Oh welll..move along!

In the heart of Sydney, we have a cacophony of frogs such that the neighbours comment. No one is boiling them and they are increasing in numbers and volume. They are as free as the humans who cohabit this great. country. They are of a variety called “stuttering” frogs, like some of the humans who share this great country.

The author states:
"In truth, feudalism is the norm and the last 75 years were an aberration, built on the backs of greater people who fought to throw off the shackles of peasantry."

To a large extent it was unionism and luck that dragged Australians out of peasantry.

But just like so many other structures that tended to benefit the many over the few they were progressively dismantled.

Unions were labelled as anti-progress and anti-business and needed to be shut down and those who benefitted from those very unions went along with it.

Strikes were banned and the majority saw this as a progress.

Government owned airlines, banks, electricity boards, telecommunications, roads and transportation hubs were sold off.

The line fed to the public was that private enterprise could do it so much better and the savings would be passed onto consumers.

What could go wrong?

Cooperatives were seen as interfering with the "free market" and there was no shortage of corporations willing to snap them up - you guessed it - so that the benefits could be passed onto consumers.

I think many Australians consider themselves to be "billionaires in waiting" and any legislation that interferes with the profits of the few is seen an attack on them.

A sovereign wealth fund for the many? Not for us.

Negative gearing and tax credits that benefit the few? Bring it on.

It has been the constant and incessant undermining of the institutions that support "the many" from the overwhelming predominant right wing media that is putting the shackles back on the many.

This is a piece of ignorant risible rubbish.

For starters, compared to a flu for the majority, four times worse than a seasonal flu that saw our hospitals overwhelmed with sick folk, many kept alive with oxygen, some on respirators.

Donald Trump claimed like the ignorant author, that this was pretty harmless, until he got it and got very sick, had he not been President, would have not had access to the best medical care in America and probably been killed by this killer virus.

People who did not get sick but carried the virus, thought they should have been allowed to roam freely at will affecting all they came in touch with. Perhaps killing a dozen or so?

Because this virus needs a host and 15 seconds to spread!

As for face masks, the irrefutable evidence is, they reduced the spread by as much as 85%!

At the end of the day, I for one was pleased with the government's response and the curfews, lockdowns, restricted movements.

W.A. Locked down its borders and for months was covid free! And proves my analysis entirely.

If only other governments had followed suit. We could have kept it in NSW. I get that the "author" doesn't give a shite about other folk, and that's UNAUSTRALIAN!

Go back to where you came from and take your complete lack of NORMAL HUMAN EMPATHY with you! You don't belong in my Australia!
Alan B.

What, WTF not again, says!
Alan B.

Cowardice has developed over generations, often through social media, virtue-signalling and conforming to moral fads of the day. A collective education system that teaches rights of the majority instead of the rights of individuals, producing hyper-conformists. Blind obedience and a pathological need to follow rules. Most people believe that to be a good person is to be a compliant person - adhering to those in power and celebratory ideas and culture. There is an overwhelming tendency to towards conformity in Australia. We get more like Communist China ever day.

ttbn: that's complete BS.

Think of another country with our freedom of movement, the ease of setting up or getting into business and our free universal health care.

If you don't like it here, where then?

There has to be rules for fools, like all driving on the left and giving way to the right.

Given COVID is spread by hosts, and they are only contagious for around5-7 days. Stay at home orders were perfectly reasonable!

Only morons would not see that!

Trump tried the let her rip strategy and killed around 200,000 more people than closed borders, lockdowns and stay at home orders would have done.

In NY they were digging mass graves and shoving them in as fast as they could, by the truck load.

That could have been here but for the government's approach!

Many old people like D Trump and probably you are useless old farts and wouldn't be missed. But not all!

I've got something left to contribute. And likely to change the face of transport, aviation, space travel and shipping around the world.

If I can live to see it realized, go to my grave in peace.

Not afraid of death, just taking this secret with me and burying it!

A fractured hip and spine, malignant cancer and kidney failure have made life constant hell, won't be sorry to go, just don't won't to go with very important, unfinished business!

When I was last in hospital was offered assisted dying. Declined because I don't believe in suicide or murder by any other name and for the aforementioned reasons.
Alan B.

