First it was not even a university, but Seneca College. Then it was the University of Ottawa. Then Carleton University, the University of Western Ontario, and the University of Toronto. Now it is almost every university in New Brunswick and Nova Scotia. The law faculty at McGill is also demanding it, presumably to save the university from expensive litigation (an implied threat, and one that strangely assumes that only one side of a debate can litigate in court). If it happens first in the United States, then almost immediately it is copied and pasted into policy in Canada. It is coming everywhere: mandatory vaccination for all faculty, staff, and students.
As a tenured, full Professor in Canada, it is my duty to encourage all faculty to be united in non-compliance with such measures.
Mandatory vaccination pressures are issued allegedly in accordance with “public health”. However, they are mandated through neither parliaments nor legislation, but are instead issued unilaterally by governments under the umbrella of “emergency measures”.
Typically, such vaccination mandates stipulate the following: faculty, staff, and students must show proof of full vaccination in order to access campus and perform their duties. If they do not do so (and some allow refusal only on grounds of medical or religious exemptions), then they must submit to still undefined special measures, such as frequent testing (perhaps twice each week, using rapid antigen tests), and masking at all times and in all spaces on campus.
This will be, for most Canadian faculty, the first if not the only real test of their integrity and dignity, and their purpose as scholars and intellectuals. It is absolutely essential that they not fail this test from the start.
It must be emphasized that this is not a position that can be taken only by non-vaccinated faculty. Action to prohibit and prevent discrimination, and actual abuses of human rights, is a stance to be taken by all faculty, whether fully vaccinated or not.
Rather than following the alternative science narrative tied to the private interests of pharmaceutical corporations and those of politicians, we should expect Canadian universities to encourage critical thinking that—as is now commonly endorsed and celebrated—“speaks truth to power”. This would be in line with Canadian universities’ many recent statements in support of social justice. To see these same universities immediately fail the first real test of their avowed commitments, is both shocking and disappointing.
In particular, mandatory vaccination pressures plainly and indisputably discriminate against employees who are members of particular religious and ethnic communities, in such a way and to such a degree that any claims to upholding “equity, diversity, and inclusivity” become completely unravelled. Not sustaining this commitment in one area, and expecting it to be sustained in other areas, is obviously neither credible nor tenable. Furthermore, the policy which imposes such discrimination is in direct violation of a number of laws and human rights codes, both here in Quebec and in the rest of Canada.
First, faculty should notify senior administrators that at no point, and under no circumstances, can they be compelled to involuntarily release any private information about their personal health status, whether they have been fully vaccinated or not. Such a mandate violates the rights of all, not just some. Such compulsion, that lies outside of the terms and conditions of employment as established by contracts or collective agreements, would be plainly illegal on a number of fronts, including violating existing laws as exist in Quebec and the rest of Canada. At no point when we were interviewed and then hired, were any of us informed of any health requirements to perform our jobs. Established policies for universities to maintain safe working environments place that burden on university administrations—they do not imply any demand for health screening and injection of faculty.
We should be particularly concerned about the apparent effort to pressure people into vaccination. As universities that staunchly uphold ethics in research, following federal requirements, this policy instead negates voluntary informed consent. Consent cannot be mandated, by definition. The policy also violates the principle of do no harm, by not advising members of the community that compliance with this policy could result in experiencing adverse effects, ranging from the mild and trivial, to serious injury requiring hospitalization, and in some cases even death. We have not seen any language warning about adverse reactions and possible death anywhere in the policy announcements.
The compulsion to vaccinate also runs afoul of legal provisions that prohibit discrimination on the grounds of ethnicity, religion, and political beliefs.
What universities are also backing is an emergency measure, but they have not furnished any proof of an emergency. Rapidly spreading viruses are common to our university communities, as with each cold and flu that sweeps through a university population every year, even multiple times in a year. The condition of “rapid spread” and “contagiousness” is not, in and of itself, any basis for an “emergency”.
University administrations should rest assured that, as was usual, when employees develop any symptoms of any sickness, they will automatically refrain from coming to campus, as they have done when they had colds or the flu. Non-vaccinated faculty therefore represent no actual nor potential “threat” to the health of the community.
We must also point out that in the early fall of 2009, some Canadian faculty contracted H1N1, and in some cases they had to be absent from class for weeks. At no point did any university administration in Canada manifest any concern about this fact. It is important to recall that in 2009, the World Health Organization declared H1N1 to be a “global pandemic,” under the very same definition it then used for Covid-19. By enacting radically different measures today, Canadian universities are thus directly at odds with their own practice, from the recent past.
Second, if the consequence of non-compliance with such mandates are that faculty must undergo frequent testing—despite having no symptoms—then this would be unfair and discriminatory treatment based on assumed health status, and that too is illegal and lies outside of our terms and conditions of employment. Being a professor at a Canadian university has never been advertised as a position that comes with a health requirement, or a requirement for medical screening in order to perform one’s duties. Moreover, given that it is now solidly established that the fully vaccinated do carry as much viral load as the non-vaccinated, and do transmit the virus, to then subject one group of persons (assumed to be non-vaccinated) to testing, while exempting others, is obviously unfair discrimination.
One can only conclude that such a discriminatory bias is meant to punish a particular group, to hinder them in carrying out their daily work requirements, and to continue singling out healthy people as a problem. It is also obvious psychological harassment, and thus directly violates most Canadian universities’ own published workplace policies.
Before attempting to unilaterally transform the terms and conditions of employment, university administrations must at least sit down and negotiate with faculty unions. Over the past 18 months, we have seen professors suddenly required to work from home, which is work not required under existing terms and conditions of our employment—it is simply not in our job description, and most are not trained for online teaching. Conversely, we have now seen them barred from continuing remote delivery when this is their first choice. Now we see those who are assumed to be non-vaccinated being forced to undergo testing, regardless of symptoms, and regardless of possible natural immunity (which is irrationally and unjustifiably dismissed from this entire discussion).
The discriminatory testing requirement is thus another apparent legal violation, and it has no place at any Canadian university.
The announced policy is a violation of human dignity: it imposes psychological pressure through a regimen of punishment designed to make the performance of one’s ordinary work duties increasingly onerous and unsustainable. It reaches the point where we could argue that it constitutes a breach of contract.
The announced policy also demands that those who are assumed to be non-vaccinated (i.e., they do not furnish proof of full vaccination), must be visibly and publicly set apart from the rest of the community (i.e., masked where others are not masked). Given the prevailing mass psychosis that incites blame, disrespect, and even overt hatred against non-vaccinated persons, to make such non-vaccinated persons openly stand apart is to jeopardize their dignity and integrity.
Third, Canadian universities must not be pressured, and should not comply with any pressures that force their participation in a regime that violates human rights. As we are only now becoming aware of the real extent of atrocities committed at Canadian Residential Schools, which closed only in the late 1990s, Canadian educational institutions ought to be extremely wary of yet another wave of government demands for harsh, segregationist, and punitive measures in the name of “saving” people.
The administration of Canadian universities may reasonably respond that they are merely following government mandates. Any government mandate that is itself an extra-legal measure, imposed without legislative support, is not one that can be used to force a university into also violating either the law or human rights conventions established under international law, to which Canada is a signatory.
Any compliance by an individual with extra-legal extreme measures could also be read as tacit consent, which would then legitimize such measures which are backed neither by established laws, the Charter of Rights and Freedoms nor—it must be noted—are they backed by any scientific support.
The administrations of Canadian universities are best advised to be prudent, and on the right side of both the law and justice. They must immediately rescind any such policy issued under the heading of a vaccine mandate. They should also be aware that failure to do so exposes them to litigation from those at the receiving end of discriminatory treatment, not just from faculty and staff, but from an even larger number of students.
For any Canadian university to try to justify human rights abuses, because they are what the government ordered, is truly Nuremberg-worthy.
Fourth, any mandate must acknowledge that the burden of proof rests with those issuing, following, and enforcing the mandate. In particular, governments and university administrations in Canada must provide fully documented proof of the following—keeping in mind that widely spread fear is not proof of any emergency other than a psychological one:
(1) That there is indeed a current public health emergency, as an objective and verifiable medical fact, and not as an artifact of government decrees. The greatest number of hospitalizations and deaths in Canada occurred during the so-called “first wave” of March-May, 2020. There has been no repetition of those numbers since then. Even then, we are basing this on assumptions: we assume that people were infected with Covid-19, using flawed testing at a time when the virus had not been isolated, and when the amplification cycles were too high—and we did not follow WHO guidelines that advised against relying exclusively on PCR tests in making any clinical diagnosis. We also did not routinely conduct postmortems to establish the cause of death of most elderly victims in the spring of last year. On top of that, it has since come to light that even among those who were already close to the natural end of their lives, they were often subjected to starvation and dehydration—fear kept away many workers from nursing homes, which then resulted in the neglect of residents. We have also learned that, at least in Quebec, such elderly and frail patients were given morphine that suppressed respiration and which, in almost all cases, quickly resulted in death. Thus we do not yet know the exact size and nature of even the “first wave,” the worst and arguably the only real wave we had.
