So, I got the ‘rona…

This is me 12 days after the onset of symptoms. The first week, it was mostly just a high temperature, headaches, and severe joint pain. Then I had two days where I felt remarkably better and thought I was over it. The next thing I knew, I was in a whole world of brain fog, fatigue, and breathing issues. This lasted an additional two weeks. I’m now in recuperation, where I can tolerate being up and about for an hour or so at a time.

My wife commented yesterday that I must be much better now, as I’ve started ranting again. She is right; I have been ranting a lot these past couple of days.

Fucking alphabet therapists. Yeah, them again. I thought my contempt for them was already off the charts, but with each day that passes, I find my chart was simply too small. There really is no end to the extremes of stupidity that these idiots will go to. Yeah yeah, not all of them, not everyone. Plenty of you lovely people are alphabet therapists and are wonderful, but you know I’m not talking about you, right? I’m referring to them, the idiot ones who give the rest of us a very bad name.

Now, I really want to name and shame the assholes that I am talking about here, but I’ve been threatened by Laura that if I do so, then I’ll be in trouble. I don’t know what sort of trouble this would be, but she finished it off with the rather sinister, “… you don’t wanna find out.” Yeah, so there’s that to consider.

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So, here we go.

First, let me begin by giving you a background to this particular rant. You know I do stuff with metaphors, right?

It’s already been well documented that the prevailing political and media narrative predominantly uses the “war metaphor” when referring to COVID-19.

This metaphor would have me in a battle with an invisible enemy that is being fought on the front lines by medics and nurses. These are our new heroes and heroines in the trenches and on the front lines of this endless fight.

As a survivor, I have managed to evade the enemy and not become a casualty of the war. In the UK media this week, the main narrative is about the lack of personal protective equipment (PPE), which is required on the front lines with urgency. Last week, the dominant narrative was the discussion about enforced rationing to prevent the depletion of vital supplies in the supermarkets. This week we are being told that domestic purchasing and use of PPE is taking it away from those heroes and heroines fighting on the front lines. The selfishness of civilians is going to compromise the security and safety of those fighting this pandemic. Government strategy and leadership are being called into question.

Yesterday, another lead story on LBC radio was whether the prime minister was attending all the COBRA meetings or was missing them due to illness (the modern-day COBRA (Cabinet Office Briefing Rooms) is equivalent to the older “War Cabinet”). On social media, I am seeing pro-conservatives comparing Boris Johnson to Winston Churchill, whilst the anti-Tory faction are comparing him to either a clown or to Hitler. This has already been seeded since the Prime Minister had already written a book titled “The Churchill Factor” with a cover design that was no mere accident.

Meanwhile, whether it be via text chat or in real life, everyone seems to say goodbye with “Stay safe.”

On the local forums of social media, neighbours are “calling out” each other for alleged social crimes. Mostly for not doing the “clap for nurses” enthusiastically enough and accusing each other of not being sufficiently patriotic. Counter-accusations of snitching and siding with the enemy are common. In these cases, the “enemy” is defined by a sense of patriotism, i.e., those who are pro-Brexit are patriotic according to other pro-Brexiteers and unpatriotic according to the Remainers. And vice versa.

Much like Godwin’s Law states that all internet discussions end when the inevitable comparison to Nazis is made, on the local forum, Farage’s Law dictates that within 12 comments on a local forum, the subject always gets switched to an argument about Brexit. This happens no matter how the original topic started out. Lost a cat? Everyone will argue about Brexit. Need an electrician? Fucking Brexit!

In response to the lockdown, many are saying that their freedom is under attack. It’s like the Blitz; it’s a police state; it’s martial law. The others are saying we all need to stay indoors in order to keep everyone safe.

To support those on the front lines, volunteer staff are being called up to help the NHS.

Your country needs you!

When all this is over and the war on this disease is won, I’m expecting there to be an epidemic of little flags and bunting everywhere. There will be memorials, statues, cenotaphs, medals, honours, and parades. Victory will be celebrated.

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That is the background.

Grand shows of patriotism and national unity are great for everyone except the progressives and woke-liberals who hate that sort of thing. They’ll probably console themselves by inventing a new gender identity and dyeing their hair a strange new colour.

So, why have I been ranting?

Well, I am now seeing alphabet therapists directly compare themselves to nurses and doctors in the front lines. I shit you not.

