The insistence on being forced to receive the COVID "vaccine" is a civil rights issue. 

Let me unwrap my assertion. 

Though receipt of the so-called vaccination is not a law, but only a mandate, there are those who treat it as a sacrosanct law with dire consequences for noncompliance. 

I would humbly respond with the seminal words of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., who, in his "Letter from Birmingham Jail," explained:

How does one determine whether a law is just or unjust?

A just law is a man-made code that squares with the moral law or the law of God. To put it in the terms of St. Thomas Aquinas: An unjust law is a human law that is not rooted in eternal law and natural law. Any law that uplifts human personality is just. Any law that degrades human personality is unjust.

And yet, people who refuse to be vaccinated endure public humiliation and are treated like social outcasts.  Children have had irrevocable emotional harm done to them.  They have also been denied a full-bodied education.  Verbal abuse and physical assaults occur.  The unvaccinated are snitched on.  Barring people from their livelihood and depriving them of participating in other social, communal, and public activities are just a few of the injustices being committed, all in the name of the public good.

The segregation that King wrote about was racial.  But in state after state, those who are vaccinated feel a "sense of superiority" that "distorts the soul and damages the personality."  They parade their virtue-signaling as a badge of honor.

As King wrote, "[s]egregation, to use the terminology of the Jewish philosopher Martin Buber, substitutes an 'I it' relationship for an 'I thou' relationship and ends up relegating persons to the status of things. Hence segregation is not only politically, economically, and sociologically unsound, it is morally wrong[.]"

People being turned away from social events, gyms, and restaurants because they don't have their vaccine passports is nothing short of segregation.

Let us consider a more concrete example of just and unjust laws. An unjust law is a code that a numerical or power majority group compels a minority group to obey but does not make binding on itself. This is difference made legal. By the same token, a just law is a code that a majority compels a minority to follow and that it is willing to follow itself. This is sameness made legal.

So I ask: how is it that Congress is exempt from the so-called vaccine?

Let me give another explanation. A law is unjust if it is inflicted on a minority that, as a result of being denied the right to vote, had no part in enacting or devising the law.

...and, I would add had no part in making a voluntary medical decision that could have profound effects on one's body.

First of all, "federal law prohibits employers and others from requiring vaccination with a COVID-19 vaccine distributed under an Emergency Use Authorization (EUA)."  This should have established at the outset that government officials, businesses, and the like have no right to force vaccinations on people.  Individuals must have the option to accept or decline to be vaccinated.

This means that an organization will likely be at odds with federal law if it requires its employees, students or other members to get a Covid-19 vaccine that is being distributed under emergency use authorization.

State law often prohibits retaliating against an employee for refusing to participate in a violation of federal law. Organizations that require Covid-19 vaccination in violation of federal law may face lawsuits under these state laws not only to block the policy but also for damages and attorneys' fees. Such potentially costly lawsuits can be avoided by refraining from adopting policies that require vaccination or penalize members for choosing not to be vaccinated.

Organizations are free to encourage vaccinations through internal communications, through educational events, and through other measures to urge employees to be vaccinated. They can take these measures so long as: (1) they are not viewed as coercive, (2) the organization makes clear the decision regarding whether to receive the vaccine is voluntary, and (3) the measures comply with the requirements in the EUAs and the related regulations for these products.

Tell that to the medical workers and others who have been summarily dismissed.  Doctors who prescribe medications for COVID are being suppressed.  Consider how much experience, talent, and dedication have now been lost.  Yet they would not buckle under the coercion.

In fact, one of the hallmarks of medical ethics is the right to be informed.  To establish that a vaccine is safe, extensive long-term testing must be carried out.  It takes at least five years or more to complete.  After receiving approval, the vaccines continue to be carefully monitored for adverse events.  While there have been a number of vaccines that were pulled from the market after they received full approval due to unexpected safety issues — e.g., vaccines for rotavirus and Lyme disease — no such removal has occurred concerning the COVID jab.

Yet consider that "as of February 2022, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and their Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System (VAERS) report an unimaginable 1,151,450 COVID-19 vaccine adverse events (all locations).  Not surprisingly, COVID vaccine deaths also continue to march upward. Almost 1.2 million people are now reported to have been negatively impacted (or killed) by these experimental COVID shots in the past 63 weeks.  This is up from 1.5% from last week."

Additionally, the latest official data from the United Kingdom Health Security Agency reports that "the fully vaccinated account for 9 out of every 10 deaths from COVID-19 in England and 4 of 5 deaths among the triple-vaccinated."

Moreover, a German health insurance company has sounded the alarm that "doctors have been coding vaccine side effects in larger numbers than German health authorities are reporting."

Finally, CDC officials admit that "crucial COVID data has been withheld for fear that it would be misinterpreted by critics."  The latest information about Pfizer is horrifying.

On a personal note, I am battling weekly reminders from college personnel who keep telling me that their records indicate that I have "not uploaded my COVID-19 proof of vaccination."  In February, they "encouraged all associates to submit [their] vaccination status."  Now, in mid-March, the school is adopting "a mandatory COVID-10 vaccination policy."

I find it disingenuous that this school offers a class on ethics but is badgering me to accede to their demands that I put a vaccine into my body that is potentially harmful, does not stop one from becoming sick from COVID, and has not been thoroughly tested.

Dr. King asked whether people would "be extremists for the preservation of injustice or for the extension of justice."  His probing words continue to guide me.

Eileen can be reached at middlemarch18@gmail.com.

Image: Triggermouse via Pixabay, Pixabay License.