Episode 127
The World Health Organization has declared the COVID-19 pandemic officially over. The nation has changed quite dramatically since the spring of 2020, both for better and for worse. In this episode, we look back at the pandemic and try to make sense of what we just went through. There were significant economic, social, spiritual consequences of the pandemic and our response to it. In many important ways, the pandemic (along with the Trump and Biden presidencies) pulled the wool off our eyes, allowing us to see a more complete and honest picture of the state of our institutions, our people, and our country. What are someways (both good and bad) the pandemic affected you? Let us know in the comments section below.
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Transcription
Note: This is an automated transcription. It is not perfect but for most part adequate.
Is that there’s a distinct anti science flavor to this, so if they get up and criticize science, nobody’s going to know what they’re talking about. But if they get up and really aim their bullets at Tony Fauci, well, people can recognize there’s a person there. There’s a face, there’s a vice you can recognize, you see him on television. So it’s easy to criticize, but they’re really criticizing science because I represent science.
[Jay]
Thank you for tuning in to the Removing Barriers podcast. I’m Jay and I’m MCG. And we’re attempting to remove barriers so we can all have a clear view of the cross.
[MCG]
This is episode 127 of the Removing Barriers Podcast, and in this episode we’ll be looking back at the COVID-19 pandemic and what we learned about the government, the people, and the pandemic. By the way, the World Health Organization has now officially declared the COVID pandemic over.
All right, Jay, let’s get into it. Let’s talk about then and now. Where did the virus come from?
[Jay]
That would depend on. When you are asking that question, if you were asking that question in late 2019, early 2020, the virus came from a wet market in Wuhan, China. Now, however, we’ve come to realize that the most likely explanation for the origin of the virus is the bio lab that is in Wuhan. It was an engineered virus that was either released or accidentally released, and. There are many government organizations here in the United States that have confirmed, or at least admitted that that is the most likely explanation for the origin of the virus.
[MCG]
Yeah, it’s amazing to me that we would have gotten into trouble back in 2020 or at least claimed to be. Racially insensitive. If we said that he was coming from Wuhan, China and today I think the FBI has now. Said that, the likelihood of the virus coming from gain a function with search in Wuhan, China, I don’t know if they went that fast, they gain a function, but they did confirm somehow saying that the virus is not. Oh originated from China and most likely from that very same laboratory that you talk.
[Jay]
About was there ever a dispute that it was from China? I don’t think that was the dispute. I think the dispute was whether it came from the wet market or whether it came from somewhere else. I think where the issue with. Quote China came from was because. President Trump, who was president at the time, had no hesitation and no qualms to say it was a China China virus, the way that he would say it, and because it’s Trump, of course. Ohh, that’s just racist. That’s xenophobic. You can’t say it’s the China virus. You can’t say it’s from China because of course there was more political impetus behind that. To make it a sort of racist or xenophobic thing to say that it came from China, I don’t think there was ever disputed that the outbreak started in China because China was the one who reported the outbreak. To the what is it? The World Health Organization so.
[MCG]
Yeah, but the problem with COVID Neven from the beginning was that it became political. Yeah, you’re right. No one really disputed. Started in China, the dispute was how we got started, whether it was getting function research, whether we jumped from animals to humans, whether it was in the wet market, whatever the case may be, it became political pretty quickly. I don’t remember back in 2020. I think a week before the shutdown or so, maybe two weeks before the shutdown, Nancy Pelosi, who was the speaker of the House, she actually went to China Town as a political stunt to show Trump that, you know, no one is afraid of this thing. And then a few weeks later, we all in a shutdown.
[Jay]
Right.
[MCG]
So it became political very quickly and. Of course, we started this episode. Doctor Anthony Fauci saying that he represents science, but the problem was that science in the beginning it became very political and not scientific very quickly. So I think that was.
[Jay]
It was only political because of who was in office. If it were any other candidate. I can’t imagine it would have been politicized to the degree that it was. They hated that man and they wanted him out. And the pandemic was a very convenient means. And to lobby or to. Lob more bombs at them to get them out of the office.
[MCG]
That might be true. I’m not 100% sure if that’s the case, but definitely Trump being in office was a catalyst for it becoming very political. I think the fact that it was a presidential election year has probably more to do with it than the fact that. It was Trump, but I can’t dispute the fact that Trump played a big role in this because, of course, we know that he’s probably one of the most divisive president we ever had. So yeah, but you know, the thing that I interest in in the most is that I wonder when will the truth finally come out? When will the Chinese government? Finally, say hey, this is everything we do, the US government say, hey, this is everything we do and we finally get the truth. I wonder if it’s going to be maybe something like a 75 to 100 years when everything is on seal and we can see truly what the government truly. Knew when the virus started, because Trump even admitted during one of the presidential debate that he actually kept information back because he didn’t want people to panic.
[Jay]
Which is reasonable, I would imagine.
[MCG]
In some sense, but in another sense it didn’t work because people still were very fearful of.
[Jay]
COVID people were only very fearful of COVID because of the type of media coverage that it received. Do you remember how every single day during Trump’s presidency on the mainstream media outlets there was a ticker at the bottom? Of every single one, whether it’s CNN, MSNBC, NBC, ABC, they all had the ticker of COVID naths, which is. Disputable because there was also a discrepancy. There was also differences in how COVID naths were counted, but that ticker was on every single mainstream media news broadcast, always at the bottom. New cases always reported on running ticker, but as soon as Biden became president, that ticker went away. There was a lot of hysteria that was drummed up and exacerbated by the coverage the mainstream media was giving. This particular virus we’ve since come to realize, and we’ve since come to know that the virus was not nearly as deadly as they purported it to be. That’s not to say that there wasn’t a pandemic. That’s not to say that it certainly warranted caution and warranted concerned. But to the degree that we saw in mainstream media, we know now it was unwarranted. I think that how long is it going to take for us to know the truth? You know, let’s take Kennedy’s assassination in 63. We’re in 2023 now. So what is that? 70 I can’t do math. What is it? 60 years later?
[MCG]
See you.
[Jay]
We’re probably going to find out. Begin to find out what happened. 60 maybe 70 years later. So you and I will be long gone. I’m sure, before we find out exactly what happened.
[MCG]
Is it tested here? Because China, when the virus started, shut down international flights? Well, not international flights. Domestic flights from Wuhan to other areas in China. But they didn’t shut down international flights. And China probably had some of the most draconian. Shutdowns and lockdowns and stuff. Yeah, with the virus. And initially they reported very low deaths in COVID, but then now somehow it’s being reported that China probably had the most deaths from COVID so.
[Jay]
Ohh, they were lying of course. So they were not forthright with upfront or forthcoming with the international community, but what was actually happening, they were welding people shut in their homes in order to try and contain the virus. They had that zero COVID policy that many people, even in China, were protesting against. And of course, there were videos. Now you had to go out of your way to find these videos, but there were videos that were posted of people that were wailing in their, like in these buildings. I don’t know if their apartment building or condos or whatever they were these. Buildings that people were living in, where the doors were welded shut and people were not allowed to come out because they were practicing that type of, as you said, draconian. Containment, so it makes sense if China were saving face and China wanted to lie about how bad the situation was, it would make sense that they would enact those policies with their own people, but that they wouldn’t shut down international flights because if they did, then people would get the sense that it’s a lot more serious than they were letting on. And many of the. Doctors and medical personnel that were raising the alarm about the virus have either died from the virus or have turned up missing in some other fashion, so they went out of their way to try and hide to the world to what degree this was affecting. I am not an expert in Chinese politics or anything of that nature, but it seemed it would be in their best interest to do so, especially if they’re trying to usurp the United States as the leading power, both economically, politically and even socially. In terms of the export of culture, it only makes sense that they would do that because they can’t afford to seem weak or they can’t afford to appear. To not have everything under control. Which is probably why they reacted the. Way that they did.
