Guest Post: A Lurker – This Modern Madness

“Men, it has been well said, think in herds; it will be seen that they go mad in herds, while they only recover their senses slowly, one by one.” ― Charles MacKay, ‘Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds’

We live in a small highlands country town in New South Wales. Ever since the madness began in late January/early February of 2020, there has been no incidence of community transmission of the Wuhan virus in our town. The air here is fresh, clean and cool when there aren’t bushfires raging nearby. The town is surrounded by trees and farms with grazing cattle and sheep, and with a small population nowhere is ever crowded, except perhaps at the local club when they have their weekly meat raffles. In short, it’s like any number of small country towns in regional Australia, mostly populated by generations of country folk, elderly retired farmers, and a small but growing percentage of blow-ins, who like us were sick of the city, and who went looking for the Old Australia of our youth.

In our church there is a wooden board that records the number of young men who went to fight in the Great War. There are a lot of names on that board. I’m not certain if the board records service, or deaths, or both. For a small country town, it seems that most if not all the families contributed a name to that board. There exists community spirit in our town. People rallied to help when prolonged drought broke the previously iron hard resolve and will of the local farmers. When fires decimated nearby villages and communities, donations of clothing and offers of accommodation appeared as if from nowhere for those displaced. This mindset of ‘doing the right thing’ is seared into the heart and soul of country folk and the older generation.

This generation, these people are the ones that grew up listening to ‘Blue Hills’ and the ‘Country Hour’ on ABC radio. They followed the weather forecasts issued by the Bureau of Meterology. They placed their trust in the ABC, the media, and government. Many still believe that government has their best interests at heart, and they possess a misplaced fondness for the ABC. Now, however, their trust has and is being abused by the activists and sociopaths who have infested those institutions. The brainwashing of the innocent and the ignorant has been relentless. So too the propaganda. I can see through the misinformation, but others cannot, those poor souls caught in a vortex of fear, who remain masked even though they walk quiet and near-empty streets, who remain masked even when driving in their cars. Those poor souls who are told by psychopathic bureaucrats that you can catch Covid in seconds, that you cannot stop to talk with a friend or a neighbour – a directive that is the true killer of a small country town like mine where just about everyone knows everyone else, and everyone stops for a chat. No longer do people talk about the weather, how much rain has fallen or is forecast to fall, what the cattle or feed prices are, or any other number of subjects that country folk yarn about. No, the talk is always ever about the contagion, where it has spread to, and the ever-present fear that one day it will appear here.

That this phenomenon is a kind of madness is undisputable. How it happened is less clear, although I have a couple of theories. Aside from the misplaced trust in the ABC and government that is held by the older generation, there is also our laid-back and “she’ll be right” Australian attitude, an attitude that has allowed government and bureaucracy to grow and erode our freedoms. This cultural, collective laziness and apathy has failed to hold our governments and the media to account, and we are paying the price for it now.
Australia, it was once said rode on the sheep’s back into prosperity; nowadays we seem to be a nation of sheep, mindlessly and obediently following the herd into the shearing shed, where we are being shorn not only of our prosperity, but also of our rights and fundamental freedoms.

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49 Responses to Guest Post: A Lurker – This Modern Madness

  1. Salvatore, Understaffed & Overworked Martyr to Border Closure says:

    @A Luker: Hear hear!


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  2. rickw says:

    Well done Lurker, perfect!


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  3. Roger says:

    A very insightful piece, Lurker. Spot on in your analysis of regional Australians.

    I encourage you to sow the seeds of non-conformism as you go about your daily life in your community.


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  4. mem says:

    I am with you mate. My Dad did seven years in second world war. Second troop in, last out. Came home with shrapnel holes in him and black malaria in his system. Set up farm, started family and became best in state for his field. He used to say to me, it will happen again but it will come from a different direction and unless you are alert you won’t know. It has now come in the form of a creeping green fungus that has taken away peoples ability to think about anything critically and in depth. Meanwhile all the rights that the previous generations fought for are being rolled back. I hope there are some young warriors out there to fight for our freedoms and liberty again.


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  5. calli says:

    This cultural, collective laziness and apathy has failed to hold our governments and the media to account, and we are paying the price for it now.
    ________________

    Indeed. Thank you Lurker.

    We never imagined our government would try to imprison us. We thought all that was all part of our colourful past, along with bushrangers, razor gangs and leg irons.

    Not so.

