25 November

George Orwell coined the term Doublethink in 1984, to mean people persuaded through propaganda language to believe two mutually contradictory things at once. Classic examples are 'Covid Safe' and 'Covid Normal'. Orwell wrote brilliantly about how language shapes beliefs. Try this beauty from the UK government, reducing quarantine for new arrivals to only 5 days to 'balance' the economy and peoples' safety. It won't do anything for peoples' safety - at least 50% of people with Covid won't test positive after only 5 days. Also notice that peoples' safety gets one mention, and then the rest is entirely about helping business. That's what 'balancing' public health and the economy means - doing all the economy things, at the expense of all the health things.