A Rose By Any Other Name. . . .

Travel Papers Please

I recently saw an article where airlines indicated some reticence to implement “vaccine passports.” Rather, they prefer to call them “digital certificates.” “Digital certificates,” it seems, befuddles the proles into believing the documents are something other than travel credentials. After all, if it is simply an app on your phone, it can’t be all bad, right?

But a greater question looms. What is the purpose of a “vaccine passport?” If the COVID vaccines are as efficacious as Big Brother would have us believe, then the only people at risk are the unmasked, unvaccinated. What do the vaccinated fear? Exactly who is at risk?

Now, with the CDC recommending those who have been vaccinated need not wear masks, the “vaccine passport” issue seems to have gained new momentum.

Vaccines: Effective, or Not?

For the purposes of this rant, “masks” and “vaccine passports” are interchangeable.

The brouhaha over masks suggests masks are really a virtual signalling power scheme. If the vaccines are as efficacious as advertised, then those who have been vaccinated have virtually no risk of contracting the virus. Especially so if one contracted COVID before being vaccinated. So, if the vaccinated are at no risk, then the only people who are at risk are those who 1) have not been vaccinated, or have not had COVID, and 2) do not wear masks.

From these syllogisms, then the reasoning behind the vaccinated being upset the un-vaccinated wear no masks seems to be 1) the vaccinated are paranoid the vaccines are not as effective as their big pharma overlords advertise; 2) the vaccinated want a visual signal that alerts them who is among the “dirty, unwashed, anti-vaxxers” so they can be shunned, or 3) the vaccinated want a visual signal to differentiate between the “good” vaxxers, and the “ungood” un-vaccinated to shame (or publicly pressure) them to get their socially approved vaccines. Moral superiority does wonders for egos, and finger-pointers.

I want to make one thing clear: In my rants about vaccines, social pressure, and vaccine passports, the term “anti-vaxxer” is restricted to those who label all vaccines as immoral or illegal government intrusions on personal rights. It does not apply to those who have legitimate questions over a specific vaccine’s side-effects, efficacy, or applicability.

Anticipatory Compliance

A term I heard recently was “anticipatory compliance.” The original context was an author’s attempt to explicate the rationale used by German Jews of the 1930s for volunteering to wear patches that visually identified them as Jews. This author explained that volunteering to enduring “little” indignities was to avoid a more serious punishment for not complying.

The vaccine passport issue suggests a similar rationale. Something we have seen, especially over the last 17 months, is the social pig-pile. Some activist group announces its self-righteous indignation about something, and we start to see corporations immediately pile on, as if to inoculate themselves against being targeted by the activist group–anticipatory compliance: Endure the little indignity to avoid the more severe punishment.

With today’s crop of anti-something activist, there is no avoiding more severe punishment. They keep coming for more. It may be that airlines are participating in the “anticipatory compliance” schema. The rationale may be that if they do not implement a passport mandate, Big Brother may force them to do so through executive order, or legislation.

The message from Big Brother and the oligarchs seems to be, “Get your ‘Fauchi ouchie,’ or get your mask on, prole.”