Westministenders: The Virus

[RedToothBrush]

Its like living in a Bad Disaster B Movie.

If you thought Brexit on your TV every day was Bad, The Virus is a whole new level.

The 5pm broadcast with Johnson and friends, and the public infomation video with the unblicking Chris Witty (who has such unfortunate mannerism he makes me think he's me a Dr Who alien akin to the Slitheen).

Who knows what will happen. Just that everything has changed and our entire economy is now on life support whilst we figure out how to deal with the crisis and what on earth our exit strategy is.

Johnson has however refused to join a joint EU purchase scheme designed to assist countries through the crisis.

Meanwhile the US is about to go nuts... so what does that do to a trade deal?

More money for the NHS? More hospitals?

Well its possible that might just happen...

And as for the lives lost - yes, lives are being lost eg that family in Sussex. The mental health damage of lockdown is going to cause a surge in suicide and domestic violence and mental health problems in the young.

It wasn't until the 70s (when it was far too late) that society started acknowledging what WW2 did to the civilian population.

Do not underestimate the desire - and ability - of the patriarchy to airbrush this into irrelevance in a few weeks time. I imagine that cunt Lloyd-Webber has already scored "Corona !" with it's rousing balcony scenes so ripped off from evocative of "Evita !".

But the 2003 heatwave that killed tens of thousands did not make people sit up and take notice.

One death is a tragedy ...

Coronavirus: Thousands of foreign NHS workers to have UK visas extended for one year

‘We owe them a great deal of gratitude for all that they do,’ says Priti Patel

www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/coronavirus-nhs-visa-doctor-nurse-paramedics-home-office-migrants-a9438211.html

So maybe if instead of the low tax low regulation economy
the UK had actually invested in its public services
and not started the year with 80,000 vacancies in the NHS
and a catastrophic shortfall in funding for adult social care
the pressure on the system might not be so bad

but Brexit will make it worse
as the rich and financially secure look after themselves
AGAIN

It wasn't until the 70s (when it was far too late) that society started acknowledging what WW2 did to the civilian population.
Why do you say that DGR? Plenty of acknowledgement in the fifties and sixties I would have thought. There was certainly a lot of discussion about the impact on the children "when Daddy came home". We saw that at first hand in my family.
Many of us grew up in homes fractured by WW2. I don't think it was a hidden problem.

Why do you say that DGR? Plenty of acknowledgement in the fifties and sixties I would have thought. There was certainly a lot of discussion about the impact on the children "when Daddy came home". We saw that at first hand in my family. Many of us grew up in homes fractured by WW2. I don't think it was a hidden problem.

I was referring more to the myths we tell ourselves ... we get to watch "The Great Escape", "Dambusters", "The Battle of Britain". They didn't make Mrs Smith is driven to drink and prostitution after her husband is MIA and she lost her children in two separate bomb strikes

Obviously you couldn't hide it (at first). But you could jolly well spin a media narrative that it was really just a fun time with bangs. Which is exactly what happened. To the extent that "Dads Army" remains a staple of BBC output.

"I wonder if a wider result of these times will be a mass re-evaluation of the world where women find themselves going to work to effectively just pay for the childcare they need ... to go to work."

If the last week is anything to go by, I think the evaluation may include looking into boarding options for toddlers

Still reading.
Thanks for sanity.

DGR I don't know if you remember it but The World At War was a hugely powerful series. I agree that it was in the seventies, but it was widely watched and much discussed (in the days when we all watched the same programmes and discussed them).
All Our Yesterdays started in 1969 and again provided a pretty realistic picture I think, but I have not watched it since.
A lot of the more gung-ho films were actually produced in wartime and reflected the need for propaganda. Went the Day Well was a bit different though.

DGR I don't know if you remember it but The World At War was a hugely powerful series. I agree that it was in the seventies,

Kinda proves my point ...

