Queer Boomers you can dance in Victoria, but just don’t mention hotel quarantine!

The Victorian Government recently announced a further easing of COVID-19 restrictions, including for nightclubs. While this is wonderful news and much deserved for the people of Victoria who have been hardest hit by the pandemic in Australia, it is not without some irony – in fact a bucket full of irony. Here are some highlights.

Exiting the political stage on a stretcher.

COVID-19 can end a political career. Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews was once a highly regarded political figure in Australia, and while it is premature to say his political career is terminal, it is most certainly on life support. In fact, he has exited the political stage on a stretcher after suffering a severe bout of Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). A disorder characterised by failure to recover after experiencing or witnessing a terrifying event. In the Premier’s case (and in indeed for many Australians watching in horror), this terrifying event was the Victorian hotel quarantine system. Like the Premier, this system has also been carted off the political stage on a stretcher. It now resides in intensive care.

Political spin gone rogue.

Political spin can come back and bite you. Unfortunately for the Premier, his PTSD has been exacerbated by a bad case of political spin gone rogue, this time self-inflicted and to his nether regions. In what has been coined the ‘Victorian gold standard hotel quarantine system’, the Premier said in response to a question about why the system had too few places compared to the other States: “We have less capacity because we have a different model and I believe higher standards.” He went on to say: “This is not about boasting, it’s just a fact … The AMA over in WA is calling it the ‘gold standard’, that’s not terms I use, that’s what they said… If it was anything other than a good system, then I doubt very much other first ministers across the country would have agreed to copy it.”

Unfortunate.

Bad karma?

In politics as in life, bad karma is real. One can only speculate about how the PTSD and self-inflicted injuries caused by political spin, contributed to the Premier narrowing avoiding permanent spinal damage in a fall that has forced him to take leave for six weeks. The result of a dance with karma I can hear some of you say.

Missteps to safety.

The supreme irony is that Victoria is at this moment in time, the safest place in Australia. And this is not because its response to COVID-19 has been competent – quite the opposite is true.

Victoria does not have to bother with processing international travellers and managing a hotel quarantine system of any significance. This has not only created a further obstacle for Australians wishing to return home, including residents from Victoria, but has shifted the burden to the other States and the Northern Territory.

Competence not required.

Boomers, enjoy the dance as we all take comfort in the knowledge that maybe, just maybe, competence in political leadership is not after all, an essential prerequisite for combatting this dreaded bug. Just ask Boris Johnson, the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, and our own beloved Scotty from Marketing, Prime Minister of Australia, and of course Donald J Trump, the ever present and recently defeated (hooray!) President of the USA.