On July 27, 1656, senior leaders of the Jewish community in Amsterdam issued a writ of cherem— the Hebrew term for expulsion and excommunication.
Their target was a young, 23-year old Dutch/Portuguese intellectual named Baruch Spinoza, himself a Jew, whose dangerous crime was questioning the unquestionable teachings of the faith.
The Jewish elders proclaimed that “The Lord will rage against this man and… blot out his name from under heaven” and ordered that no Jew should communicate with him, offer him shelter, give him money, or read any of his writings.
A few years later, the Catholic Church followed suit and added all of Spinoza’s works to its Index of Banned Books. This makes Baruch Spinoza one of the few people in history to be banished from both the Jewish and Catholic religions.
His philosophy was widely misunderstood at the time. Everyone accused him of being an atheist, which was one of the worst things you could call someone in the 1600s.
But he wasn’t actually an atheist. Spinoza’s works were an attempt for him to reconcile his faith with certain religious teachings that were illogical, self-contradictory, or refuted by science.
He wrote extensively about his “intellectual love of God”. But simply for expressing intellectual independence, Spinoza was expelled from his own Jewish community.
Now, Novak Djokovic is hardly a Baruch Spinoza. But it is truly bizarre in the year 2022 to see someone be expelled from an advanced western democracy simply for expressing intellectual independence.
Just to catch you up, Novak Djokovic is a professional Tennis player from Serbia who is considered one of the all-time greats in the sport. He’s currently ranked #1 in the world and holds an incredible number of records in professional tennis.
But Djokovic is unvaccinated against Covid-19, and that makes him a heretic.
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He recently attempted to travel to Melbourne, in the prison colony of Australia, to play in the Australian Open tennis tournament there. But upon arrival, Djokovic was immediately detained by immigration authorities.
After a ridiculous nine days of legal back-and-forth, Djokovic was deported from the country. And under current law, he is barred from entering Australia for a minimum of three years.
It’s worth noting that the Australian government had issued an entry visa to Djokovic as recently as mid-November, so it’s not like he tried to enter the country illegally.
Plus they knew at the time that he was unvaccinated; Djokovic has been public about his stance.
Yet the government only kicked up a fuss (and canceled his visa) once he had already arrived.
In support of their decision to cancel his visa, the government claimed that Djokovic was a danger to society because his presence could incite civil unrest.
Naturally they provided no evidence to support this assertion. It’s true because the government says it’s true.
But even if it were true, this particular argument is a bizarre ‘pre-crime’ condemnation of Djokovic; the Australian government has peered into its crystal ball and concluded that other people will engage in civil unrest. Therefore their solution is to punish a tennis player who hasn’t done anything wrong.
Makes perfect sense.
Their next argument, naturally, is that Djokovic is a danger to public health. Because he is unvaccinated, they claim that he can carry and spread the virus to others.
Obviously this is true. And yet, as all the data show, vaccinated people can also carry and transmit the virus. Vaccinated people can become infected and hospitalized. They can even die.
Vaccination rates in Australia are among the highest in the world, and they’re feverishly (no pun intended) administering booster shots to the population.
Yet despite this adherence to public health authorities, cases are surging to record highs. In the last 24 hours there were 55,232 new Covid cases in Australia.
By comparison, Australia had 10 (yes, ten) new daily cases a year ago in January 2021, just prior to the vaccine rollout.
But now that 92.6% of eligible Australians have been vaccinated, the infection rate has increased more than 5,000x from a year ago.
Obviously vaccinated people are transmitting the virus to other vaccinated people.
Yet the government seems to be asserting that only unvaccinated people like Djokovic can spread Omicron… which is a very flat-earth, anti-science view.
But the Australian government’s dumbest reason to expel Djokovic was that his presence in the country may increase vaccine or booster hesitancy.
This one is really extraordinary.
Let’s assume for a moment that their point is true, i.e. Djokovic could infect Australian people with his dangerous ideology.
Even so, the Australian government apparently believes that ideas only spread through physical contact.
In other words, these politicians think that Australian residents will only become vaccine hesitant if Djokovic is physically present in Australia, as if he’s going to sneeze and his ideas will spread like Omicron droplets.
But as long as they keep him out of the country, then Australians will be sufficiently socially distanced from his ideas and no one will be exposed to his heresy.
Just like the rest of their arguments, this notion is completely absurd. And yet it was their ‘rational’ basis for punishing someone whose only transgression was exercising independent thought.
Back in the 1600s (and prior), anyone who disagreed with the civil or religious authorities was branded a heretic. And their censorship was especially brutal; people were expelled, imprisoned, tortured, and even put to death for questioning authority and expressing a different view.
We have once again returned to medieval intolerance for ideological differences.
Australia’s government is a sad example of this Dark Ages-era mentality– that they (and they alone) dictate truth. And anyone who questions their supreme wisdom must be banished.
