{"id":20854,"date":"2021-04-01T11:27:34","date_gmt":"2021-04-01T18:27:34","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.nexusnewspaper.com\/?p=20854"},"modified":"2021-04-05T10:10:27","modified_gmt":"2021-04-05T17:10:27","slug":"open-space-young-people-didnt-blow-it-horgan-dix-and-henry-did","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.nexusnewspaper.com\/newsite\/2021\/04\/01\/open-space-young-people-didnt-blow-it-horgan-dix-and-henry-did\/","title":{"rendered":"Open Space<\/em>: Young people didn\u2019t blow it\u2014Horgan, Dix, and Henry did"},"content":{"rendered":"

As of March 31, the majority of the island\u2019s rising COVID-19 cases are coming from the south island. If you\u2019re in this region and you\u2019re feeling guilty about upping your social interaction in the weeks prior to the most recent lockdown, don\u2019t. It\u2019s not your fault. The government told us we could, and then realized too late that they royally screwed up. That\u2019s bad enough, but John Horgan had the nerve to stand up and essentially blame his voters for it. Logistically, with spring break, they likely realized it was worth the risk in order to stimulate the economy.<\/p>\n

Horgan stood at the podium on March 30 and pleaded with people\u2014mostly those aged 20 to 39\u2014to not \u201cblow it.\u201d He then tweeted an apology to young people.<\/p>\n

This is a prime example of the complete failure in leadership that has plagued BC recently.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>
BC Premier John Horgan giving a COVID-19 update on March 29 (photo courtesy of the province of BC).<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The government probably has the stats that back up what we\u2019ve all come to know: that if you say okay to outdoor gatherings of up to 10, they might occasionally get up to 12; people might trickle inside for a moment if someone\u2019s thirsty or needs to use the washroom. It\u2019s human nature to do what we\u2019re told while seeing how much we can get away with within the parameters set for us.<\/p>\n

We didn\u2019t blow it. We didn\u2019t set the parameters. Horgan did. Adrian Dix did. Bonnie Henry did. We didn\u2019t change the orders that led to a rise in cases. Horgan did. Dix did. Henry did.<\/p>\n

We did not start the hysteria and premature excitement of vaccine rollout. Horgan did. Dix did. And, yes, Henry did, too.<\/p>\n

I\u2019m not saying we need to abandon all personal responsibility. Each of us has a responsibility to wear a mask, wash our hands, and follow the public-health guidelines. But the government knows we\u2019re tired, knows we\u2019re going to slip up more than we did this time last year, so, if they want to control cases, two weeks ago was the time to clamp down, file stay-at-home orders and lock down properly, not wait two weeks then lock down struggling small restaurants and workout studios. It’s a complete failure of governance.<\/p>\n

For most viruses, the majority of the population needs to be vaccinated before said vaccine actually results in a drop in numbers. The government knows this, and they likely know that up until the last couple of months, they had been doing a good job\u2014for the most part\u2014in governing us through this pandemic. But the last few weeks are a different story, and now we\u2019re all paying the price for their failure that they, to make matters worse, aren\u2019t taking responsibility for. As if that\u2019s not enough, they blamed us for it. When leaders stand up and tell us not to blow it, then publicly backtrack on statements that likely piss off the majority of voters, it means they are letting emotion run the province in that moment, and that they, like us, are tired, frustrated, and looking for someone to blame.<\/p>\n

If you\u2019re so tired and fed up that you\u2019re going to start babbling emotional nonsense from behind the podium with the whole province watching, stop. Because if you don\u2019t, trust in governance gets shattered.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s my opinion that Henry was likely overruled by the rest of her team when she okayed outdoor gatherings of up to 10 on March 11. That was the day that, at her daily COVID update, she broke down in tears and had to stop speaking. It was also two weeks ago. The chatter on the internet was that her tears looked real. I don\u2019t doubt that they were, because she knew this was going to happen. She\u2019s a doctor. Two weeks, after all, is the incubation period of the virus.<\/p>\n

So don\u2019t tell us we blew it, Horgan. You did.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

As of March 31, the majority of the island\u2019s rising COVID-19 cases are coming from the south island. If you\u2019re in this region and you\u2019re feeling guilty about upping your social interaction in the weeks prior to the most recent lockdown, don\u2019t. It\u2019s not your fault. The government told us we could, and then realized […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":20864,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[9,14],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-20854","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-webexclusive","category-views"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nexusnewspaper.com\/newsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20854","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nexusnewspaper.com\/newsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nexusnewspaper.com\/newsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nexusnewspaper.com\/newsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nexusnewspaper.com\/newsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=20854"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.nexusnewspaper.com\/newsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20854\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":20857,"href":"https:\/\/www.nexusnewspaper.com\/newsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20854\/revisions\/20857"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nexusnewspaper.com\/newsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/20864"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nexusnewspaper.com\/newsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=20854"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nexusnewspaper.com\/newsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=20854"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nexusnewspaper.com\/newsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=20854"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}