Charles Wooley: Pandemic has so far brought out the worst in us

For a proud nation built on mateship and self-reliance the battles of the supermarket aisles are an abject defeat and national disgrace.

The public shaming of shoppers fighting in the aisles over a diminishing supply of toilet rolls has uncovered a dark undercurrent of human behaviour. Picture: SAEED KHAN/AFP

PUBLIC panic-buying over the past week is much more than stupidly disappointing. It suggests a moral and ethical malaise at the heart of our national character. There has been similar panic in China, the US and in Italy, but until now Australians fancied that we possessed a moral fibre, a steely nature bequeathed by our brave pioneering forebears that somehow set us apart from of the turpitudes other nations.

Generations of Australians were raised to revere the stoic, resourceful, loyal but self-reliant bushman. In flood, fire or drought he never buckled and in war time he turned the privations of a defeat like Gallipoli into a legendary triumph. Did those blokes at Anzac Cove much complain about the lack of dunny paper or having to drink their tea black?

But today where is that indefatigable spirit that defined Gallipoli, Tobruk, Kokoda and Long Tan? The battles of Coles and Woolworths in March 2020 are an abject defeat and a national disgrace. Those who fought each other in the aisles for dunny paper and long-life milk should be ashamed.

The public shaming of shoppers fighting in the aisles over a diminishing supply of toilet rolls has uncovered a dark undercurrent of human behaviour.

As for the dopey profiteers seeking to sell toilet paper on Gumtree for $400 a roll. Get a life. Get a job. And may the virus be with you.

There are times when words fail. Weak, cowardly, contemptible, selfish, piss-poor and idiotic are not enough. Shakespeare, a grand insulter, might have said they should, “Think themselves accursed and hold their manhoods cheap”.

Of course, in post-modern times that wouldn’t cover the female shoppers, but ‘personhood’ is such an un-Shakespearean word.

So, let’s give up trying to define these awful people and attempt to understand them. There’s no use asking them. They don’t really understand their own behaviour which is typical of mob hysteria. The most common answer, “Well we heard the shops were running out of toilet paper so we came down to get as much as we can,” doesn’t really explain much except the shortage itself.

Back in the US in 2012 after the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting was it ever explained why there was a run on ammunition in gun shops?

Surely none of the panic buyers ever said, “Well we hear the gummint might take our bullets away so we come down outa the hills to buy all the ammo’ we can in case we might wanna shoot up another school someday.”

Understandably there has recently been a media panic buying of psychological opinions. The functioning of tiny demented brains cannot be understood by the tiny demented brain of a journalist like me, so let’s bring in the shrinks. “If everyone else on the Titanic is running for the lifeboats, you’re going to run too, regardless if the ship is sinking or not,” said Professor Steven Taylor from the University of British Columbia.

Dr Nicki Edwards from Queensland University of Technology suggested that “toilet paper symbolises control.’ In a time when people are afraid of losing control, Dr Edwards says, “Toilet paper feels like a way to maintain control over hygiene and cleanliness.”

My good mate and personal physician, Hobart medico Dr Syntax, is a little more direct. “Mate, the mask and dunny roll hoarders are bonkers. It’s as simple as that.” His prescription is blunt. “Tell them to get a bloody grip,” Dr Syntax thundered. And that’s the best advice I heard this week.

It is not just naive and bewildered locals who are behaving badly. People arriving infectious in Australia are ignoring the instruction to self-quarantine.

In the case of the student from Nepal who went out clubbing in River City we can only hope it was a matter of poor English language skills, rather than wilful disregard for his host community.

Premier Peter Gutwein has threatened to take a big stick to future transgressors which in the end might be all that some people will understand.

Meanwhile rent-seeking industries have put out their personal begging bowls. Some universities having converted our great institutions into third-rate degree shops for foreign students who can’t make Harvard, Oxford, or Melbourne, now seem to rate public health and safety way below the value of a mercantile dollar.

The Tourism Industry is another business giving what I hope is a false impression of turning a convenient blind eye to the pandemic. But in the end, public health is about you the public. Do you want River City to accept cruise liners, those so-called ‘floating Petri dishes’ which are increasingly unwelcome everywhere else?

It’s worth millions in tourism dollars apparently, but the over-worked staff at the woefully under equipped Royal Hobart Hospital must be freaking out.

The tourism rent-seekers are also gently floating the idea that if things get really crook, you the taxpayer (if you still have a job) should somehow come to their financial assistance. Here in Little Cuba the word ‘private enterprise’ has never been fully understood. Even if you make spectacular profits in good times somehow there’s a feeling of entitlement to taxpayer support when times are not so good.

That is a great example of Tasmanian Socialism; privatise the profits and socialise the losses.

Clearly some people misunderstand the term ‘private enterprise’. Having cleaned up in the Australian Tourism Awards the Tasmanian industry really should have more confidence in its own ability to take the rough with the smooth.

Finally, the other day down Dodge City way, it seriously rained. Until now even the pig-face has been dying on the dunes and the water carriers have been very busy making their hay while the sun shines.

But now, come a very ‘rainy day’, I suggested to ‘Tex’ who has been filling my depleted tanks for the past year that the breaking of the drought might be a good excuse for him to apply for government assistance. “Mate, everyone else is doing it,” I told him.Tex replied with the only sign of old-fashioned Australian decency I have heard all week. “Mate, I would never do that. I’ll take a few weeks holiday and if it doesn’t stop raining, I’ll go back to my old trade as a welder.”

Good on you Tex. Your water is worth bottling.