The Treatment

Relax, this isn’t another column about Israel and Gaza. It isn’t even a column. It’s a post about the artist Anthony Freda, who needs a little help with networking at the moment, as he’s been getting The Treatment from the New Normal Reich’s Reality Enforcement Apparatus … as so many of us have these days.

Anthony Freda is a friend of mine, a brilliant editorial illustrator, a visual political activist, and part of the adjunct faculty of the Fashion Institute of Technology. For years, he has created illustrations for mainstream publications like Time, The New Yorker, Rolling Stone, and The New York Times, and for alternative news websites and publications. In 2006, The Village Voice commissioned him to illustrate a story about people challenging the official 9/11 narrative, and the artwork has become part of the permanent collection of the US National September 11th Museum in New York. And so on. You can read more about his background on his website.

If you have purchased any of my Consent Factory Publishing books, you’re already familiar with Anthony’s work. He has created the cover art for all of them.

Anthony’s story will also be familiar. He started speaking out against the roll-out of the New Normal Reich in 2020, and creating anti-New Normal artworks, and he has been getting The Treatment ever since. Most of his big mainstream clients dropped him, and he’s been increasingly censored and “visibility-filtered” by the usual social media platforms. Basically, he’s been exiled from NormalWorld, as many of us have, and so he’s working hard to build a new network of contacts and clients.

I don’t have to go into all the details … you are familiar with The Treatment by now. As I have been saying and writing for going on three years, the Powers That Be are done playing grabass. They are executing a crackdown on dissent. If you’re reading this post, you’re probably familiar with my case, and the cases of others like myself, and the criminalization of dissent, generally.

Anthony isn’t facing criminal charges, and neither are most people who are getting The Treatment. He’s being punished and pressured in subtler ways, as are countless people who have had the guts to speak out against the new totalitarianism. Maybe you’re one of them. If so, thank you.

Anyway, here’s how you can help Anthony out. It is easy, and it won’t cost a thing.

Share this post with anyone you know (or with anyone you know that might know someone) that might need the services of a brilliant illustrator. If you know of any alternative news outlets that use original artwork, share it with them. Anthony is focused on building a network of clients outside the New Normal mainstream, so money isn’t his main concern. He’s offering his artwork to alternative outlets and organizations for free if necessary.

Have a look at this mini-portfolio ...

Anthony Freda Portfolio

4.3MB ∙ PDF file

Download

Download

If you like Anthony’s work as much as I do, please help him out and spread the word.

For my part, I’ll be publishing a new collection of Consent Factory Essays sometime next year, and my second dystopian novel eventually — I’m working on it, but I keep getting sidetracked by “apocalyptic pandemics,” and wars, and trumped-up criminal charges, and other distractions — and I plan to ask Anthony to do those covers, and force him to let me pay him this time, that is, assuming I’m not rotting in a German prison by then.

That’s it for now. Please do take a second and think of anyone you might know who might be interested in using Anthony’s illustrations, and share this post with them. Here’s one more recent example of his work. It’s called Tsunami.