    The fear I see in the faces of once happy people stuns me. And now that fear is masked so we don’t even get the full, stark picture. Misery is in the gait of the elderly who once happily coffeed and caked at the cafés, scuttling in and out of the supermarket, unable to browse for a birthday card or a new brand of bread. The children are held at home, more fractious by the day, unable to play and interact with friends. Now these foul old women and their be-jowelled, bandy old men who rule us want them masked too.

    And for a hidden, but growing number, death is preferable to this half-life. Perhaps not acted upon, but contemplated.

    And that’s the tip of the filthy, evil iceberg.


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  6. Speedbox says:

    Excellent post Lurker.


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  7. Thefrollickingmole says:

    Consider this.

    We have the most educated population in Australian history.

    12 years of compulsory schooling, record uni attendances etc.

    But somehow that’s translated into people too stupid to know baseload power from intermittent. A virus from the plague of Justinian. And worst of all a compliance mindset to even the most retarded government brain farts.

    A cynic might even suspect the kids aren’t all right.


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  8. woolfe says:

    Brilliant Lurker, thanks. Stole your comment for twitter TFM.


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  9. custard says:

    Oh sorry I just hit the report comment thingy by mistake…


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  10. Tintarella di Luna says:

    Thank you A Lurker a beautifully written post with a deep sadness for what has been lost. Unfortunately, the wisdom of these words The price of liberty is eternal vigilance has been forgotten. Lord Acton on Liberty: In every age its progress has been beset by its natural enemies, by ignorance and superstition, by lust of conquest and by love of ease, by the strong man’s craving for power, and the poor man’s craving for food. During long intervals it has been utterly arrested, when nations were being rescued from barbarism and from the grasp of strangers, and when the perpetual struggle for existence, depriving men of all interest and understanding in politics, has made them eager to sell their birthright for a pottage, and ignorant of the treasure they resigned.


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  11. custard says:

    Great post areader I just put it up on SpaceChook


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  12. Dot says:

    Great article, Lurker.

    I was thinking the same thing today at work. People are overreacting because they haven’t faced hardship other than economic hardship with a welfare state. Older boomers remember the Vietnam War, but we have not faced off obliteration since WWII.

    It would put this into perspective. Entire generations and industries are spellbound and terrified of what is literally a very bad cold virus, which has killed very few Australians (argued between 0 – 800 excess deaths between sceptics and the official line).

    A year and half of on and off conditional house arrest for 26 million people is a deranged overreaction to the problem. We locked down to flatten the curve and we didn’t get the megadeaths predicted by the British Big Brain Intelligentsia.

    This should be over; let people get vaccinated, allow drugs that work on the metadata evidence and let the vulnerable be protected; come clean about ages, comorbidities and obesity of the deceased.


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  13. Tintarella di Luna says:

    I saw a post the other day on Mass Psychosis and how it happens – the tale of our time.


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  14. Dot says:

    *We have the most educated population in Australian history.*

    Sarcastic comment detected.

    BA in xxx Studies.
    Science degrees dumbed down (less lab work and more Bill Gammage!).
    Economics taught by communists (U of Syd).

    It’s a control mechanism. Think of Silent Weapons for Quiet Wars.

    PS

    You are their enemy in that war.


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  15. Bar Beach Swimmer says:

    Well done Lurker, perfect

    +1


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  16. Boambee John says:

    Hard to tell which is better, the article or the comments. Let there be more like this.


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  17. candy says:

    Very interesting to read, Lurker, thank you.

    The acceptance of police presence, power and over-reach is concerning. The only people it seems to worry are folks from countries where it reminds them of very unpleasant things.

    You have to wonder where this is heading.


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  18. mh says:

    Michael Savage wrote a book on mass hysteria during the Trump presidency:

    #1 NYT bestselling author Michael Savage calls out the mass hysteria mongers and their methods, and shows Americans that we must look to history to understand the present and avoid repeating the mistakes of the past.

    Since Donald Trump’s historic ascendance to the presidency, American politics have reached a boiling point. Social and economic issues, even national security, have become loud, violent flashpoints for political rivals in the government, in the media and on the streets. This collective derangement has a name: mass hysteria.

    In his new book, Stop Mass Hysteria, #1 New York Times bestselling author Michael Savage not only deconstructs the Left’s unhinged response to traditional American values like borders, language, and culture, but takes the reader on an unprecedented journey through mass hysteria’s long history in the United States. From Christopher Columbus to the Salem Witch trials to the so-called “Red Scares” of the 1930s and 40s and much more, Dr. Savage recounts the many times collective insanity has gripped the American public – often prompted by sinister politicians with ulterior motives.

