Monday June 15th, 2026, 05:45. You planned this operation weeks ago. It has to be finished by 06:30. Inner and outer perimeter secured and everyone this close is a sentry.

Why?

Because you’ve done this more than a few times by now. Enough to know that for citizens watching from afar, more than 45 minutes inspires thoughts with only bad choices. Not from you, mind you--or the other hand-picked Lion Catchers on this operation with you.

15 minutes ago you all arrived in four Toyota Prados, each 100 kilos heavier than usual. Twos and blues blaring in military column formation. The whole city noticed you ignoring all traffic lights. The “why” travels faster than you, even this early.

“Millionaire status before lunch for the brave enough.” is the thought spreading through two types of people this morning: those familiar enough with the under world to try something, and those with nothing to lose.

You’re okay with attempts from either. Nothing of value would be lost except bullet or two. One of the secret boxes in your soul wishes they would. Though you would never admit so in polite company. In any case, you spent the last three weeks directing the Lion Catchers to quietly notice the movements, actions and intentions of both groups. You slept better. “You know, we could just-” is the obvious thought that never crosses your mind,

Instead, you quietly in the dead of night over the last four days delivered the fuel. Four beaten up 55 gallon drums of diesel, buried slightly now. Sitting there, blending into the background. No one noticed because you’ve done this more than a few times now.

Which means you know the preparation was quiet but the execution has to be loud. “Millionaire status before lunch for the brave enough.” Hell. On a day like this, you Lion Catchers could become millionaires before breakfast.

But you were all hand picked and tested for this unit by old men with strange nicknames they never explain. The most dangerous type of old men at that. Those still in a professions where being targeted for murder was, and is, not that strange.

Old men whom, as younger versions of you, lost colleagues because the old men of their time chose poorly. The bad old days. These days, you have protocols and SOPs written in betrayals, burials and blood. These days, you’re here and thoughts like,

“I could explain that the kilo under the back seat dropped there accidentily.”

“Why don’t I deserve something more than a pension for putting my life on the line every fucking day?”

“I’m smarter than who I liberated these kilos from. I could do their job so much better--so why shouldn’t I?

But the old men who chose have done this more than you. They know the questions in your head don’t start with “Why?” They know you could make good use of becoming a millionaire before 06:30. But they chose you because any answer to “why shouldn’t I?” is almost always answered by a remorseful, “Who?”attached to a painful memory.

Perhaps a “Who” that’s a cherished picture in your pocket or on a tattoo on your arm. Or the reason your revenge fantasies stay fantasies until God hands your enemies to you. The space created by a missing “who” is your “why”.

You’ve done this a few times by now. The wind is right where you want it. Everything feels like 06:30 is going to work out just fine. Plenty of time to finish the after action report before 15:00.That’s when your national football team is playing Spain in the opening match of the World Cup. Your hopes aren’t high but you chuckle a bit.

Apparently, they found someone guy on LinkedIn. You hope they’re not humiliated too badly.

Part Two: Societies Must Function

Alphas:

Highly intelligent, visionary, assertive, confident, and most importantly willing to take responsibility as well as consequences for their actions and the imposition of their will. Think Captain Picard from Star Trek, Former President Donald Trump or Civil Rights leader Malcolm X. The more morality-aligned Alphas are honest, sometimes abrasively so and the one key trait that sets Alphas apart and places them securely at the top of this all male hierarchy is that, aside from the above traits, there also exists a possibility that through their actions or trying to implement their vision, their life might end in murder. A harsh reality, but one that is unavoidable and dependent on how grand their vision is, and what actions they take in bringing it to fruition. Which explains the reality of why there are so few truly Alpha-males under this more expansive classification of males. Most males simply do not want to die by murder as a result of their actions or non-actions. The true Alpha, from the outset of bringing his vision to fruition, knows this may be how dies.

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Bravos:

Also highly intelligent and often mistaken for alphas but are, in fact, happy followers/enforcers of their chosen Alpha’s will and vision. The Bravo male genuinely believes in his Alpha’s vision and is willing to use his equally high intelligence, will, presence and competence to achieve that Alpha’s vision. They can easily assume the role of an Alpha, if needed, but are not completely comfortable there. Think Riker from Star Trek, whom in the old model, would be considered an alpha, but this new theory, better describes him and his role on the Starship Enterprise. As it does that of Ned Stark from Game of Thrones or Silvio Dante from the Sopranos. Bravos enjoy the privilege and respect of people also willing to follow them if they were to reluctantly find themselves in the Alpha position. And the key trait of a true Bravo is that he has no desire to usurp his Alpha. An important distinction that will become important later. Bravos are force-multipliers to an Alphas vision and an Alpha male that has carefully chosen a group of dedicated Bravos, has a high chance of achieving his vision.

