Moderna and an "interesting peek behind the disinformation industry"
"Whatever of social importance is done today, whether in politics, finance, manufacture, agriculture, charity, education, or other fields, must be done with the help of propaganda." - Edward Bernays
In 1923 Edward Bernays, nephew to Sigmund Freud, and amazingly uncle to current Netfix CEO Marc Bernays Randolph (seriously), wrote Crystalizing Public Opinion where he outlines his general theory of narrative building and propaganda. Five years later he wrote Propaganda.
Mr. Bernays is often called the godfather of public relations because many of his insights laid the foundation for the information management industry we see today.
His view of most of humanity was, in our opinion, bleak. The great hordes are to be manipulated for the ends of those who “knew best.” Those who “know best” are/were the brightest of society (in his view) and of course Mr. Bernays’ clients which included, the Army, Navy, American Tobacco Company, the United Fruit Company, and many other companies and government entities.
The below video is an introduction to Mr. Bernays if you don’t know him.
"Intelligent men must realize that propaganda is the modern instrument by which they can fight for productive ends and help to bring order out of chaos."- Edward Bernays
Mr. Bernays’ lessons have been extensively studied, and effectively deployed in the USA (and beyond) since the 1930s.
But why talk about him now, in particular?
The reason is we were reminded of Bernays’ methods as we read the attached article by investigative journalists Lee Fang and Jack Paulson at UnHerd. In it they explore the pharmaceutical company Moderna and its propaganda/narrative creation around the Covid vaccine and broader Covid policy.
Moderna argued that lockdowns were a good idea, and that vaccine mandates are acceptable in democratic free societies, among other (now very) questionable Covid talking points.
That the top of the company (four people) made BILLIONS PERSONALLY had nothing to do with the perpetuation of these points we are sure.
It is also worth noting that Moderna, which made billions for a few individuals also partnered with the government (funded by taxpayers) during Covid.
The company continues post-Covid to scan the digital horizon for dissent.
…Moderna is monitoring a huge range of mainstream outlets, as well as unconventional ones, such as the Steam online gaming community and Medium. Meanwhile, Moderna also retains Talkwalker which uses its “Blue Silk” artificial intelligence to monitor vaccine-related conversations across 150 million websites in nearly 200 countries. Discussions around “competitor” issues, including discussions of Pfizer are flagged as well as vaccine hesitancy.
Their monitoring team includes Moderna’s global intelligence division, which is run by Nikki Rutman, who spent nearly 20 years as an analyst with the Federal Bureau of Investigation. Rutman was working from the FBI’s Boston office during the COVID-19 effort known as “Operation Warp Speed”, which involved the FBI conducting weekly cybersecurity meetings with the Boston headquartered Moderna.
Moderna identified the 2023 US Tennis Open champion Novak Djokovic, who refused to take the vaccine and who was banned from the Open in 2022 because he refused the vaccine, as “high risk” according to uncovered emails. His success was bad PR for Moderna. Others who are/were considered high risk include Elon Musk and Russel Brand. Basically anyone who questioned the response to Covid who had any kind of platform was identified. (Were they ever “targeted?)
It appears also that whether or not an anti-vaccine claim was/is true makes little difference to the company. It is concerned it appears with their bottom line (which is natural, but they have been funded partly by taxpayers). The scouring of the Internet and newscape is not a public health effort.
Keep reading with a 7-day free trial
Subscribe to Against Crony Capitalism to keep reading this post and get 7 days of free access to the full post archives.