Did anyone else watch the real Blitz Spirit with Lucy Worsley last night?

[Biscoffaddict]

Over the last year we’ve been told more than ever that we need to find our Blitz Spirit and Keep Calm and Carry On etc, only for this programme to blow the whole thing apart and reveal it was actually one great big myth put out by the government to try and boost morale. Propaganda basically. There was no ‘Blitz Spirit’ and its just a made up narrative that’s pushed on us by the media and the establishment for the last 80 years.

If you didn’t watch it I’d highly recommend it. One of the best things I’ve watched in ages.

Yes, I did watch it and it was an eye-opener. Although I have, over the years, read about other 'morale-boosting' fictions, such as when people were encouraged to donate their saucepans, iron railings etc for the war effort (aircraft manufacture, I believe) only for it to be revealed at a later date that most of the metal collected would have been useless for that purpose.
Also thought the timing of it, in current circumstances, was.....interesting!

Love Lucy Worsley. What channel was it on?

Meant to add, we also thought it was one of the most gripping programmes we've watched recently.

BBC . Should get it on iplayer. Yes, it was really interesting. Lucy is an ace presenter.

Was on BBC1.

I haven’t watched it yet but my dad moved from London just before the out break of war and said their house was always full of family and friends coming from London. He said they were all having nervous breakdowns.

I couldn’t watch it. When they started about the baby in the road l had to turn it over. It was heartbreaking.

And l love Lucy Worsley. I’d watch her all day if l could.

I grew up hearing scraps of stories of the Blitz from traumatised survivors.

People are mostly decent I believe and the debunking is just another reframing of the stories, this time to suit a modern academic sensibility.

However it's always interesting to hear eyewitness accounts. I did find a collection online of wartime snippets gathered by a government office, really fascinating.

There's actually a book about this that I read at uni over 20 years ago called "The myth of the blitz" by Angus Calder. It was a real eye opener, based on mass observation, that blew the myth apart. I can remember by parents both saying that everyone was on the edge of a breakdown and that a lot of people were out for themselves. I

Recent article on the use of myths as a political tool:

"British governments were once very good at wielding this tool. During the wars of the 19th century it became useful to persuade the British that they were frugal and had stiff upper lips, the better to encourage them through privations and into the thick of battle. It was highly effective – a whole nation was united around the idea it was good at living on semolina and dying of dysentery without a murmur of complaint."

www.newstatesman.com/politics/uk/2021/02/how-government-got-duped-myth-freedom-loving-britain

My mum had me at 42 and I’m 57. She was 19 when war broke out.

She said it was terrible. She’d frequently see dead bodies ( or even worse bits of bodies) and remembered endless endless nights of bombs and fear. People were mostly terrified, she hated talk of the ‘Blitz spirit’. She said it was a time of fear and unhappiness.

She worked nights in a munitions factory near Leeds from the age of 19-25. All her young adulthood. I find similarities between what happened to her as a young person and what is happening now.

Personally I find LW very irritating. I’m not at all surprised that she made this programme though, since it’s very on-trend to debunk anything that could be seen as remotely positive about the U.K.

My DPs lived as adults during WW2 - one in the RN and one on her own during the London Blitz, and while my DM was well aware - as I’m sure we all are now - of the black market and other nefarious goings-on, she always said that most ordinary people bore up well and did their best to help each other.

I dare say that LW, born so long afterwards, and presumably with no direct reminiscences from parents who lived through it as adults, would say that my DM was deluded.

Thanks @SpongeBobJudgeyPants @HunkyPunk I’ll check it out.

DH and I were just talking about the dangers of mythologising history and burying the "nasty" bits. We will definitely check this programme out.

We got onto to colonnialism and how I'd never learned anything about it or the devasting impact in Asia and Africa while at school, so if anyone has a recommendation for a programme or book about that I'd be very interested.

(Sorry, OP, to hijack the thread, but I thought you guys might be the right people to ask!)

