Generic Virus Thread

[Seat68]

My feeling with other countries is that they have eased and the populace think well its not ended so we have to be really careful. The UK, its eased and we think **** it lets wrestle naked and drink flagons of ale. We see easing of restrictions and think well thats the end of it. 

[blandy]

1 hour ago, chrisp65 said:

I thought it odd all along that I can buy paint and tiles but not onion sets or toms.

Why was painting considered more important than growing your own vegetables.

It’s not like the food supply chain was a rip roaring success.

 

I can paint the spare bedroom in June, or July, or October. Getting food crops in the ground kinda has to happen now.

I may be wrong, but I was told that DIY stores were allowed to open to sell stuff for essential repair and maintenance of homes, but not for cosmetic fettling, or gardening, or barbecues or garden furniture etc.

of course in practical terms, and I did this, when I went to buy putty to repair a leaking door surround, I also bought paint to repaint the door...so yeah, ways and means I guess.

[Genie]

18 minutes ago, chrisp65 said:

I think Scotland and Wales almost always have their man person up there.

 

Thought so.

From what I’ve seen Merkel seems to be doing majority of the German ones, and Trump the US ones.

Boris does have exceptional delegation skills.

[VILLAMARV]

14 minutes ago, blandy said:

If that’s in part at least in response to my post, then I’ve absolutely no problem with your relative. I pigeon holed a bunch of 30, 40, 50, 60 year olds congregating around tables and chairs they’d set up in the streets. No social distancing, no respect for anyone. Just utterly flouting the law, celebrating not the coming of peace 75 years ago, but how “we” beat the Germans. I live in a Tory voting, Brexit town. That’s ok, people can vote how they want, but when they add anti foreigner, social irresponsibility on to that, they’re commemorating nothing but their own ignorance. Virus Brexity Words removed. Brexiters remainers who did like your relative- fair play. 

I assume you'd love Joyce, she's ace.

It was, in part, in response to anyone yesterday (and indeed the wider RL community) who engages in arguments that seek to reduce complex, diverse situations into the realm of identity politics and reductionism. Which in turn, plays into divide and rule, pick a side, polemics. Hardly a new phenomenon.

It was also, in part, in response to the post I quoted, that, perhaps more eloquently than me, managed to highlight the same distinction I was. Some people are arseholes. Some are not.

Horrible, hate filled, racist, nasty sections of our society exist. Of course they do. Look at wor Tommy (don't guys, don't look at wor Tommy in rl it's a conversational example). I, like many on here, judging by the comments and likes, suspect many of the flag waving types would have been outside yesterday, displaying a lack of empathy for others conga-ing or supping tins of cooking lager etc. If I stick my neck out, I might even go so far as to suggest that may well have been the majority. I'm not trying to stop you or anyone highlighting the ****wittery of these people.

But to conflate VE day participants with brexit voting habits is not a game I want to play. Maybe there's an element of truth to it sure. Maybe that's applicable in your town. Or indeed mine, or pontypandy (yes that's a fireman Sam joke in the middle of this longer than intended post). But it's lazy stereotyping to me, and ultimately serves to alienate people from real discussion and, more importantly, a willingness to participate in said discussions in future. We certainly can't tell from a photo. I'll leave that stuff to the Emily Thornberry's of the world.

I loved Mooney's what about the russians posts. Stick it to 'em with some historical facts they don't like that challenge their prejudice. But I'm concerned at the rise of this group think nonsense that we can dismiss people from all walks of life due to our own in built prejudices.

What about people in the forces, what about people with family in the forces, what about the elderly who lived it, what about Jews or travellers or homosexuals or other sections of society who may have their own nuanced reasons for wanting to celebrate something that has nothing to do with jingoism or racism or indeed brexit.

And on the other side of the argument, sure, brexit fatigue or euphilia whatever phrase @Awol used is a thing, but everyone's out celebrating the end of fascism? Don't make me laugh. As I said, I think the reality is somewhere in the middle of those/that argument myself.

But the group think and the dismissive nature towards 'the other' is really dangerous imho and as I've maintained over the last 5 years of the brexit distraction something I truly despise. 

Not all brexit voters are racist but all racists are brexit voters. Sure, but Mr Self himself understands the importance of the first 6 words in that popular phrase. The more we embed sound bites and perceptive fallacies into our consciousness though, the more we start to believe them. (Watch BJ specifically on this, he uses repetition ALOT). This is how effective propaganda is.

People, regardless of their politics, age or social group that were out not socially distancing yesterday are rather ignorant of the realities of the pandemic. I absolutely agree with that.

Tl:dr - take the high road.

[blandy]

6 minutes ago, VILLAMARV said:

But to conflate VE day participants with brexit voting habits is not a game I want to play. Maybe there's an element of truth to it sure. Maybe that's applicable in your town. Or indeed mine,

...