(2) That infection is spread only by the non-vaccinated. We now know definitively that the advertised “vaccines”—those in use in Canada—do not protect the injected from infection, nor do they stop them from spreading the virus, or even falling sick and dying from the virus. If the fully vaccinated can—and do—spread the virus, then any requirement for frequent and rapid testing must equally apply to them. Failure to do so is proof of discrimination on the basis of health characteristics.
(3) That by advertising the need for vaccination, that the university population is not being misled about the real protection such injectable products afford. Countries such as Israel, which vaccinated more fully and more quickly than Canada, are now witnessing a situation where the overwhelming majority of the infected are the fully vaccinated. In both Israel and the UK in recent weeks, the fully vaccinated account for the majority of Covid deaths. Without even speaking of death, which is extremely rare for anyone exposed to Covid—vaccinated or not—in both Europe and the US there are now several hundred thousand cases of serious adverse reactions. Universally it is acknowledged—even by the manufacturers themselves—that the effectiveness of these injectable products is declining to the point where any protection they might have offered increasingly drops to insignificant levels.
(4) That “cases” are a measure of anything significant. The term “cases” has been abused and distorted: anyone deemed to test positive for Covid-19, has been categorized as a “case”. This is despite the fact that they may have had no symptoms, or if they had symptoms they were mild and required no treatment. Typically a real case involves someone needing treatment as a patient, usually in a clinic or hospital. Therefore it needs to be proven that a rising number of so-called “cases” is any reason for extraordinary measures, especially when hospitalizations and deaths are but a tiny fraction of what they were during the first wave.
(5) That natural immunity is not real and does not matter. Nowhere in these mandates is there any language concerning natural immunity—natural immunity is assumed to not exist, or is assumed to be irrelevant. If those issuing, complying with, or enforcing such mandatory vaccination cannot address this scientific point, then the credibility of their entire argument collapses. On that basis alone, non-compliance would be fully justified and warranted.
(6) That healthy people can be assumed to be bearers of sickness. These workplace vaccine mandates all assume that healthy, even young and healthy people, who are not vaccinated are a “problem”. The healthy are assumed immediately and in advance to not only being actual or potential bearers of infection, but also being the sole bearers of infection, and of being solely infectious. Show the scientific support for this argument, and show it overcoming contrary scientific research.
(7) That the so-called “Delta variant” is in fact “more dangerous”. Being more contagious does not equal more danger of sickness and death, as attested to by published government data. Show the scientific proof for the fact that the Delta variant is a significant variation, not just one that varies by 0.3% of characteristics compared to the original Covid-19. Show the data that proves beyond a doubt that it causes more hospitalizations and deaths than the original Covid-19 ever did. Without this proof, the rationale for such mandates is null and void.
(8) That “herd immunity” can only be achieved with vaccination of 100% of a population. In particular, show the scientific support for achieving such immunity by using injectable products that confer no immunity at all. In addition, show the scientific support for the idea that herd immunity discounts natural immunity—see point #5 above.
If there is little or no scientific support for these positions, then there is no rational justification that warrants a mandate issued on medical grounds, in the name of safeguarding public health. In that case, the policy demands non-compliance and it must be rescinded.
If what remains is merely fear of danger, then in certain instances such fear of danger may in itself be a call for urgent psychological therapy or even psychiatric treatment. This is especially the case where fear is sustained in the absence of evidence or in denial of reality, and where it clearly does harm to the persons holding this fear, who then harm others (by issuing discriminatory mandates, for example).
It must also be recalled that during the height of the lockdowns, well before “vaccines” became available, and even before masking became mandatory, millions of Canadian workers operated in close quarters for long hours every day, and yet deadly outbreaks were few and far between. It remains to be shown why now, with vaccination and masking and numbers only a microscopic fraction of what they were, it is now necessary to go to extreme lengths to ensure 100% vaccination, using products that clearly cannot confer immunity. Such products are not only obviously and indisputably ineffective as tools of immunization, they can also be dangerous.
The announced measures, we already know, will do absolutely nothing to curb the spread of the virus. Knowing that means the policy is being followed for reasons not having to do with public health. We should thus reaffirm our commitment to non-compliance with this policy.
Lastly, if what universities really fear is exposure to litigation, then there is a very simple answer to this concern: ask all those who wish to access campus to sign a waiver that the university bears no responsibility for anyone who may become ill on campus (assuming it can even be proved they became ill on campus). If there is widespread fear of infection, a university could also allow for continued working and learning from home for those who prefer that option. Whatever the option may be, every possible option should be investigated without resorting to extreme and discriminatory measures that violate human rights and the rights of citizenship.
[Canadian faculty are encouraged to adopt and or adapt this statement, in whole or in part, for use in their individual institutional settings, and they can do so without formally crediting this statement, even though it is published under a Creative Commons license. French translation follows.]
DÉCLARATION DE NON-CONFORMITÉ À LA VACCINATION OBLIGATOIRE DANS LES UNIVERSITÉS CANADIENNES
Par : Maximilian C. Forte, PhD
Au début, ce n’était même pas une université, mais le Seneca College. Ensuite, ce fut l’Université d’Ottawa. Puis l’Université Carleton, l’Université de Western Ontario et l’Université de Toronto. Maintenant, ce sont presque toutes les universités du Nouveau-Brunswick et de la Nouvelle-Écosse. La faculté de droit de McGill l’exige également, vraisemblablement pour sauver l’université d’un litige coûteux (une menace implicite, et qui suppose étrangement qu’un seul côté d’un débat peut plaider devant les tribunaux). Si cela se produit d’abord aux États-Unis, alors presque immédiatement, il est copié et collé dans la politique au Canada. Il arrive partout : vaccination obligatoire pour tous les professeurs, le personnel et les étudiants.
En tant que professeur titulaire au Canada, il est de mon devoir d’encourager tous les professeurs à s’unir face au non-respect de telles mesures.
Des pressions de vaccination obligatoire sont émises prétendument conformément à la « santé publique ». Cependant, ils ne sont mandatés ni par les parlements ni par la législation, mais sont plutôt émis unilatéralement par les gouvernements dans le cadre de « mesures d’urgence ».
En règle générale, ces mandats de vaccination stipulent ce qui suit : les professeurs, le personnel et les étudiants doivent présenter une preuve de vaccination complète afin d’accéder au campus et d’exercer leurs fonctions. S’ils ne le font pas (et certains n’autorisent le refus que sur la base d’exemptions médicales ou religieuses), ils doivent alors se soumettre à des mesures spéciales encore non définies, telles que des tests fréquents (peut-être deux fois par semaine, en utilisant des tests antigéniques rapides), et le port du masque à tout moment et dans tous les espaces du campus.
Ce sera, pour la plupart des professeurs canadiens, le premier sinon le seul test réel de leur intégrité, de leur dignité, et de leur objectif en tant qu’universitaires et intellectuels. Il est absolument essentiel qu’ils ne ratent pas ce test dès le départ.
Il faut souligner qu’il ne s’agit pas d’une position qui ne peut être prise que par des professeurs non vaccinés. L’action pour interdire et prévenir la discrimination, et les abus réels des droits de l’homme, est une position à prendre par tous les professeurs, qu’ils soient complètement vaccinés ou non.
Plutôt que de suivre le récit de la science alternative lié aux intérêts privés des sociétés pharmaceutiques et à ceux des politiciens, nous devrions nous attendre à ce que les universités canadiennes encouragent la pensée critique qui – comme cela est maintenant communément approuvé et célébré – « dit la vérité au pouvoir ». Cela serait conforme aux nombreuses déclarations récentes des universités canadiennes en faveur de la justice sociale. Voir ces mêmes universités échouer d’emblée au premier véritable test de leurs engagements avoués, est à la fois choquant et décevant.
En particulier, les pressions en matière de vaccination obligatoire discriminent clairement et indiscutablement les employés qui sont membres de communautés religieuses et ethniques particulières, de telle manière et à un degré tel que toute prétention à défendre « l’équité, la diversité et l’inclusivité » s’effondre complètement. Ne pas maintenir cet engagement dans un domaine, et s’attendre à ce qu’il soit maintenu dans d’autres domaines, n’est évidemment ni crédible ni tenable. De plus, la politique qui impose une telle discrimination contrevient directement à plusieurs lois et codes des droits de la personne, tant ici au Québec que dans le reste du Canada.
Premièrement, les professeurs devraient informer les cadres supérieurs qu’à aucun moment et en aucun cas, ils ne peuvent être contraints de divulguer involontairement des informations privées sur leur état de santé personnel, qu’ils aient été complètement vaccinés ou non. Un tel mandat viole les droits de tous, pas seulement de certains. Une telle contrainte, qui se situe en dehors des termes et conditions d’emploi tels qu’établis par les contrats ou les conventions collectives, serait manifestement illégale à plusieurs égards, notamment en violant les lois existantes telles qu’elles existent au Québec et dans le reste du Canada. À aucun moment, lorsque nous avons été interviewés puis embauchés, aucun d’entre nous n’a été informé des exigences en matière de santé pour effectuer notre travail. Les politiques établies pour que les universités maintiennent des environnements de travail sûrs imposent ce fardeau aux administrations universitaires – elles n’impliquent aucune demande de dépistage médical ou d’injection de professeurs.
