I'm I alone in thinking that we're not doomed? And other unpopular thoughts...

[GalesThisMorning]

Here is a list of my unpopular opinions. I'll list them now and then do everyone a favour and stop engaging on these threads!

Lockdown needed to happen. It may need to happen again
We have a lot to learn from countries like Vietnam, but we probably won't.
Teachers are employees with the same rights of safety in the workplace as anyone.
Children, for the most part, will cope.
A few months of disrupted formal education is not a catastrophe for most children.
Humans are resilient creatures
It's ok to enjoy the sun while furloughed.It doesn't mean you want the crisis to continue.
We've survived worse things than recessions
We should follow the rules of lockdown.
We will have a very high death toll at the end of this. Probably among the world's highest. This is not proof that lockdown didn't work and wasn't needed.

Out of interest if children cope without education why did we pay so much for a state education in the first place? I mean far too much of taxes go on something which you think doesn’t actually benefit children? (And if you’re first point re multiple lockdowns is correct then it will be a lot more than a few months they will miss!).

I do find this interesting be lots of teachers do seem to agree that formal education doesn’t really matter and isn’t important for the majority but it so opposite to what I have been told my entire life the mental adjustment to that idea is huge for me!

@Tfoot75 our govt put themselves in a place where only bad decisions were possible. Other governments made different decisions and will have neither the death toll nor the economic ruin that we do.
I'm angry too. But not at my neighbors or my kids teachers or my colleagues. I am angry with our government.

I'm not prepared to throw it all away though and protest against lockdown like they are in America, or demand that vulnerable people and their loved ones suck it up. Thankfully I think most people in Britain feel the same, regardless of what we may post online.

@Qasd what do you mean?

From everyone I speak to, children are being taught at home. Certainly in my LEA teachers are still working hard providing virtual lessons, setting tasks, giving feedback, giving support, guidance, stretching and challenging. Just not in the classroom. Doesn't mean it isn't formal education.

It's good to look at the positives as well as the negatives but no one can say for sure yet what the outcome will be. I think it depends on the extent of the global recession.

@Qasd formal education matters hugely. I don't think our current education system is fit for purpose but that's another thread.

Saying that children will not be damaged by an interruption in their education is not the same thing as saying education doesn't matter. Of course it does. But right now, across the world, it can't happen the way way we'd like. My own children and my students can understand that and are adapting to being taught in different ways for a while. When this ends they'll go back.

It's a blip, not a cessation

My unpopular opinions;

The uk reacted slow and late to the pandemic

Enforcing a quarantine after the peak is pointless (all those wanting to leave and enter the country did so in March-May)

The uk thinks that it has coped well, but will be embarrassed when the full facts surface (in comparison to our Eu counterparts)

The UK is on a downward slope like Ancient Greece. And most politician will have a get out card allowing them to flock to Switzerland and other dubious banking countries.

Politicians aren't too bothered by the high percentage of BAME medical staff affected, because it doesn't directly affect them. They will only pay lip service to the affair when they are in the hands of a very capable BAME medical staff member and they realise that behind every NI number is a person and a family. Same for most of middle England.

My unpopular opinion is...

Tom Moore shouldn't have been promoted and shouldn't be knighted.

His effort was great, but he only raised so much money because people became overwhelmed with rush of emotion for the NHS and a healthy dose of ageism.

He wouldnt have been knighted people had only donated £250, yet his effort would have been the same.

Mine are not teaching and lots of people on here say the same, they are providing ideas on activities do do with your child but not teaching, they provide no guidance on how to do anything or feedback on what is done (nor would they have a clue if we are or are not doing anything). They may be working but my child is not getting a formal education from the school system at present.

Just to say I think he is fine with it😂! It’s not a reliance problem in that he is Perfectly happy to miss out on education since he doesnt go “but what about the long term damage to my future” he is nine he doesn’t think like that! but I am unconvinced that this can go on without damaging his education longer term (the original opinion).In fact the only way that cannot be true is if actually formal education is not as important As I original thought (possible as you say maybe it never really was fit for purpose!) or If the time frame we are talking about is very short (and no one is realistically talking about a short term disruption most education unions are saying that they want a vaccine and that is a while).

