The freedom convoy has been in Wellington for a few days now.
It’s interesting the split universe of coverage. On the Freedom Convoys Facebook page the impression is of determination. Weariness. There is some anger sure. But it also feels celebratory. Of coming together to defy an unjust, anti-scientific law that segregates society. There are pictures of people organising food for protestors, videos of people dancing and singing. The message is clear. No violence.
What do they want? An end to vaccine mandates enacted by our Dear Leader but enforced by everyday business owners with no help from the ones who think this nonsense is a good idea.
Our friends in the MSM have a different narrative.
In this article our friends at Stuff try to make a something of the fact that businesses were forced to close due to the protests. Five businesses they mention (if you count the ANZ). Yet, how many businesses has our Dear Leader closed with her pointless lockdowns? How much business has she supressed with her fear mongering and “traffic light” nonsense? The Far North is one of the most economically deprived parts of the country and Ardern’s tiresome rules have cancelled a fishing competition that brings a significant boost to a place that doesn’t get many significant boosts. And makes a lot of fisherman happy.
But we can’t have fun now, fun is not “safe”. And the Brave New Left don’t care about the poor and the working class, they are too busy playing culture wars and increasing inequality. On inequality, we don’t have to be too clever. The average house price has gone up by around 60% over the covid period. Working class families haven’t been able to afford a house for decades. For the poor it is obviously worse.
You do the math.
But, more interesting is the comment by one business owner:
Boyce said the traffic light system and vaccine pass had pitted ordinary people in society against each other, which caused the hostility towards his staff yesterday.
“It’s not the government policing the mandate - it’s private businesses.”
This is the argument against mandates and vaccine passes from the start. Let’s set aside the fact that the vaccines weren’t great against Delta and they are virtually useless against Omicron even according to Pfizers own CEO.
But setting aside the fact that they don’t really work (so forcing boosters on people is unscientific as well as unethical) as the business owner above says mandates pit us against each other. They make everyday people enforce laws on other everyday people which is not their role, not something anyone wants and may even be something they strongly disagree with.
Put your hands up if you are a business and you have had any help with enforcing mandates of any sort? Been given grants or money? Even advice maybe? Anyone from the government checking in to see how it’s going? Any politicians?
This is one feature of Ardern’s Hugs Fascism. By getting everyday people to do her dirty work she builds a resentment towards those that resist her. People begin to resent the unvaccinated which diverts attention from the fact she isn’t a normal person she is just a construct.
The vaccinated say:
“I took the vaccine, I took the risk, what makes you so special?”
“I wouldn’t have to check stupid vaccine passes if you just took the vaccine.”
And the unvaccinated are equally resentful:
“Why should I put something in me, that may nor may not give me any benefit but does not bother you either way?”
“I know what the data says that’s why I’m not taking it”
Both sides feel they are doing the right thing. Both feel that they are acting as reasonable, responsible citizens and acting in the interests of the wider society. Both are holding to important values. Neither are wrong. They are just everyday people wanting to do everyday things.
Yet both are pitted against each other. Openly. By Ardern and the rest of the half wits in parliament. And the morons who call themselves experts. It’s a shame we don’t have any history experts around the covid table. Historically speaking, how has segregation and division of any sort ever led anywhere good?
The fact that Ardern refused to speak to the protestors is consistent with her avoidance of anyone who questions her insipid leadership and frankly lunatic ideas. It appears she only talks to majorities. And the right kind of media. You would not expect anything more from a construct. Without the sinew of “feedback” and “sample”, carefully assembled before her stage managed appearances where she finally assimilates into the construct, without those things she has nothing to say. Because there is nothing there but the construct.
Labour have drastically increased the amount of PR people in government that you and I pay to treat us like we are idiots.
These PR people provide inputs on how to maintain a message. Not on what is right or wrong. Not on some understanding of humanity or society. They advise politicians on how to maintain the message. Politicians are now thoroughly professionalised. Are the values that make a good professional politician useful in managing our society?
Here is the construct making an output based on the inputs of her spin doctors.
"Ok Cindy we’ve just got the latest polls and surveys together and we’ve run them through excel. The people love you Cindy. But you need to look magnanimous Cindy, no one like a show off. The polls say you should talk some crap about how you are here for everyone. We’ve asked the focus groups and the proles love that caring, sharing, hugs crap.
