Lockdown 33/47 - Lies and Statistics

Day 33 of my diary of a LOTR Fan Museum owner during our national lockdown (extended from 28 to 47 days: 33 at level 4, 14 at L3) – in NZ we’re uniting as a country to beat Covid-19 to break the chain and save lives, but …

Last scheduled day of the Level 4 of the new job before we reduce to L3 lockdown. It’s a fairly slight reduction. One member of our opposition party wittily tagged it “Level 4 with KFC” because take-away food outlet deliveries can start again. In reality there’s a lot more to it than this, such as many jobs able to recommence provided they’re done safely, keeping sufficient distance, PPE as required etc.

A dead duck for tourism though, so no change for me yet - I’m still fully on the job of STAY HOME, be kind. So, when not distracting myself or planning how to keep the Fan Museum alive, I have been compulsively following news about the spread of the disease, death tolls, and different ideas about how to balance keeping people safe and keeping countries’ economies going.

Of course, no-one really knows yet what the risk factor is, and there are different projections. And statistics aren’t really reliable as countries record differently, but they are indicative.

We are seeing some hopeful signs of things coming under control in some of the worst-hit European countries, but things are still dire still with massive casualties - recorded worldwide fatalities topped 200,000 yesterday, with nearly 3 million total cases.

Naturally I’ve been finding what’s happening in the USA pretty worrying, especially the “sarcastic” idea of researching using disinfectant or uv light internally. I saw that NZ’s Stuff article on this on FB was massively trolled by supporters of the US pres, claiming Stuff’s reporting was fake news (ie, that the article claimed using disinfectant was encouraged rather than it being a - perhaps reasonable - research idea). I wonder how those faithful folk are spinning their indignation now that the boss’s story has changed.

Altogether very depressing that we’re getting this trolling and fake news syndrome in NZ - and the ugly responses. Sure we need to reserve a bit of reasonable cynicism about the news, but in this country we are generally able to expect a reasonable level of objectivity and professionalism. Our news is not so completely polarised that nobody knows what to believe anymore.

I’ve really been feeling very low about all this. I hate aggressive, blaming, lying behaviour and discrediting of people simply doing their jobs (government officials/media). I just don’t think JRR would believe it either - would he think that the dark tower was rebuilt somewhere in the USA? Would he think the Mouth of Sauron was working overtime? What would Sam say?

I did find Joe Biden’s Here’s the Deal podcasts a refreshing relief - not the politics but the style. These were relaxed conversations with eg governors as people, where they talked about their own lives, their empathy with fellow citizens, their distress over what’s happening with Covid-19, and their own actions. No shouting, no insulting, no fake news, just discussion and people can make up their own minds.

I think I have to give up reading the negative stuff as it’s just upsetting and I feel helpless. I need to focus more on the “kindness” side of my new job.

So, today I am wishing everyone kindness and decency, no matter where you sit on the political spectrum. Best wishes, Kathy xx