[MCG]
Yeah, and I can’t really say that I trust the Chinese government, but to be honest, I can’t really trust the American government neither. So both of them are in the same bracket except. Maybe if I had to choose one that I’m going to trust a little bit more, I might lean towards the one that I can actually vote out, but yeah.
[Jay]
You might. I disagree. I would say that we are OK. We’re not that much better, but we are definitely better in terms of because at least a modicum of transparency is there. And I think that we will discover and talk about in this podcast how even the illusion of that was brought to light and how the government responded to the pandemic. How the government interacted with its people during the pandemic, so to your point, there is definitely a sense. In which we recognize, perhaps I’m sure there are people that were paying attention and this didn’t surprise them, but I was one of the people that was completely taken aback and surprised by the state of our government and our institutions. And I think the pandemic pulled the sheet off as it were, so that we could see exactly what we’re dealing with here. And it’s not pretty.
[MCG]
Yeah, let’s talk about how quickly the virus spread because. I don’t even remember Ebola, and even the swine flu and some other recent I guess they didn’t really rise to the level of pandemic. Mix, but there definitely was some sort of scale with these viruses and this is not a one to one comparison because Ebola is transmitted a little bit differently than COVID.
[Jay]
How is Ebola transmitted as opposed to COVID? I know COVID is respiratory. You blink and you get it. I’m being hyperbolic there, but it’s highly contagious.
[MCG]
Right. I think it always hardly can change this as well. But if I would guess, I think he has to be close contact, right? Unlike COVID. But regardless of how it’s transmitted, what I’m getting at is the fact of waste. The Ebola outbreak started in Africa. And even though, you know we had some cases in the US and cases other ways in the world, it didn’t really rise to the level of a COVID. Pandemic. No, it didn’t. Right. And of course that has to do with how we spread and maybe sanitary conditions and all that stuff and even medical know how to isolate folks that have gotten it and burial techniques or whatever. But my point with it is this. COVID again, this is not the one to one comparison, but COVID started in China. China trades with the entire world because of their cheap products and everything.
[Jay]
It’s the world’s manufacturer, sure.
[MCG]
So to me, the virus spreads much faster because you know everyone does business with China. So it became quickly. The first world virus as well, because Ebola started in Africa and he seems to be very much contained because. I guess the world doesn’t do that much trade with Africa. And so if at least not to the level of China and it pretty much contained and didn’t spread to the first world that much, but the virus starting in China spread quickly to the first world, again it could be because of the way COVID is transmitted compared to Ebola. But it’s just a unique. Comparison that I look at and wonder, you know. The place where the virus was started, did it have any impact on how much it spread or just because of COVID is airborne and you can get it much quicker than something like Ebola that.
[Jay]
Clearly had something to do with it. As you said, the world trades with China and so and as we mentioned before, international flights. To and from Wuhan were not shut down, and so there was only one place for the virus to go out. It had to spread not just because of where the virus originated, but because of the response to it as well. It ultimately would have. To spread and that has a lot to do with it, but it spread fairly quickly. December 31st of 2019, there were 27 cases in Wuhan and that’s when they alerted the World Health Organization. And on the 1st, the CDC suspect. The wet market. As a source, or so they say, that’s what they told the world. Whether or not they suspected the bio lab from the very beginning. I don’t know. In January 7th of 2020, so we’re only talking a week later. China isolates the strain and the genetic code was released five days later. So the first death in Wuhan or in China from the virus, of course, was in Wuhan, was on January 9th. And at that time, Wuhan officials declared that there is no evidence of human to human contact. I don’t believe they were telling the truth. I think they knew, but they didn’t tell the world. Of course, that’s just my suspicion. I’ll just leave it at that. That’s just personally my opinion. So anyway, the. First, death in China was on the 9th. And then on the 13th, there was the first documented case in Thailand. There was someone who had traveled from Wuhan to Thailand and from there on the 14th, the World Health Organization tweeted that the investigations found no clear evidence of human to human transmission. And yet. We obviously have a traveler from Wuhan that traveled to Thailand and infected others with that virus as well.
[MCG]
What did they mean by human to human transmission? Are they? And that. One human wasn’t transmitted to another.
[Jay]
Human right. They were still looking at the wet market as the source, so they were still looking at, like, something jumping from the bat to the human, something that you picked up from a non human source.
[MCG]
But that doesn’t make. Sense if you can jump from the back if you can’t jump from the back to the human, why you wouldn’t jump from a human to another human.
[Jay]
I would imagine that’s what they mean. Well, because now you’re talking about, well, OK, I’m definitely not a microbiologist or an infectious disease doctor, but from what I understand, if they say there’s no evidence of human to human contact, I mean, the people that have died from it. Didn’t get it from someone else. They got it from the animal or the bat or the in this case they were still thinking wet market. But here’s the exact tweet that the World Health Organization put out on January 14th about the virus, preliminary investigations, and by preliminary investigations. I’m sure they mean well, China told us. That’s basically what that means. Preliminary organizations conducted by the Chinese authorities have found no clear evidence of human to human transmission of. Novel coronavirus, 2019. They hadn’t given it a name at that point, so they just called it the novel coronavirus. But we know it now, as COVID identified in Wuhan and a follow-up tweet repeated that adding, however, such transmission is always a concern when patients have respiratory symptoms this requires. Further investigation and the following day there was the first documented case in Japan. Five days later, the first documented case in South Korea, and it wasn’t until the South Korean traveler from Wuhan got. Sick that they confirmed human to human contact or transmission, so this was what is this? Let’s see. A week after they said Ohh. There’s no evidence of human to human contact. A week later, that is when they said Ohh there is human to human contact and they confirmed it with that South Korean traveler from Wuhan. A day later, roughly, it showed up in Australia. The first documented case in Australia and the day after that, the first documented case in the US so everything was developing rapidly. We could give them the benefit of the doubt in saying that they did not know or understand how this virus was being transmitted. They were working hard to try and identify. By how it was being transmitted, but considering that it was a SARS type coronavirus, it was a coronavirus and we had the outbreak before, not of this particular virus. This is a new one. Obviously, we had a SARS, a coronavirus outbreak before. It baffles me as to why they wouldn’t realize the potential for human to human. Contact or transmission, I mean, yeah.
[MCG]
Yeah, that’s why I was asking that question. Yeah, because even the common cold is a member of the coronavirus. So I understand that this was new, but again I will agree with you, it baffles my mind that they would give so much misinformation.
[Jay]
Right. Right.
[MCG]
But not just misinformation.
[Jay]
I would call it obfuscation like they knew they were fudging. It didn’t really. Is that the same as miscommunication or misinformation?
[MCG]
Well, I wouldn’t even call him misinformation. I think they would just call him back a lot.
[Jay]
Yeah, they were not telling us all of what they knew at the time.
[MCG]
Right. Because I would image. And that, you know, one coronavirus will behave very similar to our other.
[Jay]
Right. They’re in the same family, right? It’s the same as can have would say, type. They’re in the same family, they’re in the same type of viruses. Why wouldn’t they behave in? The similar fashion.
[MCG]
Almost saying there probably some differences, but I don’t understand why they would not believe or say that he will contact from one human to the next, but. Anyways, I’m no scientist nor any experts, so I’ll leave that there.
[Jay]
None of us are sure. But Wuhan was shut down on the 23rd of January, once the first case was established in the United States, the very following day, Wuhan was shut down, and then a week later from there, the World Health Organization declared the coronavirus a public health emergency of international. Concern and then in the following day or two countries were banning travel from China. So from the time that the virus strain was isolated and the genetic code was released to when the country or basically the world shut down, was a month. A little less than a month, we’ll say 3 weeks, we’ll say 3 weeks.
[MCG]
Is the world shut down the world shut down? In March, this is in January.
[Jay]
No, no, no. When countries began banning travel from from China was in February, February 1st, and on that same day, the US Department of Health declared a public health emergency.
[MCG]
OK.
