To think this pandemic has provided deep insight into people's character?

[rosesbloom]

I have found it quite illuminating seeing people's reactions. Friends and family members I have known for years have surprised me. It is like this situation has acted like a catalyst to reveal people's true nature, values and character.

A friend I had known for years and thought was a kind and empathetic person said the vulnerable just need to accept that they will die if they catch it and everything needs to carry on as normal. I have an underlying health condition she doesn't know about. I just sat there in stunned silence.

It has even shown me things about myself I didn't realise. It has shown me how anxious I am about my health, usually all those worries are internal and I keep them to myself but they have had to be brought out into the light when I explain to friends/family why I don't feel comfortable going for a meal in a restaurant at the moment despite it being "allowed" and "COVID-19 secure". Even though I know I engage in risky behaviours all the time like driving a car, crossing a road, etc it is like I have a blind spot with accurately assessing COVID risks.

Have any of you had any surprising revelations from people?

I am shocked that some people think it is entirely reasonable that hundreds of families should be forced to make themselves destitute to benefit other people.
I am also shocked that some people think it is entirely reasonable to pay other people to take risks to their lives that they are not willing to take to their own life. (eg online shopping) Almost like the creation of a servant class.

Completely agree. Those with poorly paid jobs and inadequate homes by necessity live much more of their lives outside their homes. Let’s not then demonise them for it.
You have to be in a fairly privileged position to be able to create your own little comfortable ‘fortress’ against Covid and lock yourself away. Some of our friends have done this. They have no children, a second home in the country with a swimming-pool and are wfh in financial sector jobs. It’s much easier for them to stay home comfortably than a family of six including teenagers in an overcrowded 2 bed inner-city flat. Staying home for some people means playing ping-pong in their games room, exercising in their home gym or pottering about in the garden. Staying home for others means sitting on your bunk bed in the small bedroom you share with three other siblings because there’s nowhere else to go.

In the main, I've only witnessed many many acts of kindness.

Although, when I think about it, those people were generally of the kinder persuasion.

So, maybe like someone uppost suggested, Covid has just magnified people's traits.

@houselikeashed I have musicians in my family and I know how hard it is for them. It's soul-destroying the way music and singing in particular has been literally muted due to this.

@Supersimkin2 hysterical? I don’t see that I see the biggest global problem since WW 2. I think the opposite I think many haven’t grasped the economic effects medium/long term. That’s not hysterical it’s a realisation of where we are.

[quote Holyrivolli]@SisterAgatha. Of course you’re being selfish. You’re expecting people to make sacrifices that cause harm to them personally to protect you. It’s understandable as people by their very nature think of themselves and their loved ones first. But don’t dress it up in claiming that you’re not.[/quote]
The thing is the virus can affect anyone. Yes, it's less likely to cause harm to someone who is younger, but they are not immune. People who are vulnerable, risk averse or societally minded have been helping to suppress the virus for everyone, not just themselves.

My friends haven’t surprised me during lockdown really - a few might have been more or less anxious than I’d have expected. I’ve been more surprised by the attitudes people are prepared to spew out (or merely share) on social media. Also noticed a lot of people online (e.g. here) who seem desperate for the opportunity to ‘report someone and who notice the minutiae of what their neighbours do. I don’t seem to know anyone like that in real life.

@Notselfish - It seems that any logical thought process has left people and they are only able to action decisions on raw emotions.

It really is bizarre.

Many a thesis will be written on how people acted during 2020 in years to come.

Yes definitely, in the positive and the negative.
It's given me a different perspective on what I value in people. Sense for community is something I value a lot more now, and compassion for someone else's circumstances.

It's not either 'lives' or 'the economy'. It's people's livelihoods, people's mental health. It's people having no food or social contact and feeling in despair.

I've noticed some friends or colleagues getting more dogmatic or ruder, too.

Then, my closest friends are still the same great people and I love them all the more for it.

