Christmas - following the rules or not?

[BIWitched]

From what we know right now (and accepting that things may change in the next few weeks) if you're in tier 2 or 3 re you going to obey the rules about not mixing households indoors?

YANBU - I will be ignoring the rules
YABU - it's my civic duty to obey the rules

@Umbridge34

Surely being in a childcare bubble only means that your in-laws are able to look after your children while you work? What does that have to do with you all spending Christmas together? Or have you just decided that it makes you a special case?

Please explain how spending time with the people who are caring for my child whilst we work is any more risky? They spend hours with my son and we see each other during pick up and drop off. And there are no rules against socialising with people you have formed bubbles with as far as I'm aware.

Because you'll be spending a long period of time enclosed in the house with them (and seeing them on a day when you don't need to have any contact with them for childcare)

Exemptions are made to make people's lives easier & help them retain their job (send children to family for childcare) and they take the piss turning it into we can see family whenever we want to,

& I doubt there will be any social distancing

We will follow the rules as we don't want covid and i am not setting the example to my 8 and 10 year old that you can break the law if it doesn't suit you.

@DiddlySquatty
So the 3 under 5 are not people. Wow that’s a new one. What are they then. Blobs?

@CoronaIsWatching I take it you won't be relying on the NHS should you or any of your relatives get a serious case of Covid

il be having xmas with my parents, it's my Christmas off this year and I will be working the next one so with two young kids I will be making the most of it.

Woman and Home seem to have the inside track

i.ebayimg.com/images/g/dHkAAOSwHfdfisLs/s-l1600.jpg

I will spend Xmas at home with the kids. I don’t want to spread it to my parents, one of whom has cancer. Also, I just feel the responsible thing to do is to follow the rules. It’s Xmas....big deal.

Dear all those breaking the rules,

Will you commit to not using the NHS if you or your family get the virus? And will you also move to the back of the queue for the vaccine?

Thanks.

From those who give a shit about people other than themselves.

Yes, we will be sticking to the rules, I think.

My DC and I are my parents carers and we will all be together Christmas day (4 in total). We always social distance.

Yes, but I have no reason to smugly tell people it's because 'I'm not selfish/a dick'/add pejorative of choice. My parents are dead and we don't see my in-laws at Christmas. There is only my brother. Easy for the likes of me to keep rules that don't affect me personally. As to the rest of the holiday, Boxing Day is spent with one set of godparents (too vulnerable) and New Year's Eve/Day with the other set 2 1/2 hours drive away, and it's unlikely for various reasons this will go ahead, either.

The Rules are so arbitrary that rigid adherence to them with family while you go off and teach 15 university students at a time/run a school bubble, work in key services, etc, doesn't make a whole lot of sense. It's understandable that people will adhere if they see a rationale for that, but things are still so ad hoc and arbitrary it's hardly surprising when they don't. I wouldn't want my elderly/ill parents to spend their last Christmas this way, had they been fortunate enough to live to be old. I expect others feel the same way. And it's not my place to blame them for that. As for this:

If people continue dicking about dodging, bending and ignoring the rules we aren't going to see the back of this shit show for ages.

I really wish the situation were that simple. Hate to be the bearer of bad news, but that's going to be the case no matter what people do. That's just how viruses work. We are going to have to live with this thing for some years to come. In other news, H1N1 influenza (the Spanish flu that caused the 1918 epidemic) is still around and in some areas of the globe is once again on the rise this year.

You can 'lockdown' until kingdom come, it will only kick the can a few miles further down the road until people start coming out of their houses again (damn them!) and transmission re-starts. It's just not possible to hide from this forever.

Currently DD at uni in tier 1 sharing a house with 5 others who's families are all in tier 1 also. We're in tier 2.
If they all decide to go home, I cannot leave her at university by herself over Christmas.
She's coming home for her mental health if nothing else, but they'll just be the 3 of us and no other family this year.
It's breaking the rules and I'm a conformer normally but I just couldn't leave her if she was on her own.

Nope. My son and DIL are coming Xmas Day as that’s the court ordered access to their children. That’ll make a lovely even 10.

Very difficult to say when we don't know what the actual rules will be. However, if the rule of 6 still applies, we will likely break it, and see our best friends who also happen to live near us, whose kids are at school with ours, and who won't be seeing their own parents, who are, like ours, by definition older and more vulnerable.

Oh god...that’s just how viruses work. We know! Not this again. Of course it only ‘kicks it down the road’. But it slows the spread so services can cope. That’s what it does and avoids exponential growth.

We’re in a second wave because of people’s behaviour but as long as you get a nice Xmas, sod everyone else.

@Ibiza1998

Dear all those breaking the rules,

Will you commit to not using the NHS if you or your family get the virus? And will you also move to the back of the queue for the vaccine?

Thanks.

From those who give a shit about people other than themselves.

