Juno News - Why people are turning on vaccine mandates (ft. Rupa Subramanya)

00:00:00.000 Welcome to Canada's Most Irreverent Talk Show.

00:00:05.640 This is The Andrew Lawton Show, brought to you by True North.

00:00:10.560 Coming up, I talk to my colleague Rupa Subramania about vaccine mandates, vaccine passports,

00:00:16.080 and the all-important marketplace of ideas.

00:00:18.880 The Andrew Lawton Show starts right now.

00:00:22.120 Hello and welcome to another edition of The Andrew Lawton Show,

00:00:25.760 Canada's Most Irreverent Talk Show here on True North.

00:00:28.740 It is Thursday, August 25th, 2022, and I want to talk about this story that came up on Twitter,

00:00:37.100 and I try to avoid trying to extract too much in the sense of reality from Twitter,

00:00:43.760 because oftentimes it's the exact opposite of the real world.

00:00:46.900 But there was a thread that emerged there, and I don't mean a Twitter thread,

00:00:50.820 I mean a thread in the more esoteric sense,

00:00:53.660 that I wanted to delve into involving my friend and colleague Rupa Subramania,

00:00:57.800 and I thought it touched on a number of the issues we cover regularly on this show,

00:01:01.860 like vaccine mandates and vaccine passports and whatnot,

00:01:05.360 but also this idea of civil discourse and the marketplace of ideas and how we talk

00:01:10.040 so often, especially on the right, about the importance of free speech and open debate,

00:01:14.720 but oftentimes people can be very hostile to differences of opinion.

00:01:20.060 And in some cases, people can have a difference of opinion with themselves a few months back.

00:01:25.740 And for that, I want to welcome to the program my colleague Rupa Subramania,

00:01:30.580 who is the host of The Rupa Subramania Show and also writes to The National Post

00:01:35.140 and Barry Weiss's Common Sense sub-stack and all over the place as well.

00:01:39.000 But before I do, just to set the stage,

00:01:41.000 Rupa broke this tremendous story for Barry Weiss's sub-stack

00:01:44.400 about the lack of a scientific basis for the air travel vaccine mandate.

00:01:49.240 The story did very well online.

00:01:51.500 Some conservative politicians picked it up,

00:01:53.580 but for the most part, the Canadian media establishment avoided the story altogether.

00:01:59.380 And there was a little bit of a controversy on Twitter that emerged

00:02:03.220 when some people dug up this old tweet from Rupa

00:02:06.260 that I'll share with you in a couple of moments' time,

00:02:08.840 in which she talked about supporting the idea of a vaccine passport from August of 2021.

00:02:15.980 And her position has clearly changed now.

00:02:18.600 So I wanted to delve into this and also talk in general

00:02:21.420 about where we are in the COVID situation and how a lot of Canadians,

00:02:25.020 I think, that went along with some of the things in the official narrative two years ago

00:02:28.980 have now a wildly different view of all of these issues.

00:02:33.060 So Rupa, we'll get to all of that, but it's good to talk to you.

00:02:35.640 Thanks for coming on today.

00:02:36.700 Thanks so much, Andrew, for having me again.

00:02:40.380 It was interesting.

00:02:41.460 I was going to invite you on anyway to talk about this story.

00:02:45.080 I don't even want to say a story,

00:02:46.480 but this little mini faux controversy that was circulating on Twitter.

00:02:50.640 You had a bunch of people that took a tweet that you had posted in August of 2021,

00:02:57.420 so a little over a year ago.

00:02:59.140 And we'll show it on the screen here.

00:03:01.560 If you can't force people to get the vaccine,

00:03:03.760 restrict their access to events, indoor venues, etc.

00:03:07.640 Vaccination appointments in Quebec doubled after the province announced vaccine passports.

00:03:12.340 Enough with the pussyfooting already. 0.97

00:03:14.540 Time to get serious.

00:03:16.120 And you had people that were putting criticisms towards you,

00:03:20.840 despite all that you've said in the many months since then about vaccine mandates and restrictions and whatnot.

00:03:26.940 And you wrote a piece in the National Post that really delved into this evolution on your part.

00:03:31.800 And I think it's incredibly important for people not just to hear about your own journey on this,

00:03:36.160 but I think in general where a lot of Canadians are on this.

00:03:39.640 So I'll start with asking you about 2021.

00:03:43.280 Where were you?

00:03:44.480 In what sort of frame of mind your approach on COVID, on politics, on policy in Canada a year ago now?

00:03:52.320 Well, I was in the middle of a mental health crisis, just to put it simply.

00:03:57.420 I don't discuss it publicly, but that's where I was.

00:04:03.380 I was dealing with my parents' situation in India.

00:04:06.500 My parents refused to be vaccinated.

00:04:09.880 And my father suddenly fell ill with tuberculosis meningitis, which in itself is pretty deadly.

00:04:17.080 And as soon as he was discharged from the hospital on a routine visit to the hospital for a checkup,

00:04:23.780 he was diagnosed with COVID.

00:04:25.520 And I thought I was going to lose my dad and both my parents.

00:04:30.860 And my parents live on their own.

00:04:32.080 So I was dealing with a lot of stuff at that time.