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Deltas:

Delta Males are pragmatic and mentally well-adjusted. They draw genuine pride and self-worth from their work and even more so from their family life. They don’t have a vision or grand design they wish to make reality. Are generally good-natured, honest, reliable, trustworthy, tactful and also intelligent. While respected in their social groups, unlike Alphas and Bravo males who may not have time to spend with their families due to their all-consuming vision, Deltas PRIORITISE it. Making them excellent fathers and husbands. Two common downsides of having an Alpha or Bravo father or husband is infidelity or absenteeism from their family’s lives. Deltas don’t seek dominance like the Alpha; or put themselves in positions where dominance might be required of them. All they want is basic recognition and acknowledgement for their competence and contributions to the community or organization. Unlike the Alphas and Bravos, Deltas prefer to avoid confrontation. Not saying they are push-overs but will only engage in confrontation if the situation is dire and all other methods have been exhausted. These men are willing to make fair compromises and are arguably the main reason a society thrives or dies due to the majority of men falling into this category. Think of pre-cancer diagnoses Walter White from Breaking Bad; Marshall from HIMYM or Carver and Herc from The Wire.

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Gammas:

The worst type, they actively avoid all conflict or confrontation. They are, however, highly intelligent and often more so than Alpha, Bravo or Delta. These men are mal-adjusted adults who are resentful of Alphas and Bravos because of the attention they get from women; and intrinsic respect from society or an organization. They feel entitled to the passive adulation Alphas and Bravos receive naturally. They desperately wish to be in an Alpha’s position, and so will often seek to be near an Alpha, while always plotting to undermine and usurp that Alpha’s position. What Gamma males don’t understand is that an Alpha is chosen from his social and professional circle based on vision, competence, intelligence, trustworthiness and sometimes a sheer physical presence and willingness for dominance often required of them, and them equally comfortable in exerting it. Gammas however, want the Alpha role and feel they’re entitlement to it is based on their higher than average intelligence alone. While tactful in social settings, these men prefer cunning and manipulation over direct confrontation to achieve their goals. A key trait of Gamma males is that they are vindictive, envious and will blame others for their short comings. Women may initially find a Gamma attractive because he is mimicking the traits of an Alpha or Bravo, but once identified as a Gamma and his true nature is revealed, they become repulsive to women. This is due to the one key trait of a Gamma in that they lie to others and to themselves about their position in the hierarchy. Fancying themselves to be a kind of “Secret Alpha”, secretly feeling as if they are at the top of hierarchy and actively deriving pleasure from their secret manipulations.

Undesirable in organizations because men like this will hold onto grudges and may actively seek to harm that organization to appease their vindictive nature. Despite having the intelligence and perhaps vision to to be Alpha, their inherent dishonesty and non-confrontational nature, makes others unwilling to follow them. Much unlike Alphas, Bravos and Deltas who deeply understand and respect accountability in leadership and, most importantly, respect the sense of order this hierarchy aides to the maintaining of a functioning society, Gammas resent hierarchies.

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Sigmas:

The Sigma male or, “The Lone Wolf” is often, at a glance, confused with either a Gamma or an Alpha (depending on their actions) but this male archetype is as rare as an Alpha but differs from the Alpha and all others in some key areas through unique traits. They are honest to a fault, sometimes brutally so like the Alpha, but never being so out of malice. A Sigma has zero interest in participating in any hierarchy, while at the same willing to do so if called upon (which is often). They may have a vision but would rather work at it alone. In fact, they actively prefer solitude over participating in any social event due to their high intelligence (IQ and EQ) and are often intellectuals of their field. They are highly observant, natural lie detectors and are so committed to the praxis of sound logic that the often false and duplicitous nature of prolonged social interactions taxes their mental energy. The weight of watching and seeing through the fakeness and false personas projected by others is a chore they know they must endure from time to time. Hence their need for down-time alone to process, self-reflect and work on their chosen craft or vision as well as themselves. The Sigma is confident but humble because unlike the other males types, the Sigma’s self-worth is not based, in the least, on the opinions of others. They don’t need outside validation because, in their solitude, they have already applied objective logic to the work they are passionate about and so, are their own worst critique. They are quiet like the Delta but are also unafraid of confrontation like the Bravo and Alpha and will speak their mind if they see a logical inconsistency being unfairly leveled at themselves or others.

While many Gammas often like to think of themselves as the “Secret Alpha”, when exposed as a duplicitous Gamma, they will then often try to assume the characteristics of a Sigma. Which they fail at because the key differences between a Sigma and a Gamma, is that Sigmas never lie, are not vindictive and would actively rather not participate in the hierarchy, or care about the social adulation that comes with being an Alpha or Bravo. They simply do not care who likes them and who doesn’t. If fact, a true Sigma will not even ascribe himself this label as he rejects all labels whether they be positive or negative.

If an Alpha has asked a Sigma to join their hierarchy (formal or informal and if they accept) they will never seek to usurp the Alpha. To the contrary, they will “play their role” in that hierarchy without question and earn the respect of others in that hierarchy through their actions. If their actions aren’t enough to prove their worth, they will simply walk away from that hierarchy because they’re content with their own company and actively prefer it anyway.

Sigmas do not need attention from women to validate their masculinity, but women who take the time to get know a Sigma, will be genuinely intrigued when they discover a deeply complex individual, whom at first glance appeared simple and unassuming. The enigmatic nature is not an act they are trying to put one, it is who they are and they simply don’t care who appreciates it and who doesn’t.

