Southwell's Word Emporium

This week on Twitter I suggested we should run an experiment to see what it might look like if we didn’t regard Covid in the same way that Chicken Little views the unsteadiness of the firmament . To do this we need pick somewhere to be a type of lepers’ colony.  Tasmania would seem the logical choice. On this island, let's pretend it is Tasmania, Covid would be treated like the seasonal flu. People can get vaccinations but it is only recommended. It is not mandatory for any occupations, even for those doing healthcare. Residents are free to do anything they want to feel safe. They might choose to stay away from crowded places, wear masks or perhaps seal themselves into  hermetically sealed bubbles . If none of this is reassurance enough they can leave the island and find a much larger hermetically sealed bubble – such as Western Australia. Equally, those who don’t want to live with lockdowns, lockouts, social distancing rules or restrictions, testing, quarantine...

  Let’s start off by doing something ridiculously easy. Shooting-dead-grouper-in-a-barrel-easy. Easier than taking  candy from a baby. I’m going to point out something  Peter FitzSimons  got wrong. My apologies in advance for subjecting you to some of his cod-blokey bluster, but it’s only three lines. Or as he might put it: “What’s that you say? You GOTTA BE PULLING MY CLOTHES PEG! Read FitzSimons! – and me on an empty stomach! You gotta be JOSHIN’ ME COBBER!” Alright, nothing else for it here’s the authentic article: “ Sorry, what? Novak Djokovic says – hold his breath and hope to die – he might not come to the Australian Open in January if he has to prove he has been double jabbed? And this presents  what  kin d  of a problem to the organisers ? None that I can see. ” A day had barely passed before this latest assault on journalism was released and sent  slouching towards Bethlehem,  that the  Herald Sun  reported  about a th...

  I faced a Covid conundrum on Saturday.  It might not have been a conundrum for some, but I have never liked the punitive tone of Victoria’s Covid response, set primarily, but not solely by the Premier.  It makes me wince when a glowering Dan Andrews delivers another hectoring press conference about how “rule-breakers” threaten the “precious thing” of Covid suppression or elimination.  However, many Victorians have apparently lapped this up.   After the Premier went on a particularly strong, even sweary, indignation bender about an illicit Jewish engagement party (an engagement party! WITH SHARED JOY! HOW DARE THEY!) the couple involved said they had to hire bodyguards.  Some cheered taking playground swings and slides off kids. CHO Brett Sutton stated the ban was about the “non-compliance” of some naughty parents, who (heaven forbid) met in parks and took off their masks to socialise a little after weeks of lockdown.  Anyway, I was in Highpoint on Sa...

For most of my media career I have been an editor or curator of content rather than a writer. I’d like to change that. Being, as always, 20 years behind the curve I am starting a blog, but a blog with ambitions. At its centre is one of the most absurd ambitions a modern writer could secretly harbour. I want to be paid. Yes, that’s right … paid! I don’t want to add items to my “portfolio” but to receive, even in a minor and hopefully one day more substantial way, money for what I write. The problem with the internet (I am here to tell you, Sonny Jim, so put on your  “being lectured to spats” ) is its inventors were hippy dippy let’s “make-everything-free-for-everyone-and-create-a-better-world-with-sprinklings-of moonbeams” types. While this was admirable and has been, on the whole, a boon for humanity, the digital world is just the real world… digitized. It obeys the same rules of human behaviour and economics. Creating a “commons”, where no one was paid meant nothing was of relativ...

There have been many Australian low points during the Covid period but in terms of sheer heartlessness it is hard to go past Queensland Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk’s declaration that Queensland hospitals were   “our people” . So much for “we’re all in this together” or even for something we used to call  Australia . Just for the record, even if they are squabbling about it, Queensland hospitals receive  federal funding . It is no wonder  One Nation’s vote  collapsed during the last Queensland election. Normally that would be a good thing but obviously One Nation was out One Nationed by the Queensland ALP. Perhaps they should change their party name to “One State”. The other ALP premier to most obviously benefit electorally from a bellicose parochialism is WA’s Mark McGowan. He proudly explained to  an ALP conference  why they almost had an electoral clean sweep: “It’s because we stood up for Western Australians’ health.” Perhaps he should rename his ...