To think our new normal could be a better way of life?

[Wehttam]

Ok first of all, hear me out. Maybe this is hypothetical fantasy but I think it has merit.

As we are adjusting to Lockdown and both its benefits and disadvantages, I have started thinking about how civilisation may be able to use this as a starting point for a new way of life, accepting the previous 24/7 have it all lifestyle is fundamentally poisonous to our wellbeing.

I fully understand this is a global pandemic and is catastrophic for many people, losing loved ones, suffering illness and the fear of how this could potentially affect many people’s lives going forward economically is a worry no one wants or needs, I am not minimising this nor am I advocating for blanket suffering or pain before you come for me.

Environmentally this is momentarily allowing the planet to slowly recover from one of its biggest problems, Us. Look outside, the air is cleaner already, the noise we had so become used to has quietened, our frantic pace of living has slowed, for most of us this will have untold health benefits as well as benefits to nature we will see manifest further over the coming weeks.

I fully appreciate how for many people this is an uncertain time, those suffering DV or poverty are living in hell, the situation right now is unpeeling the veneer society generally paints over these problems though. What if our new reality was to help those who are vulnerable and suffering but still maintain this level of calm muted living.

Excessive commuting, over consumption of single use anything, traffic everywhere, takeaways, shops, bars clubs, restaurants catering for every niche or whim, flying everywhere incessantly, worrying about having he latest this or that, which all means sweet FA at the moment. What it all boils down to is all of that was needless to actually live and breathe properly wasn’t it?

Eventually once Lockdown starts to be lifted, are you willing to go back to that chaos the outside world had become? I’m not so sure I am and I dont think it will be any good for those who do. Thoughts?

I think (although it feels like it) it won't have gone on for long enough to really change us in the sense of societal change. This takes years/decades not a few months. We're looking at huge economic problems though, which may lead to change, hopefully positive but who knows right now

I am enjoying spending more time with kids and getting stuff done at home, doing exercise most days instead of squeezing it in as and when....but I'm painfully aware that at the moment were living off March's payday. DH is self employed and not earning, I will be furloughed come this month. We are lucky to have a fairly spacious house and outdoor space. But we have old cars and the last time we went abroad was 2012. We very rarely eat out, cant remember the last time I bought new clothes for myself and don't have weekends away or trips out, so it's not as if we're making massive savings there.
At the moment I feel lucky that so far we are all healthy, and so are our family. By the end of the month I think we will be starting to stress more about money and wondering how long staying at home is sustainable. And even then I realise I'm lucky that we havent reached that point already.

And the sheer soul destroying isolation that some people are living through currently is nothing to aspire to or glorify
Jeeze some people have no idea

It might also change us in the other direction. Think about the generation that lived through the horror of the First World War and then a flu pandemic, and then gave us flappers and the jazz age.

PrincessConsuela I think society will have to eventually redeploy those who worked in minimum wage roles in bars, restaurants, shops, cinemas etc to reduce the workload in the services which matter such as healthcare, manufacturing, community workers. Simply to ease the burden on those who work in those professions now.

I am not advocating for life as we know to simply stop and us all to have no money or jobs, but to redistribute humans and economic resources to deal with the reality of what we face. Whether we like it or not things will have to change, for the health of the nation and the natural environment we live in.

Yeah I get what your saying op.

Ermm some of those jobs are also shitty jobs on minimum wage ?

So just same shit... just a more worthy one?

Or do you also think that there will be an increase in pay alongside a massive influx of extra workers?

That Kitty O’ Meara “poem” can fuck right off, and so can anybody who quotes it.

Some met their shadows?? Way to gloss over hundreds of thousands of people suffering and dying in pain.

I love people thinking they can play chess with other people's lives
What if you normally flip burgers and that makes you happy
But no no no in the new world order you will have to be a care worker because.....we'll because

i don’t want to live in a country where we can’t have frivolous fun, a meal out, a game of bowling, a takeaway coffee. Living solely to help keep people alive!

PrincessConsuela Not just a more worthy one but a necessary one. You do realise that going forward the likelihood of us being able to go to bars, clubs, cinemas, shopping centres will be almost nonexistent? This virus until it is cured or has a vaccine is going to be a massive pain in our arses for the foreseeable future.

So the government will have to come up with ways to entice the general populace into understanding some sacrifices will have to made. Some of our previous follies will need to be curtailed and that those who worked in industries now redundant should consider other opportunities elsewhere on the basis they will receive an income from the authorities, a civil service incentive. Otherwise the socioeconomic impact could be very difficult to stomach.

