To wonder why people aren’t more angry?

[Rainbowb]

Throughout this whole crisis I have really been surprised by the level of acceptance from everyone in this country of the whole situation. I know we haven’t had much choice in the decisions made and we’re probably a very polite nation as a whole but we have been so quick to accept the arrival of a deadly virus and drastic changes to our lives, seemingly without complaint. Is no-one out there demanding to know how on earth this was all able to happen? We’ve faced the huge loss of human life worldwide and it is continuing, surely we are all entitled to get angry and demand answers? I see grieving families, children missing out on being with other children and not having an education, families being separated indefinitely, people’s mental health suffering and vulnerable people potentially at risk and I feel so frustrated and angry. If we got fired up about climate change, why not this??

I’m angry with politicians: decades of underinvestment in health and social care, not seeking to address huge problems with both or say publicly that much higher investment is needed if we want adequate services.

The tories for awful policies on health and social care (and many other things), brexit, an economic disaster that hasn’t even bitten us yet and is itself and will compound the economic shocks.

The opposition for being ineffective/unelectable.

The media.

All to do with pre Covid things that, in my opinion, put the UK in a much weaker position to respond promptly and well to this emergency than other wealthy European countries.

To the people who are so angry...what are you doing about it? What is your anger achieving?

HappyBdayCaptnTom Thu 30-Apr-20 00:58:43
To the posters surprised there have been no riots, did you get ready for battle and march onto the streets but find the streets empty or were you just hoping others would go out and riot on your behalf whilst you peered from behind the windows?

SnowsInWater Thu 30-Apr-20 00:58:48
The british are angry at another country causing them pain and anguish and loss of freedom and decimating the economy??
Oh the irony.
So well expressed

These two posts express what I think of the anger-mongering at the moment. Be angry if you want to, nobody's denying your right to be so and express that BUT your rights end where mine start. I'll be angry if and when it's the right time for me to be so and I might well decide that a chatboard isn't the right medium for me and I won't be bloody well 'summoned'.

People only ever get angry when their own personal liberties have been impinged on anyway, they largely don't seem that exercised when other people's rights are trampled on.

For now, I reserve my right to be sad, confused and worried at what the virus has wrought.

I’m angry with politicians: decades of underinvestment in health and social care, not seeking to address huge problems with both or say publicly that much higher investment is needed if we want adequate services.

You should be angry with Blair/Brown who trebled NHS spending but didn't bother with reform or efficiency or control, which meant it was mostly wasted.

I think no-one should jump to conclusions without solid science, but if it is proven that the wet markets are where these viruses cross species, the chances of it happening again seems quite high if nothing is done about them. So I would hope China would read the science and offer to take appropriate steps. Possibly even without anyone's anger, just out of respect for the potential consequences.

Thank you for all your interesting responses, they’ve helped me question how I feel about the situation. I’m not sure I agree that anger is always a wasted emotion, it has changed people’s rights and freedoms jn the past. I know you can’t get angry at a virus but you can get angry when there has been negligence, bad practices, cover ups and inaction that have caused large scale human suffering. I fear that if we don’t get angry and demand answers eventually, then this will all be allowed to happen again. I think the Australian PM is starting to push for it so maybe others will too.

@user1473878824 plenty of ways of calling for an international response against China that don’t involve armed conflict.

Whats the point of being angry? It is what it is. My aunt on frontline had someone die on her yesterday. This lockdown is needed.

When this over id like answers from china though

Among my group of friends many are angry. Many are questioning how the situation escalated and why/what measures should have been taken sooner/why there was seeming apathy then panic.
Climate change may well be a factor as warmer, wetter winters don't tend to kill off as many viruses (view from environmental science people).

thecatsthecats... that is possibly the most smug and belittling post I've ever seen. I hope you're happily ensconced in your much-better country. No need then to press your nose up against the glass of ours, pointing and jeering.

I have family in other countries and they're also jeering at the UK whilst busily blundering into their own mistakes and mis-steps.

The only 'winner' of course being the virus; it's getting the job done. The rest of us? Not so much.

@TheSkyWasDark

Not saying that we are exempt. We also keep animals in appalling conditions and that needs to change, but we pale in comparison to what China does to animals. Just stating the fact that it's their lack of animal welfare laws and food hygiene that keeps on causing these viruses. And as covid 19 has proven, it goes on to affect the whole world. Its horrendous that so many people have died of corona virus so far, but at the same time, we are lucky that there wasn't a 20% mortality rate, or 50% or 70% or 90%. We might not be so lucky next time. When mad cow disease arrived, we changed our practices. Thousands and thousands of people have now died of corona virus, people's livelihoods have been lost, the economy is suffering and what does China do? Reopen the very same meat markets that caused all of this.

