Posted on 10/26/2021 6:30:21 PM PDT by lightman
New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio’s mandate last week for all city workers to get COVID-19 vaccines gave rise to even more protesters standing up against what they see as a violation of freedom of choice and a communist takeover of the country.
The Epoch Times was there to interview some of the NYPD officers and FDNY participants, and witness the massive march across the Brooklyn Bridge that ended in front of City Hall on Monday afternoon.
Protesters chanted slogans as they marched in support of freedom and against the mandates issued by de Blasio and President Joe Biden.
Active FDNY Captain Jason Wendell of Engine 274 said that there were “thousands and thousands” of them present in the Monday march.
“New York City firefighters and police officers have been exposed for the last 20 months to COVID-19. Most of us have gotten the sickness and gotten over it perfectly well and have natural immunity,” Wendell said, “and the fact that the mayor and politicians are not acknowledging that the vast majority of us are already naturally immune is nothing short of tyrannical.”
“There were thousands and thousands of New York City firemen and New York City police officers, sanitation workers, and teachers here today to protest these obscene mandates.”
The mandate will affect 160,500 city employees, which includes first responders.
If they fail to show vaccination proof by Oct. 29, they will likely be sent home without pay.
“The city will become much more unsafe without first responders and police officers and sanitation workers keeping the city functioning, this will have a tremendous negative impact on the people of New York as you push out these workers from service,” Wendell added.
Paul, a 24-year-old NYPD officer, has been with the police for 3 years. He said that he joined the march because he’s being denied freedom of choice.
“It should be our choice,” Paul said. “I personally don’t want [the vaccine] and if it’s that effective for everyone else, then they shouldn’t care if we get it.”
“The messaging by the government was saying that it wasn’t effective … if the government’s telling that, then why would I get it. It’s not effective.”
Retired police officer Philip McManus worked for NYPD from 1990 to 2018.
“Why are we here? We’re here, it’s not just because of forced mandates, medical mandates. This is about freedom. This is the real issue, it’s about freedom. And we’re fighting a dictatorship in this country. We’re fighting a tyranny in our country. The reality is, we have a president who is forcing people to do something that is absolutely against their religious opinions or their medical decisions, and we have to do everything we can to fight for everyone. Everyone that was forced to be vaccinated needs to stand united for freedom. We all know what’s going on in this country. We have a communist takeover in this country. ”
“Give me liberty or give me death,” he said, quoting Patrick Henry’s famous words from 1775.
“How dare any politician, any corrupt politicians think that they could force Americans to take this vaccine?
“Wake up America! we’re fighting tyranny in this country. We are fighting communism in this country.
George, 53, a retired fireman and veteran that worked for the FDNY for 22 and a half years, doesn’t want to get vaccinated because he believes they are dangerous.
“Real, deadly global pandemics don’t have [such] a [high] survival rate,” George said, “and if that’s the case, we don’t need [a] vaccine,” George said.
“If you surf on all the alternate media sites—not Facebook, Youtube, where they censor all that stuff—there are a million videos of people out there that get palsy, they got the shakes, one girl’s got giant blood clots in her cheeks, people are dying.”
“We’re in year two of ’15 days to slow the spread.’ And as a free American and a veteran, there’s not a politician alive in this country that has the power or authority to compel you, me, or anyone else to take the vaccine or wear a mask. We’re free Americans. It’s time for people to wake up,” George further noted.
“The very same crowd that wants to ban guns to ‘save the children’ while being champions of abortion, they’re saying ‘my body my choice.’ Oddly enough, ‘my body my choice’ doesn’t want to work for this.”
He added that just by being asked if you are vaccinated, it could count as a violation of the HIPAA medical privacy laws.
‘It’s About Control’
An NYPD officer who identified himself as “Qball and retirements” opined that the mandates might lead to a system of totalitarian technological control.
“I oppose the mandate because of the New World Order. It’s not about the virus. It’s about technology and control of the masses,” he said.
The Epoch Times also interviewed NYC special and general education pre-K teacher Jessica Castellon.
“I don’t believe experimental drugs should be mandated on children whose physical development and cognitive development is still unrolling. We don’t know the long-term effects of this on children. We don’t know the long-term effects of this on adults who already have fully formed functioning bodies. We don’t know what this will do to the children and we cannot afford to have America’s future generation imperiled by a drug, just to [line] the pockets of the politicians and those in Pfizer, Moderna, and all the other pharmaceutical companies,” Castellon said.
