Right-wing figures exploit "Disease X" fears, selling pricey "emergency kits" with unproven treatments. Alex Jones and others push this new scare.
This time around, the grifters are telling their suckers that Hillary Clinton and the round-earthers have cooked up a diabolical pathogen called "Disease X" to rid the planet of "excess population," "install a corporate world government," and "enslave humanity." If you don't want your body to get covered in festering boils and carbuncles the size of chicken eggs, you need to buy a "medical contagion kit" with vials of life-saving ivermectin manufactured right here in God's most favorite country in the whole universe.
Oh Jesus is this what some guy in my extended social circle was trying to tell me about?
I’ve gotten pretty good at playing dumb and diverting the conversation away towards something tangentially related and based in reality, but it’s getting hard man.
The worst part is that when the next pandemic actually does emerge, they'll scream that it was disease x and say they've been using the "cure" all along, so they'll take zero precautions and probably performatively engage in behaviors that spread the disease.
Disease X is a standin for planning purposes. They've been planning for The Big One and COVID-19 qualifies. They're probably planning for the next one incorporating lessons from COVID
Let 'em spend their money on this and lock up the fraudsters just before they can donate ant money to any republican campaign. Kill two birds with one stone. Keep the idiots on the street from sending to trump and keep the idiots at the top from doing so.
This is why education, thusly critical thinking, is so important in a digital and globalized world. These unfortunate people who lack the skills to understand these obvious lies for what they are become the ramifications of voting corruption into power, who then go on to limit school funding in favor of personal gain. It's a vicious circle we are in, but I think if we keep voting for pro-education, pro-social-welfare politicians then the cycle can be broken. The most important thing to do is to never give up a steadfast defence against facism, bigotry, and corruption. Our very existence as a democracy could depend quite a bit on these next few rounds of voting.
You're definitely right, however that is by design. "Education" systems (i.e. religion-based private learning) attenuate critical thinking by replacing scientific analysis with theological opinion. Yet in my eyes that's not education, that's pushing an agenda.
Recently 'Disease X' was a topic of discussion on a forum in Dubai (?). That was a template name for any disease that'd need excessive measures to adapt for it, like a covid pandemic. No wonder headless chikens run with it like it means some exact conspirological pathogen.
Seeing Jordan Klepper talking to that guy that bought all the donnie regalia complaining about the price of things (with the built-in assumption of "it's due to Biden") was hilarious. Dude said he spent thousands of dollars on useless shit with donnie branding, complaining about the price of food and gas. JFC, these people are BEGGING to be fleeced. Same with the guy with that "never surrender" shirt being asked about the picture of donnie as he is actually surrendering with the classic "HUH?" as a response.
Well, I guess they had to come up with something to explain the fallout from COVID since they simultaneously claim that either (a) it's not real or (b) it's just a mild flu.
It sure is interesting how the right has appropriated a lot of populist rhetoric for their fake populism. The platform of the right wing does everything possible to prop up something like a "corporate world government".
They have some seriously stupid people in their base.