As I said I can only square the “it doesn’t matter” by changing some pretty fundamental views on education And it’s role in society - something we previously invested significant money in, we have a whole government department dedicated to it! So I need more that just “it won’t matter” to be convinced (I do want to be convinced I could probably live with most other things if I didn’t worry that the impact on his education is huge)

Apart from my mother, the only people I see who are vehemently anti-lockdown are here. Oh, and the small group of protesters who pitched up in a local park last weekend, but I didn't even need all the fingers on one hand to count them, so I'm guessing they aren't demonstrative of a popular position.

Everyone else I speak to - whether it's family, friends, work colleagues, other students, people on social media - thinks that things are bad but necessary, and without lockdown would have been a lot worse. And yes, we are looking for positives. I suppose we could all wallow in misery and spout on about doom and disaster but what would that achieve? The virus isn't going to think 'oh shit, I'm upsetting people' and piss off.

These all sound like the popular opinions to me. It's what I'm seeing everywhere. Its too early to reopen schools etc.

I, however, disagree and think schools should reopen now for some which for me feels like the unpopular opinion. I dont send my children just to get a formal education, but also because it gives them so much more. The ability to see friends, get other influences rather than just family, routine of getting out of the house and following social rules etc. I also think it is the correct time to start coming out of lockdown slowly.

Maybe we are all seeing things that we don't agree with so thinking our opinions are unpopular.

Many children are not being adequatelly educated. I'm a SAHM with a decade of teaching experience, but I can't change the fact that being at home is just the wrong environment for adequately teaching my DS with his SNs (plus the effect on his sibling). He needs his peers to model for him, he needs his teacher, not his mum masquerding in the wrong role, and he needs a classroom not a kitchen table.
We have many more advantages than thousands of other children. Mine are safe. They have resources. Food on the table and a secure roof over their heads.

I know one young family that has had to move in with parents. Lockdown finished off a fragile relationship and the slack in the health service means that she doesn't have the shifts to reliably pay the rent. I know another on the brink of moving in with grandparents. He's redundant and she's a student. They are praying that a job interview has been sucessful or they will be unable to pay their rent. If she gives up her degree, there's no guarentee of any work that will financially see them through, and she will scupper her prospects long term.

On a population level, the virus will not doom us, but sitting smugly at home calling for continued lockdown can cause economic doom. Life is never risk free. There are multitudes of "minor" illnesses that have rare complications of serious or lasting illness or death. Normally we live around that.

We can't guarentee a timely vaccine. We have to get on and live around it. Ultimately we are all guarenteed to die, but until then we have to live not exist in a shadow life that polarises advantage and disadvantage. I think curtailing the spread of the virus with lockdown was the right call for the situation in March with what we knew at the time, but we are now at the point where we have to cautiously move forwards and keep society functioning or the toll of economic collapse and damage to mental and physical health from other causes will outweigh the damage from the virus.

@qasd how about if we say that it does matter but since the disruption is happening we need to look at ways to mitigate. I think that allowing them to build resilience is doing just that. He sounds to have a very healthy 9 year old point of view!

We are all going to have to adjust to different ways of teaching and learning for awhile. My youngest is probably going to miss out on a huge chunk of the bit where he learns Welsh, which is the language he will continue to be educated in and which we dont speak at home. But he's not alone in that and I'm confident in his school's ability to catch him up.

My eldest had missed out on his opportunity to sit A Levels. But he's still (hopefully) going to university and in the long span of his education this will just be a thing that happened, not the point in which his education collapsed

Just to clarify - I'm not calling for continued lockdown. Where I live we are in lockdown and I understand and agree with the reasons why. I don't want to live like this forever and I dont think we will.

Maybe we are all seeing things that we don't agree with so thinking our opinions are unpopular

Yes there's definitely that too!

My mental health is doomed. I have never struggled with MH issues before. So this is all new.

On a societal level though I’m inclined to agree with the OP

Tell you what though I’m a damn sight less compelled to comply with lockdown after the past couple of days and that awful twat and those awful twats behind him.