While not ever seeking positions of leadership, they often find themselves in those positions through actions that display their high level of competence.

Sigmas are generally a net positive to any organisation they join because their intelligence, powerful observational skills and honesty. Sometimes other males will be intimidated by these traits and will seek to harm or hinder a Sigma’s professional or social development. If the Sigma finds out, they will not shy away from direct confrontation like the Gamma but instead form a plan to retaliate (if the grievance is worth their time) that they have given enough thought to, that its chance of failure is near zero. One would greatly benefit from a Sigma next to, or behind them rather than against.

Well-written TV shows with well developed characters offer us profound glimpses into these male archetypes, and for the Sigma, quite possibly no other better representations of that type of male is better portrayed than in HBO’s Det. Rustin Chole from the first season of True Detective or Det. Lester Freeman from The Wire. Writer, Hunter S. Thompson has similar Sigma traits though rumours (some verified) of involvement with the occult (perhaps without his knowledge) combined with his intense substance abuse show fluctuations between morality and immorality in his life that is not typically in the nature of a true Sigma.

Conclusion:

One thing to keep in mind is that all of these male types are defined by Western cultural standards. When transplanted to other cultures, misclassification often results. A Gamma in the US or UK may be mistakenly viewed as an Alpha in an Asian cultural setting. Just as Asian Alpha in an Asian cultural context, may in fact, be a Gamma when viewed from a Western perspective. So I implore those who have read this, to spare the time to observe male interactions and see if it rings true to you too.

For a live video presentation of this theory, subscribe to my YouTube Channel:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hC30W06Y8ZY&list=PLfFD5yUzLRa7gt-ai63-wlC7K7SXWXtGK

For a long time now, an unspoken social dichotomy exists that men were are Alpha or Beta males. It’s hard to pin-point when this dichotomy entered the collective Western culture. Some say the late 90s or early noughts when a wave of self-dubbed Professional Pick-Up Artists started charging men for lessons on how to seduce women through altering of their interactions with females. Positing that Alpha type traits were intrinsically more attractive to the opposite sex; and that men who took them on could then reap the same benefits and luck with women natural Alphas enjoyed.

While distasteful and essentially dishonest in some of their methods, the Professional Pick-Up Artist-Guru movement gained traction because the patterns of male and female behaviour they described rung true to both sexes. Consequently, the Alpha or Beta male dichotomy has stuck, mainly in the collective Western culture, ever since. Alpha-males: the will-imposing, ultra-confident, assertive go-getter; unafraid of confrontation and always dominant in social settings, which studies show, women do find attractive.

Wolf packs and lion prides offered a great analogy to this emerging dichotomy of that time. Saying that it was to a human male’s advantage to be considered alpha and not beta. Alphas were leaders, not always tall, but many are and always possessing a commanding presence. They were generally considered good-looking as well as successful in business through the imposition of their will onto others and successful with women who found a sense of security from these dominant characteristics. Characteristics the pick-up artists extrapolated from the predatory animal-world, which does not function neatly like human civilizations due to animals lacking the ability to reason. This should have been a red flag about blind spots in this false dichotomy, but I’ll get into that later.

Betas, in contrast, were the inherent followers; not considered attractive or charismatic and socially awkward. Which led to their lack of success in business and general sense of repulsiveness to women.

The Beta male label is applied broadly unto a class of men today labeled incels (involuntary celibate males). But the pick-up artists made lots of money convincing insecure males who didn’t fall into the Alpha category (very few do) that they could wear Alpha male traits like a mask and some were successful. The new paradigm I will shortly describe will explain why. However, the large majority were not due to the powerful female intuition, which easily saw through men attempting to project Alpha-ness, thus making them unattractive and in some cases, equally repulsive.

The Alpha-Beta dichotomy has been around so long now, that an entire generation has reached maturity thinking it is complete and true. When, in actual fact, it is neither because of one glaring reality. A reality so glaring that most of us who were adults as this dichotomy emerged, were blinded by it.

The Alpha or Beta-Male Dichotomy is Wrong.

The Alpha-Beta male dichotomy wrongly assumes that the majority of human interaction, development and progress is dedicated to one thing and one thing only: men seducing and bedding as many women as possible. And women; happily being the objects of that dichotomy.

A healthy civilization; even at its most basic iteration, the village (though we’re going to use cities as an example heretofore) needs to function properly and it does this through the actions, and most importantly, the directed mental energy and time of the people in that civilization, village or city.

Despite the clichés; trains and buses do need to be on time; your banking software needs to be reliably consistent; a formal structure for teaching children must to exist in your community; a criminal justice system must function as close to justly as possible; and access to healthcare has to be maintained and sustainable. I could go on but you get the idea.

These systems make up society and though we barely notice, we undoubtedly depend on them. More importantly, they only work when all members of that community, civilization or village have access to gainful employment. If not at an ideal rate of 100%, then at least a display of will from that city’s leaders of an attempt to attain it. The socio-ecosystem of a living city needs to work and that involves systems of order. Order requires thought. Thought requires time. And here is where we need to ask an important question.

What?

