Is this a portent of what lies ahead here?  Power-mad leaders in Western ostensibly democratic nations seem to be enamored of the controls over their own citizenry they seized when the Chinese virus first hit.  Even as the death toll from COVID variants declines as transmissibility increases (following the normal pattern of virus mutation), some nations resort again to the heretofore unthinkable notion of quarantining the healthy majority, not the sick.

And now, military forces are being called in to supplement police, who feel unable to contain the popular resistance.

The left-wing Guardian newspaper is upset, mainly because racial minorities are going to be affected in New South Wales, Australia's most populous state:

The deployment of troops to enforce Sydney's lockdown could alienate the community and fuel vaccine hesitancy, particularly in the hard-hit western suburbs where many Indigenous Australians and migrants and refugees live, community groups and residents are warning.

Three hundred defence personnel are preparing to be deployed on Sydney's streets on Monday after New South Wales police made a formal request for their help. They'll undergo training at the weekend before joining police on the streets as they enforce a sixth week of lockdown.

Interestingly, the article makes no mention of European-heritage Aussies and their reactions to the military being called up to keep them locked in their homes, except this:

Another resident from Bankstown, who asked not to be named, said people were going to be frightened to see soldiers on the street: "If the military knocks on doors, people are going to be scared and angry.

"It absolutely will not have the desired effect. You can't have the desired effect on people who've been ignored by the government for 20, 30 years. The government is trying to help them — you think they're going to believe that any more?"

He said residents in western Sydney felt as though they were being treated like "uneducated, barbaric western suburbs heathens".

"When you look at the response to outbreaks in the northern beaches or eastern suburbs, those communities were approached like they were reasonable and civil.

"But when it comes to us, we're treated like uneducated, barbaric western suburbs heathens, that need to feel the full brute strength of the law."

 It is unclear from the article if troops are being deployed solely in Western suburbs, but judging by photos of last weekend's mass demonstrations in Sydney (and elsewhere), it is mostly Caucasian Aussies up in arms against the lockdown:

YouTube screen grab.

Meanwhile, Sweden, which never locked down, continues to have a far better track record on COVID fatalities than the United States.

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