[Jay]
And then that’s when things. I mean, we didn’t completely shut down in February, but by March, everyone was shut down. So we’ll give it 3 weeks a month from when they isolated the strain. From when they identified the virus to when everything shut down was about 3 weeks, we’ll say 3 weeks to a month.
[MCG]
Right. What about initial reactions, though? Because I think we can look at it from different. You know, maybe the people, the government, you know, as I said before, Donald Trump initially said he withholds some information because he didn’t want people to panic. But then it seems like you know the federal politicians and the local politicians and the doctors, the people all had different reaction. And I’ve even had people who have said to me that they got COVID in December of 2019 of early January, even before the government. Said that, the virus was here. They said that they got. COVID like symptoms where they have lost their sense of smell and their taste, but then back in late December, no one was talking about COVID.
[Jay]
Right, right. So then you’re saying more than likely the virus? Was here long? Before they suspect that it arrived.
[MCG]
I don’t know. I’m just. I’m just going off of what folks have said to me that they had it early January and late December.
[Jay]
Right.
[MCG]
So you know, of course, these are folks that didn’t really go to the hospital or anything for it. They just thought they had a bad, bad case of the flu or something.
[Jay]
Flu or.
[MCG]
So who knows? I can’t prove it and. I’m not going to tell them that they are. But that’s what they said. Also, you think about the federal government. I talk about Donald Trump as well. But Nancy Pelosi has mentioned that as well. But the politicians, to me, you know, never make a good crisis go to waste. Sure, definitely grab a hold of this, even though initially they were done playing it as much. Everyone else, right. You know when the country went into shut down. My initial thought was two weeks. We’re going to be back. In the office. Well, he has been over three years and haven’t been back in the office since, so not because of COVID. Now of course, because my company decided to not to renew the lease of their office that we’re in and they say, hey, we’re going to give you. Sniping to upgrade your Home Office and stay there I guess. But the politician definitely used it to grab power. I think the local politicians as well didn’t know how to react. And of course we see the. The action in different parts of the country drastically different. If you live in California compared to Florida, you had a different experience compared to if you live in New York, where declared emergency and grab a hole of that power very quickly and shut down churches and shut down.
[Jay]
Right.
[MCG]
Or the social gatherings. But then you can see what they really like. This exposed the government so. I remember even California, they shut down churches, but they allowed strip clubs to remain open. You know, that’s telling. And then they allow people to go and March and protest, but then he can’t go to church and he kind of show you where the government is.
[Jay]
Right.
[MCG]
And then some countries even had it worse. Justin Trudeau in Canada, that was really bad up there as well. I know Italy initially had it really bad as well. Remember, Italy was probably the first first world country that had a really got here really bad.
[Jay]
Yeah, Italy was the first one to just. I mean they locked down, they they became the new Ground Zero, as it were, for that virus they for a while.
[MCG]
I didn’t think it was pain and stuff like that before.
[Jay]
There they.
[MCG]
He was really bad in the US, but then. COVID really hit the first world countries really hard. It seemed like at the end of the day, the first world countries were hit harder than the third world countries. When it comes to COVID, maybe except for Brazil, but Brazil is probably more like a Second World economy than a third world, so. I don’t know, but then the doctors, though I don’t want to be critical of the doctors because I think the doctors did a pretty good job and also their nurses and their healthcare workers did a pretty good job and they did it with a pandemic that was killing a lot, a lot of people. And I think their hands were tied because of the political climate because they were. A debate. That’s why it’s so funny or annoying. When Doctor Anthony Fauci come out and say Ohh, I represent science, but there’s no debate. The doctor thought that was recommending what they call it. I’ve affected and stuff like that, and they make fun of it and call it horse. The Wormer and all this stuff I remember taking. Private reckman when I was going to. New Guinea and I start taking it like I think it was like a week or two before we left. Then we had to take it while we were there and then continue taking it a week or two. When we came back to the US and that was because we were trying to. Prevent getting malaria. So when I heard that was being recommended for COVID like, yeah, I know that. I took it before. Why is it that all of a sudden now we become so political, right? That’s the whole thing about it. That’s why the science got blurred because. We all know science as we learn more. That’s why sometimes I don’t want to be so hard and Doctor Anthony because I understand we didn’t know that much at the beginning and we learn and go and we change our minds and things change. But there were no grounds for debate. The scientist community couldn’t come together and say, hey, we understand, OK, this happen. But we should just drink and accept whatever is coming down the Pike. And the problem with that is, again, because it became political, they’re going to be the great divide, because now you’re forcing me to wear a mask. You’re forcing me to stay in my home. You’re forcing me to do XY and Z and I’m like I hit the coat. Angie Tate, but agitate. Said hey, I’m a young and fit. If COVID killed me, gonna kill everybody else. I wouldn’t put myself in the same bracket. That and dictate. But we saw from evil. And that COVID affects greatly a certain age group, a certain weight of people than others, but yet everybody had to be under this draconian rule, even if they didn’t want to.
[Jay]
I remember the governor of New York. What’s his name again? His brother was a anchor. Yes, the former governor of New York.
[MCG]
The former Governor of New York.
[Jay]
I remember once he gave periodic press releases and periodic updates with how they were handling COVID in his state. And he said something that was just incredible. My incredible, I mean, terrible. Just a terrible thing to say, but just so incredible that he would have the gall to say something like that. There was something like a decrease in the numbers temporarily or something. Some good news that he reported and he blatantly said well, God didn’t do that. Science did that. And I thought. You know the basic definition of science, although in light of the pandemic we’ve come to realize that what they call science and what the actual definition of science are now called 2 completely different things. But as science has become a God for many people, and so it’s their religion.
[MCG]
Yeah, it’s the religion.
[Jay]
And so if you question it, which you’re supposed to be able to do in science. Right, if you. Question it. If you present an alternative, or if you’re merely standing up to say that you want to learn more, you want more information, you want to investigate further. And suddenly you’re anti science. You’re anti this anti that and they felt like they had to really crack down on people to keep that narrative from flourishing. Because I would imagine the prevalence and the presence of social media changed how people in power, let’s say. Interact with the people with the Internet, with our phones. Everyone has a mini computer in their pocket. Anyone can instantly become an investigator on their own. They’ve got their phone, they can record, they can do the research for themselves. There’s the search engines, there’s Google. The access to information has completely changed the landscape in terms of how. The people interact with the powers that be, as it were, that perhaps they felt like early on they had to really clamp down on any dissent. Because of the possibility of the proliferation of false news grifters that would try to take advantage of the pandemic and enlarge themselves and put out misinformation and or put out things that are just blatantly untrue, but because they can present it convincingly, people would be LED astray. So perhaps if we want to give them the benefit of the doubt. We can say maybe that’s why they reacted. In such a draconian fashion as they did. Now, I’m not saying that they reacted the way China did in terms of the intensity, but it’s not that far off because people were being told to stay home. If you come out, you’re going to kill Grandma. You may not get sick from it, but you might bring it home to grandma. There was this fear mongering this. Of inability for us to think for ourselves because they didn’t want you thinking for yourself. There might be a benevolent reason because people don’t really understand infectious disease, and we really need to clamp down and shelter in place. Or it could be a malicious reason, IE wanting to control the people, and I think it’s more the latter than the former.
[MCG]
One thing I would add do or say is this, as we compare the US response to China response that we’ve been doing one thing. We need to be grateful for is the strength of the US. And their separation of power from the federal government and the state, because if we didn’t have that, it would have been easy for the US, the whole of US to be California or New York or wherever else that had what we would call draconian, sure, rules and shutting our church, even though.
[Jay]
The states. Yes, indeed.
