How long until we forget?

[Twizbe]

I've been having this debate with my MiL. She is convinced that social distancing, mask wearing, hand washing etc will continue forever. She says that people will never return to before and that it will stay in the forefront of people's minds forever.

I think people have short memories and once we get a vaccine things will quickly return to how they were before.

My son is almost 4 and knows about the virus, but I predict that by the time he has children it will be a distant memory for his generation. He might still be paying for it but a lot of the restrictions will be forgotten.

What do you all think?

@heyahun - can't wait to chuck mine away, I wear them but absolutely hate them. You may not be bothered by them but you aren't everyone.

you only have them on in the shop or in cafe's briefly

And you are of course aware that many people have to wear them all day at work? And on their commutes on public transport?
No? Well they do. Not everyone is furloughed or working from their home office.

I think on the surface everything will return to normal but these things always have a significant psychological effect that takes a long time to shake out. The post-war baby boom was a weird situation brought about by the fact that so many men had died and people craved security and predictability. A very significant proportion of the generation who were young adults during the war carried on their lives and seemed very normal but had effects that would now be linked to PTSD. It shaped the types of parents they were and how their lives played out. Equally I think the pandemic will have an influence on how lives go, especially those of younger people. It will of course have a practical impact in terms of the economy, unemployment education etc but I wonder also if it'll cause a further drop in the birth rate?

You’re spot on, things won’t ever get back to normal.

"Ever" is a very long time.

Yes, there will be long-lasting economic effects from this, but things will get back to normal, although of course 'normal' is changing all the time.

This is interesting to me as I am very fortunate to live where we haven’t had any COVID restrictions, social distancing or masks for months.

There were a few weeks of lockdown and a few weeks of social distancing but since June everything is completely back to normal (apart from border restrictions)

So all your posts are interesting to me because prior to this I would normally travel to England 40 plus times a year by plane. I last visited in February and masks were starting to appear but I don’t own one and apart from one trip to an optician in the spring have never worn one.

I and others like me will find it very strange when travel opens up a bit more if you guys are all still living in a way that is a complete unknown to us, and likely to travellers from further afield as well.

Likewise anyone from the UK travelling here at the moment would find no social distancing, no masks, no hand sanitizer and big public gatherings very strange. Especially kids who have grown up through this nightmare

Some people will definitely become long-term germophobes where they weren't before. But most people won't, I don't think.

There's already a huge variation in people's sensitivity to the risk of infectious diseases (and food poisoning and so forth) and most people think that they are normal, people who don't go as far are disgusting, and people who go further are crazy. I think people will generally revert back to their default levels. A minority will permanently veer slightly further towards the crazy extreme on the disgusting-crazy scale, but will probably still be in the 'normal' range.

Stuff that is very unnatural behaviour for humans, such as covering our faces and staying two metres apart, is not sustainable on a population level because for most people it takes a real mental effort to fight against your nature like that. We are a social species and we will remain so.

I’d like to think mask wearing when you have a cold/flu will be the norm along with it being less acceptable to go to work infecting others. Likewise strangers keeping a distance and no greetings with hugs/hand shakes etc.

I hope it’s a memory that’s forgotten by most children but lots will remember it, either as they are old enough or because they suffered loss from it.

I think people will start to behave as they did pre-COVID pretty quickly tbh. I only wear a mask because I have to in order to go about my business - I will ditch it as soon as I am able. I can see already that social distancing won't last in any meaningful way - whenever I have seen friends and family we have tried to stay 2m apart initially and then gradually the distance between us has got smaller - this happens every time, without exception.

My dd was extremely vulnerable to swine flu - a common cold had put her on a ventilator - and I was a hand washing maniac during that period. I made dh take his clothes off on the front doorstep if he had been into the office. I was absolutely riddled with anxiety about other people's germs. All this behaviour stopped as soon as the risk of catching swine flu lessened (both because it was less prevalent and dd had surgery to correct her heart condition), although I will never forget the time she was ill, if that makes sense.

It'll be a thing of the past. I think by next Christmas it would be like a normal Christmas.

Well hope so anyway.

Bloody masks. And people being pious about masks. And plastic shit everywhere and blue masks on pavements. Alcohol gel is making us sicker overall. There is a reason Africa has seen comparatively fewer deaths and I’m sure one factor is they have a healthier microbiome.

Can’t bloody wait to move on from that crap.

Bloody masks. And people being pious about masks

One of the very many phrases which I soon hope to never hear again is 'mask compliance'.

Behaviour soon becomes ingrained I think people will be acting strange with eachother for a long time yet

@U8myufo

Behaviour soon becomes ingrained I think people will be acting strange with eachother for a long time yet

I disagree. Back in March, people would jump out of each other's way as though you were a leper, but 8 months on, a lot of that has already gone. A year ago, none of us had even heard of the phrase 'social distancing'. A year from now, hopefully we never will again!

@U8myufo

Behaviour soon becomes ingrained I think people will be acting strange with eachother for a long time yet

I’m not acting strange with people at the moment

@IcedPurple yes perhaps you're right actually. When I think back to people taking massive semi circles around others they met back in March things don't seem quite like that now

I think we're looking at a two tier society.

First, there a people (I'd suggest the majority) who are content to return to more or less the normal we had before - the pub, restaurants, socialising, travel.

Second, there are people who will continue not to do any of those things.

2 to 3 years

I hate masks and will be so glad when we don't have to wear them. At the moment I put mine on as I'm walking through the shop door and take it off as I'm coming out again when it goes in my pocket until I go again.

I'm washing my hands more as I never used to wash them after picking up the post etc and that will probably stay but there's no way I'll be using hand sanitiser all the time.

Regarding working from home, I'm hoping my office will reopen sooner rather than later as I'm getting to the stage I can't cope any more. I doubt it will for a long while yet unfortunately.

I'm another one who hates wearing masks, and can't work from home and do need to wear one through my work day everyone i step away from my desk. Hate hate hate them. Hate the spots they give me and the way I cant hear people speaking in them. I dont know anyone who likes masks in real life, everyone treats them as a thing they must do. Suspect as soon as its back to being optional, most won't bother anymore.

I still find myself automatically putting out my hand to shake hands with people at work, or going in for a kiss hello when i see a friend. When that's OK to do again, I think it'll come back quickly to normal.

Anyway, I think hand washing more will stick. I used to wash my hands after the loo, before and after preparing food, and if anything got on my hands, now at work I regularly just go wash my hands, as well as washing them as soon as I walk in the door.

WFH, full or part time will be more long term lasting, many jobs can be done as easily from home, employers haven't seen a drop in productivity, but have seen their costs fall. The down side of that is I know 2 childminders who are struggling as families have cancelled wrap around care. If you can start earlier and then take a break at school run time, why would you pay for care?

More respecting personal space, I'd have hoped, rather than specific rules.

I don't think this will happen.

I queued for the supermarket yesterday and people were queuing completely normally. Even until the end of queuing over the summer everyone was leaving nice big gaps, whereas it was barely a foot from one person to the next yesterday. I think it was only fear keeping everyone apart before, but I was surprised at quite how incautious everyone is being this time around - I thought it would have become somewhat automatic and people would unthinkingly resume their summer behaviour.