There is indisputably a new pathogen circulating the globe. But the real and lasting damage doesn't come from the virus itself, but the people responding to it.xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

The pandemic is primarily a narrative driven hysteria that is causing unnecessary death as it fills hospitals and doctors offices' booking systems with hypochondriac patients worried about every faint body twinge they feel, preventing others with serious illness getting treatment; it is killing people with the largest increase in suicides and accidental deaths(drug overdoses) through the hopelessness it is creating with its lockdowns, quarantines, travel restrictions, and alienating masking; it is fueling unnecessary death through the fiction being perpetrated on the globe by pharmaceutical companies and their political and media allies pushing the false idea that vaccines are the only possible treatment for a virus that is simply otherwise so 'novel' it is 'untreatable'; and it is killing people directly through the incorrect administration of an experimental intra-muscular mRNA vaccine for a virus whose main modality of death is thrombosis brought about by blood-clots and heart inflammation that these types of vaccines are known to produce, particularly when accidentally injected directly into the bloodstream ¹.

This is a tightly coordinated narrative that relies on the full scope of repressive techniques available to the emergent assemblage of technology companies, intelligence agencies and their bought political advocates in Congress. The repressive apparatus brought to bear on eliminating every form of counter-factual critique from the mainstream has been incredible, using every form of moral, political, and economic coercion available. What has become pervasive is what has become truth. This is a truth based in appeals to primal emotion and fear, very basic ones. The fear of the alien, the 'novel', the absolutely new pathogen that has 'never-before been seen', with unpredictable symptoms, mysterious and unknowable ways of killing its hosts, that silently moves through the air among populations striking down the most vulnerable and transforming the young and healthy into unwitting 'vectors' or 'murder'. Our responses to the virus, amazingly consistent from the beginning until now have been fear-based isolation, quarantine, restrictions on travel, blocking ourselves off from the undetectable assassin; covering of the face and the debasement of social interaction, formalities (hand-shakes left hanging in the air, stepping back from a greeting, throwing oneself away from the threat of contact in the vegetable aisle). And, of course, the unwavering belief in 'science', the necessity to have innovated our way out of this situation, the inapplicability of any already-existing solution or treatment as anachronistic to the reality of the time, such has become our fealty to 'vaccines'. Advanced very early as the only hope of a long-term solution to the COVID problem, the world at first waited in quarantine for their development and then, once rushed to market with limited testing by precisely the corporations that developed them, a feverish campaign to ensure every last man woman and child was inoculated with the chemical formulations. But against the backdrop of waning enthusiasm for existing restrictions and the ever more apparent disparity in their application, the desire to get back to business as usual, amplifying the pitch of the morality pleas that then became mandates to get shots in every arm. Get vaccinated to prevent transmitting the virus to more vulnerable populations, our grandparents, parents, uncles, the elderly; get vaccinated for your own good, to prevent your own hospitalization and the collapse of the healthcare system and the unnecessary death that will produce through the treatable illness that will not be able to access the system; get vaccinated to prevent the spread in schools, workplaces, shopping centers, plans, trains and automobiles. And then, get vaccinated unless you want to lose your job, have access to society, go out for a drink with your friends, or to watch a movie with your family.

Amidst all this emerged the slowly percolating reality of the virus restrictions and their uneven and performative manifestation. Teenagers walking outside in the park with a mask on; husband and wife in their own automobile, masked; the endless hand-sanitizer stations put in place early on in the pandemic before it was known the virus was airborne, still vigilantly required; packed subway cars full of masked people clinging to the fantasy of a belief that a mask offers protection under such circumstances. Then the working-class situation: clerks forced to stand all day long wearing masks, those who still needed to pack into buses, trains, subways when everyone else was in quarantine and 'social distancing'; the solidarity and informal understanding that eventually arose in these situations about how absurd all these restrictions were and the growing tolerance and, in fact, need to display transgressions against the never-ending dictates to comply with senseless restrictions one knew that, after days and days of small lapses and impossibilities to protect oneself, one had already been and indeed could not prevent being exposed.

And yet, despite the reality much of the working-class has faced during this pandemic, the lines of conflict that persist with those that insist on the performative display of their virtue by following to the letter these rules; all those that enjoy intervening in others lives whenever they can to remind them to put on hand sanitizer, pull up their mask, make a point about the cleanliness of their mask and a public display and shaming as it is replaced with another clean one; the conversations among friends and family that come down along class-based, economic and political partisan lines about those still able to make a living under these conditions, those who actually prefer the isolation as a rainy-day authorization to stay at home lazing around working on their laptops. And above all, the never-ending arguments in everyday life and in the media, making economic and political arguments on behalf of the pharmaceutical and healthcare companies (the profits they undeniably derive from these vaccines, and the efficiency of the healthcare system they control and need available for more profitable treatments and surgeries) that masquerade as hypocritical morality arguments among all the rest of us dupes reluctant to cross over into the barbarism of any policy that might put minority or handicapped populations at risk.

Which brings us basically up to today. We've been waiting now for a while to see what the next COVID variant would be called and how its name and origin story might indicate how the virus would continue to spread into the future. Now, the world got its first indication: B.1.1.529 variant coming again out of South Africa: Omicron.