[MCG]
Many federal cases were won in New York and California because there’s don’t churches and synagogues and other places of worship, quote and UN quote because they were taken to court and they lost. And that point to the strength of the Constitution because without that. Florida could not do what they do, and even many of the states in the Midwest that you know, your neighbor is a mile and a half apart from you. They’re like, why do we need to have these rules when no one really live on top of each other? As you would imagine in New York? So that add to the strength of the US. And add to the reason why the rules were different. And of course I hate to say it, but there might be some truth to this as well. Most of these countries that have the draconian. Rules don’t have a Second Amendment, so that could also reduce the likelihood of the government clamping down a little bit harder on the people. Looking at Australia, there were videos out where people were being beaten and stuff like that by police because they didn’t stay in their home or whatever the case may be.
[Jay]
They had quarantine camps. We’ll be nice and call them quarantine camps, right? That they were hauling people off to and people were trying to escape and the. The PR got so bad that they actually tried to change the narrative and say, see, it’s not a concentration camp, it’s not a quarantine camp. People are enjoying themselves there and then, but in reality we realize what was happening because like I say, everyone has a phone. Everyone can be an instant independent journalist now and record what’s actually happening as opposed to the narrative that they’re selling you. Or the narrative that they want you to believe.
[MCG]
Yeah, but again, talking about the reaction of the government 15 days or 50. Yeah, 15 days to flatten, flatten the curve.
[Jay]
Yeah, two weeks slow. So slapping the Yep.
[MCG]
Well, I must say at the same time, but if we want them to say, because if that’s a three month. The pushback probably would have been too great, right? Even if there is in a month, maybe the pushback would have been too great. So 15 days to flatten the curve and then keep on extending, extending and extending it until for some states it was six months a year and still trying to flatten the curve and he’s still like he never for some places it’s probably. Just recently got flattened according to the emergency rule that they have, you know, right now the US, the emergency.
[Jay]
Right. Right.
[MCG]
Stuff has been lifted, but you know again what I’m thankful for is the fact that we have a constitution. We have separation of power between federal government and state. Some powers belong to the federal government, some belong to the state, and the COVID-19 response was more state and local government response than anything the federal government did try to drop the hammer on some stuff, but. They were met with resistance again. Because of our strong Constitution compared to China or even honestly a country like Canada.
[Jay]
And Canada was certainly in draconian and how they responded to many things as well. But I was comforted to see the ornery side of the American spirit come out when the government tries to clamp down, and you still have people who will stand up and say no, which is. But this country is basically known for standing up against tyranny and winning. But I was also disheartened to see how many people were willing to just cave or willing to just comply. By and part of that could be because they were frightened so badly by the media.
[MCG]
Yeah, they were fearful.
[Jay]
Yeah, they were fearful. They were frightened so badly by the media and by the ominous predictions that were being put out by people that we trusted doctors, institutions, hospitals and things like this. And so we’re talking about initial reactions here. Doctors were urging people to social distance. And to wear masks and to stay home and to comply with government curfew and government shelter in place type mandate. It’s because they didn’t want sick people coming in or they didn’t want anymore sick people than they were having to deal with. But I have. Heard certain doctors, nurses and other first responders, not first responders, like EMT’s, but just people on the front lines of fighting the pandemic. Medically, that were saying things that were quite. And that’s something that perhaps we should be paying attention to because many of them were beginning to say, especially when people were beginning to stand up against the requirement for masks and the requirement for social distancing, they were beginning to say, well, why should I? Have to treat you. If you’re not protecting yourself from the virus, why should I treat you and then expose myself to the virus when you’re not taking the necessary precautions to protect yourself from the virus? And my mind I was thinking that is an incredibly dangerous path to go down deciding whether or not you’re going to provide healthcare. Because someone didn’t follow whatever protocols that might be in place. So the reason why I say that’s dangerous, let’s say for example you have COVID which are asymptomatic and you get into a car crash. They test you when you get there. I find that with the rapid test and they find that. You’re unvaccinated, but you have COVID. What are they going to deny you treatment because you didn’t so-called follow protocol or whatever it is? That’s a very dangerous path to go down. How could you possibly? You know the Red Cross, particularly in a war zone, they don’t discriminate in terms of who they receive for care. They will receive both the enemy and friendlies because medically they just have that standard that they’re going to treat everyone well. It seemed like in the pandemic there was a rising sentiment. I don’t think every healthcare professional felt this way, but there were a few that were voicing it, which means that there were more than we think. They were just saying what other healthcare professionals probably wanted to say but couldn’t say this idea of well, if you don’t get vaccinated, if you’re not social distancing, if you’re not following all of the protocols that the governors and mayors have put in by edict, then why should we have to treat you? And that’s a dangerous sense of it that I saw rising among healthcare professionals.
[MCG]
And that go back to the fact that it became political and I’m going to use an example that I’m going to try to. Keep it PG13 at least. But I remember during the monkey pox, by the way, what has become a monkey pox?
[Jay]
Yeah, exactly. That disappeared. That didn’t matter. Everything actually disappeared during the pandemic. Don’t you know the flu didn’t exist in? A little more.
[MCG]
Right. So during monkey pox, during the height of monkey pox. I remember reading that article, and I’m going to spiral listeners from where I was reading this article, but it was basically outlining the travel of. Someone who’s in their LGBTQ A+ community and this man went to Europe and he basically went from country to country to Co. And he in great detail this reporter was telling us what this man did. So he basically went to gay bars and hook up with a bunch of strangers night after night after night in different countries. And he went into details of things and whatever case maybe, and he suspected. That he was going to get the monkey pox so happened he came back to New York. A week later, he developed the symptoms for monkey parks, but he didn’t hear any healthcare workers saying because you have a promiscuous lifestyle that caused this to happen, we’re not going to treat you because politically you can’t say that.
[Jay]
Right. Right.
[MCG]
But politically you can say because you don’t take. Actions to prevent you from getting COVID we don’t want to treat you well again. We can be thankful that the fact that many hospitals and clinics or wherever cheated everybody. But again, I think all this was just because COVID became political.
[Jay]
It was completely politicized. In fact, there is a resurgence of the monkeypox outbreak in Chicago right now as we speak, literally updated a day or two ago there. Are currently nine or seven cases confirmed in Chicago, and they’re suspecting another outbreak of monkeypox, but it’s not receiving any type of news coverage. Well, I mean you have to go dig for it, but it’s not on the mainstream media sites and all of that sort of thing. Well, the political element is there because you might stigmatize a group of people. It goes against the mainstream narrative. And so don’t talk about this. We’re just using monkey pox as an anecdotal example, but we saw that happen time and time and time and time and time again, people that were going up against the narrative that contradicted what they were saying about COVID were route. Mainly and systematically silenced or canceled or reprimanded in some type of way that says be quiet, stop talking. This is the narrative. This is what we believe. This is what we want you to believe.
[MCG]
Yeah, I would just add this much like the AIDS pandemic, which I think is probably still going on and and if that ever came to an end, it’s highly a lifestyle disease. Not everyone who got AIDS or who have gotten monkey parks is because of their lifestyle, so to speak. We know the truth is that most of the people who have gotten it and the people that they asked to come and get vaccinated are people that are within a certain. Lifestyle and certain set of behaviors, we just leave it at that for now. Maybe we’ll discuss that in another episode, but anyway, also I want to talk about the CDC and their rural Health Organization because to me initially they were like chickens where they had cut off and that’s fine because we don’t know what’s going on. But what shame. Is they in telling the people that this is new? We don’t know what’s going on, things going to change, we’re going to study it. We’re going to come back and tell you what we know thus far and we will update this information. I think people like Doctor Anthony Fauci and other people, I think they were too caught up in. Being confident and full of themselves, so to speak, that they didn’t want to say stuff. And again some of them would did say that they didn’t know, but I think I would have felt better if they had said, hey, we are not 100% sure, we don’t know.
[Jay]
That’s being honest and they can’t. I’m being cynical. They can’t. Do that but right.
[MCG]
Well, here is Doctor Fauci. In March of 2020.
[Interviewer]
There’s a lot of confusion among people and misinformation surrounding face masks. Can you discuss that?
