Oh, the Lengths to Which They Will CoV! - The birth of 'Analcdotal' evidence

'Callous Liars Club' is the worst sequel ever made

Note: **The Prometheus Hub page/post** compiles most of the research and resources [1,500+] I’ve used/found/analyzed/watched/etc. during [and prior to] my efforts with DRASTIC, so that those who are looking for more about COVID’s origins can find it in one place.

I don’t plan on ever charging a subscription fee for any of the content on my site; everything I keep here is the result of 20 months of research conducted because it needed to be done and very few were doing it. However, this has literally been my full-time job since March 2020, so any ‘subscription’ as a donation will help me continue this work uninterrupted by the real world. Or, if you’re still in the recovery phase of the financial pandemic, spreading the word could be just as helpful to the cause; after all, everyone has suffered from the lack of honest & unbiased information from our leaders that would’ve helped us be clear-eyed about what we were going to face. I have no greater responsibility with this site than to keep it accessible to anyone who deserves the truth - which, of course, is all of us.

*This article represents the first crossover research project between myself and my 1-year-old non-profit adventure into the dark corners of the pandemic, SARS-CoV-Rix [Society for the Advancement of Rixey’s Sarcasm about COVID]

**Disclaimer: Gain-of-Sarcasm [GoS] experiments were conducted on the original version of this article, which was published in March. It is more obnoxious & more contagious, but can’t cause myocarditis and can’t be exploited by pharmaceutical companies.

As I was reading a news article about China forcing US Diplomats to undergo anal swab tests for COVID-19, and pondering clever acronyms, I saw a news report about censorship of Dr. Seuss. As a ‘serious’ historian, calling out scientific censorship is a duty of objectivity, but let’s be honest - I can’t pass up an opportunity to use sarcastic acronyms & children’s book ‘scandals’ to highlight the dangers of mass stupidity and scientific cowardice. Acronyms are used all the time to communicate things in a more efficient manner, so let’s see if you can pick up my ‘subtle’ message for a certain ‘syndicate’ of virologists:

Has your virology lab gone ANAL? [Aggressively Naysaying Actual Logic]

Showing Signs of SWABs? [Stunning Willingness to Accept BS]

Stay safe with the RECTUM principles! [Reject Evidence, Coordinate Testimony, Undermine & Misdirect]

Report concerns immediately to a trusted campus authority figure with common sense, as these symptoms can quickly lead to reputation-threatening embarrassment and/or loss of taxpayer funds in support of your morally questionable efforts to secure tenure. In the event of RECTUM failure, double down with DASAC [repeat as needed]

D.U.H.

Dangerous Unpublished Human trials?

A.C.E. [2]

Advocate w/Contrived Evidence

S.C.I.E.N.C.E.

Scientists Concealing Important Evidence Neatly Consistent with lab Emergence

A.B.S.O.L.U.T.E.L.Y.

Announce Blanket Statements to Obscure Links which Uncomfortably Tie to Evil LaboratorY

C.O.M.P.L.I.C.I.T.

Coordinate Obfuscation of Mutual Participation Links In Controversial Infectivity Turbocharging

**Yes, this is an acronym made up of acronyms**

Dr. Fauci & his merry band of Hypocritic Oafs

Scientists are fighting back against research investigating the possibility of a lab leak origin for COVID-19, claiming that such 'conspiracy theories' rely on 'anecdotal' evidence [mostly, that China’s only BSL-4 lab is in Wuhan, where the pandemic began]. After a year in which 2.5 million people died of COVID-19, during which other scientists have uncovered voluminous [and damning] evidence in support of the lab-origin hypothesis, I’ve seen only a handful of articles that addresses any of the suspicions raised with actual experiments of their own.

I’m not a virologist, but when someone reads more than 800 articles [12-14,000 pages] on a narrow range of subjects, they’d better have gained some valuable insight. Assuming I’m comfortably far from the low end of the research Bell curve, the non lab-origin hypotheses are resting almost entirely on prior, generalized evidence - and have failed to respond at all to most of the current findings.

My recommendation is that we stop complaining about anecdotal evidence and focus on the people who consistently use such 'facts' to avoid open and honest debate. Their evidence isn't the problem, their perspective is the problem, and it leads to what I'd call 'Anecdotal Intelligence:' an undue trust in one's own accrued wisdom that slowly shifts into a denial of actual facts, if they don't support one's conclusions.

Researching COVID-19, especially the origins of the SARS-CoV-2 virus and its emergence into humans in Wuhan in December, 2019, has reinforced my understanding of the universal distribution of bias in human existence. The first thing any future historian learns in grad school is the importance of perspective, and the second principle is the importance of objectivity in research, with the goal of muting inherent bias to present an accurate picture of past events. However, regardless of an author’s level of integrity and accuracy of analysis [on average, not exceptional], there is nothing that prevents a reader from judging a book by its cover anyway. Exhibit A of said phenomenon:

Creativity Metaphor or Virologist Response to Criticism?

Anecdotal Evidence?

Everyone who disagrees with something/one has the freedom & the privilege to speak about it. But, they also have a responsibility to not pull sh*t out of their *ss [analcdotal evidence]. If you are passionate enough about a topic/cause/issue, then you should be motivated to WIN an argument, not just start one - and that means actually 'knowing' what you're talking about. And that means more learning, and research, and less Netflix.

One of the most disturbing aspects of increased media factionalism has been the tendency of news broadcasters to marginalize the incorporation of opposing views in their coverage; creating an echo chamber while complaining about the editorial decisions of other news organizations is bold hypocrisy, indeed. I talked about this last year in discussing my purpose for writing about the nascent pandemic, the tragic impact of politicizing news about COVID-19, and the cowardice of avoiding the big picture last September when the CDC wouldn’t tell the American people what to expect over the winter. I used the CDC’s own historical records and statistics to produce a model far more accurate in predicting magnitude than the CDC’s own ensemble forecast. The accuracy of any projections is not comforting to me, because I didn’t want the pandemic to get that bad; I just wanted to raise awareness and help spark more effective action. Sadly, the partisanship has gotten stronger, not weaker, with the passage of time.

For a year, we've been chastised to 'follow the science,' but no one seems to be referring to something that they've researched themselves. If they did dig around, scientist would see that there's plenty of room for nuance in almost any COVID-19 debate. The reason is because scientists don't always agree, and it's not terribly difficult to find intelligent, thoughtful experts to support different conclusions; sadly, the pandemic brought out the worst in many of our leaders, and it became de rigeur to proclaim one's opposition as extreme, regardless of any counter-evidence.

The same phenomena is now occurring with COVID-19 vaccines & vaccine mandates. Painting with too broad a brush is killing our society in a variety of ways, but in particular, it has fueled a rabid cancel culture [on one side] and a rabid anti-cancel culture [on the other]. My take is that it's less about partisanship and more about laziness, and it's not hard to spot the good from the bad, either. Quick quiz - which one is/was suffering from anecdotal intelligence: Sean Hannity or Rush Limbuagh? Rachel Maddow or Chris Cuomo? Barack Obama or Donald Trump?

[just in case there was some doubt, the answers are Hannity, Cuomo and Both]

But on the bright side, we get to keep enjoying sequels…. like this:

~Rixey

P.S. I’ll never mandate paid subscriptions, but I won’t turn down donations via subscription.* Every donation means another spike protein of justice, riding a lipid nanoparticle across the blood-brain barrier of the bureaucracy.

[*in my fight against the mortgage mandate]