Aibu to ask why we should bother?

[Blossomspring]

Lots of threads on here about people not taking CV seriously and I’m just not sure I get it.

How can you expect people to take it seriously when the government does not impose a proper lockdown?

Also lots of people sitting in judgement of those still trying to work, keep businesses open who haven’t been covered by the government’s income protection. How can you sit in judgement of people who might lose everything, who are being forced to choose between their health and their families as well as others and earning a wage to survive? Another sign the gov aren’t taking it seriously or allowing people to take it seriously.

If you want people to self isolate to protect themselves and others then you need to provide them with the income to do that and also force people to stay at home.

Im self employed and have now lost 6 months worth of work. Most people in my sector saying there won’t be work now for months. None of us covered by the measures announced yesterday. My death and even that Of my family’s is of less concern to me than not being able to survive and losing everything. It might be an unpopular view to publicly say but it’s not an unreal view.

You can only die once even if it is miserable and sometimes life is worse than death.

As long as my income isn’t protected and I’m forced to choose I will keep going out to try and find work and move around.

Exactly mumsmas1. It is nothing like flu at the moment. Flu does not kill normal, healthy 60 year olds. This does.

We have a vaccine for flu, we don’t for this.

Kids show symptoms of flu and so do young people, so they stay in and don’t spread the virus, whereas with this they don’t. Add that to the fact that this transmits much more easily than flu and you add up to a lot of death.

I don’t want to scare people but I am beginning it is the only way to get people to stay inside!

I know exactly what being in poverty is like, both as a child and an adult.

Ordinarily, I'd say that there is no way on earth that I am ever going back to having to claim benefits. Been there, hated it.

But money isn't as important as survival. Money is only important in terms of survival - housing, food, heat. And if, when my fixed term contract comes to an end, my employer doesn't renew it thanks to the changes we are likely to see over the next five months, if I can't get another job although I do have NHS experience, so might be in a slightly better position than others, I will stop being so bloody fussy, get over myself and claim money through benefits without histrionics.

To threaten to or commit suicide or knowingly harm the health of family members out of pride or a feeling of being 'too good' to go back on benefits would be ridiculous in my view - and no child will thank a parent who did so, rather than ensure their continued survival through whatever means necessary.

Being poor is not worse than being dead.

Firstly I am not a fan of Boris Johnson or his government but I think they are acting responsibly and reasonably - working night and day with very committed civil servants to work through the impact on all areas of government and society. They have done a lot - from increasing health service capacity, protection and looking for tests and vaccine, schools and education, protecting key workers, financial measures to support businesses, guarantee wages, relaxingHMRC rules, close social businesses and starting on provision for the self employed. However working out how best to support the self employed and casual zero hours workers is not straightforward in terms of how to determine what level of income to guarantee and how to administer it. By definition government has an arms length relationship with these categories - self employed a couple of times a year through HMRC etc. The easiest way is through the benefits system but how to they set the level of support and calculate whats fair?

I am deeply sympathetic to lots of people who this will impact upon - people who are vulnerable healthwise (my 90yr old DF, my friend going through chemo, my BF's daughter with a congenital disease) and those who are financially vulnerable (again lots of my self employed friends, small business owners, and friends in casual employment). We will all take a hit on our emotional, social and mental health - all of us. We are fortunate in this country that we have a safety net - the benefits system - and though that cannot at the moment guarantee everyone their current income it does at least guarantee a basic income. Some countries do not.

This conservative government is a libertarian government - they prefer not to control and tell people what to do but to advise and influence but they are gradually having to work through different levels of measures as either there is lower adherence than required to contain the virus or the measure do not work to prevent its rapid expansion. Lockdown will come soon.

The government does not have the option to choose between economic life and health and nor do we. Many ICUs are already full. The costs of making these provisions - in their billions - will mean a huge national debt and with the recessionary skrinkage of the economy the impact on everyone will be huge for 10 or 20 years mayb e longer. There will be less jobs, businesses will not re-open, and with that there will be a smaller working population to pay taxes to support pay these bills and support the unemployed on an ongoing basis. It will be as big as the 1930w. So its not just a short term pain we are going through and then everything will go back to normal - its going to cost us as a nation long term. The best efforts we can make to contain the disease now the more hope we have of a better economic recovery and jobs.

There is no way we can choose between health and our financial wellbeing - they are linked. We are in it together. And even those who want to defy the government's directives may get ill or have to look after others who are.

If we look at the Kubler Ross 5 stages of grief we can see that when a shock happens - like bereavement - or in this case by a pandemic - it is natural that we go through many stages and emotions, from anger, to sadness, disbelief etc. Its clear OP thats how you are feeling and understandably so. But no one is to blame right now. We are responding to an unprecedented challenge and no government across the world knows the best course of action to take. We wont have a choice but to grin and bear it and try to mitigate and cope as famillies, communities and society as a whole. No all seeing being will be able to wave a magic wand and make this better. Yes it will impact on people differentially but the only way we will survive is to be compassionate and supportive of each other and recognise our collective societal responsibilities. Health and wealth.

There have been job vacancies advertised in our little town and surrounding area for the last week - food production operatives, care workers, drivers etc. I'm sure there are in your area as well.

Would you rather die than take one to bring some income in? Are they somehow below you?

So all of you staying in are never going out because if you do you could bring it home to your family...

Well I have 2 children who are vulnerable to this virus . One esp so and we are on lockdown indefinitely to try and save them getting it. That is my stark reality. And it is not much fun !
Lots of people are suffering in one way or another but if everyone carries on spreading it how many thousands or even millions will die ?

Excellent post, Bouledeniege

Lightasthebreeze yes. Unless I am going to work or getting food I am staying home. I will likely get it so I am protecting others more than myself.

