In epidemiology, MacIntyre says, not everything is as it seems. She mistrusts some of her colleagues who put their reputations and grant applications ahead of scientific evidence and public health.
If biopolitics is power that is realised through the organisation of how people live, then necropolitical power is realised through dictating the limits of who gets to live and who dies.
Because permaculture is perceived as benign, generally harmless and peace-loving, its presence at freedom rallies speaks against the impression that the far Right is violent and dangerous.
…while it is clear that Australians in general are more persuaded by ‘positive liberty’ arguments than the new libertarians would like to imagine, it is striking that the case for lockdown, or indeed for mandatory vaccinations, is only rarely made in those terms.
‘This is a crisis’ is not a mere empirical observation that can be unproblematically represented in a semantic act. Instead, ‘This is a crisis’ is a logical observation—it is a claim. And it is, moreover, a conceptual claim.
…it is tempting to argue that any society should resist both state compulsion and certification, and encourage the social recognition that global diseases and rapid vaccine development predispose us not to the primacy of individual bodily rights but to the recognition of our obligation to the other.
UK news reports say that many, perhaps a majority, will continue to avoid crowded venues even after ‘Freedom Day’. But of course that is of little use; a minority of 5 to 10 per cent letting rip is sufficient to turn these places into spreader hubs.
…the public deserves not to be put at risk when simple precautions can be taken to screen for and guard against possible bad side effects of vaccines, however rare these side effects might be.
a girl’s voice called out from within the crowd. In Cantonese, she cried ‘Liberate Hong Kong’. Her chant echoed from the building walls and amplified her voice. The crowd responded swiftly, chanting in unison: ‘Revolution of Our Time’.
As the pandemic raged, it appeared that Israel’s disregard for Palestinian life, an institutionally entrenched position, would be costly not only for Palestinians but for Israelis themselves.
Although the development of a COVID-19 vaccine broke records for speed, never before have virtually limitless financial and scientific resources suddenly been made available.