Nous devrions être particulièrement préoccupés par l’effort apparent pour faire pression sur les gens pour qu’ils se fassent vacciner. En tant qu’universités qui défendent fermement l’éthique de la recherche, conformément aux exigences fédérales, cette politique nie plutôt le consentement éclairé volontaire. Le consentement ne peut pas être obligatoire, par définition. La politique viole également le principe de ne pas nuire, en n’informant pas les membres de la communauté que le respect de cette politique pourrait entraîner des effets indésirables, allant de légers et insignifiants à des blessures graves nécessitant une hospitalisation, et dans certains cas même la mort. Nous n’avons vu aucune parole d’avertissement concernant les effets indésirables et la mort possible dans les annonces de politique.
L’obligation de vacciner va également à l’encontre des dispositions légales qui interdisent la discrimination fondée sur l’appartenance ethnique, la religion et les convictions politiques.
Les universités soutiennent également une mesure d’urgence, mais elles n’ont fourni aucune preuve d’une urgence. Les virus à propagation rapide sont communs à nos communautés universitaires, comme chaque rhume et grippe qui balaie une population universitaire chaque année, même plusieurs fois par an. La condition de « propagation rapide » et de « contagiosité » n’est pas, en soi, une base pour une « urgence ».
Les administrations universitaires doivent être assurées que, comme d’habitude, lorsque les employés développent des symptômes de maladie, ils s’abstiennent automatiquement de venir sur le campus, comme ils l’ont fait lorsqu’ils ont eu un rhume ou une grippe. Les professeurs non vaccinés ne représentent donc aucune « menace » réelle ou potentielle pour la santé de la communauté.
Il faut aussi souligner qu’au début de l’automne 2009, certains professeurs canadiens ont contracté le virus H1N1, et dans certains cas, ils ont dû s’absenter des cours pendant des semaines. À aucun moment, aucune administration universitaire au Canada n’a manifesté de préoccupation à ce sujet. Il est important de rappeler qu’en 2009, l’Organisation mondiale de la santé a déclaré que le H1N1 était une « pandémie mondiale », selon la même définition qu’elle utilisait alors pour le Covid-19. En édictant aujourd’hui des mesures radicalement différentes, les universités canadiennes sont ainsi directement en rupture avec leur propre pratique, d’un passé récent.
Deuxièmement, si la conséquence du non-respect de ces mandats est que les professeurs doivent subir des tests fréquents, même s’ils ne présentent aucun symptôme, il s’agirait alors d’un traitement injuste et discriminatoire basé sur l’état de santé présumé, et cela aussi est illégal et ne relève pas de nos engagements et des conditions d’emploi. Être professeur dans une université canadienne n’a jamais été annoncé comme un poste assorti d’une exigence de santé ou d’une exigence de dépistage médical pour exercer ses fonctions. De plus, étant donné qu’il est désormais solidement établi que les personnes complètement vaccinées portent autant de charge virale que les non vaccinées et transmettent le virus, soumettre ensuite un groupe de personnes (supposées non vaccinées) à des tests, et en exempter d’autres, est manifestement une discrimination injuste.
On ne peut que conclure qu’un tel préjugé discriminatoire vise à punir un groupe particulier, à l’entraver dans l’accomplissement de ses tâches quotidiennes et à continuer à désigner les personnes en bonne santé comme un problème. Il s’agit également d’un harcèlement psychologique évident et viole donc directement les politiques publiées par la plupart des universités canadiennes en milieu de travail.
Avant de tenter de transformer unilatéralement les conditions d’emploi, les administrations universitaires doivent au moins s’asseoir et négocier avec les syndicats du corps professoral. Au cours des 18 derniers mois, nous avons vu des professeurs soudainement obligés de travailler à domicile, ce qui n’est pas un travail requis dans les conditions d’emploi existantes. Ce n’est tout simplement pas dans notre description de poste et la plupart ne sont pas formés pour l’enseignement en ligne. À l’inverse, nous leur avons maintenant interdit de poursuivre l’enseignement à distance alors qu’il s’agissait de leur premier choix. Maintenant, nous voyons ceux qui sont supposés non vaccinés être contraints de subir des tests, quels que soient leurs symptômes et quelle que soit leur immunité naturelle possible (ce qui est irrationnellement et sans justification exclu de toute cette discussion).
L’exigence de test discriminatoire est donc une autre violation légale apparente, et elle n’a sa place dans aucune université canadienne.
La politique annoncée est une violation de la dignité humaine : elle impose une pression psychologique par le biais d’un régime de punition conçu pour rendre l’accomplissement de ses tâches ordinaires de plus en plus onéreux et insoutenable. Cela atteint le point où nous pourrions soutenir qu’il s’agit d’une rupture de contrat.
La politique annoncée exige également que ceux qui sont supposés être non vaccinés (c’est-à-dire qu’ils ne fournissent pas de preuve de vaccination complète), doivent être visiblement et publiquement séparés du reste de la communauté (c’est-à-dire masqués là où d’autres ne le sont pas). Compte tenu de la psychose de masse qui prévaut qui incite au blâme, au manque de respect et même à la haine manifeste contre les personnes non vaccinées, faire en sorte que ces personnes non vaccinées se démarquent ouvertement revient à mettre en péril leur dignité et leur intégrité.
Troisièmement, les universités canadiennes ne doivent subir aucune pression et ne doivent se plier à aucune pression qui les force à participer à un régime qui viole les droits de la personne. Alors que nous commençons seulement maintenant à prendre conscience de l’étendue réelle des atrocités commises dans les pensionnats canadiens, qui n’ont fermé qu’à la fin des années 1990, les établissements d’enseignement canadiens devraient se méfier d’une nouvelle vague de demandes du gouvernement pour des mesures dures, ségrégationnistes et punitives au nom de “sauver” les gens.
L’administration des universités canadiennes peut raisonnablement répondre qu’elles ne font que suivre les mandats du gouvernement. Tout mandat gouvernemental qui est lui-même une mesure extra-légale, imposée sans appui législatif, n’est pas un mandat qui peut être utilisé pour forcer une université à violer également la loi ou les conventions relatives aux droits de la personne établies en vertu du droit international, auxquelles le Canada est un signataire.
Tout respect par un individu de mesures extrêmes extra-légales pourrait également être lu comme un consentement tacite, qui légitimerait alors de telles mesures qui ne sont adossées ni aux lois établies, ni à la Charte des droits et libertés ni, il faut le noter, tout support scientifique.
Les administrations des universités canadiennes sont mieux avisées d’être prudentes et du bon côté de la loi et de la justice. Elles doivent immédiatement annuler toute police de ce type émise au titre d’un mandat de vaccination. Elles doivent également être conscientes que ne pas le faire les expose à des litiges de la part de ceux qui subissent un traitement discriminatoire, non seulement de la part des professeurs et du personnel, mais d’un nombre encore plus grand d’étudiants.
Qu’une université canadienne essaie de justifier les violations des droits de la personne, parce que c’est ce que le gouvernement a ordonné, est vraiment digne de Nuremberg.
Quatrièmement, tout mandat doit reconnaître que le fardeau de la preuve incombe à ceux qui émettent, suivent et exécutent le mandat. En particulier, les gouvernements et les administrations universitaires au Canada doivent fournir une preuve entièrement documentée de ce qui suit, en gardant à l’esprit qu’une peur largement répandue n’est pas la preuve d’une urgence autre que psychologique :
(1.) Qu’il existe bien une urgence de santé publique actuelle, en tant que fait médical objectif et vérifiable, et non en tant qu’artefact de décrets gouvernementaux. Le plus grand nombre d’hospitalisations et de décès au Canada s’est produit au cours de la soi-disant « première vague » de mars-mai 2020. Il n’y a eu aucune répétition de ces chiffres depuis lors. Même alors, nous nous basons sur des hypothèses : nous supposons que les personnes ont été infectées par Covid-19, en utilisant des tests défectueux à un moment où le virus n’avait pas été isolé et où les cycles d’amplification étaient trop élevés – et nous n’avons pas suivi les directives de l’OMS qui déconseillaient de se fier exclusivement aux tests PCR pour établir un diagnostic clinique. Nous n’avons pas non plus effectué systématiquement d’autopsies pour établir la cause du décès de la plupart des victimes âgées au printemps de l’année dernière. En plus de cela, il est apparu depuis que même parmi ceux qui étaient déjà proches de la fin naturelle de leur vie, ils étaient souvent soumis à la famine et à la déshydratation – la peur a éloigné de nombreux travailleurs des maisons de retraite, ce qui a ensuite entraîné la négligence des résidents. Nous avons également appris que, du moins au Québec, ces patients âgés et fragiles recevaient de la morphine qui supprimait la respiration et qui, dans presque tous les cas, entraînait rapidement la mort. Ainsi, nous ne connaissons pas encore la taille et la nature exacte même de la « première vague », la pire et sans doute la seule vraie vague que nous ayons eue.
(2.) Cette infection n’est transmise que par les non-vaccinés. Nous savons maintenant avec certitude que les « vaccins » annoncés – ceux utilisés au Canada – ne protègent pas les personnes injectées contre l’infection, ni ne les empêchent de propager le virus, ni même de tomber malade et de mourir du virus. Si les personnes entièrement vaccinées peuvent propager le virus, et le font, alors toute exigence de tests fréquents et rapides doit également s’appliquer à elles. Ne pas le faire est une preuve de discrimination sur la base de caractéristiques de santé.