Not all brexit voters are racist but all racists are brexit voters. Sure, but Mr Self himself understands the importance of the first 6 words in that popular phrase.

I haven’t seen anyone do the former. At least for my part, I did more the second thing. The throbbers in the street by me were largely Brexit types. Not all the brexit types were breaking the law, and not all the lockdown breakers were brexiters. Like I say I live, pretty happily amongst them, talk to them and all the rest, but yesterday’s exceptionism and jingoism massively annoyed me given the covi situation.

[chrisp65]

22 minutes ago, blandy said:

I may be wrong, but I was told that DIY stores were allowed to open to sell stuff for essential repair and maintenance of homes, but not for cosmetic fettling, or gardening, or barbecues or garden furniture etc.

of course in practical terms, and I did this, when I went to buy putty to repair a leaking door surround, I also bought paint to repaint the door...so yeah, ways and means I guess.

Correct on both counts.

Quite rightly, they were kept open for essential repairs. Can’t have someone with no water or a rain coming in through the roof. But I know they were operating on just about anything can be essential. Plenty that I know just put in orders to do some general cosmetic fettling.

It was never going to be perfect, and it all worked as well as could be expected for the first few weeks. It’ll be increasingly vague now

 

In similar stylee, one of the cafes (Cariad) has now reopened on the Island with the strap line ‘coffee to die for’.

 

[VILLAMARV]

10 minutes ago, chrisp65 said:

In similar stylee, one of the cafes (Cariad) has now reopened on the Island with the strap line ‘coffee to die for’.

I just snorted tea out my nose, so thanks for that

Edited May 9, 2020 by VILLAMARV
Changed through to out in case people thought I was doing lines of tea to deal with the boredom

[bickster]

58 minutes ago, chrisp65 said:

I think Scotland and Wales almost always have their man person up there.

 

Certainly true for Scotland

[mjmooney]

38 minutes ago, bickster said:

Certainly true for Scotland

Harsh. More applicable to Northern Ireland. 

[bickster]

1 minute ago, mjmooney said:

Harsh. More applicable to Northern Ireland. 

That isn't human is it?

[bickster]

8 hours ago, bickster said:

Jesus wept, the horses have bolted, run at cheltenham, run at aintree and have been turned into glue and now we're closing the stable door

Sorry to be quoting myself but apparently you'll have used the glue making your own sympathy cards for someone you loved that died of Covid too

 

This isn't happening for another 3 weeks!

[OutByEaster?]

1 hour ago, bickster said:

This isn't happening for another 3 weeks!

Sorry, you lost me; what isn't happening for another three weeks?

[bickster]

9 minutes ago, OutByEaster? said:

Sorry, you lost me; what isn't happening for another three weeks?

The 14 day self isolation for anyone entering the country, you know that they should have done in March

[markavfc40]

Ice cream van has just stopped on my road for probably first time this year. Actually had us all looking out the window like you would if ambulance siren was coming from ambulance parked up road.

[Zhan_Zhuang]

Second-wave is going to be here soon enough.

The media have been whipping this up for over a week now so many people think all is fine...we'll be in and out of lockdown for awhile.

[HanoiVillan]

It's entirely possible that there won't be a second wave of infections from this weekend. A lot of the activities people are worrying about have happened outside during sunny weather, and most of the recent evidence I have seen is suggesting that transmission under these circumstances is very low.

Of course it's possible that I'm wrong - we're still learning about the virus all the time, and maybe enough of these gatherings turned into house parties or other types of interaction with a higher transmission risk. But I wouldn't be worried about seeing ice cream vans, for instance.

[AVFC_Hitz]

Us expats have a tenous network here in Sofia. Bars have been open since Thursday but none of us have said that we're going out. Me, personally, will ride it out for another two weeks after the national news has had Sofia airport reopening to streams of Bulgarians coming back from the uk.

69 new cases since Thursday. A record number. One dickhead, who we really dont like, put on Facebook about putting on a shirt and going into the unknown has just posted that he's caughtt sniffles and a cold and blamed it on the weather.

Yeah, I'll stick it out for a few more weeks.

 

[wilko154]

Quite ironic that people celebrating VE Day, and the end of WW2 where people made huge sacrifices for years, will most probably prolong this pandemic in the UK.

People in WW2 made sacrifices for year upon year, people nowadays have been unable to stay in their houses for 8 weeks.

[welnik]

17 minutes ago, wilko154 said:

Quite ironic that people celebrating VE Day, and the end of WW2 where people made huge sacrifices for years, will most probably prolong this pandemic in the UK.

People in WW2 made sacrifices for year upon year, people nowadays have been unable to stay in their houses for 8 weeks.

What absolute tripe! So what you are saying, is that me and my neighbours who were celebrating on our own drives, sevaral metres apart from one another, are going to prolong the spread! 

Have you been sniffing glue? 

[snowychap]

You wot?

'zackly.