Masks to be Mandatory in Scotland until at least next Spring

[Ginandfantalemon]

Just read this and wondered what others in Scotland are thinking.
The article states that Scotland will stick to the strictest rules in the UK and it is hoped that voluntary mask wearing, as in Asian Countries, will be a measure that is adopted. I truly don't know if I can go on anymore. I haven't been out for over a year because of these bloody rules and this is just enough now.

@Mangomammy

OP I’m so sorry you’re living like this. It’s awful.

Try taking small steps, like going into a cafe to get a take away coffee without a mask on, without a lanyard on - no one should need to advertise any sort of disability. Maybe take a friend with you for some moral support? Hopefully no one will be a c*nt about it. I haven’t heard of/ experienced any negativity for not having a mask on, but I guess there will always be obnoxious dicks about.

Thanks. I get into a panic even thinking what I would say or do if I was challenged at a shop door, for instance, for not having a mask on.

OP - go out for a walk tomorrow and wear a mask for 5 minutes. Do it for 10 minutes the next day. You will be fine. At the surgery where I work we have had loads of people saying they can't wear a mask due to anxiety and they all manage it for as long as they are in the building

No. She's exempt. End of. She doesn't need patronising "tips".

But the tips aren’t patronising! OP is saying she won’t wear a lanyard. People are trying to help.

Oh I knew she wld have to be different. She was hoping Boris wld make an arse of it.

I don't mind so much in the winter by oh my gosh it's torture in the summer. Feels like you can get a breath.

Took kids to soft play other day (youngest is too little to go on certain bits alone) I had to keep pulling my mask out for a breath.

I was getting petrol the other day and a guy in shop coming out had no mask on and guy infront had no mask on. I heard the girl working there chatting after they left. They were saying oh have u not noticed so many people aren't wearing a mask compared to just a few weeks ago. Be interesting to see what happens.

And in my experience - people ARE challenging others without a mask, or with a lanyard.

I volunteer in a charity shop, usually through the back, on my own, therefore no mask required. Last week I was on the till to let a colleague have a break, safely behind my perspex box.

A customer wasn't wearing a mask, hadn't even registered with me, but it had with another customer. "That man's not wearing a mask!" she said. I said "He's probably exempt". Then the other customer asked me to go and challenge him about it, which I refused to do. SO she stormed out in a humph and is probably posting all over local facebook groups about selfish granny killing superspreaders in the charity shops.

I am confused....as often happens.....how can "voluntary mask wearing" be mandatory or adopted? Its voluntary? Doesn't voluntary mean that you do it if you choose to and not if you don't?

@pianolessons1

OP - go out for a walk tomorrow and wear a mask for 5 minutes. Do it for 10 minutes the next day. You will be fine. At the surgery where I work we have had loads of people saying they can't wear a mask due to anxiety and they all manage it for as long as they are in the building.

Ffg please, most of.us that can't wear masks have already tried this. It's been over a year. Putting pressure on someone to just try harder is just going to make their anxiety worse.

Believe me, I would try to wear.one if pressured, in fact I have tried (and tried and tried) until it got to the point where I start stimming in a self-injurious way even thinking about wearing one.
If I was forced to try and wear one by your surgery, would you be able to deal with the subsequent meltdown or the scratching myself (to the point of bleeding), the hitting myself on the head and rocking so hard I bang my head on the wall (which are the stims I do just before meltdown). If you're lucky you might just recognise the flappy stage before get that far and be able to tell me not to bother even trying, but of course by then it might be too late.

I wish I lived in Scotland. I’m sick and tired of maskless English numpties getting too close and breathing their covidy germs all over me

oh PS has it changed to masks or has Scotland always been different? In england, its facecoverings....I have got several zillion light washable scarves and I use those instead of a mask when i need to. Its better for the envrironment than both disposables AND buying new washable masks.

@Shellfishblastard

But the tips aren’t patronising! OP is saying she won’t wear a lanyard. People are trying to help.

The reason that she won't wear a lanyard is because of the attitudes demonstrated by the patronising poster.

Which are that she could wear a mask if she really wanted to, she just needs to practise and get used to it. And by extension, anyone who is exercising their right to not wear a mask is a selfish granny killer who only cares about themselves.

Lots of people have been spouting this bollocks for a year.

Queen Nicola told us that vaccinations were our way out. But that was clearly yet another lie. She is quite happy for students to crowd into nightclubs, drink, dance, snog the face off each other, but our kids to continue wearing masks in school and around the supermarket?

Without vaccines we'd likely already be slap bang in the middle of yet another lockdown. Vaccines are doing exactly what it was hoped they would do, suggested to the public they might do, and expected by scientists that they would do, hence why, despite having reasonably high levels of infection and cases, we are seeing far fewer hospitalisations and deaths than we were pre vaccine

What exactly were you expecting them to do? Destroy all covid, cure cancer, bring back the dead, and pop round and cook your dinner for you?

'Queen' Nicola

She's a democratically elected head of government put there by her peers. Grow up.

@godmum56

I am confused....as often happens.....how can "voluntary mask wearing" be mandatory or adopted? Its voluntary? Doesn't voluntary mean that you do it if you choose to and not if you don't?

This thread is about Scotland.

Mask wearing is not voluntary in Scotland. It is LEGAL requirement. In shops, public transport, secondary schools, while walking to your table in a restaurant, in museums, galleries, soft plays.... any "public place".

Lots of people are choosing not to wear a face covering, but that's against the law.

Actually, @XDownwiththissortofthingX, I was expecting vaccines to do exactly what they have done. Save thousands of lives, stop people getting sick enough to be admitted, and relieve the pressure on the NHS.

That has been achieved. Cases are decreasing, but even when higher in the start of the summer, numbers dying are very low.

