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Prior to 2020 I didn't know and din't care who was the Premier of my state in Australia. I was very proud to have spent a decade and half in Australia and quite glad to see my kids becoming true Aussies. Fair dinkum! Team Australia, team Victoria! No one in my family watched any news, occasionaly we'd look through a free local newspaper pulled from postbox, despite huge "please no junk mail" sign on it. March 2020 started the first "lockdown". I though it did make sense, praised the JobKeeper program our federal govt introduced and was a bit disappointed in my employer trying to make a claim, as I thought we didn't really need it, as we didn't bear much losses. But it's a par for the course, I guess, whenever a financial support for business is made available it makes sense to claim a need. Worst case it will be refused. By May 2020 Victoria was the last state to be getting opening up again. By then I already knew the Premier's name, but my only problem with him was that he appeared a bit too cautious (which is forgivable), and his rhetoric was the one of a kindergarten teacher - very patronizing, but not a big deal. The bigger distrust started when I've heard him saying literally "I am scared of this thing and you should be scared too". This was like a red rag for a bull for me. Since then every word out of collective govt mouth, every article, every slogan and every "order" was about drumming up fear, by all means. And those who did not want to fear were sent all sorts of "messages" and promised all sorts of punishments and executions. We've seen people handcuffed for posts on fb, pregnant lady interrogated for daring to sit on a park bench ("not one of the allowed reasons to leave home"), people arrested for sitting on a beach (more than 5km from their house), police in full riot gear, "kettling" of random people, drone surveillance, pepper spray and rubber bullets deployed liberally. It was more wild than response to political unrest in the proven dictatorship of Belarus! The fearmongering continues today with the same fervor, double vaccinated are new unvaccinated. So yes, it was and still is all about being afraid. Sorry, this is something I cannot take from anyone. My willingness to collaborate on any issue is completely lost on govts of all colors. From now on I think it is absolutely ok to seek any possible loophole in any govt initiative, avoid paying dues as much as legally possible and generally comply with regulations in the most destructive and sabotaging ways - but all legal, of course. By the way, such was the recommendation of US or British counter-intelligence to German people sympathetic to Allied cause and wanting to contribute to counter-nazi effort without being implicated. I wonder whether the thought of such possibility crossed the enlightened minds of our new feudal lords? |