An Open Letter From The Misunderstood
We, the Misunderstood, cannot go along with a course of action, no matter who recommends it, that leads to the loss of liberty and humanity.
Dear Family, Friends, Neighbors, Co-workers, and Community Members,
We, the Misunderstood, would like to explain why we are not wearing a mask or supporting vaccine mandates. We attempt this explanation in writing, because there isn't a forum for discussion. Yet we find our cherished relationships and way of life are threatened by the headlong tilt toward totalitarianism in our country.
In March 2020 U.S. citizens largely voluntarily closed schools, churches, entertainment venues, and all but “essential” businesses for two weeks. The idea was to prevent overrunning our hospitals by “flattening the curve,” that is – slowing the spread of COVID-19 to a more manageable level for the hospital resources available.
Fast forward to October 2021. Was it worth it? We opened the door to unprecedented government control, and it ran with it. We have treatments for Covid, and a vaccine, both causes for celebration. Cases, deaths, and hospitalizations have all dropped in the U.S. since August 2021. The same is true worldwide. Meanwhile, vaccine mandates are gaining momentum, and the separation of people into the vaccinated and the unvaccinated is in full swing.
On October 6, 2021, the Los Angeles City Council passed an ordinance requiring proof of vaccination, or a negative Covid test within 72-hours, to do just about anything except go the grocery store or pharmacy. To enter malls, museums, gyms, sports arenas, indoor government facilities, movie theaters, salons, bars, and restaurants, among other indoor venues, you must essentially “show your papers.” Similar ordinances have been implemented in New York City, New Orleans, San Francisco, and West Hollywood. Welcome to Communist China.
Those who find they are comfortable with these requirements – a vaccine passport or a negative Covid test – have lost sight of what America is about.
We, the Misunderstood, cannot comprehend the compliance with these mandates, the virtue signaling around them, or the discrimination and even hatred that is being directed toward those who are questioning what is happening.
Dr. Michael Osterholm, a prominent infectious disease expert and strong supporter of masks and lockdowns, states, “We’ve ascribed far too much human authority over the virus.” On October 4, 2021 the New York Times declared Covid “in retreat” and reported that cases, hospitalizations, and deaths are all dropping in the U.S. and worldwide. The article notes that Covid has followed an up and down pattern from the beginning. “Since the Covid virus began spreading in late 2019, cases have often surged for about two months – sometimes because of a variant, like Delta – and then declined for about two months. Epidemiologists do not understand why.”
We the Misunderstood ask this: Can we correlate that up and down pattern of COVID-19 to human interventions, meaning the face masks, lockdowns, and restrictions on movement and gathering? The answer is, No. There is no correlation. For example, any chart you’ve seen that shows a drop in cases after a face mask mandate and lockdown was put in place is incomplete, until you expand that chart to see that cases rose sharply thereafter. This fact is verifiable in every country in the world. You simply make a chart with the date, the number of cases, hospitalizations or deaths, and mark the point on the chart when the mandates were instituted. Not once is there a prolonged correlation between the implementation (and continuation) of mandates, and the rise and fall of COVID-19. (See Ian Miller's Twitter site @ianmSC to look at dozens of these charts.)
But mention this verifiable fact to an avid masker and vaccine mandate proponent, and prepare for the onslaught. You, the Misunderstood, are: a conspiracy theorist, and an uneducated, anti-science, inconsiderate, selfish danger to others.
Boom! Smack down! Solved that little problem.
Except it’s not a little problem. While the majority of people go along with the McCarthy-like oppression of those who aren’t “complying,” others feel uncomfortable and say nothing. Only a few resist.
When I was about 12 years old, I saw “Judgment at Nuremburg.” The movie provides actual footage of the atrocities the Nazis inflicted during WWII. The footage is interspersed with a dramatized version of the international military trial against former Nazi leaders for “crimes against humanity.” I remember the moment when a Nazi leader justified his complicity with the increasing cruelties against Jews with the statement, “I just didn’t think it would go so far.” I was stunned by the truth when the presiding judge, played by Spencer Tracy, said something like, “The first time a Jew was treated unfairly, just because he was a Jew, it had already gone too far.”