If you agree with the above reality that cities need to function in a sustainable manner, then what percentage of time does hooking up form into the equation of a city seeking to offer its citizens the best possible life? The answer is not as much as hyper-sexualized shows on Netflix would have us believe.

Simply put, the Alpha/Beta male dichotomy is wholly false because it fails to address the reality that in order for a city to run properly and offer its citizens safety, happiness and opportunity, only 5% to 10% of any citizen’s (male or female) time can be dedicated to the pursuit of hooking up. Possibly up to 15% if a random outlier male or female happens to have enough excess time, energy, resources and the proclivity to focus so much of their time on hooking up.

We inherently feel this to be true because most of us would rather seek to build and raise our families in places where hyper-competition for sex did not dominate the collective thoughts and actions of its citizens. I find it difficult to envision a city where abject hedonism reigned supreme. I would argue that; not even the ancient Rome of Emperor Caligula, or the hedonistic excesses of the pre-revolutionary French and Russian aristocracy reached more than 15%. Their realms still had to function properly and perhaps, had those civilizations been less hedonistic, they might still be around.

Another Question.

If the Alpha/Beta male dichotomy isn’t an appropriate way to designate the way modern males interact with each other (and females) within the context of maintaining a functioning society that, rightly so, now includes females in positions of power. With some seeking to form thriving, safe families or some content directing their mental faculties, energy and time to the sustaining of that society, then what is?

The answer is an informal social theory called the Socio-Sexual Hierarchy that addresses the sustainable functioning of an organization, community, city or country. I would gladly accredit the person whom I believe formed this theory but I’m not sure if that person wants the accreditation. So I will err on the side of caution and not do so. However, know that what follows is not of my development but its classifications ring true to me and thus, makes it worthy of sharing.

But one thing readers should avoid taking offense to, and that is of extreme importance in understanding this new paradigm — is that it ONLY applies to men in our interactions with each other. Men in professions like construction, social clubs, formal or informal sport clubs involuntary build hierarchies while females do not. Such a matching paradigm for females has not yet been put forward but an intelligent and highly astute Generation-Z female I explained this male paradigm to suggested that for women, rather than forming strict hierarchies in their all-female social and professional groups, females, in contrast tend to form something akin to “Circles of Influence”. I’m not a female but from my observation, this rings true to me as well.

In this new theory modern males are classified into six categories: Alphas, Bravos, Deltas, Gammas, Sigmas and Omegas.

Read Part Two,

https://medium.com/@FidusLogosSemper/alpha-bravo-delta-gamma-sigma-or-omega-which-type-of-male-are-you-part-two-4a44e7c9c880

Ash Wednesday, 2033:

The guilt at cringing when my incoming call alert read, “Mother” was the furthest thing from my mind now. The phone conversation with her, the day before, didn’t seem as bad as it felt. At first, the guilt would bother me for days but had long since, subsided into a passive dread that my mother likely knew that I cringed at her calls. That not she know, but she probably knew that I knew she did; and yet, like all mothers, loved me anyway. A love returned that I made sure, she equally always knew.

Her bringing up God in almost all of our conversations was mildly annoying, but I guessed just as much as a mother knowing her son cringed at her phone calls. Still, I would rather have been on the phone with her now; in the safety of my Southwest DC flat, than here at the White House during what looked to be the most important event in all of recorded human history.

“Michael,” she would probably start, in a tone that was more warm quilt than actual sound. “Good Catholics are forgiving to a fault. When you’re ready to come back, we’ll be here waiting.”

Sirens were blaring through the White House. In the melee, the overnight presidential aides with their expensive, fresh-pressed suits, didn’t know what to do with themselves. I couldn’t help but chuckle. I had been one of them long ago — young, brilliant and consumed by the idea of my new, yet un-earned power. Had I been one of them now, instead of a Senior Advisor to the President, I probably would also feel offended at Secret Service agents brusquely forcing us to follow them, with looks that left no room for doubt what the result of non-compliance would be.

Instead, the me today let my mind wander to the comfort of mother’s voice as I dutifully followed the sudden, almost certainly life-changing, orders of the Secret Service. But bless the expensive suits and 24-hour gym memberships of those young aides. They had yet to realize that hearing the Secret Service speak at all, meant something was going gravely wrong.

“Do you still say the Rosary, Michael?” Mother had asked yesterday.

“When I remember to.” I lied.

“You didn’t forget it, did you?”

“You do remember that St Albans is a Catholic boarding school; and Georgetown U, a Jesuit university, right mother?”

“I know, I know but can you say it for me?” She requested.

“Oh c’mon! Mother, please?”

“Just humour an old woman who just likes to hear her son’s voice. Especially if its reciting the Rosary.”

I did but it felt empty. In truth, I couldn’t remember the day I became an atheist. I didn’t attend any secret meeting of the recently God-less. There was no alert on my phone, nor could I remember even wanting to be one. It just happened. Like how our truest friends come into our lives one day, never leave, and if you asked us to to tell you the day we met them, we would draw a blank. I can’t remember scientific advancement ever saying definitively,

‘We’ve proved it, folks. There is no God!’