[Tony Fauci]
The masks are important. For someone who’s infected to prevent them from infecting someone else. Now when you see people and look at the films in China and South Korea, whatever, everybody’s wearing a mask right now in the United States. People should not be walking around with masks.
[Interviewer]
You’re sure of it? Cause people are listening. No, closely. To this.
[Tony Fauci]
Right now, people should not be walked. There’s no reason to be walking around with the mask. When you’re in the middle of an outbreak, wearing a mask might make people feel a little bit better, and it might even block a a droplet. But it’s not providing the perfect protection that people think that it is, and often there are unintended consequences. People keep fiddling with the mask and they keep touching their face.
[Interviewer]
And can you get some schmutz sort of staying inside there?
[Tony Fauci]
Of course, of course. But when you think masks, you should think of healthcare providers needing them and people who are ill. The people who, when you look at the films of foreign countries and you see 85% of the people wearing masks, that’s fine. That’s fine. I’m not against it. If you want to do.
[Interviewer]
It that’s fine, but it can lead. To a shortage of. Masks, which we’re starting to see.
[Tony Fauci]
That’s the point. It could lead to a shortage of masks for the people who really need it.
[MCG]
And I think. That what he said there, it’s pretty base.
[Jay]
Reasonable Yep.
[MCG]
But we’re talking about the same man who went before the Senate. We’re in three mass. We’re talking about the man who has been vaccinated 2 three times and still got COVID and I’m like, OK, so you did all the precautions. You follow all the rules that you were encouraged us to follow wearing masks, even though you’re at one point, you tell us. They’re not going to work, which? I’m showing that they didn’t work. They were unnecessary. Fine, I read the math because it wasn’t something that I find that I had a biblical reason to disobey the government on. But fine. But you talk about the man who wore 2-3 masks to a Senate hearing, vaccinated and still got COVID. Again, I don’t know, saying let’s be honest with us that what you said there was like, hey, if you want to wear. If you make you feel better, wear it. But be honest with us and tell us, say it’s not gonna work. It’s not going to prevent you from getting covered and I would have been fine with it, but the politics of it came in pretty quickly and that’s when we say, man, who do we even believe? Because common sense tell us. That cloth mass is not going to prevent a small virus from spreading, but then we have government officials and the representation of science telling us not to read it, then to read it, then to read too. Where do?
[Jay]
We go from there. You can sufficiently confuse and frighten the people into doing anything. We are in as of the recording of this podcast May of 2023. And I saw a man today in his car by himself, masked. With the windows up in the car by himself, masked were traumatized. Not just the fear mongering but also the confusion. It was not a cohesive message. It was clear that they didn’t know what they were talking about at. Least initially, and. It was obvious also that they were adjust. Saying what they were telling the people based on a narrative that someone behind the curtain, let’s say, wanted them to share because his message completely changed, he went from the recording that we just heard to urging people to double mask. At one point, he himself, wearing three different masks and talking. About droplets droplets. And that became the thing that he harped on. Trying to scare people, particularly the people who listen to mainstream media and believe everything. They say at that point it’s hard to decipher truth from the propaganda. I remember trying to find information about masking and the vaccines online, and I remember having to go to videos that were I specifically had to look for videos that were 3456 years old, long before the pandemic. Because that’s the only way to be sure that it wasn’t contaminated by all of the fear mongering and the propaganda and the misinformation that was out there. And even if you spoke up to say something about it, of course you would be cancelled. You would be considered to be someone who didn’t care about their. Fellow brethren, because you didn’t mask up if you didn’t make up for yourself, you should mask up for those around you that might get sick. In reality, none. Of that worked. I masked up because of that particular reason, because if I didn’t mask up, there were people that were saying ohh you know you you gotta you gotta think about. Other people and blah. Blah blah. Well, so in my case, remember in the scripture. And the passage talking about liberty wasn’t talking about masks, but it was talking about eating like, for example, something that I’m OK with eating would cause your brothers to stumble, or that would be an issue for your brother. OK, if the whole mask thing is an issue, I’ll throw a mask on, Brother. No big deal. You know what I mean? That’s not a hill to die. But it was a symptom. It was an indicator. It was a presentation of something I think was far greater and far more malicious from the ruling powers that be, as it were. Air quotes in terms of how they were manipulating people into thinking and feeling and behaving so that it fit their narrative.
[MCG]
Yeah, probably going to break after this, but another thing, the negative effect of the math was that people then became accustomed to seeing folks in math. And then folks have used. Is that to commit a bunch of crimes, you know and.
[Jay]
It became a lot easier.
[MCG]
Sure, because no longer you walk into a bank or to a store or whatever the case may be, unless you have a mask on and hoodie up, they don’t get suspicious because everybody wearing masks and hoodies, so.
[Jay]
I do remember reading also that there was an uptick. Now I haven’t verified this, but I do remember seeing a a news article about an uptick in child abduction because it was easy to hide the child’s face. It was easy to get away. Be with snatching up a child because all you do is throw a mask on their face. Their face is hidden, your face is hidden, so it’s a little easier to get away. So it’s. Proliferated, or at least admitted, easy to commit crime. It also became a political symbol if you weren’t masked, you were in many cases seemed to be. You’re probably on the right, as it were, and if you were masked, you were probably on the left. So much so that I remember a famous. Kim refers A politician or celebrity saying that. This was when the vaccine came out and initially they were saying, you know, if you get the vaccine, it basically cures the coronavirus. It prevents transmission and you don’t have to worry about it anything. So people were taking their masks off if they were vaccinated and people that were on the left, at least this particular celebrity that was on the left decided that because he was vaccinated. He felt like he could take the mask off, but because he didn’t want to identify with people on the other side, he kept wearing his mask. And so the mask became this sort of political symbol. If you were wearing your mask, and if you were double mask, or if you were this or the other, you were a part of this poll. Medical Group again, it’s crazy how politicized it was. And if you didn’t wear that mask, you were part of a different group and people they thought they could identify people based on that.
[MCG]
Right.
[Jay]
So it became a lot more than.
[MCG]
What it was supposed to be, right? And also you talk about the development of children not seeing people faces. And then of course, we can get into education and stuff like that, the. Shutting down of schools? Sure.
[Jay]
Oh man, that was a big thing.
[MCG]
But yeah, you’re listening to the moving by Risk podcast. We’re talking about COVID and lesson learned. We’ll be right back.
[Jay]
Hi, this is Jay MCG and I would like for you to help us remove barriers by going to removingbarriers.net and subscribing to receive all things removing barriers. If you’d like to take your efforts a bit further and help us keep the mics on, consider donating at removing barriers.net/donate removing barriers. A clearview of the cross. This is the removing barriers podcast. If the podcast or the blog were a blessing to you, leave us a rating and a review on your favorite podcast platform. And don’t forget to share the podcast with your friends. Removing barriers, a clear view of the cross.
[MCG]
All right, Jay. So we’ve been talking about COVID basically lesson learned and the different reactions from the government and the people and stuff like that. Just going to the vaccine a little bit and talk about the reaction to the vaccine, the campaign, big farmer and stuff like that. But before we do that, I also want to mention this though, because we talked about how much. They became political. I remember during the 2020 election cycle, Kamala Harris and other folks saying that they’re not going to take the vaccine because, of course it was being developed on the Trump. And as soon as they won, they start singing from a different hymn. And sat encouraging people to take the vaccine. And that to me, was like The funny thing about it. I even remember a coworker, and this co-worker is a very outspoken Democrat. And I have no problem with that. I don’t care what the case. Maybe I don’t identify it either, but he was telling me that he wasn’t going to take the vaccine, but as soon as Biden won, he too sat singing a different. And and was even upset when maybe upset is not the right word, but a bunch of former coworkers were trying to meet up, and when they invited me to come, I told them, hey, I don’t normally tell people this, but since you’re asking me to meet up and I figured this might be important to you guys, I didn’t get the vaccine. And he just said he wasn’t going to meet up because I have chosen not to get the vaccine. Of course, I was gracious. I didn’t throw back his words in his face because he didn’t really bother me, but. We meet up or not, but just the political nature of it, and even the vaccine. But let’s talk about Big Farmer and how you know the campaign and how they reacted to.