User, oh I have plenty of annoyance with Blair / Brown too

“To the people who are so angry...what are you doing about it? What is your anger achieving?”

Agree on that. For me personally it’s a background feeling when I think about stuff, and easy to “compartmentalise”.

Listened to a fascinating episode of the podcast Hidden Brain on “armchair” hobbies/politics. Basically arguing that if all you do is read media/social media and discuss then it’s a hobby, with certain payoffs. Which is fine! But inactive, making no difference to others. Gave examples of people getting stuck into local community issues, local politics, providing services, volunteering, campaigning or whatever - active stuff.

THIS !!!

The fact that our govt pissed around celebrating brexit and then catching the virus themselves - rather than taking lessons from countries like Singapore and S Korea (who have experience of SARS) is something to be angry about. But I'm not sure how useful that anger is to anyone now.

Spot on @Theflushedzebra

I'm pretty perturbed by wet markets in China too. That's not racist.

I don't want to be angry. I just want to get through this.

@Littlemeadow123 China is fucking huge. It is not that easy to just close everything straight away. Yes, they have shitty practices, obviously, but if it ends up being in their economic interest they will abandon those.

Hoping this horrendous situation & Keir Starmer will see an end to this shitshow of a government too! 🤞🤞🤞

They didn't do the best they could with the scientific information. They cherry picked science that worked for their thinking, focusing on herd immunity while it's still unclear, resisting lockdown in favour of economics. Allowing concerts, sports events to go ahead. Announced pubs will be closed..at 5pm on a Friday, causing people to go to the pubs 'in case it's the last time in a while'. Saying people shouldn't go to pubs/restaurants while avoiding closing them. Downgraded Covid19 in March. Sent away PPE in March, turned down PPE, restricted tests, threw money at new untested designs instead of proven equipment. Threw money at unproven tests. It was a complete shambles. They didn't even do a strict lockdown when it came to it.
They had a plan for a pandemic and didn't follow it at all.
They weren't 'doing their best', they were doing what was best for them personally, instead of the people they are supposed to serve.
The only good thing you can say, is at least they didn't screw things up as badly as Trump. Lions lead by donkeys is much more apt war saying than blitz spirit

As this thread shows people are trained to be so passive and not question.

If you look for answers your called a conspiracy nut and sneered at. If you ask for people or countries to be accountable for our businesses going down the pan, our kids losing half a year education or thousands of lives lost or the fact we’re heading in to the biggest recession we’ve probably ever witnessed your accused of inciting war or blame.

People have been trained to be passive.

Yeah I’m fucked off. This wasn’t my fault and yes there are people to blame.

I'm not saying our government made the right decisions but they did the best they could based on the scientists information. Things may have been a lot worse if they made different decisions we'll never know

But they didn't, take the release of untested patients into care homes... Prof Chris Whitty warned the Govt what this would lead too but they still went ahead, it was a failure of basic public health infection control, known about for around 200 years.....

Johnsons advice to continue shaking hands, failure to observe what was happening in Italy, so horse racing and football still allowed to go ahead.

They followed Scientific advice but what advice exactly? and from whom, we don't know who is on SAGE, it was certainly very different from the RoW.

Considering our death rate is going to be, per capita, one of the highest in europe, its difficult to imagine how this pandemic could have been handled any worse.

But we won't get angry as a nation, because we have a very compliant MSM and (generally) people are selfish in this country, only interested in themselves and their own feelings.

Being angry is exhausting. There is absolutely nothing I personally can do about the situation, except for what I'm told by the government (stay at home).

I am angry with China and think there should be consequences.

@TheSkyWasDark

They closed the meat markets that have links to coronavirus and kept them closed while they were suffering massively with corona virus. Now they've lifted lockdown, they have opened them again, despite the fact people are still dying in other countries. It's an insult.

But yeah, they'll only change if it is in their economic interests. Not that economic interests are an excuse to carry on with something that endangers the world. Money and greed are going to end the world if we don't do something.

@LyingWitchInTheWardrobe

Cheers, and thanks for your good wishes, but I'm still in the UK currently.

I take a long view on things, and have a pragmatic understanding of geopolitics. I have travelled widely and seen good in bad in a lot of places. There are some things our country excels in, but many levels on which it functions poorly.

I don't see the need to get overexcited about a country or its people (on a general level), just because I was born here. It's not the same as wishing it badly, just knowing that life here doesn't fit that well with me.

Anger generally just makes a bad situation worse. It is however a natural emotional response.
I for one am happy to " surrender my free will" the free will at the moment the ability to swan around infection people with a potentially deadly virus.