looking for more research, here’s an April 6^th study from the Annals of Internal Medicine, “In conclusion, both surgical and cotton masks seem to be ineffective in preventing the dissemination of SARS–CoV-2 from the coughs of patients with COVID-19 to the environment and external mask surface.”

That’s infected patients let alone healthy people!

I’ve seen people from OSHA talking about how the recommendations do not fit their guidelines this as this video explains too.

Hmmm, I just picked up a pulse oximeter to test if a mask lowers oxygenation for myself. Let me conduct a little experiment… (I’ll report back later my results.)

I also came across a BMJ study that said “This study is the first RCT [random controlled trial, aka the gold standard of studies] of cloth masks, and the results caution against the use of cloth masks. This is an important finding to inform occupational health and safety. Moisture retention, reuse of cloth masks and poor filtration may result in increased risk of infection. Further research is needed to inform the widespread use of cloth masks globally. However, as a precautionary measure, cloth masks should not be recommended.” (emphasis added)

If you want to go even deeper here’s a couple articles reviewing more science against masks:

• COMMENTARY: Masks-for-all for COVID-19 not based on sound data
• Coronavirus Fact-Check #6: Does wearing a mask do anything?

And to balance it out, I’ll point out an article by Nassim Taleb, whose work I respect, on why we should wear masks. The biggest point of disagreement I have there is that there IS a good amount of evidence that masks don’t work as I’ve covered here.

Personally, I’ll wear a mask in a store as is required at every store where I live. Their store, their rules. (I see this as the same as no shirt, no shoes, no service, just add no mask in there.)

If I was to visit a nursing home I would certainly take precautions.

But no, I’m sorry I will NOT wear a mask outside. I do not give the state of California that power over me.

It’s Not Really About the Masks…Preparation for What’s Next

Fauci mentions it’s a symbol and I think he’s right about that! I see people talking about how it’s a submission ritual. Submission to the fear, to the propaganda.

The symbol or lack of it certainly becomes a trigger for social reinforcement.

But that’s not really what I’m talking about here.

The other day I saw this article headline and had to click in:

Study: 100% face mask use could crush second, third COVID-19 wave

Finally a study FOR masks that I could look into. The study’s titled “A modelling framework to assess the likely effectiveness of facemasks in combination with ‘lock-down’ in managing the COVID-19 pandemic”

Ding, ding, ding! Alarm bells ringing. It’s a modeling study…because the models have been so effective thus far with SARS-CoV-2, right? (After all, we’re already basing asymptomatic transmission off of models instead of the data.)

Layers and layers of bad science does not make the underlying assumptions true. Repeating something over and over again does not make it true. But, unfortunately, both of these do make things more BELIEVABLE.

This paper contains some equations that are above my head.

Since that’s Greek to me, I should just trust the experts because they’re smarter than me, right?

Authority figures never lead us wrong, right?

There couldn’t possibly be an untrue assumption underlying all that math, could there?

To me, it’s not really about the masks…I’ve seen this messaging before.

The SF Gate article states “Homemade coverings that catch only 50 percent of exhaled droplets would provide a “population-level benefit,” they concluded. As has been well-publicized, wearing a mask primarily protects others from yourself, rather than the other way around. It is not a sign that you consider others a danger.”

It’s not about your health, it’s about the community health.

As I said, I’ve seen this before, as this exact messaging has grown stronger and stronger around vaccines the past few years.

And that is what this is all about. The propaganda of the masks fits hand in glove with the propaganda for the upcoming vaccine.

“Everyone needs to do it.”

“It’s not about you. It’s for other people’s protection, especially the weak.”

“You are dangerous if you don’t have a mask on/the vaccine.”

“You can’t be allowed at school/can’t travel without one.”

Never mind the logical inconsistency of it. We ALL need to vaccinate to protect those whose immune systems are too weak to handle vaccines…yet we vaccinate babies the day they are born without investigating if their immunity is strong or weak.

The agenda is already in action…

New York tried to pass mandates for the coronavirus vaccine before it’s even succeeded in “warp speed” vaccine safety trials. This was fortunately defeated.

In Colorado you can still have children exempted from vaccines for school, but now you must go through re-education if you do. This law passed.

Propagating the Propaganda

So how does the scientific propaganda work?

Some science is put out showing masks work. The media propagates the message. They do not propagate any of the science or naysayers that don’t fit the agenda.

The governing bodies and officials line up to the approved message, even flip-flopping as necessary. That’s fine, people don’t remember the past much anymore.

The politicians push orders making it law.

I literally revised my diagram as I finished writing this article.

Agenda comes first. Science next. Media and government to follow.

And by then the propaganda is strong enough to grab 95% of people, who then work to socially police one another.

Perhaps that’s why when I posted on Facebook “Someone help me out. Where is this new science that proves mask wearing works?” I got lots of people on both sides of the debate…and not a single one of them actually linked to a study.