That’s all very grim reading. But it’s worth noting that while those 2000 bozos were protesting I-don’t-know-what in Wellington, more than 22,000 other outstanding humans around the country were being vaccinated that same day, joining the near 90% of the eligible population who have already had at least one jab. Whoop!
Loads to chew on today, the world is being dragged in several different directions of weird. I cannot for the life of me think why people imagine that a pic of their cat will help solve anything except brightening someone's day - I send dogpix for happiness, not to plant trees! Being always online seems to have warped many of us in a weird way.
The Travis Scott debacle . . . wow. How bloody dare he, and his partner, be so callous to humanity? People died, thoughts and prayers are going to do nothing. How's about maybe paying for funeral expenses, trust funds for their families, paying the extortionate medical expenses of the survivors? It's the least the man can do. I'm unbelievably mad.
The protest in Welly was frightening - it really seems to signal a change in the mood of protest in Aotearoa. We've had protest before, it's even been violent at times, but the mood here seems different (says this human in their little box in Auckland). Seeing media as the enemy and attacking them, the Americanisation of the protests . . . we haven't done this before really. We've always protested in a very Kiwi way - with hikoi, or with flour bombs, or facing up to police on the streets at Springbok tours, or sitting and singing waiata at Parihaka. This just seems different, and odd, and violent is ways that we haven't seen before. Our violence has always been aimed carefully and purposefully, thought out, and against things that were, well, actually really very wrong, like our own ethnic cleansing and land grabs or apartheid. This is different - this is seeing enemies in places where there really aren't enemies, bringing in anti-semitic themes, Nazi themes, weird American themes. Smarter people than me may be able to synthesise this into some sort of coherent theory but it just seems like cherry picking anything that might rile people up.
I'm not going to lie, I'm scared of how this has the potential to escalate. We had a relatively polite protest this week - they threw tennis balls not Molotovs - but where are we going? Can we derail this train before it reaches its destination of actual riots? I hope so.
I want to round out by thanking you for your apology. I did not comment on your last post because those comments, that screenshot, really bloody hurt. I'm a fat trans person and the internet world I live in right now is ugly. People are saying some pretty awful things about fat people who die of Covid. The trans world is reeling from the vile stream of consciousness screed posted by Lily Cade. What you wrote was not a big thing but . . . it was pretty crushing when seen in the context of everything going on in fat activism and trans activism right now. So thank you for reflecting, for thinking, for doing better.
That was some seriously incohesive protest. What a mess. Anti vaccine, anti government, anti media, Trump, water reforms, qanon, Jacinda hate, probably some 1080 in there to and FREEDOM!! Quite a wide remit and I don't think they nailed it. 🙄
I genuinely feel concern for Jacinda Ardern, for both her physical safety and also her own mental health.
Lobbing tennis balls at the media doesn't seem like a particularly kiwi thing to do. I miss the days when we threw dildoes or flour to show our political disgust.
Most of this article is just bits of horror swirling in my brain. I have been thinking about Travis Scott though. Every gig I've been to has a weird crowd groupthink vibe - and at every gig I've been to, the artists try really hard to use that for positivity! Pick people up, get that man some water, step back from the barrier, help her get out. People enjoy the music, the buzz, and have a great time. Travis Scott's inaction is unforgiveable. Unusually for me, I really hope the legal actions against him succeed. He LET people die.
Dear David, you are a gem. Thanks for apologising and owning up to it when you accidentally get things wrong. We all do, all the time, and being able to say I'm sorry, and mean it, is worth so much (I'm not triggered by the word obesity, though it does make me feel bad seeing I fall under that BMI category). To the three things you mention in yet another amazing newsletter:
1) I will actually plant you trees if you send me photos with you and pets! Not everyone, but you and Webworm readers. You and your favourite furbabies will get your own section in my wetland when I restore it - especially seeing they won't be allowed anywhere near it, and we gotta make up for any wildlife they might have killed (I gotta put my own miniature panther and wolf pack behind a fence to keep them from the wildlife on our new land in the midst of bird paradise...). That's a promise, just give me time to implement it.
