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Samantha Blanchard completed her degree in Journalism at the New Zealand Broadcasting School before working for the national talkback radio station RadioLIVE for three years.
After spending a decade overseas, she returned to the South Island of NZ and helped found an independent newspaper called The GB Thinker, when vaccine mandates split her local community.
Silenced, her first documentary, premiered on Friday April 7th 2023.
In this conversation, Samantha explains that when the initial lockdowns were announced in New Zealand in April 2020, no one knew exactly what was going on and she felt the government was keeping her safe.
But as time went on, she started to notice that “something was being accepted without question” and used the time in lockdown to call on her journalism degree and started following the trails of peer-reviewed studies.
Sam explains that it was particularly research into repurposed drugs and early treatment that led her to “smell a rat.”
She shares how she quit her job when the vaccine mandates were imposed and trusted that something more worthy of her time would come along.
She describes how it felt almost channeled, as if she was being called to bring back her journalism skills.
She began with the newspaper The GB Thinker with the aim of bringing some balance to the media in her local community which was being divided.
The documentary came next, she expands, as she continued to trust, and synchronicities led her to the interview with Peter Williams.
Peter Williams, a very familiar mainstream TV and radio host for almost 50 years, resigned from mainstream media because of an issue to do with freedom of speech, and not being allowed to ask questions of the Covid narrative.
Sam then fleshed out the message of the documentary with Jodie Bruning, a credible sociologist, in order to bring in the sociological perspective, and Anne O’Reilly, a deregistered medical doctor.
The intention of the documentary, explains Sam, is it “seeks to heal” by presenting an alarming story in a way that is familiar, factual, calm, soothing and measured.
“So many relationships have been hurt,” she expands, and “the baseline mantra throughout” is that “we are reasonable Kiwis asking reasonable questions” about censorship, freedom of choice, and freedom of speech.
Sam dives into how we should not separate people into the vaccinated and unvaccinated, which was intentionally “dumbed down” into “pro or anti - yes or no” - but “we are smarter than that” and “we weren’t given all of the choices.”
“Had there been more open-mindedness and more discussion, then we could’ve been a lot more reasonable in the way that we dealt with things,” she says.
Sam talks about how she discovered - like so many of us - that “raging at my family about the situation was not going to solve it” and when her mother one day “raged back” that she should “do something about it then!”, Sam realised she did need to do something to be the change that she wished to see.
She then talks about how she interviewed Dr. Simon Thornley but could not include the interview, and that “the fact that we can’t have an epidemiologist who had a different view on things safely speak about his position, even in hindsight at this point, should be deeply concerning for people.”
But “when you give trust to a project,” Sam continues, “even the set backs” help the project along.
Sam brought in Jodie Bruning and presents in the film that “we interviewed him [Dr. Simon Thornley]. We’re not allowed to use it,” and “so we protect him at the same time as telling his story and vindicating him.”
Sam then talks about Anne O’Reilly who was pressured into deregistering as a medical doctor despite being calm, measured, compassionate, reasonable, with extra training in functional medicine which looks at the root cause of illness, and exactly the type of family doctor that anyone would want, Sam says.
Sam then shares excellent advice for people eager to do journalism: “create the platform, write the story, but around what someone else has to tell,” and finishes with her advice for people living in fear and worry in these unprecedented times:
“For me it’s a practice of presence and/or being in nature,” she explains, “and you create peace for yourself by making it into a practice, and it becomes easier and easier, and you settle down more and more … and it’s only to be discovered by you yourself in practice, and it takes time; you have to be patient, but it happens.”
Vimeo censored the film on Tuesday 12th April.
New link: rumble.com/v2gxr4i-silenced-nz.html
“If you appreciated Silenced please share it with 2-6 friends and family members, especially those who seem unsure about the issues,” asks Sam on the website.
Silenced
http://silenced.co.nz
The GB Thinker
https://issuu.com/thegbthinker
The GB Thinker (Facebook)
https://facebook.com/thegbthinker
Reality Check Radio
https://realitycheck.radio
J.R.Bruning Talking Risk
https://jrbruning.substack.com
Covid Plan B
https://covidplanb.co.nz
NZ Doctors Speaking Out with Science
https://nzdsos.com
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Samantha Blanchard, her film Silenced & healing NZ