To think we're more politically apathetic than ever?

[penelopepitstopsgain]

Now I remember the Iraq war protests when 750,000+ marched to try and avert what many believed (without any expert insight) to be the wrong course of action. To no avail, but there was such a huge impetus to hold the government to account and let them know we knew and expected better from them.

Fast forward to 2020 and here we are facing a catastrophic pandemic with upward of 20,000 UK mums, dads, sisters, brothers dead including health professionals and we hear day after day of government failings.. but where is the outrage??

I'm truly baffled, and this is not a party political issue before I start hearing about Diane and Jeremy. There are no political points to score when death is concerned.

We cant' march on downing street but where are the petitions and demands to MPs to ensure we are getting the best possible outcomes?

From reports today that the new Nightingale Hospital has had to turn away patients due to a lack of nurses, the fiasco of the PPE which is still in Turkey 72 hours (or more like 5 weeks) after it was needed, the opting out of the EU ventilator scheme that could have undoubtedly assisted with saving lives, the PM missing 5 successive cobra meetings and more preoccupied with getting divorced and engaged as exposed in the Tory supporting paper, The Times ...have we become so apathetic that we no longer have the will to challenge and fight for a better outcome even though the stakes are as high as it gets?

You think a mass protest is a good thing during social distancing?

The government are doing their best. As if they deliberately decide to not bother trying to sort this shit out.

I am sure the outrage will come, but I don’t think that anything can be done in the midst of the crisis. What exactly should we advocate for right now? There’s no obvious right solution that’s clear to laypeople. Also different groups have different interests in this crisis - there isn’t necessarily one policy that is best for everyone.

There actually is one course of action that we should be taking but we're not. The more successful countries carry out far more testing than we do. That course of action would provide data on where we are with the virus. But we haven't been doing that because it requires planning and competent governance both of which are sadly lacking.

@AliceAbsolum The government clearly and demonstrably aren’t doing their best. That’s kind of the ops whole point!

This government need to be held to account for their neglect to prepare, failure to act in a timely manner and continued mishandling of the crisis.

The country should have been shut down - easy for an island nation. Australia and New Zealand have deaths of 67 and 13 respectively. Look at us - the number of families suffering bereavement that should not be.

Reckoning must surely come - Johnson was a one agenda politician. On the face of it his only agenda was Brexit. In reality his only agenda was Boris Johnson - first and last.

If Covid hadn't hit us this bad, Johnson would have been well on his way to dismantling our NHS. We shouldn't forget that.

Now is the time to listen to what WHO and govt are saying

It’s not A time to protest , or to get angry

That will come I am sure .......

I’m horrified if this utter shitshow is the government “doing their best”

Johnson is a terrible leader, entirely unfit for the job (or any job which gives him a semblance of power). He was only voted in because people thought he could bumble his way through leaving the EU easily enough - that’s working out really bloody well for us isn’t it?

I’m completely fed up. But also know there’s nothing we can do about it at the moment. Another leadership contest now would be very poorly timed.

I’m hoping when it’s all over, the government will be held to account and Johnson will be forced to resign. Ideally I’d have another election because I’m sick to the back teeth of tories. It won’t happen but one can dream!

have we become so apathetic that we no longer have the will to challenge and fight for a better outcome even though the stakes are as high as it gets?

There's not a great deal we can do right now though and let's face it, nobody looks at these petitions do they? Hospital staff can't exactly go on strike (well, I know they theoretically can but they won't want to leave their patients will they?), nobody can organise a protest march and riots aren't allowed at the best of times.

We can express our displeasure at the ballot box though.

I'm outraged. The government has fucked up on a monumental scale. They should have heeded findings into a 2016 pandemic dry run, they should have properly financed the NHS, they should have seen what was happening in China and Italy and taken the threat seriously. Johnson is a joke, his cabinet no better. It's a travesty. I've never been apathetic about politics though. I think a lot of people are, and many are both disengaged and misinformed.

I think it is all very well in hindsight to say the Government should have done this or the Government should have done that. People forget that we were being completely guided by the scientists and forecasters who were completely reliant on the data and numbers coming out of China. If you were presented with the figures we were given at the time would you really have decided to do things any differently?

If there's not political points to score - what's the point in a march? Everyone is trying to work together to sort out this pandemic.

What the fuck would a march solve - more policing, more people giving each other coronavirus from being in close proximity and travelling to a meeting. Are you nuts? Do you want a scenario like the states.

FFS everyone is trying to work together to end this - PPE is an issue everywhere and people like you on mumsnet tonight should be utterly ashamed of yourself trying to work everyone up into a political frenzy.

Or is this some new way of trolling?

I'm furious.
Right now though we have to come through this.

Then the inquiry, then voting.

My kids will be old enough to vote in 4 years. Lest they forget this travesty.

@underneaththeash OP isn't asking for a march though so I have no idea what you're frothing about there.

'm truly baffled, and this is not a party political issue before I start hearing about Diane and Jeremy. There are no political points to score when death is concerned.

And yet you want mass protests in the streets for ... some reason or other. Don’t lie about your obvious political shit-stirring.