Vaccines have done their job. All Ms Sturgeon's posturing about get the jab to get your life back wasn't true though, because even though a high % of people are vaccinated, she's keeping in loads of restrictions.

As for my thoughts on the people who actually vote for the old witch... well, better left unsaid I think.

Thanks. I get into a panic even thinking what I would say or do if I was challenged at a shop door, for instance, for not having a mask on.

That is not something that is happening

OP, I am in Scotland; the only shop I have seen challenge shoppers who are unmasked is Sainsbury’s. I have seen individual staff be snippy with mask-less customers in some smaller shops, but those staff are pretty snippy in normal times .
Pick a quiet time, IF anyone asks, say you are exempt. There is no legal requirement to wear a lanyard.
Hope you feel better .

@liveforsummer

Not sure where you are, but in my little corner of England it most certainly has been. And we are a little rural set of villages.
Right up until the week before masks became optional we had covid marshalls employed by the local council in our garage rudely confronting people who weren't wearing masks.

@godmum56

I am confused....as often happens.....how can "voluntary mask wearing" be mandatory or adopted? Its voluntary? Doesn't voluntary mean that you do it if you choose to and not if you don't?

It's not 'voluntary mask wearing'

Vaccines have done their job. All Ms Sturgeon's posturing about get the jab to get your life back wasn't true though, because even though a high % of people are vaccinated, she's keeping in loads of restrictions

'loads of restrictions', that basically amount to nothing more than mask wearing in few specific circumstances. Aye, those moaning gits in the Soviet Gulag had it easy compared to us poor, repressed Scots eh?

What exactly is it you hate about the residents of Glasgow Southside, that turns you into a seething, incoherent mess with no sense of perspective? Please enlighten us?

@Quickchangeartiste

OP, I am in Scotland; the only shop I have seen challenge shoppers who are unmasked is Sainsbury’s. I have seen individual staff be snippy with mask-less customers in some smaller shops, but those staff are pretty snippy in normal times . Pick a quiet time, IF anyone asks, say you are exempt. There is no legal requirement to wear a lanyard. Hope you feel better .

Thanks, yes it's Sainsbury's that we get our weekly shop from so perhaps they all have someone on the door. Maybe if I danced and drank my way round the shop I wouldn't have to wear a mask.

@TheGenealogist

Actually, *@XDownwiththissortofthingX*, I was expecting vaccines to do exactly what they have done. Save thousands of lives, stop people getting sick enough to be admitted, and relieve the pressure on the NHS.

That has been achieved. Cases are decreasing, but even when higher in the start of the summer, numbers dying are very low.

Vaccines have done their job. All Ms Sturgeon's posturing about get the jab to get your life back wasn't true though, because even though a high % of people are vaccinated, she's keeping in loads of restrictions.

As for my thoughts on the people who actually vote for the old witch... well, better left unsaid I think.

I currently vote SNP. Interesting that you can judge me on that basis without any iota of knowledge about why I make that decision. Sounds like a very thoughtful nuanced opinion. And life has far fewer restrictions than before but we are still in the middle of a pandemic so it is entirely reasonable that some remain in place. Vaccines have allowed us to get a life back. But case numbers are still high and could still increase in Autumn and when the schools go back. People are still getting long COVID, and young people and children are either not vaccinated at all or only partly vaccinated. So maybe we owe it to them - as they have already sacrificed so much- to continue to put up with limited restrictions for a while longer. I would be far more convinced of arguments made on the basis of evidence than on the basis of political beliefs. Especially if those political beliefs include no space for alternative opinions

You know how some people get these murderous, ragey feelings about Boris Johnson and the "toaries", @XDownwiththissortofthingX? Well I feel the same about your Dear Leader. She is one of the few people I genuinely loathe and detest.

And it's not just masks, is it? Limited numbers in university lectures. Book a slot to go swimming, social distancing in schools, social distancing in healthcare, work from home, check in and out of cafes, masks at funerals.

Yet Rangers and Celtic can have capacity crowds and you can have as many people in your house as you want for a wild party?

She has lost the plot totally.

@Shellfishblastard

But the tips aren’t patronising! OP is saying she won’t wear a lanyard. People are trying to help.

OP shouldn’t need to wear a lanyard tho.

@RunnerDown
" I would be far more convinced of arguments made on the basis of evidence than on the basis of political beliefs. Especially if those political beliefs include no space for alternative opinions"

Then where is the evidence that was used to prove that it is safe to stand 6 deep at a crowded bar drinking as much as you can, whilst not wearing a mask or dancing in a crowded nightclub, whilst probably as it stands at the moment, not fully vaccinated and not wearing a mask, yet one single person cannot enter a supermarket, say at 8pm in the evening when it is at its quietest but legally needs to wear a mask. I can't understand the scientific facts of that.

Totally agree, @Ginandfantalemon. When I was at the supermarket this morning it was almost empty. Whole aisles to myself, no queues at the tills.

But the law says you have to wear your mask.

On the other hand I could go to a club tonight and be in very close proximity to 1999 other people, no masks.

No sense to it at all.

@Username916

I think I live in a different Scotland to the one portrayed on mumsnet! Dictatorship my goodness quite sensible to continue wearing masks. I'm not sure what other restrictions there are on my life at the moment other than that. Don't know anyone who disagrees and I haven't seen anyone maskless in a shop or hairdressers! Very thankful to have Nicola and not Boris throughout this whole thing.

Well you must be living in the middle of nowhere! I don't live in Scotland but have visited a few times and have seen loads without masks on, especially on my last trip!

I am concerned through at the inability of many in Scotland to properly critique the performance of govt in Scotland. If you think 'well at least she is better than Boris' is good enough- well that doesn't bode well if Scotland goes independent.