There’s this iconic scene in the 1984 “Footloose” where Kevin Bacon’s city-boy character Ren McCormack goes head-to-head with his macho antagonist Chuck Cranston to show who’s the bigger man in a game of “chicken.”
The two young men mount tractors on opposite ends of a single-lane road facing each other and drive full speed ahead to see who flinches first. In this hazardous game, one of them must swerve off the path, or both could die in the head-on collision — but the first one to swerve will be dubbed the “chicken” for his cowardice. After Ren’s shoelace gets caught on the throttle, keeping him unwittingly on the path, Chuck embarrassingly barrels off his rig at the bitter end into a ditch of water — right in front of his girlfriend, who subsequently falls in love with the victor.
That scene keeps coming to mind as President Joe Biden’s administration squares off with the American people. The president who promised unity, leadership, and a return to normalcy has challenged you to a game of chicken, is charging at you, and is waiting for you to flinch.
Biden’s Game of Chicken
Nowhere has this intimidation tactic been as clear as with medically coercive vaccine mandates. Near the start of Biden’s tenure, after shots were rolled out quickly thanks to Trump’s efforts, Biden left no doubt about his position: It wasn’t just that vaccines were good, but that everyone who was eligible for a vaccine should get one as soon as possible.
So Americans began doing calculations. Many who knew that their risk factors were heightened prudently jumped in line for the first available shots, but others not so much. Lots of pregnant women paused, unwilling to undertake extra risks quite yet. Many others with natural immunity decided to sit this one out for a while, as did a horde of the young and healthy, who have never been at serious risk of dying from COVID-19.
After shooting up immediately, vaccination numbers then stalled, which didn’t please the Democrat administration that had promised to shut down the virus. Biden’s patience began “wearing thin.”
And so there were talks of vaccine passports. New York City instituted them, and federal bureaucrats such as the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention touted them as a potential “path forward” in July. At that time, Biden was toying with the idea of requiring shots, not just for medical workers, but for all federal employees.
Opponents were seeing the writing on the wall. When the ruling class began medically segregating people into first- and second-class citizens, the fight became less about the necessity of universal vaccination and more about the importance of medical freedom. And instead of falling in lockstep with the administration’s goals, Biden’s detractors began piling onto the opposing tractor.
Biden didn’t veer. He forged full speed ahead with the declaration that in addition to all federal workers, all private workers for companies with at least 100 employees would need to get the jab or get endlessly tested, reportedly affecting more than 80 million private-sector Americans.
Despite this fascist announcement being nothing more than a press release, companies caved to the president’s wishes left and right. From hospitals and major airlines, to police departments and universities, head honchos adopted Biden’s refrain: Get a COVID shot or be fired. With alarming authoritarianism, Biden and the private sector chiefs he deputized to enforce his vaxx ambitions went full throttle.
A Refusal to Flinch
Something remarkable has occurred in response. Countless American workers have remained unflinching. Instead of veering off the path, they’ve held the line, turning in their boots, hanging up their scrubs, and unpinning their wings.
While the number of administered vaccine doses trended up slightly at the end of September and beginning of October, the jump wasn’t drastic — and it actually appeared to coincide with a rise in booster shots. According to the data, the number of fully vaxxed Americans has gone up only 3 percentage points since Biden’s fearmongering private-sector declaration more than a month ago on Sept. 9.
Instead, what we’ve seen day after day are brave men and women who either kept driving ahead with worker strikes or counted the cost of medical freedom and opted to completely walk away from their careers. It’s working. The more workers refuse to comply, the more other employees are emboldened to join them. And the more these freedom-fighters pile on, the more their bosses learn things don’t go so smoothly when the employees you rely on for everyday operations quit en masse.
Take what happened with Southwest Airlines, which was forced to cancel several thousand flights just days after it mandated the vaccine for workers. A rumored “sickout” resulted in reportedly only three out of 33 air traffic controllers showing up to work.
Despite Southwest’s denial that the mayhem was a result of its vaxx policy, after several days of chaos, the airline changed course and walked back its pledge to begin putting workers who applied for vaccine exemptions on unpaid leave in December. As The Federalist reported on Wednesday, sources said that part of Southwest’s meltdown was because pilots took their paid sick leave shortly before they were scheduled to be fired.
A San Francisco In-N-Out is displaying the same courage, with the local health department shutting it down for not checking patrons’ vaccination status.
“We refuse to become the vaccination police for any government,” In-N-Out Chief Legal and Business Officer Arnie Wensinger told Newsweek. “We fiercely disagree with any government dictate that forces a private company to discriminate against customers who choose to patronize their business. This is a clear government overreach.”
Noncompliant health workers are quitting or being fired in droves. By Monday, one-third of Chicago’s desperately needed police were reportedly still unvaccinated, opting for unpaid leave over getting the shot. Seattle police officers and firefighters are getting similar treatment. After being fired for refusing to comply with medically coercive mandates, the brave first responders fed the homeless and then marched up to City Hall to return their boots.
Seattle PD and Seattle Fire walking up the stairs of Seattle City Hall to turn in their boots. These a excellent officers and firefighters with years of service that truly can’t be replaced. pic.twitter.com/OmfrMhCNpc
— Katie Daviscourt🇺🇸 (@KatieDaviscourt) October 19, 2021
The fact is, this is the beginning of the fight, and if Americans chicken out and comply against their convictions, it will be the end of medical freedom. Several thousand workers across a few industries might be expendable to the COVID authoritarians right now, but weak points can only withstand so much pressure. The worker shortage is only getting worse.
Somebody’s got to give in this game of chicken, and Biden is gambling that it will be you. It’s time to make sure he loses that bet. Timid Americans are holding out for a hero, for a reason not to just give in and get this strong-arming over with — but we’ll never escape tyranny by capitulating to it. Be the hero they need. When freedom is at stake, don’t barrel off. Go full throttle.