There has been extensive censorship of legitimate, expert criticism during the COVID-19 event (Kheriaty, 2022. Shir-Raz et al, 2023. Hughes, 2024). Such scientific suppression makes the narrow frame visible for what the sponsors of global health authoritarianism permit for questioning of The Science™. In contrast to genuine science which innovates through critique, incorporated science does not welcome questioning. Like fascism, corporatist science views critiques of its interventions to be heresy. In the COVID-19 event, key opinion leaders who criticised the lack of scientific rigour behind public health measures (such as genetic vaccine mandates) were treated as heretics by a contemporary version of the Inquisition (Malone et al., 2024). Dissidents were accused of sharing "MDM" (Misinformation, Disinformation and Malinformation) assumed to place the public's lives at risk. Particularly in prestigious medical universities, questioning the dictates of health authorities and their powerful sponsors was viewed as being unacceptable, completely outside an Overton Window that had become far more restrictive due to fear- mongering around a "pandemic" (see Figure 1).

Higher Education is particularly susceptible to this groupthink, as it lends itself to a purity spiral, which in turn contributes to the growing spiral of silence for "unacceptable views". A purity spiral is a form of groupthink in which it is more beneficial to hold some views than to not hold them. In a process of moral outbidding, individual academics with more extreme views are rewarded. This was evidenced at universities where genetic vaccine proponents loudly supported the mandatory vaccination of students, despite them having minimal, if any, risk. In contrast, scholars expressing moderation, doubt or nuance faced ostracism as "anti-vaxxers". In universities, there are strong social conformity factors within its tight-knit community. Grants, career-support and other forms of institutional support depend on collegiality and alignment with prevailing norms. Being labeled a contrarian for questioning a ‘sacred cow’, such as "safe and effective" genetic vaccines, is likely to jeopardise one’s reputation, and academic future. Academic disciplines coalesce around shared paradigms and axiomatic truths, routinely amplifying groupthink. Challenging reified understandings as shibboleths can lead to exclusion from conferences, journals and cost scholars departmental, faculty, and even university support. Particularly where powerful funders object to such dissent!

Here, administrative orthodoxy can signal an “official” position for the university that chills debate. Dissenters fears of isolation and reprisal (such as poor evaluations and formal complaints for not following the official line) may convince them to self-censor. Particularly where the nonconformist assesses that the strength of opinion against his or her opinion is virulent, alongside high costs to expressing a disagreeable viewpoint- such as negotiating cancelation culture. Individuals who calculate that they have a low chance of success to convince others, and are likely to pay a steep price, self censor and contribute to the growing spiral of silence. The COVID-19 event serves as an excellent example for this growing spiral’s chilling effect versus free speech and independent enquiry.

COVID-19 is highly pertinent for critiquing censorship in the Medical and Health Sciences. Particularly as it featured conflicts of interest that contributed to global health "authorities" policy guidance. Notably, the World Health Organisation promoted poorly substantiated and even unscientific guidelines (Noakes et al., 2021), that merit being considered MDM. In following such dictates from the top policy makers of the Global Public-Private Partnership (GPPP or G3P), most governments' health authorities seemed to ignore key facts. Notably: i. COVID-19 risk was steeply age-stratified (Verity et al, 2019. Ho et al, 2020. Bergman et al, 2021); ii. Prior COVID-19 infection can provide substantial immunity (Nattrass et al., 2021); iii. COVID-19 genetic vaccines did not stop disease transmission (Eyre et al. 2022, Wilder-Smith, 2022); iv. mass-masking was ineffective (Jefferson et al., 2023. Halperin, 2024); v. school closures were unwarranted (Wu et al., 2021); and, vi. there were better alternatives to lengthy, whole-society lockdowns (Coccia, 2021, Gandhi and Venkatesh, 2021. Herby et al., 2024). Both international policy makers' and local health authorities' flawed guidance must be open debate and rigorous critique. If public health interventions had been adapted to such key facts during the COVID-19 event, the resultant revised guidance could well have contributed to better social-, health-, and economic outcomes for billions of people!

This post focuses on six types of suppression techniques that were used against dissenting accounts whose voices are deemed illegitimate "disinformation" spreaders by the Global public-Private Partnerships (G3P)-sponsored industrial censorship complex. This an important concern, since claims that the suppression of free speech's digital reach can "protect public safety" were proved false during COVID-19. A case in point is the censorship of criticism against employee's vaccine mandates. North American employers' mandates are directly linked to excess disabilities and deaths for hundreds and thousands of working-age employees (Dowd, 2024). Deceptive censorship of individuals' reports of vaccine injuries as "malinformation", or automatically-labelling criticism of Operation Warp Speed as "disinformation", would hamper US employee's abilities to make fully-informed decisions on the safety of genetic vaccines. Such deleterious censorship must be critically examined by academics. In contrast, 'Disinformation-for-hire' scholars (Harsin, 2024) will no doubt remain safely ensconced behind their profitable MDM blinkers.

This post is the first in a series that spotlights the myriad of account suppression techniques that exist. For each, examples of censorship against health experts' opinions are provided. Hopefully, readers can then better appreciate the asymmetric struggle that dissidents face when their accounts are targeted by the censorship industrial complex with a myriad of these strategies spanning multiple social media platforms:

Practices for @Account suppression

#1 Deception - users are not alerted to unconstitutional limitations on their free speech