What would have happened if everyone stayed at home in WW2

[IsurviveonCoffeeandWinein2021]

So reading lots of different threads tonight arguing for and against lockdown. How it is not safe and the comparisons to WW2 has got me thinking?

What would have happened if at the start of national service everyone just said no? So instead of fighting they stayed home to protect everyone cause then maybe we would not get bombed? So the war was to protect our freedom and our rights. This virus vs lockdown is now very similar. Protect the NHS? Destroy your own life?

As far as I know CEV was not a thing then. National service was compulsory so how would that have worked? I understand some people got to opt out but where thought of very badly unless severely disabled.

Let's face it not one single person who entered that war or stayed behind was safe.

I wonder what happened with medics then as obviously this predates the NHS. People died. It was sad but we fought for our lives. None of that involved staying in our houses watching Netflix!

Medics, technicians all were conscripted. Where would we have been if everyone wanted to stay safe?

Your question makes absolutely no sense. I suggest you look up 'war' and 'pandemic' in the dictionary.

I'm not sure what you're trying to say OP.

Are you saying that because people were forced to defend our freedoms in the war, that we should fight against lockdown and fight for freedoms now?

Or are you saying that people in the war defended our freedoms and our lives - they were doing their duty and we now need to do ours and stay at home to save lives?

The analogy seems muddled.

Either way, if I take my first interpretation, that you're saying we need to fight for freedom, the virus will rip through us even more than it already has, hundreds of thousands more will die (given that we have already lost 100,000 with restrictions in place), the NHS will be overwhelmed and the economy will suffer regardless. What price your freedom Vs other people's freedom to live? If I have misunderstood what you are saying I apologise.

But I prefer my second interpretation. Let's stay home, save lives - it's a small price to pay compared to what those brave people went through in the war.

The comparison to war is ridiculous. But if you must then the people who flout the rules are the same as those who broke the blackout - they are inviting the enemy in. And the people who spread conspiracy theories or urge others to break the rules are basically the fifth columnists - undermining the national effort. If you want to dig for victory, dig in on the sofa and watch Netflix!

Seriously, it’s pretty simple. The more people who think they are being bravely defiant by going out and about, the more cases will end up in hospital and then the fewer beds there will be to treat the sick.

The other way you can do your duty is by making sure you get vaccinated when invited.

And hide thread

So, 4 pages in and we have managed to establish that the war was in no way similar to the current pandemic, therefore we can stop with the daft comparisons going forward.

@IsurviveonCoffeeandWinein2021

I absolutely do understand how it works. Young men where forced to war like we are forced to stay at home?

So young men did what they were told and we won the war.

Do what you're told now and we will beat the pandemic.

Is that your point OP?

In other words, a positive strategic group action will give better results than individual selfish ones

doormat Bob The Germans were told what to do, did so and lost, so best not to do what the government says?

Hmmmm
Well if no one signed up we would all have been bombed to shit and everyone would have died. So that would have been a pretty wank idea.

You can’t compare the 2.

In WW2, if people had been told to stay at home, we’d be German now. Unless Hitler told people to stay at home in which cases, actually, you've stumbled upon the perfect solution.

Conversely, we can’t beat the pandemic by fighting in the trenches. We can’t fire up our spitfires and bomb the shit out of it. If it was possible to sign up to some sort of National service that would actually eradicate this virus, I’m sure many people would sign up to it. I know I would.

I think you'll find, OP, that during the Black Death and the Great Plague people certainly did stay at home and practise social distancing as they knew diseases spread through contact with infected people. There were similar measures during the Spanish Flu pandemic just over a century ago.

I take it you'd have preferred us to try to carry on as normal and find ourselves without essential services as a result, as key workers got infected and were unable to work - National Grid, telecoms, food production and distribution, banking, education and (obviously) health and social care. It would have been chaos.

@IsurviveonCoffeeandWinein2021

I absolutely do understand how it works. Young men where forced to war like we are forced to stay at home?

The thing is, even though millions had been lost in ww1, people still had a sense of national pride, and the majority were willing to fight for their country. People were more about community then, opposed to individualism now. So they were more willing to do stuff, like sending their children away to strangers for years, or other sacrifices like living in the dark, sleeping in bomb shelters etc, than we would be now.

The only valid comparison between WW2 and this is that in both cases governments all over the world made drastic changes to civil liberties and economic policy in the interests of tackling an emergency. The UK government had been planning for the outbreak of war for some years by the time it happened. Unfortunately our present government had decided that pandemic preparations were not a priority and our plans and provisions were not up to date. If they had been, maybe we'd have had a competent track and trace system from the outset, which taken with closed borders and a strict but short lockdown might have put us in a position more like Australia and NZ.

The only valid comparison between WW2 and this is that in both cases governments all over the world made drastic changes to civil liberties and economic policy in the interests of tackling an emergency

Excellent point. And those civil liberties were returned to people after the war.

For example, identity cards. Everyone had to carry one and people who didn't were prosecuted. After the war, the Act governing this was repealed.

Nice to see you BTW Gasp0deTheW0nderD0g. I haven't seen you on a thread for ages.

You’re not even comparing apples and oranges, you’re comparing apples and typewriters. Batshit thread.

Thanks, @pinkearedcow! I am often wittering on about The Archers.

Rationing and conscription also eventually ended.

People in WW2 also didn't like masks and some protested against them.

The war years were miserable with a huge increase in crime and not the jolly time that propaganda tells you it was.

@AfternoonToffee

So, 4 pages in and we have managed to establish that the war was in no way similar to the current pandemic, therefore we can stop with the daft comparisons going forward.

Exactly. So next time someone starts wanging on about "blitz spirit" and "good job people didn't moan during WW2" we can point them towards this thread and those saying what an offensive analogy it is 👍

I don't understand the logic OP. Makes no sense to me.

It did not take long for people to start throwing insults around. It really is not necessary. I think the point of the post was to
Illustrate to all the people who say "you wouldn't have lasted a minute during the war" or "your only being asked to sit on your couch and watch Netflix" have no real understanding of the brutal struggling people are going through right now.

There really is no comparison so people should stop doing it.

@IsurviveonCoffeeandWinein2021

It did not take long for people to start throwing insults around. It really is not necessary. I think the point of the post was to Illustrate to all the people who say "you wouldn't have lasted a minute during the war" or "your only being asked to sit on your couch and watch Netflix" have no real understanding of the brutal struggling people are going through right now.

There really is no comparison so people should stop doing it.

I think you are being very very disingenuous IsurviveonCoffeeandWinein2021. I am still not sure what the point of your OP was, but my feeling was you were saying that we are being somehow cowardly by sticking to lockdown rules and not going about our normal lives.

But I am willing to give you the benefit of the doubt if you expand a bit futher on some of your points and explain your thinking.

What were you trying to illustrate by saying:

As far as I know CEV was not a thing then. National service was compulsory so how would that have worked? I understand some people got to opt out but where thought of very badly unless severely disabled

And what did you mean by:

Medics, technicians all were conscripted. Where would we have been if everyone wanted to stay safe?

The war years were miserable with a huge increase in crime and not the jolly time that propaganda tells you it was.

There was a huge increase in thefts and rapes. It wasn't all blitz sprit of all sticking together.

My Nan does keep saying "we would never have refused to use black out curtains because we thought it was taking our rights away "in our own homes", we knew it raised the risk to our country so we just did it for the good of everyone"

She is horrified at the way some people are behaving but I do have to remind her it wasn't all holding hands and standing side by side.

They are both very different things though a virus transmitted through people and a physical war.

Sorry, what on earth are you talking about? Absolute drivel