(3.) Qu’en annonçant la nécessité de la vaccination, que la population universitaire ne soit pas induite en erreur sur la véritable protection qu’offrent ces produits injectables. Des pays comme Israël, qui ont vacciné plus complètement et plus rapidement que le Canada, sont maintenant témoins d’une situation où l’écrasante majorité des personnes infectées sont complètement vaccinées. En Israël et au Royaume-Uni ces dernières semaines, les personnes entièrement vaccinées représentent la majorité des décès de Covid. Sans même parler de décès, ce qui est rarissime pour toute personne exposée au Covid, vaccinée ou non, en Europe comme aux États-Unis, on dénombre désormais plusieurs centaines de milliers de cas d’effets indésirables graves. Il est universellement reconnu, même par les fabricants eux-mêmes, que l’efficacité de ces produits injectables diminue au point que toute protection qu’ils auraient pu offrir tombe de plus en plus à des niveaux insignifiants.
(4.) Que les « cas » sont une mesure de tout ce qui est significatif. Le terme « cas » a été abusé et déformé : toute personne jugée positive au Covid-19 a été classée dans la catégorie « cas ». Ceci malgré le fait qu’ils n’ont peut-être eu aucun symptôme, ou s’ils avaient des symptômes, ils étaient légers et n’ont nécessité aucun traitement. Généralement, un cas réel implique une personne ayant besoin d’un traitement en tant que patient, généralement dans une clinique ou un hôpital. Par conséquent, il doit être prouvé qu’un nombre croissant de soi-disant « cas » est une raison pour des mesures extraordinaires, en particulier lorsque les hospitalisations et les décès ne représentent qu’une infime fraction de ce qu’ils étaient lors de la première vague.
(5.) Cette immunité naturelle n’est pas réelle et n’a pas d’importance. Nulle part dans ces mandats il n’y a de langage concernant l’immunité naturelle – l’immunité naturelle est supposée ne pas exister, ou est supposée non pertinente. Si ceux qui délivrent ou appliquent une telle vaccination obligatoire ne peuvent pas aborder ce point scientifique, alors la crédibilité de leur argument entier s’effondre. Sur cette seule base, la non-conformité serait pleinement justifiée.
(6.) On peut supposer que les personnes en bonne santé sont porteuses de la maladie. Ces mandats de vaccination en milieu de travail supposent tous que les personnes en bonne santé, même jeunes et en bonne santé, qui ne sont pas vaccinées sont un « problème ». Les personnes saines sont supposées immédiatement et d’avance non seulement être porteuses réelles ou potentielles de l’infection, mais aussi être les seules porteuses de l’infection, et être uniquement contagieuses. Montrez le soutien scientifique de cet argument et montrez-le surmontant les recherches scientifiques contraires.
(7.) Que le soi-disant « variant Delta » est en fait « plus dangereux ». Être plus contagieux n’équivaut pas à plus de danger de maladie et de mort, comme en témoignent les données gouvernementales publiées. Montrez la preuve scientifique du fait que le variant Delta est une variation significative, pas seulement une variation de 0,3% des caractéristiques par rapport au Covid-19 d’origine. Montrez les données qui prouvent sans aucun doute qu’il provoque plus d’hospitalisations et de décès que le Covid-19 original n’en a jamais fait. Sans cette preuve, la justification de tels mandats est nulle et non avenue.
(8.) Cette « immunité collective » ne peut être obtenue qu’avec la vaccination de 100 % d’une population. En particulier, montrez le soutien scientifique pour obtenir une telle immunité en utilisant des produits injectables qui ne confèrent aucune immunité. En outre, montrez le soutien scientifique de l’idée que l’immunité collective réduit l’immunité naturelle – voir le point 5 ci-dessus.
S’il y a peu ou pas de support scientifique pour ces positions, alors il n’y a aucune justification rationnelle pour un mandat délivré pour des raisons médicales, au nom de la sauvegarde de la santé publique. Dans ce cas, la politique exige la non-conformité et elle doit être annulée.
Si ce qui reste n’est que la peur du danger, alors, dans certains cas, cette peur du danger peut en elle-même être un appel à une thérapie psychologique urgente ou même à un traitement psychiatrique. C’est particulièrement le cas lorsque la peur est entretenue en l’absence de preuves ou dans le déni de réalité, et qu’elle nuit manifestement aux personnes qui ont cette peur, qui nuisent alors à autrui (en émettant des mandats discriminatoires, par exemple).
Il faut également rappeler qu’au plus fort des mesures de santé publique, bien avant que les « vaccins » ne soient disponibles, et même avant que le masque ne devienne obligatoire, des millions de travailleurs canadiens opéraient à proximité immédiate pendant de longues heures chaque jour, et pourtant les épidémies mortelles étaient rares et lointaines entre elles. Il reste à montrer pourquoi maintenant, avec la vaccination et le masquage et les chiffres seulement une fraction microscopique de ce qu’ils étaient, il faut maintenant aller très loin pour assurer une vaccination à 100%, en utilisant des produits qui ne peuvent clairement pas conférer une immunité. De tels produits ne sont pas seulement manifestement et incontestablement inefficaces en tant qu’outils d’immunisation, ils peuvent aussi être dangereux.
Les mesures annoncées, on le sait déjà, ne feront absolument rien pour freiner la propagation du virus. Le savoir signifie que la politique est suivie pour des raisons qui n’ont pas à voir avec la santé publique. Nous devons donc réaffirmer notre engagement à ne pas respecter cette politique.
Enfin, si ce que les universités craignent vraiment, c’est l’exposition au litige, alors il y a une réponse très simple à cette préoccupation : demander à tous ceux qui souhaitent accéder au campus de signer une renonciation que l’université n’assume aucune responsabilité pour toute personne qui pourrait tomber malade sur le campus (en supposant qu’il puisse même être prouvé qu’ils sont tombés malades sur le campus). S’il existe une peur généralisée de l’infection, une université pourrait également permettre à ceux qui préfèrent cette option de continuer à travailler et à apprendre à domicile. Quelle que soit l’option choisie, toutes les options possibles devraient être étudiées sans recourir à des mesures extrêmes et discriminatoires qui violent les droits de l’homme et les droits de citoyenneté.
[Les professeurs canadiens sont encouragés à adopter et/ou adapter cette déclaration, en tout ou en partie, pour une utilisation dans leur environnement institutionnel individuel, et ils peuvent le faire sans créditer formellement cette déclaration qui est publiée sous une licence Creative Commons.]
—
La traduction en Français a été faite par Richard G de Fearless Canada / Courage Québec.
ZERO ANTHROPOLOGY 
Dennis Riches
I point I seldom see mentioned: Herd immunity through vaccination against a corona virus is impossible. Eradication through vaccination was possible with smallpox and polio because those viruses infect only humans. Corona viruses and influenza viruses continue to exist and evolve in animal populations, so new variants always come back into the human population.
Maximilian C. Forte
Thanks, an excellent point.
Lucy Narbaitz
Also, I think herd immunity cannot be achieved if vaccinated people transmit the virus.
Tena
The oral polio vaccine was/is a live virus vaccine and capable of shedding, which is why they stopped using it in the 90’s. Interestingly enough they continue to use the oral polio vaccine in third world countries where there is a lack of sanitation. Polio continues to thrive there and it is even found to be the vaccine variant and not even the wild virus most of the time. It might even be safe to assume that polio was eradicated because of sanitation as it is found in human waste.
Interesting fact – Dominick Tenuto of Staten Island got polio from changing his daughters diaper 40 some years ago and was awarded millions.
haederpaul
I think I’ve drilled down pretty deeply over the years concerning DARPA and other agencies working on super-charging viruses, including the so-called bat viruses. That story is certainly not even considered part and parcel of why in USA’s Operation Warp Speed, with DARPA in the driver seat, came up with these spike protein jabs. It’s the bombardment of news (sic) and the chaotic nature of the flagging USA empire, the putridity of the old Empire, including its great vast resource hinterland, Canada, that occupies the newsfeeds and consumerist minds of many Westerners. However, this journalist — Webb — is serious and foremost an objective researcher, yet, when we look at this SARS-CoV2 endemic, we as a clump of Western post-industrial societies do not want honest critical thinking into at how and what was tweaked in the lab(s) to produce this batty as hell bioweapon. Cognitive dissonance at its best.
Quoting —
Bats as Bioweapons
As the ongoing coronavirus outbreak centered in China has spread to other countries and been blamed for a growing number of deaths, a consensus has emerged that this particular virus, currently classified as a “novel [i.e. new] coronavirus,” is believed to have originated in bats and was transmitted to humans in Wuhan, China via a seafood market that also traded exotic animals. So-called “wet” markets, like the one in Wuhan, were previously blamed for past deadly coronavirus outbreaks in China, such as the 2003 outbreak of Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS).
In addition, one preliminary study on the coronavirus responsible for the current outbreak found that the receptor, Angiotensin-converting enzyme 2 (ACE2), is not only the same as that used by the SARS coronavirus, but that East Asians present a much higher ratio of lung cells that express that receptor than the other ethnicities (Caucasian and African-American) included in the study. However, such findings are preliminary and the sample size is too small to draw any definitive conclusions from that preliminary data.
