Hello Irlandia has become recently a target of the main stream media since a freelancer journalist Shane Raymond from The Times, Irish Edition, contacted us yesterday morning at 11.21 with a list of questions he wished to have answers to by 5pm as he was going to write about us because our webpage appeared to indicate that we didn’t believe that COVID-19 was a real disease.
The e-mail reads:
Hello,
My name is Shane Raymond. I am writing to you on behalf of The Times, Ireland Edition. We are writing a piece about information featuring on your page that appears to indicate that you don’t believe that COVID-19 is a real disease. Can you answer some questions for me please:
1. Can you tell me a bit about your background? How many people run this page? Do you all live in Ireland? How long for? Why did you set up the page?
2. Do you believe that COVID-19 is a real disease? Do you believe that restrictions stop the spread of COVID-19? Do you believe that the COVID-19 vaccines will be safe or effective?
3. Are you afraid that by airing views that contradict public health guidelines that you will be putting your followers at risk from COVID-19? Or make them less likely to take vaccines?
4. Has Facebook removed any posts from your page, factchecked any posts, or warned you about the content you post? 5. Do you still intend on to hold the Ladies Night Party at Space@DublinBIC on 27/03?
We intend on publishing tonight. Our deadline is 5pm.
Journalist
< contact removed >
And if so who would that someone be?
As per Linkedin “Shane Raymond is a journalist specialising in social media discovery and verification. His bylines have featured in The Times, The Sunday Times, Al Jazeera, Marketwatch, The Irish Times, ABC7, Storyful, Hot Press, The Irish Examiner and The Sunday Business Post. His research has been published by Reuters, The New York Times, The Washington Post, The New York Post, The Guardian, Vice News, Sky News and The Irish Independent. “
4 days ago Shane Raymond retweeted the following:
The quoted link in the above retweet will take you to the source Tweeter thread with another link to the following project’s webpage:
Yeap, clearly we are – together with our followers – one of those “conspiracy communities” speculating and sharing “unsubstantiated claims about the process of vaccine rollout and how vaccines might impact people’s lives post coronavirus”, etc, etc. You know the narrative from the almighty censorship.
Since we were supposed to be the conspiracy fans what was particularly interesting for us was the source of funding for such a noble endeavour like COVID-19 Vaccine Misinformation Monitor: Ireland at Institute of Strategic Dialog (www.isdglobal.org). Surely, if we are the bad guys, and they are the good ones, that kind of undertaking should be supported by gofundme.com or other similar initiatives, right? We should under no circumstances find Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation as their sponsor, right?
Wrong!
Boom!
Make of it what you will.
Anyway, we swiftly prepared an appropriate reply and sent it the same day – at 16.07 – to Shane as requested:
Dear Shane,
You’ve given us incredibly short notice to address your inquiry in relation to an article you are about to publish.
The way you formulated the questions to us is concerning. We never said Covid was not a real disease. You’re twisting things – possibly to suit your own agenda, or possibly because you don’t understand the nuance in our messaging.
Therefore, we would appreciate it if you could let us know that you won’t misrepresent us in this fashion.
If you do decide to write this misrepresentation in your report, we will be consulting our solicitor for legal advice and contacting you in future.
You will find in the attached document our full response to all your questions.
Kind Regards,
Hello Irlandia Team
Here is the PDF of the document containing our detailed response. You may find it particularly interesting and eye opening. Highly recommended read, especially the file from European Medicines Agency.
We are still waiting for the promised article.
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