    Dr. Savage provides vital context for the common elements of dozens of outbreaks of mass hysteria in the past, their causes, their short and long-term effects, and the tactics of the puppet masters who duped gullible masses into fearing threats both real and imagined. By shining a light on the true nature and causes of American mass hysteria in the past, Savage provides an insightful look into who and what is causing dangerous unrest in our lives – and why.


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  19. Thefrollickingmole says:

    Dot.

    It’s been an awesome education if you want compliance and people set up to administer others.

    Oh you mean old fashioned knowing stuff… how gauche.


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  20. Damon says:

    There does seem to be a susceptibility to mass hysteria. Covid, a generally mild respiratory virus, is going to kill us all. A one degree rise in global temperature portends the end of the world. When I was in my 20s, we had nuclear bomb safety practices, but the atmosphere was far different. More amusement than fear. Greta would have been laughed out of the room. We believed in ourselves, and I wonder what has become of that faith.


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  21. Kae says:

    *We have the most educated population in Australian history.*

    Hmm.

    Not what I deduce from the calibre of comments/posts by many about a lot of subjects on FB.

    Good take.

    I am in a small LGA which is affected by Brisbane lockdowns.

    So many shuttered shops, businesses lost, jobs lost.

    I was very fortunate to be employed by a tertiary institution, able to work from home from March to July, and then retire with a VSP.

    Many other people have and are still struggling. The bills don’t stop.

    None of the ABC or Government seat shiners have lost anything from this pandemic, and it has cost a fortune.

    The vaccine roll out has been a farce.


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  22. Salvatore, Understaffed & Overworked Martyr to Border Closure says:

    Well said Kae.


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  23. Katzenjammer says:

    Or housing block monthly zoom meeting. One of the ardent left women in the block had read that the local shop she had visted was now on the hit list of possibly maybe not so likely sites. She turned up for her test and was isolating until receiving advice. There was so much excitement in her voice at being a player in this history. The day of her shop visit didn’t co-incide with the tame-span or date of the warning, but that’s of no consequence when you’ve just become an important symbol.
    .
    I believe that’s a large part of what’s captivated so many – the belief that this is a moment in history that will be read about in future centuries – “this fear of breated air is so exciting.”


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  24. Mak Siccar says:

    Thank you for the excellent post Mr? Lurker. It is even worse for the small country towns because old farts like me are prevented from travelling around the country and spending munney therein.

    I would like to see a second part to this post in which realistic actions, in both the short-term and long-term, to restore our freedoms back to pre-2019 levels are proposed.


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  25. Shy Ted says:

    We mustn’t forget that employees of the various health departments can ONLY follow the official narrative. If they don’t they’re breaching policy which is a sackable offence. Emails are routinely circulated with this implied threat so the many, many sceptical workers are silenced. Debt does that to you. Speak out, lose everything you’ve worked for.


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  26. Pogria says:

    My parents escaped a communist country in the fifties and emigrated to Oz, thank God. I have never forgotten what they used to tell us about life in a country that became communist after the war.

    Since seeing Kerry Chant constantly on television, this image has been in my mind the whole time.
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GrsJAXExZ8s


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  27. Rabz says:

    How the hell did we manage to so blithely sleepwalk into this insane tyrannical idiocy? At the moment, existing in Sydneystan, I simply can’t see a way out.

    which realistic actions, in both the short-term and long-term, to restore our freedoms back to pre-2019 levels are proposed

    The list wouldn’t be complete without the most practical urgent and necessary action we could take to restore those freedoms.

    Heads On Pikes Time (aka HOP Time).

    P.S. Very thoughtful piece, Lurker.


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  28. Enyaw says:

    Apologies , hit the report thingy in error , please ignore ,, I dont know what it is for anyways .


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  29. Struth says:

    Brilliantly written a lurker.


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  30. Sirocco says:

    Thank you Lurker, and all commenters. The reason I read Catallaxy.


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  31. Old bloke says:

    That’s a very sad story Lurker, we see the Karening of the population in our cities, I had hoped that some sense and stoicism still remained in the regional towns.


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  32. egg_ says:

    Prof Robert Sapolsky talks about brilliant scientists “living in their bucket” (silo) e.g. Joseph Mengele and the damage done to millions of fellow humans through their faulty “categorical” thinking.

    What nerd “buckets” (silos) do Bill Gates, Jack Dorsey, Mark Zuckerberg et al live in?

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NNnIGh9g6fA


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  33. John A says:

    Thefrollickingmole says: August 12, 2021, at 7:40 pm

    Consider this.

    We have the most educated population in Australian history.

    12 years of compulsory schooling, record uni attendances etc.

