(Psst: The FTC needs me to remind you that this web site comprises affiliate hyperlinks. Which means if you happen to make a purchase order from a hyperlink you click on on, I’d obtain a small fee. This doesn’t improve the value you may pay for that merchandise nor does it lower the awesomeness of the merchandise. ~ Daisy)
The OP has suffered loads from deplatforming, as Daisy has documented. This has been very tough financially, however we’re removed from alone. One of many greatest public figures recurrently getting shut down is Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., an official presidential candidate. RFK is continually getting banned and smeared as an “anti-vaxxer.” However is he actually that loopy?
Some background on RFK Jr.
RFK Jr. was born well-known and privileged, besides, in fact, for his father and uncle getting assassinated in his childhood. For a very long time, RFK Jr. was greatest referred to as an environmental lawyer. He grew to become concerned in cleansing up the Hudson River within the Nineteen Eighties as a part of court-mandated community service from a heroin arrest. His group service impressed him to work with a number of teams devoted to cleansing up the Hudson, and he ultimately founded Waterkeeper Alliance in 1999.
His environmental hero standing didn’t final, nonetheless. In 2005, he entered the vaccine debate after being contacted by parents of vaccine-injured children. Since then, it has been onerous to seek out an article about RFK Jr. that doesn’t start by describing him as an “anti-vaxxer.”
For about fifteen years, most individuals (myself included) had been content material to dismiss him and the anti-vaccine motion normally as cranks. I raised my kids with all their photographs, trusting the medical occupation to maintain us wholesome.
Till Covid.
Because the “two weeks to flatten the curve” become months and generally years, many individuals started to appreciate there was one thing deeply improper with lots of our formerly-trusted establishments. We noticed companies get shut down and livelihoods ruined. Selections weren’t being made in the very best pursuits of regular People, those that ran small companies and relied on establishments like the general public faculties.
When the jabs got here alongside, issues bought weirder. Pure immunity was totally ignored and the nation was anticipated to submit itself as guinea pigs for this remedy that had by no means been examined for long-term results. When vaccine mandates started to be carried out, RFK Jr.’s advocacy for parental alternative relating to medical therapies began to sound much more cheap.
It grew to become apparent that there was loads of mendacity and manipulation happening. I grew to become more and more suspicious of “official” voices and extra keen to take heed to figures like RFK Jr. I purchased his ebook, The Real Anthony Fauci, virtually as quickly because it was obtainable.
I learn the entire thing. All 492 pages detailing one rip-off after one other. Chances are you’ll not agree with RFK Jr. on each subject, however nobody can deny that he is aware of his materials. And nobody has sued him for libel or slander, which makes me assume the ebook is generally correct.
The Actual Anthony Fauci bought over 1,000,000 copies and has greater than 23,000 opinions culminating in 4.8 stars, but garnered no ebook opinions from legacy media.
So, why are the Democrats so afraid of him?
On pages 142-142, RFK Jr. recounts going from a sought-after visitor speaker whose articles had been recurrently featured in legacy media to a complete outcast. His standing modified abruptly as soon as he turned from cleansing up waterways to pharmaceutical firms. Nevertheless, he has deep pockets, he’s bought the Kennedy identify, and he hasn’t gone away.
As the general public, normally, grew to become increasingly distrustful of the Covid response, folks grew to become extra keen to take heed to non-mainstream voices like RFK Jr. His non-profit, Kids’s Well being Protection, saw its profits double in 2020.
His “Defeat the Mandates” rally in January 2022 was attended by over 30,000 people.
After The Actual Anthony Fauci was revealed, Tucker Carlson hosted RFK Jr. extra recurrently. The 2 males had an interview on April 19, the day RFK Jr. introduced his plan to run as a Democratic presidential candidate. On April 24, 5 days later, Fox fired Tucker, resulting in hypothesis that Tucker’s willingness to offer RFK Jr. a big platform was a part of the explanation for his dismissal.
RFK Jr. has been interviewed by the likes of Russell Brand and Jordan Peterson. Regardless of being endlessly labeled “loopy” and “extremist,” after watching him work together with a wide range of hosts, he comes throughout as something however.
After immense social stress, Instagram had to reinstate his original account in addition to his campaign account as soon as he introduced his presidential bid. Former Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey has endorsed RFK, a lot to the outcry of the MSM. He’s confirmed tough to silence.
He could be very spectacular in a presidential debate.
Somewhat than name-calling, if RFK Jr. is so dead-wrong about vaccines and youngsters’s well being, why doesn’t anybody really interact him?