2) I hope Travis Scott gets sued into the poorhouse (and the Kardashian Klan with him) for putting his fans' lives into actual mortal danger. What an utter douche.
3) How on earth did you foresee this sad event in Wellington? Did you know something we didn't (probably, if you monitor Telegram)? Can you actually see into the future, even though you live in the past (timezones)? I remember smugly commenting on your last newsletter that there aren't anywhere near as many idiots in Aotearoa than in the US (proportionally). That is probably still true and yet, that potential super spreader event on our doorstep shook me to my core. I did NOT see that coming, despite your warnings. Not like THAT. Reading that online disinformation in Aotearoa has increased 100 FOLD since Delta got into the community makes this make a lot more sense, but it also deeply worries me. And the Nazi and Holocaust references are so bloody triggering and offensive, I am going to write an article on what throwing those words around nilly-willy actually does to actual survivors of actual Nazis and Nazi abuse. This needs to stop. I don't know how, but it adds such an insane layer of cruelty on top of the insanity, and as some rightly point out - those with those posters find themselves a lot closer to actual fascist ideology than the public health measures and government they are so ignorantly protesting. Gah. I wish we still lived in our bubble where we seemed to be the sanest and safest country on earth :-(
My unvaccinated coworker tried to convince me that Travis Scott was a Satanist on Monday and I had to just nod, smile, and say "I don't know that I agree with that."
It's just bizarre to me that that some people jump to "it must have been a blood sacrifice." The leaps of logic feel like their getting bigger.
Thank you for writing about all the things that have been on my mind this week. Plantatree was obviously a scam from the get go but it became viral because 1. It's pets - people love posting about animals even if no one asked haha, and 2 it is for a 'good cause'.. I wonder if people actually stopped to think if a tree would actually be planted. What really irked me about their post on their page was when it asked to be shared and reposted and something about they can't actually plant trees but if you shared then they would. Anytime someone openly asks me to engage in their social media with likes/shares/repost all I see is a red flag. Nobody cares about likes/shares/reposts unless they have an agenda with some kind of kickback. Influencer culture is so damned shameless.
As for Travis Scott, the video clips I've seen were hard to watch. I wonder if there really was more he could have done to prevent that or were the organisers more to blame for the poor security enforcement? I don't know what Travis is like but telling people to beat someone up for touch his shoe definitely incites violence so maybe he does want violence in his shows. RIP Chester, that video was so heartwarming. I guess there's my answer -- artists can do something.
The Parilament protest.. I dont even want to get into it. It depressed me seeing this shit in New Zealand. Calling for Jacinda's arrest and the hang Jacinda messages on the tennis balls is so at odds with who I thought we were. It was a sad day for NZ and I just have to remind myself that those protesters were only a very very small percentage of us.
Despite the size of the protest at least is was relatively peaceful - doesn't seem like the conversation on telegram are turning into reality, at least for now.
The travis scott bit really makes me sad. I had never heard of him until this all happened.
I have gone to *hundreds* of metal and punk shows in my life. Dozens of festivals. One band i’ve seen 100x, another 78x, numerous others that i have seen upwards of 20-40x that i didn’t care enough to keep track. I have never once felt like my life was in danger. And I am almost always right up front on the barricade. A few times i’ve had the wind knocked out of me after a sudden crowd push, but it’s not common, and it’s never felt unsafe. just uncomfortable for a few seconds.
to see young kids, teenagers, and early 20s music goers losing their lives, or being severely injured just because they wanted to be in the crowd is so shocking and devastating to me. One of the victims was 14, the age I started going to shows regularly. I hate that what should be a solace and comfort zone turned into this.
You can’t perform and make money without fans. You won’t have any fans if you encourage them to harm each other at your shows. I truly do not understand.