Two years ago, media reports began discussing the Pentagon’s sudden concern that bats could be used as biological weapons, particularly in spreading coronaviruses and other deadly diseases. The Washington Post asserted that the Pentagon’s interest in investigating the potential use of bats to spread weaponized and deadly diseases was because of alleged Russian efforts to do the same. However, those claims regarding this Russian interest in using bats as bioweapons date back to the 1980s when the Soviet Union engaged in covert research involving the Marburg virus, research that did not even involve bats and which ended with the Soviet Union’s collapse in 1991.
Like much of the Pentagon’s controversial research programs, the bats as bioweapons research has been framed as defensive, despite the fact that no imminent threat involving bat-propagated bioweapons has been acknowledged. However, independent scientists have recently accused the Pentagon, particularly its research arm DARPA, of claiming to be engaged in research it says is “defensive” but is actually “offensive.”
The most recent example of this involved DARPA’s “Insect Allies” program, which officially “aims to protect the U.S. agricultural food supply by delivering protective genes to plants via insects, which are responsible for the transmission of most plant viruses” and to ensure “food security in the event of a major threat,” according to both DARPA and media reports. (source: Bats, Gene Editing and Bioweapons: Recent Darpa Experiments Raise Concerns Amid Coronavirus Outbreak by WHITNEY WEBB • JANUARY 30, 2020)
+–+
Here in USA, and in my current state, Oregon, the rules masters are out in force — county X making all outdoor activities fully masked. The college football games shall go on, but in a masked stadium. The Society for Human Resources Managers on their website blithely state how employers DO have the right (sic) to mandate vaccinations and do have the right (sic) to check vaccination status. We are seeing more states protecting employers allowing them to prescreen candidates for jobs with the same “proof of auto insurance and vaccination status.”
A great film, A Hidden Life, by Terrance Malick is apropos today, even though it covers quite beautifully and skillfully the case of Franz Jägerstätter, who refused to fight for the Nazis in World War II (refused to sign the loyalty oath to Hitler). When the Austrian peasant farmer is faced with the threat of execution for treason, it is his unwavering faith and his love for his wife, Fani, and children that keeps his spirit alive. We are there, today, with Corona Madness.
Interestingly, if these governments and pimps for corporations really were concerned with the public’s health, we all know what measures could take place to save lives now and future lives. This was from 2006 — imagine now, with 85,000 chemicals in play in industrialization, and in USA, hardly any of them are tested by EPA. And the old cousin of Agent Orange, Round-up, shoot, how many more white papers and deep research projects do we need on that industrialized poison destroying human physiology?
These are not nice peoople, to include the administrators and provosts and presidents of so-called institutions of higher learning. Many faculty are Eichmann’s, Big and Little.
Quoting:
In a study spearheaded by the Environmental Working Group (EWG) in collaboration with Commonweal, researchers at two major laboratories found an average of 200 industrial chemicals and pollutants in umbilical cord blood from 10 babies born in August and September of 2004 in U.S. hospitals. Tests revealed a total of 287 chemicals in the group. The umbilical cord blood of these 10 children, collected by Red Cross after the cord was cut, harbored pesticides, consumer product ingredients, and wastes from burning coal, gasoline, and garbage.
Of the 287 chemicals we detected in umbilical cord blood, we know that 180 cause cancer in humans or animals, 217 are toxic to the brain and nervous system, and 208 cause birth defects or abnormal development in animal tests. The dangers of pre- or post-natal exposure to this complex mixture of carcinogens, developmental toxins and neurotoxins have never been studied.
+–+
https://www.ewg.org/research/body-burden-pollution-newborns
haederpaul
And here, the World Socialist Web Site to the rescue — the “thing” is tomorrow is about unleashing all the dirty dogs of scientism, and bringing out all the guns , and this is their strategy —
https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2021/08/21/pers-a21.html?utm_term=covid19-strategy-allnewsletter-announcement&utm_medium=email&utm_source=email&utm_campaign=covid19-strategy
I am not sure of my schedule, but here, 5 pm Eastern time, 2 pm Pacific.
Sunday, August 22, 5pm US Eastern Time
For a global strategy to stop the pandemic and save lives!
An online meeting streamed at wsws.org/live
Maximilian C. Forte
My goodness, I remember a time when the World Socialist Web Site produced sound, analytic articles that were well-informed by careful research. Here they are crying for TOTAL GLOBAL ERADICATION, of a virus that is found in animal populations. They thus call for total vaccination. But then that would mean having to catch and vaccinate every single bat in the world, and then every field mouse, rat, vole, mole, shrew; don’t forget all the apes and monkeys; then of course all stray dogs and cats; wild hares, foxes, raccoons, skunks–a total vaccination of anything that breathes air. Why? Because, somehow, this is THE virus that tops all other viruses, the line in the sand gets drawn against this illness like no other illness in existence, now or in the past. Killing a small fraction of what was recorded under the Spanish Flu, it has somehow grown into something infinitely worse. STOP EVERYTHING UNTIL WE STOP COVID! This is pure psychosis at work–it is the essence of what I call pandemicism.
Thanks for the warning about the WSWS, we now know better than to waste our time with them.
haederpaul
It was rather embarrassing, truly, the one hour this WSWS devoted to their COMPLETE lockdown of the world, COMPLETE Zero Dark Thirty of eradicating the globe of corona. Civets, bats, pangolins, and all snotty kids, well, lock them away. Not very deep, and alas, I was able to finish a fiction project while listening to these bizarre folks advocate complete lockdown. Yep, those professional farm workers, too. Let’s eat MRI’s from USA, Canada and Nato forces. Yum, Meals Ready to Eat!
Another note, and an important one —
Tomorrow, 8/24, teachers and others from around USA, and one was from France, and another from Germany on our first meet-up.
Please, publicize. It is a strategy session, with some working with the Common Law Project to fight mandatory jabs. Today, of course, the multi-billion dollar felonious Pfizer just got the FDA’s seal of death, err, approval for the jab to go from EUA to Gold Star Approved!
Hey folks!
For anyone interested in talking about the vaccine exemption process and other issues/questions around it. Please feel free to come to our next meet up. Also, feel free to invite others. (pass this along if you wish)
If you think you will be attending and have information you can share about the exemptions process please (REPLY) to this email and I would like to prioritize you at the meeting to share what you know.
Thanks and hope to see folks there!
Date: Tuesday August 24th
Time: 5pm PST/8pm EST
Meeting Link: CONTACT haederpaul@gmail.com for information
+–+
Finally, a decent quick look at just what is “progressivism”:
Quoting:
Progressivism is an ideology that champions limitless growth, unbridled use of technology and the control of nature over any intrinsic sense of worth or fulfillment. We all get dragged along on the march of ‘progress’ because progressives assume any deviance from their values is inferior and because they tend to control the world’s resources. Progress under this model is linear; the future is always an improvement on the past, and any attempt to resist change or divert course is seen as regressive and unscientific.
Progressives often engage in leftist rhetoric, but their proposals always result in strengthening and expanding the existing, inequitable system and further entrenching the current, elite class. Progressives propose superficial policies rather than measures that would truly allow citizens to become more self-sufficient or otherwise reduce inequality because that would undermine their primary goal of unlimited growth. That is why progressives increasingly take refuge in identity politics; it allows them to talk about changing the system without actually having to challenge the exploitative aspects of society that they rely on for profit and growth. They then blame the increasing disparities on their opponents for resisting ‘progress’.
Progressivism is the direct descendant of the imperialism that dominated much of Western history for centuries. While the common narrative of modern history would have us believe that imperialism faded away in the 20th century as military aggression was replaced with international, economic cooperation and democratic revolutions, imperialism never died. In the United States and other countries there has always been a championing of Enlightenment ideals of liberty and equality alongside the denial of these same values to other groups who were conquered, exploited, or oppressed for imperialist goals of expansion and profit. The legacy of imperialism is just as deeply imprinted on the minds of Americans as liberalism is.
https://www.wrongkindofgreen.org/2021/08/22/the-pandemic-response-as-contemporary-imperialism/
Maximilian C. Forte
Thanks Paul, but just a note that I also wrote an essay on Progress, Progressivism, and Progressives on this site, in 2018, with a prior version published a few years before. As with everything else on Wrong Kind of Green, I very much admire and agree with the extract you provided. “Progress” has always been a project that relies on great force, on brutal violence. Anthropologists used to understand this, before they started bowing their heads in silent deference to partisan bosses and corporate billionaires.
Also, I had to edit your post: you provided sensitive meeting information that could encourage disruptive individuals to engage in Zoom bombing. People should contact you for information about the link, and do whatever you can then to vet them.
haederpaul
Yes, Max, I think that’s when I started following your work, and I read the piece and of course for me, it resonated, as same old news, but for you and your readers, of course, cogent. Spot on, my friend. I believe I quoted you a few times in my articles, and when I was still teaching college composition and writing, I used some of the work of yours — until I was cancel-cultured out of education.
