“Absolutely disgraceful,” one woman said, not referring to anything specific about the protest. There were nods of agreement.

Last Friday at 2pm, a group of counter-protesters gathered on a zoom call to express their disagreement with what might potentially be happening at the anti-lockdown protests, hypothetically.

“They’re probably not wearing masks or socially distanced,” said a man.

“That could very well be the case,” another man agreed, “it’s definitely within the realm of possibility”.

They became silent. Pondering what was happening at the protests, in theory, like. The horror of men in full grey tracksuits, breathing orally, speaking directly into each other’s mouths.

“Does anyone have any idea how the protest is going?”

“No, no, I’m at home so I am”.

“Me too”.

“Yeah”.

It was silent again. One participant infected the call with a low droning sound like a printer running. It became so loud that the culprit appeared as speaker, mouth agape, looking at the screen with visible fear.

Before anyone could say “Zoom Etiquette” Professor Luke O’Neill, one of the speakers who agreed to address the gathering, arrived. Before he started his speech, he commended the novelty and ingenuity of the Zoom counter-protest, pointing out that if the event was held in person “we would all surely be dead in minutes”.

Stern nods of agreement from the participants.

The prominent immunologist gave a short presentation on vaccines or something. It allegedly featured a graph.

At the end of the talk, the moderator said: “Professor, thank you for joining us, before you go, have you any idea what might be happening the protest? Feel free to really speculate.”

“Oh, it’s probably a perfectly peaceful super-spreader event. Very uneventful I’d say. This will not be major news for multiple days.”

“Thank you, Professor.”

“Bye, Bye-Bye, Bye, Bye”

The host has ended this call.

The Badger