I am grateful, in some ways, for the whole Covid charade. Whilst a lot of it - the lockdowns, vaccines and yes, even the manufactured viruses - caused considerable damage and, sadly, injuries and deaths - in some ways, I think it had to happen. Because this world has been sleepwalking to a crazy extent for far too long.
The conditioning and brainwashing that has been done to humanity is huge. My biggest brainwashing came in the form of religion, which has done considerable damage to me and seen me suffer 5 serious mental health episodes, the absolute pinnacle of which was this year. Again, even though I would never have chosen it nor would I want to go through it again in a million years, maybe it had to happen.
One thing that I've never massively followed is the crowd. I've never thought that vaccines were wonderful - I hated injections as a child and it never even occurred to me that I might need them in adulthood to protect me from viruses - that's just crackers to me. I've never been outraged about where my taxes go - although taxation is theft. I'm not a fan of the Royal Family. And I have less trust in doctors and our national health service than ever.
And whilst conspiracies were never a massive part of my life prior to Covid, that side of me was probably always in the background. Especially after suffering one of my mental health crises during the lockdown, I was outraged at how only one thing mattered during that time. I knew of more people that committed suicide in 2020 than in the rest of my life combined - but those people didn't matter. Only Covid did.
After this, I didn't really care what people thought about me. Admittedly, I was a bit of an asshole at times, and lost one or two friends that I regret losing. As time has gone on, I have adopted a bit more tolerance to certain situations - whilst I will probably never be entirely comfortable with people wearing masks, it doesn't trigger me quite as much as it did during the lockdown. And I was fortunate that I knew quite a few people that were on the same side of the fence during the lockdown, and managed to live reasonably normally.
But the extent of the conditioning that has been placed on humanity is still clear to see. We're all victims of it, to an extent, even if we might call ourselves 'critical thinkers'. I've seen some people become so entrenched in conspiracies that they'll automatically believe everything that they read in The Light Paper or see on YouTube. Some of these people, who were saying that we should have the right to choose how we live during the lockdown whilst shouting 'freedom', proceeded to slander those that just wanted to live their lives in a peaceful way and not fight, fight, fight. I ended some friendships because of this.
I'm always a bit reticent when someone talks about 'the truth'. Maybe partly because of my experience in religion. As much as possible these days, I try to stick to my own beliefs or try and find some middle ground - because I feel that whatever is closest to 'the truth' is often, if not always, somewhere in the middle of extreme views.
For example, some might say that Covid killed millions of people and the vaccines saved lives, and others may say that it was a complete hoax and hardly anyone died of Covid. There's certain things on this which have no middle ground for me - the Covid vaccines were basically bad in my book, end of story. And I saw first hand evidence that what the media was saying to us wasn't quite right. But I don't believe that 'Covid didn't exist' - even people I know who have 'conspiracy' views have said that they've had an unnatural virus.
Then, there's something going on at present which some might call the 'trans agenda' or 'non-binary agenda'. There's a disgusting element of anti-trans rhetoric within some of the conspiracy or 'truther' ranks - honestly, some of the most toxic people exist in these circles, and the hatred I've seen written about trans people is something that should be unacceptable to any person with morals. I used to work with someone who had a sex change from male to female; that person is no longer with us, but I saw them after the transition and they were still a decent person. I myself have never seriously considered changing my sex, but I have had times where I haven't felt that much of a man and did get caught up in the non-binary thing for a short while.
Now, to be brutally honest, whilst I try and respect people's choices, I'm really not keen on people referring to themselves as a 'they'. It just doesn't sit comfortably with me. The bigger issue is that kids are supposedly being taught about transgender and non-binary matters in school (and whilst I haven't seen first hand evidence of this myself, on this occasion I am going with the assumption that there is no smoke without fire). That is not right, and I believe that it is being used as part of the (continuous) agenda to keep the consciousness of humanity down.
Women are, quite rightly, standing up to the crazy notion that men can get pregnant or breastfeed - and whilst I don't have an issue with people who change their gender, things are going too far out of balance in this area to the point where nature is being tampered with. Getting pregnant is something that only a woman can do. End of story. And if people get offended by that, too bad.
The far right gets vilified more often but the far left can be just as bad in some ways. People like to be offended these days and there is a narrative which the media subconsciously plant in people's minds that is not politically correct to speak against. And many people don't, for fear of retribution. That's why I support JK Rowling, who is not afraid to say what she thinks, and as far as I can tell, is doing her best to support women.
It's time to speak out, even if our body shakes.