Lewis Andrew
sojournal.co.nz
The end of the Covid nightmare seems in sight. The sceptics are being proved right, and more and more people are waking up to the injustice of the government’s authoritarian response these last couple of years. The Convoy, and subsequent police brutality and politicians’ disdainful dismissal of genuine grievances have been the combustible material that will bring more to Wellington in support of the convoy and maintain the pressure on our corrupt and cowardly politicians.
Jacinda’s dismissal of the protestors as “not representative of the vast majority of New Zealanders” is only likely to push more enraged people into protests. We have seen with our own eyes packed motorway bridges. Our telegram channels have been inundated with videos from real people, not media with a set perspective to push. We are not 70-year old nanas ready and willing to believe what the nice people on the news serve up to us each night about those nasty anti-vaxxers who don’t care if everyone dies.
Then we have Trevor Mallard, smugly watching the carnage he caused from behind the mainstream media on a balcony, for all the world looking like some Caesar surveying the plebs below his palace.
Then take a look at Luxon. Seen that picture of him looking timidly through the windows at the protestors below? What a spineless jellyfish. Can you imagine that ‘man’ as prime minister? Nor can I. He’s done his dash and many now ex-National voters will be looking for someone else to represent them. Unfortunately slim pickings at this stage.
These are the people who govern us. We live in the remnants of a Christian civilisation where these people are called ministers. They are ministers in the sense that they are under God and are called to do his bidding. He limits what they are authorised to do and holds them accountable. They are his ministers for our good. They are called to punish the evildoer (Romans 13). Defining the evildoer as someone who refuses to be vaccinated is not one of the powers that God has granted them. Furthermore, they are also, in a democratic society our ministers. They serve us. We don’t serve them.
Yet as we have rejected our Christian moorings we head further down the path of ancient despotic empires where the elite see the people as so many pawns to be sacrificed as necessary. In the deified state under which we are suffering, these people have become like gods, defining good and evil. They have removed the shackle of the true king Christ and pretended that there is no one to whom they must give an answer. They have become so inflated with a sense of authority and righteousness that they have lost touch with the ordinary people.
Their disdain for the protestors at their door is as obvious as it is despicable. These people are the wrong sort of protestors. If it had been a climate protest, all the young, affluent, white, woke and witless girls would be out there and most politicians would have applauded. As it is, we have a crowd that is too poor, too brown, too working-class….just too damn ordinary. How dare we peasants demand to be treated as human beings. The politicians, the media and the recently university ‘educated’ sneer at us.
They have become so far above the average person that they turn their backs on us like we are non-people. We are mandated out of our jobs, denied use of public services like the library, unable to take our loved one out for dinner on Valentine’s Day, denied entry to the houses of our faith, pushed out of our sports clubs, stopped from attending weddings and we are supposed to just take this outrageous treatment like we deserve it? Because, as the exalted jellyfish Luxon had the audacity to say, we don’t have a right to impinge ‘on other people’s daily lives‘. So shut up and take it you, peasants.
But there are cracks in the dam. Water is pushing through, and that dam is going to collapse. Winston Peters, that consummate politician/rogue knows he is onto a winner and is backing the protestors. Rodney Hide has published a letter to David Seymour the ACT Party ‘leader’ schooling him in the principles his party is supposed to stand for.
Yesterday, in a press release, Seymour commented on the shortage of teachers and midwives and then says this, “ACT is as pro-vaccination as anyone. But we have said since November that Labour’s mandates went too far, that there should be the option of regular testing as a substitute, and that we should allow businesses to decide their own rules.” Note the beginning of a backtrack here. Seymour apparently has been saying since November the mandates went too far. He’s trying to make a pathway for himself to come over to the side of righteousness.
A trickle of butt-covering, excuses and switching of sides will now commence and soon enough become a torrent.
Cowardly leaders all around the country who forced out their workers, pushed people to be vaccinated against their will, stopped members of their congregation from entering church, and endorsed the government’s authoritarian regime are going to be embarrassed and will move to damage control mode, desperately trying to save face and position.
Here’s the thing. We must not forget what has happened. I will forgive those who have sinned against me. I will forgive those who were quiet when they should have been shouting from the rooftops against this evil. I will forgive those who went about their lives like it was business as usual and callously ignored our plight. But I will not forget those in leadership positions – church leaders, business owners, doctors, school leaders and politicians who failed to stand for justice.
They must all face a day of reckoning. Leadership is not for everyone. It is not the right of the elite. It is something that is earned through courageous character which stands for truth and righteousness. Whether they deserve to remain as leaders is a debatable question. Many should just stand down.
