Journalists in Canada started the new year by continuing to foment division and hatred among Canadians, to normalize the idea that the role of citizens is to quietly obey the political class and to quadruple down on their personal investment in the narrative of unending COVID catastrophe.
How blasé are Canadian journalists about the extraordinary changes to the structure of our democracy that we're witnessing ? Well, some of them are now characterizing the totalitarian state control over the bodies of citizens occurring in Canada as "an interesting" move to contemplate.
Robyn Urback Globe and Mail:
Bob Hepburn of the Toronto Star is an outspoken cheerleader for the abolition of the principles of liberal democracy. Here he gushes approvingly for a Premier punishing people for believing citizens in a democratic country are absolutely entitled to 'refuse' a politicians order to take certain drugs.
Gary Mason at the Globe and Mail is once again using his platform in the mass media to openly target a group of his fellow Canadians and call for their persecution.
Shocking and despicable that Canadian journalism has sunk so low.
It's an indictment of the current state of journalism that there are no professional "consequences" for intentionally attempting to turn public opinion against a particular segment of the population. This is a direct threat to the security and ability to function in society of the people Gary is targeting.
But check out his indignance when some of the people he has targeted respond in kind. Suddenly "vitriol" and "outright threats" are beyond belief. Why? Because it's different when it's directed at him:
Notice that even as Gary whines about the "consequences" of using his platform to go after a minority group of his fellow Canadians he bemoans that we "insist on defending their rights"! The astonishing thing is that Gary expects us to perceive him as the morally superb, unfairly maligned party in this scenario.
The malice and absence of self-awareness is stunning.
Here Garry literally decries that we can't deny people health care:
And here is Gary championing a 'tyranny of the majority' style of governing while projecting his own intolerant worldview onto "most Canadians":
Gary Mason is openly and unapologetically opposed to defending the rights of a minority group of Canadians.
Until just this moment this would have been considered the single most un-Canadian thing imaginable.
Suddenly it's acceptable for senior journalists in this country to foment this kind of hatred.
Gary isn't the only one.
Here's Tasha Kheiriddin from the National Post doing it:
Tasha has previously referred to her fellow Canadians as "living petri dishes".
And yet it is well understood that characterizing a segment of the population as spreaders of disease is a common propaganda tactic practiced by the most odious totalitarian regimes and their acolytes.
But exactly like Gary, she's deeply resentful of being on the receiving end of the kind of malice she foments towards other people. Here she uses her platform to publicly paint herself as innocent victim:
Every day Canadian journalists like Gary Mason and Tasha Kheiriddin use their privileged access to a platform that shapes public perception to threaten, demonize and foment hatred towards powerless people.
How is it possible that these professional members of the media establishment regularly engage in something they must know has such a despicable precedent?
Evolutionary biologist Bret Weinstein warns about this very precedent in this clip from an interview by UK journalist James Delingpole:
"We don't really have a precedent for a population demonizing a minority as disease ridden and then coming to its senses and going back to behaving in decent way towards each other."
More of the same:
John Ibbitson, Globe and Mail:
And this example of malicious projection form Heather Mallick at the Toronto Star:
This is the same Toronto Star that published this hate-filled messaging on its front page not that long ago.
There was sufficient backlash to that front page that the Star was forced to issue something resembling an apology. Actually they tried to claim it was some sort of accident. They said they "stumbled badly". Apparently one of their editors tripped while carrying a steaming bowl of hate propaganda and it happened to spill all over the front page of the paper or something.
There is an interesting new phenomenon that is important to identify. Keen observers of mainstream media have probably noticed a slight shift in attitude from some corners of the media establishment. There are stirrings of dissent. It appears we are seeing the first signs of an effort on behalf of certain journalists and media outlets to distance themselves from two years of their endorsement of the official narrative.
Lorrie Goldstein, Sun Media:
Jen Gerson, Natonal Post, CBC:
This is the same Jen Gerson who told people only a few months ago they were obligated to take an experimental pharmaceutical product despite hearing "something bad" about it. Jen was incensed that people would privilege their personal judgement about what they put in their own bodies above whatever was stopping her from giving her four year old a birthday party:
The same Jen Gerson who bought into the statist concept that the people to blame when government imposes months of authoritarian controls on you are your fellow citizens... not the politicians who are doing it you:
The same Jen Gerson who had previously complained that "inter-municipal travel restrictions" hadn't been sufficiently oppressive:
This cautious rediscovery of critical scrutiny and journalistic integrity is to be welcomed. But coming as we enter the third year of this mania it has to fall into the category of 'too little too late'.
Scottish broadcaster and historian Neil Oliver has drawn the same conclusion in response to the recent mea culpa from Danish media regarding their uncritically pro- narrative COVID coverage:
The editorial board at The National Post decided it was safe to come out against "mandatory vaccination" and a discriminatory tax on the 'unvaccinated':
At first glance it looked like Post was taking a stand in defense of an unfairly maligned minority group of Canadians.
But in reality they made sure to represent these people as rightfully deserving of contempt and their choice as totally without justification:
He (Trudeau), and Legault, are tapping into Canadian’s frustrations with those who have not been vaccinated. That frustration is understandable, given that the shots have proven effective and come with side effects that are either minor or rare.
Notice the hypocrisy: They admonish political leaders for failing to "find a way to mend this divide" while they divide the population into "Canadians" who are frustrated and "those who have not been vaccinated". Are the millions of people in this country who have chosen not to be injected not "Canadians" too?
Andrew Coyne, senior zealot at the Globe and Mail, didn't like the Post's begrudging defense of equal access to medical treatment for all Canadians one bit. Any hesitation to endorse any form of persecution the political class wishes to inflict on people who won't submit to Andrew's will is intolerable to his sensibilities. Democracy, principles, human decency... even logic itself be dammed!
So Andrew took the National Post to task:
The first thing to notice is that Andrew likes to use the royal 'we' (pluralis majestatis) when he's talking about his own opinions.
And by beginning his rebuke with "Oh lord" Andrew is letting us know just how wearisome it is to contend with people who are incapable of matching the excellence of his own reasoning. And who can blame him (us)? After all, Andrew's reasoning is so compelling: The vaccinated can be infected by people who didn't take the thing that doesn't stop you from getting infected. So obviously 'we' should force them to take the thing that doesn't stop you from getting infected so everyone won't be protected from getting infected.
You see? Like Andrew says, "it's not hard people"!
But if there's a Canadian 'journalist' who is not to be outdone when it comes to passing off incoherent gibberish as profound insight, it's Toronto Star sportswriter and infectious disease authority Bruce Arthur.
Undeterred by 'omicron's' failure to generate the public health disaster he had been eagerly anticipating, Bruce recently transcended the limitations of linear thinking... and perhaps even time and space... with the following nugget of cosmic wisdom:
That's right folks: "Things could be improving as they get worse." It's a "delicate thing" don't you know.
Could you ask for a better demonstration of the cognitive dissonance that defines the thinking of everyone invested in the narrative of unending COVID catastrophe?