Covid-19 Vaccine Passport for Entering Businesses and Working is a Terrible Idea

Saturday Morning Radio Alarm

Saturday mornings used to be a relaxing time. The radio would turn on to wake me up with Jack Tame on Newstalk ZB talking about something trivial. Very little that was memorable, but that's what you want on a Saturday morning. Certainly you don't want something that is straight out of 1984 or a similar dystopian future.

When Jack Tame introduced his opinion on vaccination passports, I was initially disturbed. The disturbance then led to alarm which led to texting Jack just what I thought of his opinion.

John Key and the Wannabe Totalitarians

Sure, I've been hearing the same thing ever since John Key upset the narrative by coming out of hibernation. All and sundry and have been since espousing the benefits of a vaccination passport, the ultimate in protection, a bright, shining future where that the vaccinated will to be able to have full freedom of movement without fear of The Virus or Government Lockdowns. Those few that resist will eventually have no choice except to submit because they won't able to work or go to anywhere. So the story goes.

Government IT Projects

Initially I haven't been worried, because most government IT projects are slow and generally underestimated. Also, the changes involved in enforcing such draconian restrictions everywhere would be huge. They would require all businesses to be involved, therefore relying on mass compliance. Maybe this might get 50% off the ground, initially.

However, getting any further would rely on very bright people who tend to be somewhat contrarian and unlikely to want to help exclude New Zealanders from society if they don't have the correct medical treatments.

I don't want to go into more detail, not wanting help in any way, but am confident that democratic societies will struggle to continue down this path. Given that we don't have a recent history of people being carted off in the night to be never seen again, we just don't have the DNA for this level of social control.

Refusing a vaccine is a bit like smoking

Back to Jack, who started his opinion with his wonderful experience of logging onto an online database and to see his vaccination status for Covid-19. Even though the site was still under development, it could still show him he was fully vaccinated as of last week. The smugness virtually exuded through the radio waves.

Don't know how the vaccine does it, but it seem to have some sort of mind altering power, changing people who might have hesitated on the mandate vaccines for everyone path into slavish adherents.

This is what it seems to have done to Jack, who after talking about how vaccine passports were now going to be necessary for big summer events, continued with wanting them used almost anywhere; inferring that if you are not vaccinated against Covid-19, you should not be allowed to enter almost all premises.

Then we got to the thing that set me off, where he had to use a convoluted justification that involved the greater good of society while implying the unvaccinated are like smokers who have the ability to give him lung cancer.

The way I look at it, refusing a vaccine is a bit like smoking. As far as I’m concerned, you can choose to smoke a cigarette. The health impacts are well-documented, but that’s on you. However, the moment your choice impacts upon my health, the moment I’m sucking in second-hand smoke, we have a problem.
Your freedom to smoke a cigarette in a restaurant impacts my freedom not to get lung cancer.

The primary reason someone should get vaccinated is because the science is clear – vaccinations protect our health.
But a person’s choice not to get vaccinated impacts us all. If someone’s not prepared to contribute to the greater good of society, why should they benefit from a society’s collective rewards?

So much to unpack here.

The Smoking Analogy

Jack most likely used this analogy for several reasons.

Maybe he picked it up from John Key who referred to lung cancer deaths from smoking where you take the consequences from your lifestyle choices.

Maybe also because smokers in NZ used to be able to smoke in restaurants, so it is something many of us remember. Sometimes it was very unpleasant trying enjoy a night out in an environment where you were sitting near someone smoking. I remember what this was like in the 1980's, but would be surprised if Jack does, given his much younger age.

Anyway, I can concur with not wanting to be exposed to smoke indoors. However, a simple solution is to ask smokers to not smoke in the environment. Thus allowing the smoker into the restaurant, while keeping the annoying smoke out.

As an aside, my Dad died of smoking related lung cancer when I was in my early 20's. I grew up with him smoking at home and so far, no lung cancer here or in any of my siblings, two of whom smoke. Just being exposed to smoke is not going to give a person lung cancer.

The Virus is like Cigarette Smoke

Jack doesn't want to be exposed to is the virus, which is why he used the smoking analogy. The virus is like the smoke that he doesn't want to breathe in, which in his mind is likely to give him lung cancer, though hopefully I've managed to ease his mind that lung cancer is not that contagious.

Anyway, we have a way of dealing with smoking that has been accepted over time, that smokers do not smoke in restaurants in NZ. The smokers themselves are perfectly welcome to enter a restaurant, there is no mandate to ban smokers from restaurants yet, so here is where the analogy falls apart.

Vaccinated or not, you can't just choose whether or not to carry the virus. Maybe the vaccinated have less chance of carrying it (that is not clear from the latest studies - BMJ link), but if they do, you can't see them infecting others the way you can spot or smell a smoker in the act of smoking and demand that they take it outside.

A Vaccine Passport to enter a Restaurant is a lot like Fascism

Demanding that only vaccinated people can enter restaurants is a lot like barring smokers whether they are smoking or not. Smokers are not continuous chimneys that are always smoking and likewise the unvaccinated are not automatically always infected with Covid-19.

To ban the unvaccinated from restaurants because they might be infectious is where the fascism comes in. This banning of only the unvaccinated doesn't really stack up if the goal is to prevent transmission. Instead, it shows that the goal is to force compliance.

Greater good or good for Jack

Jack's final statement that if a person isn't willing to contribute to the greater good, then why should they benefit, is probably the most disturbing part of what he's written.

By virtue of our existence, I believe we all have the right to benefit from our society. Only the most heinous crimes, mostly involving murder, have typically excluded members, and then generally for a limited time. Otherwise, how we justify including those who are disabled or unwell or insane?

Reading between the lines of his opinion piece, it easy to see that the wider issues around what such a system would create aren't included in his definition of greater good.

No Real Debate

For such a potential fundamental change to NZ society, there has been very little public debate on the supposed greater good vs greater harm of segregating society by vaccination status.

It's not helped by the supposed political opposition wanting to go more totalitarian rather than less.

I'm in the strange position of feeling safer under the leadership of Jacinda Ardern than that of Judith Collins. [Edited 28 November 2021: Not anymore, Ardern has gone full jackboot and Collins changed her mind and then got rolled by the National Party]

Newstalk ZB excludes dissension

Where is Newstalk ZB's contribution to the greater good of society? Certainly not in encouraging debate.

On Jack's Saturday morning radio show, I know he received negative feedback to his vaccine passport opinion, because I texted my disagreement. I wasn't alone, because from the tone of his voice, it sounded like there were many who objected in a way that Jack couldn't quite deal with. He took the easy was out by only reading the positive feedback, with the proviso that he would read the ones that disagreed with him later. But later either never came or I missed that segment.

Jack Tame's treatment of dissenting opinions has been typical of the coverage Newstalk ZB has given to those objecting to the unfolding government Covid-19 vaccination push.

One of the late night hosts inferred on-air recently that he was uncomfortable with the direction the station was taking in regards to what opinions he could field from callers and which he could not. That's all he said, and maybe he was just thinking aloud as he was trying to come to terms with what he was told to do.

Though, just heard the talk host, Andrew Dickens, read out suggestions that everyone over five be vaccinated and his response was that doing so would be totalitarian! Interesting, so these hosts do have lines they don't want to cross yet. Or maybe he hasn't given the full memo.

What Next?

This is not just about Covid-19 and vaccination anymore. New Zealand is on the precipice of changing dramatically. The fact that debate is being squashed in the media should be very alarming to everyone.

New Zealand Conservative

Search This Blog