to not know what difference a female perspective would have made?

[icewoman]

Covid enquiry.

Helen McNamara, deputy cabinet secretary says women were being ignored and disregarded and the female point of view was missing from most decision making

I have no difficulty believing that our revered leaders behaved like a bunch or ignorant arrogant chauvinistic pigs but I do wonder what, if anything, a female point of view would have changed about the decision making?

They may have been able to point out to our beloved government that they'd ordered a few billion pounds worth of PPI that was only designed to fit men...

Fair enough. My view is most people are good, I don't have a massive capacity for hate towards my fellow citizens so I'm hoping to use the process to learn and understand.

Personally I'm becoming aware that the inquiry threads are going to be very angry.

A someone who was he only female partner in her professional firm I can say categorically that this is no true - if you behaved like a man you'd be labelled bossyover assertive etc etc. The way you get to this level is by treading a very fine behavioural line between being diplomatic and helpful and making sure that your voice/opinion is heard when it really counts and by being far far better at doing your job than most of the men put together. Even when you get to the table you often need to bite your tongue for a bi until the men have seen what a good job you do before they'll listen to you properly.

I didn't use the word hate.

I'm glad you're going to learn and understand. From what I can see, others are just using it as an opportunity to cover up the fact that they wanted to report their neighbours for going out more than once a day (even though there was never a rule against that).

I remember the level of conversation on here

It was posters shouting ‘schools are not childcare’

And wOnT someone think of the children in that crap up down lettering

Discrediting any parent or anyone pointing out harms to women and children

That was from majority females, I don’t hold great hope that they’d help skew it towards women and children

The public wanted lockdowns and that’s what they got, no thought to harms.

My experience of my neighbours, colleagues and friends was they were pretty caring. I don't know anyone who reported people, and most people spent their energy trying to care for their loved ones.

Maybe the way the people we know behaved impacts how we feel about it all.

The inquiry will stir up a lot of different feelings presumably.

People I knew were great

It was mn that astounded me. A parenting site

I don't think anyone who called for schools to be closed in January 2021 is caring. I think they're a shortsighted idiot. So I suppose that's where we differ.

But it did make a difference, didn't it, in countries like Denmark and New Zealand? Who knows if it's because they were led by women but I suspect they were able to take a broader view. As for the UK, absolutely disgusting - you wouldn't let them take charge of a school disco ffs

Why don’t you try closer to home with Sturgeon?

Who shut private nurseries causing huge stress to working women and impacting dc

I think trying to understand people will be more productive for me than calling my neighbours arseholes and idiots, so I agree we differ in that regard!

Have a good rest of the day @BallaiLuimni

I agree that trying to understand is important, but I don't see many people actually examining their thinking. I've seen a few people admit that they regret their pro-lockdown stance, but they don't seem to have much insight into why they thought that way. With the inquiry I'm just seeing people use the Tories as an easy target to deflect from the fact that they were totally in favour of all the policies they're now criticising. That's why I'm taking the immature approach of calling them idiots - I would be far less ragey if they said 'you know what, I supported that at the time and I wish I hadn't.' That would be productive.

I would be far less ragey if they said 'you know what, I supported that at the time and I wish I hadn't.' That would be productive.

I wonder if any poster who spent the pandemic hurling abuse at anyone pointing out harms to women and children would be this productive.

Yes it was obvious it would cause harm.

What I don't understand is why you feel you were special in spotting it.

I think because - on MN at least - loads of posters flat-out denied that there would be any harm. And said that, if there was, it was just the fault of the parents for not providing a satisfactory homeschooling/home childcare environment because ‘SCHOOLS AREN’T CHILDCARE.’ It wasn’t just that these people thought there would be harm, but it was justified. It was a complete denial. The mere suggestion that measures could have negative effects was heresy and murder.

As I’ve said upthread, I think it’s possibly because people who were furloughed were overrepresented on Mumsnet, and also a certain kind of SAHP who felt their choice had finally been justified and enjoyed the advantage they felt their children were getting. But overall, the public wanted lockdowns. Which is unsurprising because lots of them were getting paid not to work.

If you read your post, it is full of negative interpretations of other people. It reminds me a lot of the tone of debate in 2020/21.

This projection of bad motivation onto fellow citizens is negative.

I could just as well say those who didn't support school closures hated old people and didn't care if people with disabilities died. Those things were said too.

I think people were generally really stressed during COVID. It was stressful and chaotic. We had no clear leadership and it was obvious there was no plan.

It was a shit time.

They issued guidance about nannies months earlier than guidance about after school clubs. Whole class/gender/selfishness clusterfuck going on there.

I remember MN at the time. There were some threads called the “Anti Dementors” which were set up by people who thought the lockdowns were a pretty bad idea. They were often lighthearted and contained pictures of wonky vegetables that people had grown. Quite often posters would come onto the the threads and try to pick fights with the ADs (who would often ignore them). It was as though any opinion which diverged in any way from “Lockdown as much as possible” was unacceptable.

There was a teacher who put up really long posts about how unsafe schools were and that all schools should be redesigned to include better ventilation / be more safe. Many people were not sure how this would happen but they were shouted down.

The best thing New Zealand and Denmark did was shut their borders.

The government made up excuses why we couldn't. Heathrow was a clusterfuck bringing in the virus. Priti Patel was very quiet about that.

Not the borders thing again.

Think about food and goods getting into the U.K. on lorries

It’s not just flights.

Yes it was a clusterfuck.

https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2020/dec/26/anger-of-10000-lorry-drivers-held-hostage-in-covid-christmas-standoff

And closing borders was still not realistic at all

Simon Stevens says that "certainly by the beginning of March it could be seen that if action was not taken to reduce the growth of COVID then the NHS would be overwhelmed"

Wasn't it at the beginning of March that Boris Johnson said "Take it on the chin" on This Morning?

And the middle of March when Cheltenham went ahead? And some football matches?

And March was most likely when the people who died in April caught covid.

It honestly beggars belief.

And there's this:

Not really, no.

EasternStandard - yeah, that's why I mentioned NZ and Denmark. Sturgeon's presentation during the pandemic was spot on and as much as she tried to differentiate from England, policy was virtually identical. Being a woman doesn't make one a better leader any more than a man does, but it can give a broader/ different perspective and priorities.