00:04:34.400 It was a very traumatic experience.

00:04:36.580 I really felt that had they been vaccinated, that they would have had a, you know,

00:04:43.920 they probably wouldn't have gotten COVID and they wouldn't be in that situation.

00:04:48.300 Also, I couldn't visit them in India.

00:04:51.880 There were very few flights at that time.

00:04:53.920 And there was just no way for me to get there.

00:04:56.500 And, but I was fortunate that I had a distant relative who was there looking after them.

00:05:03.760 And so I was, you know, but, you know, I was okay with that situation at that time.

00:05:09.580 But just to, you know, just my own personal experience is that, that, you know, I, I don't

00:05:16.100 know if you, you remember the, these horrific images coming out of India, which was in the

00:05:23.580 midst of its Delta wave.

00:05:25.900 Um, uh, and the Delta variant was actually discovered in India.

00:05:30.180 And yeah, that was back before it was even called the Delta variant.

00:05:33.140 It was like the Indian double mutant variant or something. 0.94

00:05:36.420 Exactly.

00:05:36.720 Exactly.

00:05:37.500 And, uh, I cannot tell you how, um, and this was, this was all happening at the same time.

00:05:42.860 This is roughly around March, April, um, and, um, and I, um, would get, uh, phone calls from

00:05:50.000 friends, um, I'm sitting here in Ottawa and they had asked me if I could hook them up with

00:05:55.660 someone who could get them an oxygen cylinder.

00:05:58.280 They were ready to pay thousands of rupees, whatever, uh, name the price, or I could, I'm

00:06:04.280 willing to, uh, pay as much as, uh, you know, as much as it's required for me to get a hospital

00:06:09.540 bed.

00:06:09.760 I just want to be able to get to a hospital, uh, and several of my, uh, friends died, uh,

00:06:15.520 because I wasn't able to help them.

00:06:17.440 And again, these were individuals who were unvaccinated.

00:06:20.760 And I so felt strongly about vaccination at that, at that time.

00:06:25.460 And I felt that this was, and remember the public messaging at that time was, uh, Joe Biden

00:06:31.480 was saying at that time that, uh, vaccination reduce, uh, will, will prevent transmission.

00:06:36.740 So I, I, uh, and I, I, uh, sincerely believed it and I truly felt that getting double vaccinated

00:06:43.740 would bring us, take us back to a pre, uh, pre COVID times.

00:06:48.140 Um, and, and, and also these personal stories, these personal experiences I had, not just

00:06:54.100 with my parents and with, uh, friends and, um, friends back in India.

00:06:58.560 I, uh, you know, it, it, it really did, um, have a very traumatic effect on me.

00:07:03.560 Um, uh, uh, which, you know, I mean, I, that tweet of mine, when I sent it, um, nobody even

00:07:11.700 knew me in Canada at that time.

00:07:13.020 It's only getting traction now because they've, you know, it was discovered in the context of

00:07:17.960 my story.

00:07:18.560 Uh, the initial tweet barely even got any traction.

00:07:22.220 I don't think any, you know, I had a handful of retweets at that time.

00:07:25.860 Nobody even knew me.

00:07:26.800 Um, and, uh, but that, that's neither here nor there.

00:07:31.020 The point is that, you know, I was in a very bad place and, uh, and I felt that, uh, mandates

00:07:37.740 were a way of, um, nudging people into, um, getting vaccinated.

00:07:43.520 Um, I hadn't, you know, obviously, um, you know, my, you know, my thinking on this has

00:07:50.980 changed since then.

00:07:51.980 Um, and again, there was a, um, you know, I realized, uh, uh, you know, just a couple of

00:07:59.980 months down the road that the vaccine passport system wasn't making any sense.

00:08:04.400 Uh, and the rhetoric against the unvaccinated was just, uh, getting, uh, out of control.

00:08:10.160 I thought, I mean, my tweet, uh, itself, uh, is pretty, uh, strong in its wording, but,

00:08:16.260 uh, the fact that, uh, politicians were now using vaccination as a political wedge issue

00:08:21.660 as Justin Trudeau did, um, this is something I've pointed out in my big story for Barry

00:08:27.080 Wise, uh, which came out on August 2nd, uh, that the federal vaccine mandate for travel

00:08:32.540 was, uh, was, uh, you know, I had no scientific rationale.

00:08:35.660 It was really used as an election issue.

00:08:37.460 Um, and it was at that point that I started to realize that this was not about public health,

00:08:43.220 really.

00:08:43.520 It was about something else.

00:08:44.800 It was, uh, uh, it was not about saving lives or protecting, uh, protecting us from COVID.

00:08:50.500 It was about winning elections.

00:08:52.160 And then, uh, you know, subsequently a few, as, as time went on, um, uh, you had, uh, the

00:09:00.660 prime minister, uh, calling unvaccinated people, misogynists, racists, and should we tolerate

00:09:06.000 these people?

00:09:07.000 Um, and the rhetoric just kept, uh, just get getting, uh, just was getting, um, uh, you

00:09:13.940 know, really divisive and, uh, nasty and, uh, it made me feel very uncomfortable.