[Jay]
It you know. So the vaccine was developed in record time. It was definitely a scientific marvel that it was developed as quickly as it was now. Granted that technology had been under development for decades. You you can go back, as I mentioned before. Even on YouTube many, many years, 5/10/15 year old videos describing mRNA technology and the potential and the use. For it in terms of vaccines, in terms of other different medications. However, I think that anyone that was even giving the development of the vaccine cursory attention would agree that the development of the vaccine was rushed and it would not be unreasonable. To have concerns about the safety of the vaccine, I don’t think that was an unreasonable line of thinking at all. And yet people who were hesitant to take the vaccine. Were categorically, I don’t think demonized is too strong a word. They were ostracized and demonized and made out to be bad people because they didn’t rush to take the vaccine. I can’t say that I 100% fault the medical companies that were working to bring the. Seen into existence as a company that develops medicine. If I were the CEO of that company, I can’t say that I wouldn’t use the current situation in order to advance or promote the technology that I’m working on.
[Tony Fauci]
OK.
[Jay]
I’m just going to be honest and say, you know, if the people are freaking out about a particular. I’ve got something that might be able to help. I’m certainly going to do whatever advancements that are necessary in order to provide a product that people might need. I think that there are ethical limits to the. That personally, I think all of those ethical limits were either broken or stretched. Now that’s where the real problem comes in. Because you had, and perhaps anyone listening here will probably say, well, girl, everybody knew this. Where have you been? But I was surprised to see the degree to which the pharmaceutical companies. And the government linked hands to not just bring the medicine about, but to kind of. Strong armed people into taking it. That’s where the real issue is.
[MCG]
Yeah, I would agree with that because quite honestly, I don’t care how quickly it came about. Yeah, I don’t care. What are the fact that it was? I’m already technology. That’s fine with me. I think the big issue, as you alluded to was the fact that they were mandating that I put this thing in my body. No, actually I don’t even care if people want to take the vaccine. I think you should be individual choice if you want to take it, by all means, take it. If you don’t want to. By all means don’t take it. That’s where the line should have been drawn, because I’ve spoken to people and I asked them, OK, so if you are vaccinated and I’m not vaccinated, how does my lack of vaccination affect you?
[Jay]
Especially if you’re vaccinated and they were explicitly saying both in official government sources as well as mainstream media sources that getting the vaccine was basically a cure, it was a preventative measure. You were guaranteed not to. Get it well.
[MCG]
Will it change it tune pretty quickly because at one point I remember was there.
[Jay]
They changed their tune very quickly.
[MCG]
Maderna, I think was at 95% effective. And then if you don’t get the booster almost every couple of months, you drop until at this point is well below 50% effective. If you have not been boosted.
[Jay]
Right.
[MCG]
And I’m like, so how many times do you want to inject this thing into me? I had to get religious exemption. From my work because they wanted to force me to take the vaccine and it was a double whammy for me because my company was mandating it and the federal government, which I’m a contractor to the federal government. Is kind of saying that everybody, including contractors, have to get it as well. I’m like, well, I can want to wait and watch and see and maybe in 20-30 or something 2031 maybe I’ll get the vaccine. But for now, I want to watch and see and see if anyone hands.
[Jay]
Right.
[MCG]
Fall off or their fingers start rotten off or something, I don’t know. That probably not gonna happen, but I want to watch it. See and observe and who knows 20 years from now, you’re gonna see commercial. Did you take the COVID vaccine back in 2021?
[Jay]
You qualified to participate in the class action lawsuit.
[MCG]
Who knows? Six, you know, I.
[Jay]
Well, see, here’s the thing though as well. By the time Operation Warp speed was put into place. He understood that the virus was not nearly as deadly as they were purporting it to be. At the beginning of the pandemic, what they thought was 5% mortality rate, I think Trump was caught on tape saying that this thing has a 5% mortality rate or whatever it was, we came to understand at the point of operation warp speed that the percentage was more at .05% or or .01%. I think it was. I think it was .01. I’m gonna have to Google it.
[MCG]
It was definitely below 1% of.
[Jay]
Yeah, I think it was, yeah.
[MCG]
You’re talking about a death rate. Right. Yeah, or.
[Jay]
How lethal it was, or how deadly it was. I think it was point. Now I gotta Google it we. Did an episode on that and I had my stats and I forgot to look up.
[MCG]
Yeah, I think it was something like 0.01% or something like that. I don’t remember though, but it was pretty small.
[Jay]
Along those. We’ll have to we’ll Fact Check us. We’ll have to go. Back and look so at that point, we know that the virus is not as deadly as we thought it was. And yet the mentality behind getting vaccinated was still along the lines of. If you don’t do this, you’ll.
[MCG]
It still was a political and that’s the the whole thing about the virus, the vaccine, everything became political.
[Jay]
Completely political. So now. No, no. Now we’re talking about money now because you have these companies that are involved.
[MCG]
Well, I can’t blame the companies, you.
[Jay]
Know in a capitalist society well.
[MCG]
There’s something going on and you want to get their stuff out there quickly. I wouldn’t blame the company. Quite and you have to blame the government because the government is the one who would have to stamp approval. I don’t even know if the vaccines have finally gotten FDA or whatever approval he needs.
[Jay]
It did. Most of them did, yeah.
[MCG]
He was approved on the emergency.
[Jay]
Ohh, you mean you don’t know if any of the vaccines have received just like the regular or standard authorization FDA for use?
[MCG]
Right. He has been in all emergency, right. And we don’t know the long term effects of this because there’s no data to show.
[Jay]
There’s absolutely no data.
[MCG]
There’s nothing to show on this.
[Jay]
We are the Guinea pigs in this particular experiment right now, and people were lining up in droves. Still are lining up in droves to take this vaccine, and I think generally there’s no reason to be concerned. Learned that you would experience some type of long term debilitation from taking the vaccine. I think perhaps most Americans would believe I’m talking about what most Americans believe now, not what I believe, but what most Americans believe they would probably say. There’s no way the government would strongly encourage us to take something that has the potential. To create long term disability or harm.
[MCG]
Yeah, but the fact is the government didn’t know what another.
[Jay]
The government absolutely did not know, still doesn’t know. And from what I understand that these companies, they’re not being held responsible.
[MCG]
Yeah, they wanted to be responsible in like, what, 75 years of life?
[Jay]
In 75 years, whatever it is.
[MCG]
Yeah, but it’s funny. But I have a clip here from Tucker Carlson talking about the vaccine and some concerns that he’s reporting. This is from April.
[Tucker Calson]
Wink to neurodegenerative disease, myocarditis, bells palsy, liver disease, impaired adaptive immunity, impaired DNA damage response, etcetera. So it’s possible. In fact, it’s looking likely that the vaccine might suppress the immune system. This fact, the authors concluded, will quote, have a wide range of consequences, not the least of which include the reactivation of latent viral infections and the reduced ability to effectively combat. Future infections. End Quote. Now, again, we sincerely hope that’s not true. But it’s not just the conclusion of 1 scientific journal The Lancet. Maybe the most famous scientific journal in the world released similar findings in February. The lancets piece was entitled quote risk of infection, hospitalization and death up to nine months after a second dose of COVID-19. Vaccine A physician called Kenji Yamamoto made this observation with the data from The Lancet. He wrote this in a letter to the Journal of Virology, and we’re quoting. The study showed that immune function among vaccinated individuals 8 months after the administration, 2 doses of COVID-19 VAC. Was lower than that among the unvaccinated individuals. Now your first response. If you’re a humane person to a line like that, has got to be deep sympathy. Because people were misled, they were forced. They were forced medical ethics turn out the window. People were forced to take medicine they didn’t want, and some of them have been hurt by it. And you don’t have to take this man’s word for it, pop The Lancet. Study yourself. You won’t find anything of the text of the article saying what Kenji Yamamoto said, which is weird. Why would the Lancer. A hidden major finding like. We can’t say, but if you look at table three in the piece, here’s what you’ll find buried in the data among people around the age of 80 who have been double vaccinated. That would include people like Joe Biden, the per capita rate of medical incidences including hospitalizations or death is nearly twice as high as the rate of serious incidents for the unvaccinated. This is 180 days after. The nation. What is that and why is no one interested?