Yes, I’m quite glad this has been shown on a mainstream history programme. I did a whole research project about this at university but not many people in the wider public seem to be interested in believing that it’s propaganda.

It’s interesting because I think in years to come all of the pandemic will be painted in the “blitz spirit” light, but it’s all rubbish. If it was true there would have been no panic buying loo roll, snitching to the police when your neighbours have one person on their doorstep, or fat bashing when people with high Bmi have been offered the vaccine.

@GETTINGLIKEMYMOTHER

Personally I find LW very irritating. I’m not at all surprised that she made this programme though, since it’s very on-trend to debunk anything that could be seen as remotely positive about the U.K.

My DPs lived as adults during WW2 - one in the RN and one on her own during the London Blitz, and while my DM was well aware - as I’m sure we all are now - of the black market and other nefarious goings-on, she always said that most ordinary people bore up well and did their best to help each other.

I dare say that LW, born so long afterwards, and presumably with no direct reminiscences from parents who lived through it as adults, would say that my DM was deluded.

As LW pointed out in the programme, your perspective of the Blitz would have been vastly different according to where you were living and what you were involved in doing. It was the East End which bore the brunt, and as LW demonstrated by showing actual reports in actual newspapers, even other Londoners would have been under the impression that the plucky eastenders were bearing up cheerfully, and would have had no idea at the time of the real human cost of the onslaught. It's called propaganda.

My Nan went through the Salford & Manchester Blitz aged 15 - 16. She was evacuated to Accrington but hated it so returned to Salford just as the Blitz started.
So school was finished for her at 15 & she found an office job plus helped in her parents' grocery shop.
She remembered walking to work across miles of broken glass crunching under her feet.
Firstly ALL the slightly older boys in her group of friends ' (I have a group photo of them) were killed in the Battle of Britain.
Then her dad died of a brain abcess caused by an ear infection- no antibiotics were available for civilians then. She was devastated.
The Hope Hospital where he died was bombed & a whole wing of operating theatres taken out killing doctors, nurses & patients.
Her 6 year old neighbour burned to death in her under stair cupboard while sheltering with her parents.

My Nan joined the ARP underage & delivered messages by bicycle during raids while bombs were dropping - one of her 14 year old colleagues was blown to bits.
During other raids she would sit in her damp partly flooded cellar with her mum all night, which gave her bad chest infections all her life.

Then she met my grandad twice & fell in love, but he got sent to Burma for 2 years & she spent all that time worrying if he would die.
They married on his return after just 2 dates! She was 20 & he was 31.

Nan talked a lot about the Ww2 because some big events happened during the war in her life, & she was a bit of a drama queen too, but she said really the Blitz was awful.

I started watching this, didnt give myself time to actually listen to anything and turned it over in a strop.

Stupid me!!

I'll watch it today on catch up.

Thanks @Biscoffaddict

@ssd that’s interesting. Can I ask what made you feel like that?

Agree @GETTINGLIKEMYMOTHER.

I don't think anyone ever could argue the Blitz wasn't awful.
This is what gets me about these so called exposés.

I watched it and thought it was excellent (barring LW slight lisp which unfortunately made me think of the Biggus Dickus sketch in Life of Brian! everytime she said 'Blithz')
I thought it really brought to life the reality rather than the ' We all pulled together and it was fine' that we are told about so often.

And the propaganda element... Governments don't change do they?!

Hunky I think the ops parents are more likely to know what their experience was having ACTUALLY lived it rather than reading articles. Don’t be so bloody patronising. There may well have been a large amount of propaganda going on but the truth probably lies in the middle some where. Most people I have spoken to don’t regard the Blitz spirit as being benign without bad things happening. What they mean is they formed a cameraderie with lots of their neighbours to try and help each other get through it and rebuild. They don’t for one minute hide the fact that their were awful parts. Each experience is valid and doesn’t deserve someone years away from being born telling them in later years they got it wrong.

Yes buffy.

It's so irritating.

So easily influenced by one TV programme... who is to say this is not propaganda to suit their narrative