Peter Hitchens, usually such a ray of sunshine, is sunk in gloom. And for why?
I sense that I and some others have now become the targets of a worrying wave of spite, censorship and intolerance, very like the McCarthyite frenzy in 1950s America - he wrote in his Mail on Sunday column on 10 January.
He was indignant at a claim by former BBC hack Paul Mason that the attitude of self-styled Covid sceptics was on “the same spectrum as full-blown science-denial”. Mixing historical metaphors, Hitchens described his McCarthyite foes as “new Red Guards” who “love to accuse dissenters of 'denial' of Covid. This may seem ludicrous. Covid exists. I wouldn't and don't deny it.” No indeed.
Hitchens made his position quite clear on 22 March 2020, the day before the first lockdown, when he wrote: “I see very little evidence of a pandemic.” By 3 May he was still utterly unimpressed: “Let me say it again: the coronavirus is not as dangerous as claimed.” The death rate had “passed its peak in this country on 8 April” ... By 31 May it was all over.
Continue reading @ Private Eye.
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