@Doubletrouble99 and @underneaththeash comments such as yours are what prompted this thread. Where does your over arching faith come from and what evidence is it based on?

People forget that we were being completely guided by the scientists and forecasters who were completely reliant on the data and numbers coming out of China.

That's simply not true.

Each country had a choice as to how they dealt with the impending threat and as you can see in Germany that has 83 million people (vs UK 66million) and just over 5k deaths the approach the government takes has a DIRECT impact on the outcome.

I don't know how else to stress this, but this bs, doffing of the cap, "they must know best and no one else could do better", is the exact apathetic nature I'm talking about.

But the government’s policy is to increase testing - they have pledged 100,000 tests by end of April. Yes, they are having difficulty actually delivering this (and are not likely to do so) and yes they will need to be held accountable for this. But mass protests encouraging the government to adopt a policy that is already their policy aren’t going to do much imho.

@ aupresdemonarbre perhaps my post was too long for you to take the time to read it but I was not advocating marching during a lockdown hence this part of my OP
We cant' march on downing street but where are the petitions and demands to MPs to ensure we are getting the best possible outcomes?
In short what would you do if you could save 15,000 lives? Wait until the number keeps rising and we've returned to some semblance of normality or try and put pressure on to make a difference now?

I didn’t suggest you were advocating marching? I think you are replying to a different poster.

My point is that I can’t see any productive use to which protest can be put at this point. Yes, of course there will have to be inquiries into why different countries seem ti have done better than us, and what we should have done differently. But that seems to me to completely separate from

The outrage and protests you are suggesting.

In short - it’s not at all clear what policy you think we should be advocating for to ‘save lives’.

@aupresdemonarbre I was referring to this aspect of your response about mass protests

But mass protests encouraging the government to adopt a policy that is already their policy aren’t going to do much imho.

If you're on a train and it's about to fall off the rails do you sit tight and trust the driver or highlight your concerns and try and save yourself?

A dramatic analogy I know but my premise was that most people seem happy to just sit on the train. Where's the "what can we do" ethic?

I'm advocating that we write to our MPs (irrespective of party) and demand the scrutiny that should have been in place from the start.

Many also don't realise that we have no contact tracing system in place and this is a pre-requisite before ending any lock down.

I agree with you OP. It is a horrendous cock up from so many angles. I am in Australia and at various stages I have thought "that can't be fucking true" about the UK's response.

There are still people who insist on the fact that the government is trying their best. If a company, say internet company, overcharges you or leaves you without a service, people don't say "ahh...they are only trying their best". No, people get angry about stuff like that. But the deaths of thousands of people....all okay for some reason.

This government is incompetent at best and criminally negligent at worst. Of course, we can't protest on the streets. But to just accept it, gets me angry.

Actually there is possibly a reason for it. In people, fear or an insurmountable problem overwhelms the creative, solution and critical-thinking parts of the brain. So some people's brains are literally not able to process this, which could explain why people are happy to say "they are trying their best" instead of examining what has and is still happening under their noses. They seem to accept this virus as a force of nature, which can't be dealt with in a rational way.

@Proppedupinbed I feel like I'm in some parallel universe as I'm shit scared or this virus but equally scared of the lack of emotion and concern around the current incompetence.

I've worked for companies where we develop contingency plans and using the example of PPE, your plan wouldn't simply be to make sure there are masks and gowns and a few suppliers. You would need to check all angles from a 360 perspective; sizes, life span, deterioration, multiple sources, self manufacture; checked and updated every 3 months...my mouth was literally open when I realised that this hadn't been done.

I think you are right though.. the idea that we are in this shit storm and
no one competent is at the helm is just too much for some people to process so it's easier to have blind faith.

When even the government newspapers turn against the current thinking it's time to realise something is amiss (The Telegraph have just reported that Government Covid-19 testing for nurses were in many cases, inaccurate and could have led to infected nurses going back on the wards)

penelopepitstopagain - Your experience in developing contingency plans obviously means you know than most. However I would suggest that MPs would not necessarily have your experience either. They are reliant on the civil service and their procurement experts. From my experience of local government verses private enterprise I would suggest that these in the civil service who deal with these things have little idea how to respond to this type of situation and have no idea how to ramp up things quickly - quickly being the operative word.
Your suggestion that we compare ourselves with Germany is non sensical. Germany are in a completely different position with regard to their ability to roll out mass testing. They also did not need to expand their ICU capacity and open completely new hospitals. That was a massive undertaking and was rightly concentrated on.

If you're on a train and it's about to fall off the rails do you sit tight and trust the driver or highlight your concerns and try and save yourself?

Unless you're a train driver yourself, you trust the driver because he's the one driving the train. Highlighting your concerns will do what exactly?

I'm no fan of Boris or the Tories and didn't vote for them, but I don't think people's reaction/lack of reaction to the way the government are handling Covid 19 is down to political apathy. Neither is it down to blind faith. It's down to realising that raging and complaining will achieve very little except doom-and-gloom media reporting and low morale. I'd call that pragmatism, not apathy.