Instead science just described a world where a God was unnecessary. But of all the things I’ve learned in life, chief among them was that every one believes in a higher power; and those who don’t, are almost never truly happy.

For some, this higher power comes in the form of an established religion. For others, it is the world of spirituality, varying versions of it. Some that believe in a wish-granting universe, moving events and material things in and out of their lives. Or others following the syllogisms of some persuasive logician. For others still, it was the unobservable construct of planets, stars, blackholes and the statistical promise of life dissimilar to ours. Different realms of belief, but all supported by the same abstract concept; faith. For a long time now, I no longer knew which group my faith was in.

A Senior Secret Service agent appeared with the director of the CIA who was wearing sweatpants and a bathrobe. No doubt, collected from home and gave him ten seconds to get dressed.

“If you have Q-Level clearance, follow us!” The Senior Agent ordered. I did, so I did.

“Where are we going?” Another Senior Advisor asked.

“War Room! President is en-route.”

“Are we under attack?” I asked.

The CIA Director shot the Senior Agent a look and shook his head. The Senior Agent said nothing, looking me right in the eye, shooting down my question with nothing more than the weight of his silence.

You could tell that on a night like this, the Senior Agent’s god was protocol. The rumours say that somewhere in the halls of their HQ, which no one knew the actual location of, was a database of protocols for every conceivable threat to POTUS. The urban legend was that somewhere in that database; filed under “D”, was a Presidential Protection Protocol for an excessive number of ducks landing on the White House lawn. As if, 8 ducks and all was well, but 9 ducks and the Marines were instantly deploy.

It was hard to shake the thought that if the CIA Director was being called to the War Room in his bathrobe, perhaps what was happening, was something not in that database.

We made it to the War Room where on giant screens around the cavernousness, grey room, the Prime Ministers of the UK, France and Russia were already broadcasting. The only idea of what could possibly be happening came from broken, overheard murmurings from the dozens of Generals, CIA staff and scientists around the room.

“….Every satellite?….”

“….Russia and China too, could it be a ruse?”

“….What kind of tech is this?….”

“….Is that even possible?…..”

“… the Vatican? Why?“

Quick glances at screens peppered around the room and computer screens along the central table showed the same grainy image. No doubt taken by the last operating satellite before they all went down, I overheard. Crowds were gathering around these screens and the buzz said it was the cause for what ever was happening. The image suddenly came onto one of the big screens.

It was a sphere of light with oval shaped black dots covering its surface. Behind it was a clover-like glow that looked like sunshine but it was hard to tell. Nothing about it resembled anything I had ever seen. Every once in a while one of the voices in the room would rise above the buzz of the crowd. Listening to those raised voices, the nature of what this object was came sharply into focus for me. But like a forgotten wish where the wish itself was forgotten until a surprising moment reminds you of it, I couldn’t believe that what I was seeing was true.

“It said WHAT?”

“That can’t be! That can’t be!”

Others couldn’t believe it too. In the corner, I saw a woman fall to her knees and begin to cry. In another corner, a Muslim linguist began to pray. One scientist lunged for a Secret Service Agent’s weapon but was quickly subdued. The generals were a mixed bag. Some had on war faces, some were stunned silent, a few had wide grins, just nodding their heads with approval.

The President came in and the mood of the room instantly composed itself to his presence. He wore tan pants, a blue button down and a leather jacket. It wouldn’t surprise me if the outfit was also chosen by protocol. He took his seat at the head of the table in front of the screens just as someone placed a cup of coffee in front of him.

“Thank you,” he managed kindly, with the puffiness of robbed sleep still on his face.

“We’ve got a live feed from a Chinese satellite!” Someone said.

A live image of something came onto the biggest screen. It was definitely in Earth’s atmosphere and it was pulsating in and out of sight, as if fluctuating its very density.

“We’ve got sound, sir.” someone else said.

The noise coming from the it was metallic, like a cacophony of trumpets playing notes made of lightning.

“What is that?” The President asked calmly.

“At 0–3 hundred hours this object entered Earth’s atmosphere over Antarctica, sir.” Answered one of the smiling generals.

“Object? “ the President repeated. “Is there no other intel on what that thing is?” he asked, turning to the CIA Director.

“My analysts say it appears to be made of…..erm…. light photons, sir.” the CIA Director replied.

“Do we at least know what that noise is?” The President asked, still the calmest energy in the room due to the blissful ignorance of being the its newest member.

“Actually we do!” Said a sheepish scientist with the palest face I had ever seen, “It’s…uh… speaking to us, sir.” he stammered.

The sheepish scientist then fell silent. The President stared at him, possibly wondering why this man would choose this moment to practice suspenseful story-telling. But the room had fallen silent too, no one could muster the courage to say the name that moments ago, had washed around the room like a tsunami. It was the praying Muslim linguist who eventually broke the silence.

“It is saying ‘Be Not Afraid’, sir. And when it came to our prophet, peace be upon him, in the desert long ago and recited the Koran to him, it said its name was ‘Ji-bra-il’. Christians call it by another name.” The scientist said with tears, which looked to be of joy, running down his face.

“Which is?” asked the President.