And so the construct obeys stating:
She “will govern for all New Zealanders” and she knows everyone was living in an "increasingly polarised world", but she hoped this election had shown New Zealand that this was not who we were and that as a nation we can listen and debate.
A couple of thousand cars in a convoy heading South. 17 kilometre convoy moving North.
The convoy Facebook page has over 66 0000 members and has only been going for 12 days:
By comparison, The Labour Party Facebook page has 304 thousand members and has been going since 2010 and is down with the smiling (I think) and young, masked, hospo workers. Yep because Labour has been great for hospitality and we are stupid:
But the construct won’t even talk to those 60 000 plus people. Because that’s how debate and “governing for all New Zealanders” works.
It would be great if we had someone, anyone in the parliament who would address the concerns of the at least couple of hundred thousand people who are against mandates. It would be democratic even. But constructs aren’t interested in democracy or debate those are just key words that the media advisors tell them score well. The construct is interested in forming itself into a simulacrum that will gain them power. And then keeping that power for as long as possible.
So, unsurprisingly, not a single MP would take that “risk”. Not one. They would not even offer a nuanced statement saying they understood the frustration but the vaccine was necessary to protect the country. Instead just ignore them “they will pass”. Stuff sound almost gleeful:
“Yet Bishop delivered an eloquent explanation for why neither he, nor any other MPs had gone outside.
“We fundamentally as a Parliament believe in the science of vaccination, and it's really important that we stand collectively together to send that message.”
“That's why you don't see any MP out there ... talking to them, because they don't want to give succour to the protesters,” he said.”
That’s what counts for eloquence now?
I would posit that you don’t see any MP’s out there because they are cowards and don’t really stand for anything, and there isn’t any real diversity in parliament because they are all constructs. Their construct mouths move with the machinations of what their press secretary’s tell them the latest trending topic on Twitter is. They all stand for the same thing, in this case “belief” in vaccines.
Vaccine. A word that used to mean one thing but in the last year or so has been hijacked to mean something different. A vaccine used to be something you took as a kid to stop you getting and spreading something very dangerous, like measles, for the rest of your life.
Now it’s something you take every three months so that you can get something not very dangerous like covid, spread it to other people with the same vaccine, have your summers cancelled, have to wear an even more restrictive mask, put 36 billion dollars into some truly reprehensible corporate entities coffers and possibly end up hospitalised or dead anyway.
Call me old fashioned but I like the old use of the word vaccine better.
I digress.
The media has done what they have done throughout this pandemic. Covered the constructs ass and only told one side of the story. Where are the interviews with the protest leaders? Or anyone to do with the protest? Nowhere.
Plenty on scuffles and arrests though and “increasing aggression”. As if nothing has been happening that might make people unhappy in the last 22 months. I guess if you are in the middle class and can work from home it’s been all goods.
But nothing in the media about this sort of stuff from the trucker convoy facebook page:
Or this (people organising food packages for convoy members):
Kids making cookies:
And hundreds of messages like this (I’m sure she’s not the only one who has felt this way in the last 21 months)
The media didn’t ask them and didn’t report on any of this.
And this is the other insidious part of Ardern’s hugs fascism. It pretends to be caring. It says “we are them”. It gives out hugs. It says “be kind”.
It’s hard to combat that. It’s like wrestling with a blanket. It just distorts it’s shape a little. And then moves back to where it was. Implacable. Dull. It has no weakness because it has no strength. It is everything and nothing.
And it is presented by the construct. Which is also everything and nothing.
When the fascism comes with brown shirts and black boots pushing on your neck, you can fight and resist. You can play them at their own game. The enemy is clear. The violence is clear. The suppression is clear. Anger is easy and giving into it is even easier.
But how do you resist the person who just wants to be “kind” and help everyone?
Hugs Fascism is kind. It cares. It hugs you tight and will never let you go. It manipulates. It controls. It invents consensus. It divides and rules us all, weakened by our division. It constructs the narrative insidiously and anyone who asks the wrong questions is ignored or left out of the room for ever. Or offered a hug.
It slowly suffocates the life out of you. Out of everything.
I’m not sure how to combat it. Because we obviously can’t rely on the rest of the political class. Or the media.
Hugs fascism is the most dangerous thing to happen to New Zealand.
We need to figure out how to stop it.