If a vaccine rolls out nobody will be queueing for it. There will be protocols about exactly who gets it when. Moral behaviour won't be a criteria.

The pride some people feel by declaring that ‘no I’m not following the rules’ is sickening. Aren’t you clever not giving a shit.

If a vaccine rolls out nobody will be queueing for it. There will be protocols about exactly who gets it when. Moral behaviour won't be a criteria.

Indeed. The naiveté on these threads is quite incredible.

They’ll either:

a) Relax restrictions over Christmas. As viruses are not well known for respecting Christian festivals, there will therefore be a massive spike in January. Cue even further restrictions and moaning about the government. Oh - and understandable fury from people who’ve lost jobs and businesses because of months of restrictions which can then be deemed “flexible” so that people can have a family roast dinner

Or...

b) They won’t relax restrictions over Christmas and will have to crack down hard. Checks on who is on public transport. Checks on registration plates etc. Cue lots of moaning about the fascist regime.

Boris et al can’t win. It’ll be a shit show either way. Couldn’t have happened to a nicer, more deserving group of people....

@Rachie1973

Nope. My son and DIL are coming Xmas Day as that’s the court ordered access to their children. That’ll make a lovely even 10.

Classy.

Poor fractured Britain, Covid, Brexit, food poverty, job losses and so on. The powers that be have us all at each others throats, as designed.

I will do what is asked of me (when I get time to translate the mixed messages lol), for the good of society. But there is no such thing as that anymore, it is an economy right?

@DeliciouslyFemale

I’m just wondering how many of the outraged posters live completely alone, with no other family nearby?

I do.

I will be abiding by the rules.

I am clinically vulnerable and have been advised by 2 of my Consultants to continue to shield, as effectively as I can. I'm just 40, but Covid-19 would likely kill me, so we are extra-cautious as a family.

In light of that, we will be following the rules and staying at home, just the 4 of us - me, DH, DD13 and DD11. We usually spend the week before Christmas travelling round the UK visiting various family members and delivering gifts and have a huge get together on Christmas day. I think it'll make a nice change, just to hunker down the 4 of us and have a relaxing, quiet day without all the rushing about which usually precedes it.

As much as I'd love to see my DSis and her family and my DPs, they have been out and about, living their "normal" (if Covid-limited) lives, so it would be too much of a risk to have them here.

I hope people do follow the rules. I, like many others, need to be able to resume my life. I even miss going to Tesco!

My parents and my brother each live in Tier 1 areas of England. Under the current English rules a gathering of the four of us from our three households is fine.

However, despite the fact that my county in Wales has but a fraction of the number of cases per 100k compared with these Tier 1 counties, the Welsh Government saw fit to impose draconian travel restrictions upon me. I am not allowed to leave the county except for work. As most people I know (other than work) live in other counties, I haven't seen anyone (not even outside) other than my next door neighbour since the beginning of the month. As of 6pm there will be a national "firebreak lockdown", again despite tiny numbers of cases in many areas. These restrictions are completely disproportionate.

I spent the last seven months obeying the rules, watching customers at work (public transport) do as they please but still I behaved. Come December though, I don't care what the rules will be. I live alone, I will not spend Christmas alone. I shall go down to my parents at Christmas. I shall also go to see a London concert in mid-December (socially-distanced and masks worn).

If Drakeford even hints at following the path apparently contemplated by the Scottish Government then I shall pick up a placard, march down to Cardiff, and stick it where the sun doesn't shine.

I was desperate to spend this Christmas with my family given I haven’t for three years. Two years ago I was busy being diagnosed with cancer, last year I was still recovering from treatment so I really wanted to see them at Christmas this year. I have been to my home town just once this year to see my family in August and I probably won’t see them until next year now. Despite all that, there is no way I am going to break the rules. I will stay at home with my DH and DD.

Every additional interaction increases the risk of transmission of the virus. It isn’t about the equivalence of meeting in school v meeting in a home for example. It is about finding a consistent way of reducing overall the numbers of opportunities for the virus to be transmitted. Those of you talking about accepting your own risk need to understand that it isn’t just you and your loved ones that you put at risk it is everyone else you all come into contact with after that.

I have many issues with the way this pandemic has been managed and the communication from government has in many cases been shambolic. But the virus doesn’t give us a bye because Boris is an incompetent idiot and we all need to do our best to adhere to these rules, especially at Christmas, when a high number of people not adhering to the rules risks a nationwide spike in cases two weeks later.

@Princessdebthe1st
I hear and concur with everything you say. A voice of reason.
My sister too had cancer last year and was recovering. I too would love to spend Christmas with her and her family but we won’t. We lost my Mil during lockdown and the other side of the family could do with friendly support but again we won’t.

There are people who genuinely need support and caring help, but on MN there are so many who just refuse to adapt for one Christmas as they must see friends and family who could easily have one Christmas in their own homes. It makes you despair.