I am not allowed to post any screenshots here. I asked Laura for permission. She didn’t answer. She just gave that look that all men all over the world know and understand. I was allowed to make this though:

Narcissism is rife amongst personal development gurus, alphabet therapists, meditation teachers, NLP trainers, “master trainers” (lol!), life coaches, the lot of them, and now a new thing to add to the stupendous levels of bullshit claims these people tend to make for themselves: we can add that of Stolen Valour.

For those who are unaware of such things, Stolen Valour is an epidemic-level problem in the West. It’s weird when men (and it’s nearly always men) buy themselves a uniform and then attend parades, events, and so forth, pretending to be military veterans. Do a search on YouTube for “stolen valour” – it’s the sheer number of them that is so mindboggling. In the UK, it is known as “walting,” and these guys are referred to as “Walts” after Walter Mitty. They get caught so frequently by genuine soldiers, mostly because of crass errors in their uniforms or badging. As an aside, I went to school with one of the UK’s leading Walters. He’s been at it since he left school. Try searching “Michael Tierney Walt” and you’ll see the websites dedicated to tracking his current exploits.

I’ve long claimed that Walting is exceptionally common in the world of the alphabet therapist. It is facilitated by the organisations of people also keen on walting too. This is why we see the endless illusion of qualification created by numerous me-too imitation registration bodies, societies, associations, guilds, and boards, all claiming to be protecting and maintaining standards of the “profession”. These are the organisations that didn’t want to join the people who actually developed the work themselves (I’m thinking here of the likes of Bandler, Grinder, and other innovators who each have their own original organisations representing their work, but yet these other assholes instead figured they’d do them a favour and set up a rival organisation to protect the standards on their behalf, etc.).

The majority of these are just fake. Ironically, the best of these tend to be those who are in it purely for the money. You see, they know who and what they are and how to maintain interest for that all-important recurring subscription payment. The rest of them are in it for the status and sense of importance that it affords them. These latter organisations are ten-a-penny and keep popping up all the time, but they rarely last very long.

But it is the sheer number of Walts in the world of therapy and personal development that I find so astounding. You’ll find terms such as “fully insured,” “fully qualified,” “internationally accredited,” and “internationally recognised,” along with grandiose claims like “master trainer” and “master life coach.” They also refer to their 10-day “master practitioner” course as their “masters.” Over-inflated claims of success and past occupations are common too. Everyone works miracles in the shortest time. They all have coached and treated thousands of people each. They get six-figure incomes and celebrity clients, and they live the dream. Well, in their imaginations and on social media, at least. The ones I know in real life are lonely, permanently anxious, and invariably as neurotic as a sack of gibbons.

With all this in the background, scroll to page 16 and then write to the ANLP and ask if they ever thought to check the claims made here before publishing. https://core.ac.uk/download/pdf/70767893.pdf (“From Bam Bam to Tap Tap”). Now, for all I know, they might be true. After all, who am I to question it?

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So, here is what we have:

As mentioned in previous blog posts, we have dozens of alphabet therapists and trainers claiming that they can prevent or cure coronavirus. This dumbfuckery is astounding to me, but well, their great theory has not yet been tested by reality.

So far, only a small percentage of the population has been infected with COVID-19, and I am the only person I know in the therapy world who has been infected so far. I just know this will change over time; rather worryingly, the chances are strong that everyone will get this disease at some point.

What we know from the data so far is that the level of effect upon the infected ranges from nothing at all through to death. I got it mildly by all accounts and didn’t need hospital treatment. So, what will happen when these alphabet therapists start to get it?

Well, several things will begin to appear:

1. The more narcissistic individuals will move from an extreme hero position to an extreme victim. They will post voluminously on their social media to elicit the much-needed sympathy to maintain their narcissistic supply. There will be much competitive suffering.
2. Those with the mildest symptoms will attribute it to their self-healing abilities, proven techniques, and seven-step systems. We will get to hear all about it repeatedly on social media postings.
3. We will hear grandiose tales of heroism and the conquering of this disease.

This pandemic has revealed the extent of the narcissism among the alphabet therapists and given them the opportunity to reveal themselves for who they are. But the pandemic has also provided a new opportunity – a social narrative that will allow a whole new form of Walting for the civilian population of therapists.

Once all this is over, we will hear hints of the endless tales of how these idiots saved their clients through their coaching techniques, “raising” their immune systems; defeating the infection where no doctor could; and of how they fought in the trenches and front lines. And it has already started. Just look on social media and YouTube.

And as ever, who will be asking for the evidence? I doubt many of the imitation ‘standards bodies’ will be bothering. They rarely do.