> Nobody bats an eyelid....Can't go to Kmart....Riots in the streets...slight personal discomfort
Hyperbole overload.
Here in Victoria, we're still in the world's longest lockdown. Curfews, strict rules, masks outside, closed local businesses, police ready to pounce on anyone waving a sign saying "end the lockdown".
To express any anti-lockdown opinion, is to be a traitor of public health. You're not a team player unless you submitting to the world's longest lockdown.
"This is literally a war", said the NSW Premier a few months ago in her description of the pandemic. I guess it's fitting a military man in uniform heads the vaccine rollout.
A small group of health workers, mostly women, sat silently socially distanced in a Victorian park recently, with masks on. They were protesting vaccine mandates. A bus load of cops pulled up and surrounded them. Can't even protest in a responsible covid-safe manner. It's illegal. You're an anti-vax menace to society if you express anything against whatever the government throws your way because "fighting the pandemic" as you put it.
"slight personal discomfort". You know nothing about the toll of the world's longest lockdown when you frame it as "Kmart inconvenience".
And what exactly should "batting an eyelid" look like for the average person on the subject of war crimes in Afghanistan? Would it please you if more than 250,000 marched though the city like they did in protest of committing Australian troops to the war on terror?
I have no idea what your eyelid battering minimum standards are for war crimes, but one would expect a common reaction would be to allow the courts to deal with the offenders. The average person can't email the judge and provide external influence in those matters. But hey, "nobody bats an eyelid" sounds more dramatic for a good story, I guess.
> Can't even protest in a responsible covid-safe manner
Breaking lockdown to protest lockdown kinda misses the point of a lockdown. I understand people's frustration but once you compare the number of covid-related deaths to other countries you can reasonably conclude that the overall effort of fighting the pandemic was successful. Were there some badly implemented measures from the local governments? Possibly. But the idea behind them was to preserve life, which seems to have happened. I don't know of any country that managed to somehow allow people free movement and keep covid-related deaths to a minimum, so it's a trade-off between the two.
> You know nothing about the toll of the world's longest lockdown
Well, I know that in any democratic society citizens have not only rights but also responsibilities. Lockdowns are a way in which the community temporarily sacrifices some freedom in order to protect vulnerable people, and I believe that this must be done in any civilized society. Yes, it will take a toll on people, and it's the right thing to do. We've known it since Socrates.
The reason I'm calling it a Kmart riot is because I can see the avalanche of social media comments by your average Joe, radicalised in his own bubble to believe that Australia is creating the fourth Reich because he has to wear a mask. Another very common lockdown complaint is "my kids are bored they want to go out". Yeah, sorry, I can't take this seriously. I'm sure there are some real dramas out there, I have empathy for people who experience hardship, but the majority (totality?) of the complaints I've heard are just laughable.
> Would it please you if more than 250,000 marched though the city like they did in protest of committing Australian troops to the war on terror?
Yes it would, but my minimum standards would be to have a social media response of at least the same magnitude as the one to the lockdowns. That's an easy way to gauge public opinion these days, just count the number of articles, likes and comments on Facebook and YouTube.
Bonus points for writing letters to MPs, government and journalists to inquire on the progress of the investigation, if there are enough resources allocated for it and what is being done to protect the witnesses, for example.
Edit: I'm not against war, sometimes it's absolutely necessary. Targeting civilians however is simply abominable and it's not clear to me how one can be at peace knowing unconvicted murderers are walking around in the community. If morality isn't an issue, at the very least we have the practical concern of whether they'll murder civilians again. Brushing this off seems not very prudent.
> Breaking lockdown to protest lockdown kinda misses the point of a lockdown.
Everyone has a line where breaking lockdown to protest lockdown becomes an option. For some that line is approximately 30 weeks in.
Some family units will cope better than others. The wealthy ones with large houses, spare rooms, backyard retreats do better. Families locked up in tight, affordable housing suffer more. And when education becomes a tedious long-term chore delivered via choppy laptop without quality social interaction, the need for ending lockdown weighs heavy.
> citizens have not only rights but also responsibilities
Many of the rules have been made on the run, with vast differences between states and countries. There is no universal playbook for lockdowns. People will disagree, strongly disagree, and sometimes protest.
In regards to "fourth Reich", some look at history and are concerned by scope-creep, or foot in the door power-grabbing opportunities by law-makers. Before the pandemic, there was much condemnation of policy-making, over-stepping, even corruption and flatout lies in and around Gov HQ and parties. Endless juicy material for commentators and critics, paints a picture of alarmingly untrustworthy political power sources and related corporate associates. One might be forgiven for questioning or resisting the box-ticking responsibility demanded of citizens by those distrusted so vigorously in normal times.
"Today we are announcing a 2 week snap lockdown", said literally hundreds of days ago. IMHO protesting lockdowns is safer from moral corruption than the nightly news would have you believe.
Hyperbole overload.
Here in Victoria, we're still in the world's longest lockdown. Curfews, strict rules, masks outside, closed local businesses, police ready to pounce on anyone waving a sign saying "end the lockdown".
To express any anti-lockdown opinion, is to be a traitor of public health. You're not a team player unless you submitting to the world's longest lockdown.
"This is literally a war", said the NSW Premier a few months ago in her description of the pandemic. I guess it's fitting a military man in uniform heads the vaccine rollout.
A small group of health workers, mostly women, sat silently socially distanced in a Victorian park recently, with masks on. They were protesting vaccine mandates. A bus load of cops pulled up and surrounded them. Can't even protest in a responsible covid-safe manner. It's illegal. You're an anti-vax menace to society if you express anything against whatever the government throws your way because "fighting the pandemic" as you put it.
"slight personal discomfort". You know nothing about the toll of the world's longest lockdown when you frame it as "Kmart inconvenience".
And what exactly should "batting an eyelid" look like for the average person on the subject of war crimes in Afghanistan? Would it please you if more than 250,000 marched though the city like they did in protest of committing Australian troops to the war on terror?
I have no idea what your eyelid battering minimum standards are for war crimes, but one would expect a common reaction would be to allow the courts to deal with the offenders. The average person can't email the judge and provide external influence in those matters. But hey, "nobody bats an eyelid" sounds more dramatic for a good story, I guess.