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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

To not understand clapping for kids

266 replies

VivienScott · 04/04/2020 11:07

Why are we now doing this? The premise I’ve seen is that their lives have been turned upside down, no longer able to see family or friends. Isn’t that all of us? And surely if they don’t understand why we’re on lockdown, they’re not going to understand us clapping?
Hasn’t this gone a bit far?
I do have kids, and they are most definitely affected, but I don’t feel the need to clap for them especially and they don’t want me to.

OP posts:
haarp · 05/04/2020 12:28

Why would I clap for anybody? Yes, the NHS is great, but it's their job, that's what they're there for. Would I clap and cheer the mechanic for fixing my car after I've paid him? No, of course not. So why would I clap for being made better after I've paid into the system for decades? I'm very grateful for those in the NHS, don't get me wrong, but they're simply carrying out their contractual obligations. And as for children? Should be doing their homework.

haarp · 05/04/2020 12:31

The way things are going we'll soon be genuflecting on our doorsteps. Have I slipped into a parallel universe over the last month? Have I somehow found myself living in N Korea or Stalinist Russia? It sure feels like it. I'm actually DISGUSTED by the brown nosing, snitching behaviour of the unwashed masses of the UK.

haarp · 05/04/2020 12:32

Because it's what they do in N Korea!

haarp · 05/04/2020 12:45

"Why not put up bright pictures in our windows instead?"

I'm an amateur artist, so I'm going to do myself a lovely picture of Baphomet with the tagline beneath: "Dead Inside: Fuck Off"
Yeah, that'll certainly brighten up MY day. Couldn't give a shit about anybody elses day!🤣

BlueJava · 05/04/2020 12:47

Personally i have not clapped for anyone and wont be. Cringe inducing. Felt very sorry for the paramedic clapped by her street as she went to work , that's one of the last things I'd want as i left the house.

haarp · 05/04/2020 12:55

"I was really up for the first clap for the NHS but on Thursday did say to my husband that there was an element of “I just don’t want to be seen by the neighbours to be not doing it.”

Can't you think for yourself then? I couldn't give a rodents posterior what anybody thinks, whether that be neighbours, family or whoever. I reserve the right NOT to be part of the madding crowd, and to keep my distance from them. I keep my distance (mentally) from ppl all the time as I've come to realise in my 53 years on this planet that nearly all humans are mad fuckwits with the brains of a cabbage and the common sense of a lemming.

insancerre · 05/04/2020 13:25

I’ve changed my mind
I think it’s a great idea
If everyone is clapping and making lots of noise, them nobody will hear me filling up my recycling bin with all the empties

BuzzShitbagBobbly · 05/04/2020 14:15

I couldn't give a rodents posterior what anybody thinks

Yet you are doing something that is explicitly designed to be a public action for others to see and hear.

BuzzShitbagBobbly · 05/04/2020 14:16

Ah.

Humblest apologies to haarp if I got the wrong end of the stick in my pp. I'm not sure if she is a clapper or not.

AuntieMarys · 05/04/2020 15:05

No one did it here!!!

PrincessHoneysuckle · 05/04/2020 15:07

Noone has done it here

OytheBumbler · 05/04/2020 15:19

Maybe we could invent clapping machines to put on our doorsteps?

They could clap away all day while we get on with our drinking lives.

babycakes1010 · 05/04/2020 15:21

No one did it here

BawbagBiggins · 05/04/2020 15:28

Someone on my local facebook page suggested we all point switched on torches into the sky at a certain time - I can only imagine this was to honour all the frontline wizards we have lost during the pandemic.

Whoareyoudududu · 05/04/2020 15:39

I honestly thought it was a joke.

Willow2017 · 05/04/2020 15:54

Someone on my local facebook page suggested we all point switched on torches into the sky at a certain time - I can only imagine this was to honour all the frontline wizards we have lost during the pandemic.

Grin Grin Grin
Brilliant!

DrierThanANunsNasty · 05/04/2020 15:56

@BawbagBiggins best comment of the day Grin

Willow2017 · 05/04/2020 15:57

Kids are 'Heroes' now wtaf?
Way to confuse little kids "Oh look Johnny, the whole street is out clapping just for you" cue 2yr old Johnny running inside scared shitless!
My kids would be mortified at the mere suggestion of this nonsense.

GulliBelle · 05/04/2020 15:58

Did anyone hear anybody applauding for the children?

Saladaysior · 05/04/2020 16:04

What a load of wank

Willow2017 · 05/04/2020 16:07

Not a sound in my street! thank goodness, my neighbours all seem pretty sensible sorts
Nobody is outside at all.

I'm sure some kids are having a really difficult time and suffering

Randoms clapping on their doorstep wont make the slightest difference to any child who is having a crappy time at home for a miriad of reasons. Its like saying 'There there, your parents are crap, you were having problems at school, you feel like shit, you cant access support but me standing like a performing seal on my doorstep will make it all better because I say it will.

Winterwoollies · 05/04/2020 16:13

I hate this. So many kids are having the time of their lives and lauding them as 'little heroes' for doing fuck all is probably why so many of them are unbearable little shits.

jacks11 · 05/04/2020 17:04

I find the whole “clap for...” totally ridiculous. As a one off? Ok, fine. Ongoing weekly claps are just pointless, especially when it seems quite possible thst the whole thing is largely being driven by peer pressure, people not wanting to be seen not to do it.

Many children won’t really understand the whole thing and it won’t make their situation any better and it won’t help vulnerable children in any way. It’s all a bit virtue signalling and done “for show” to me. Also, children are not “hero’s”, they are children having to put up with a difficult situation. But they aren’t hero’s. We need to get out of this habit of exaggeration and superlative language, it doesn’t do them any favours. And it’s a bit nauseating, IMHO.

As a Dr working on the front line, I would far rather people put pressure on the powers that be to sort important things out now. And look after the NHS going forward, rather than promising the nation that they can get a better, more wide-ranging health service that can be everything to everyone without resourcing it to do just that. Then blame staff when it doesn’t have the best possible outcomes or shortest possible waiting times.

The hypocrisy of the vilifying of the junior doctors from the Tory government and much of the press, as well as many others, not too long ago is a case in point. Not that long ago they were all spoilt/arrogant/lazy, champagne-swilling junior doctors, desperate to swindle the tax payer. Now where would we be without them (and all the other people who keep the NHS functioning)? And at what personal cost? But of course now we’re all “hero’s”. Until this is over, and then normal service will resume and it’ll be forgotten.

And I know we are not the only group, many others will be treated in a similar manner.

Willow2017 · 05/04/2020 17:44

Jacks11
Exactly, they will be back to complaining about anyone and everyone as soon as this is over.

OnceUponAMidnightBeery · 05/04/2020 17:49

Um, sorry... children having to stay at home are as heroic as frontline NHS staff, or others facing hundreds of the public daily, potentially all carrying covid 19?

Ok then.