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Town-hoppers Hog Supplies

Could those doing the town-hopping thing be seen as akin to looters?

I think so, despite paying for what they are taking, because they are flocking to smaller towns and villages, from further afield, and buying up everything they can get their hands on in the wake of the Coronavirus scare, and that is really unfair. It is also very wrong.

We already know about the toilet paper nonsense, it’s happening here just like everywhere else, and many of the people stripping supplies from my local supermarket have come from Sydney and surrounds and for some reason believe they are justified in coming to our small village and emptying the supermarket shelves, at which point some may then go home. But many will opt to stay on, thinking they will be safer from the virus here.

Except we don’t want them here.

Many locals are now being confronted with depleted shelves, every day, and apparently it is because those who have turned up from outside of the area are waiting at the supermarkets at 7am for the doors to open, and then stripping whatever has been delivered the evening before, leaving little, if anything, left for the local population. They are doing this every day! We haven’t seen toilet paper here for weeks. Yes, it has been coming in overnight but is all bought out in about twenty minutes, because people who have travelled into the village are stocking up here before they leave to go home, but many are making no move to leave just yet, but continue to shop up a storm.

But just how much toilet paper, rice, pasta and other non-perishable food items do they need? And how about the local population who don’t need these grasping out-of-town travellers here in the first place? Why do these people believe they are more entitled to the local supermarket’s stock than the people who actually live here? It’s disgraceful!

But it’s not just here. This is the story in small towns and villages up and down the coast as well as inland. They have been invaded by city people wanting to stock up on far more supplies than they need and then decide to sit the virus out in the regional area they are depleting. If they weren’t behaving so selfishly, they may be welcome, but they come, they strip our resources and stubbornly refuse to move on. Those that have gone home have done so with their vehicles loaded to bursting point with what they have stripped from local outlets, leaving local populations struggling just to get the basics. It is incredibly selfish.

I can see riots happening in the near future over this. We have already seen altercations in supermarkets between shoppers with loaded trolleys, determined not to allow a single packet of toilet paper go to someone else, and getting violent over it. It is going to happen over food lines and inevitably, those with the fullest trolleys are often the perpetrators because they refuse to acknowledge that others also have a right to buy. Honestly, there is enough for everyone. Supermarkets in Australia are not threatening closures and product lines are in good supply, so there is absolutely no need to go on a rampage through the aisles or to be lashing out at others just trying to do their normal food shop. There shouldn’t be shortages, and there wouldn’t be if the panic buyers would just stop, so we could all get what we need and be done with it. Simple! But they won’t stop. Honestly, the town-hoppers really need to pack up and head back home.

Seriously, JUST GO HOME!

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The Toilet Tissue War

Forget the blue chip shares. Forgo the usual moneymakers. Looks like toilet tissue is set to be Next Big Thing and those who have emptied supermarket shelves in their headlong determination to stockpile sufficient bulk packs of it, enough to see them well into the next decade, may be warming to the idea that they could be sitting on a fortune! But let’s hope they aren’t, because they don’t deserve to profit from their greed.

It would have to be something like that because why else would people be loading shopping trolleys with far more toilet tissue than they will ever need for a long, long time?  Because a global crisis inevitably brings out the worst in people and it becomes an every-man-for-himself situation. Hence the feral coming to the fore down in the toilet roll aisle in supermarkets all over Australia as some members of communities decide they are more entitled to household staples than others, and are prepared to come to blows over a packet of toilet rolls. That they have already overbought is beside the point. They want more.

Which inevitably has gone viral and I am pretty sure Australia has become the laughing stock of the planet as a result. Like, I am almost embarrassed to admit I live here at the moment!

I think the “It’s all mine! Mine!” mindset initially surfaced during the bushfire crisis. Emergency Service organisations repeatedly advised people to forgo their coastal vacations over the 2019/2020 Christmas/New Year period because of the fire threat, and because the small towns and villages along the coast would be trying to see to the safety and wellbeing of their own. They did not need to have to deal with an influx of tourists as well. So those in the big cities ignored the advice, headed to the NSW South Coast and were trapped by the inferno. Then they systematically cleaned out supermarkets, petrol and water supplies and left the locals floundering. Then they stayed on, despite repeated requests from emergency services to please leave, as they were placing to much strain on the local infrastructure and services.

I had never seen a supermarket made so devoid of stock, and in so short a time, as I did in my local supermarket on New Year’s Eve. People just raced in and cleared shelves of everything, whether they needed it or not, and the rest of us were left to try and manage. I’m guessing that mindset is still alive and well if what I’m seeing now is any indication.

But toilet rolls? And now facial tissues? Yes, those who have missed out on toilet rolls have resorted to boxes of tissues. Or maybe it’s the same people? Who would know, but laughably, the next thing after toilet tissue and facial tissues has been paper towel and that’s so not a good thing. Those resorting to repurposing paper towel as toilet paper are going to have a big plumbing problem because paper towel is not designed to be flushed down a toilet. It will clog. The toilet paper crisis will probably end up being a boom time for plumbers as a result, so at least there’s something positive. Sort of.

Meanwhile, non-perishable food items with a long shelf life remain stubbornly on supermarket shelves! Sure, I know some people have been stockpiling food in the event that lines may become scarce for a while, at least until after the Corona Virus has done its World sweep and gone away,  but wouldn’t you have thought that food would have been the first thing to get the Big Rush? Before toilet tissue? Seriously, that was the first thing to cross my mind and that’s what I expected to see. People need to eat and yes, if they eat they will sooner or later need to take a trip to the bathroom, but if you ran out of toilet tissue you can find away around it. But you can’t easily find a way around running out of food.

Thing is, none of this stockpiling is even necessary. Supermarkets are not threatening to close. Toilet tissue manufacturers have not stopped production or shut down. Supermarket trucks are still doing their usual rounds with their usual deliveries, which include toilet tissue. There is no shortage, except for the one in supermarkets created by people who think they are entitled to clean out the supplies in one foul swoop. Supermarkets mostly have invoked a limit per customer but they should have done that sooner, and have someone there to suss out if family members were posing as individual shoppers because some people will do that too.

Where’s the point of having a room full of toilet rolls and facial tissues if the pantry is nigh on empty? Even if you were to sell some of your toilet roll stockpile at an exorbitant price , if the food has all been bought up while you were brawling in the toilet roll aisle, what are you going to spend the money on? More savvy types stocked up on canned, bottled and dry goods with Use By dates of late 2020 or into 2021. Those guys will get around the lack of toilet tissue but, unfortunately for the toilet tissue hoarders, may well be unwilling to trade food for it with the likes of you!

Especially if you were the one who punched them out over a six pack of Sorbent when all this nonsense started.

And it is nonsense.