God the dementors won't even be happy when lockdown is over
So let me get this straight
Lockdown is meant to be gruel eating and hair shirts
And when it's over
We all have to stay miserable
Forever
Cracking
Do fuck off

FFS, not just enough to spew a load of utter drivel like 'our new normal', gimme a break, this is a temporary set of circumstances for most and that is a very good thing but also victim-blaming shite about how people are 'unwilling to compromise' and just want luxuries and only behave on whims and I'm just a hippy. Utter dross. 1.2m new UC claims in a month. There's nothing fucking good about that, it's grinding, miserable poverty.

Sick of smug, middle-class wankery like this.

hobnob it’s not a new world order it’s a new way of living, for now, a long term temporary fix until the virus is under control.

Are you going to quit your job and become a carer,nurse,delivery driver,factory worker etc?

Can some of these posters tell me their qualifications in economics?
I'm fascinated

If you honestly think that's what governments will do
I want some of what you've been smoking

I think that counts as an unnecessary luxury.

Am I the only one wondering why the hell people can not accept this is our reality right now? I’m not the one making the rules, speak to Mother Nature or your God and ask why this is happening. Accepting this will make it easier for you in the long run,

peppermint it’s not middle class wankery it’s a discussion about how we function as a society throughout this.

Miserable poverty will exist just the same as it always has, that’s not society that’s the system. The big club none of us are in.

Some of our previous follies will need to be curtailed and that those who worked in industries now redundant should consider other opportunities elsewhere on the basis they will receive

Previous follies? WTF?

It won't be unnecessary if I have to read any more of this utter bollocks
And I swear some of the fucking dementors on here are rubbing their hands in glee spreading misery

Cross-post. FFS, 'they' just need to find another way to get income, just magic it up. The government needs to magic it up, too. And not only that, but force them to work! Got it! You've drunk the Kool-Aid. Be glad it's not your young adult child who's waiting for the UC that you're so gung-ho for the bloody government to force to do a dangerous job. We tried that shit before in history. It didn't end well for millions. But hey, fuck 'em in your delusion new world order.

JFC, not even the stoners in my building are this deluded and sanctimonious and they're permanently baked.

"Speak to Mother Nature"
Oh god I swear ds made this gin stronger than normal
Fuck sake

Wehttam are you planning to quit your job to care for people on no wage, just a civil service incentive?

Before it was about balance and after it should be about balance.

No country needs to endlessly grow wealth at the cost of the people and the environment. Especially when the wealth created is concentrated in the hands of a few. There needs to be more distribution of wealth in all countries.

But until we all stop and demand this, there never will be, as too many as happy to go along with the system to create their own wealth and others be dammed, whether its the working poor, unemployed, sick and disabled in this country (taking it up the arse) or whether it a whole continent of people who we will never meet and therefore don't care about.

No companies need to keep endlessly growing and making money for their shareholders and owners. No company need to pay those at the top hundreds and thousands times more than those at the bottom and in the middle.
No company needs to pay slave wages in any country.

There are other ways, models and systems of doing this, but humans have historically chosen the ones that make them and theirs richer, whilst ignoring the poverty and pain around them.

We can make different choices as individuals, I have chosen to for years but on the whole unless government direction and companies change then nothing will change in the long term.

There a great article about the things Americans have been fighting for, for decades that in 3 weeks due to covid 19 have come into being, albeit mostly temp. Like not being able to cut off water gas and power to people, paying unemployment quicker, releasing the 550k people held on remand because they are poor and could not make bail, held for minor infractions and non violent crime, releasing the women who are pregnant held for non violent and petty crimes, releasing the old and sick inmates being held yes for petty and non violent crime. They have a highly punitive system that locks people up for really petty crime and over proportionally affects the poor and minority groups. Then the US health care well they haven't changed much to that and are still turning people away from hospitals, a 17 year old boy died of covid-19 two weeks ago, the day after being turned away from a hospital.

Like here the companies who refused wfh are finding in many cases that it does work and the banks have been stopped charging high interest for a period of time. Even student loans have been put on hold.

www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2020/apr/13/covid-19-made-unthinkable-reforms-a-reality-in-the-us-now-make-them-stick

These things and many more were within the power to change before covid 19, this may be a wake call but I will not hold my breath that the people with real power to make changes will actually heed it. Here in the UK the NHS has been decimated for years, will covid-19 change anything, will people stop voting for the Tories? I will not hold my breath as people here do love to vote to everyone poorer.

I actually don't have any faith in people as a group. Individuals yes, but as a group we are crap at changing structures and systems especially if personally we do okay out of them.