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>I don't expect you to understand, but in Europe, people actually care about their rights [1] That's a bit condescending. In recent weeks there were tens of th

>I don't expect you to understand, but in Europe, people actually care about their rights [1] That's a bit condescending. In recent weeks there were tens of thousands of people marching on the streets of Sydney and Melbourne to protest covid lockdowns and defend their right to free assembly.

BLKNSLVR 5y ago
Fucking perfect example. Exemplifies exactly the things that get Australians hot and bothered enough to protest - getting it totally and absolutely arse-about. Perfect example, nicely done.
bradrn 5y ago
> tens of thousands of people marching on the streets of Sydney and Melbourne to protest covid lockdowns and defend their right to free assembly As an Aussie I must say that I see these protests rather differently. For better or worse, Australia has gotten used to having zero COVID: people here tend to see the protesters not as brave individuals defending their rights, but as idiots who recklessly endanger the lives of others by spreading disease through a largely unvaccinated populace. Many people here are of the opinion that some ‘fundamental’ rights can and should be suspended in a critical emergency.
shric 5y ago
Do you have a source for "tens of thousands"? I think it was fewer than 10k. Thankfully only 3,500 in Sydney out of a population of 5 million. Fortunately the vast majority of Australians aren't completely selfish and thoughtless. Nobody likes lockdowns. The government doesn't benefit from them, it's not lining some evil overlord's pockets.
- jlangenauer 5y ago
  I believe the governments in Australia do benefit from the lockdowns. I'm from Australia, but live in Germany, so when I look back home from here, I'm shocked by how deliberately the fear of Covid has been stoked and played up in Australia. Constantly in and out of lockdowns, daily press conferences about death and case numbers, no path out and no hope. It feels to me that Australia will be a country suffering from PTSD once it finds a way out of the pandemic and impossible dream of zero covid. (For comparison, here in Europe, the pandemic is largely over, and our vaccination wall is looking strong enough that even what's coming over winter shouldn't be too bad.)
  - XorNot 5y ago
    There are not enough vaccines. Which is to say, the current Liberal government was offered a blank cheque from Pfizer to order as many as it could mid last year, instead didn't (because they're incompetent and incapable of understanding moderately sophisticated ideas), and then proceeded to engage in a runabout of graft, corruption and waste that means even when we are technically overflowing with AstraZeneca vaccines it's actually still surprisingly hard to have them (and I'll note, we also got short changed on AZ because Europe shut down exports of it for a while - though that's also on the Fed gov because again, we could've bought literally as much Pfizer as we wanted early on). They aren't benefiting from anything: the governments are all rightly tanking in popularity, and being held up by Rupert Murdoch's multi-decadal commitment to dumbing down the narrative.
- inkblotuniverse 5y ago
  >The government doesn't benefit from them It gains more control over people's lives and consolidates economic power into megacorporations. Shrinks the pie, but you have more direct control over it, and megacorp one will have better bribes bribes you than 1000 mom and pop stores. Seems like an okay deal to me.
hestefisk 5y ago
You mean the illegal protest where people turned up without masks, defying public health orders? I doubt that captures the majority of us concerned about mass surveillance.
- ghiculescu 5y ago
  The fact that you describe protesting as illegal kinda says it all.
  - justinclift 5y ago
    Err... we're literally in a pandemic, where people getting together in large numbers makes things worse. When we're not in pandemic conditions, people are quite welcome to gather and protest whatever the heck they want.
    - jjgreen 5y ago
      Don't be surprised if that takes, er, a while to happen
      - XorNot 5y ago
        So do you people who keep telling everyone dictatorship is next whenever anything happens get tired of being wrong literally every time?
        jjgreen 5y ago
        I missed the bit where I told anyone that dictatorship was next.
        XorNot 5y ago
        Oh, so what was the implication of your comment meant to be? Why is the government not going to end the pandemic measures anytime soon?
ostenning 5y ago
Australia barely protests about anything, and when a group of passionate people finally standup for something they believe in, they generally are ridiculed. Politicians squash any kind of dissent, even passing laws restricting protests. This isnt about antivax/anti-lockdown protests either, im talking about climate change, social inequality, workers rights etc. Australia is a largely apathetic country, complacent because of their own wealth and removal from the international community. But the situation is going to turn quite negatively for Australia, its becoming progressively worse because nobody actually believes in anything fundamental. We keep installing savvy businessmen politicians rather than people with a longterm vision for the country. The result is exacerbating social problems. It makes you think where the countries priorities are when homelessness in Melbourne has gotten terribly worse in the past 7 years. People rather maximise their gains on the property market, borrowing exorbitant amounts of money to buy property they cant really afford, meanwhile devaluing the currency. The result is the social fabric of a nation disintegrating.

