Analysis by Dr. Joseph MercolaFact Checked
- October 18, 2021
STORY AT-A-GLANCE
- October 4, 2021, Southwest Airlines sent an announcement to its employees informing them the airline is “required to comply with the government federal contractor mandate for employees to be fully vaccinated against COVID-19”
- The following weekend, October 9 and 10, 2021, Southwest Airlines was forced to cancel some 1,800 flights. While some claim the cancellations were due to a coordinated “sickout” in protest of the vaccine mandate, Southwest Airlines blamed “disruptive weather” and “air traffic issues” for the cancellations
- An estimated 50 to 60 NBA players remain unvaccinated. In a recent article, the Rolling Stone accuses me of capitalizing on players’ refusal to get the jab
- Rolling Stone again relies on the propaganda narrative of the Center for Countering Digital Hate, despite Facebook having refuted the organization’s made-up claims
- As of November 30, 2021, unvaccinated Canadians will be barred from planes and trains “to ensure a minority of people cannot sabotage Canada’s economic recovery” by spreading the virus and getting people sick. This despite the scientific fact that the COVID jab does not prevent infection or spread of the virus
October 4, 2021, Southwest Airlines sent an announcement to its employees informing them that "because Southwest Airlines is a federal contractor," the airline is "required to comply with the government federal contractor mandate for employees to be fully vaccinated against COVID-19."1
The following weekend, October 9 and 10, 2021, the airline was forced to cancel some 1,800 flights. The reason for the mass cancelations remains unclear, however.
While some claim the cancellations were due to a coordinated "sickout" in protest of the vaccine mandate, Southwest Airlines blamed "disruptive weather" and "air traffic issues" for the cancellations. Curiously, bad weather did not have the same devastating effect on most other airlines. American Airlines, for example, which is much larger, cancelled just 63 flights that weekend.2
The pilots' union also denied involvement, saying that "our pilots are not participating in any official or unofficial job actions."3
The timing is interesting though. Friday October 8, 2021, Southwest's pilot union asked a Dallas, Texas, court to temporarily block the vaccine mandate until its preexisting lawsuit4 against the company, filed August 30, 2021, is resolved. According to the pilot union's legal filing:5
"The new vaccine mandate unlawfully imposes new conditions of employment and the new policy threatens termination of any pilot not fully vaccinated by December 8, 2021. Southwest Airlines' additional new and unilateral modification of the parties' collective bargaining agreement is in clear violation of the RLA [Railway Labor Act]."
While the mass cancellations of flights surely made life difficult for many people, coordinated walkouts appear to be the only way to make our voices heard. The COVID-19 shot is far from harmless, and any blood clotting issue would be a clear career killer for pilots and flight attendants. Pilots also aren't allowed to fly when they report being fatigued, and fatigue is a very common side effect of the jab as well.
Interestingly, a few weeks ago, there was a report of a Delta pilot who had recently received his second dose of the COVID jab, who died during the flight. The plane was landed safely by the co-pilot. You can learn more details in the video below.
NBA Players Take a Stand
In related news, an estimated 50 to 60 NBA players have refused to take the COVID jab.6 Among them is Kyrie Irving, who is predicted to be sidelined from dozens of games during the 2021-2022 basketball season. As reported by USA Today:7
"New York City's vaccine mandate requires professional athletes playing in public arenas to be vaccinated against COVID-19, and Irving's vaccination status remains unclear. Now, for the first time, Nets coach Steve Nash is acknowledging that the team expects Irving to miss home games at Barclays Center due to the mandate.
'I think we recognize he's not playing home games,' Nash told reporters Sunday. 'We're going to have to for sure play without him this year. So it just depends on when, where and how much.'"
In early August 2021, the NBA Union had held its annual summer meeting online. One of the agenda items was whether the league office should mandate that 100% of players had to get the COVID jab. Across the board, those in attendance said such a mandate would be a "non-starter." As reported by Rolling Stone magazine:8
" … unvaccinated players were pushing back. They made their case to the union summit: There should be testing this year, of course, just not during off-days. They'd mask up on the court and on the road, if they must. But no way would they agree to a mandatory jab. The vaccine deniers had set the agenda; the players agreed to take their demands for personal freedom to the NBA's negotiating table."
Rolling Stone also disparages Orlando Magic's Jonathan Isaac, who has refused the COVID jab on religious grounds:
"When NBA players stated lining up for shots in March, Isaac started studying Black history … He learned about antibody resistance and came to distrust Dr. Anthony Fauci. He looked out for people who might die from the vaccine, and he put faith in God.