Bravo Bouledeneige

My whole family is staying home also, we will not be visiting family or friends

So you are still going out then. Liwwybettykins The virus doesn’t think to itself, I will avoid that person because they are getting their food shopping

Lightasthebreeze I am a doctor. I have to go to work. I also need food to survive and look after people....

The posters blethering on about moral obligation have no room to talk if they are still shopping for food. Not a degree of moral superiority there

What a profoundly stupid thing to say.

It’s about limiting social interaction. Limiting. It’s impossible to stop it altogether. 65m starving to death to avoid 5m dying of corona (which is probable without immediate, serious action) is not good maths.

Shopping for food is an essential requirement but one that should be carried out sensibly. It’s a million miles away from, “My life is lovely & I’d rather die of a virus (and kill several others I infect) than lose it”.

So no....one trip a week to a supermarket to stock up on essentials for a family, hand washing and maintaining distance to limit exposure, is not immoral. And anyone suggesting otherwise is being childish and ridiculous.

OP I'm a bit confused by your post. As it stands as long as you don't need to self isolate and don't work in the sectors subjected to enforced closures then you can continue to work. The ssp currently being offered is for self employed who are sick/isolating due to current guidelines and is the same for every employee who doesn't receive enhanced sick pay. As pp have mentioned you can take advantage of the things that have already been put in place mortgage holiday/no eviction at the moment and the more stringent the lock down becomes the more help will be announced.
DO NOT WORK IF YOU HAVE A COUGH OR FEVER.
You will only add to the problem and prolong the time you are unable to work fully

Also, there are like no delivery slots for food at the moment... so what are people who didn’t stock pile supposed to do?

I think the point is people shouldn't be making decisions based on money right now

Perhaps the government shouldn't be making decisions based on money, but it's not reasonable to ask people not to worry about having no income and only a small amount of potential support.

YABU - Italy has over 4k dead because they let this run too long before taking extreme measures. Older and younger people are dying. If everyone felt the same way as you you'd lose quite a number of loved ones too early.

thenose The more pertinent question is: if you prioritise what you have in life over the actual life of another, why should anyone bother about what you lose?

I would say that is what most of life in this country is based on. People look out for themselves.

If you want people to self isolate and to care about others then the government needs to announce a universal basic income for all - start treating everyone in this society like they belong and are valued. Pushing those into poverty and punishing them on the grounds that we should be better moral humans and value someone else’s life more will not make people like me do so.

When landlords evict people for losing their job and causing them to sleep rough...who’s prioritising who’s life then? I could go on. You can’t have one ethos when it suits and then flip it when it doesn’t.

For those saying you should save enough or my business might fold etc etc I don’t know your situation in the same way you don’t know mine. The fact is of course some will be in dire straits but they may have family or friends who can help them. It’s all very easy to take the moral high ground.

But if you don’t then why would you not keep trying to work.

And it is insulting to tell self employed people to go onto UC for help when that is not what is being offered to PAYE. That’s not woe is me. Pointing out glaring injustices, stark disparity is not woe is me. Call it for what it is.

If you say so, Forza, 'Limiting interaction' is a very subjective term, isn't it? What has hand-washing got to do with it? Those carrying on working are not washing their hands? Those who are now under house-arrest are feverishly washing them all the time - that is, until the essential trips out to stock up?

This board is chock-full of stupid posts.

Rushing on to pillory somebody who is really struggling isn't up there on my 'list of important things to do today'... but, you carry on venting your spleen on a chatboard. I'm sure you're making all the positive difference in the world.

Nothing wrong with going to work, I will be but for some reason OP shouldn't be going to work and should stay in but others are going to work.

Mine isn't a worthy job though, but my work is still open.

OP "My death and even that Of my family’s is of less concern to me than not being able to survive and losing everything. It might be an unpopular view to publicly say but it’s not an unreal view."

I completely understand OP

Losing my high risk child would be me losing everything. I’d live out of a cardboard box ad have not a penny rather than lose them.

The posters blethering on about moral obligation have no room to talk if they are still shopping for food. Not a degree of moral superiority there

I am pretty much staying in.

If I go shopping I look to see who is in the store first.
If it looks crowded then I don’t go in.

We are avoiding everyone.

Dp who is in threat risk group hasn’t left the house for a week

lowlandLucky, I am self-employed and have some safety net moneywise.

My DP's work has been wiped out for the foreseeable. OK, well, my work will (touch wood) probably carry on as fairly normal, so with that and my buffer we'll hopefully be OK, depending of course on how long it all goes on for. DP's work may or may not recover longer term.

There is also my over-70 father. He had to carry on working past retirement and has already been struggling financially due to having been left with marital debts from my mother when they divorced. She also gets half his pension.

He cannot work now as he has to self-isolate and his work can't be done remotely.

I'm going to have to try to support him on top of myself and my DP. I don't know how that will work but I have to try.

Should I have looked into a crystal ball and seen this coming? Should I have 'made the choice in life' to put away more money just in case my DF had to work at 75 despite also getting chronically ill at 70, and just in case we also found ourselves in a global pandemic one day? Should I not have got that takeaway fucking coffee that time because I should have known this was going to happen?

You are despicable.

cuppaza that’s fair enough. I have no children. My point is we all have something we care most about and when that’s taken from you you have nothing to live for. But that is different for everyone. And it’s one thing asking people to care about someone else when something affects them but I notice more and more when things affect the poorest in this population it’s just ignored and you’re expected to cope and adapt.
I think in a situation like this when you’re forcing people to choose between health and livelihood and offering no guarantee of a basic income (£94 a week is not a basic income) and pushing people into inevitable then this is what will happen.

Yes we are all interlinked and that works lots of ways. The government needs to look after all citizens, employed and well off need to look out and worry for those who aren’t otherwise it just isn’t going to cut it the other way.