> nutjobs who have been loudly protesting every weekend since the start of covid have been left completely untouched
Are you sure about that? Or simply blinded by bias?
Police were barging into homes with search warrants, in one case handcuffing a pregnant mother in front of her kids because she encouraged people to go protest on facebook. Simply writing a comment about these protests was enough to be charged with incitement. [0]
There were hundreds of arrests each weekend for attending protests made illegal by public health laws. The same laws people were marching in the street about. Thousands punished by the legal system for exercising their basic democratic right. [1]
How exactly is that "untouched"? What a strange rewriting of recent Australian history to suit your own narrative.
It's more the fact that they're protesting mask mandates that were lifted months ago, lockdowns that haven't happened for almost a year, and QR code checkins that are no longer present.
They are not advocating for N95 face masks out of concern that the cloth ones are ineffective.
Every Saturday, to this day, there is an antivax protest through the streets of Melbourne despite the fact that there have been no domestic covid restrictions since around this time last year, and international borders have been open since Jan.
It's basically now just a social event for the Q crowd that leaves them feeling important and the rest of us feeling perplexed.
I’m talking about masks not vaccines. There are also a lot of assumptions about who you think the people in the crowd are. You don’t know it’s a social event for the Q crowd. Why is it strange that people have different opinions, right or wrong? What’s perplexing is believing every single person should agree on something.
Well... they wouldn't have been arrested if the mandates had been lifted. Or are you talking about people protesting them now? Because, If they weren't still protesting them, the mandates would still be in place or be re-imposed!
Nothing to do with strong masks. Knowing the cheap masks you bought from the chemist are useless, why must we be forced to wear them? Why not mandate that everyone needs to wear a wig, they are just as useless as stopping covid.
We can all play pretend and think they work. But is that cheap mask thats been re-used, continually adjusted or worn incorrectly really helping?
In Australia we had mask mandates during summer where temperatures would be over 35 degrees during the day. How well does a sweaty cotton mask work to stop covid?
My thoughts were along similar lines in terms of "if this group, then why not them, and them, and them, and them, and them" where pretty much every single "them" I can think of is a much greater blight on society than climate protesters.
I'm a supporter of Australia's gun laws, but not a supporter of this kind of over-the-top restrictions for, what I consider to be (and that's the rub), the trivial / minor offense of protesting.
The protection of "the economy" is paranoia-level, which doesn't bode well. Corruption is a transaction that encourages more transactions, whilst protest is only ever a restriction, therefore if the economy is the priority then protest is a worse crime than corruption.
It's so trivial when you gridlock major cities REPEATEDLY to spread a 'message' that could be told in a million other ways. Its trivial to worry about things like 'the economy' that provides a means to put a roof over your head and the ability to feed yourself and your family. Only someone who has little to no responsibilities could find it trivial.
When I first watched The Blues Brothers as a kid I thought they'd go to jail forever for all the carnage they wrought driving through that shopping centre, and I totally could not understand why my dad laughed and said "it's not that serious".
Now I do understand that. A long while ago I understood that.
A long while ago did you also understand the difference between fantasy and reality? That events in a movie created to entertain the viewer have no consequences. That you don’t see all the insurance claims and lawsuits because it’s not entertainment.
Do you understand what an economy is? Do you understand that you don’t build your own home or grow your own food or supply your own power and water? That there needs to be a means for you to purchase these items?
Do you understand what impacting services and business means? Do you understand the negative consequences?
It’s so ‘not serious’ that the government has had to introduce new laws to deter people from disrupting the city.
I think we're irreconcilably on opposite sides of an ideological wall on this topic. I understand what you're saying and your point of view, I just don't agree with it. I think there's a matter of scale and timing as well.
Covid has made the economy much more fragile than it used to be, but it has also removed the veil of the importance of being in the office, so disruption to city streets is less of a hit on overall economic productivity than it used to be.
> It’s so ‘not serious’ that the government has had to introduce new laws to deter people from disrupting the city.
In regards to this, that's the core of the problem and the ideological difference of opinion. What one government legislates against, another government is just as likely to repeal as overreach based on what each government considers important or what keeps their pockets full.
Just because you believe in something doesn't mean any action you take to push that belief is acceptable. There are not multiple groups blocking major roads, bus ways, bridges, trains etc. only climate protestors.
Take this scenario, imagine someone dying in gridlock in the back of an ambulance because a protestor glued/chained himself to the road. Extreme? It's happened. Now for what special reason was this person glued to the road for? So they could hold a sign that says 'end fossil fuels'. Thats it, holding a sign!
Clearly you live in a media echo chamber, the leaders and youtubers who record those protests were targeted in the same way.
One YouTube journalist even got the police on camera conspiring to press fake charges so they could give him no internet bail conditions, and thus stop his future recording of those events. No media reported it.
The leaders were all charged with incitement, encouring others to do illegal things (like going outside).
You could argue the overreach that these people experienced is now being applied to other dissenting groups.