“Gabriel.” replied the linguist, softly, almost in a whisper. “It’s the Archangel Gabriel, sir.”

Aside from being a global medical emergency of proportions not seen since the 1918 Flu Epidemic, The Great Cough was also a global bureaucratic storm the HKSAR government had to safely navigate to keep our 7 million citizens safe without restricting too many freedoms. The HKSAR did the best job it could with the ever-shifting information it had to work with.

By early 2021 the Hong Kong SAR government had agreed to buy 22.5 million doses of TGC vaccines, with three companies supplying 7.5 million shots each: the China developed Sinovac, German/American Pfizer-BioNtech and British/Swedish AstraZeneca. At the time, only the Sinovac and Pfizer-BioNtech vaccines were available to Hong Kongers but more Western versions were soon to follow.

This act of offering Western and Chinese made vaccines, in itself, remains an objective contradiction to current Sinophobic narratives that attempt to paint post National Security Law-HKSAR as an oppressed police-state dominated by China’s heavy hand. It just simply isn’t.

It can’t be denied that Hong Kongers had a medically-informed choice that most of the West did not. A choice that becomes important when we examine at how the vaccines offered to us here in Hong Kong were developed. Here, we had the choice of either the Chinese-made Sinovac or the Western developed Pfizer-BioNtech, and later, other Western versions which were all also developed using a new vaccine development technology designated as mRNA (messenger ribonucleic acid) as Pfizer-BionTech’s version.

A technology developed in nine months for which no long term side-effect studies had been conducted, nor live long term trials completed. Instead the Pfizer-BioNtech vaccine had relied on AI machine learning technology to create statistical models of the potential long-terms results and effects and used that data to pass US FDA (Federal Drug Administration) approval, which normally requires vaccines gather this data over a period ranging from five to 10 years. The Sinovac vaccine, however, was developed using the traditional method, and so offered HK citizens opting for it a sense of comfort from decades of long-term trials and further improvements upon existing vaccine technology.

The HKSAR advisory panel on the TGC pandemic recommended (itself a recommendation from the World Health Organisation) HKSAR citizens take the Pfizer-BionTech vaccine. The advisory panel would then set up 29 community vaccine centres, of which, only five offered the Sinovac vaccine while the other 24 would offer, initially, only Pfizer-BioNtech’s mRNA version, with other mRNA versions following shortly afterwards. Many Hong Kongers opted for the mRNA versions. This recommendation was one globally amplified by Western media pundits and highly influential global figures like Microsoft co-founder, Bill Gates’ promotion of the Pfizer-BioNtech version and mRNA technology itself.

We now know much more about The Great Cough prevention methods, and some new information about the actions of Pfizer-BioNtech advocates like Bill Gates has emerged that sheds rather damaging light on Gates’ motivations. In September of 2019, Microsoft CEO Bill Gates invested 55 million USD in a pre-IPO equity investment into BioNtech. Then, only a German start-up pharmaceutical company that before the The Great Cough pandemic started three months later, had never launched or produced a single product but yet, had garnered the attention, and more importantly, a massive financial injection by arguably the world’s preeminent tech-giant. 18 months later, BioNtech would partner with American pharmaceutical company, Pfizer bringing its market value to over 45 billion USD, proving to be a wise gamble for Mr Gates in 2019.

For decades, the Microsoft co-founder has been a vocal and influential, advocate for vaccines in general and particularly after December 2019. Further leveraging his influence to promote the new mRNA vaccine technology. Specifically, Pfizer-BionTech’s version which, when studied critically, contradicts the persona Gates had curated for himself as benevolent and altruistically motivated advocate for vaccines. The reality of his personality looks different if we apply the sage wisdom of “following the money”. A business giant of his global influence actively promoting a company he has financial interests in — is at best, unethical and at worst, immoral.

However, despite not being a doctor, when Mr Gates spoke about vaccines, people, governments and world bodies like the UN, listened. Evidence shows that Hong Kong’s citizens favoured the mRNA vaccines Mr Gates was profiting from over the traditionally made Sinovac. It appears now though, that Mr Gates is no longer as confident in mRNA vaccine technology. Speaking at Australia’s Lowy Institute on January 23rd, 2023, Mr Gates said:

“We also need to fix the three problems of [COVID-19] vaccines. The current vaccines are not infection-blocking. They’re not broad, so when new variants come up you lose protection, and they have very short duration, particularly in the people who matter, which are old people.”

Aside from being a complete 180 degree turn from his previous stance on mRNA technology, which he characterized as “magic”, his recent comment is one plainly obvious to everyone; the mRNA vaccine needs more study. The nefarious part though, is in US SEC (Securities and Exchange Commission) findings showing that Gates, through the nontaxable Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation had, very quietly during the 3rd quarter of 2021, sold the majority of the Gates’s foundation shares in BioNtech. Decreasing his stake in the company by 86% when the company’s stock price was approximately 334 USD and close enough to its highest of 389USD for the sale to be another wise and lucky financial gamble by Gates. His initial 2019 investment in the company was at a little over 18 USD a share. His sale in 2021 equated to a 260 million USD windfall.

