Last night I listened to Brendan O’Neill interview Nick Carter on the Covid situation in Australia.
The Aussies are really serious about controlling the virus — although not quite as serious as the Kiwis, who have gone stark raving mad.
What shocked me most was not the strict Covid rules, and how they’re being enforced (even using the army!). That was bad, but even worse was Mr. Carter’s attitude that yeah, ha ha, all these horrible things are happening right now, and our freedoms and civil liberties are disappearing (see, e.g., woman arrested for anti-lockdown post on Facebook), but “our strong liberal institutions won’t allow this to go too far.”
They’ve already gone too far, and once people seize powers, they rarely give them up. Precedents are being set. And recall Jonathan Swift’s definition of precedent: something done illegally before that can be done legally now.
In England, people are telling the government where they’re going to facilitate contact tracing.
That’s simultaneously a great idea and terrifying. We should be using technology to help control the spread of the virus, but freedom and privacy are always afterthoughts with these people.
“Oh, if you’re concerned then we’ll make it opt in. And by the way, what do you have to hide?”