Idk what the point of this comment is, other than to say that as a music fan I hate this. I know you’re also a big fan of metal… maybe it’s because taking care of your own is an inherent part of that community, but this just seems so unfathomable to me.
Thanks for the note at the end!! Those 2 things touched on my anxiety but I guess I’m used to regular people not really giving a shit about those things, or else getting angry when people point them out, so I automatically push it down and didn’t think to say anything. Appreciate it.
I’ve been telling people to stay home Tuesday and Saturday this week… Thanks for your coverage of this, I’m really reassured by your journalism. The fact that someone who specialises in this area is examining it clearly, and really getting to the bottom of it, helps me make sense of it and tempers the anxiety a bit. It’s really good, much prefer to read your coverage of the conspiracists than main media’s.
If you're poking into police procedure around the protests, I'm also very curious why there has been no vaccine mandate put in place for NZ Police, given their close interaction with the public. It also seems to be quite hard to get an answer as to how many police are vaccinated.
Every time I read these emails I’m left shaking my head at humanity, but also incredibly thankful for the work you do. I’ve taken the ignore everyone route despite being enraged by the ‘if they can vaccinate the world why can’t they eradicate world hunger?? Huh?? Huh?? Wake up!’ Or my favourite ‘we are all one, this vaccination has caused so much division, we need to spread love and kindness’ (ahhh no, my prematurely born child with a weak immune system is just my priority you crystal wearing, essential oil selling f**khead). Aghhhh so much rage. I shall read the links provided for some fresh ideas and try to chill the fuck out. Crazy times, with no relief in sight. Off to plant a tree xx
Here I thought the pet picture thing was at least someone with good intentions who got in over their head but looks like it's just rampant engagement- harvesting. Always good to have my cynicism reinforced.
That’s all very grim reading. But it’s worth noting that while those 2000 bozos were protesting I-don’t-know-what in Wellington, more than 22,000 other outstanding humans around the country were being vaccinated that same day, joining the near 90% of the eligible population who have already had at least one jab. Whoop!
Loads to chew on today, the world is being dragged in several different directions of weird. I cannot for the life of me think why people imagine that a pic of their cat will help solve anything except brightening someone's day - I send dogpix for happiness, not to plant trees! Being always online seems to have warped many of us in a weird way.
The Travis Scott debacle . . . wow. How bloody dare he, and his partner, be so callous to humanity? People died, thoughts and prayers are going to do nothing. How's about maybe paying for funeral expenses, trust funds for their families, paying the extortionate medical expenses of the survivors? It's the least the man can do. I'm unbelievably mad.
The protest in Welly was frightening - it really seems to signal a change in the mood of protest in Aotearoa. We've had protest before, it's even been violent at times, but the mood here seems different (says this human in their little box in Auckland). Seeing media as the enemy and attacking them, the Americanisation of the protests . . . we haven't done this before really. We've always protested in a very Kiwi way - with hikoi, or with flour bombs, or facing up to police on the streets at Springbok tours, or sitting and singing waiata at Parihaka. This just seems different, and odd, and violent is ways that we haven't seen before. Our violence has always been aimed carefully and purposefully, thought out, and against things that were, well, actually really very wrong, like our own ethnic cleansing and land grabs or apartheid. This is different - this is seeing enemies in places where there really aren't enemies, bringing in anti-semitic themes, Nazi themes, weird American themes. Smarter people than me may be able to synthesise this into some sort of coherent theory but it just seems like cherry picking anything that might rile people up.
I'm not going to lie, I'm scared of how this has the potential to escalate. We had a relatively polite protest this week - they threw tennis balls not Molotovs - but where are we going? Can we derail this train before it reaches its destination of actual riots? I hope so.
