• An excerpt from my newest post on Medium •
Australian democracy is not on COVID-induced life support
In 2020, American governments decided that it was acceptable to overwhelm their health system, permanently maim a potentially innumerable number of people with post-COVID syndrome, while slaughtering six hundred thousand of their own people in defence of their citizens’ right to go to a Denny’s. In 2021, the Australian states, who decided not to accept this outcome, ordered restaurants to use Uber Eats and click-and-collect: How utterly Orwellian?
At least, reasonable controls on movement during a pandemic being “Orwellian” appears to be the position of writer Conor Friedersdorf who sensationally questioned in The Atlantic whether or not Australia remains a liberal democracy.
His analysis lacks an engagement with the broader history of national emergencies in consolidated democracies and seems oversimplistic.
Post image © Sam Wilson (CC BY SA)