00:09:19.660 And, uh, finally in December, I, um, got my, um, uh, third shot, uh, uh, and, and, um, I,

00:09:28.660 um, I, I have to say I largely did that because I was, um, uh, possibly visiting my parents at

00:09:35.740 that time, transitioning through Germany.

00:09:38.040 And I believe Germany was requiring, requiring at that time, a booster, uh, uh, dose.

00:09:43.800 And so I just wanted to have that in case I was, uh, in case I was, uh, going to travel.

00:09:50.720 Uh, but then I got Omicron, um, a few days after I got the vaccine and, uh, and then I

00:09:57.220 realized, well, this is so much for the vaccine passport system, so much for the vaccine mandates.

00:10:02.320 And then, um, but also, you know, my own personal experiences, I've seen people, you know, in

00:10:10.020 the cold, waiting to get into restaurants, uh, looking in because they can't dine, dine

00:10:14.940 in, uh, uh, from the outside looking in.

00:10:17.360 And, uh, and these were just, this was just heartbreaking, you know, and I, you know, I,

00:10:21.800 at this point I had art, you know, I was starting to process my own trauma, my own pain and suffering.

00:10:26.940 And I was in a position to be able to, um, uh, actually step out of my shoes and, and see what,

00:10:34.880 what it was like for other people.

00:10:36.360 Um, and, uh, and then the Quebec government, um, um, um, sorry, before that, um, Ontario went back

00:10:45.800 into lockdown, as did several other provinces.

00:10:48.180 Remember, we were told that, uh, you get fully vaccinated, there will be no more lockdowns

00:10:52.860 and restrictions, those days are behind us and, um, and these are just really the end days of

00:10:58.300 the pandemic, but, uh, what ended up happening instead was the, uh, our provincial governments

00:11:03.720 here panicked and put us back into, um, uh, a semi-lockdown.

00:11:08.120 And I really felt a very, you know, um, that I thought that was a betrayal of, uh, public trust

00:11:14.980 and, um, and, you know, when we were promised that we wouldn't go back into lockdown here, I was

00:11:20.780 adhering to all of these, um, public health measures.

00:11:23.840 I was triple vaccinated and, and here I am, I can't go to the gym because it's under lockdown.

00:11:29.220 We're under lockdown.

00:11:30.800 I can't do this.

00:11:31.600 I can't do that.

00:11:32.320 You can't go to museums, art galleries.

00:11:34.340 Everything was off limits once again.

00:11:37.160 And then, um, and then the fear mongering once again began, uh, hospital capacity issues,

00:11:42.760 uh, Omicron, the rest of the world was saying Omicron was mild, but our health authorities

00:11:48.740 here were saying that Omicron was not mild.

00:11:51.500 It was very deadly.

00:11:52.700 And, um, and, and so then it made me wonder, like, what's the point of vaccination?

00:11:56.700 Why are we panicking again?

00:11:58.340 You know, why did we, why did, why did we, why did we do all that we did to get to this

00:12:03.200 point to once again, panic, like we're back in March of 2020.

00:12:07.520 And, uh, and so, uh, and then the Quebec government was toying around with the idea of,

00:12:13.100 uh, uh, taxing the unvaccinated and I was, um, uh, my views on, on this were, um, starting 0.50

00:12:19.720 to, um, uh, you know, they, they were, they were, they were, they were getting well-known

00:12:24.600 and on Twitter.

00:12:25.480 And so someone at TVO reached out to me and asked me if I would debate, uh, be on a debating

00:12:31.220 panel.

00:12:31.620 So it was Roman Baber and I against, um, two other, uh, individuals, one, one of them being

00:12:37.100 a Globe and Mail columnist who, um, really wanted, you know, the, uh, the unvaccinated 0.97

00:12:42.760 to be, um, ostracized and just, um, just, just really, uh, essentially kicked out of society.

00:12:49.960 And, uh, and I, uh, didn't agree with his views.

00:12:53.260 And so I debated, um, uh, you know, I was on this panel on TVO and my views, uh, on the

00:12:59.440 unvaccinated was that, uh, that, that, that their marginalization needs to end.

00:13:04.920 And then a couple of weeks later, three weeks later, the Freedom Convoy protest happened.

00:13:09.620 And that also was an eyeopening experience for me.

00:13:12.680 So in short, that's my, that, that, that, that was the evolution in my thinking.

00:13:18.620 That was my journeys.

00:13:19.860 So.

00:13:20.860 I don't know if I would say that was short.

00:13:23.240 You answered a couple of questions that I was about to ask there.

00:13:25.620 So I can skip ahead because I think it was interesting to me seeing a lot of the response

00:13:31.120 that you got when people went back.

00:13:33.360 And I think in bad faith started digging up that tweet and using it to make whatever

00:13:37.000 claim I didn't see it as a gotcha moment.

00:13:39.480 I mean, this wasn't like something that you were ashamed to say you were saying it because

00:13:44.120 you believed it at the time.

00:13:45.220 And there was also something that really didn't sit well with me about how people engage with

00:13:50.260 that tweet months later in the area, a year later, I guess, because I felt like, what's

00:13:54.780 the point of talking about these issues if we don't want people to change their minds

00:13:58.600 on them?

00:13:58.920 What's the point of having these conversations if we don't expect that it's possible for people

00:14:04.060 to change them?