I want to round out by thanking you for your apology. I did not comment on your last post because those comments, that screenshot, really bloody hurt. I'm a fat trans person and the internet world I live in right now is ugly. People are saying some pretty awful things about fat people who die of Covid. The trans world is reeling from the vile stream of consciousness screed posted by Lily Cade. What you wrote was not a big thing but . . . it was pretty crushing when seen in the context of everything going on in fat activism and trans activism right now. So thank you for reflecting, for thinking, for doing better.
That was some seriously incohesive protest. What a mess. Anti vaccine, anti government, anti media, Trump, water reforms, qanon, Jacinda hate, probably some 1080 in there to and FREEDOM!! Quite a wide remit and I don't think they nailed it. 🙄
I genuinely feel concern for Jacinda Ardern, for both her physical safety and also her own mental health.
Lobbing tennis balls at the media doesn't seem like a particularly kiwi thing to do. I miss the days when we threw dildoes or flour to show our political disgust.
Most of this article is just bits of horror swirling in my brain. I have been thinking about Travis Scott though. Every gig I've been to has a weird crowd groupthink vibe - and at every gig I've been to, the artists try really hard to use that for positivity! Pick people up, get that man some water, step back from the barrier, help her get out. People enjoy the music, the buzz, and have a great time. Travis Scott's inaction is unforgiveable. Unusually for me, I really hope the legal actions against him succeed. He LET people die.
Irrespective of saving the world, posting cats saves the day often so here you go, fam - https://i.imgur.com/cpbbkC5.jpg
Dear David, you are a gem. Thanks for apologising and owning up to it when you accidentally get things wrong. We all do, all the time, and being able to say I'm sorry, and mean it, is worth so much (I'm not triggered by the word obesity, though it does make me feel bad seeing I fall under that BMI category). To the three things you mention in yet another amazing newsletter:
1) I will actually plant you trees if you send me photos with you and pets! Not everyone, but you and Webworm readers. You and your favourite furbabies will get your own section in my wetland when I restore it - especially seeing they won't be allowed anywhere near it, and we gotta make up for any wildlife they might have killed (I gotta put my own miniature panther and wolf pack behind a fence to keep them from the wildlife on our new land in the midst of bird paradise...). That's a promise, just give me time to implement it.
2) I hope Travis Scott gets sued into the poorhouse (and the Kardashian Klan with him) for putting his fans' lives into actual mortal danger. What an utter douche.
3) How on earth did you foresee this sad event in Wellington? Did you know something we didn't (probably, if you monitor Telegram)? Can you actually see into the future, even though you live in the past (timezones)? I remember smugly commenting on your last newsletter that there aren't anywhere near as many idiots in Aotearoa than in the US (proportionally). That is probably still true and yet, that potential super spreader event on our doorstep shook me to my core. I did NOT see that coming, despite your warnings. Not like THAT. Reading that online disinformation in Aotearoa has increased 100 FOLD since Delta got into the community makes this make a lot more sense, but it also deeply worries me. And the Nazi and Holocaust references are so bloody triggering and offensive, I am going to write an article on what throwing those words around nilly-willy actually does to actual survivors of actual Nazis and Nazi abuse. This needs to stop. I don't know how, but it adds such an insane layer of cruelty on top of the insanity, and as some rightly point out - those with those posters find themselves a lot closer to actual fascist ideology than the public health measures and government they are so ignorantly protesting. Gah. I wish we still lived in our bubble where we seemed to be the sanest and safest country on earth :-(
My unvaccinated coworker tried to convince me that Travis Scott was a Satanist on Monday and I had to just nod, smile, and say "I don't know that I agree with that."
It's just bizarre to me that that some people jump to "it must have been a blood sacrifice." The leaps of logic feel like their getting bigger.
Thank you for writing about all the things that have been on my mind this week. Plantatree was obviously a scam from the get go but it became viral because 1. It's pets - people love posting about animals even if no one asked haha, and 2 it is for a 'good cause'.. I wonder if people actually stopped to think if a tree would actually be planted. What really irked me about their post on their page was when it asked to be shared and reposted and something about they can't actually plant trees but if you shared then they would. Anytime someone openly asks me to engage in their social media with likes/shares/repost all I see is a red flag. Nobody cares about likes/shares/reposts unless they have an agenda with some kind of kickback. Influencer culture is so damned shameless.