Alpha didn't stick; beta seems a bit like a joke. And then there was a period of silence where the letter combinations seemed themselves more intimidating. Then came Delta. Immediately the name struck fear in anyone that heard it. Its etymological meaning ('change') evoked the fear of an ever-changing morphing alien spore that the world might never rid itself of. Its name short and potent: more transmissible, impossible to stop, flooding the work and 'replacing' all other existing variants almost overnight. With Delta the name plays itself up. But now we have Omicron, and with Omicron, there's a slight problem already. It crosses over into the performative, it needs to be downplayed by the one who speaks its name so as not to seem ridiculous, particularly at this point, after almost 2-years of COVID-19. Omicron is calculation.

Its origin story is curious: that it might have originated in a 'single individual', probably unvaccinated, immuno-compromised, possibly with HIV—a host within which the virus could mutate unmitigated for weeks to produce all of the countless mutations constituting this variant, “more than 30” on the spike protein alone¹. And this is the second variant to come from out of South Africa this year alone, the first was early this year before Delta, back in April. South Africa, the location for the science fiction film District 9 evokes in the mind the post-apocalyptic slum cities of Johannesburg, where millions dwell in a provisional, improvised existence surrounding small pockets of racialized prosperity. South Africa is the meeting point between the Western colonizers and the mysterious African continent and, as it is understood today, its developing populations and economies not properly yet incorporated in the global economy, still prisoner to their corrupt, tribal sociologies. South Africa is the meeting point between the worlds most under-developed economies and the West's persisting colonization projects, on the one hand, and their neo-colonial projects, justified on their need to atone for their history of slavery and exploitation of the natural resources of the continent (that still persists, one can see most conspicuously in the rare-earth minerals mined in the Congo for Tesla cars)².

So it is immediately interesting, considering the current context, the name, the location, and the origin story of this new COVID strain. Just at the moment when working-class fatigue, blended with liberal moral hypocrisy and the performative rules-following farce have begun to achieve an unassailable critique on the current biomedical regime of vaccine mandates, 'passports', lockdowns and continued travel and social restrictions. Fueled by new studies showing that none of these vaccines stop the transmission of the virus³ and that their protection in any case wanes⁴ quickly over time, it was seemingly only a matter of time before the entire edifice of dishonest, misrepresented science and the fake morality arguments based on them in the mainstream would fall to the truth of the situation we are living in: an endemic virus that is not that deadly, that mostly affects older populations and those with serious chronic illness or disease, and that is readily amenable to a cocktail of already existing and cheap drugs⁵. Already last week, the arguments had started to shift away from the morality of vaccination to prevent spread to the more vulnerable and return to the original argument about vaccines continued protection against serious illness and death and hospitalization rates and the 'burden' the unvaccinated thus pose to the system. Frustratingly, advocates had not yet been able to forcefully mount their argument in its most pure, liberal form as global advocacy for the world dispossessed, poor and still developing that have remained cut-off from the vaccine as rich countries give themselves a third and fourth dose and still try to stamp out the remaining vestiges of resistance to the public health policy.

With Omicron, all that seems like it is about to change. A virus that arose in a single individual will now become the basis for ensuring every last living thing in developed countries should be vaccinated. And the fact that this case 'probably' arose in the underdeveloped periphery of Africa means that the liberal West must now dedicate itself fully to ensuring as well that every last man, woman, and child in the under-developed world also get its 'share' of the life-saving vaccine. Reports are currently unclear whether or not the vaccines as they are still provide protection from this new strain, and as such its unclear at the moment which direction of the narrative will prove most beneficial. Because, on the one hand, what would be beneficial at this moment would be to move on entirely from arguments based on these previously deficient vaccines that have proven themselves amenable to critique. There is an economic rationale for this (get a new set of shots in every arm), but there is also a propaganda function: opposition to a hegemonic narrative requires that that narrative change so much, so quickly that critique of it is rendered paranoid, delusional and schizophrenic in how varied and multiple it needs to be to accommodate the entire history of the situation into its logic. Critique is rendered incoherent in this way⁷. On the other hand, however, is really unclear whether or not such a narrative could be used to mobilize a planet exhausted with this virus after two years when what seems more politically expedient would be to exempt those already vaccinated from a new pressure campaign to ensure their even more fervent support for additional efforts to force the unvaccinated to take the needle.

In either eventuality, it is time for us to take a step back and assess this situation. It is obvious to anyone paying any attention and not held hostage to fear and hypocritical moralism what is happening. In the same way the 9/11 was used to foment fear of 'terrorists' among us and out there that could strike at any moment using unconventional, ordinary and undetectable methods (that was used for the introduction of the entire surveillance apparatus we are still currently living with and the justification for the past 20-years of endless wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and testing your shoes at the airport scanner's endless line), COVID-19 is proving to be the transformation of liberal moral globalization from an antiquated, anachronistic military strategy into a contemporary biomedical, technological, and information-based system of control, colonization, and economic profiteering. Rather than what was originally a right wing, neoconservative project in the Middle East on behalf of giant oil conglomerates, the military industrial complex and associated technology firms, we now have the (neo-)liberal project arising out of the fascist alloy of technology monopolies and the state in this new biomedical structuring of existence for which there is seemingly no concession not worth making. What might seem like a temporary state of exception for the benefit of public health is on the verge of becoming a permanent restructuring in mobility, rights to bodily autonomy, the pervasive censorship of all forms of casual and formalized dissent, and the unrestrained ability of these pharmaceutical and healthcare companies to free themselves of regulatory restrictions and to involve the entire planet's humanity in an ongoing experiment, the outcome of which is simply unknowable (mRNA is essentially a form of gene-therapy, and the virus itself most probably and arguable arose from out of a similar form of unrestrained, myopic 'research' at the Wuhan Institute of Virology).

Footnotes