Lone Voices Usually Ignored – Until it’s Too Late

Kevan James

November 12, 2020.

There are countless examples. Individuals who speak out on one thing or another and are usually derided for their observations on whatever it is they observe and comment on (either that or they are just ignored). Yet the remarks they make often prove prophetic, perhaps not at the time but later, and sometimes years pass before they can say, ‘I told you so.’

Far be it for me to place myself in this bracket as in truth it really is for others to say, but I can’t help considering myself as one of those lone voices. That said, the term is somewhat contradictory; if there are many such voices they are hardly ‘lone’. But who hears them? Or even reads their message? Indulge me for a moment and do forgive my (once again) referring you to a book I wrote, first published four years ago, in 2017, ‘Comments of a Common Man’.

Intended as my observations on life in general but the United Kingdom in particular, the book was updated in 2018 and the third edition a year ago, in 2019. The consistent thread throughout is freedom, of each individual, each citizen, to live their lives as they choose, pursue the careers they wish, to come and go as they please, without undue interference from the state and its agents. I warned that our liberty was under threat and with ever-increasing severity. In the book I wrote that three things had been used consistently to undermine freedom and liberty. The first is terrorism or the threat of it; we are routinely watched, profiled, questioned, searched and in some cases, arrested before doing anything ‘just in case’. That terrorism represents a real threat is indisputable but it isn’t new. We in the UK have lived with it since the 1970s but we haven’t, until comparatively recently, restricted ourselves or been restricted in what we do, where we go or how we get there.

The second thing to be used is Paedophilia. There are bad people around, we know that. But we have, again until comparatively recently, never raised our children to be automatically fearful of certain people. Neither have we lived in fear for our children – we bring our kids up to be aware however. Or at least we used to. I also raised another point in my book, which is that there are two ways to control people; by force and intimidation or by instilling fear. Make enough people fearful of something and they will bow to one’s will. It is what the terrorist does – make you fearful of being blown up, stabbed, shot or otherwise harmed, to make you submit. And it is what governments have done with both terrorism and paedophilia – make us afraid of both.

We don’t consciously think we are afraid, but we are. We can be very fond of saying how we will cheerfully do serious harm to anybody who may be perceived as a danger to our kids. And will we? Possibly we might, indeed some have but out of fear rather than anything else. An atmosphere of suspicion pervades the very fabric of our lives now; suspicious of somebody because of their faith or origin, or even just their name; suspicious of somebody, usually male and of more mature years, just talking to children. And that suspicion lingers because governments have, in some cases rather subtly, allowed it to not only linger but flourish. It is an old concept but one proved to have worked time and again – divide and conquer. Instil fear into the population, get the media onside with juicy details (they love a good ‘bad’ headline) and everybody meekly submits. Whether they realise it or not.

So what of the third thing used by governments to exercise control? As well as terrorist cells rampant among us, paedophiles roaming the parks and playgrounds, the third is health. Ah…yes - health. In my book I cited examples of so-called health drives instigated by governments ostensibly to improve our well-being. Smoking was the first and food the next. I asked a question in the book – where does it stop, where do we go next? Now we know. And we know with devastating impact.

Allow a little repetition - again…yes, I know, I keep on about this but it really does seem like I am the only one - the lone voice - raising the point but…how many coronaviruses can infect humans? The answer is seven. Three of them can result in the common cold. Have we shut down the world because of these three coronaviruses? No, we haven’t. Three can lead to a number of ailments although none have any serious implications and just one, the most recent, can lead to COVID-19. Just that one and it is this disease that can lead to other health conditions, including those we might already have (yet not know we have) that might kill.

But the result of COVID-19 has been mass panic, hysteria and outright fear. In fairness, this has gripped governments the world over and all have responded the same way, by closing down life; by shutting down business large and small; by imprisoning previously free people in their homes; by trashing the world’s economies; by, to all intents and purposes, destroying all we once knew and held dear. By dehumanising us and compelling us to cover our faces and forcing us away from each other; by denying us that which we need most as people – contact. By giving power to those who do not deserve it, do not need it and who will abuse it.

At a funeral, a grieving widow is comforted by her son with an arm around her shoulder until, waving his arms and shouting, thus halting words of solace in mid-sentence, an official somebody (who previously and ordinarily was nobody) strides in and demands they separate. The Daily Mail newspaper is not everybody’s choice of reading (and is as guilty as any of sensation and disinformation) but today’s headline is worthy of note: ‘For Pity’s sake, Let Them Hold Hands’, it says, with a wife forced to wave at her husband from a distance in a care home. That is repeated across the UK – loved ones torn apart by fear.

And we are indeed being divided. The mask law, introduced in the UK last July, contains exemptions for those who find covering their nose and mouth with a piece of cloth hard to do. Exemptions ignored in the rush to comply; shops, rail stations, everywhere, big signs displaying the message, ‘You Must Wear a Face Covering’. Yet no mention until very recently, of the words, ‘Unless Exempt’. Hence masked people confronting those without, demanding to know why their face is uncovered. Divide and conquer…

Think back to March: it was only for a few weeks, it’s just temporary…and here we are, eight months on, facing what will inevitably be compulsory vaccination. Without that we will not be able to have our health passports. Without our health passports we will be forbidden to leave our homes. The state’s tracking system will monitor our every move, every act we take – in my book I even suggested we will be forbidden to have sex except for an allocated time slot and should we have children, they will be removed from us as we are a danger to them while they are children – all adults, without exception, are dangerous so once born, our kids are whipped away to be raised in a safe environment until they are adults (we get them back then but as adults they too will be decreed a danger to their kids if they have them).

Sounds rather outlandish - yet would anybody have predicted the events of 2020 back on January 1? No, not really; except I did, one lone voice in the wilderness. But this is the future. This is your future. And I told you so.

© Kevan James 2020

Illustration: Frederic Guimont

Comments of a Common Man Edition 3

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