As for Travis Scott, the video clips I've seen were hard to watch. I wonder if there really was more he could have done to prevent that or were the organisers more to blame for the poor security enforcement? I don't know what Travis is like but telling people to beat someone up for touch his shoe definitely incites violence so maybe he does want violence in his shows. RIP Chester, that video was so heartwarming. I guess there's my answer -- artists can do something.
The Parilament protest.. I dont even want to get into it. It depressed me seeing this shit in New Zealand. Calling for Jacinda's arrest and the hang Jacinda messages on the tennis balls is so at odds with who I thought we were. It was a sad day for NZ and I just have to remind myself that those protesters were only a very very small percentage of us.
Despite the size of the protest at least is was relatively peaceful - doesn't seem like the conversation on telegram are turning into reality, at least for now.
Did love this bit:
https://twitter.com/benmackey/status/1458189152810274816?s=20
The travis scott bit really makes me sad. I had never heard of him until this all happened.
I have gone to *hundreds* of metal and punk shows in my life. Dozens of festivals. One band i’ve seen 100x, another 78x, numerous others that i have seen upwards of 20-40x that i didn’t care enough to keep track. I have never once felt like my life was in danger. And I am almost always right up front on the barricade. A few times i’ve had the wind knocked out of me after a sudden crowd push, but it’s not common, and it’s never felt unsafe. just uncomfortable for a few seconds.
to see young kids, teenagers, and early 20s music goers losing their lives, or being severely injured just because they wanted to be in the crowd is so shocking and devastating to me. One of the victims was 14, the age I started going to shows regularly. I hate that what should be a solace and comfort zone turned into this.
You can’t perform and make money without fans. You won’t have any fans if you encourage them to harm each other at your shows. I truly do not understand.
Idk what the point of this comment is, other than to say that as a music fan I hate this. I know you’re also a big fan of metal… maybe it’s because taking care of your own is an inherent part of that community, but this just seems so unfathomable to me.
Thanks for the note at the end!! Those 2 things touched on my anxiety but I guess I’m used to regular people not really giving a shit about those things, or else getting angry when people point them out, so I automatically push it down and didn’t think to say anything. Appreciate it.
I’ve been telling people to stay home Tuesday and Saturday this week… Thanks for your coverage of this, I’m really reassured by your journalism. The fact that someone who specialises in this area is examining it clearly, and really getting to the bottom of it, helps me make sense of it and tempers the anxiety a bit. It’s really good, much prefer to read your coverage of the conspiracists than main media’s.
Also, that Scott story is terrifying goddamn 😦
If you're poking into police procedure around the protests, I'm also very curious why there has been no vaccine mandate put in place for NZ Police, given their close interaction with the public. It also seems to be quite hard to get an answer as to how many police are vaccinated.
Every time I read these emails I’m left shaking my head at humanity, but also incredibly thankful for the work you do. I’ve taken the ignore everyone route despite being enraged by the ‘if they can vaccinate the world why can’t they eradicate world hunger?? Huh?? Huh?? Wake up!’ Or my favourite ‘we are all one, this vaccination has caused so much division, we need to spread love and kindness’ (ahhh no, my prematurely born child with a weak immune system is just my priority you crystal wearing, essential oil selling f**khead). Aghhhh so much rage. I shall read the links provided for some fresh ideas and try to chill the fuck out. Crazy times, with no relief in sight. Off to plant a tree xx
Here I thought the pet picture thing was at least someone with good intentions who got in over their head but looks like it's just rampant engagement- harvesting. Always good to have my cynicism reinforced.
Everyone sharing pictures of their pets on Instagram are the same people that shared 'Kony 2012'