.

I admire your courage and wish you well Alan B.

Thanks for the example.

.

If you don't like it here, where then?
Alan B,
Agree on that. However, unthinkingly going along with the undermining of what makes Australia still a decent place for decent people, must be addressed. Only decent people can do that not the myriad of Academic hangers-on who are part of this group that make the decisions which bring about the changes for worse ! As I said, only decent people with decent thinking & a decent mentality can do that !
Stop voting in lawyers & bureaucrats !

Most of today's occupants of this Nation have no recollection nor appreciation how socially active Australians were & what real socialising actually meant a mere two generations ago.
Packing yourself into a stadium at great expense is about as far away from socialising as one get.
Freedom to socialise never meant forced participation in mass stupidity. It meant to have fun & harmony not being offended at a joke at your expense.
Freedom of or rather not having insipid totalitarian attitude authority. Freedom of speech has become a social gauntlet courtesy of socially inept Academia !

'Most of today's occupants of this Nation have no recollection nor appreciation how socially active Australians were & what real socialising actually meant a mere two generations ago.'
.
And why do you suppose that is?

Special Delivery,
the last five words tell you !

The last five words are an opinion not a reason.
'Inept academia' as you call it, is a manifestation of an indifferent society.
A socially ignorant society whose preoccupation is amusement and spending money they don't have, because they believe they are entitled.
And you want to change that?
Good Luck, the wheel turns ever so slowly so you, or I, are not likely to see it.
Consider yourself lucky at this point because it won't be pretty when it happens.

Thanks David Bell for the summary of Covid- in some places they are still bigoted against the unvaccinated- despite the claim's of record employment.

From David Bell's blurb... (not that credentials are everything... some such as Ben Goldacre say science is more about the quality of your ideas than the quality of your authority. Others such as Kuhn say that science is a process of academic democracy- but over time the truth comes out.)

David Bell, Senior Scholar at Brownstone Institute, is a public health physician and biotech consultant in global health. He is a former medical officer and scientist at the World Health Organization (WHO), Programme Head for malaria and febrile diseases at the Foundation for Innovative New Diagnostics (FIND) in Geneva, Switzerland, and Director of Global Health Technologies at Intellectual Ventures Global Good Fund in Bellevue, WA, USA.

Consider yourself lucky at this point because it won't be pretty when it happens.
Special delivery,
I don't disagree with you there. All we can do is to put out ideas on platforms such as OLO & hope that each time we post there'll be at least one whose mentality allows the kind of thinking that is missing/forbidden in the entitlement era.
I have spoken with many of all ages & it's surprising how many are actually in favour of a Gap Year National Service. The main opposing comes from middle class suburbia where the Peter Principal runs riot !

Indyvidual- Yes many benefit from military service. There is a document from the French Revolution that describes Total Mobilization of Society for warfare.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lev%C3%A9e_en_masse

Levée en masse decreed
Levée en masse in 1793, by Lesueur

The decree was enacted by the National Convention on 23 August 1793, having been penned by Barère in conjunction with Lazare Carnot. The decree read in ringing terms, beginning: "From this moment until such time as its enemies shall have been driven from the soil of the Republic, all Frenchmen are in permanent requisition for the services of the armies. The young men shall fight; the married men shall forge arms and transport provisions; the women shall make tents and clothes and shall serve in the hospitals; the children shall turn old linen into lint; the old men shall betake themselves to the public squares in order to arouse the courage of the warriors and preach hatred of kings and the unity of the Republic."

Free thinkers are referred to as anarchists
The fanatical like minded are called mobs.
The seemingly mindless are seen as self serving fools.
Who have I left out?
Oh yes, the religious zealots who believe doing good only applies to each other when in agreement.

There was a quote about the wise teaching before preaching verses zealotry- but I couldn't find it. But the below are interesting...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zealots

“Goodness without wisdom always accomplishes evil.”
― Robert Heinlein

“There’s nothing quite as frightening as someone who knows they are right.”
― Michael Faraday

I have done no wrong but the zealots are trying to attack me because I am so critical of them.
Sunil Gangopadhyay