Meet the Other Phone. Child-safe in minutes.

Meet the Other Phone.
Child-safe in minutes.

Buy now

Please or to access all these features

Covid

Mumsnet doesn't verify the qualifications of users. If you have medical concerns, please consult a healthcare professional.

How the fuck did they get through the war??

254 replies

ssd · 17/12/2020 22:25

If it was 6 years...

This hasn't been a year yet and were all losing the will.....

I think the only benefits people in 1939 had were no 24/7 telly and no social media

But 6 years....OMG

OP posts:
GeorgiaGirl52 · 17/12/2020 23:48

They also had a stronger belief in God and in their government.
A firm belief that "God is on our side" and "God Save The King".
Or, in our case "God Save President Roosevelt."

MissLucyEyelesbarrow · 17/12/2020 23:50

@oakleaffy

Re British deaths WW2 450,700 Deaths. {Military and Civilian}

Covid is paltry compared to that.

Face-palm.

That WW2 figure is for 5.5 years. The average annual death rate was therefore about 82,000. Covid will likely be similar, by the time we get to 12 months from the first death.

I'm neutral on whether Covid and WW2 are comparable, but at least get the basic arithmetic right.

GervaseFen · 17/12/2020 23:52

The sense of nostalgia for war is amazing. I blame 1940s themed bloody tea shops. Domestic crime went up massively during WWII.

Namenic · 17/12/2020 23:54

miss Lucy should we also do it as a proportion of the population rather than absolute deaths?

Defenbaker · 17/12/2020 23:55

@tunnocksreturns2019 You've been through some tough times, that's for sure. It's totally understandable that you might feel a lack of empathy for people who are whinging about stuff that seems pretty minor, by comparison. I hope things improve for you.

I think that the blitz spirit was perhaps exaggerated/romanticised by wartime propaganda and Hollywood films made afterwards, but people were probably more stoical back then, as their lives were undoubtedly much tougher in many ways than they are today. Back in 1939 most working class people lived in very basic housing, with no central heating. They didn't have freezers, automatic washing machines or microwaves, few had telephones and nobody had TVs or computers. Birth control was practically non-existent which meant that large families were common, so many houses were severely overcrowded. Most terraced houses didn't have proper bathrooms - just an outside toilet and a tin bath which had to be filled using kettles. The NHS didn't exist, many women died in childbirth, and there was little in the way of social welfare to support the poor. It was socially acceptable for naughty children to be hit by their parents, teachers, or even by the police, who would routinely clip unruly kids around the ear, just for being cheeky. All in all, life was tough in the 30s, so the people brought up back then were forged in steel.

All that said, 2020 has been a miserable and sad year for many people, and it's understandable that people feel stressed, after trying to avoid an invisible enemy for months on end. Hopefully this war will be over fairly soon, rather than drag on for 6 years.

Pinkandwrinkly · 17/12/2020 23:57

My uncle died in WWII. It destroyed my Grandma who never got over his loss and it fractured the whole family.
I agree that it's easy to assume that previous generations coped better... but I actually think their mental suffering wasn't made public due to the shame of not being seen to keep a 'stiff upper lip' and carrying on regardless.

notimagain · 17/12/2020 23:57

This hasn't been a year yet and were all losing the will.....

In the context of making comparisons with WW2 it's perhaps worth bearing in mind that as far as the British population were concerned fark all happened for the first 6-9 months of the war ..hence the expression the "phoney war"..

www.historylearningsite.co.uk/world-war-two/world-war-two-in-western-europe/the-phoney-war/#:~:text='Phoney%20War'%20is%20the%20name,September%201939%2C%20seemingly%20nothing%20happened.

Post fall of France the UK then got clobbered for several months late 1940 and into 1941 (Battle of Britain, then the Blitz) but then Hitlers attention then moved Eastwards .. whilst things in the UK weren't great (rationing, etc) in the following years it's perhaps worth bearing in mind the civilian population weren't subjected to air raids every night for 6 years.

middleager · 17/12/2020 23:59

@Flaxmeadow

people could still socialise with each other

With the risk of having bombs dropped on their heads

This happened to my great aunt in her home, not a dance hall.
WeAllHaveWings · 17/12/2020 23:59

I'm sure in years to come we will look back on all this with rose tinted glasses too.

Armi · 18/12/2020 00:00

@tunnocksreturns2019

I remember you from previous, very sad times. Thinking of you (which is no fucking use, but there you go.)

Star
notimagain · 18/12/2020 00:00

Link fail re Phoney war..let me offer this one:

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phoney_War

eeeyulesmiles · 18/12/2020 00:04

@chomalungma

This is nothing in comparison. Ridiculous comparison

I don't think the OP is comparing.

I think she's saying that if people are finding this hard, then how the hell did people get through an event such as the war which is obviously much much harder.

That's how I read it too.