@frazzledquaver - 1 Death Per Million Per Day.

That is a fact, a fact that has caused the utter and ongoing desctruction of the economy, social interaction, peoples mental wellbing, routine medical checkups, cancer treatements, lonliness, suicidal thoughts, destruction of childrens education, mass poverty, huge fiscal deficits for years to come.

I'm shocked at how some people have no resilience at all. They get upset because life is harder due to restrictions. My life has never been easy, this is just an extension of the same shit. I have anxiety and have coped far better than I thought I would, I'm not a wuss, I'm actually really strong, I've just had some really crap shit happen to me.

If I can manage to stay compassionate to others during this others should too.

People with MH issues don't all find this completely unbearable, suicide's happen at the best of time's, the problem is lack of funding and resources for MH care and has been for far longer than this pandemic.

If everyone concerned about MH care had raised the issue prior to this we may well have been in a better position to cope now. It pisses me off no end that it's being used to justify people's unwillingness to do the right thing.

Yep so surprised and disappointed in so many.

The thing that really got my back up are the ones who don’t follow the guidance and then when questioned say something like “it changes so often I don’t even know what we are allowed to do anymore”.
I mean, if you are going to flout the rules at least own it.

I’ve distanced myself from those that have been having parties, pictures on fb of them crammed onto the beach, cuddling their parents, aunties, friends etc. I’m just not interested in spending time with them.

I wonder do the people who are annoyed by any suggestion that the more vulnerable will have to protect themselves more, have any view as to how long the current situation should last? If theres no effective vaccine should economies crash and burn , should young people be deprived of normal life , should medical screenings and treatments be severely delayed for ever?

@Treesofwood

I am shocked that some people think it is entirely reasonable that hundreds of families should be forced to make themselves destitute to benefit other people. I am also shocked that some people think it is entirely reasonable to pay other people to take risks to their lives that they are not willing to take to their own life. (eg online shopping) Almost like the creation of a servant class.

Well said.

Yes it's been far too polarising. I like to think DH and I are somewhere in the middle.

But I have been genuinely surprised at how utterly unintelligent so so many people are; can't asses risk, can't analyse, can't see that this isn't black and white, are terrified in a way totally out of proportion to the risk when compared to the risks all life entails, can't see that the damage to the economy is not something only the rich, right wing tories need to worry about but that this is going to fuck us all!

[quote fromdownwest]@frazzledquaver - 1 Death Per Million Per Day.

That is a fact, a fact that has caused the utter and ongoing desctruction of the economy, social interaction, peoples mental wellbing, routine medical checkups, cancer treatements, lonliness, suicidal thoughts, destruction of childrens education, mass poverty, huge fiscal deficits for years to come.[/quote]
I don't really understand your figures - where do you get 1 death per million per day from? And as far as I knew, children are now in school, pubs are open in the vast majority of the UK, people can meet in small groups, etc. All made possible by people taken responsibility to try to suppress a virus which would have otherwise overwhelmed the NHS.

@SomewhereEast

Its been an education in the power of fear, basically. People will agree to literally anything in order to feel 'safe'.

This is what scares me, it's like people have lost all sense of perspective. The government are more than willing to take advantage ( even if they couldn't organise a piss up in a brewery).

@rosesbloom that’s exactly what you implied. That people that disagree with the current measures are not kind or empathetic. Maybe read your original post?

I disagree. I don’t think this has necessarily shown who people truly are. It has backed people into a corner, causing huge anxiety either because of health reasons, loss of livelihood and future career, dreams and aspirations, or because of how isolated they feel. The government wanted to scare us, to be terrified of Covid above all else. They succeeded and people are responding in different ways. Someone who is now overly anxious about health may never have become this anxious before. Someone saying “let old people die so we can carry on” would have never said sth like that before but they are being driven to desperation because they are alone, with no future or livelihood anymore.

Yes, humans are selfish. We didn’t need a pandemic to tell us that. But I don’t think all these people who are having extreme reactions are showing their true traits. Some are. But some have just been broken and changed by this experience.

