So, Covid is still a thing and my city (among many others) are facing curfews, lockdowns, and many many more restrictions… which is great. I’m all for that. It’s not the best for my mental health but it certainly is better than being able to go to a bar with friends at the small cost of human lives. There are a lot of issues that I have with the government regarding the current school politics, the forced tests, the constant switching between distance-learning and split classes studying together in a classroom, etc. I hate it. I don’t get it. I feel bad for the children and the parents but that’s a whole different topic, I guess. Today I wanted to talk about #allesdichtmachen (#closeupeverything) which has been trending on Twitter today because some German actors decided to mock the pandemic, “satirically” commenting on the government’s pandemic restrictions. This was directed by a director from Munich and 50-something actors uploaded videos on a YouTube channel where they say stuff like “You need to close all of the stores, including groceries, so that not only our souls starve” or “Without fear, I have fear, so please give us more fear”, etc.

Freedom to be cynical?

It’s apparently supposed to be ironic and quirky and satire and whatever but nobody sees that. The far-right and covid-deniers are applauding and using this to fuel their own narratives. Conspiracy-theorists count these actors as their supporters to gain more traction. These narratives that these actors “ironically” were painting is being used to fuel similar narratives. It all sounds the same. They’re mocking measures that save lives while ridiculing the efforts of our government. Sure, our government isn’t the best in the world and sure, it’s not going well right now. Sure, this pandemic has been going on for ages now… but effectively, they don’t publish troll videos where they mock the lives lost, which makes them better than these actors, in my opinion. These actors are “concerned about the loss of culture” in the form of theatre, movies, shows, etc. They are, to put it bluntly, concerned about not being able to fatten their pockets. Established actors are concerned about not being able to make more money by going to work. They felt the need to publish these videos and now the backlash is coming and they blame it on cancel culture and they help the far-right and covidiots paint this picture of the journalists, social media, and the government being controlled. These far-right politicians and covidiots say that we live in a dictatorship when these actors literally wouldn’t have been able to do this if we weren’t in a democracy. 

And yes, we very much live in a democracy so everyone is allowed to have opinions… that just doesn’t mean that everyone should say them out loud. Freedom of speech doesn’t entail freedom of consequences. If you think that your career is more important than the lives of thousands, then you can say that out loud. Anytime! You can say it and shout it and whisper it and mumble it. You can rap and sing it, you can add it to your prayer and publish it. That’s what democracy is about, after all. BUT and that’s a big “but” in capital letters as you may have noticed… BUT that doesn’t mean that you can get away with it and weasel your way out. Other people also have opinions and can & will share them. If they don’t like what you said, they’ll say it out loud. They may be harsh at times and insulting but effectively, it’s their freedom. They have that freedom of speech to call you out on your bullshit. You can fucking say what you fucking want. And the media that is also being criticised here apparently only says what the government wants them to say… but there are more than enough interviews, reports and news shows criticising the government, so I don’t know into what hole they stuck their head into… but there is plenty of evidence that the media isn’t saying the same things over and over again.

The FAZ (a newspaper over here in Germany) said that “Freedom of speech also means freedom of failed satire”, which is very appropriate and very true. These actors say that it’s satire when it’s essentially just facepalm material. Satire is supposed to criticise something in a comical and maybe sarcastic way. Satire also is very hard to pull off, which is why not everyone does it. These actors don’t clarify if this is their actual stance on things and in most of these videos that I’ve watched it came across like they actually meant it. Their “irony” and “satire” comes across as cynicism. It’s not helping anyone. Nobody asked for people to be cynical about it. Cynics are the assholes that make the pandemic harder to bear. 

Let’s not be assholes.

Covid-19 is serious. The people that die from it die horribly, practically drowning on land because their lungs fill with lots of moisture. At least, that’s what a friend told me who actually works as a surgeon’s assistant and who sees these deaths with his own eyes nearly daily. At the same time, people that got it and healed from it may still suffer from respiratory issues that will cause them a lot of problems in the long run, which is why it’s so important to fucking stay at home and wear masks and limit social interactions and stuff. This is why it’s so fucking important to fight covid and to fight the pandemic. It’s fucking important to fight with the government against this disease that has taken more than 80.000 lives in Germany instead of fighting the government that as far as I know hasn’t killed that many people in recent years, or has it? I don’t know. These actors probably have something to say about that. At least I believe they may have to say something about that since one of the 50 videos essentially is about that actress beating up people in public when they don’t wear masks because she wants to do it before the police do it. Oh, that’s so funny. It’s so quirky! Wow, top-class satire. Very funny and good. That showed the government! Yup. Clearly. 100%.

Not.

Jan Böhmermann who’s actually quite good at satire most of the time tweeted a documentary showing how the pandemic looks like in an intensive care unit in Berlin. That’s a video to watch instead of 50 cringy videos that basically say nothing. For me, it feels like I’ve not been leaving the house for a few months or something… but no, this is very real and it’s still going on. That documentary made me realise how real this still is. That documentary gave me insights on how fucking bad this shit still is. Those videos were hard to watch because I can only deal with a tiny bit of stupidity per day. I can’t deal with this much stupidity all at once.

Anyways, these were some thoughts on the situation. I’d rather have a longer lockdown than fewer friends, relatives and neighbours to hug when this is over. I mean, this will be over eventually and being cynical about it isn’t going to help. It’s gonna make things worse because these covidiots will make their own narrative relevant through this and more and more people may start to not listen to the government anymore and they may end up risking more lives… and then this goes on for longer… and eventually, there will be a coup… and then the world goes to shit… and then comes freedom in the form of the robot uprising but I guess I probably won’t see that anytime soon… the robot uprising would be better than a fucking civil war lead by idiots that are too stupid to wear masks. Man, Covid sucks. Covidiots suck. 

So, uh, stay safe and be kind to others. Don’t post cringy videos that make you look like a covid-denier or a covidiot or whatever you wanna call it. Cause that’d be silly.

Cheers!