Since that ill-fated security guard decided to f*ck a whole city (as the satire mags so delicately put it), the Australian state of Victoria has descended back into lockdown.
Depending on where you live, this could mean anything from prison food to a second wave of Zoom meetings and a curtailing of frivolous outside activities (let alone dates).
Inconvenient at best, terrifying at worst. It’s also something Australians in other states should have empathy for: even if there is the odd joke circulating about how “once again Melbourne proves it’s two weeks ahead of Sydney” they should come from a place of (deeply buried) love.
As the almost disastrous Ruby Princess scandal showed, mistakes can happen anywhere, and how you are impacted by this pandemic will inevitably, to some degree, come down to the roll of a dice (preferably not Sydney’s Star Casino’s, but we digress).
Back to bad (whether it’s really bad or just badly received we’ll leave up to you) jokes from a place of warmness, though, check out the following Capri photo, yesterday posted to Instagram by DMARGE.
View this post on InstagramEveryone is welcome to join us in 2021… Everyone except Victoria. 📸 @stuartcantorphotography
The caption? “Everyone is welcome to join us in 2021… Everyone except Victoria.” Provocative? Sure. But what can we say: we were taken by the charm of lifestyle photographer Stuart Cantor (whose ‘Euro summer’ shots are enough to make your eyes bleed with jealousy, if not your mouth run with Melbourne hot takes).
Alas, the comment was not well received, with comments pouring in from (presumably) Victorians, most of which can be summed up by the middle finger emoji.
To be fair, some took it in their stride (stop it!!). But others were incensed:
“Having followed you for many years I would have thought you were better than that” read one, while “that’s almost humourless,” commented another.
The same incensed individual didn’t stop there:
“@dmarge wow, you talk about mental health on your website and serve this up.”
On a positive note, there were some ‘crying laughing’ emojis thrown in, as well as a couple of comments from people who simply missed foreign shores.
“Capri memories.”
Maybe there’s hope for humour after all.