The WhatsApp message leak

[Mycatsgoldtooth]

So, we’ve had the FBI saying it was a lab leak, the leaked messages showing many of the restrictions were for show, stats on the reality of masks being mostly useless unless N95s. Where are all the people that were so upset about anyone saying anything against the government now.

It’s almost as if no one care where the virus came from and how the government reacted. If I’d spent years being terrified and washing my shopping I’d be really pissed off.

www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2023/03/01/untruth-untruth-peddled-justify-great-lockdown-disaster/

Relevant extra context from recent article about the FBI endorsing this theory:

Among the US agencies investigating the origin of the virus, four still favour the theory of natural transmission from animals. Two more, including the CIA, are undecided.

And thought this was interesting:

While the debate and investigation continue, there is one unavoidable winner: China. If the source is a lab leak, it has questions to answer about biosecurity. If the source is a wet market, it has questions to answer about animal security. Today, scientists argue with each other instead.

www.thetimes.co.uk/article/why-fbi-confirm-covid-lab-leak-theory-now-2023-bbp5hf7c6

It's not quick though?
it's one of many theories that was suggested from minute 1. I don't claim to know the answer. I'm reminding posters that free speech was basically forbidden - you were allowed to spout the government line and nothing else.

people were suspended, banned etc and however pathetic it sounds, I was suicidal and MN was my "company".

in the end, cigarettes and alcohol were better! Not things I did pre lockdown.

I was also sure the western world was involved otherwise there would have been some action taken against the lab where the leak occurred….think of how much this has cost the world financially!

Action taken by who? Can't see how it would be at all possible without Chinese government cooperation.

people don't understand the lab escape theory.

If a lion escaped from London zoo and killed you, that is an escape from an institution, that might have had lax safety.

London zoo did not invent or bioengineer lions

(geneticist/ virologist here)

It’s too much to acknowledge that you were one of the ones who rolled over, accepted authoritarianism without a second thought. You were one of the ones who spat bile at anyone standing up against it.

I was one who accepted it, it didn’t cross my mind to consider anything else, and I’m disappointed and angry at myself for it.

I didn’t ever criticise anyone standing up against it, that always left a nasty taste, because, if MN was anything to go by, we were only allowed to believe in one version of what was going on, and I don’t believe that many things are black and white enough for all other views to be outlawed, and the very fact that they were was concerning.

Yep. This is the trouble, the FBI (with whatever evidence they have not released) are endorsing the idea that SARS-COV-2 originated from a lab, but not the extensive conspiracies and misunderstandings that have sprung up surrounding it.

Thank you for your honesty.

Are posters saying the gain-of-function research is a conspiracy?

Wasn't it the US Department of Energy that released this report - not the FBI? But the FBI has 'moderate confidence' where the Department of Energy has 'low' confidence.

Accusations like that have certainly been made

A couple of threads, where posters were concerned about loved ones being CTs, included lab leaks and gain of function research as reasons for their concern. One time someone tried to explain GOF and got told that no one wants to know 🤷🏻‍♀️

Both are saying it’s possible/likely

Obviously not, but there's a lack of understanding as to what it entails, and there are certainly many conspiracy theories that spear off this.

There's no evidence to suggest, for example, that the SARS-COV-2 genome of the original variant identified has been genetically engineered.

@EmmaEmerald

The actual wording the departments used for the lab leak theory is 'Low confidence' (Department of Energy) and 'Moderate confidence' (FBI). Not 'likely'.

Both are saying it’s possible/likely

Christopher Wray used the word “likely”.

@EmmaEmerald

Christopher Wray used the word “likely”.

Interesting - that certainly isn't quite the same as his own agency's finding as 'Moderate confidence'.

In any case, four other US agencies, including the CIA, are either still investigating or have reached different conclusions; and there are also investigations occurring across the globe. The debate is hardly decided. From the Wall St Journal:

"Four other US agencies, along with a national intelligence panel, believe that the pandemic was likely the result of natural transmission, and two are undecided."

MeetPi "The debate is hardly decided."

I don't think anyone said it was.

@EmmaEmerald

I don't think anyone said it was.

Some on this thread appear to think so, though.

But a research laboratory is not a zoo.

Besides, while I believe the origins of the virus are important, it is not the point here. The point is that the government and their advisors made decisions and created policies that had unbelievable impact on people’s lives without very good grounding for doing so. They talked about this over WhatsApp like a group of mates discussing Sunday league football tactics. They took away everything that mattered and I don’t think I’m being hyperbolic to say that things will never be the same again. Freedom is not freedom if it can be taken so easily.

I am so angry.

They took away everything that mattered and I don’t think I’m being hyperbolic to say that things will never be the same again

This. It all feels different now. Some of it is measurable like COL but in addition to that things feel somehow off and dystopian.
It'd also hard to relax and feel safe again after you've experienced what the powers that be can do. And not even with any gravitas, on jokes and whims.

I am angry too. My life has been hugely changed due to the impact of the lockdowns. I've lost family members as a direct result of the NHS restricting their normal services. I have a business that was massively affected by the lockdowns. So many people don't understand and think that it's all in the past now. The reality is that I am constantly living with the risk of losing the business due to the debts accumulated from that period and the knock on effects.

I questioned everything about lockdowns, from the long term damage to peoples health (physical and mental), the economy, children and their education, isolation of elderly and lack of support for those that need it generally etc. etc. Each time I questioned it, someone would respond with the government lines of 'the science' etc, and accuse me of not caring.

So many of the government actions were nothing to do with logic or science or protecting people. The only thing they were protecting was their careers and their prosperity.

Interesting thread.

So. One of the biggest players in the mainstream media, which(according to some)during the pandemic was is and is in cahoots with Klaus Schwab etc al in order to bring about the great Regret or Reset or what ever has suddenly done an about turn? Has suddenly decided to tell the truth. Why is this? Why do all the covid/lockdown sceptics and conspiracy theorists suddenly have 100% confidence in the MSM again?

Oakeshott has an agenda. The Telegraph has an agenda. They will have cherry picked those messages.

I have no doubt we were lied to during the pandemic, and our corrupt government made some huge mistakes, gave huge contracts to their dodgy mates and did an awful lot of covering up. But I haven't seen anything to suggest that no restrictions were needed or that the pandemic was some sort of scam, which is the line lots of people here were pushing during the pandemic.

I remember during lockdown comparing the daily press conferences and adverts to that Halloween film where people watch the advert and get brainwashed… quite scary tbh.

I don't recall many posts on here saying the pandemic was a scam.

FWIW I don't trust the agenda behind the leaks either. I don't trust anything any more.

The phrases scamdemic and pandemic were favourites at one point.