Back then people faced Inquisition, witch hunts, and public beheadings. Today it’s the Twitter mob, cancel culture, and expulsion.
It’s not quite as bloody, but still ruinous.
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Good. We deserve everything we get and I hope it is good and hard. Australians love making jokes about New Zealanders buggering their sheep, yet are blissfully unaware that they are being buggered like sheep by their appointed representatives.
“It’s not quite as bloody…….”
Yet.
Indeed. And the bloodshed won’t be coming from the victims of the inquisition, but from the attempted perpetrators.
Novak said on his entry documents that he had a valid medical exemption, and was thus granted provisional entry. However, when he arrived, he in fact did not have a valid medical exemption per Australian regulation. So he was grabbed up at the border. Australia does not check the validity of the claims made until the visitors arrive at the border – the visitor has the responsibility to have documents supporting the claims made. Additionally, he lied on his entry documents with respect to his whereabouts in the previous two weeks, which could have been prosecuted, but which was not. These two items enraged the public.
He “won” a temporary reprieve of the first deportation order, as he was told he had until 8:30 to produce the proof required – which he did not have – but was ordered deported at 7:45. The judge ruled that because he was not given the agreed upon time, that he had not been granted procedural fairness, and the order was quashed. However, that did not mean that he still could not be deported, if the process was done again properly.
Tennis Australia, desperate to have Novak at the tournament, advised him in November/December that if he had had Covid within the previous 6 months he would get a medical exemption. This is despite the Australian government directly telling Tennis Australia that they do not recognize recent Covid as a medical exemption. TA thought Novak would get away with it, as other countries so allow, and I suppose thought that the Australian government would fold under public pressure. The pressure was opposite that, however, and the public wanted him deported.
Novak then, miraculously, came down with Covid on December 16, just in time to complete his isolation period, if you can believe that. He did not isolate in his infectious period, if you believe he was infectious, but attended events and gave interviews. He has admitted to this openly.
Novak, as regulations currently stand, will be unable to compete in any of the major tournaments, but things may have just changed for Wimbledon.
Australia, unlike the US, actually controls its borders. It has every right to do so, and need not, nor should not, give one thought to what anyone else says about such.
Novak, his team, and Tennis Australia tried to circumvent the rules regarding entry to Australia, and failed. The Australian government may have turned a blind eye to it, except Novak bragged and broadcast his “medical exemption” via Twitter and such prior to his entry, which caught the attention of the press and public, and so he got snatched up upon entry.
He should simply have stood firm with his convictions, and not tried to game the system. He tried to game the system, and got caught out. Now, he is banned from Australia for 3 years, if he does not receive a special ministerial override of the ban. Him threatening to sue because of “poor treatment” in the deportation centre will not help him if he decides he want to return.
^^^^^^^
this guy is a card carrying NAZI.
Hey f*cker aussie how long have you been on the payroll
You bark like a trained dog.
Dear God, I hope this is a long winded troll. If he’s not a troll and if the idjit is actually DEFENDING the bullshit laws and mandates issuing from the bullies masquerading as ‘leaders’ in Australia then he needs his little emptyheaded ass kicked.
MM, this is the kind of shit that level headed Aussies have to put up with EVERY FUCKING DAY. These same Aussie fuckwit mutts, would just as quickly turn their own family in for a pat on the head and a scratch of the belly from their masters.
I’m 99% sure this is a cut and paste from some liberal reporter or govt mouthpiece ( I repeat myself)
I don’t think he/she is defending the laws. It sounds as though he’s/she’s defending a sovereign nation’s right make it’s own laws. Plus, it sounds as though Djokovic lied. The laws are indeed bullshit, especially for a “free” and “democratic” (peshaw) western nation.
screw you git. You speak as if he were some kind of leper spreading incurable misery.
Screw your countrymen also if they did indeed become outraged at Djokovich entering because he was really just a mirror showing the cowardice of your citizens. Enjoy fascism, enjoy your camps, enjoy your unarmed, inability to fight back– the vast majority of you deserve what’s coming.
Not much of an ocker, mate. More a statist fairy.
If any TBPers have as yet not seen the John Wick trio, please rectify that as soon as is practicable. Pure gold.
Here’s Mr. Wick getting told he’s off tap, aka ‘cherem’ because he offed an ‘untouchable’:
Brought to you by Pfizer.
Love this series. Wick was excommunicado because he offed a guy in the colosseum. Knocking anyone off in the colosseum is against the rules. The female assassin was killed in chapter 1 for doing the same thing. Too bad chapter 4 is delayed a year.
We are John Wick (even though he is a fictional character). We don’t follow the rules either. FJB.
PS. Wick becomes a targeted individual. You can see as the info is spread across millions(?) of phone numbers, and phones blow up. The crowd looks at him with hungry eyes because if they off him, they are paid a bounty. People think that stuff is just paranoia or conspiracy theory. It’s a tough pill to swallow. If it seems too unbelievable, it probably isn’t.