00:14:04.720 Because I think what you went through, and obviously you had your own reasons for it, were

00:14:08.820 very similar, at least in the general trajectory to where a lot of Canadians were on this.

00:14:14.620 If not, you know, by the fall of 2021, certainly by the time the winter came around and people

00:14:20.060 were still feeling like they were living under this boot of restrictions and lockdowns and

00:14:24.120 mandates.

00:14:26.460 Yeah, absolutely.

00:14:27.680 I don't think my experience is somehow unique in this, as I say in my column.

00:14:32.640 Well, first of all, Andrew, just responding to the reactions out there of people who are

00:14:40.580 anti-mandates and they felt that I was one of them and that they felt betrayed at this

00:14:47.660 position that I'd taken.

00:14:48.660 For one thing, none of these people even knew me back then.

00:14:52.140 Like I said, I was a nobody.

00:14:53.840 Nobody even knew of me.

00:14:56.240 And a lot of them only just started.

00:14:59.140 I mean, I've been a fan of you since you started writing in the National Post, but a lot of people

00:15:02.640 in that orbit anyway didn't start connecting with you until the time of the convoy or shortly

00:15:07.680 before then.

00:15:08.600 Exactly.

00:15:09.180 Exactly.

00:15:09.500 I would say that's probably when or when I started writing about Omicron in early January

00:15:14.400 is probably when I, you know, many of these people discovered me, you know, yes, the responses

00:15:21.060 were unfortunate, but I also see them as also having suffered through this process.

00:15:27.200 And I mean, of course they did.

00:15:28.940 Many of them lost their jobs.

00:15:30.720 Many of them were on leave without pay.

00:15:32.100 And so I get where they're coming from.

00:15:35.880 But, you know, I do want to point out that, you know, it doesn't take, you know, this was

00:15:41.160 being used by many of my detractors to try to discredit the story that I broke, which is

00:15:48.820 kind of, it's a self-destructive move if you, you know, if I may say that, because the largest

00:15:56.200 story here is not my story, my tweet from August of 2021, the story here is not me.

00:16:02.960 The story is this, the fact that the federal government had no scientific rationale for

00:16:07.880 these mandates.

00:16:08.780 And especially when they've made it very clear that these mandates could be brought back in

00:16:14.260 any time at the drop of a hat, if they feel that the situation warrants it.

00:16:19.160 So, you know, that's the issue that we should be focusing on.

00:16:22.860 But I'm happy to share my story, and which is why, you know, I agreed to speak to you

00:16:27.780 about it, and which is an important reason why I also wrote this column for the National

00:16:33.180 Post.

00:16:34.760 And, yeah, it's unfortunate that, you know, that people reacted the way they did.

00:16:41.100 But I suspect that I'm not alone in this.

00:16:45.920 I suspect that a lot of people were gripped by fear and paranoia.

00:16:50.800 And as I say in my, in my column, you know, I'm pretty, I'm someone who, you know, generally

00:16:57.180 thinks through the issues and, and, you know, and, you know, and comes to a decision about

00:17:02.300 various things.

00:17:03.460 And I consider myself to be pretty rational minded.

00:17:06.920 I'm not someone who, you know, gets taken in by the hysteria.

00:17:10.900 But, you know, it was a very unique time in my life.

00:17:16.280 I can't expect people to understand what it feels to not be able to see your parents who

00:17:22.920 may die from COVID, because they were unvaccinated.

00:17:26.900 And at that time, the public messaging was vaccination will prevent you from getting COVID.

00:17:34.080 And, and that's where I was coming from, plain and simple.

00:17:38.920 But then I started, you know, as I was processing my own trauma, you know, and I was in a position

00:17:45.020 to read what was read about what was happening out there.

00:17:50.880 You know, I started to see things from a different perspective.

00:17:54.280 I started to see, I started to hear these other stories.

00:17:58.720 And I started to see that this was not right.

00:18:03.540 And something was not right about this.

00:18:05.760 And I changed my mind.

00:18:08.000 I had to change a part.

00:18:09.680 And I think that's...

00:18:10.160 Let me ask you about, Rupa, the fear aspect there, because you mentioned it, and I don't

00:18:13.900 want to lose that thread, because the big challenge here, and I remember March 2020 very well,

00:18:20.120 when I think most people in this country, liberal, conservative, didn't matter, were looking

00:18:25.840 at the headlines and the photos coming out of China, and then later Iran and Italy, and

00:18:31.700 as you mentioned, later on India.

00:18:33.400 And we were seeing all of these things that in certainly March 2020 terms, we couldn't

00:18:38.700 really conceptualize, we hadn't lived through.

00:18:41.600 And I think there was a sense of community.

00:18:43.340 There was a sense of, let's do what we need to do to get through this.

00:18:46.940 And people started to become more skeptical of that at very different intervals.

00:18:51.740 Some people started early on being very skeptical of the official narrative, like April 2020.

00:18:56.900 For others, it took them until, you know, maybe January 2022.

00:19:00.980 But people have gradually started to become more skeptical, I think, generally speaking.

