A Sociology of Fear
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Steve Templeton talks with sociologist Dr. Frank Furedi, author of How Fear Works: Culture of Fear in the 21st Century, about the continuity of the culture of fear... Read more.
Germophobes to the Left and Right
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With two years of overreaction to and media obsession with the myriad of ways that COVID-19 can kill or permanently disable people, there’s reason to believe a... Read more.
Plagues and the Unleashing of Power
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We can see the long arm of history reaching from the times of the Black Death to modern epidemics, where coercion and state control are accepted by a terrified public... Read more.
War Was Always the Wrong Metaphor
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With two full years of hindsight, it’s clear that lockdowns were a disaster and that mandated measures caused more harm than benefit, yet this has not prevented... Read more.
The High Costs of the Appearance of Safety
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The public demanded control over something that couldn’t be controlled. Local, state, and national leaders, whether they understood that they couldn’t actually... Read more.
A Manual for Post-Pandemic Germophobia Therapy
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The more I thought about it, the more I realized that living in the modern world has left most people, including journalists, politicians, physicians, and even many... Read more.
How Covid Panic Destroyed Communities: Our Church and My Story
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Shutting down everything couldn’t last indefinitely, and people couldn’t avoid being in personal proximity indefinitely without serious consequences. The virus... Read more.
A Fantasy of Virus-Free Air
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In our current safety culture-driven pandemic response, any risk of infection is deemed unacceptable, and those who highlight potential costs of mitigation measures... Read more.
Rev. Cotton Mather and the 18th-Century Battle Over Smallpox Inoculation
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One of the most fascinating battles between opposing views about variolation occurred during the New England smallpox epidemic of 1721. When a ship brought smallpox... Read more.
The Politicization of Immunology
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Both immunity to vaccination and infection protect against severe disease, but the scope of immunity that develops after infection is broader, generally more durable,... Read more.
The Problem With Science Is Scientists
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The overwhelming desire of a terrified public for evidence of interventions that effectively eliminate the risk of infection will inevitably pressure scientists... Read more.
Masks: Before and After They Became Political
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If one actually takes the time to consider the preponderance of evidence regarding universal masking, it becomes extremely difficult to conclude that it has had,... Read more.