As of today, six people over 70 have died in Australia and the entire country’s economy is locking down like a line of dominoes.

This is playing out fast and more than a disease to be terrified of, it seems like the real fallout here will be economic.
Indulge me while I theorise about how it could be a thundering wave of much needed change…. A tenuous house of cards that is only just beginning to fall… upon which afterwards nothing will be the same again.

The virus is real, and it’s not a conspiracy even if it’s source is somewhat dubious.

What’s even more real is that a small group of privileged people financially oppressing most of the world, sitting on stacks of worthless cash they keep printing, is literally crumbling before us. Corporations living on debt, while superannuation companies gamble with our retirement funds which are mandatory to invest in stocks, and bankers not held accountable by the real world. All are royally fucked.

The time of allowing different rules of play for Them and Us is over.

Right now much of the world is systemically going into self isolation.

A certain percentage of the workforce is transitioning to working from home. More will soon follow.
However the service industry which makes up much of Australia, is instantly unemployed overnight. Giant industries like entertainment, sporting events, hospitality, arts and culture, all at an indefinite standstill until further notice. Do you notice that no one is putting a projected timeline on things? That’s because they don’t have any idea. Two weeks, eighteen months? Place your bets.

How is our welfare system going to cope when even our click-and-collect supermarket shopping has buckled under the pressure?

The current system is just not set up for this.

The majority of individuals have no work, no potential income and hence, no money to spend. All the renters and mortgage holders won’t be paying. It feels inevitable that without major national intervention, the banks will collapse, because they have lent more money than they ever had to lend. House. Of. Cards.

Wall Street has fallen, way lower than the crash in 2008. The debt based economic system has been broken since then. The bottom is falling out of this leaky boat none of us signed up for willingly.

Trump just froze mortgages and evictions, and said every household would get $1000 per fortnight, basically echoing a universal basic income. If he does something positive about healthcare… Well… I’m speechless already.

New York has the national guard distributing daily rations of food and medicines.

Spain has rid its hospital system of privatisation overnight, it’s now nationalised.

So many changes that we were told repeatedly by those in power “are just too hard to implement” are happening rapidly now.

A financial system most of my community has not easily integrated into or actually actively resisted…. is cracking, breaking and melting like the Wicked Witch of the West.

This system has fucked the little people for 50 years. It has strangled us with inflation, with fractional reserve liquidity, with assets that don’t mean anything.

There are enough houses in Australia for everyone. So stop paying rent, stop paying your mortgage.. even if you are still working, if you want to help enact global change.. let’s strangle them back.

The best thing we can do, is absolutely fucking nothing financially.

The political obsession around complete denial of recessions is a driver for ridiculously cowboy monetary policy. The central bankers have dropped rates way too far, in Europe apparently they are negative now. You actually pay the banks to hold your money. Insanity.

Right now we are in the liminal space, where I’m listening to dystopian ads on mainstream radio about instant micro loans, and an email address you can write to to get a packet of basic supplies including toilet paper, on roads totally avoid of traffic at rush-hour. How quickly it has all fallen apart. I am aware it is going to get much worse before it gets better.

However, on the other side of this we need
– to reduce debt (at all levels)
– to shorten our supply chains
– to secure our borders (from capital rather than people)
– to localise our manufacturing base

I think we need to start talking about how.

The global strike we didn’t quite get with Occupy is happening this minute. I’m excited at the idea of everyone being unemployed at once, despite the many real fears it is bringing up around food and housing security. Suddenly everyone is around for dinner. Emissions going down worldwide. As if we haven’t had the technology to do remote working this whole time.

So… Aside from staying home, and connecting with our community, this is what I think we should do.

Spend nothing.
Panic garden instead of panic buying.
Local economy, trade economy.
Remember : We can do this, we lived like this for thousands of years.

A travel ban for the next 12 months in or out of Australia is looking highly likely.

ITS A LOCK IN PARTY AUSTRALIA.
All our warehouse self sustainable community skills born out of the 90’s prep for Y2K kick in NOW.

I have no idea what the new world looks like, but I truly think we are in the middle of the storm of change most of us have not-so-secretly hoped for forever.

For the first time, I see an opportunity for us all when the dust settles. For those of us who don’t have six houses, live beyond our means, for those of us who always inherently knew this “dream” was a scam not to be trusted.

It’s time to adapt and dream up what we want the future to look like.

Anyhow I’m self isolating at home, so a gal can dream can’t she?
Who’s with me?

💛