'At the end of the day, it's people,' Isaac says of the scientists developing vaccines, 'and you can't always put your trust completely in people.' Isaac considers un-vaxxed players to be vilified and bullied, and he thinks 'it's an injustice' to automatically make heroes out of vaccinated celebrities.'"9
Another player who has spoken out against the COVID jab mandate is Golden State Warriors Draymond Green, who during a September 30, 2021, press conference said he will not pressure other players to get vaccinated.10
He said he believes the vaccination issue has become a political issue. In the process, we've lost the notion that people's personal medical decisions must be honored. He also noted that the pressure levied to force people into taking the jab is causing many to get suspicious. "Why are you pressing this so hard?" he said.
Rolling Stone Attacks Me
In another article,11 Rolling Stone reporter Matt Sullivan takes aim at yours truly, referring to me as "the anti-vax godfather." The article appears to be an emergency response to a tweet in which I said that "NBA players are being very courageous to speak up."12
Natural immunity is better than any vaccine, which proves these mandates are not about immunity — they are about forced vaccination and control.It's becoming apparent that the technocratic machine has one primary front group working on their behalf, and that is the Center for Countering Digital Hate (CCDH). Despite being publicly outed — by Facebook, nonetheless! — as a biased organization that fabricates data, Sullivan shamelessly refers to a "CCDH analysis" conducted specifically for the Rolling Stones, which claims to have found:13
"… consistently increased engagement on social posts in support of vaccine-denying athletes from accounts linked to what they call The Disinformation Dozen.
The nonprofit estimated in March that this group … accounted for 73 percent of all anti-vax content on Facebook; the social network responded by shutting down their main accounts and penalizing their other ones, but Silicon Valley's Covid police haven't stopped the anti-vaxxers from re-emerging to ally themselves with celebrities.
'The Disinformation Dozen are sort of saying, 'They've got Biden, we've got Kyrie Irving,' and they're trying to see if they can use it to access Black audiences, young audiences and basketball fans,' says CCDH chief executive Imram [sic] Ahmed.
'This cancer is seeking to replicate itself in another organ of society. The hope is that it can be contained and doesn't metastasize from there. But the worst thing that can happen is for players to react to nonsense — if they're wrong, the price is paid in life' ...
Dr. Joseph Mercola, who tops The Disinformation Dozen, tweeted his applause to more than 325,000 followers this week for Golden State Warriors superstar Draymond Green's rant against vaccine mandates as 'very courageous' and for an appearance on Fox News by the Orlando Magic forward Jonathan Isaac — who told RS that he didn't know why vaccinated people wear masks indoors — as 'a refreshing voice of reason.'14"
Facebook Has Refuted the CCDH Report
What Sullivan didn't include was the fact that Facebook has publicly refuted the CCDH's "Disinformation Dozen" report, stating that:15
"… these 12 people are responsible for about just 0.05% of all views of vaccine-related content on Facebook. This includes all vaccine-related posts they've shared, whether true or false, as well as URLs associated with these people.
The report16 upon which the faulty narrative is based analyzed only a narrow set of 483 pieces of content over six weeks from only 30 groups, some of which are as small as 2,500 users.
They are in no way representative of the hundreds of millions of posts that people have shared about COVID-19 vaccines in the past months on Facebook.
Further, there is no explanation for how the organization behind the report identified the content they describe as 'anti-vax' or how they chose the 30 groups they included in their analysis. There is no justification for their claim that their data constitute a 'representative sample' of the content shared across our apps."
Despite that, Sullivan continues to promote that CCDH report as "fact" and Imran as some sort of authority on who has the greatest influence on social media.
Are Naturally Immune 'Antivax'?
Sullivan emailed me a few questions in preparation for that smear piece. Among those questions was whether I have "counseled any NBA players seeking information about the vaccine," and "If so, how so?" Apparently, he believes I advise professional athletes, which I don't.
He also wanted to know how I consider these sports influencers to be part of "my movement" or "my team," and whether I believe Irving's defiance of the New York City vaccine mandate would rally my supporters. Here's my reply:
"Many of these athletes have had COVID themselves and the public health officials are reluctant to admit they are right. Natural immunity is better than any vaccine, which proves these mandates are not about immunity — they are about forced vaccination and control.
You've said the NBA is 'relying on science' in a previous article yet they are ignorant and lying about natural immunity — just as the federal government is doing. The mandates are not about immunity, they are about control and obedience. www.washingtonpost.com/outlook/2021/09/15/natural-immunity-vaccine-mandate/
Individuals can think for themselves and should be allowed to do so, independent of pharmaceutical influence, employer mandates or political authoritarians. I believe that each person must fully educate themselves before engaging in any medical risk taking.
People are smarter than they are being given credit for, and everybody has their own unique circumstances to base their decisions on including biological vulnerabilities that can make vaccine risks greater for some people than others. twitter.com/ericspracklen/status/1445901692143390720?s=21
I applaud anyone who stands up against medical mandates which can negatively affect their lives. It takes courage to take on the attacks of the media and pharmaceutical interests and accept the consequences being forced upon them without their consent.
Many stadiums are packed with 80,000 people now, without any vaccine mandates and have embraced life beyond the ridiculous propaganda currently controlling in the media."
