I recently received, uninvited, a copy of ‘issue 47’ of The Light, a professionally produced 28 page ‘newspaper’, hand delivered to my door. It says it is a ‘people-funded’ monthly publication, though I have never seen it before. I have no idea why I, or my neighbourhood, was selected for this delivery.
It claims to offer ‘the uncensored truth’, so I was intrigued. Always interested in learning new things, and hearing new points of view, I began to read. I was rapidly astonished. This was not news as I have seen it before.
Genetic weapons
The front page is devoted to a single story, headed “Shifting the blame: establishment liars seek to avoid justice over covid con”. It claims that Covid vaccination is a “genetic weapon”. It reports that several (unspecified) state attorney generals in the US are bringing lawsuits against Pfizer, claiming that “media and governments continue to ignore excess deaths, or claim they have nothing to do with the genetic weapons”. “They wanted us jabbed forever, with vaccine passports in place, so that those who refuse to be lab rats would lose access to society and even food”.
Two pages on and Jacqui Deevoy, a freelance journalist, reports on how the mainstream media refused to publish her articles on Covid. In the early stages of the pandemic she says that the UK government confirmed that Covid was “nothing to worry about”. She tried 28 editors with “a story about the implementation of euthanasia in care homes and hospitals under the guise of Covid treatment”. One editor had followed up individuals who had reported “that their loved ones had been brutally murdered by the state”.
In 2022, The Irish Light published photos of 42 people who it alleged had died due to Covid vaccination. Investigation found a variety of causes of death for these people, but no Covid link. Nevertheless the publication caused distress to relatives of the deceased.
Other causes for alarm
But the writers are not only shedding ‘light’ on Covid. There are other causes in their sights. The article ‘Woke war is corporate enslavement’ explains how ”the worlds largest businesses support far left causes”. Here the target is corporations supporting ‘diversity, equality and inclusion’ initiatives (DEI), and Pride month, which “almost no one asked for”. It offers a dire warning “Corporations cannot force us to buy their DEI rubbish today, what if in the future governments give them that power?”
A piece on the release of Julian Assange suggests that, now he has been released, he should join with GB News, Russell Brand, Joe Rogan and Tucker Carlson in a crusade against “the falsification of history, globalist control networks, and the utter charade of left-right politics”. Other articles highlight 18 “false claims” in the government’s consultation about fluoridation of drinking water in the North East. A page is devoted to a story about how Swedish Social Services have dealt with a child custody case involving a Christian Romanian family. They also have their sights set on 18-minute neighbourhoods, which they claim are a tool to control free movement in cities.
The campaigning group Hope not Hate notes that previous editions have included a defence of convicted anti-semitic holocaust deniers. They also report that the editor, Darren Smith (aka Darren Scott Nesbitt), is a flat earther who denies the existence of gravity. But it is clear that The Light is not only aimed at a far right audience. It also includes articles which might appeal to a range of people on various parts of the broad left. They include alternative medicine, environmental issues and mental health.
The secret state
A common thread through most of the articles is a suspicion of government, and particularly of international cooperation: the United Nations, the World Health Organisation and the World Economic Forum. One article explores the United Nations Strategic Development Goal 16.9, which aims to ensure that everyone on earth has a unique digital identity by 2030. The UN presents this as a means of ensuring that nobody is excluded from the digital world, but The Light sees this as the reverse: “building a global digital ID system that is inherently exclusionary and can punish regime critics and silence dissident voices by cutting them off from its society”.
Who is paying for this?
It is unclear how this publication is funded. There are two visible sources. The first is the volunteers who buy stocks of the paper to distribute. This costs them 20p a copy, which implies serious commitment to the cause/s. The second is advertising. Mainstream printed newspapers are financed heavily by advertising, but only five of The Light’s 28 pages are advertisements. They include alternative health products, franchised selling of adhesives and offers to buy old gold.
But producing a professional publication of this sort is not cheap. There are presumably other funding sources, but what they might be is far from clear. The Light News was a company registered at Companies House in 2020, but it was struck off the register for non-publication of accounts in February 2022. At that time its sole Director was Darren Nesbitt. Another company, apparently unconnected, and based in Blackburn, was registered with the same name in 2023.
The driving force?
Darren Smith appears to be the key figure, as the Director of the former company, and the editor.
Some indication of his views can be seen in an incident in February, when a Stevenage resident, shocked by the content, which she saw as hate speech, protested about receiving a copy of The Light. When the Stevenage Comet approached him for a comment, he reversed the argument, accusing them of hate speech and disinformation, saying, “Your organisation is in line with the policies and plans of every major corporation, investment bank, government and supra-government organisation. We oppose everything they are doing. That makes us a target of hate speech and disinformation from your organisation. It’s what you are paid to do, by said organisations.”
Beware
This publication brings together a wide range of conspiracy theories, which appear to be developing into some sort of ideology of the right. In the last week we have seen the consequences of divisive rhetoric and misinformation on the streets of many towns and cities. Reading The Light is a helpful reminder that promoting them is not the exclusive territory of the internet.
