Introduction
What's the difference between the truth and a "right-wing" "conspiracy theory"? About 12 months.
Throughout 2020, the health establishment, the government (particularly of the political left), and mainstream social media platforms had been quashing the Wuhan Institute of Virology lab leak hypothesis. Anthony Fauci, the head of the NIH, also dismissed it as a possible cause.
However, just over the past month, all of the institutions did an about-face and suddenly, the lab leak hypothesis was no longer a conspiracy theory. The hypothesis was deemed "acceptable" by our corporate and political overlords. That said, when you look deeper into this, it turns out some of them took the hypothesis seriously the entire time.
As I covered in my editorial on Anthony Fauci, he was notified by a virologist Dr. Kristian Anderson on how the virus's genome appeared to be engineered. Fauci also sent an urgent email to Dr. Hugh Auchincloss on a 2015 paper on SARS gain-of-function from the Wuhan Institute of Virology, expressing concerns about US money being tied to the research. This all happened in early 2020 when the pandemic was about to peak.
In both of my writeups, I noted some of the shady dealings and conflicts of interests happening behind the curtain. For instance, EcoHealth Alliance President, Peter Daszak, funneled NIH money to the Wuhan Institute of Virology and thanked Fauci for publicly rejecting the lab leak hypothesis. In addition, he was also used as an authority figure for one of Facebook's "fact checkers" to "debunk" the theory.
Well, it turns out not only did the hypothesis was suppressed due to collusion and conflicts of interests, but political correctness also played a significant role.
Scientist Makes Fallacious Reasons for Not Calling for an Investigation
On June 17, 2021, The Hill published an article titled "Harvard scientist says Trump hatred motivated experts who denied Wuhan lab leak theory". Wait, hold on, the article is now titled "Fear of link to Trump motivated expert skepticism of lab leak theory, scientist says" if you look at the unarchived version (with no update note of what the title used to be). Very sneaky, The Hill, but nice try.
Anyways, a Harvard postdoctoral associate, Alina Chan, signed a letter along with 18 other scientists in May calling for an investigation into the origins of COVID. However, she admitted that prior to the letter, experts were hesitant to "lean too close" to former President Donald Trump. Here's her quote from her interview with NBC:
"At the time, it was scarier to be associated with Trump and to become a tool for racists, so people didn't want to publicly call for an investigation into lab origins."
This is a completely asinine reason to withhold calls for an investigation. For one thing, this is a guilt by association fallacy. Just because Trump supported the lab leak hypothesis over the natural evolution theory and you hate him, that does not automatically make the hypothesis incorrect.
Chan's quote also contains an Appeal to Consequences fallacy. To summarize, this form of argumentation asserts that the truth value of a claim is dependent on the positive or negative outcomes. It is fallacious because the desirability does not determine the truth value of the proposition. Chan's argument falls under this form of the Appeal to Consequences fallacy:
X is false because if people did not accept X as being false, then there would be negative consequences.
"X", in this case, would be "people didn't want to publicly call for an investigation". The negative consequences would be the investigation becoming a tool for "racists".
Closing Thoughts: Political Correctness Should Never Dictate Such Important Decisions
As a matter of fact, political correctness should be abandoned. When it gets in the way of science and justice like holding the CCP accountable, it is a complete liability. Safety protocols from the Wuhan Institute of Virology have been always iffy and for much of the 2010s, the lab did a lot of gain-of-function research on coronaviruses. Just last week, it was revealed that the institution even kept live bats. There's no reason to believe that another virus may spring loose from China and cause another outbreak. Performing a thorough, legitimate investigation can prevent that sort of crisis and save many lives.
Unfortunately, that was not how Alina Chan and the other experts felt. Instead, they were more concerned about association and not hurting other people's fee-fees. This is a dangerous mindset to have and can potentially harm many people. In fact, political correctness already has done great harm in the past.
Arguably the biggest example of political correctness inflicting a lot of damage is the infamous Rotheram Sex Scandal. Several young girls were raped by Pakistani gangs and the authorities didn't do anything because as one Labour MP put it, they did "not [want] to rock the multicultural community boat". Well, one can easily conclude from the numerous victims and the accompanying emotional scars from all of the sexual abuse that it didn't work out. But at least the police was not "racist"...?