And just days after the recent under-reported statements on mRNA technology by Gates at the Lowy Institute in late January of 2023, by Friday 27th January, BioNtech traded at around 144USD but by Monday, it had dropped to around 140 USD. BioNtech, whose only product to this day is its mRNA vaccine, remains quiet about it earnings forecast for 2023. While not as sharp a drop as it took from September to October of 2021 in the wake of Gates’ 2021 sale of his stake in the company — which dropped from from 360USD a share in September, 2021 to 245USD by October, all signs say that Gates’ recent comments are going to negatively affect BioNtech’s future earnings as well as trust in mRNA technology itself.

I’m not a Brit but as a youngster many of my friends were, and almost all my teachers at school were too. So my view of monarchies generally, and the Queen’s passing specifically, is mostly as objective observer.

For all the flack European monarchies get for being outdated; rooted in exploitation; or the echoes of a time too long past to be of any relevance now, monarchist societies have much to gain by the active preservation of their monarchies. And no other European nation has done this better than Britain.

Just imagine a world where Tsar Nicholas II of monarchist Russia had taken his cousin’s, King George V’s advice in 1918 and immediately moved the family to the safety of Britain after Nicholas foolishly abdicated (and abolished) the Russian throne, allowing the Bolsheviks to take full control of Russia.

One, Nicholas and his family of five children wouldn’t have been savagely murdered shortly afterwards by the drunken Bolshevik soldiers charged with “protecting” them under Trotsky’s orders.

And two, WWII may not have happened all together because having living symbols of Russia’s regal past, in exile, but offering the hope of another way than that of Leninist/Stalinist Soviet Communism, would have forced the mask of altruism to fall away from Leninist/Stalinist Communism much sooner than it did.

Meaning young Hitler may have simply lacked the audience for his hyper-nationalist and anti-communist platform to spread. If the Communist threat from Russia was too busy contending with active missives from an exiled royal family, expanding Leninist/Stalinist Communism westwards towards Germany’s borders would have been much harder. In that scenario, it is doubtful Hitler’s platform of stopping Communism would have ultimately resulted in what actually happened: him being voted into power.

A Russian Royal family perhaps waiting for an actual Communist Soviet reformer (like Kruschev) who could have corrected the mistakes of the earlier Soviet leaders who tried to accomplish too much, too fast and instead, have found a synthesis of Soviet Russia with her monarchist past.

A realist and less heavy-handed than his predecessors , Kruschev may have thought restoring the important sense of a historical connection to time itself a monarchy provides as the by product of its existence, may have aided in the reforms he sought.

Who knows? But maybe the best way to stop WWII with a time machine is to leave baby Hitler alone and instead take a crack team of Navy Seals or SAS operators to July 17th, 1918 and make sure the Russian Royals made it safely to Britain.

In general, I strongly disagree with the post-modernist, neo-liberal position that a classes society with no reverence for a monarchy (or the God that ordains their right as kings) is the best hope humanity has to survive. As a historian, the religious and mystical roots of the surviving monarchies are reasons enough to keep them around.

This is not say that a return to feudalism or colonialism is the answer either, but to post-modernists, I bid a sincere good luck in finding a better example of class, poise and occasionally, a little needed stoicism than that of the British monarchy and especially, Queen Elizabeth II.

Spoiler Alert!

If you haven’t seen Top Gun 2: Maverick then stop reading now. Not because it’s worth the watch. In my humble opinion, it isn’t but it’s customary to give such warnings when discussing movies. Personally, as far as social “faux pas” go, I consider refusing a non-umbrella holder, walking towards you during a rainy week, the right of “wall-closeness”, a much bigger offense than movie spoilers.

Often, I prefer them. One of the worst feelings in the world, next to being umbrella-less and still refused the right of “wall-closesness” during a rainy week is sitting down to watch a movie where a spoiler would have done the the exact opposite.

With that out of the way, Top Gun 2: Maverick came out a few weeks ago and despite the frankly underwhelming plot; its unrealistic final mission and a female lead we were supposed to magically remember from the 1986 original, the needlessly-long awaited sequel is set to become Tom Cruise’s entry into the billion dollar box office club.

Joining the first Harry Potter film, Zootopia (for some reason), 2010’s Alice in Wonder Land and Rogue One: A Star Wars Story. But also, the company of true cinematic masterpieces like Christopher Nolan’s The Dark Knight Rises and The Lion King (1994’s cartoon and 2019’s live action adaptation).

And even despite the promise of a rekindled Iceman/Maverick rivalry that under-delivered worse than that now infamous show with men made of actual ice, dragons and maverick dragon riding queens, the movie is watchable, but not to anyone remotely aware of the subtly of American made propaganda.

These days, according to everyone, it seems Chinese or Russian made propaganda is everywhere and everyone has suddenly attained the Carrrie Mathison’s (from Homeland);

or Jack Ryan’s (from Jack Ryan),

or Stan Smith’s (from American Dad) level of intelligence training to recognize it.

A subtlety, I would soon come to learn, America was not always so good at executing. And yet, still one that I didn’t catch until I outgrew the audience American propaganda is aimed at: children and people who form their opinions from shows like Homeland, Jack Ryan and American Dad. At a certain age, you notice that there are only so many times you can watch the CIA save the world before the pattern becomes too ubiquitous to ignore.

