This year so far, we've projected a very strange image of who we are.

First, it was fires and then floods. Next, we had Kylie Minogue advertising an Australia that hadn't existed for decades. We've abandoned international students, who now have to rely on charity. Australia used to have an image as clean, clear, beautiful, kind, fun. A place you'd want to call home. But years of government inaction about climate change has made it far less appealing (and how weird is it that Fiona Kotvojs, Liberal candidate for Eden-Monaro, cannot make the link between the shocking summer bushfires and climate change?).

For our next trick, it looks like we have decided to brand ourselves as coronavirus. Sharp move, huh? The country which managed to more or less avoid a huge COVID-19 pandemic is now branding itself with what looks like a sparkly coronavirus badge. It's even got AU across the middle.

Let me explain.

Earlier this week, the imagery to used to promote Australia as a "brand" to international markets was revealed. According to Mumbrella, Australia's National Brand Advisory Council put the recommendation to the government that Australia shouldn't use the boomerang kangaroos we know and love because it would "simply reinforce what people already knew about us".

The new symbol, a weird, exploding circular image, is meant to represent the golden wattle, the symbol of our land. Instead, it's a malevolent sparkling COVID-19, just like the ones we see on the ABC 7pm news behind the presenters as they introduce the next pandemic horror show. Stamped in the middle is AU, to signify Australia but also gold. Because we are gold.

The council admitted the image won't be "immediately recognisable internationally", but basically, people would get used to it.

Then, of course, we heard it cost $10 million. Which seems like a lot of money. Then we heard that the green and yellow kangaroo symbol was headed for the knackery, and would be replaced by the exploding wattle coronavirus symbol.

Turns out that the story, first leaked to News Corp, isn't the complete picture. Surprise.

The green and yellow kangaroo will continue, albeit updated. The green will be darker, and the yellow transformed into gold. The coronavirus symbol ... well, yeah, it definitely looks COVID-y - but then it was designed before we saw those images on every single screen. And there are multiple renditions of the logo itself, some of which look less like an infectious disease.

Is it ugly? Depends who you ask. Dee Madigan, creative director of Campaign Edge and regular Gruen panellist, likes it. She says the kangaroo logo wasn't doing us any favours.

"Australians are seen as happy-go-lucky; and the kangaroo is a little bit negative, flippant and whimsical. It lacks sophistication and it reminds people how far away we are," she says.

And she adds that Australians moaning about the design should remember they aren't the target market.

"For those reasons, I am one of the defenders of the new logo and I wouldn't normally be in favour of anything the government does," she says.

So what about the cost?

Turns out that it might be a little at the high end, but for international research and logo design, it is not too far out of the ballpark.

"Any government body will pay a premium that other businesses wouldn't pay," she says.

And who made the final decision?

The folks on the National Brand Advisory Council include, among others, Andrew Forrest, chair of Fortescue Metals Group; Wesley Enoch, currently the director of the Sydney Festival; Bob East, chair of Tourism Australia (which pulled the remarkably tonedeaf Matesong campaign); and Edwina McCann, editor in chief of Vogue Australia, among her many other responsibilities.

McCann says there was extensive research done to find a brand that would coexist with the kangaroo.

"Nobody was rejecting the kangaroo, but Australia has never had a national brand," she says.

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This was a surprise to me. I thought the kangaroo was it. McCann says it has always been aligned with what we manufacture or grow - but never attached to any of our ideas, nor our people. This, of course, makes sense - to try to promote our people, our intellectual property, our big ideas.

McCann says we must promote our country as gold standard, because it is. She says the new branding is beautiful, and I'm going to have to take her word for it. She's a design genius, and I'm just a person who sees the coronavirus around every corner. McCann urges me to think of tiny little flecks of gold dust on every glorious thing we do. WiFi! The HPV vaccine! Cochlear implants! Education!

Then the both of them, McCann and Madigan, remind me that for years, New Zealand used the kiwi as its main symbol. Now it's more likely to be the silver fern, which I'd argue is far more readily identifiable; and crystallises the New Zealand way of life - a natural, clean, sparkling environment. And sometimes you see the koru, a fern about to unfurl. Gorgeous as it is, and recognisable as it is, we can't have it, just as we can't have Jacinda. Shame. So we have gold wattle instead of silver ferns. Clemenger BBDO Sydney worked with Indigenous design consultancy Balarinji to create the gold burst, and I hope it convinces me soon. But now I've got a better picture of why we needed a different way to promote Australia.

With a slight rewrite, Monty Python was prescient: "You can stick it in a bottle or you can hold it in your hand.

"This here's the wattle, the emblem of our land."