Apartheid in Austria?

In 1941, Jewish communities were rounded up, segregated from the rest of society and forced, in a vile and humiliating exercise by the Nazis, to wear yellow badges on their clothes. Those in Austria who oppose the vaccine today are accusing the government of subliminally, at least, doing the same to them.

As I believe strongly in democracy and the freedom of individuals to have control over their own bodies and decision-making, I deplore the decision by the country. All the same, to make comparisons with the atrocities inflicted on the Jewish communities around the world at the time of the Second World War, is perhaps a stretch too far.

As Covid infections surge in the country where many of the electorate - 35 per cent at least - have bucked the trend to have double vaccinations and boosters, the government has decided to enforce strict lockdown on the un-jabbed and future sinister sounding penalties. Is this genuinely the right way to go?

Naturally, there’s not a lot of logic going on here. Firstly, many of those with infections have already been double-jabbed and those diehards against the vaccine are digging their heels in even more, staging protests and threatening to cause mayhem on the streets today. Could a Covid Civil War beckon? Two million angry people roaming about the country doesn’t sound like a great idea to me.

Meanwhile in France, there are countless demonstrations being staged across the country, many in solidarity with the unvaccinated in Austria. There is a lot of momentum here and a mounting fury about state control and the new totalitarian order taking over the world. This is deeply troubling, whichever side of the debate one takes.

My husband, as a Septuagenarian, will be offered his booster today and as ever I will worry. On the one hand, I hope it will offer him protection, but on the other I fret about any effect it might have on his health. None of us know the long-term effects of this vaccine. All we can do is to have faith in the science and hope that it will not prove detrimental to our future health and that of our children and future generations to come.

BBC Rats leaving the ship

News of the departure of tough, no nonsense, journalist Andrew Marr from the BBC, marks the beginning of an exodus from the corporation. Marr has served for 21 years at Auntie and is now leaving to take up a lucrative position at LBC Radio and Classic FM, and can we blame him?

Nadine Dorries has now been appointed the Cerberus at the gates of the BBC and she will take no prisoners. I am sure that with her intervention the BBC license fee will soon die the death and the new rule on impartiality will see many other presenters leaving in droves.

In truth, I have not watched television for years so cannot really comment on the current roster of presenters. However, I recently made friends in London laugh when I asked them how they could endure watching the giggling antics of Holly Willoughby and Phillip Schofield on the BBC’s breakfast programme. They gently informed me that both worked for ITV. Sometimes, it’s great to live in a vacuum.

Free Britney

At long last, enduring pop sensation, Britney Spears, has been allowed to sever ties with her sinister-sounding and controlling father, Jamie Spears, who was granted a conservatorship in 2008 which controlled her life and finances.

Admittedly, Britney Spears appeared to have had her demons at the time but the conservatorship carried on for far too long and almost destroyed her life. She is now nearly 40 years old and has in effect been mummified in a contract that has given her no rights, freedoms or ability to control her own finances. I have been furious on her behalf.

How dare her father abuse a position of trust in this way? Now that Britney is free, thanks largely to her legion of loyal fans who had petitioned constantly for her release from this barbaric conservatorship, I hope she will do what she wants with her own money and her own time. If she blows every penny of her fortune, that is, after all, her decision.

JK Rowling out in the cold

It’s sad and sobering to think that author JK Rowling who created the famed Harry Potter series of books which spawned a massive film franchise, will not be allowed to attend the 20th anniversary of the premiere of the first film.

Foolishly, the author dared to dabble in Trans politics and was immediately cancelled. Why any savvy, well known person with a desire for self-preservation would voice an opinion of any kind these days, surely defies belief?

Most of the cast will be in attendance but the woman who made them all rich is now a pariah of her own making, hated and vilified for being a feminist who claimed that women were biologically different from transexuals.

I think she made a huge error of judgement but at the same time, the fickle behaviour of stars Emma Watson, Rupert Grint and Daniel Radcliffe, all of whom made a fortune thanks to her books, is disappointing. All of them could have agreed to differ and denied sharing her views, but to cancel her completely is shocking and ungrateful, to say the least.

Anna Nicholas’s seventh Mallorca travel title, Peacocks in Paradise, is now available to purchase at all good UK bookshops & via amazon. In Majorca it’s available at Universal Bookshop, Alameda shop in Soller and the Atelier in Fornalutx and in Palma bookshops.