I think this has changed my view of the war. I wouldn't say I had a really rose-tinted view of it before, but I've got a new appreciation of how frightening the uncertainty about the outcome must have been, and also the separation from people, even if you weren't in an area being bombed. Also having to trust the government while not being sure they're necessarily doing the right thing - it's easy for us to think people must have had confidence in the wartime government, because we know the final outcome, but they didn't. It's true people were together more, but actually some were still stuck apart - family in different countries; soldiers fighting in Europe or the far east; prisoners of war. Even family in this country couldn't be casually telephoned. You may have been able to be close to people, but were they the important people? Some must have been very isolated, just like now.

I know some people are irritated every time the war gets mentioned at the moment, but it's normal for people to do that. The fact is that that's how far back we have to go back, to find something as disruptive and frightening (and deadly) as what's going on now. That doesn't mean the war isn't worse than the pandemic - it is, but it's also closer to it than anything else that we can look back to in living memory. There may be loads of differences but there are still similarities. It's normal for people to look for those, or even find strength from some of them, or insight.

myhobbyisouting · 18/12/2020 00:06

Why do you keep starting these threads then disappearing? I'm losing the will with them more than covid tbh

Fieldofyellowflowers · 18/12/2020 00:08

Because there was more community spirit and less selfishness back then.

Because a war is something that you can see and physically fight.

Because there had been wars before, it wasn't a new thing.

Fieldofyellowflowers · 18/12/2020 00:10

Oh, and they had Winston Churchill. We've got Bojo.

AfterSchoolWorry · 18/12/2020 00:11

No internet. So they were forced to engage with RL.

Also, they had much more patience and humility, because no internet.

LonnyVonnyWilsonFrickett · 18/12/2020 00:12

I was around 30 when I realised that my grandparents (both long dead by that point) had been alive during the war. It wasn't talked about, ever. Our 'picture' of the war is based entirely on winners' propaganda, to be honest.

That and people were really fucking busy. Food shortages meant women queuing up for hours in separate shops, not stressing about not having a Tesco delivery slot, running a house was hard graft, most people that weren't in the forces had jobs or were doing some sort of voluntary work...

Time40 · 18/12/2020 00:13

I'm reading a great book just now written in 1947 called the Slaves of Solitude by Patrick Hamilton

One of my favourite novels! It's absolutely brilliant - so waspish and funny; and yes, a really excellent way to find out what life was really like in London during the War.

RhubarbTea · 18/12/2020 00:14

Because they were able to touch each other and have sex and kiss and hug and talk for hours in kitchens over a cuppa putting the world to rights.

MissLucyEyelesbarrow · 18/12/2020 00:23

We could. Or we could discount military deaths and just count civilian as more analogous . Or we could average the ww2 death rate over 6 years (sep 1939- Aug 1945), rather than knocking 6 months off for the phoney war, as I did when averaging.

I'm not arguing that Covid and WW2 are easily comparable. But, as someone who has been seeing patients die and be seriously harmed since March, it's pretty upsetting to see Covid deaths being blithely dismissed as no big deal.

notimagain · 18/12/2020 00:23

I was around 30 when I realised that my grandparents (both long dead by that point) had been alive during the war. It wasn't talked about, ever. Our 'picture' of the war is based entirely on winners' propaganda, to be honest.

God you have made me feel old Shock.

...both my parents were alive in the war, both were in uniform - mother in the ATS, father in the infantry... fortunately for him (trigger warning) the two bombs finished it all off before he got shipped out to the Far East...I also had an Uncle strafed whilst walking down a London Street and another one who fought at Monte Cassino...so certainly my picture of the war is not based on writers propaganda..

MissLucyEyelesbarrow · 18/12/2020 00:24

...replying to @Namenic

RedToothBrush · 18/12/2020 00:26

I think I've read that during war periods the suicide rate tends to go down. They think this is because people feel they at least have a purpose / role in society. (This then increases after the war finishes).

By contrast the pandemic is the exact opposite as it askes a lot of people to do nothing. And to not be part of society. We don't really know what this does to people.

Nanalisa60 · 18/12/2020 00:28

Pubs never shut in the war!! Not a lot of food !! Expect fish and chips!! Which you did not need a coupon for!!

TibetanTerrier · 18/12/2020 00:31

@TracyBeakerSoYeah
Remember the children in the Romanian orphanages after Ceaușescu was toppled. How due to lack of touch & interaction the children just rocked in their cots with blank looks on their faces.

The children were like that due to institutionalised violence, neglect and abuse. They were kept naked, with shaven heads, and tied to their beds to keep them under control. Many of them were mentally and physically disabled. Sexual and physical abuse by the staff was standard, the older children would beat the younger, and starvation was rife. Medical treatment was scarce, so children would watch each other die every day from infection, anaemia, starvation etc. The trauma they suffered was indescribable, and it was far more than lack of touch and interaction that caused those children to behave like that.

Swipe left for the next trending thread