Among the many great characters created by satirical British comic, Viz, is “The Parkie”. Look out! He’s a Right Bloody Bastard! warns the strapline. And he is: he spends his entire career raging at anyone who has the temerity to play, walk their dog, lie on the grass, or otherwise enjoy themselves in “his” park.
After all, what kind of bastard wants to stop children playing in the park?
Playgrounds and outdoor exercise equipment in Blacktown City Council have been closed over fears Covid-19 could be spreading in parks[…]
In a statement on Facebook, Blacktown City Council said playgrounds “can attract gatherings (of people) and result in the spread of the virus to children and adults alike”.
What a pack of bastards!
“Please note that the latest closures and the new health advice do not restrict children from walking, running, exercising and playing in our parks and playing fields under the supervision of parents or carers.”
The Australian
For now.
An old Leunig cartoon likewise shows a bastard parkie ordering a crying little girl pushing a pram out of the park, pointing grim-faced at a sign declaring, “No Wheeling Baby Brothers”.
But Viz’s and Leunig’s bastard parkies, even the bastards of Bankstown City Council, are rank amateurs compared to the bastards running Victoria.
[Since March 2020] we have spent 299 behind mandatory masks indoors, 100-plus at home (non-) schooling, 233 with closed church doors. We’ve lived through 93 wedding-less days, 56 curfewed nights and 178 days with playgrounds taped and silent.
Is there anything more miserable and spiteful than a children’s playground sealed off with officious plastic tape? Unless, perhaps, it’s a skate park filled with sand — it took California to stoop to that level of vindictiveness.
Still, as Kiwis get plunged into house arrest again, over a single case, they can at least give thanks that they aren’t living under the boot heel of Ardern’s trans-Tasman socialist buddy.
Our 200 days at home is longer than the Battle of Britain, shorter than the Blitz. At the speed of light, it would get you an eighth of the way to the nearest star. At average walking speed, it would take about 200 days (without sleep) to pace the entire coastline of Australia.
Not that you would have been allowed to…
A lot of Melbourne not being Melbourne. The unappreciated, depreciating cultural capital. Art galleries became empty mausoleums of dust-covered creativity, museums became warehouses of old stuff quietly getting older, for 233 days and counting.
So far, it has meant 257 days of cinemas, theatres, music halls and concert halls closed, ghost lights shining on stages.
As Cat Stevens once wondered, Where Do the Children Play?
We’ve gone 229 days without the zoo, that lifeline of child distraction, where one may gaze enviously at a small mustachioed monkey and imagine he’s been wondering why things have been so quiet recently, why those other big monkeys stopped visiting.
The Age
Because the gorillas in charge are determined to beat their chests and fling their poo as long as it takes to preserve their alpha status.
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