[MCG]
So that was Tucker Carlson talking about the vaccine and very some serious concern. Of course. You know, a lot of people on the left will consider Tucker causing to be a conspiracy theorist. True may not be true, but this should be a part of the debate.
[Jay]
Yes, we should be allowed to discuss it. And let’s be real, the pandemic exposed the reality that people that we say are quote and conspiracy theorists. They’re really just people who have a different way of looking at the narrative and are probably hitting on something that’s true. The difference between conspiracy and truth now in post pandemic. America is only about three to six months. People that are on the fringe, they sound like conspiracy theorists, and then six months later, we find out. Wow. These people were telling. The truth all. Along and those are the people that are actually paying attention that are actually studying things in depth almost with nerd like quality, where they’re getting down into the grit and understanding. The underlying reason for things they’re the ones that are labeled as conspiracy theorists. But the things that he brought up in that little clip that you played there, we should be allowed to debate these things. We should be allowed for the open discourse. We should be allowed to even entertain it, to study it, to think about it, and come up with our own conclusions. And the American people were not afforded that. Because the people that tried to raise up these concerns, whether it’s Tucker Carlson, Luke Rodowsky, Tim Pool, Brett Weinstein, the list goes on and on, Joe Rogan, so many people that were speaking something that was against the narrative, they were systematically shut down or demonetized or de platformed in some other way cancelled as it were. There was no room for debate. There was no room for communication or for discussion or for the quote. That’s what science is supposed to be. There was room for none of that, and that is the tragedy. That is a lesson learned that I think perhaps America needs to take note of the fact that if the government or if the powers that be want to do something, for quote your safety or for the safety of the people, they can justify. A lot of evils, a lot of overreach and a lot of injustices in the name of doing something for the greater good or for the safety of others or for the health of everyone. And that’s something that we need to learn and remember.
[MCG]
Yeah, you’re touching it, but. Even on YouTube and different big tech platforms, there are things that they were banning you from saying, and a few months later it came out to be true. Like Max doesn’t work. The vaccine doesn’t prevent you from getting it or from spreading the.
[Jay]
Virus the virus came from the Wuhan lab in China.
[MCG]
All these were banned and get you whatever on these big tech platform are now, it’s widely accepted as being true and talking about lessons learned.
[Jay]
All of those things.
[MCG]
I wonder what we could learn from. You know, this COVID pandemic in pandemics going forward, should we say that open discourse should be the way forward so we don’t be banning people from saying whatever they want to say? Should we say let the scientists and the doctors put them in the room and figure this out in an open public forum? And stuff like that, because obviously what we did in this past, but then it didn’t work and I hope we have learned lessons going forward. Is again talking about a vaccine. Would the politician look at it? The American institutions, the way they even colleges, where requiring the vaccine to get in their police, we’re saying, hey, we’re not going to come and go to small issues and small issues could be a robbery taking place or, you know, who knows what could happen in a robbery. You know the school system churches. That have shut their doors and some of them have not even returned to full services.
[Jay]
Yes, three years later, I think only recently. And I’m not saying that Jehovah’s Witnesses are a sound religion, they’re not their cult, but they’ve only returned to opening their doors this year, and this is like three years later. But that also raises another thing about how church has responded, because many churches initially shut. Because this is a new thing we want to protect our congregants. We want to be as wise as possible, and then there are others that began to see the discrepancies that began to see the holes and the hypocrisy where protesters were allowed to go and do their thing. But everyone else was shut down. All of the institutions or businesses that promote sin. Whether it’s the liquor stores or the bars or anything like that, they were allowed to continue or the alcohol stores in particular, I think bars were shut down, but at least the alcohol stores were left open and and that sort of thing, they were allowed to continue where as churches were shut down and by and large churches in the United States complied by and. Large a few of them began to stand up and fight back. John MacArthur and Grace Community Church in California being a prominent example because they were in the news because they took the Governor of California head on, Governor Newsom, but for the most part, churches complied. And that’s something that what are the lessons to be learned from there? Is the church’s responsibility in a situation like that, where the government is running roughshod over their people, and the truth is being muzzled and suppressed and. Institutions that promote sin or not.
[MCG]
Yeah, he had not given the spirit of fear, but that of. Sound mine paraphrasing that verse, but yeah, you have a point there. The funny thing you mentioned that you have witnesses and of course I don’t believe the driver witnesses have sound doctrine, right? But something I heard about the driver witnesses concern the pandemic is that they added over 400,000 people. To their church.
[Jay]
Did they really?
[MCG]
And that’s because they did aggressive campaign through Bible study through. Whom? And that’s telling. Because you know, a lot of folks were fearful during the pandemic. And when people are fearful, they usually turned, quote, UN quote to something religion or something, alcohol or whatever they so talking about taking advantage of that. Wonder, why didn’t our churches add that amount again? The truth. Is normally not. Readily accepted as falsehood. And of course because of our flesh, and this is just a free given kind of point to us and say, hey, we could have done more with the pandemic, with the fear that people have because of the pandemic and maybe win more people to loss. But what did we do? Maybe some of the town churches. They shut down, they limit their services. They didn’t get creative, like maybe a kid. Your witnesses move a lot of their Bible studies and. Stuff like that, maybe with through aggressive online campaigning, whatever, I don’t know. But that’s just a side note there, but.
[Jay]
You know, we went witnessing this past Saturday, and I met a woman at the door who used to be Baptist and. Became a Jehovah’s witness. I wonder if perhaps with the aggressive nature of their Bible study online, perhaps she got wrapped up into that, and perhaps that’s how that happened.
[MCG]
Well, Baptist is a broad term, I don’t know, but anyways.
[Jay]
Very broad term moves to say that she actually believed the truth, but if that’s what was happening during the pandemic, well first it shows two things. First, of course, people turn to faith or some type of religion when they’re. Trade chances are they’re gonna turn to the right one because people turn to what they know in their moment of crisis or in their moment of fear, but also the thirst and the hunger that’s there for a type of discipleship that’s more intimate, one-on-one, or maybe in a small group, one on a few people, are hungry for that. And perhaps that’s something that our church is kind of didn’t. Quite pick up on or capitalize on.
[MCG]
I think COVID gave us a glance at how easily folks can be controlled.
[Jay]
Mm-hmm. Especially if you scare.
[MCG]
Them right? Just a small change. You know, norms, cultural change or whatever it may be. People get fearful, you know, let’s imagine if initially, when COVID came out, it wasn’t about. You know a long line for toilet paper. It was long line for food and stuff like that.
[Jay]
Ohh yeah.
[MCG]
Can you imagine how much of an impact covered would have had if the food supply was impacted and not, you know, it might take a bit longer to get a couch or something, something from Amazon. But for most part, the food supply, at least in the US, was not impacted. I know prices went up but.
[Jay]
Yeah, I mean for a short while there, the shelves were looking quite bare. Because there was issue with in terms of transportation and distribution and don’t forget that we had the convoy, the trucking convoy thing that happened not just in Canada but also in the US so there were spots here and there, but generally the food supply chain was left intact generally.
[MCG]
Right, so people weren’t necessarily going hungry because of COVID is my point.
[Jay]
Right, right.