Neither of us is going to convince the other here . I'll just leave my prediction here that when the consensus has come that this is over, the mental toil on the most vulnerable will be quietly covered up by increasing tales of derring-do, heroism, and "we all pulled through".

I am not sure how old you are DGR, but if you were a child growing up in the immediate post war, you would have been very much aware of the deleterious effects.

You could spin the media narrative, but you couldn't make those who lived through it believe that narrative. Some shopkeepers were referred to as little Hitlers. DF talked about being bombed night after night, and always felt that the war had blighted his career, (although I think that was debatable.)

Duff Cooper was the Minister for Information - he had assistants who went round trying to boost morale, and counteract the stories people were telling. They were referred to as Cooper's Duffs.

I think All Our Yesterdays was 1950s? I remember watching it at my Grandma's before we had a television, and seeing pictures of Hitler and the Nuremberg rallies, which means that this must have been on sometime between 1958 and 1961.

No we probably won't agree DGR because I guess we all reflect our own personal experience. I was a post-war baby who grew up with the aftermath of the trauma my parents experienced (father in Burma, mother and sister bombed out of their house).
It wasn't treated lightly in our house or amongst their friends.

All our Yesterdays started in 1960 Peregrina.

I am not sure how old you are DGR, but if you were a child growing up in the immediate post war, you would have been very much aware of the deleterious effects.

Not that old (bristles). Mind you I can recall a time before digital watches. But clearly too old to make a cogent point anymore ...

World War 2 was rather different and a very long time ago.
People were not stopped from earning a living.
Children were not shut in their homes.

What we have now is a disease that is grinding an already broken NHS into the ground
and grinding an already damaged economy into the ground
and grinding the already damaged education of the next generation into the ground

all the while Trump is rolling back legislation to make climate change worse
and Brexit will exacerbate the lot

No we probably won't agree DGR because I guess we all reflect our own personal experience

I wasn't talking about personal experiences. Yours, mine, or Uncle Tom Cobleighs.

I was talking about the media narrative of those experiences ...

Hi Peregrina, yes I meant MPs when I referred to “the party” earlier, not the whole membership. I agree that if they think he’s going to lose, they’ll dump Boris, but I don’t get the sense they think that currently.

Isn't boris's approval rating through the roof at the minute? Of course, I suspect how long that lasts depends on how badly this all ends up, both here and abroad.

How's he getting on anyway? Anyone know?

I was disagreeing with you about the media narrative DGR. Like Peregrina I watched the serious documentary programmes when they first came out.

I was disagreeing with you about the media narrative DGR. Like Peregrina I watched the serious documentary programmes when they first came out.

many years after the war. Not 1946, 1947 or even 1966, 1967 ...

OK, I must be remembering All Our Yesterdays from about 1961. I definitely remember the Nuremberg rallies and Hitler ranting.

I suspect the media narrative has changed over the years... Now, it's all wonderful, blitz spirit, blah, blah. I don't think you could fool people who lived through it.

It was different for us post war babies - although things were still difficult and there was rationing still, there was more hope. The NHS for one, and both DH and I went to newly built schools, thrown up as a result no doubt of the baby boom.

DGR It was 1960 and All Our Yesterdays is the first series I remember watching when I was ten. It doesn't mean the programmes didn't exist before that. That is the point I am trying to make about personal experience.

even 1966, 1967 ..

No definitely watching it in 1960 - 61 up to 1964. After that I was a teenager and more interested in the Beatles and programmes such as Ready Steady Go, your weekend starts here.

Of course, back then, a lot of people didn't have televisions. This took off in a big way when ITV began to be rolled out nationally - so late 50s?

We got our first TV in 1960 - DF said it was so that me and DM could watch Princess Margaret's wedding. Only years later did I find out that it was the year of the European Cup.

Similarly, there was a big boost in colour TVs in when, early seventies (?), BBC2 came along. A different world.

I give up. I've clearly lost any ability I ever had to write clearly. Looks like 38 years on, Miss C. was right.

Anyway, a pithy point properly made by someone else.