‘Fuck the Covid rules.’ Really?

[Yellownotblue]

To all the posters (there have been many) saying they don’t plan to abide by the new rule of 6 - is your attitude specific to Covid, or do you generally don’t care about acting illegally?

For instance would you drink and drive ‘because you have a good reason’?

Or park illegally or drive without a seatbelt?

Would you drop litter on the streets?

I’m genuinely confused by the admission that so many posters see law-abidance as a “nice to have”, rather than some basic standard of life and morality in a society.

Most will follow it. Where I live compliance to things like masks is very high, going by posts on here, not always the case.

You’ll get hotspots where compliance is lower.

We all know the police will not be able to enforce this across the country.
God I wish I was living in Sweden right now. Another 100 bloody billion being spent and yet our new normal is little better than a communist state. Roll on the new tax hikes.

I'm as law abiding as you can get and even I'm thinking of ignoring the 6 limit to an extent. We are a family of 5 and under these rules we won't be able to see either set of grandparents, possibly for months and months. They are old and sad. I can't see what difference it would make to have a meeting of 7 people instead of 6. And frankly, through the Cummings thing, we were all explicitly told that actually we didn't have to stick to the letter of the law and should just use our common sense to evaluate risk, so that's what I'm going to do.

I would guess a LOT of very law-abiding families of 5 and 6 will become lawbreakers right quick. Telling a family they can't meet anyone else unless they split up first for six months, unless of course they're at work, or school, or weddings or funerals or team sports, is cruel.

I'm thinking if you want to host a party, just make sure someone's renewing their vows.

did no one see the infection figures, specifically the ages?
what do you want?

The rules are inconsistent for a reason though , it’s a trade off . If we want to keep things like work and school open and we want to be able to hold weddings and funerals then everything else has to stop because otherwise we are spreading it from work and school etc into society generally.

I must admit to feeling pretty depressed about the whole thing at the moment . Dh seems to be back in the office, I am trying to avoid the office and work at home ( office in listed building and very crowded) ds3 has suddenly announced that he thinks he might want to try to defer university partly because it just all seems pretty chaotic which I massively sympathise with but all around us are saying he should just go .

@snowy0wl

Why do people keep posting Corona-related discussions outside the Coronavirus chat area? :(

Because it's the biggest issue facing the country. I see the coronavirus topic for detailed questions, but this is a general morality question.

We get aibu questions about schools, work, relationships too.

I honestly don’t see what’s so hard to understand.

If you get Covid then contacts are traced and patterns are looked for.

Presumably meeting of groups of more than 6 people socially produces a large number of cases.

So the idea is to stop doing that so we CAN do other mixing like school and dentistry, work and more limited socialising, and continue to keep infection rates low.

Why is this hard to understand?

If you work in a school, or send your dc, then keeping transmission lower elsewhere helps. I’m not sure why it’s hard to get either.

I don’t just do something because it’s legal/illegal no, I think

We’ve been rule-abiding so far. We will be ignoring the 6 person restriction - in a limited and specific way, obviously!
As a family of five, we are not going to insist that my parents-in-law visit separately when any one of us could legally go and sit with 5 strangers in a crowded pub. We will continue to apply common sense and meet one other household at a time. The rules are inconsistent and illogical and have a widely varying impact on different households, for no real difference in risk.

@MindyStClaire

Well I guess the government have made it clear that it's ok to break the law in a "specific and limited way" this week.

Yes, the timing is unfortunate.

I agree with the poster who said it’s generally specific to Covid. People are fed up. Ten people from two households is no different to six from two, in my book. And they’re not going to police a one year old’s party... how would they?

Obviously I would not drink and drive or not where a seatbelt, but I have been known to park on double yellows and I have frequented an illegal rave or two, in my youth.

We will be ignoring the 6 person restriction - in a limited and specific way, obviously!
Then you will be increasing yours and others risk of getting and passing on the disease because meetings as you describe are the ones where it’s happening

Ten people from two households is no different to six from two, in my book.

Depends on distancing and air circulation.

I assume the reason workplaces are not too bad is room limits. People are getting too close in domestic settings.

Maybe we need some kind of points system or app for personal risk. We have kids in two schools- raised risk. We work from home, don’t use public transport, haven’t been going to the pub, haven’t been to any large gatherings, live rurally, only go to essential shops, lowered risk. We went out for dinner recently - raised risk. My father in law never goes out save to visit family - no direct risk. Impossible to do, obviously, but would be a nice way of incentivising sensible behaviour.

IVE following the rules to the letter. But it makes no sense to families not to see grandparents. My parents look after my sisters kids (4) yet by these rules when a key worker parent arrives home, one of them will have go stand in garden before the parent can step in the house. Or else risk for 5min meaning there are 7 breathing souls in the house. So yeah I’m all for them become criminals and leaving together after 5min.

They don’t socialise or see anyone else or going to cafes and pubs. This will be the majority of criminal families. Adding 1-2 extra people so they can see families. Who are going to get it anyway even If they waited in the car the whole time.

Ten people from two households is no different to six from two, in my book.
Does your book contain any data on the number of Covid cases in people who’ve been meeting in large groups as you describe?

The rules are ridiculous and a lot don't make any sense. The government seem to think the virus can count, tell the time, know the days of the weeks and doesn't go to the pub.

More local distinctions would be good as well. Our area is right down near the bottom of the risk list, yet we have the same restriction on household gatherings as very high risk areas.

@Yellownotblue

To all the posters (there have been many) saying they don’t plan to abide by the new rule of 6 - is your attitude specific to Covid, or do you generally don’t care about acting illegally?

For instance would you drink and drive ‘because you have a good reason’?

Or park illegally or drive without a seatbelt?

Would you drop litter on the streets?

I’m genuinely confused by the admission that so many posters see law-abidance as a “nice to have”, rather than some basic standard of life and morality in a society.

‘Law abidance’ is not the standard of morality, it should be the other way around. The people who make these laws have told you every day for years now that they don’t give a fuck about you or this country. How far do they need to push it before you’ll listen?

Completely agree with MarshaBradyo
We can only keep schools open if we limit contact out of school. We are a family of 5 so it will limit what we can do and who we meet but it is a trade off to be able to keep businesses open.

Because the rules are inconsistent, illogical and are being made up on the hoof because this government are criminally incompetent and are trying to shift the blame for their fuck ups onto the general public.

This for me too. I'm generally law-abiding, and I keep up with the ever-changing legislation because I have to ensure that the workplace I lead is compliant with it and my team safe... but this past weekend I hosted my three year old's birthday party in my garden with, I dunno, around 15 people. I didn't think "Fuck the rules", I thought "If I can go to the pub with these five adults and be surrounded by another 30-50 adults, and if these kids can be at nursery together each day, then being outdoors with these people for two hours is probably fine."

Thank you to everyone for posting, it’s interesting to hear viewpoints.

I agree the government is handling this appallingly, as they have all along.

@kungfupannda

More local distinctions would be good as well. Our area is right down near the bottom of the risk list, yet we have the same restriction on household gatherings as very high risk areas.

Ours is pretty low risk and projection keeps it that way. I’m fine with same restrictions to keep it that way. Better chance of schools staying open.