It was as if our nation was in its early 20s, young at heart and inherently friendly to everyone, while regularly having a tongue in cheek go at those we liked best.

But we appear to have crashed headfirst into early onset midlife crisis, and the whole thing has just imploded.

Only we didn't buy a Ferrari and leave our spouse for a younger model - we bought a third-hand Tarago and whacked a stick figure family of stickers on the back window.

I'm not sure what has gone wrong, or when it all went wrong, but something definitely happened to us.

Once upon a time we were so eager for people to come and join the party over here, our government developed a Populate or Perish policy to bring in people post-World War II.

Whereas now, we are fighting to keep people desperately fleeing war-torn lands out. We used to be known for our fair spirit, especially on the sporting field, and now we are known the world over as cricket cheats.

We seem consumed with refusing to up the welfare "allowance" of those in need and we're suddenly worried about drug use ... but only for those who can't afford drugs, not those who are employed and addicted.

Kids used to play in the streets and neighbours used to know each others' names: it used to take a village to raise a child, now the village seems hellbent on judging the parents.

Recently, it was suggested that parents on welfare payments with kids who break the law should lose their payments.

Given that the ABS tells us the number of young offenders is actually trending down across the country, I question whether the purpose behind that proposal was actually to impact youth offending or the cost of welfare payments.

Just like many of us in the middling age bracket, we are all conscious of our budgets and "unnecessary spending," after all.

We are also putting our head in the sand with regards to new technology and changing science around climate and the benefits of moving to renewable energy sources.

We are sticking to "oh but we've always done it that way" with a side serving of "but my friends (from mining, oil and gas industries) said coal is a good investment."

If Scott Morrison starts asking who left all the lights on, demanding we turn them all off while reminding us that we don't live in a tent and need to close all the doors or we're grounded as the answer to climate change, I'm packing up and going home.

However, I think the saddest part of this aging process is the loss of our sense of community; the very mateship that made our country so strong, so enviable to others across the globe.

Australia wasn't just the country for laidback, stress-free partying and fun (although it was that), it was about sticking by each other, literally giving your mate the shirt off your back if he needed it more than you.

With the exception of a resurgence during the bushfire crisis, there's been inklings of the loss of this mateship.

Over the most recent few years, we have seen ourselves led to the battleground by the media and the political puppet strings it wields to fight to the death with our brothers and sisters over unemployment, welfare, disability, penalty rates, raising Newstart ... the list goes on.

But nothing has demonstrated how much we've lost touch with who we used to be - and who we used to be to each other - than the videos of people fighting over bloody toilet paper in the supermarket aisles, hoarding hand sanitiser and bulk buying tissues in response to the outbreak of just 80 cases of coronavirus across all of the country.

Enough is enough, Australia. I'd like to speak to the manager.

Zoë Wundenberg is a careers consultant and un/employment advocate at impressability.com.au