“The mandates have had a negative impact on teachers and others like teachers assistants and other staff members of the DOE [Department of Education] because they’re statewide. In New York State there is a statewide shortage of teachers, so when teachers are placed on unpaid leave, that stresses the sub central system. There are not enough substitute teachers to cover these absences.”
The Epoch Times reached out to the mayor’s office for comment.
The Epoch Times reported that in Chicago, the vast majority of firemen and police initially didn’t want to take the vaccine, but that situation changed after they started getting sent home without pay, facing a long, uncertain process with HR if they want to return.
I'm never taking that covid vaccine nor doing anything they mandate of me . And I’m in the USA.
They may take my life but they will never take my freedom!
In the background the Brooklyn Bridge looks sorta like a pair of guillotines side by side.
I’m with you.
I CHOSE to get vaccinated....my CHOICE.
If the vaccination is even half of what it is claimed to be I really don’t give a rat’s rump whether anyone else is vaccinated or unvaccinated, masked or unmasked, coughing or calm, close or distant!
I am pro VOLUNTARY vax.
I am barely tolerant VOLUNTARY mask.
I am anti MANDATORY vax.
I am vehemently anti MANDATORY mask.
I have absolutely ZERO need to “feel safe” on the basis that everyone in a venue, a health care facility, or any other place has dutifully shown their papers and/or diapered up.
America will remain “the land of the free” ONLY if we demonstrate that we are “the home of the brave”!
Amen to that! (#23)
I couldn’t have said it better myself.
I'm not a collectivist(socialist/communist) control freak but I am an individualist.
I just know the media lies. And i know they've said the same things about global warming, sars, bird flue, swine flu (around 50% mortality for some of these flus) yeah right if so deadly why hasn't anyone died after the initial media scare from the deadly swine flu, the deadly sars, the super deadly bird flu, etc. how could these super deadly flus disappear without a trace after the initial media scare?
Why hasn't it gotten warmer? then the media try the same thing in an election year and you think i’m going to believe cnn when they say the covid is a deadly pandemic? I never believed it.
I'm never taking any vaccine.
Believe it or not, I do understand your position.
I am of a vintage to have seen previous epidemics come and go, and to have seen that they were frequently accompanied by epidemics of fear which proved more destructive and disruptive than the disease itself.
I am also of a vintage to have seen the end-game of Vietnam, the Watergate trials, and Three Mile Island and learned that the Government can and does LIE.
Unquestioning obedience is not healthy for our republic.
And both parties deserve some of it.
Omgosh
“ The $8 billion through 2025 amounts to a down payment toward a previously stated commitment by de Blasio for $50 billion in pensions funds invested in green-minded companies.”
“People who don’t like Trump should be able to resist this kind of tyranny without it being made part of MAGA”
__________
People who don’t like Trump tend to try to cancel and victimize those who do.
This has been the case in absolute spades since the day the Bad Orange Man declared his POTUS candidacy and campaign signs started being attacked, stolen and ruined by assistant professor-types all around this great Nation.
Nobody in One Guy’s part of New Jersey could keep a campaign sign for the Bad Orange Man on their lawn for more than a few hours before a psycho came to do what they clearly saw as their civic duty.
So yeah...the way this issue went down in the tri-state area still chaps a few @$$€$ in these here parts and makes us long for a time when individuals will no longer be publicly persecuted for expressing unabashed support for a true Patriot and good American who has always loved this country and, in particular, deserves much better from his fellow New Yorkers.
Ever since 911 FDNY has been known to fly American flags on the back of their rigs. I think it’s time to begin flying those upside down, along with covering any decals officially painted on the trucks with an upside down version. Let that city fail, they elected him they deserve it
Bkmk
‘We Have a Communist Takeover’
Damn. Shouldn’t have mandated it on all those detectives. They figured it out.
No sh!t, Sherlock.
This canNOT be true; or else I would have seen it on the news!
Yup!
Off to my email list.
I think the Dems would be thrilled to replace the white guys working gubmint jobs in NYC with preferred minorities/women - but there aren’t enough to do it (for many reasons - lack of interest or skills, criminal background, inability to pass a drug test, inability to show up for work).
Maine and NYS removed religious exemptions for vaxx refusal in 2019.
Right before CoupFlu hit.
Anyone know if any other states did this?
You couldn’t miss Goliath.
Anyone know who’s really running the country?
Bueller...?
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