00:19:06.340 But I think government's answer to that skepticism has been fear, that at first it was, you are

00:19:13.340 going to die. 0.95

00:19:14.040 And then when that didn't work, your grandma's going to die. 1.00

00:19:16.140 Your neighbors are going to die. 0.88

00:19:17.340 Everyone's going to die.

00:19:18.760 And at a certain point, we still see people now that are living in fear.

00:19:23.900 I mean, I've been out in the world, I've been on airplanes, and you see people that look

00:19:27.240 like they're about to go into a nuclear facility with how, like, you know, shrouded they are

00:19:34.060 in PPE and masks.

00:19:36.000 And sometimes people mock those images of people.

00:19:39.780 But I actually feel very bad for people.

00:19:41.640 Because a lot of them have been made to fear this life and this world by government.

00:19:47.700 Yeah, no, absolutely.

00:19:48.980 I mean, it's easy to mock them.

00:19:50.240 But I think we should be, you know, more sympathetic.

00:19:55.160 We should be more mindful of their experiences.

00:19:59.000 You know, obviously, they've succumbed to fear.

00:20:04.220 And what is tragic about this is that I see a lot of young people masked up, double masked,

00:20:09.980 triple masked.

00:20:11.900 It's not necessary.

00:20:12.720 We're the ones who need it the least.

00:20:14.440 Yeah.

00:20:14.880 So something is going on here.

00:20:18.160 And, you know, we need to be able to address that at some point without mocking these individuals.

00:20:26.780 And, but yeah, it's, you know, we all, look, March of 2020, I found myself in India.

00:20:33.160 I was under the world's harshest lockdown, where the prime minister of India locked down a country of 1.1 billion people.

00:20:43.000 You know, I'd not, I'd never experienced anything so draconian.

00:20:46.860 That was also a pretty traumatic experience.

00:20:49.380 Hospitals were closed.

00:20:50.740 You couldn't get a prescription from a drugstore.

00:20:52.760 Everything was closed.

00:20:53.600 For the first few days, there was very little in the way of, you know, you couldn't get groceries.

00:21:02.220 It was, it was not, people started hoarding.

00:21:04.460 It was not a good situation.

00:21:05.800 And there was a big, large migrant exodus.

00:21:08.780 Again, these were gripping images from India that, you know, everybody around the world saw of people literally walking from the big cities back to their towns and villages,

00:21:17.060 walking for thousands of miles just to get to where they were, get to their homes, because the cities no longer had jobs.

00:21:24.680 Everything was shut down.

00:21:26.040 They no longer had their jobs in the cities.

00:21:28.960 And I remember at that time writing a series of articles for an Indian think tank.

00:21:34.680 And I was a big proponent of the Great Barrington Declaration.

00:21:38.560 I still am.

00:21:39.660 I was anti-lockdowns.

00:21:41.220 I, I, the Great Barrington Declaration hadn't yet come out at that point, but I was a big fan of Dr. Jay Bhattacharya and I referenced his work quite extensively.

00:21:50.680 And I was of the opinion that lockdowns shouldn't, shouldn't happen and, and that we must protect the most vulnerable people in long-term care homes and retirement homes and that kind of thing.

00:22:03.260 And I, even by the way, I should just jump in there.

00:22:05.560 Even the WHO has come around on that position somewhat.

00:22:08.800 They're saying, oh, lockdowns are terrible.

00:22:10.260 No, they should be a last resort only.

00:22:12.700 Exactly.

00:22:13.220 So, and the criticism that I, the, you know, at that time, again, this was people reacting to what I was writing at that time said that I was a COVID denier.

00:22:21.880 I was underplaying the seriousness of COVID and, and so on and so forth.

00:22:27.720 And so, you know, at that time, when I, when I returned to Canada, I was the only person wearing a mask.

00:22:34.600 When I, when I went to my local farm boy after the 14 day quarantine, I went grocery shopping and I was wearing a mask because that's what we were told in India, wear a mask.

00:22:46.280 And I was the only one wearing a mask.

00:22:48.140 And I was the only one wearing a mask.

00:22:48.520 Everybody was just going about their daily lives.

00:22:51.460 Nobody seemed afraid.

00:22:53.480 I thought that everybody was just like trying to figure out what was happening in April of 2020 when I returned to Canada.

00:23:00.860 And, and then I realized, you know, well, I'm not, I'm not going to wear a mask if nobody else is wearing a mask and I stopped wearing a mask.

00:23:08.500 Then the, then the mask mandate came into effect in July of 2020 and things really changed at that point.

00:23:14.780 I think people got very fearful people truly felt that the masks were helping them.

00:23:22.920 They, they were, and that it was, it was preventing transmission of the virus and, and people, you know, I just saw people who were, who, who, who, who didn't think that wearing a mask would make much sense suddenly became fearful and were double masked even.

00:23:41.640 And, and I saw, you know, I saw this happening and I just went along with it because, you know, I'm not going to fight a public health mandate.

00:23:48.980 You know, I, I need to be able to come back into my building and access the elevator, you know, and I'm not going to, you know, be a martyr for that cause.

00:23:57.780 So I just went along with it like most people did.

00:24:00.900 And so, you know, I've seen not just, you know, a change in my thinking around these various issues.

