Talking the talk, walking the walk: controlled opposition at the freedom rally

Niall McCrae

Among the hundreds of thousands attending the freedom rally in London last Saturday were some well-known personalities, who have come to realise that the covid regime only ends when we make it end.  Talk Radio presenter Julia Hartley-Brewer, a trenchant critic of government ministers and rare voice of sanity on the airwaves, marched with many of her audience. It was a wonderful day, and this time it was too big for the mainstream media to ignore, although reports were grudging and derisory.  

In response to the blackout of previous protests, the Reform Party paid for a helicopter to show the human tide from the sky. Isobel Oakeshott tweeted the video evidence, precluding the likes of Marianna Spring of the BBC misinformation unit from dismissing the vast attendance as fake news. 

Laurence Fox spoke by megaphone outside Downing Street, and participated in the throwing of tennis balls over the gates. On the previous day Fox issued his rallying call against an illegitimate government, while promoting love and peace as the spirit of this popular revolt. Fox has attended rallies since March, and seems to be fully on board.

Yet there is a sense of controlled opposition in the new recruits to the freedom movement. An interview on Talk Radio yesterday illustrated the tendency to talk some of the talk and walk some of the walk but not to go all the way. Martin Daubney, an associate of the Reform Party and Fox’s Reclaim Party, was interviewed by Hartley-Brewer about the march and showed that either he doesn’t quite get it, or he is self-censoring to maintain his reputation in polite society.

The shared perspective of guest and host was that the rally was a joyous gathering of nice ordinary people, but that the media were focusing on the radical fringe. They were keen to emphasise that the protest was not against vaccines but against lockdown. Daubney obviously does not want to be associated with ‘anti-vaxxers’, who he claimed were a tiny minority. 

The Reform Party video prior to the event, titled ‘Freedom march live’, displayed this limited resistance. ‘Vaccines work’ was a prominent message, based on the naive notion that vaccination is the key to liberty. When I met party leader Richard Tice in the campaign for the London Assembly, I found that while he had converted to the anti-lockdown cause, he was sniffy about any vaccine critique. Blood clots, according to Tice, were coincidental, although he was discouraging his grown-up daughter from taking the jab. 

To her credit, Hartley-Brewer defended the right of marchers to oppose covid vaccination, but she made clear that she completely disagreed with them. This is not a rational stance, though. What exactly is Hartley-Brewer against? She appears to be dismissing any concerns about the mass injection programme, whether the mounting evidence of adverse reactions, the proposed jabbing of schoolchildren, or the introduction of vaccine passports. For Hartley-Brewer, mixing with vaccine sceptics would risk being smeared as a ‘swivel-eyed lunatic’. 

Daubney agreed with Hartley-Brewer on the ‘anti-vax’ element, and also on the presence of Trump banners (she saw one, he saw two).  According to Daubney, these flag-bearers were extremists, but he did not explain why, or show any understanding of the relevance of Trump to the rally. You will not hear Hartley-Brewer or Daubney speak of the Great Reset or the ‘build back better’ agenda of the New World Order, because there is none so blind as will not see.  It wouldn’t take much thinking for Daubney to make links between the forces of global technocracy and the national populism of the previous US president. A little more courage and he could have observed that many people believe that the election was stolen for the same motives as the worldwide lockdown. 

This is controlled opposition. GB News is similar: light-touch reporting of the march while pushing the vaccine narrative. The imposition by stealth of a digital surveillance system seems to be off the radar of Tice, Daubney, Oakeshott et al.  That is a huge omission on their part. But more grating is that they are behaving like gatecrashers at a wedding, criticising the celebration while quaffing the champagne. 

Daubney muttered that the media were besmirching the marchers by mentioning particular ‘figures of the movement’. Presumably he was thinking of Piers Corbyn, among others. This is rude and disrespectful of the activists who started the freedom rallies at great risk to themselves. Corbyn, Kate Shemirani, Fiona Hine, Louise Creffield and Jeff Wyatt have all been arrested and most are still facing multiple charges for organising or attending peaceful protests. As Greta Thunberg would say:’ How dare you!’.  

I don’t want to knock Daubney too much; I had a pint with him a while ago and undoubtedly he is a good bloke. But he should make more use of his critical faculties, and have the courage of his conviction to call out the totalitarian coup against the common people. Otherwise, this is controlled opposition. They should stop controlling themselves, and open the door to truth – the real key to freedom.