It's Not About Health, It's About Control
As noted by Spencer Fernando,17 the idea that the COVID jab would be mandated and forced on people was rejected as loony conspiracy theory at the beginning of the pandemic. Ditto for vaccine passports. Yet here we are.
The pace toward tyranny is slower in the United States compared to some other countries, thanks to our Constitution, but President Biden's attempt to dictate unconstitutional COVID injection mandates to private employers across the nation is evidence that the Constitution is routinely being overstepped even here. Some countries, like Canada and Australia, aren't even pretending to hide the fact that it's about social control anymore. As noted by Fernando:18
"Have you noticed how events in Canada have really moved in only one direction? Compliance at all costs. The trend has been clear: More and more control, more and more threats of punishment, and more and more demands for compliance."
As of November 30, 2021, unvaccinated Canadians will be barred from planes and trains" to ensure a minority of people cannot sabotage Canada's economic recovery" by spreading the virus and getting people sick. But there's a giant hole in this rationale.
A person with natural immunity is safer than anyone who has gotten the jab, because its more robust and provides wider protection against variants. The COVID shot does not prevent infection or spread of the virus.
If the goal were to prevent spread of the virus, then the only things that would make sense would be to prove you're not infected or that you are immune. Proof of vaccination will have zero impact on the spread of the virus. You'll just end up with a vaccinated population that spreads new mutations among themselves.
The Power of Natural Immunity
In a September 15, 2021, Washington Post article, Dr. Marty Makary, professor at the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine and Bloomberg School of Public Health, stated:19
"It's okay to have an incorrect scientific hypothesis. But when new data proves it wrong, you have to adapt. Unfortunately, many elected leaders and public health officials have held on far too long to the hypothesis that natural immunity offers unreliable protection against covid-19 — a contention that is being rapidly debunked by science.
More than 15 studies have demonstrated the power of immunity acquired by previously having the virus. A 700,000-person study from Israel two weeks ago found that those who had experienced prior infections were 27 times less likely to get a second symptomatic covid infection than those who were vaccinated.
This affirmed a June Cleveland Clinic study of health-care workers (who are often exposed to the virus), in which none who had previously tested positive for the coronavirus got reinfected.
The study authors concluded that 'individuals who have had SARS-CoV-2 infection are unlikely to benefit from covid-19 vaccination.' And in May, a Washington University study found that even a mild covid infection resulted in long-lasting immunity.
So, the emerging science suggests that natural immunity is as good as or better than vaccine-induced immunity. That's why it's so frustrating that the Biden administration has repeatedly argued that immunity conferred by vaccines is preferable to immunity caused by natural infection, as NIH director Francis Collins told Fox News host told Bret Baier a few weeks ago.
That rigid adherence to an outdated theory is also reflected in President Biden's recent announcement that large companies must require their employees to get vaccinated or submit to regular testing, regardless of whether they previously had the virus."
If You Don't Take a Stand, Who Will?
Clearly, we're not dealing with either logic, science or health. The effort to vaccinate the whole world, whether they need it or not, is about control and greed.
"Some have said that people have 'gone crazy' during this crisis," Fernando writes.20 "However, I think the reality is that people have been revealed.
A large number of people (and nearly all politicians) have demonstrated that in a crisis they panic, lose any sense of proportion, are unable to think creatively, and double-down on the same failed approach over and over again.
Worse than that, they have shown that they would prefer to demonize and direct fear towards others, rather than seek to take responsibility for their own lives and their own health. Rather than seek control over themselves, they seek control over others."
Many are now so locked into irrational fear, it's virtually impossible to get them to look at data or facts. Meanwhile, the political class has grown obsessed with controlling everyone, and don't want to see or hear anything that might undermine that aim.
As a result, those willing to defend freedom and individual rights appear to be a shrinking group. But no matter how small that group gets, we can never quit. As noted by Fernando:21
"… it's remnants that hold on to values in difficult moments, and provide the foundation from which those values are renewed and rebuilt. That's why we must continue to stand up against measures like the national vaccine passport, and stand up for our fellow citizens who are being demonized by our pathetic and failed leaders."
The question is how? How do we stand against the ever more draconian rules being thrown at us? For starters, we all need to stop making money for the authoritarians. That means not donating to political campaigns that support authoritarian leaders or buying products or using services provided by companies that in turn support the elimination of our rights.
Secondly, we need to get organized. If you work at a company that is threatening to implement mandatory vaccination, you could coordinate a "sickout," where everyone calls out sick on the same days, or some other form of strike. You can also consider taking legal action.
In early September 2021, USCourts.gov posted a list of attorneys willing to take on vaccine injury cases and/or cases involving vaccine mandates. Since then, that webpage has been removed, but the list can still be found on Daily USA24.22 Legal counsel may also advise you on how to protect your communications.
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