00:24:07.100 I've also seen how the public has reacted, you know, the public reacted to this, you know, from, from when April, 2020, when no one was masked and everybody was just, you know, that summer of 2020 in Ottawa, you know, everybody was just really happy that, you know, you could die now.

00:24:24.320 And, and, and, and life was, there was, there was a glimmer of hope that life is going to come back to normal.

00:24:29.780 And then the vaccines would arrive here in a few months and everything would be back to normal.

00:24:33.720 But that unfortunately wasn't the case.

00:24:35.860 I would like to point this out to you, Andrew.

00:24:37.740 I mean, this is a very puzzling question that several of us have raised and there's no clear answer to this, except that there was fear.

00:24:44.540 So why did we become more afraid after vaccines?

00:24:50.140 You know, all of these restrictions, all of these restrictions, the mandates, the vaccine passport system, all of that happened post vaccination.

00:24:59.660 Eighty percent of Canadians were fully vaccinated by about October, a few days before the mask mandate, sorry, before the vaccine mandate was implemented.

00:25:12.660 The federal vaccine mandate was implemented.

00:25:16.220 Why?

00:25:17.460 You know, what, what, what was the rationale behind that?

00:25:20.240 And again, I want to point this point, you know, if I can point you to the court documents in this cross-examination of the bureaucrat charged with holding the pen for the federal mandate for travel, federal vaccine mandate for travel.

00:25:37.080 She makes a very interesting point.

00:25:38.680 She says, look, we couldn't do the vaccine mandate when 50 percent of Canadians are vaccinated because it would cause chaos in the transportation system.

00:25:48.280 But instead, we did this at 80 percent.

00:25:50.540 That makes no sense.

00:25:52.400 Why?

00:25:52.740 You know, you'd want to incentivize people to get vaccinated at a much lower percentage.

00:25:57.260 But, you know, but why would you do it when more than 80 percent of Canadians are vaccinated?

00:26:01.840 What exact what purpose does it serve?

00:26:03.840 So, you know, I wonder where we were going with this, you know, was just everybody really afraid?

00:26:08.980 Was it politics?

00:26:10.100 What's going on here?

00:26:10.880 Why did we become more afraid after vaccination?

00:26:14.980 Yeah.

00:26:15.560 And I think that there's a that's a hugely, hugely critical question, Rupa, because there have been, I think, two phenomena at play that I would identify.

00:26:24.840 One is is that when everyone around you was wearing a mask, not you, but, you know, one, when everyone around someone was wearing a mask, it was easy to feel like, OK, this is all sorted out.

00:26:36.920 When the number of people interested in complying goes down, if you view that an unmasked person is a viral vector, you're going to be more scared when other people start moving on with their lives and you're not ready to yet.

00:26:49.880 I think that's part of it. But I think the other part is that governments have done a terrible job at explaining away their failures, because at first and there are some clips you can see of some people saying that vaccination is 100 percent effective and early on saying herd immunity will get at, you know, 70 percent and then 80 percent and then 90 percent.

00:27:09.880 And then it needs to be more. And then, well, now it's three doses. So we go back down to only 50 percent of people are vaccinated in the government size.

00:27:17.840 And I mean, even the story that I was covering earlier this week on my show of Western University putting a booster requirement in place, they also say in the same breath, and we might also put social distancing and masking back in place.

00:27:30.380 So which is it? Are vaccines as good as you say they are? Or are they just as effective as sitting six feet away from someone and you have to stack anything and everything together?

00:27:40.840 And we're all just told that we have to accept that that's the way it is. And if you question it, you, as you noted firsthand, you're a denier.

00:27:49.200 You can't say, well, hang on. How can you say this and then also this? It's you. We aren't allowed to do that.

00:27:54.780 No, we're not. That's unfortunate. And that's that that's very anti-intellectual and it not not how, you know, we should, you know, that's not how you, you know, understand issues, important issues of the day.

00:28:11.760 It's not it's not a way for for us to have any kind of a meaningful conversation if if if the response always is a smear of some kind, that you're an anti-vaxxer, you're a COVID denier.

00:28:24.780 And and and that you don't believe in the science or or or Twitter shut suspends your account because you raise some very important questions about the vaccine's ability to prevent transmission.

00:28:38.460 It's it's most unfortunate, but but that's exactly you know that these were exactly the kinds of questions that I had.

00:28:44.640 And and and it took me a while. I mean, it took me maybe a couple of months to get around to this point of view.

00:28:51.120 And and and and and, you know, most of it, I mean, it's not an excuse, but most of it had to do with my own personal situation.

00:28:58.280 And that, you know, I started to realize, like, what is going on here?

00:29:02.400 I mean, I, you know, we're we're vaccinated, but yet we're still fearful.

00:29:08.760 The public health messaging of on the pandemic, at least here in Canada, continues to be one of fear.

00:29:15.760 And and and and I just found that hugely problematic.

00:29:21.280 And, you know, I mean, I know people who are triple vaccinated who are still at one point a few months ago, wanting to just, you know, not not congregate in more than, you know, in not more than five people in a group.

00:29:37.040 And I was thinking, well, yeah, yeah, but we also have this wave of quadruple vaccinated people that are getting COVID for the second time in four weeks now.

00:29:45.800 And also, let's not forget, I mean, this is a very important point, which, you know, and I couldn't unfortunately couldn't get into it in my piece for The National Post.