I was a Union Organizer in Seattle for adjunct faculty, and went to COCAL in Mexico City with other part-time faculty and union folk to strategize on that hellish situation. Georgetown U was a terrible place where I went organizing PT faculty — business, law and other fields of study, those faculty are something to really consider in terms of Eichmann’s a la Ward Churchill! I was pepper sprayed as an Occupy Seattle teacher when I was working for two colleges, including Seattle Central Community College and Green River College.
Here, my short piece on Cornel West:
https://www.realchangenews.org/news/2011/11/23/cornel-west-praises-occupy-seattle-movement-green-river-community-college
Here’s a good one by the Whiteheads, on really k12, which is just a breeding ground for the college students I ran into for 36 years as a teacher!
https://dissidentvoice.org/2021/08/the-dangers-of-going-back-to-school-after-a-year-of-covid-19-lockdowns/
The Dangers of Going Back to School After a Year of COVID-19 Lockdowns by John W. Whitehead and Nisha Whitehead / August 23rd, 2021
“Every day in communities across the United States, children and adolescents spend the majority of their waking hours in schools that have increasingly come to resemble places of detention more than places of learning.”
— investigative journalist Annette Fuentes
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Concerned STEM Prof.
Thank you for this posting. You are a braver soul than I am. Being tenured means nothing in this environment. We cannot rely on any system previously put in place to protect us.
As a Professor of Sociology I am quite sure you see where this is all leading.
My University just recently issued their own diktat. Official communications are coercive toward receiving the Pfizer and Moderna shots, and there is no attention paid toward informed consent, adverse reactions, the actual risk of complications/death from COVID, and so on. Messaging is fear/duty based and a siege mentality is being cultivated.
Faculty are being squeezed both by the administration (which rationalizes that they are following Public Health guidelines) and in our case also by the Faculty Union, which failed to take on the administration publicly and in my opinion compounded the problem via an email to all Faculty members from our union President stating that the union is pushing for even more safety measures. This is without any consultation with the members.
The University is mandating self-declaration of “vaccination” status. I also place that word in quotation marks. We are mere weeks from the start of the Fall term, and I suspect most faculty will not be able to withstand the pressure to conform. One would hope our colleagues have critical thinking skills and would not rush out for their “jabs” but I believe the majority of professors have already drunk the Kool-Aid. I don’t use that reference lightly. I fully expect “outing”, bullying, and ostracization directed at non-conformists by faculty, staff, and students alike.
Honestly at this point we are rudderless.
Maximilian C. Forte
Concerned STEM Prof.,
many thanks for your message. I would echo it entirely–it is also a perfect description on the institutional setting in which I work. Personally, I am not entertaining any unrealistic outcomes.
Nevertheless, I will press on. I hope others will do the same, especially if they are senior colleagues with already well stocked pensions and other savings, who mostly or wholly own their homes, and who might have been toying with announcing retirement soon, or within a few years. They are the ones who have least to lose by standing up and standing firm. I do not expect newly hired colleagues to do anything except keep their heads down, and I would not blame them for that (well, not much). Unfortunately, this is still Canada, and professors here generally challenge very little–they have been trained too well in repeating what others say, and repeating what others want to hear. In the best of times, with maximum job security, they keep silent.
As a different source of inspiration, recall the courageous words of a serene and smiling Iraqi information minister, as Baghdad itself was being pounded by US bombs in March of 2003. He was standing in the street, speaking to foreign journalists, who openly wondered in disbelief at him as he was talking strong while plumes of black smoke rose in the distance behind him. I will never forget his words, spoken with a steady and reassuring smile: “Are you afraid? Why are you afraid, if I am not afraid?” It was wonderful. While many in the US mocked him, his main prediction came true, spoken in figurative terms: “You will commit suicide at the gates of Baghdad”. The US quagmire in Iraq played an enormous role in the current downfall of that country. At the risk of sounding like “Baghdad Bob,” I will echo his words.
When we emerge on the other side of this, Canadian academia is going to need a radical restructuring, if not a complete dismantling and rebuilding. What is happening now is totally unpardonable, inexcusable, unacceptable, and never to be forgotten.
Lorie
Thank you for this. I want to print it out and post it on every university door in the state.
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Infectious Library Staff
I am a staff member in an academic library in the United States (New Mexico, specifically). I appreciate this statement. You make many of the same arguments that I would make. My university recently did an abrupt 180, deciding to mandate vaccines for employees and students. I have submitted an exemption request, but I am not optimistic about it. As a backup, I had planned to submit a temporary exemption that was offered, based on the vaccines’ not yet being fully authorized by the FDA, but it looks like that is going to happen very soon, perhaps as early as tomorrow. I refuse to take one of these (so-called) vaccines. If my exemption request doesn’t get approved, I guess I will be fired by the end of October. However, I don’t know for sure what will happen, and I am just waiting for everything to play out. The university may not be in a hurry to fire staff mid-semester, especially if many of us abstain from the injections (although I don’t think that’s very likely).
I am in my mid-50’s. My financial situation was already pretty tenuous. I don’t own a house, and am not anywhere near to being able to own one. I make a lower middle class income, and I have had to spend a lot of money on chronic illness (including spending money on “conveniences” which verge on necessity, given my health issues). Granted, I am also pretty terrible at managing my finances. If I am fired, I plan on cashing out my pension, and relocating to Texas–without a job lined up. I think it will be extremely difficult for me to find another job in New Mexico paying at least what I have been making, as an unvaccinated person. I have somewhat more hope of that happening in Texas. I also just want to get out of New Mexico, where I find the political situation pretty intolerable at this point. I thought of myself as left-liberal until sometime in the last several years, but I am now a “deplorable.” Needless to say, being treated this way by my university, where some variety of woke leftism is hegemonic, does not make my feeling toward the left end of the political spectrum any warmer. Granted, I recognize there are some pretty solid leftist arguments against the policies that have been mandated ostensibly in response to Covid-19. They are largely missing in action in my university, however, and apparently in most of what passes for the academic left. It is all a bit dizzying. I would have thought that, at a minimum, not having so much blind faith in pharmaceutial companies and captured regulatory agencies (with histories almost as checkered as those of the companies they regulate) would come naturally to most people more-or-less on the left side of the political spectrum. No such luck. Even when it comes to a vaccine that was developed while Trump was in office!
I do realize that in some countries the right is the political wing most enthusiastically pushing for authoritarian Covid-19 policies.
I recently asked a colleague for a reference, saying I might not be working at the university for much longer. She was willing to give me a reference, but was curious about why I might be leaving. At first I was reluctant to explain it, in case it would lead her to change her mind about the reference. Eventually I impulsively explained why I was leaving. She was very understanding and supportive. Unfortunately, she decided to get the vaccination, under duress. Feeling pressured into get the vaccine to save her career, which she has worked at intensively, has been extremely upsetting to her. If anything happens to her thanks to the shots, I will just be that much angrier about this whole situation.
I have seen very little public opposition to the vaccine mandate at my university, not even anonymous opposition. There has been some. Faculty seem most enthusiastic about it, while students show the most opposition, at least going to be public comments (not any sort of systematic opinion survey).
*
You write in one of your comments here: “When we emerge on the other side of this, Canadian academia is going to need a radical restructuring, if not a complete dismantling and rebuilding. What is happening now is totally unpardonable, inexcusable, unacceptable, and never to be forgotten.”
What to do about academia might be the least of it, when–if–we emerge on the other side of whatever “this” is. I think there is a lot more social and economic disruption ahead of us, and large-scale violent civil unrest (well beyond anything we have seen recently) seems inevitable within the next decade, at least in the United States. I don’t know enough about the Canadian situation to comment. Certainly, if a federal vaccine mandate were to somehow make it out of the courts here, that would set off an enormous amount of violence. As corrupted as our judiciary has become, I still don’t really see that happening.
I think the vaccine mandates are part of a larger agenda pushing some sort of totalitarian, technocratic, neo-fedualist world government (or at least world system that amounts to nearly the same thing). I don’t have a really clear notion of all of this, but yes, I think there is a massive conspiracy afoot. Increasingly, I think the whole “pandemic” was created in order to push this dystopian agenda. Why wait for a virus to accidentally be released, when you have all of these plans you are waiting to implement? Anyway, there is an enormous struggle ahead of us.
Maximilian C. Forte
Thank you “Infectious Library Staff,”
your message resonates very strongly with me. I am sorry to hear about New Mexico–being at a distance, and knowing little, permitted me to fantasize about what a great place it must be for residents. It seems the world is now in very short supply of any such great place. It does help that certain zones are rebelling against the prevailing dictates–Alberta here in Canada, states such as Texas and Florida in the US (we could add others for a more complete list); Mexico, which thus far is rejecting pressures to “vaccinate” youths; Iceland, which has adopted an approach similar to Alberta’s, as national policy: let the virus work its way through now, natural immunity is the only solid basis for achieving herd immunity, etc. A number of African and Caribbean states are also refusing the bioterror dictates, some very quietly and others because they simply lack the resources needed to erect an elaborate Health Security State.
Yes, you are right: universities have not been a hotbed of critique and opposition to this new wave of fanatical securitization, of ridiculously disproportional responses that create absurdly illogical and self-contradicting policies. As one colleague at McGill expressed succinctly regarding one aspect of this debate: either the “vaccines” protect or do not protect those that receive them–if they do protect, then there is nothing to fear except fear itself; but if they do not protect, they must not be inflicted on others.