    But somehow that’s translated into people too stupid to know baseload power from intermittent. A virus from the plague of Justinian. And worst of all a compliance mindset to even the most retarded government brain farts.

    A cynic might even suspect the kids aren’t all right.

    The Tree of Knowledge is separate from, and distinct from, the Tree of Wisdom.


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  34. Tintarella di Luna says:

    Jim Killen often spoke if those educated beyond their intellectual capacity- excellent summary of thosein charge and elsewhere in the graceless elite class – my Italian dad left school at 8 he was illiterate in his own language but would often saywhendealing with Agribureauracy: they go to university knowing very little and come out knowing less


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  35. Kneel says:

    “… they go to university knowing very little and come out knowing less…”

    Or, as they say, they learn more and more about less and less until they know everything about nothing.


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  36. Helen says:

    Beautifully written Lurker, poignant.


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  37. Mak Siccar says:

    A letter in today’s Oz.

    Would it be too much to hope that the mandatory vaccination zealots get off their high horse, stop yelling and make a case for what they hope to impose on all of us? I am prepared to be persuaded but no one has explained why the science of vaccination can be ignored. Repeat after me: vaccination does not prevent getting the virus and does not prevent spreading it. Its benefit is personal to the person jabbed. How many times do they have to be told?

    Frank Pulsford, Aspley, Qld


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  38. Gilas says:

    All good and true..

    … but what are we going to do about it??


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  39. mh says:

    Is 1984 Becoming a Reality? – George Orwell’s Warning to the World

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vEMlvpMY7yw

    Seeing the giant screens of Gladys at the Sydney vaccination hub for teens yesterday, what else could you think of but Orwell’s 1984.
    Australians love Big Brother.
    Australians jumped straight to the final page with barely a whimper.


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  40. Perplexed of Brisbane says:

    Well done Lurker.

    It is great to see many of the stalwart Cats here. The Cat was a breath of fresh air in the staleness breathed upon us by our masked betters.

    On the odd time I am caught out and hear what dribbles from the lips of our betters, I think to myself, that the only thing I want to hear from them is the sound of their heads rolling from the guillotine to the basket.

    I’m waiting for the mandatory vaccination to come in for work. It will be easy to talk tough and say no behind a keyboard but hard to resist when it means food and shelter for your family.

    I was hoping our ‘Christian’ Prime Minister may have an ace up his sleeve but I don’t think he is that smart and seems to be driving that push. What a disgrace.


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  41. Gilas says:

    … but what are we going to do about it??
    ===========================

    Nothing, it seems.

    The Zimmer-frame brigade knows how to talk tough, though.


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  42. Chris M says:

    “I was hoping our ‘Christian’ Prime Minister may have an ace up his sleeve but I don’t think he is that smart and seems to be driving that push. What a disgrace.”
    .

    Yes Christian indeed, what a total fraud. He’s into bestiality – that is embracing and being humped by the globalist beast as he rushes to mark us all and gut any remaining fragments of Australians. What horrors this evil man faces on judgement day.


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  43. kaysee says:

    Lurker, a great word picture of life in the country.
    How is it that the political representatives of the country towns are not fighting back for the people they represent?

    ….. there is also our laid-back and “she’ll be right” Australian attitude, an attitude that has allowed government and bureaucracy to grow and erode our freedoms.

    Even now, there are many who do not see the warning signs. What the government (via the media) is telling us is all for our own good.


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  44. Damon says:

    Surely at some point the governments and their health officers become liable for damages? On the basis of a bit of RNA, people are threatened, fined, and deprived of liberty, even though there is absolutely no evidence of active infection. Even the man who invented it said it was not suitable as a diagnostic tool. The greatest farce in Australian history and politicians are running around exuding self congratulation.


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  45. ChrisM:
    ““I was hoping our ‘Christian’ Prime Minister may have an ace up his sleeve but I don’t think he is that smart and seems to be driving that push. What a disgrace.””
    **************************************************************************
    He’s a Christian in the same way the current Pope is a Christian.


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  46. A Lurker says:

    Thanks everyone for all the very kind comments. I might do a follow-up post some day but today is not that day. In the meantime I can only suggest listening to this speech to help us get through this most trying time…https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qk_rPHoSc8w


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  47. PeterW says:

    “ He’s a Christian in the same way the current Pope is a Christian.”

    It must be said that there are a proportion of “Christians” who are like most members of football clubs.

    They like being “part of the club”. They pay their membership, wear the club colours, attend the matches and barrack vociferously for their “side” ….. but they never actually play the game.

    I hope that Morrison is not amongst them and is really just out of his depth, but the possibility exists.


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