Lately I, and others, often get mislabeled as “boomers” when we’re usually not. Neither is anyone who instantly understands why, with Top Gun2: Maverick, I had to watch it in the full IMAX experience. So me and a friend less interested in anything remotely political decided to do just that. They had never seen the original but I remember wanting to become a nothing but a Naval Aviator after watching it as a child. Still though, the details in my mind of the original movie were sketchy.

I had images of angry, bald-headed US Navy Captains; references to cargo planes full of fake dog poo flown out Hong Kong; cool sequences of dog-fighting; volleyball, legitimately talented singer, Kenny Loggins, producing the entire sound track; and the deus ex-machina of the ending being the power of Iceman’s and Maverick’s “rivals turned friends” cinematic trope.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=siwpn14IE7E

Excited as I was, a sticky point I couldn’t get past was the 36 year wait for a sequel. Two entire generations had come into adulthood since and and on top of that, the two-year marketing campaign that had this film coming out in at least four different months of two consecutive years, just didn’t feel organic (much like a certain “illness” that seems totally real and not an obvious power grab).

I felt something was off with the film and I couldn’t understand why until the Gen-Xer (not Boomer) in me kicked in and the clouds parted. This film was not so much a “film”, but more so pure American propaganda for the Generation Alpha(10–14 year olds today). A realization soon confirmed by my staunchly apolitical millennial buddy when they suggested we watch the first one so we could follow the new movie better.

We loaded the 1986 film and within 20 minutes, my buddy had an epiphany that almost brought me to tears,

“This is unwatchable! It’s just a commercial for the US NAVY! And just showing how America is so great!”

My jaw dropped. While my friend is generally apathetic towards history or current affairs alike, I am not. That someone, so profoundly naïve (by choice) to politics could, in 20 minutes, see through the veils and shrouds of a catchy tune, some good-looking anti-hero, his straight-edge nemesis, the loss of a precious Goose, and finally our anti-heroes redemption; to see the first Top Gun for what it obviously was, made me feel more than a little proud. I asked my buddy to look up the word “propaganda”.

To the other fact-loving, geo-political historians out there reading this, don’t worry, the 90 minute lecture to my partner on Russo/Sino/Anglo Cold War machinations did come, but the beauty is that they were the result of my buddy’s own critical mind suddenly kicking in and wanting to know more, and not my attempts to answer questions they hadn’t asked. And this was was a massive epiphany for me.

While I would love for my friend and I to grow closer through a shared interest in Geo-politics, the truth about China and history in general, me forcing them into it is not the best way to achieve this. I learned that the best way was just to be there when the dark and sometimes ugly truth of this world became clear to them.

Boomer Praising alert!

The conventional, authorized view is that America is just so great that it doesn’t need make propaganda. Which stands in direct contradiction to the Smith-Mundt act of 1948.

“…The US Information and Educational Exchange Act of 1948, popularly referred to as the “Smith-Mundt Act,” specifies the terms in which the U.S. government can engage in public diplomacy. ….”

It is this Act, that almost every Western nation has, in some form or another, that stipulates how America is to produce and disseminate propaganda though calling it “public diplomacy” sounds way better than “Outright Propaganda”.

“…Among the provisions of the 1948 Act was “the creation of an information service to disseminate abroad information about the United States, its people, and policies.” A major vehicle to achieve this objective was the development of the international broadcasting station, Voice of America (VOA)….”

Most folks may not have known such an act even existed. Likely the same folks who claim every video that comes out of China (except ones showing China in a bad light) are obviously propaganda. But that the US has a law specifically allowing them to produce propaganda isn’t the best part. What is even less known is that, in 2012, under President Obama, his administration decided, very quietly, that this act needed a special upgrade. The Smith-Mundt Modernization act of 2012 took the original and added an interesting new direction: inwards.

“…Authorizes the Secretary and the Board to make available in the United States motion pictures, films, video, audio, and other materials prepared for dissemination abroad or disseminated abroad pursuant to such Act, the United States International Broadcasting Act of 1994, the Radio Broadcasting to Cuba Act, or the Television Broadcasting to Cuba Act.….”

Now why America would decide to turn its own propaganda machine inwards is a question the people calling all Chinese media; propaganda, also need to ask oftheir leaders. For all the flack that Boomers get these days, they did come up with some deeply insightful sayings like, “You can lead a horse to water but you can’t make it drink.” Which makes make think of what my buddy said as we tried to watch the first Top Gun.

“This is just a commercial for the US NAVY! Or just showing how America is so great!”

Will forever be etched in my mind. I remember that, at the time, I gently went over and gave my dude a hug, which garnered a strange look. A look asking for an explanation. An explanation that I was more than happy to deliver a power-point presentation about, but thought that particular moment of clarity for them, just wasn’t the time for it. My friend had arrived at a truth so obvious to so few and had gotten there with nothing more than a little critical thinking. That was enough for me.

-Meno Monteir

Twitter: @MonteirMeno, Instagram: @menomonteir