I would agree that framing any of this discussion in Left vs. Right terms is going to produce meaningless results. Ruling parties and governments following widely disparate ideological positions, have adopted authoritarian measures, steering away from decades of accumulated scientific knowledge while invoking “follow the science”. Likewise, opposition to such policies comes from people with equally divergent political backgrounds. Where parliaments lack any opposition on these issues–as in Quebec, for example–then the very definitional basis for the idea of a Left vs. Right is nullified. Political parties in general have failed to advance democratic debate, revealing themselves to be useless organs of the public interest, and extremely useful tools of the private interests of the elites that dominate them. There are exceptions of course, even major ones, and at least in the US public political debate on these matters is still vigorous–this is something that imitative Canada has failed to imitate.
Lastly, as a friend put it to me in private, many of us will be in different occupations and careers very soon, and we just have to prepare for that. It is not the end of everything for us. I am fully aware that it is extremely unlikely that I will prevail over my university administration, and certainly not alone. For those who choose to comply, I am very sorry for them: the academic world they chose to join, is not the one in which they will function from this point onward. None of their published works or their teachings that purport to be “critical” will be taken seriously by anyone, least of all themselves. Academics will simply degenerate into serving as arms of the state, as auxiliary police forces; as hollowed-out, automated cheque collectors, who offer unanimous consent in return for cash; quietly complying and producing nothing of any substance that will allow them to look back in pride at everything they have “achieved,” serene about what they have made of their lives. They will have failed themselves, their universities, the public interest, and democracy. This will take a terrible toll on them, which few of them have even begun to realize. I don’t think gaining freedom is the worst case scenario for us, as individuals.
Infectious Library Staff
Thanks for your reply. I may have more to say about it, but right now I just wanted to add that I intentionally left out some detail I originally put in about the other library employee I mentioned. I don’t want to jeopardize her career, especially since she has now sacrificed by getting the shots, while remaining in the closet about her views on the “vaccines.” The fact that I feel I have to be so cautious just underscores how oppressive the atmosphere has become.
Infectious Library Staff
I find it difficult to make general statements about New Mexico. I wasn’t born here, and didn’t move here until late in life. As dissatisfied as I currently am with the state, mostly for political reasons, it does have a charm that is difficult to resist. In many respects, it goes its own way (although our governor seems to want to emulate the governors of California and Washington). I am originally from a large east coast city, and I find there is a lot more gentleness in the everyday culture here. I also appreciate the local pride in local cultural traditions. The scent of roasting green chiles in the fall, or the site of farolitos at Christmas are small things, but they do contribute to a distinctive atmosphere.
It is easy for outsiders to project all sorts of fantasies onto New Mexico. There is a book entitled, Utopian Vistas: The Mabel Dodge Luhan House and the American Counterculture, that describes successive waves of artists, bohemians, and dreamers who came to Taos, bringing their own fantasy views of what Taos represented. After a while, I began to feel pity for the native Taoseños subjected to all of these starry-eyed outsiders. (Personally I have found something a little “off” about Taos when I have been there, but it could just be that the elevation doesn’t suit me.)
I was glad to see Lopez Obrador at least resisting the pressure to vaccinate younger individuals. Hopefully he won’t die unexpectedly, under mysterious circumstances! It’s definitely interesting to see which countries put up some resistance to the agenda being pushed globally. I suspect one could learn a lot about the weaknesses of global elites by closely examining those patterns.
I am not truly in the academic game, just someone on the margins, providing support, but in the past few years I have become almost embarrassed to work at my university, given how much of an indoctrination mill it seems to have become (or maybe it always was, and I just missed it). There is still some good work being done, but there is an awful lot of rot. It’s difficult to predict where this will all end up. I am not as confident as you are that academic careerists will have many regrets in the future (but maybe that’s not a good paraphrase of what you’ve said), but we’ll see.
Lorie
Infectious Library Staff– I hear you, I’m in NM. We’re organizing protests against vac mandates. Join if you can, understandable of course if it’d jeopardize your job (further). Anyway, this Wed (8/25) there will be a “Healthcare Protest for Vaccine Choice” (to support healthcare professionals who are anti-mandate, also teachers, students, workers, anyone is of course welcome) as I said, wed 8/25, 11am in Abq in the civic plaza. Will post the flyer when I get the link.
Infectious Library Staff
I am just coming back and seeing this now. Thanks for the information. I don’t have a lot of free time when I really feel up to such things (for health reasons), but I will keep my eyes out for events like this. Maybe once I have lost my job, and after I have done what I can do to prepare for my next moves, I will be able to go to such protests (if they haven’t ended by then, as individuals scramble to do something about their individual situations).
Eva Bartlett
Reblogged this on In Gaza.
Douglas Smith
The proof of bad medicine consists in the disharmony which it induces on all levels.
Maximilian C. Forte
Thank you Douglas, for that very wise statement.
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GK
Thank you for writing this, Maximilian. It sums up very well what I’ve been thinking about since April 2020.
haederpaul
While I am an educator, environmental activist, journalist and artist, it never surprises me how deeply Eichmann the arts are. Robert Bly and I had a few bourbons together years ago, in Spokane, when he was a literary guest. He told me that it was the English Department (plural, departments) that gave him the most pushback and hell during his early years as an anti-Vietnam War poet.
So, no exemptions, no religious rationale for not getting the jab, and there are no conscientious objector status for this jab. Indeed.com has seen a 90 increase in the past 30 days of jobs listed on that rotten website with “vaccine proof as part of employment” jobs listed.
We in the arts have to prove the jab status, and it will blanket across USA, Canada, and EU, and more: Quoting one artist — people need money.
“None of us have been working. People need the money. But we also can’t contribute to people not being safe, and we don’t want to be unsafe.”
Dr. David Ghilarducci — the deputy health officer in California’s Santa Cruz County, site of the Grateful Shred outbreak — expects vaccine requirements to become the norm at venues throughout much of the country soon. “The businesses want to provide a service that is safe,” he says. “They see it from a business angle, and also as a moral and health issue. Verifying that the entire group in there is vaccinated will probably attract more business. Personally, I would choose the venue that had that rule over one that didn’t have that rule.”
+–+
This new Scarlet A will run through society like wildfire, and a museum director in Italy (I am sure he has money stashed away) has resigned: Quoting,
Fabrizio Masucci, the director of the Sansevero Chapel Museum in Naples, has resigned from his post in protest against Italy’s new state mandate requiring all museum visitors to show proof of coronavirus vaccinations.
Italy introduced its new “green pass” requirements today, August 6. The rules require people to show digital certificates proving they have had at least one dose of the vaccine, or have tested negative for the virus within 48 hours, before they can enter restaurants, cinemas, museums, and indoor sporting events. Italy is the second European country to require such proof. France introduced its equivalent law earlier this week.
Masucci, who was the museum’s director for 10 years, said in an open letter that his decision was driven by his conscience, adding that the government was exploiting cultural institutions to force vaccinations.
“I would like to calmly remind you that museums are by their very vocation places of inclusion, and that equal access to art and culture [is] a right of all,” he said.
+–+
In USA, on the so-called “liberal” Tom Hartman show, he is spewing this: “I guess if you arrive to an Emergency Room after a fall or car accident, and you do not have the vaccination, then you probably should not be treated by the medical staff.”
+–+
Delta Airlines is increasing health care (sic) insurance premiums $200 a month for those who do not have the jab.
+–+
One hell of a propaganda operation!
ozmurf
Here is European Council Regulation 2021/953, (36), which can be found here:
https://op.europa.eu/en/publication-detail/-/publication/141deaf1-cd73-11eb-ac72-01aa75ed71a1/language-en
Regulation (EU) 2021/953 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 14 June 2021 on a framework for the issuance, verification and acceptance of interoperable COVID-19 vaccination, test and recovery certificates (EU Digital COVID Certificate) to facilitate free movement during the COVID-19 pandemic (Text with EEA relevance)
It contains the text:
It is necessary to prevent direct or indirect discrimination against persons who are not vaccinated, for example
because of medical reasons, because they are not part of the target group for which the COVID -19 vaccine is
currently administered or allowed, such as children, or because they have not yet had the opportunity or chose not
to be vaccinated. Therefore, possession of a vaccination certificate, or the possession of a vaccination certificate
indicating a COVID-19 vaccine, should not be a pre-condition for the exercise of the right to free movement or for
the use of cross-border passenger transport services such as airlines, trains, coaches or ferries or any other means of
transport. In addition, this Regulation cannot be interpreted as establishing a right or obligation to be vaccinated.
I also read that courts in Spain have quickly declared “green pass provisions as illegal and discriminatory” – but I don’t have a reliable reference.
However, I also read that supermarkets in France bar the unvaccinated from shopping.
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sp
Dear Professor, I wish to extend my thanks to you for speaking out. You truly deserve your title, unlike many (or perhaps most?) of the so called intellectuals populating the universities these days. I am a Concordia alumni, Poli Sci. I am totally flabbergasted by what is going on in our society (and the world in general) – I don’t know what to believe at this point, but I am convinced things aren’t right. The fact that so many are so quick to actually defend the erosion of our Liberty is disgusting and shocking. I wonder if our courts will even be able to uphold the law at this point? I hope. One of my ‘professors’ from Concordia, from a course on the Charter of Rights and Freedoms and Constitutional Law, had posted on twitter in favour of vaccine passports and mandates – I just don’t understand how it is possible!