But on I shall plod.

I haven't been 'shipped in' from anywhere. I express my concerns about an extended lockdown on here because it's mostly a safe forum for me to do without being attacked by frothers who think we are all going to die.

I'm sorry Welcome. I really hope things get better for you soon. I have struggled with MH issues in the past and a bad bout doesn't necessarily mean its going to stay that way.

Fuck the twats who can't even stick to the rules they set the rest of us. On we shall plod indeed.

@TeaAddict235 yup our glory days are probably well and truly behind us, covered in glory we are not!

I tend to agree I did feel doom I must admit but now I’m feeling much calmer and think we will all just bumble along with this and be sensible and life will continue. I think a lot is driven by fear, people are absolutely terrified and that’s clouding people’s judgement, people are scared, I worked right up until the Friday before lockdown in a school, we had measures in place, I didn’t catch it neither did my child. Infection rate was higher then, I’d be more than happy to go back now as it’s lower and stricter measures in place 🤷🏼‍♀️

Things needs to remain to keep us all safe until such time it no longer is present.

I agree with all of the points in the OP, but I don't think they are actually unpopular views at all. They are moderate, reasonable views which are therefore, almost by definition, the ones which aren't being yelled about all over social media,which is why they feel unpopular than they actually are.

I particularly agree with the one about the gap in formal education not being a catastrophe (and I'm a teacher with dc of school age).

Children, for the most part, will cope.
A few months of disrupted formal education is not a catastrophe for most children.
Humans are resilient creatures

I'm not going to disagree with you in that many children will cope and many will be alright for missing a bit of school.

I still think significant numbers aren't coping and the impact of their education being disrupted will be enormous and will affect them across the whole of their lives.

But if you move in a certain bubble you won't ever come into contact with them while they're children or adults. And they will be carrying the damage done for the rest of their lives with minimal help. Just because they aren't the majority of children, doesn't mean they don't matter.

I look back at my own school days. There was the girl who was being raped by her father and it wasn't picked up on for 8 years. No one noticed but at least her hours at school got her away from him a bit each day. What are children like that enduring at home stuck in without an escape now? There were the children whose parents fought bitterly and got drunk on a regular basis. It wasn't a high enough level for SS or school to pick up on but again school gave them an escape. There were the children who were self-harming or who had eating disorders and who valued the structure school provided. There was a disabled child who was rather ostracised and had few friends but who at least had positive interaction with teachers in the day - those kinds of kids will be sitting at home alone right now, sinking.

So by all means comfort yourself with how resilient people are and how this isn't doing harm to most. It's easier to go through life like that isn't it and we all cope in our own ways. I'm afraid I'm going to continue to be dismayed by the teachers who aren't thinking about those children but who don't want to go back to work despite the fact we have lots of science showing the virus poses them minimal risk.

In respect of schools, I don’t understand what, long term (and by that I mean past September), parents with school age children who work, are supposed to do. Or with younger children? Yes some can wfh, but what about those who can’t? And that’s not even ideal for an employer’s perspective, mine is already losing its initial patience. If those parents have to stop work long term then amongst other things, the impact on taxes will be huge. I understand holding off a bit (1 June was the earliest date) but for those advocating the status quo for much longer? Whilst the comments on formal education are interesting, it’s an important but by no means the only factor.

Bogroll that doesn't sound great. However, I thought that children with SEN could go to school?

Again that is certainly the case where I live (one of my best friends is a TA)

I am starting to wonder if there are geographical issues at play here too? I always knew Brighton was the best place in the UK to live

Headspin I guess parents in that position (who need their DC to be in school for childcare so they can work) will need to find other childcare solutions.Or find a job that fits in with the childcare you do have available (from other parent/GPs/friends) Or find a job that you can do from home. Not easy options but options you don't have if you are dead.

Wishing chair Why are you blaming teachers?

Teachers will go back to work when they are told to by their employers (Local Government in most cases)

If their employer says their school is closed then they will continue to teach from home/online.

The teacher bashing that goes on in MN these days is really despicable. I am not a teacher by the way.....