By Tom Woods

As you’re reading this I’m in Orlando for the donor reception before the film premiere tonight; if you’re in central Florida please join us for a wonderful evening (doors open at 6:30pm; screening begins at 7:00) that won’t cost you a cent: https://www.tomwoods.com/documentary

(The film, you’ll recall, is the documentary I’ve been supporting that chronicles the madness of the past three years, in order to make it harder for them to do anything like this again.)

It’s a massive project, because imagine trying to summarize the misinformation and social and economic devastation since 2020. There are so many dimensions to it, so many ways — many of them hidden and unknown to us — in which people’s lives were ruined.

Just today I had a chance to read a Telegraph article highlighting yet another casualty I’d heard about but barely had a chance to consider: children with special needs.

The article is called, “My son is autistic — I can’t forgive what lockdown did to him.”

Noah is non-verbal autistic and has a rare form of epilepsy.

Certain things — markers, you might say — that comprise his daily routine keep him balanced and happy. If he wasn’t at his nursery on a given day, he had to be taken to a cafe before 10am, where he would have sausages. And not just any sausages: only one or two venues would work.

Parents without such children would never dream of indulging the kind of idiosyncracies that a child like Noah has, but as a matter of survival Noah’s worked out a routine that kept him stable:

Once preferred activities, meal times and places were established, there was very little scope for deviation. Messing around with the routine meant meltdown. He would chew incessantly, oftentimes to the destruction of clothing; would be inconsolable; and it would be very difficult to steer him out of it. Both my wife and I have been on the receiving end of some particularly challenging and aggressive behavior when his routine is disturbed.

And his father adds, “Just as Noah was starting to recognize and respond to sign language, picture exchange cards and make better eye contact, the pandemic hit the UK.”

His nursery closed indefinitely, as did the other places Noah enjoyed visiting. The children whose play he enjoyed watching simply disappeared.

Children like Noah use picture cards to help them communicate. He kept showing his parents the cards for the cafe and the park. In order for them to learn communication, they need to see that when they communicate something, there is a result. But there could be no result now.

There is more to the story — and indeed there are countless stories.

Those stories weren’t heard, because people were shamed into supporting the useless mitigation measures.

Noah’s father concludes:

We will never know how that dreadful period affected his development in the long term. What we do know is that it could not have come at a worse time. Between the ages of two and five, with the right support and therapies, autistic children can make remarkable progress. Sadly those that do not talk by his age are vanishingly unlikely ever to do so. At least he is now happy in himself, which is all any parents want. We live in hope, but he still only has a few words – which are certainly less choice than the ones I’d reserve for the policy makers who did this to him.

Never forget.

On a happier note:

(1) I’m very pleased to report that I’ve arranged a special discount for my readers and listeners if you’d like to attend the Mises Institute’s “Property, Civilization, and Culture” event in Reno next month. Take $10 off your admission with code Woods23 at this link:

https://www.mises.org/WoodsReno

If you’re a member of my Supporting Listeners program you get a $15 discount; reply to this email if you belong to that program to get your special code.(2) For my would-be entrepreneurs, this is one of the most important weeks of the year. My favorite online business model (I run three such businesses) is the membership. Instead of making one sale, you make recurring sales, over and over.

The best thing about membership-based businesses is that you don’t have to worry that your success this month may have been a fluke, and maybe in six months you’ll be homeless. That’s the way to a nervous breakdown.

Once a year the world’s top expert on memberships (my guest on Tom Woods Show episode #2313, in fact) runs a no-pitch, no-cost workshop on how to launch and run a successful membership, aimed at complete beginners. It will be wasted on most people. You, dear reader, are not most people. Reserve your spot right away so you can live capitalism instead of just arguing about it on the Internet:

https://www.tomwoods.com/membershipworkshop

Tom Woods