Firearms Owners Against Crime
Institute for Legal, Legislative and Educational Action
Institute for Legal, Legislative and Educational Action
If you think that Covid restrictions have been awful in parts of the United States, try living in Australia or New Zealand. These once-free liberal democracies, so-called champions for equal and civil rights, have become home to some of the hashish covid restrictions in the world.
Did you think a respiratory virus would cause the Australian and New Zealand governments to turn their countries into island prisons? To be honest, I never thought of New Zealand at all before 2020.
Most people could not have predicted how fast democratic governments morphed into their own brand of tyranny. Pre-covid, the leaders of Australia and New Zealand were faceless, interchangeable managers of faraway nanny states. Why then did these governments come down hard on their pretty passive and tame people?
Over time, these countries bought into the idea that liberal democracies are incapable of authoritarianism. In democracies, “we are the government.” Therefore whatever decisions democratically elected officials decide, the population should go along.
This attitude has forced Australians to protest to restore fundamental rights like the freedom to travel more than 5km from their home and do mundane tasks like going to work and shopping for groceries.
Even after witnessing the atrocities committed by fascist and communist regimes, citizens of most western democracies gave up their firearms. Like sheep, they handed over their natural right of self-defense to the wolf. Those who give up their guns in the name of public safety will give up about anything.
Australia and New Zealand gave up their firearms only after becoming too meek and obedient to offer pushback anyway. Rather than seizing guns by force, governments accepted them (after passing legislation) from citizens who no longer perceived the state as a threat or their firearm as a tool to fight oppression.
A 2014 poll found “89 percent of Australians thought their gun laws were either “about right” or “not strong enough.” To the average Australian, the state acts for the good of the people. If it’s not working for the good of the people, what are you, lone dissenter going to do about it?
As the old adage goes, temporary covid measures have become permanent. Citizens of Australia live under endless lockdowns. The government has even resorted to shooting shelter dogs to prevent people from using the rescue of a puppy as a pretext to leave the house. In New Zealand, the government has transformed its two-island nation into a prison to reduce covid cases to zero.
Jacinda Ardern, Prime Minister of New Zealand, said, “For now everyone is in agreement … elimination is the strategy. There is no discussion or debate amongst any of us about that.” One hundred new covid cases caused the government to implement a new national lockdown order.
There is no debate about striking a balance between security and liberty. In the age of Covid, wanting your freedom to live a normal life is synonymous with wanting your grandmother to die. The long-term cost of giving up liberty in exchange for safety is significant. Unemployment, missed cancer screenings, depression, suicide, and days, months, and years of your life that you can never get back are just a few of the many consequences of draconian Covid restrictions.
During national emergencies, security becomes another justification for violating the rights of peaceful people. Contrary to popular belief, there is more to life than merely breathing, and there are worse things than death.
Watching millions of Americans go along with the official narrative surrounding covid restrictions has been hard. However, there are still pockets of freedom to be found. Those areas with fewer restrictions are primarily in gun-friendly states, which have maintained enough distrust in the government and support a system of decentralization.
Decentralization, the founding principle of a federal republic, has helped to avoid a one-size-fits-all approach that saw national lockdowns, mask mandates, and business closure around that world. If there is a silver lining to covid, it is the re-emergence of using state governments and localism to check federal overreach.
American progressives, worshipers of Saint Fauci, and supporters of Moms Demand Action want the United States to look more like Australia and less like Florida. Unarmed and on indefinite house arrest. A Venn diagram of Americans who strongly support covid mandates and gun control is a perfect circle.
Michael Malice often remarks on Twitter, “the right to bear arms is more central to the American legal system and American history than the right to vote, and far more important.” If, after watching Covid authoritarianism unfolded before our eyes, you are still weighing the pros and cons of gun control, you are already heading down the road to serfdom.
Published in General