“Who steals my purse steals trash ….”
Iago, the antagonist of Shakespeare’s play Othello, says very eloquently that if anyone steals another’s purse (or money), it is not nearly as important or as drastic as stealing that person’s reputation. Once gone, it can never be restored; it is like trying to glue a Dresden china figurine together after it has been shattered.
Impossible to do.
During World War II and the Vietnam War, specific departments were responsible for the distribution of propaganda as well as for the systematic discrediting of leaked military information. Discrediting the sources … whistleblowers … served to confuse and disorient their enemies.
However, it also kept the citizens of the warring countries in the dark. Oftimes, discredited peope included journalists who had inadvertently or deliberately released sensitive information that could damage the Allies or the US, respectively (in the case of WWII and the Vietnam War). Alternatively, released information might put the governments or the military in a difficult situation, having to explain or justify what ordinary citizen might deem harsh or morally reprehensible activities during wartime: the torture of captives in order to illicit information, for example.
The phrase: “All is fair in love and war” does not sit comfortably on everyone’s shoulders, especially if they are personally affected. As a result, it is sometimes considered necessary to conceal or mask a difficult tactical decision. It has been suggested that Winston Churchill’s determination not to let the enemy (Germans) know about the Enigma code breakers in World War II led to many British citizens being put into certain danger: Coventry, UK, for example. Chruchill was allegedly unwilling to forego this important tactical tool and he weighed the cost of wartime lives against future gains.
The historic art of disinformation has been used time and again down the ages in political or military arenas, but it seems to have become so commonplace in our time, the mid to late 20th and early 21st centuries, that it is now a buzz word used by the common citizens to discredit any opinion or viewpoint that differs from the majority or the masses.
Do the words “conspiracy theorist” mean anything to you?
If you are one of the mainstream population, and you trustingly believe everything the government and scientists say without question, it is an easy dismissal of an “other”, someone who thinks differently than you. If, however, you are the person being labelled as a conspiracy theorist, you are seen as a person who believes in every outlandish or ridiculous theory that exists. It is a destructive and demeaning label that sticks like glue.
In other words, if you disbelieve or question established answers to puzzling situations, you are labelled as a conspiracy theorist. From that point on, anything you say or believe is subject to ridicule and mockery. This is because you are now considered to be someone who is illogical, easily manipulated, and prone to following personal beliefs and feelings rather than scientific or established facts.
Over the past few weeks, there have been several investigations and probing questions being asked about the origins of the Coronavirus (Covid-19) virus and the possibility of the virus escaping from a laboratory in Wuhan, China. Along these lines, the impartiality of the World Health Organization (WHO), the culpability of the National Institute of Health (NIH), and the foreknowledge of scientists associated with these organizations have been questioned. In fact, Dr. Anthony Fauci, the acknowledged leading expert on the virus in the US, has been linked to the funding of Gain of Function experimentation on numerous viruses including the SARS and the COVID virus through the NIH.
Almost from the beginning, numerous scientists and immunologists from around the world, such as Chinese Immunologist Dr Li-Meng Yan, insisted back in 2020 that the structure of the virus proclaimed that it was man-made and theorized that because of its extreme potency and the way it specifically seemed to target humans, it had probably gone through some gain of function modifications in laboratory conditions.
This was rejected almost uniformly by the mainstream media and by many leading scientists as ridiculous and as an unforgivable attempt to confuse the public. In other words, this was a conspiracy theory, a particularly destructive, unconscionable conspiracy theory.
If you asked about the origins of the Coronavirus (Covid-19), if you questioned the often contradictory information coming out of China and the WHO, if you investigated alternative theories … from respectable but free-thinking scientists …, you were a believer in conspiracy theories.
In fact, in February 2020, several leading, respectable scientists wrote a letter claiming that the Covid 19 virus was definitely not manufactured or made in a lab. It stated: “We stand together to strongly condemn conspiracy theories suggesting that COVID-19 does not have a natural origin.” (The Lancet: VOLUME 395, ISSUE 10226, E42-E43, MARCH 07, 2020).
One of the authors of this letter was Peter Daszak, one of the representatives that the WHO sent to Wuhan, China in February 2021 to try to definitively discover the origins of the Covid-19 virus. However, it has now come to light that was a glaring conflict of interest as Mr. Daszak was involved in the original Gain of Function research at the Wuhan Institute of Virology. And this research was funded by the NIH (of the US) through a sub agency of the NIH: Eco Health Alliance.
Senator Rand Paul very recently questioned Dr. Fauci (during a Senate Covid Hearing in May 2021) about the use of US taxpayer funds for Gain of Function experiements in Wuhan, China since 2014; this was when it was declared to be too dangerous for these types of experiments to be conducted on US soil. Dr. Fauci strenuously denied this, but there is sufficient proof and the testimony of dozens of scientists to confirm that this was (and is being) done.
The WHO has also been shown to have disturbingly close ties to China. In fact, the Chinese government has so much influence over the WHO that the scientists who went to China in February 2021 had to be approved by the Chinese government before they were granted access to specific, limited areas of Wuhan, and always under supervision.
There was little doubt that the Chinese government was in charge, not the WHO or its appointed investigative team.
In this ongoing drama/reveal, where many of the “conspiracy theories” are being shown to be more fact than fiction, what is being done about the reputations of the so-called conspiracy theorists?
Are apologies being issued?
Certainly not by the mainstream mass media outlets.
Certainly not by official channels — govenment or otherwise.
So, perhaps the next time you are getting set to label someone as a conspiracy theorist, you might take a deep breath and keep your opinion to yourself. Facts matter, but facts are changeable and constantly evolving as our knowledge increases.
My strong advice is: remember that once you say or do something harmful or damaging to someone’s reputation, it cannot be erased, so it’s better to reserve judgement and let the facts emerge naturally.
OTHELLO ACT 3, SCENE 3, 155–161
Iago:
Good name in man and woman, dear my lord,
Is the immediate jewel of their souls.
Who steals my purse steals trash; ’tis something, nothing;
’Twas mine, ’tis his, and has been slave to thousands;
But he that filches from me my good name
Robs me of that which not enriches him,
And makes me poor indeed.https://www.enotes.com/shakespeare-quotes/who-steals-my-purse-steals-trash
