AIBU to think people will blame the PM for relaxing the rules rather than take personal responsibility if someone they see at Christmas is hospitalised with covid?

[PrincessNutNuts]

I think people will blame the government generally, and the Prime Minister personally, for relaxing the rules for five days at Christmas if the Christmas they had leads to a loved one being seriously ill with covid.

"The government shouldn't have let us do it if it wasn't safe." they'll say.

They won't take personal responsibility for it and admit they knew it wasn't safe - for instance - to mix school age children with elderly or Shielding people who don't see them regularly, and haven't seen people indoors for months.

What do you think? Will people hold their hands up and take responsibility for putting their loved ones at risk?

Or blame Boris?

Oh but I do blame him for so much.

I took personal responsibility, played it safe, and my child still caught Covid because I was faced with an impossible choice between health and GCSEs.

And the wicked lies he and his pals spout about schools being safe and children not catching or transmitting the virus, while refusing to put in place any measures for protection.

I blame him for being spineless, incompetent, after the populist vote, and for not giving a shiny shit about any of us.

I do wish people would stop calling him Boris 🙄

I am mixing with 3 families over 4 days at Christmas and have assessed the risk as very low considering we’re all isolating in the lead up and haven’t gone anywhere in weeks anyway.

I think the overall expected rise in cases will be blamed on the government, of course it will. If it were my loved one who got sick though, if I’d spent time with them, it would be myself I blamed.

I don’t blame him for me losing a much loved family member to covid.

I do blame the government for, mixed messaging, late lockdown, school exam fiasco, worst economic cost due to covid in Europe, 1.8 billion of pandemic funding to Tory contacts and mates, no school strategy, Cummings debacle, going against scientific advice oh and mixed messaging AGAIN regarding Christmas.

No gov would have found this pandemic easy but they have fucked up and u-turned throughout the whole fucking year.

Of course they will. Some people are thick and arrogant and Johnson doesn't have the guts to lay it on the line.
He'll flounce off and resign in the new year anyway. He doesn't care. The rest of us will pick up their mess.

Every death since Dominic Cummings' trip to test his eyesight is a death I've blamed Boris for.

He was doing a shitty job beforehand, but when he let one of his own advisors break the rules, that's when he really lost control.

People who are mixing households for Christmas need to take some personal responsibility, but our PM shouldn't have told them that was acceptable behaviour in the first place.

The people who worry me are those who are going to carry on regardless.

But wouldn't they have broken rules anyway?

Bonniedundee it’s not his demographic

I do wish people would stop calling him Boris

@TheRaccoon why?

People hear what they want to hear, I've not heard anyone say it's ''safe''... anyone who thinks it's 'safe' to mix hasn't been paying attention to the data shared all year or what is happening all over the world. Bottom line, rates are up as people won't stop mixing. If people mix more, the rates will go up more and yes we'll have another lockdown and everyone will complain again. Boris will be blamed either way as people don't want to take responsibility for their own choices.

Different people and different families have different risk profiles therefore it was either a matter of stopping everyone from mixing over Christmas to protect the vulnerable and limit spread or leaving it to people to make judgements. A large amount of information has been shared to help people make informed choices. It's easy to blame the government, but not so long ago people were moaning because they were unable restrictions when their particular area had low cases etc... he's damned either way.

Personally, I'd have preferred no relief for Christmas. I am at risk, as are numerous members of my family. The risks others take over this period will inevitably impact will us, but I recognize there are people who are healthy, who have healthy families and are therefore willing to take the risk for the sake of having a Christmas.

The government knows full well that relaxing the rules at Christmas is madness - goodness the medics could not spell it out more clearly. BMA describe is as a blunder - even Boris should be able to understand that.

It is fundamentally wrong. He is trying to curry favour with the electorate and to avoid making rules that he does not know how he is going to enforce.

And people will die.

The idea that people will take personal responsibility is a joke - we have all seen the big gatherings and know people who are just ignoring the rules. And there was a woman on TV the other day saying she does not follow any of the rules as god will protect her from the virus.