BLKNSLVR 5y ago

Fucking perfect example. Exemplifies exactly the things that get Australians hot and bothered enough to protest - getting it totally and absolutely arse-about. Perfect example, nicely done.

bradrn 5y ago

> tens of thousands of people marching on the streets of Sydney and Melbourne to protest covid lockdowns and defend their right to free assembly As an Aussie I must say that I see these protests rather differently. For better or worse, Australia has gotten used to having zero COVID: people here tend to see the protesters not as brave individuals defending their rights, but as idiots who recklessly endanger the lives of others by spreading disease through a largely unvaccinated populace. Many people here are of the opinion that some ‘fundamental’ rights can and should be suspended in a critical emergency.

shric 5y ago

Do you have a source for "tens of thousands"? I think it was fewer than 10k. Thankfully only 3,500 in Sydney out of a population of 5 million. Fortunately the vast majority of Australians aren't completely selfish and thoughtless. Nobody likes lockdowns. The government doesn't benefit from them, it's not lining some evil overlord's pockets.

jlangenauer 5y ago
I believe the governments in Australia do benefit from the lockdowns. I'm from Australia, but live in Germany, so when I look back home from here, I'm shocked by how deliberately the fear of Covid has been stoked and played up in Australia. Constantly in and out of lockdowns, daily press conferences about death and case numbers, no path out and no hope. It feels to me that Australia will be a country suffering from PTSD once it finds a way out of the pandemic and impossible dream of zero covid. (For comparison, here in Europe, the pandemic is largely over, and our vaccination wall is looking strong enough that even what's coming over winter shouldn't be too bad.)
- XorNot 5y ago
  There are not enough vaccines. Which is to say, the current Liberal government was offered a blank cheque from Pfizer to order as many as it could mid last year, instead didn't (because they're incompetent and incapable of understanding moderately sophisticated ideas), and then proceeded to engage in a runabout of graft, corruption and waste that means even when we are technically overflowing with AstraZeneca vaccines it's actually still surprisingly hard to have them (and I'll note, we also got short changed on AZ because Europe shut down exports of it for a while - though that's also on the Fed gov because again, we could've bought literally as much Pfizer as we wanted early on). They aren't benefiting from anything: the governments are all rightly tanking in popularity, and being held up by Rupert Murdoch's multi-decadal commitment to dumbing down the narrative.
inkblotuniverse 5y ago
>The government doesn't benefit from them It gains more control over people's lives and consolidates economic power into megacorporations. Shrinks the pie, but you have more direct control over it, and megacorp one will have better bribes bribes you than 1000 mom and pop stores. Seems like an okay deal to me.

hestefisk 5y ago

You mean the illegal protest where people turned up without masks, defying public health orders? I doubt that captures the majority of us concerned about mass surveillance.

ghiculescu 5y ago
The fact that you describe protesting as illegal kinda says it all.
- justinclift 5y ago
  Err... we're literally in a pandemic, where people getting together in large numbers makes things worse. When we're not in pandemic conditions, people are quite welcome to gather and protest whatever the heck they want.
  - jjgreen 5y ago
    Don't be surprised if that takes, er, a while to happen
    - XorNot 5y ago
      So do you people who keep telling everyone dictatorship is next whenever anything happens get tired of being wrong literally every time?
      - jjgreen 5y ago
        I missed the bit where I told anyone that dictatorship was next.
        XorNot 5y ago
        Oh, so what was the implication of your comment meant to be? Why is the government not going to end the pandemic measures anytime soon?

ostenning 5y ago

Australia barely protests about anything, and when a group of passionate people finally standup for something they believe in, they generally are ridiculed. Politicians squash any kind of dissent, even passing laws restricting protests. This isnt about antivax/anti-lockdown protests either, im talking about climate change, social inequality, workers rights etc. Australia is a largely apathetic country, complacent because of their own wealth and removal from the international community. But the situation is going to turn quite negatively for Australia, its becoming progressively worse because nobody actually believes in anything fundamental. We keep installing savvy businessmen politicians rather than people with a longterm vision for the country. The result is exacerbating social problems. It makes you think where the countries priorities are when homelessness in Melbourne has gotten terribly worse in the past 7 years. People rather maximise their gains on the property market, borrowing exorbitant amounts of money to buy property they cant really afford, meanwhile devaluing the currency. The result is the social fabric of a nation disintegrating.