I look back at my time at Concordia, and I had often felt like a dissident – in many ways I think the ‘cancel culture’ was a useful primer for this whole corona nonsense. To make people afraid to speak up. Well I had been in classes where I voiced the unpopular opinion, and sometimes it was me vs. the entire mob. But other times, I literally had other students come up to me after class and thank me for saying what they were thinking, but were too scared to say. Well, that is what you are doing. You are articulating what I think is actually on more people’s minds than the so called media wants us to believe. You are on the right side of history, Sir. Thank you for fighting the good fight. I do have hope. Not sure what else to say here, but Thank You once again.
Maximilian C. Forte
Thanks very much for your message. As I have told many others who contacted me by email, their messages are the unexpected gifts of publishing this statement. I have heard from many people in different occupations: registered nurses; a MD, a realtor, and a financial analyst; psychologists; student affairs officers; professors in philosophy, law, history, geography, theology, sociology, English, and public health; students in Quebec and across Canada–the list goes on and continues to grow (I spend no less than eight hours per day just replying to emails). However, what I noticed about Concordia is in perfect agreement with what you wrote, I am very sorry to say.
In any case, your former professor at Concordia is not getting their wish, not just yet: just today the University President sent out his message indicating that there would not be any mandatory vaccination, “for now”. On July 9, he promised a statement on August 25, advising us to wait for that announcement. The date came and went, with silence. Two days later, his statement came out and you could sense a bitter resentment that it was not what he wanted to announce: no big hammer dropped, just a lot of small hammers that amount to the same problem–illegal discrimination. Student-owned and student-operated food services, that all Concordia students support with their annual fees, will now enforce the vaccine passport. Moreover, students belonging to ethnic minorities and religious communities opposed to vaccination, will suffer the most, in a University committed to “diversity,” “inclusion,” “social justice,” and to teaching people about “anti-Black racism” and “systemic oppression”.
All students are to be masked in all classes, always. Yet the University President boasted, “we are a heavily vaccinated community,” suggesting it could be as high as 85%. That’s still not herd immunity? And you all need to be masked, when so heavily vaccinated, because the vaccines work so well?
Will they ever look back on their statements with shame, and wonder at how they could have uttered–let alone printed and signed–such absurdities? Be grateful that you are free of such university environments. As an academic colleague said on another site several years ago, the really smart ones stay away from university.
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Natasha Ksonzek
I have to say thank you Max, for speaking and for your truth and courage. Among the robotically trained society it is abomidably clear to some of us that the education institutions as the state indoctrination operations have been highly successful. At the University of Toronto, the compliant rule. The only Prof that I was aware of who has been against these coersive measures is Prof Arnold Itwaru who created the Caribbean Studies program as an anti imperialist anti racist program some 20 years ago, and whom you met some time ago. People seem to be mistaking obedience for integrity, and a virtue. We were all trained multiply for this day. “Simon Says” is the macabre game they trained us in, that they are playing us with today.
I feel we may need to form alliances to create a new kind of educational network that would not be centralized but community based and communal in nature. And needless to say, not state controlled. Education for human potential, not mass dumbing-down for our servant roles. Perhaps this will be the break we necessarily need to make with the vestiges of the traditional state white-washing brainwashing that has stood in for culture and identity. Perhaps this will give us the impetus to reach for and create a new culture of humanity on the spot. A humanity of sentient beings standing together for what is conducive for our communality and well-being, as guardians of our sovereignty of intelligence and creaive essence.
Natasha Ksonzek
Other Eye Books
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and in speaking, shares and in sharing we author our own community
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Maximilian C. Forte
Many thanks Natasha, and of course I not only remember Arnold very well, I have long admired him since I first met him in the 1980s at York University. I am glad to hear that he has taken this principled stand, and now he will find himself very alone…on campus anyway. I am not too hopeful about setting up an alternative educational system: it’s not just faculty who comply and enforce, it is students as well who are instantly triggered into denouncing anything as “misinformation” which they have not heard before, or with which they disagree. We did not use this language in universities before, i.e., “misinformation,” “conspiracy theory,” etc. We spoke of theories that were inadequately supported by evidence, or that were criticized, or which were the centre of debate–but rarely would you hear something be dismissed out of hand as an instantaneous and immediate reaction. Critiques had to be respectful, charitable, logical, and well constructed. Hostile criticisms themselves ran the risk of being dismissed. All of that has changed. It is now just censorship or silence.
Natasha Ksonzek
Thanks, I agree. Everything has changed, which is why those of us who see through the institutional compliance with authoritarianism and the coersion of our intelligence may want to form other ways of educating, other ways of organizing for those who are silenced but who are many more in numbers than they want us to believe. Numbers of people who are not in agreement with the current course of events are being manipulated and are many more than reported. Similarly, hospital admission numbers and claims of hospitals being overrun with cases have sometimes been found to be almost empty. If 30% of hospital frontline workers were in support of the protest on Sept 1 against current measures, as reported in alternative media, I have no doubt that there are more of us who do not want to take part in the new lockdown world order. But I have to say that any new initiatives that we can organize into being must necessarily be invented differently from the current systems of organization. I am guessing that there are alot of people who are simply staying out of the counted spaces, ie, there may be many who would love to be able to engage in learning but not in the University as a state model. I was thinking that maybe we have to come up with other ways of organizing engagement that would depart from the “system” model. I am thinking that there must be many who are simply staying away from the formal education establishment at the moment. While I don’t have a clear idea of what such a venture would look like, I think it may be necessary for some of us to start organizing to sustain knowlege and truth and real teaching for the present and future. In some ways I see this as an extension of the Western conquest histoirical practice of trying to destroy all other cultural knowledge systems including of course traditional practices and of cultural transmission of these thousands of years of humanity sustaining cultures. Many were forced to go underground to survive at all or for fragments to survive. We may need to meet, to gather, to both sustain a living humanity based entity as well as to envision and enact a new old way of communal transmission of culture and knowledge. I cannot bear to see all taken away nor can I bear the thought of not trying to organize differently to sustain us.
In solidarity,
Natasha Ksonzek
Other Eye Books
haederpaul
Ahh, Natasha, the K12 system in USA, UK, Canada, well, James Taylor Gatto wrote about it, about the Prussian roots of USA’s education system, and alas, the fact is, this is where indoctrination and dumb-downing starts, and then as a college teacher myself, I have to work hard in 16 weeks to open eyes and neural pathways to help my students unlearn almost everything — history, patriarchy, racist ideology, Disneyfication, McDonaldsification, infantilization, all of it, part and parcel, Western Consumer Compliant Capitalist Culture.
Quote — Schooling Against Education: Gatto’s Underground History
“Traditional education can be seen as sculptural in nature, individual destiny is written somewhere within the human being, awaiting dross to be removed before a true image shines forth. Schooling, on the other hand, seeks a way to make mind and character blank, so others may chisel the destiny thereon,” —Gatto, The Underground History of American Education
https://truthout.org/articles/john-taylor-gatto-challenged-the-ideas-inherent-in-us-mass-schooling/
The answer was mass schooling. In 1839, Prussia became the first country on the European continent to enact a national child labor law. It is no coincidence that this North German state subsequently became the most important country in the development of modern schooling. Often described as “an army with a country,” Prussia took the logic of the regimented factory shop floor and military training camp and applied it to the development of a national school system.
This “army with a country” demanded malleable subjects rather than educated citizens, and it was for the production of the former that a new national school system was created. One of the most important pedagogues in the development of the Prussian system, Heinrich Pestalozzi, touted his approach as one that would mold the poor “to accept all the exertions and efforts peculiar to their class.” As Gatto put it, Pestalozzi “offered them love in place of ambition. By employing psychological means in the training of the young, class warfare might be avoided.”
If modern schooling was born in the militaristic milieu of early 19th-century Prussia, it came of age in the rigid class system of England and reached maturity in the colonizing adventures of the British Empire. One need to look no further than Friedrich Engels’s 1845 book, The Condition of the Working Class in England, to understand the impact of the industrial revolution on England’s poor, whose living conditions dropped precipitously at the same time as mass schooling was being introduced in the country.
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Joel Gauthier
This is amazing. Stand strong Max!!
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Maximilian C. Forte
UPDATES AND APOLOGIES:
My apologies to everyone–two months ago I intended to produce a follow-up article coupled with a resource guide. In the time that has intervened, I have joined several networks (two of them networks of academics, one of which I am helping to build), and between several hundred emails per day and countless Zoom meetings every week, I am left with little time. In addition, preparing a resource guide when the events keep changing (for which the resources are designed), when lawsuits come and go, and when new initiatives are always being formed, means that the material keeps changing shape and growing. Even the follow-up portion keeps changing: there have now been many prominent statements by academics resisting the mandates, and I am trying to incorporate all of them.
Very soon, my “silence” will finally end here, where this fight is concerned. In the meantime–and not to sound like a broken record–but if you want daily updates see the Zero Anthropology Telegram Channel at:
https://t.me/zero_anthropology
(You can also preview the channel in your browser, without having an account.)