Of course they will. Why blame themselves when they can point the finger at the government? If people can’t take responsibility for their own lives, if they get covid or spread it, it’s on them, not bloody Boris Johnson.

@Cornettoninja it makes him sound too friendly and harmless for my liking. Plays into his stupid scruffy haired cascade.

We never called May “Theresa” or Cameron “Dave”, I don’t see why we would call Johnson “Boris”!

*facade not cascade!

It is fundamentally wrong. He is trying to curry favour with the electorate and to avoid making rules that he does not know how he is going to enforce.

How do you enforce it though? the population have to be on board.

The idea that people will take personal responsibility is a joke - we have all seen the big gatherings and know people who are just ignoring the rules. And there was a woman on TV the other day saying she does not follow any of the rules as god will protect her from the virus.

Again won't those people just break rules?

[quote TheRaccoon]@Cornettoninja it makes him sound too friendly and harmless for my liking. Plays into his stupid scruffy haired cascade.

We never called May “Theresa” or Cameron “Dave”, I don’t see why we would call Johnson “Boris”![/quote]
I think Cameron probably started it with his whole ‘call me Dave’ bit.

I don’t see it that way tbh, I think it’s just a short hand way of referring to him and far more distinguishing than ‘Johnson’. Peoples surnames tend to be more unusual than their first names but Johnson is so common it doesn’t really separate and identify him as much as the far less common ‘Boris’. Particularly as his brother is in parliament too.

DH and I were just saying this. Nobody is forcing people to get together, but I bet people will blame the government for allowing it. A lot of people I know are just having christmas on their own, us included, but I heard someone today saying they're still going from London to family in Scotland despite Nicola Sturgeon banning overnight stays - their view is she can't enforce it and what can she do....

YANBU.
I've heard "It's ALLOWED" all over the place recently- ie it's allowed to go to the shops three times a day. It's allowed to meet with multiple groups of six people.
Yes, but doesn't mean it's a good idea.

Ultimately you can tell people what to do but after a bit they will take no notice and do what they want anyway.

This last lockdown I think is responsible for the jump in numbers and many more deaths.

The science said a firebreak lockdown would keep the virus under control.
But doing it in the run up to Christmas just meant on 2nd December everyone ran out to the shops to do their Christmas shopping and instead of the steady flow of people in shops there was a sudden surge. People trying to get everything done in 1/2 the time.

Whether Boris said to stay in or not people are just going to do what they want to do so it would have been a pointless exercise in trying to get people to isolate for Christmas.

I do blame the government for, mixed messaging, late lockdown, school exam fiasco, worst economic cost due to covid in Europe, 1.8 billion of pandemic funding to Tory contacts and mates, no school strategy, Cummings debacle, going against scientific advice oh and mixed messaging AGAIN regarding Christmas

Absolutely

Anyone who’s mixing indoors over Christmas must take personal responsibility for the potential consequences. Just because the government says you can do something doesn’t mean you have to.

I’m not looking forward to January hard lockdown and the near collapse of the NHS as they battle with flu, Covid and whatever else’s spikes in the winter which will follow the Christmas and NY relaxations.

He's doing this so he can blame us.

YANBU

The Govt was damned if it allowed a relaxing of the rules and damned if it didnt.

Too many people cant see that we have to have blanket guidelines because they wont fit everyone's precise situation. What were they expecting?

Dear Mrs Ariadne Smithins of 25, Acacia Gardens, Penge your personal guidelines are.......

Be a grown up. Make proper grown up decisions. Dont try to 'game' the rules. Live with the consequences.

There's no way people would have followed any harsher rules anyway and there aren't enough police to enforce if a law was passed to prevent travel/mixing over Christmas. So just what do people want Boris to do? At the end of the day, it's down to the public to minimise risk to themselves and others. And like we've seen, when too many people can't be arsed to take pretty simple precautions, the infection/death rates rise and we end up with more/longer restrictions.

@user1497207191 I assume when you say people wouldn't comply you mean the majority of people?