[MCG]
But imagine if we were. And it wasn’t tell people that they were fighting for in a line, you know, imagine the change in the culture and people life would happen because of fear. Because the way our economy and the society work is structured, we can be easily controlled. I don’t think a lot of folks think about that. We can be easily controlled if the federal government decides to wield its power. Because of course you know about the rise of AI, but not just that. Many of us today can’t function without Internet, without the stuff that we rely on each day, and the government can have direct control of that. That’s why I think again, I’m going way after pick here, but that’s why I think other folks are pushed back on electric vehicles and all the things because the government have. Greater control and. I guess the big thing that I want to tied all together. Is that the? Fear that was in the minor heart of people and their major things that we needed in terms of food, water, shelter, clothing were left intact. It was a virus that. Had less than 1% fatality rate and yet we reacted this way.
[Jay]
What if it were something much more lethal, or much more deadly?
[MCG]
Not even much more. Whatever was something that again, as I say, affected our food supply, our water supply, our heating supply.
[Jay]
Would you comply or would you stand up? There was the discussion among Christians about whether or not we should comply, and many people brought up Romans 13. And I have it here it says first one let every soul be subject unto the higher powers, for there is no power but of God the powers that be are ordained of God. Whosoever, therefore resistex the power resistor, ETH, the Ordinance of God, and they that resist shall receive to themselves damnation, and many Christians would use that. As the verse that says, hey, you know, whatever government says we ought to comply, we may not agree, but let’s comply. It’s not a hill to die. And then there are others that said, well, yeah, but you need to continue reading the subsequent verses, for example, verse three says for rulers are not a terror to good works but to evil. Wilt thou then not be afraid of the power? Do that which is good, and thou shalt have praise of the same, for he is the Minister of God to thee for good. But if thou do that which is evil, be afraid. For he beareth the sword not in vain, for he is a Minister of God, a revenger to execute wrath upon him that doeth. The argument on the other side of the aisle was OK. If your government does not fit that description. As a Christian, you have a duty to stand up. You have a duty to resist. If your government is doing what our government is actively doing, IE punishing good and rewarding evil, and they are not bearing the sword. To strike fear in the heart of the evil doer, they are wielding it as a terror or as an oppressive tool to keep the righteous oppressed. At that point, should Christians stand up? And then there was the back and forth about that. I think we learned a lot about where we stand as a country. As I mentioned earlier in the podcast, I am alarmed and disappointed at how many people complied. I understand that many people felt like masks and social distancing were not heels to die on, and that of course there was that liberty issue. Of course, if you were doing that in order not to upset a brother, but when it came to things that really came pretty close to where the rubber meets the road. IE mandating medication or in this case the vaccine or. And dating that you don’t go to church, that you stay home even though the Scriptures have an explicit command for us not to forsake the assembling of ourselves together, where at what point do we tell government to go kick rocks because we are obeying the King of kings. And I don’t think many Christians ever envisioned a situation where here in the United States. We would be having to entertain those questions and I think a lot of Christians kind of got a wake up call during the pandemic and everyone is having to kind of look within themselves to find out where they actually stand. And where does the government have authority and where does their authority end and allegiance to Christ? You know, take over and it’s more important than obeying the government. Everyone has to answer that question for.
[MCG]
Yeah, ultimately I think we can look at it this way and we can go to the scriptures and see examples of government overreach. Tyrannical government and how Christians or believers reacted. So let’s take the many examples we have in Scripture. Let’s take Esther. Let’s take Shadrack, Meshach, and Bendigo. Let’s take Daniel. Let’s take dirt. The apostles in the early church. Let’s take Joseph. And many, many examples in Scripture where the government overreach and we see how Christian respond or believer responded. And this is what if their uniform thread throughout all of them, they never resist. Until they were asked to disobey God. And that’s where I think Christians need to join the line. Shadrack, Meshach and Abednego took a stand not to bow, but if you notice. Quote UN quote, if you want to put it this way, they went to the ceremony because the king said everyone should gather they went. And got her. And yell. Then they stop praying, but in any other things, Daniel was obedient to the king. The apostle, the early church, when they were caught and beaten and commanded not to preach in the name of Jesus Christ and more. What did they say? We are to be God rather than man. So for me, what I’ve seen throughout Scripture. Is that Christians or believers have taken a stand when it is clear that what they’ve been asked to do or what the government is asking to do, is in clear violation. Of the word of God. The problem I see with a lot of Christians today is that they conflate their conservatism with their Christianity. And they decided, hey, I’m not going to obey. I’m not going to read the silly masks because it doesn’t work. And that might be true. But at the same time show me a scripture where the Bible telling that thou shall I wear mask? Or a principle, or the application or something it wasn’t. Direct conflict with the word of God. That’s why I wore the mask. That’s why it wasn’t a big deal for me, because when I look at it, I didn’t have a scripture nor a biblical standing to say I’m not gonna wear it, except for the fact that I don’t believe it worked. But when it came to the vaccine, I refuse the vaccine because and now I can say, hey, this is a new vaccine. My body is the Temple of God, just like I don’t drink alcohol. Smoke and stuff like that. I try to control what goes into my body. I’m not going to put that stuff in my body until at least I have the Peace of Mind that this. Saying is not going to do my body harm again. That’s my stand on the vaccine. Someone else might have a different stand and praise the Lord for the vaccine because there’s some people out there that kind of help calm the fear. Whatever case may be sure, we can argue shouldn’t be that way, but they have calmed the fear and some of them return to church or whatever. But at the end of the day. I think the Gospel of Jesus Christ is where we have to bring this back to, because the Bible tells us the perfect love, cast it out fear and where have we seen perfect love demonstrate? Upon the cross of Calvary for us, for God, full of the world that he gave his only begotten son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life. But God commended his love, the worthers, and that while we were yet sinners, Christ, that this is how God demonstrated his perfect love for us by sending his son to die on the cross for our sins. And we know the Bible teaches us that if we repent of our sins and trust only in Jesus Christ, when Jesus Christ say I am the way, the truth and the life, no man come to the father, but by me, then we can be saved. And that’s the ultimate goal here. We have learned a lot of lessons because of this pandemic. I’m sure there’s approach. The lesson that we have learned, we have seen people, how they will behave. Some people even compare it to the mark of the beast. Can you see people taking their number now because?
[Jay]
Yeah, I could see that much more clearly.
[MCG]
The Bible talk about the back of the beast, the back of the beast is going to be food, a shortage of food. Well, you can’t buy or sell without getting it right. So if you don’t have it, you’re not gonna be able to get food. But at the same time, people react differently when the shortage is something that you absolutely need food and stuff like that, and who knows. You know, but at the end of the day, you know, I will point people to Christ and that’s where I. Will leave it.
[Jay]
Yeah, I wish. If nothing else, I hope that this pandemic pointed people to our need for Christ and not just the unsaved. The saved as well. We need the gospel every bit as much as a lost person does. And so the pandemic gave us an opportunity to realize, OK, where are we putting our strength? Where are we putting our our confidence, where we putting our trust, are we trusting? In the Lord to provide for what we need in spite of shortages in spite of government mandates, in spite of of vaccine mandates or a virus, a deadly virus that’s out there, deadly or not, is our trust and our faith and our confidence in the Lord and what he says and how he says the world is going to end or. Come about or what’s going to happen, or are we going to listen to? To the prevailing voice of the day, whether conservative or liberal, it would behoove us, as people of God, to put our trust and faith in the Lord Jesus Christ as MCG said, and not in the Chariots of men as it were. The scriptures talk about how faulty and how unwise it is to put your confidence. In men. And so if anything in this particular podcast, if we would encourage anyone is to put your confidence in your trust in Christ. Hey, thanks so much for listening to the Removing Barriers podcast. Did you know that you could find us on Twitter, Gab Parlor, Facebook and Reddit, go to removingbarriers.net/contact and like and follow us on social media, removing barriers, a clear view of the cross?
[MCG]
Thank you for listening. To get ahold of us to support this podcast or to learn more about removing barriers. Go to removingbarriers.net. This has been the removing Barriers podcast we attempted to remove barriers so that we all can have a clear view of the cross.
