Trust Australia’s biggest sook to lose his shit over Victoria’s new face mask regulations. Less than 24 hours after the new rules were introduced, Andrew Bolt has already published two (2) whiney columns about the tremendous burden of following the most basic instructions by wearing a mask.
And no, none of his columns touch on any of the genuine criticisms of the new mask policy. Instead of rightfully calling out the Victorian government for threatening to fine people $200 if they’re caught without a mask when it could instead focus on handing them out for free, he’s decided to just dismiss the whole thing as one big political stunt.
“On what medical basis is this necessary?” he wrote, as if yelling at a cloud.
“For six months of this virus crisis we didn’t have to wear masks.”
For those not keeping track, the pandemic was much less severe six months ago. Allow this graph to demonstrate:
https://twitter.com/CaseyBriggs/status/1284657179601977346
Back then, community transmission was minimal and the impact of mandating face masks would’ve been negligible. Not so, nowadays.
“I smell politics,” he said in another column.
“The Premier desperately needs to look like he’s doing something, with another 363 new infections announced on Sunday.”
It’s almost if – and please, hear me out, Andrew – making face masks mandatory in public is doing something.
Bolt’s argument is that the whole thing is for optics. But most people already know masks won’t actually protect them form the virus. Instead, the masks are there to stop us from accidentally spreading it.
Melbourne’s back in Stage 3 lockdown, and now masks are mandatory, too. What more do you want?
From security guards hooking up with quarantined travellers, to sending in cops to lockdown public housing towers, there have been plenty of fuckups under Dan Andrews‘ watch.
But by having a go at something so trivial in terms of sacrifice but so beneficial in terms of public health, it’s almost as if Bolt’s just being a professional shit-stirrer instead of actually caring about tackling this goddamn pandemic.
Face masks may help stop the transmission of the virus through droplets, but they won’t stop Andrew Bolt from shutting the fuck up anytime soon. Perhaps a muzzle would be more appropriate in this instance.
