What fresh hell is this? National VE day

[wetpants]

This has popped up on my local FB page, villagers are all up for it too. Apparently it’s a nationwide incentive??

The thing is, most front gardens are tiny or non existent here. There’s no way you could be 2m away from your next door. Also these villagers who are up for this are the same people who few weeks ago cried about a lone bloke sitting on a crass verge, well away from any pedestrians. How is this any different?

I’m not British (have lived here a long time though) so maybe I’m just not getting the fervent VE day misty eyeness

And don’t get me started on 9pm nationwide singalong WHO comes up with these things???

putting my EU flag in the window is exactly the way I will commemorate the arrival of peace in Europe

Ha ha maybe I should do that too. Although I don't live in a particularly Brexity area, we were about half and half here and I think the rural bits voted for Brexit and the urban areas voted more to remain.

I expect the chief clown PM will be announcing some lockdown loosening on Thursday night too, it'll be all BORIS GIVES US OUR FREEDOM SO WE CAN CELEBRATE THOSE WHO GAVE HIM HIS, or some such shite.

This country is absurd. It's almost embarrassing.

We won’t be taking part in any of the out in the street things but DS is looking forward to celebrating it all. He is very much into history so this week all our work is going to be themed about Ww2 and VE Day, including him planning for a celebratory tea party on Friday for which he is already planning some traditional recipes we can try.

Given the national celebrations have all had to be cancelled I do get why people are suggesting things though. As long as there is no pressure to take part and those who aren’t aren’t disturbed too much then I can’t get worked up about it (assuming social distancing can be maintained obviously!)

No, should my community decide to go ahead with something similar I won't be joining. It's all a bit olde-worlde-holiday-camp-activityish for my taste, with a bit of the 'good citizen' thrown in for good measure. However,

If if makes others happy let them crack on. I won't attempt to piss on their chips.

The only thing I'd object to is if the silly, passive-aggressive anonymous notes start coming through the doors of non-participants to the tune of 'Dear Number 42, we were disappointed not to see you participating, where's your community spirit?', &c &c.

In which case. Fuck off.

My workplace had something on its noticeboard suggesting arm-twisted, compulsoryjollity for VE Day. I was grateful that everyone now wfh was one neat way to get out of this jingoistic shit.

We've had this shared widely in all our neighbourhood groups. Find it stomach churning in its lauding of white nationalistic Britishness and specifically Englishness - clearly the people who thought this up can't conceive of a world where people don't have back gardens never mind front gardens. We live in one of those particularly English places in Kent where it is all church fetes and bunting and scones but I used to live in an estate in Central London and the idea of this would have been totally alien there. I guess it's not meant for "them". Fine to mark VE day and remember the horror of war but this seems totally tone deaf to me.

A street party would have been nice

Lets hope it slashes down.

@Handsoffisback possibly not, I would say reserve it for older teenagers. It is very factual but pulls no punches when it comes to some of the footage. I don't just mean concentration camps but also bodies of soldiers and victims of torture, starvation and bombings. Not all of the episodes feature such images, but enough do that I would say to exercise caution when showing it to children.

I just feel this is very wrong whilst we are still have hundreds of deaths a day

This is how I feel too. VE day is worth remembering - some countries have it as a permanent holiday every year - but now it's got overtaken by the corona virus. When we have got to grips with this, then there will be a time for celebration. But then, I want to see proper investment in the NHS as the result.

These people need to read up on war crimes such as the Dresden firestorm.

Gosh there’s some real cynics out there.
My DH shared this with me from twitter...

The only kind of bunting we’ve got in the house is pirate bunting. I might put that up.

@Handsoffisback just to follow on from that, also some other footage, e.g. the footage of the Pearl Harbor bombings, writ large in colour is very emotive, even though you don't explicitly see any individual suffering, if that makes sense.

Cameras were running whilst Pearl Harbor was being attacked and watching it in "real time" rather than just seeing the aftermath is a very powerful experience.

Also failing to remember anything massive happening 25 years ago for the 50th.

But it was the year I was sitting my Finals at uni so that might have had something to do with it.

@wetpants does your village begin with a D??

@Lockheart yy. Russians died on a massive scale. Something like a third of all civilian deaths worldwide were in Russia alone - close to 15 million people. In St Petersburg people were literally keeling over starving and then freezing to death in the streets. On the fronts similar, malnourished, freezing, fighting until they died from cold and starvation.

I think on balance the post war attitude to all of this - as expressed by my father all those years ago - is the one that resonates most with me rather than the post 1995 one.

We certainly had a street party for the 50th anniversary. It was great fun

Oh FFS, it's about time these people moved on, and stopped banging on about the bloody war, it's not as if the UK actually did much to win, the USA, and Russia did most of the work for them.

Forced street parties?? Don't be ridiculous. Are people actually that bothered about possible random Facebook disapproval? Grow up

I'm not the one who needs to grow up and it has nothing to do with Facebook disapproval, I am used to that because I don't spout the party line.

But if people are celebrating right outside my house, it is very difficult to avoid, and I can't go out, because I can't get past people. I accept it is slightly different when people are on their driveways but it still means loud music and being disturbed by it.

If people want to party they can wait until it's allowed and hire a hall to do it. Or do it in a park, when that's allowed.

It IS enforcing it on everyone, and it's unnecessary.

And sociability is not a sign of maturity or lack thereof.

No. Just no.

I'm not aware of anything happening around here but if there is I won't be pressured to join in.

Also failing to remember anything massive happening 25 years ago for the 50th

I was overseas in 1995. Thank goodness!

@Handsoffisback it is an excellent series IMO and too short. The footage is almost exclusively footage and photographs shot during the war, no modern historians sat in their library talking at you. However it is very hard hitting in places and (without meaning to sound like the introductory voiceover on the BBC) there are some scenes you may find distressing.

it is a bank holiday, for some of us who work, it is a day off.
in my village there were planned events for this anyway, which have been changed

i remember the one 25 years ago
plenty of elderly people will appreciate it.
i wont partake and wouldnt have done anyway.