As a 12-year-old I was in a situation where I was frequently bullied at school, and also picked on and ostracized by some of the perpetrators in other settings. I was painfully aware of what it felt like to be treated poorly, just for being myself, while others were complicit, or remained silent.
No, we in the U.S. are not witnessing another genocide such as Nazi Germany perpetuated, or as we saw in Cambodia (1975-1979), Rwanda (1994), and Bosnia (1992-1995), among others. But genocide against the Uighurs in China is happening today, even if most of the international community is averting its eyes. Unfortunately, the human capacity for cruelty has not changed. The human tendency to go along with the crowd also has not changed.
We the Misunderstood, are not inconsiderate, uneducated, anti-science people. We recognize the pattern when one group is marginalized from society by a government that legitimizes its actions with propaganda, while the majority of the citizenry complies with the hope of not being targeted. That failure to speak up, in hopes of not being targeted, didn’t turn out so well for the compliant and/or willfully ignorant citizens of Nazi Germany. The Jewish genocide inflicted gaping wounds on its victims, the perpetrators, the quietly complicit, and on the whole world.
No, we are not seeing genocide in the United States. But we are seeing the systematic marginalizing and dehumanizing of people who are refusing to show proof of their vaccination status. This is not a dramatic and overblown statement. People are losing their employment, their social standing, their freedom of speech, movement, and association right before our eyes. To think that fear of a virus would cause people to revert to a state of self-preservation that is cruel and without humanity, is a frightening thought.
It’s not just the COVID-19 virus that is causing this division. Every major issue of the past year and a half is leading to division among people and dissolution of our freedoms. Whether it’s the virus, or the regurgitated movement to judge and discriminate against people based on their skin color, the patterns are the same. Loyalty to a political party is replacing loyalty to the U.S. Constitution and the integrity to do what is best for our country. Political divides are causing hypocrisies that harm and ostracize those who are not in political power. The cancel culture is on steroids. Every issue has become polarized to the point that there is almost no ability to discuss differing points of view.
As the Misunderstood, most of us are not against vaccines. We are not against sacrificing for the good of others. We are not selfish. We are the torch bearers. We are the canary in the mine. We see history, we see fact, we see what is happening today, and we know that the vaccine mandates are a violation of personal autonomy. We’ve watched, and we know that the pandemic is being used to undermine the unalienable rights that have been guaranteed in the U.S. since its inception. We, the Misunderstood, are trying to preserve the American experiment, officially begun on July 4, 1776.
Benjamin Franklin was asked by a citizen after the Constitutional Convention of 1787, “Well, Doctor, what have we got, a republic or a monarchy?” It is said that without hesitation Franklin responded, “A republic, if you can keep it.”
Today we have a U.S. President who acts like a monarch, issuing unconstitutional executive orders and mandates, and encouraging others to do the same. He has appointed cabinet leaders and heads of various government agencies, who also are trampling civil rights in their stampede toward “the greater good.” If it weren’t for the protections in the U.S. Constitution, we would already be under a monarchy. But those protections are becoming riddled with philosophical holes, and weakened by various government leaders and judges throughout our country.
We, the Misunderstood, cannot go along with a course of action, no matter who recommends it, that leads to the loss of liberty and humanity. For this, we are treated with loss of liberty, and without compassion, by many who used to be our friends and colleagues. How far will the collective madness go? And will we still have America when time and perspective begin to shine a light on the atrocities of our time?
College professors, students, ecclesiastical leaders, military personnel, teachers, police officers, journalists, volunteer workers, medical people, pilots, and many others are losing jobs and opportunities, and having their lives destroyed, because they refuse to comply with the vaccine mandates. In short, your neighbors, family, and friends are suffering. Are you okay with this?
Or maybe you just think, “It won’t go that far.”
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Edited 10-11-21 to correct the context for the Benjamin Franklin quote.