The far flung nation of Australia and its close neighbor New Zealand were widely considered two of the worst examples of authoritarian western response to the covid pandemic. The Australian public was locked down and under house arrest in the larger cities. In some cases only one person would be allowed to leave home at a time and could only travel a short distance to shop for necessities. People who went to public parks or beaches were fined or arrested. Covid camps were created to detain not only people who had traveled overseas, but also people who simply tested positive.
Most disturbing of all, Australian officials had people arrested who dared to criticize the lockdowns on social media. Australian news organizations widely defended such measures in lockstep with the government narrative. With the exception of a few minor complaints, journalists from the land down under acted as propagandists for the government and for Big Pharma.
It was these Orwellian conditions and similar attempts across the west that led to many personalities in the alternative media to speak out and become decidedly anti-establishment. One of those figures was podcaster Joe Rogan.
Rogan attracted the full fury of the corporate media for engaging in interviews with lockdown critics who debunked many of the narratives put forward by government authorities. As it turns out, in the majority of cases Rogan and his guests were right. The fearmongering over covid was overblown. The lockdowns were ineffective. Social distancing was ineffective. The masks were ineffective. The vaccines were suspiciously experimental and proven less effective than natural immunity. Death numbers were inflated by comorbidities.
The virus itself only has an average Infection Fatality Rate (IFR) of 0.23%, meaning 99.8% of all people regardless of vaccination status were under no threat (the original false claims from the WHO and others was that the virus was deadly for 3% of people).
The lockdowns were pointless in terms of public health, but very useful in terms of public control.
To this day, many in the media still despise Joe Rogan and the alternative media for revealing the inconsistencies within the covid theater. Not to mention, they hate the fact that their elitist ivory tower is being torn down by civilian journalists. This was the motivation behind a recent attack on Rogan by the head of the Australian Broadcasting Corporation, Kim Williams, at the Australian Press Club (Williams took over the position at ABC at the start of 2024). Williams described Rogan as ‘malevolent’ – a person that ‘preys on the fears of the public’.
Australian Broadcasting Corporation boss Kim Williams launches an unhinged tirade against Joe Rogan (@joerogan):
“People like Mr. Rogan prey on people’s vulnerabilities. They prey on fear. They prey on anxiety.”
“I personally find it deeply repulsive, and to think that someone… pic.twitter.com/NNenTOkiqP
— Wide Awake Media (@wideawake_media) November 27, 2024
Many would refer to the venomous comments spit by Kim Williams as gaslighting and projection. Joe Rogan is popular because of his sincerity, a quality which is severely lacking in modern journalism. It’s the establishment media that commonly exploits fear and disinformation to set the public into a frenzy; it’s this very behavior that caused millions of consumers to abandon mainstream outlets in the first place.
The ABC reported in 2023 that public trust in corporate media and the government was in steep decline post-covid. Instead of asking why this is the case and having the courage to participate in some self examination, media elites have instead chosen to blame podcasters like Joe Rogan (and the supposed ignorance of the public) for their fall from grace.
When ABC radio host Raf Epstein (an employee) asked Williams to speak further about his views on Mr Rogan and expand on his broad-brush attack, the ABC boss dredged up old covid-era accusations with no validity.
Epstein: “Are you worried that podcasts that don’t provide the scrutiny that you might get on the ABC, that they are the future, and that we really are going out of fashion?”
Williams: “Well, I would hope that we’re the best antidote to misinformation and, more alarmingly, disinformation…I mean, Joe Rogan did an enormous, in my view, an enormous amount of damage back in 2020 and 2021, when he was particularly virulent in many of his remarks about vaccinations…I don’t think people have unlimited license to say what they want, simply because they believe something to be so…”
It’s important to note that covid cases and deaths plunged in 2021 well before the experimental mRNA vaccines were widely released to the public. It should also be noted that the vaccines did not prevent transmission as officials originally claimed.
Williams then turned to gaslighting. Angry that he had received so much criticism online for his comments, he accused Rogan fans of being “made of glass” and unable to handle critique.
Williams: “What fascinates me is you say something negative about Joe Rogan – and I have been swarmed with the most unbelievably vicious responses. I got one this morning that said that I should stay in my lane and watch out, and you read it and you think, ‘What are you saying to me?’”
Epstein: “Do you think they’ve got glass jaws?”
Williams: “Their whole body is made of glass. How can people react in such a, frankly, demonic fashion? I really stand back in disbelief…”
Keep in mind, ABC news has shut off comments on the Youtube video of Williams’ Press Club interview. Exactly the kind of behavior you would expect from a mainstream propagandist with a glass jaw.
Asked whether podcasts were “a threat” to the ABC, Willaims answered in the affirmative.
“Of course they’re a threat to the ABC. I think they’re a threat to all views that are contrary into their own…If they represent the newfound mainstream, our society has deep troubles, and the only response that is available is to back education and knowledge…Knowledge is the is the antidote to this kind of hysterical rubbish.”
Considering the reality that the alternative media has been consistently proven right while the corporate media has been consistently exposed as dishonest, this kind of rhetoric from Williams rings rather humorous. The attacks on alternative personalities like Rogan stink of desperation. The last gasps of a dying institution long bereft of honor or honesty.
Tyler Durden
Sun, 12/01/2024 – 11:05