00:29:54.100 Natural immunity, you know, this is the elephant in the room and we've just completely sidelined it.

00:30:00.320 I mean, it's something as old as time itself, but and we just doubled down on vaccination by, you know, by the time Omicron came around, most of us were either vaccinated or infected combination of both.

00:30:14.060 But yet we were living in fear.

00:30:16.740 And so, you know, we just completely ignored the science behind natural immunity, which is perplexing.

00:30:24.260 I mean, of course, I mean, you know, one could argue that, I mean, it's not that perplexing, given that big pharma has an incentive here to push the vaccines as much as possible.

00:30:33.160 And governments, including our government, have signed billion dollar contracts with these big pharmaceutical companies to get the vaccines into us.

00:30:41.620 So there is that reason.

00:30:43.760 But but, you know, I mean, this was my question back in November and December.

00:30:47.580 I mean, why are we not looking at natural immunity?

00:30:49.520 Why is it that you can fly to Germany and several European countries with the proof of recovery from vaccination?

00:30:56.280 But that's not something that we were doing here in Canada or the U.S.

00:31:01.360 It was it was it was perplexing.

00:31:04.820 It made no sense.

00:31:06.020 And I know they say follow the science, but where's the science here?

00:31:10.940 And and then so, you know, I was gripped by all of these questions and and I wasn't really getting any clear answers on them.

00:31:18.440 And to them and I, you know, and then that eventually I realized, I mean, this was I'll tell you, even with my with me wearing a mask, you know, I was triple vaccinated and I got Omicron and I recovered from Omicron drinking hot toddy for a week.

00:31:36.120 And it was it was the best thing I ever did.

00:31:39.380 If Pfizer doesn't make the hot toddy, though, that's not that's not an acceptable cure.

00:31:42.940 And and and, you know, and then a month later, the or more than a month later, the Freedom Convoi protest came to Ottawa.

00:31:53.540 And here I was for the first time in this crowd of people, large group of people.

00:31:59.740 They were happy.

00:32:00.800 They were unmasked.

00:32:01.380 They were not afraid.

00:32:02.680 I was still a little afraid.

00:32:04.440 And I was wondering, why am I afraid?

00:32:06.480 You know, why, why, why, you know, why am I wearing a mask outdoors?

00:32:10.900 We were told that being outdoors is actually pretty safe.

00:32:13.660 You don't have to be masked when you're outdoors.

00:32:15.540 But for those first couple of blocks, I was actually wearing a mask.

00:32:20.000 And and I thought to myself, this makes no sense.

00:32:22.660 And and I'm also recovered from COVID and I've been triple vaccinated.

00:32:29.300 I probably had COVID early on in the pandemic back in January 2020.

00:32:34.820 You know, I was, you know, very sick and I and I probably recovered from COVID at that time.

00:32:40.900 So I was thinking, but this is the science tells you you have the antibodies, you have your outdoors.

00:32:46.660 So you're, you know, at very low risk of getting anything.

00:32:49.820 So why are you so afraid?

00:32:51.040 And that's when I took my mask off.

00:32:52.660 And I've never looked back.

00:32:55.020 So, you know, all of these experiences, you know, had an effect, had an impact, you know, in my own, you know, in my own thinking.

00:33:05.760 And and that's how I came to be, you know, very anti-mandate.

00:33:13.180 Let me ask you about your position on the vaccines themselves, because you've explained how your position on the mandates has changed.

00:33:20.600 Has your position on vaccination and to get vaccinated?

00:33:24.500 Has that changed?

00:33:25.280 So I've drawn a line in the sand, personally, for myself, I'm not going to get another booster.

00:33:32.180 And and, you know, I'm not I just won't do that.

00:33:36.980 I do believe unless the facts change, I look at the data.

00:33:41.180 I looked at the stuff that Public Health Ontario publishes.

00:33:45.400 I see the data from other countries and vaccination does play an important role, especially in certain age groups.

00:33:53.280 So I'm not I don't think it makes sense to boost or vaccinate young people.

00:34:00.180 But I I think it might make sense, say, for my parents, for example.

00:34:06.200 And, you know, those who are immunocompromised and in certain age groups.

00:34:10.900 And the data does show there that vaccination does play an important role now.

00:34:17.800 So that's my position on vaccination.

00:34:20.340 So personally, I would not get another shot.

00:34:23.560 And and for various reasons, I don't think that I want to be on a carousel of boosters.

00:34:30.740 You know, I don't think it makes any sense.

00:34:33.000 I have recovered from COVID and, you know, I have antibodies.

00:34:40.160 Keep in mind that the the the vaccine that I got in December of 2021, that the vaccine effectiveness or, you know, the the, you know, its protection only lasted for, I think, 12 weeks or 20 weeks, something thereabouts.

00:34:58.060 So, you know, I don't think we're meant to be on these frequent boosters.

00:35:05.260 You know, it's something about that makes me feel very uncomfortable.

00:35:08.500 Yeah. Yeah. And in France, you'd be unvaccinated basically come September, because I think France, it's a nine month window of memory surge.

00:35:16.260 Right, right, right.

00:35:17.600 Something like that, 230 days or that's what most European countries insist on.

