Calling on Our Collective Humanity
**Note: I was an educator in New Brunswick, Canada and, at the time this was written, I was facing imminent layoff without any access to financial support. I sent this follow-up letter on November 10th, 2021. To this day, not a single question has been addressed.**
It’s official: the New Brunswick Government has institutionalized medical apartheid. Those who have and have not participated in human trials for a genetic experiment is the basis on which such an absurd course of action has been predicated. Despite this country's rich custom of rights and freedoms, private businesses and establishments are now being manipulated to require users to provide proof of a COVID-19 vaccine to work, exercise, shop, and generally participate in social life. Domestic and international travel restrictions have virtually eliminated—practically overnight—millions of citizens’ ability to move freely across the earth. Without proof-of-product, which is to say, a receipt, millions are now either prohibited from leaving their own country through conventional ports of entry and exit, prohibited from domestic air travel altogether, and/or prohibited from re-entering their homeland. This is a slippery slope we have embarked on, one that historically begins with a “papers, please” policy and the predictable arc that follows. Typically that of genocide and open war.
On November 19th, 2021, GNB intends to double down on its discriminatory tactics by placing roughly 5000 public servants on indefinite unpaid leave. These individuals and the families for whom they provide will be barred from receiving the social services all tax-paying Canadians are typically entitled to (e.g., unemployment insurance). This is the type of conduct one would expect from a hostile party, one that seeks to punish dissent through economic austerity as part of a broader policy of attrition.
I asked sensible and direct questions in my letter “RE: Mandatory Employee Vaccine Mandate” sent to Blaine Higgs, Jennifer Russell, Dominic Cardy, and George Daley on October 18th, 2021. Not a single question has been addressed. Not one.
I have yet to see a copy of the policy nor an endorsement from public health. I have yet to see a reference to any scientific studies nor an evidence-based rationale for the mandate. Even unvaccinated public servants working from home will be placed on unpaid leave. This mandate bears no connection to safety, whatsoever. It is the opposite of safe—it is reckless and antagonistic.
Those imposing vaccination requirements using coercion are effectively practicing medicine without a license. Still more disconcerting is that they are complicit in coercing the rapidly growing number of vaccine risk-aware citizens to violate their right of informed consent by submitting to these inadequately tested and fast-tracked experimental shots. To deprive employees of their right to medical choice is to deny the possession of sovereignty over their bodies. Choice is compromised when an individual must decide between putting food on their family’s plate and being inoculated with a potentially dangerous experimental injection. Let me be clear: the government has called this “choice” in an attempt to escape having to answer to criminal charges of extortion and abuse. (1, 2)
At the beginning of the pandemic, COVID-19 was the enemy. Compassion was widespread. We all had to cultivate the courage to “get through this together”. Unvaccinated nurses showed up every day and risked their lives to serve unvaccinated patients. Unvaccinated teachers showed up with unvaccinated children to provide the best quality education possible during challenging and unprecedented times. All GNB employees did their very best to serve the public and ensure our essential services could continue operating.
When the vaccines rolled out, the initial goal was to reach 70% vaccination and then “return to normal”. Once we reached 70%, however, the goalpost kept shifting.
In mid-September 2021, once the number of vaccinated individuals started to plateau, Jennifer Russell, Blaine Higgs, Dominic Cardy, and Dorothy Shephard’s rhetoric changed from the enemy being COVID-19 to “anti-vaxxers”. These individuals have repeatedly stated this is a “Pandemic of the Unvaccinated”. Mr. Cardy has spoken publicly on many occasions, promoting hatred amongst the unvaccinated demographic. He has gone so far as to call unvaccinated children “plague kids” and has even said the unvaccinated should be “beaten”. Complaints from angry parents and citizens have been sent to Premier Higgs, yet no individual or public response was ever documented.
Censorship, doublespeak, hate speech, and hypocrisy have been the modus operandi of our government since the pandemic began. Medical professionals who publicly question the narrative have lost their licenses. A significant portion of the scientific and medical community understands there is more to public health than just infection control, and that vaccine mandates can harm public health more than they help. (3) We need their voices heard in the decision-making process. Vigorous and hard scientific debate should be encouraged, but smearing, slander, and politicization must be combatted and never tolerated.
Moreover, the government and media’s egregious rhetoric has fooled the public into believing the unvaccinated are “less than human”. Perhaps historical events are being recognized and espoused because men historically make a lot of money and gain a lot of power from disasters, manufactured or otherwise.
There are so many cases throughout history where people have chosen to dehumanize certain groups, for whatever reason, and it’s been incredibly effective. On each occasion, this led to large-scale horrific events where the government and the general public thought they were in the right. This is a terrible side of humanity that continues to repeat itself over and over and over again. We are seeing it happen once again today.
As an educator, I strive to create a learning environment that inspires students to live authentically, think expansively, and create bravely. What I am currently observing is not a product of compassion and critical thought, but rather of an industrialized indoctrination system churning out compliance and conformity.
Education is not memorizing dates or historical facts. Education is understanding how the majority of a population was convinced that their government’s violent and oppressive actions were required for the “greater good”. Education is learning how to spot the signs of history repeating itself, including tyranny.
Our government has weaponized fear and hatred against their people. This conduct is more suited to totalitarian regimes and dictatorships, the antithesis of democracy.
I stand in solidarity with those honouring and fighting for our rights and freedoms. I refuse to participate in, nor uphold the legitimacy of corrupt and oppressive institutions. I have no intention of complying with GNB’s discriminatory mandate. The government can take away my salary, but not my integrity.
Dear reader—remember this: It is merely the idea that we should live in fear of scarcity and uncertainty which allows us to surrender our sovereignty to a centralized (and easily corruptible) organization. The outsourcing of Truth perpetuates our collective enslavement. Deep down, however, every one of us knows until all beings are free, no one is free.
When we are scared, we are easily manipulated. It is radical self-responsibility and warrior-like courage that will break the spell. Make no mistake, real power is and always has been with the people. We can all play our part in co-creating the more beautiful world our hearts know is possible. The time is now.
References:
Criminal Code, RSC 1985, c C-46, s 346, <https://canlii.ca/t/7vf2#sec346>, retrieved on 2021-10-29
Criminal Code, RSC 1985, c C-46, s 265, <https://canlii.ca/t/7vf2#sec265>, retrieved on 2021-10-29
Subramanian, S.V., Kumar, A. Increases in COVID-19 are unrelated to levels of vaccination across 68 countries and 2947 counties in the United States. Eur J Epidemiol (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10654-021-00808-7
The study concluded, “Even as efforts should be made to encourage populations to get vaccinated, it should be done so with humility and respect. Stigmatizing populations can do more harm than good. Importantly, other non-pharmacological prevention efforts (e.g., the importance of basic public health hygiene with regards to maintaining safe distance or handwashing, promoting better frequent and cheaper forms of testing) needs to be renewed in order to strike the balance of learning to live with COVID-19 in the same manner we continue to live a 100 years later with various seasonal alterations of the 1918 Influenza virus.”