Blame: the pandemic game of choice

Australians are renown for pulling together in a crisis.

Why then, in the midst of this pandemic are we tearing each other apart and putting so much energy into outrage and blame? Yeah, we’re hurting, but so is everyone else.

In The Weekend Australian Magazine last weekend, Bernard Salt urged Australians not to descend into blame and division, but to find that ‘intrinsic stoicism’ our nation was built on.

He hoped he and his fellow Melbournians would emerge from the pandemic as a galvanised community. Wounded and battle-weary, yes, but united by shared experience and a shared desire to rebuild.

But are we built for that in the modern age, when the tendency is to huddle in our tribes and scream blame at each other because we’re suffering?

The trouble with that behaviour (aside from destroying social cohesion) is that those voices generally prompt reactionary solutions that aren’t solutions at all.

Here in Australia, we have a long (and not-so-proud) tradition in government of reacting to the loudest voices. Current social media behaviour, misinformation and our willingness to be outraged at government has only served to exacerbate this.

In local government, it used to be the handful of old white guys who turned up at town hall meetings to bark at council staff. Without exaggerating, I recently attended a community event where I was introduced to some community members I had not met and albeit jovially, the opening comment was “great, someone from the Council, I wonder what I should complain about now”.

While the council would be there to find a solution for problems and genuinely engage with impacted community members. In the end, though, the solution would by and large represent the view of those angry old white guys who ‘made the effort to turn up’.

Today, we have more inclusive engagement practices, but often it can be the same voices who yell the loudest (or abuse through social media) and who have the greatest influence. And, surprise, surprise, they’re generally handing out blame.

And now blame has become the name of the game mid-pandemic.

We’re too easily outraged as a society. COVID-19 is one of the most complex challenges we’ve faced, and we need to understand that a single person (Premier or Chief Minister) isn’t going to have the answer.

We need to channel all that anger and outrage into something more useful. Like working together to find a way forward that works – or at a minimum has the least negative impact – for the greatest amount of people.

Or as I like to say, the solution that sucks the least.

Have you ever noticed how well three levels of government can work together in a natural disaster? How quickly communities pull together? That’s because we have to. There’s no choice when floodwaters rise, cyclones hit and bushfires bear down on us.

A pandemic should be no different. But because this one has dragged on for six months (and counting), we’re turning on each other. Now we’re closing borders and pitting political parties, states and communities against each other.

Now, before the attacks are turned my way...I fully acknowledge Victorians are doing it tougher than the rest of us and I don't profess to have an answer that cuts through all the bullshi*t. But what I do know is that the current approach is both embarrassing to watch unfold in our country and simply unhelpful. 

Isn’t it time we chose to be better, contribute to the solution instead of throwing mud at each other? Shouldn’t it start with different levels of government and political parties putting aside power games and slanging matches?

There’s a least-sucky solution out there, and we’re only going to find it together.

Image how well all humans would all work together if earth was being invaded by some extra-terrestrial life form and threatening our existence……?

The choice before us includes contributing to the solution and a more cohesive approach – we must be better than what we’re doing now.