The forty stories in this book answer that question for a wide variety of mostly West Coast kiwis: teachers, nurses, midwives, tattoo artists, retirees, writers, and many others. What they all have in common is that sooner or later they found themselves on the wrong side of the official narrative. How did they end up losing sympathy with the government's covid strategy - one of the harshest in the world? What did it cost them as a result? These stories tell the truth, in all its rawness, of lockdowns, mandates, MIQ and masking madness, but also of the 'sweet uses' of the ugly face of adversity. Here for the first time is the human face of New Zealand's politics of kindness. Here is the unofficial history of the covid crazy years.