Sidney Secular
You didn’t even notice it, but that was the idea. Furthermore, there’s no going back – you feel it in the air. The transition to tyranny was so smooth, you couldn’t grasp it or get a handle on it. Things seem to function about the same, but saying that is sort of lame. It’s morphed to the point that in America 2.0, most of the time you expect flack and a setback or two before things can get back on track, at least you hope and pray, anyway. However, when you examine things above the fray, that is, if you can rise above your frayed nerves, you see that you can no longer relate to society, authority, technology and other people in quite the same old way. The CV thing that began in 2020 paved the way by overriding the way we as a society used to do things.
In 2020, an unprecedented experiment unfolded in real time. Entire populations quickly adopted in weeks to rules that would have seemed impossible to impose mere months earlier. Movement was everywhere restricted. Access to the workplace and public spaces required verification of the vaxx. Social interaction was mediated by digital and jab status. Debate narrowed or was entirely shunned. Compliance with and obedience to unreasonable dictates were presented (and became) a civic virtue. Even after those measures were lifted in bits and pieces (and here and there), that lifting was accomplished only against great resistance and it still remains in effect today in doctors’ offices and medical milieus among the staff where the omnipresent (and useless) masks continue to mask the reality of their impotence.
The hard of hearing sometimes grumble as the medicos commonly mumble as if the masks weren’t being worn. No one – then or now – really feels imprisoned because the whole system presented itself as protective and “for one’s own good.” Obedience did not feel like submission among the submissive – and this unseemly behavior appeared normal under the circumstances. Fear played an essential role in carrying out the process: fear of being left out of normal associations or fear of being ostracized by one peers quickly came into play. Yet, exceptions to the mask-wearing demand for the favored few seemed to give the politicos and plutocrats extra privileges that bestowed upon the entire affair an air of artificiality.
The sheeple started enforcing the rules and protocols on each other just as they had done in Communist China and the former Soviet Union! As a result, it felt as if a communist state were being set up. Skeptics were viewed as a threat to collective safety and it was even proposed to quarantine the non-obedient in camps to protect the “good obedient citizens.” As a result, a new understanding in the evolution of governance was brought into being.
Simultaneously, and in tandem with this planning, other exercises in restricting liberty are being carried on. Contactless transactions are starting to replace cash in the name of hygiene and efficiency. Digital wallets are replacing physical currency in the name of convenience. Online verification is replacing in-person identification also in the name of convenience and efficiency. These changes seem harmless, even beneficial. Yet each one contributes to a world where transactions, identity and access flow through systems that are traceable, recordable, and centrally managed.
Anyone who thinks this is a good thing should look into Communist China’s social credit system! The technical ability to restrict actions under such systems has been established. Of course, no one declares that a system of control is being built. The language surrounding these acts is optimistic and inspiring: smart infrastructure, public safety, innovation, etc. etc. etc.
The cumulative effect is the construction of a surveillance environment in which all human activity can be monitored and guided with unprecedented subtlety. Yet, where this is in place, the people have quickly adapted. What was once intrusive became normal, even convenient. What was presented as temporary became routine – and permanent. People adjust rapidly to new baselines, especially when they are presented as necessary for the collective well-being.
And yet, another strange consequence emerged from these studies in control: deep social division. People stopped agreeing not only on policies, but on what constituted reality itself. Long standing friendships unreasonably and unalterably fractured. Communities split into opposing camps. This fragmentation had another consequence — people were less able or inclined to question the broader systems evolving around them because they were too busy distrusting their neighbor.
There was no dramatic moment when freedom disappeared. No “Big Brother” appeared on our television screens. But at this point, participation in worldly events increasingly depends on some sort of approval from some governing entity and that approval depends on some sort of compliance with the demands made by that entity – and that compliance is measured digitally. In this environment and at this time, control and compliance appear as convenience to those of us who are being controlled and who must comply, but you may be sure that that will change in the not-too-distant future.
In this matter, the most unsettling question is simple: if another global emergency were declared tomorrow and similar measures were reintroduced, would society – would we – resist? Probably not, as the path has already been trod – successfully – once. Still, both the question and the concern linger in the background of our ever more technologically advanced “modern” life.
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