Remember that the Supreme Court threw out Murthy v Biden.
This past week Kennedy and CHD were at the 5th Circuit providing oral arguments before 3 judges about why they had standing for their First Amendment censorship case.
But the other side needs to kill free speech in order to take over, so the stakes are very high. Here is Tedros (today) who in his eloquence talks about trust, and how to get it back—by killing free speech, of course. See how he twists the free speech story.
Internet and social media platforms have given people unprecedented access to health information.
But they have also turbo charged the spread of mis- and disinformation, which has contributed to mistrust in vaccines and other health interventions, fuelled stigma and discrimination, and even led to violence against health workers and marginalized groups.
During the COVID-19 pandemic, falsehoods about masks, vaccines and “lockdowns” spread as fast as the virus itself, and were almost as deadly.
Just as mis- and disinformation undermined the response to the pandemic itself, so it continues to undermine negotiations on the WHO Pandemic Agreement.
Media, celebrities, social media influencers and politicians have spread false claims that the Agreement will cede national sovereignty to WHO and give it the power to impose “lockdowns” or vaccine mandates on countries.
As you know, these claims are, of course, entirely false. Sovereign governments are negotiating the agreement; and sovereign governments will implement it, in accordance with their own national laws.
It’s easy to blame, dismiss, ridicule or insult those who believe or spread mis- or disinformation.
To be sure, governments and internet and social media companies have a responsibility to prevent the spread of harmful lies and promote access to accurate health information.
WHO is working with a range of companies and researchers and partners to understand how misinformation and disinformation spreads, who is targeted, how they’re influenced, and what we can do to counter this problem.
But we must also make sure that when we seek the trust of others, we are ourselves trustworthy.
We cannot assume or expect trust; we must earn it. [Good luck with that—Nass]