00:35:25.100 So, no, my my view on vaccination is very clear.

00:35:30.120 I've written written in favor of vaccination that if you if you feel you must get vaccinated, go go and get vaccinated.

00:35:38.880 I think it makes sense for certain groups.

00:35:42.300 And but I am an anti-vaccine mandate.

00:35:46.060 And there is a big difference between the two.

00:35:47.940 There is. And one of the things that I've been frustrated by, and I don't know if you've seen it as well, is that there seems to be a tribalism among some people who are against vaccine mandates where they I mean, I've been criticized by people for being vaccinated and saying I'm vaccinated.

00:36:03.860 Now, again, government keeps changing the definition, so a time will come when I won't be.

00:36:08.300 But the thing that I would find very annoying there is that at the beginning, I was always about protect the vulnerable.

00:36:15.040 And that didn't mean it didn't exist.

00:36:16.760 It doesn't mean there's no benefit to this thing.

00:36:18.780 It's about people deciding their own risk threshold and deciding the risk threshold for their loved ones.

00:36:23.640 And I find that there's been too much in a very small pocket, admittedly, but a very small pocket, even of some of the people that listen to the show and write to me after that, they find anyone who gets vaccinated or gets boosted to be a betrayer in some sense of a cause, which is, again, I think no better than what we see the other side doing, which is people vilifying the unvaccinated.

00:36:46.640 Yeah, absolutely.

00:36:47.640 There's tribalism on both sides, let's face it.

00:36:51.140 And and but I, you know, but I wouldn't I don't know how big these groups are, but I would say that for the vast majority of people who who were reacting to this old tweet, you know, were were very kind, very tolerant, very supportive, you know, and very appreciative of the

00:37:16.620 of the fact that I was being honest about it and upfront about it.

00:37:19.620 And and so the the responses I received were very encouraging and supportive, very overwhelming.

00:37:28.620 And, you know, and I would say that there.

00:37:31.620 Yeah, there are a few people on on who are anti mandates anti vaccinate anti vaccines and or me or or, you know, to qualify that properly.

00:37:43.620 They're not anti-vaxxers, but they have particular issues with the mRNA vaccines or COVID-19 vaccines in general.

00:37:52.620 But but, you know, you know, I don't know how big their their numbers are, but I would just just gauging just going by the reactions that I've been getting.

00:38:02.620 Most people are, you know, very appreciative and and and, you know, make the point that you made earlier, which is, you know, you want people to be able to come around to a certain point of view.

00:38:13.620 You want you want critical thinking in society.

00:38:15.620 You want people to be able to go through these issues and not not stick to a position come hell or high water.

00:38:22.620 You know, you want to be able to.

00:38:24.620 Yeah, I would not do this show if I didn't think it was possible and desirable for people to engage with different viewpoints and perhaps change their own.

00:38:32.620 I mean, that's classic or go right back to John Stuart Mill and on Liberty, the idea that the exchange of ideas strengthens your own resolve and also lets you correct deficiencies in your thinking when necessary.

00:38:43.620 Yeah, I mean, and it's important for, you know, discourse, especially when it comes to these very important issues.

00:38:51.620 As I said, I mean, if if if if the starting point is, oh, you changed your mind because of because you, you know, you benefit from this monetarily.

00:39:02.620 I don't even know how that's happening. I mean, I you know, I've been called all kinds of things.

00:39:08.620 And, you know, it's unfortunate because it doesn't advance discourse.

00:39:13.620 Right. Which is what we want to do. At least that's I'm in the idea space.

00:39:17.620 Right. I'm not an activist. I'm not an activist at all.

00:39:21.620 I'm you know, I see myself as someone who is in the idea space.

00:39:25.620 I want to be able to advance discourse. I want to be able to put these ideas out there and for people to debate and discuss them and come to their own conclusions.

00:39:34.620 You know, you don't have to believe me. You don't have to take it from me.

00:39:38.620 So I but you know, I think I think most people see that most people recognize the importance of ideas, the importance of people being able to change their views and the importance of critical thinking.

00:39:52.620 I think most Canadians value that. And a few people want to want, you know, want to resort to tribalism.

00:39:59.620 Well, what can you do about that? You know, I you know, eventually I'm hoping that they'll also come around and and it'll be better for all of us.

00:40:08.620 Well, and it part of it is listening to your great show on True North, the Rupa Subramanya show and also reading your work and listen to mine while you're at it as well.

00:40:17.620 Rupa, always good to talk to you. Thanks for coming on today.

00:40:19.620 Thanks so much, Andrew. Thanks for having me on your show once again. Thank you.

00:40:23.620 Thank you. That was Rupa Subramanya here on The Andrew Lawton Show.

00:40:27.620 That does it for us for today. We'll be back with more of Canada's most irreverent talk show next week.

00:40:33.620 You're listening to The Andrew Lawton Show here on True North. Thank you. God bless and good day to you all.

00:40:38.620 Thanks for listening to The Andrew Lawton Show. Support the program by donating to True North at www.tnc.news.

00:40:46.620 The Andrew Lawton Show.

Juno News - August 25, 2022

Why people are turning on vaccine mandates (ft. Rupa Subramanya)

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