I really like my neighbours, some of my friends are literally amazing and having time to think about my life, rather than rushing through it is leading to some very big changes personally.

I hope this whole thing does not go on for much longer, people are becoming so angry on the roads, being quick to shout at others in supermarkets - you can literally see some people struggling to cope even strangers that were not known to me before they started screaming at the poor cashier. A sense of calm needs to return, and order - and normality in the real sense that isn't stretched by the stress of the experience of a pandemic. We need a quieter time as country when she is all over I feel - so we can quietly put our country back together, to get our green policies finally up and running - to start putting people first.

@amusedtodeath1

I'm shocked at how some people have no resilience at all. They get upset because life is harder due to restrictions. My life has never been easy, this is just an extension of the same shit. I have anxiety and have coped far better than I thought I would, I'm not a wuss, I'm actually really strong, I've just had some really crap shit happen to me.

If I can manage to stay compassionate to others during this others should too.

People with MH issues don't all find this completely unbearable, suicide's happen at the best of time's, the problem is lack of funding and resources for MH care and has been for far longer than this pandemic.

If everyone concerned about MH care had raised the issue prior to this we may well have been in a better position to cope now. It pisses me off no end that it's being used to justify people's unwillingness to do the right thing.

Yes, I agree with this. I think there has, in particular, been a real underestimation of the resilience of children. I see people whining about the mental health issues caused by children having to wear masks on buses and in corridors at school. Really? The vast majority of kids don't mind at all and are ready to step up to the plate. Especially if it keeps their schools and sports groups, etc, going for longer.

I've got a child with a serious chronic condition who wears devices attached to his body the whole time to keep him alive and healthy. He's as happy as any teenager. Positioning it as some massive infringement of his liberties or bewailing the loss of an idealised life wouldn't help him. Acknowledging that it's not ideal and then making the best of the situation is, IMO, the best approach.

Well, it’s certainly brought out the judgemental!

lockdown is also sacrificing vulnerable people, just a different set of vulnerable people

I think empathy requires imagination and conversations.

This has been a totally new situation and protecting everyone from covid, while not neglecting the economy, other health needs and people's mental health requires a very fine balancing act.

I also find that people on here can be very quick to take offense. If a young healthy woman is eaten up by anxiety about covid and someone reassures her that it only affects the old and people with certain health conditions, that is taken as heartlessness.

But I have been genuinely surprised at how utterly unintelligent so so many people are; can't asses risk, can't analyse, can't see that this isn't black and white, are terrified in a way totally out of proportion to the risk when compared to the risks all life entails, can't see that the damage to the economy is not something only the rich, right wing tories need to worry about but that this is going to fuck us all!

@unchienandalusia (like your username btw!) yep.

And the 'I'm paying others to take the risk for me' argument. We hardly ever hear about those usually badly paid factory, warehouse and shopfloor, delivery and postal workers, etc who take daily risks to serve all the rest.

I give most everyone a pass. Everyone is stressed. Some people are non too bright and taken in easily by conspiracies etc. It's nobody fault.

Brexit however is less forgiveable. Two months to go and then it could start dragging this country under. A double whammy blow to our country. Covid was unavoidable. Brexit was self inflicted.

Late to this thread but very much so. The selfishness, the entitlement, the unwillingness to abide by the rules, the snitching on others, the whole damn thing, has been a fascinating insight into people's true character.

I've realised that I really don't need as many people around me as I thought. I've found that I react more strongly than I thought I might to a perceived sense of injustice, like when others were allowed back to school my DC weren't.

I've also realised just how lucky I am I have a lovely home, a great family, a stable WFH job etc.

I've found that my interest in the news and current affairs is actually a slightly unhealthy obsession, and although is shared by my colleagues, isn't really in my social circle, so with WFH I've had less people to discuss the current situation with.

I really, really want it to be over now though!