Folks refuse to have interaction in arguments with RFK Jr. as a result of they’ll’t. He’s a long-time trial lawyer, so he’s good at arguing, and he’s additionally very, very clever. He’s snug studying scientific materials and understands a lot of the debates round childhood well being and vaccines in a manner that many individuals, even many college-educated folks, simply don’t.
For instance, in The Actual Anthony Fauci, on pages 285-286, he discusses the controversy between Louis Pasteur and Antoine Bechamp again within the nineteenth century. To simplify: Pasteur is the man who realized that germs unfold ailments. He posited that, by retaining environments germ-free, we might keep away from infections. Clearly, there’s loads of reality on this. It’s the mannequin Western healthcare runs on.
Bechamp, nonetheless, who lived at about the identical time as Pasteur, argued that it wasn’t so easy. He thought we might by no means kill each possible germ, nor ought to we attempt to. As a substitute, Bechamp thought our time could be higher spent specializing in optimum vitamin and fundamental sanitation in order that our our bodies could be greatest capable of struggle off no matter dangerous germs got here alongside. We all know, at this level, that there’s reality on this as effectively, and RFK Jr. makes use of Bechamp’s line of considering to posit that possibly we must always focus extra on higher-quality meals and a more healthy surroundings for youngsters fairly than extra pharmaceutical merchandise.
There’s nothing loopy about this, and actually, the extra we uncover concerning the significance of the microbiome in our intestines, the extra it is sensible. In David Quammen’s ebook The Tangled Tree, that includes the lifetime work of microbiologist Carl Woese, he places forth the current analysis indicating that we perceive the microscopic world far lower than we predict we do. Merely lumping microscopic life varieties into “good” and “dangerous” classes, after which making an attempt to kill off all of the “dangerous” ones, can’t work when the traces between the species are pretty blurry.
Many scientifically-literate people perceive this to various levels, and that is a part of the explanation that PhDs displayed the most persistent suspicion across the Covid vaccines. Time has proved them right, as we discover that the jabs had been, at greatest, pretty ineffective and, at worst harmful for sure teams.
Controversial or not, he will get the phrase out.
And this all goes to show that RFK Jr. understands points at a stage that almost all public figures simply don’t. His stances are undoubtedly debatable, however they aren’t unhinged and so they don’t come out of nowhere. Nevertheless, as a result of understanding his standpoint effectively sufficient to have interaction in severe argument requires an understanding of each science and historical past, most pundits discover it far easier to simply name him loopy and refuse to let him converse.
However RFK Jr. will get his message out anyway, discovering various shops, doing his greatest to show the inside workings between Huge Authorities and Huge Enterprise.
And that is most likely why RFK Jr. is such a thorn within the facet of the Democratic institution. He doesn’t play together with a lot of the large donors he’s alleged to play together with. He has watched the Democratic Celebration go from being anti-war, anti-corporate, and pro-free speech to being the celebration of lockstep conformity. No different household represents the outdated Democratic Celebration the way in which the Kennedy clan does; he’s in a novel place to level out the methods through which the Democratic Celebration has morphed into one thing fully totally different than it was even twenty years in the past.
RFK Jr. additionally has a pulse on utilizing media in a manner that almost all institution figures don’t. Throughout his current interview with Jordan Peterson, he referenced the primary televised presidential debate again in 1960, when younger, good-looking John F. Kennedy mopped the ground with Richard Nixon.
The way in which through which his uncle used the latest type of media to his benefit sixty years in the past clearly made an impression on RFK Jr. He stated that Trump gained the 2016 election, partly, as a result of he used Twitter to his benefit, despite the fact that legacy media handled his marketing campaign as a joke. RFK Jr. believes that the 2024 race might be vastly influenced by podcasts, and he has an actual benefit right here as a result of, in contrast to so many different candidates, he’s prepared and keen to take a seat down and debate for 2 or three hours at a time.
He’s an attention-grabbing candidate.
I ought to make it clear, once more, that I disagree with RFK Jr. on loads of points. I used to work in oil and gasoline, and I believe his characterization of “clear” wind and photo voltaic is manner off. I might argue with him on that.
However I’m completely satisfied he’s on the market, throwing rocks at institution home windows and forcing highly effective figures to both clarify themselves or show by their silence that they’ve one thing to cover.
What are your ideas? Is RFK Jr. a viable candidate? What do you consider him, execs and cons? Do you assume he has any likelihood in his presidential run?
Let’s talk about him, the media response, and his candidacy within the feedback part.
About Marie Hawthorne
A lover of novels and cultivator of excellent apple pie recipes, Marie spends her free time writing concerning the world round her.
