Confessions of a Victim of Big Pharma, by Shoshanna Silcove

 Diethylstilboestrol (DES) was a medication commonly prescribed to prevent miscarriage, between 1946 and 1971 in America. If your mother took DES while she was pregnant with you, then you are a DES daughter or DES son...' Better Health Channel
    

It was 1989. He loomed large and imposing, even as he sat behind his expensive oak desk, many medical degrees displayed on the walls around the room. "You will most likely never fall pregnant, but even if you do, you will not come to full term," explained the highly acclaimed fertility expert in a flat emotionless professionally polished monotone.

 A short time later I would discover, at age 31, that I was a victim of Big Pharma from before I was born. This victimisation gave me membership to an exclusive group of women known as DES daughters. This was a drug given to thousands of young women in America in the 1950's and 1960's that was supposed to prevent miscarriages. My mother had had a miscarriage after my older brother was born, so she was proscribed DES and took it when I was still in utero. 

 Upon discovering I was a DES daughter, I had many questions for my mother that I could not ask her because she passed away from cancer at the age of thirty three when I was only five years old. While correlation does not equal causation, one wonders if she would have lived much longer had she not taken the hormonal drug. Since the medical establishment would never investigate this possible causation we can never know for sure, however, I strongly surmise this to be the case.  I would learn that most of the thousands of DES daughters would never be able to have children. I met a woman in my community who was infertile from this drug and she successfully sued Big Pharma. 

Big Pharma was forced to admit culpability because DES was never properly tested before it was approved. Profits came before people, but unlike today, Big Pharma did not have the power to quell all legal liability as they do when it comes to the Covid19 drugs.

As a young woman I wanted and planned to have at least four children, or maybe more. One cannot describe the trauma I felt being told that I was most likely never going to become a mother.  However, I was blessed by G-d with an open miracle to have the one child I did have, as the vast majority of DES daughters have none. The difference between zero and one for a couple struggling with fertility is bigger than the universe. We would not be the proud grandparents we are today had we stayed at zero.

 Nevertheless, the impact all this had on my life and the lives of my family is incalculable. Psychologically the pain and hurt runs deep.  I can compare it to having been a rape victim, as I felt as if I was violated before I was even born. All these years I harbor a distrust of Big Pharma and its cohorts in the medical system which had failed me. It turns out this distrust has served me well because, I am fully aware and cognizant of the horrific harm Big Pharma and even many doctors are actually capable of inflicting on an unsuspecting public.

 The similarities between the DES saga and the present Covid vaccine debacle are strikingly numerous. An untested drug was used on thousands of unsuspecting people in an experimental trial that seemed initially to work in yielding its promised result in the short term, only to be revealed in later years as having caused irreparable and extensive damage to peoples'  health and lives. In the case of DES however, there was still a healthy skepticism of Big Pharma and, ultimately they would be held accountable. At that time Big Pharma did not yet have the power to control the governments of the world as they do now. This makes them a much more formidable and dangerous force, capable of inflicting great and horrific crimes against humanity on a mass scale. Like the DES debacle, in reference to the Covid  shmax drugs, we are yet to meaningfully grapple with or face  the huge onslaught of its detrimental effects to come in the not so far future. You have been warned!

    

Apartheid Comes to Chabad of Melbourne, Australia, by Shoshanna Silcove

"Apartheid is an Afrikaans word meaning "separateness", or "the state of being apart",  Wikipedia

      

     This past Shabbes marked the first one after the Rabbis and their associated community organisational heads of Chabad of Melbourne, Australia declared a state of apartheid in all their shules and institutions. Proof of Covid19 vaccination status has now become the requirement for a Jew to be permitted to daven with a minyan. The main Chabad hub, known as Yeshiva Centre, hired an outside professional security service that posted a guard at each of its entrances. Each guard held lists of names of Jews, who had, prior to Shabbes, submitted their proof of vaccination to the Yeshiva Centre. The guards checked off their names, and those not on their list were not let through the entrances onto the premises.

    This exclusion of Jews from entering an institution and shule that prominently displays the name Chabad along with the Rebbe's visage and name, is a disgrace and an affront to everything the Rebbe taught us to believe in. The juxtaposition of this scene of a gentile security guard with the authority to deny entry of a Jew into his shule to pray to Hashem, against the backdrop of the Rebbe's picture and name, leaves one feeling chilled with shame and disgust. Such a sight is reminiscent of the oppression against our people by Nazis, Soviets or so many other gentile anti-Semites. However, this time the oppression is being carried out by Jews, by those who define themselves as Chassidim of the Rebbe, against their very own fellow Jews and Chassidim.

    Those carrying out this apartheid against their fellow Jews have many rationalisations for their policies. First, is that of the survival of the institutions which rely heavily on government funding. They have no choice but to make sure they follow government regulations, otherwise they will be forced to shut down. This argument is the most understandable one and the easiest justification to accept. From a pragmatic point of view this is actually correct, as a shut down could occur. One can empathise with the organisational  officials' impulse to do everything possible to keep the institution viable and sustained. However, one must ask, sustainability at what price if the soul of the institution has been destroyed?

     There are numerous halachik arguments used as well, such as the concept of pekuach nefesh.  This was previously used  during lockdowns to justify the cessation of all communal Jewish practice, and is now being used to justify the exclusion of a certain newly defined underclass of Jews. This argument is easily dispelled however, by simple scientific facts and statistics,  a topic that is out of the scope of this article. Suffice to say, contrary to the government and media propaganda, there is no danger to anyone's health from the unvaccinated. Besides, why do those who are vaccinated fear being made ill by those who are unvaccinated, unless they do not believe their vaccinations actually work to protect them?

     All these rationalisations and justifications, while on the surface may seem reasonable and fair, all have some common underlying aspects to them. They are all coming from the yetzer hora in a silk kapotah, or the evil inclination dressed up in a silk kaftan. This  famous centuries old analogy describes how even the most well meaning Jew can engage in the most wicked and unholy actions while dressing them up as good and pure.

     What are the unintended consequences, from a spiritual perspective, of engaging in this apartheid? Is a Chabad centre even worth its name if it creates an underclass of Jews, if it intentionally separates Jews as outsiders, as those who are not entitled to be given access to fully engage in Torah and mitzvos, as is their G-d given right? Does it reflect the ethos of its namesake anymore? Can this institution even be defined as being one that is on the same path as the Rebbe's mission? One can only sadly conclude that is does not. 

       One can certainly sympathise with the conundrum that organisational heads find themselves with during these dark times. Nevertheless, a Chabad institution that betrays the foundational theological principles of Chabad in order to sustain itself, has ceased to be a Chabad institution and has morphed into a hollow building with Chabad window dressing. These are burning issues and questions that this community must contend with. The Rabbis and officials are showing callous indifference to the suffering of their community as they refuse to  be challenged. They behave as dictators doling out orders without explanation.  Much of the suffering is exacerbated by these policies, but especially by the present apartheid, which  will surely not bode well for the future of this community, or bring blessing upon those who are imposing it.